Roughly speaking, the waterway between the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea resembles a narrow glass tube with a bulb blown in the middle of it. The Dardanelles forms the first part of the tube, the bulb is the Sea of Marmora, and the remaining part of the tube consists of the Bosporus, or Ox Ford. The Dardanelles, or the Hellespont as it was called in ancient times, extends for 45 miles; the Sea of Marmora is 175 miles in length, and the Bosporus continues the waterway for another 17 miles. On a clear day it is said that from a hill on the shores of the Dardanelles one may look right across the Sea of Marmora and behold Constantinople, nearly two hundred miles away.
Now let us suppose that we are making a voyage from the Ægean Sea to the Sea of Marmora in times of peace. When we enter the strait we find that it resembles a wide river rather than an arm of the sea; and this is not surprising, for the channel is nothing but the bed of a river that was submerged in far-off days. The channel is only about two and a half miles wide, and we can clearly see the shores on either side of us. On our right is Asia; on our left is Europe. Along the line of this waterway East and West have met since the days when the world was young.
Almost every mile of the Asiatic shore of the Dardanelles recalls memories of the song and story of ancient days. We have scarcely entered the strait before we see on the Asiatic side the Kum Kale fort, and behind it the classic ground on which stood the famous city of Troy. I am sure you remember how Paris carried off the lovely Queen Helen to Troy, and how Homer's heroes fought for ten long years before the city was captured, and she was recovered and carried back by her husband to her home in Greece. Modern historians, however, tell us that the Trojan War was fought not for the fair face of Helen, but because the king of Troy almost closed the waterway by levying crushing duties on the goods that passed his shores. It is strange to note that Britons and French have shed their blood at the Dardanelles in order that wheat from the fruitful lands bordering the Black Sea might pass freely to the Mediterranean, and so to the crowded cities of Western Europe.