Charles Emmerson quotes:

Constantinople had been changing for sometime before the Young Turks got hold of it. It would continue to change long after they had gone.

It (urban peacekeeping) was quite a task, requiring a permanent balancing act between communities, each with their own interests, festivals, traditions and historical rivalries imported from the wide-open spaces of the countryside into close quarters.

Newspapers provided a common culture of aspiration.

The city (of Vienna) had an unerring tradition of celebrating some of it's greatest composers after it had around them to die in poverty.