Pray, cast your eyes upon the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles, those splendid maritime gateways where Europe and Asia exchange polite nods. It appears the gentlemen in Ankara have developed a sudden and most passionate affection for the gold of foreign merchants. With a flourish of the pen, the Turkish authorities have increased the transit tolls by a further fifteen per centum!

One can almost imagine the scene: a stout commercialist, dreaming of his profits, arrives at the strait only to be informed that his passage now costs a staggering six dollars and seventy cents per ton. 'Great heavens!' he might cry, clutching his ledgers to his chest, 'Is there no end to this rapacity?'

Indeed, the sheer audacity of the matter is quite comical. For forty long years—from 1883 to 1922, if one allows for the drift of time—the fee remained as stagnant as a pond in July, perched at a modest eighty cents. But then, a sudden fever for profit seized the administration! In a fit of inspired greed, they hoisted the price fivefold to four dollars and eight cents, followed by a series of nimble leaps in 2023 and 2025.

Mr. Abdulkadir Uraloğlu, the Minister of Transport—a gentleman who surely views the sea as one great ledger of debts—boasted that such manoeuvres have swelled the coffers of Ankara by some thirty-one million dollars, bringing the annual haul to a princely two hundred and fifty-four million.

Forty thousand vessels pass through these waters annually, each captain likely wondering if the next voyage will require him to surrender his boots and waistcoat just to reach the Mediterranean. While the Convention of Montreux permits the restriction of warships during times of calamity, it seems the only 'calamity' currently recognised is the possibility of a merchant leaving the strait with too many shillings remaining in his pocket. Such is the way of the world, where every strait is but a golden opportunity for a clever rogue in a government office!