Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1895-10-11

oulidSi ny VI "oiICh anu Shhu'S Gil,
and the torturing of prisoners.
The narrative makes one of the
blacklist chapters of human history.
Thousands of Armenians are fee
ing across the border into Russia;
but they are almost sure to be
robbed of everything on the way
by the Koordish brigands who in
fest the mountains. DR.. Dillon
says:
at is no easy thing for an
Armenian man to cross the frontier
and enter Russia, if he possess a
gold or silver coin or an article Of
clothing; nor for a woman to leave
the country without first under.
going indignities the mere mention
of which should make a mans blood
boil with shame and indignation.
"Oh, but these things are not felt
so acutely by Armenians as they
would be by Europeans" said an
English lady to me few days ago:
"The wind is tempered to the
shorn lamb, don't you know" 1t
may be so; but l have seen and
conversed with hundreds of Ar
menian women lately, and l found
no signs of the tempering process.
Whatever vices or virtues may be
predicated of Armenian women,
chastity must be numbered among
their essential characteristics.
They carry it to an incredible
extreme. In many places an Ar
menian women never even speaks
to any man but her husband, un-
less the latter is present. Even to
her nearest and dearest male re.
latives and connections she has
nothing to say; and her purity, in
slums of Erzeroum as in the valleys
of Sassoun, is above suspicion. Yet
these are the people who are being
continually outraged by brutal
Koords and Turks, oftenti,nes until
death releases them. have re-
ceived two touching appeals from
the women of Armenia, sealed with
their seals and addressed to their
sisters of England. What they
ask is indeed little; that they may
be protected from dishonor.
English people have not even a
remote notion of the extent to
which young married women and
girls are outraged sll over Armenia
by Turkish soldiers, Imperial Zap
tiehs, Koordish officers and brig.
ands; and outraged with such &C.
compartments of nameless brutality
that their agonies often eliminate
in a horrible death. Girls of eleven
and twelve-nay, of nine are torn
from their families and outraged in
this way by band of "meD"
whose names are known, and whose
deeds are approved by the repre-.
sentatives of law and order. Rape
violation, outrages that have nc
name, and whose authors should
have no mercy, are become the
commonplaces of daily life in Ar
menia. myself collected over 800
of these cases, and I have heard o.
countless others.
DR.. Dillon gives a long list of in
stances. He continues:
1t is not only absolutely use
less. but often positively danger
Gus, to complain to the officials
who, from high to low, take an &C
tive part in this Oriental "sport'
themselves. The Deputy Cover
nor of Arabghir actually arrested
and expelled a number Of the mel
of that town whose wives were
considered to be among the hand
soonest women in Armenia. HI
next approached the latter, bur
was received with the scorn lie de
served. Then these women shu
themselves up in their houses, re
fusing to allow him or his men tt
enter, whereupon he told them
publicly and shamelessly, that i
they wished their husbands to re
turn, they must yield to his de
sires."
When We consider that seven
teen years ago the six principal ma
tons Of Europe pledged themselve'
by the treaty of Berlin to secure
protection to the Armenians; ant
when we consider that the atroci
ties going on in that region hav,
been perfectly we'll known TO
years to the governments of thes,
six nations, through the reports
of their own consuls, and that no
a hand has been raised to enforc,