Valdez daily prospector., 1915-12-11
TURKS NABLE TO
 <-~.g MASTER THE kURDs.

The Kurds, who, report says nave been responsible for the massacre or hundreds of thousands of Armenlans, gre described in the war primer is sued by the National Geographic So- ciety.
 "The Kurds are survival from the days when self-respecting men lived only or at least principally, by the sword. Their wild tribes are scat tered throughout Asia Minor, acting to thwart the most modest efforts of the land toward modern comfort, se- curity and organization. Although once fabulously rich, the country has not been able to bring forth sutt1- ciency through all the years that the Kurds have practiced their un- tanned housekeeping here, a house keeping that has consisted in aban- doning the summer tent for the win ter cottage, after preliminary killing the owner and his family, and re plenishing of goods at the point of a rife, the transaction usually followed by the burning of the footed shop.
 "The Kurd is a picturesque citizen and whatever his numbers may be and census matters in Turkey are in- definite-he is much more in evi- dence than the Armenian and other peoples among whom he lives. The Kurd is the travellers first impress sion in Asia Minor, and in most cases he remains the predominant one. The kurds wear clothes of viv- i'd coIors; they also wear rags. chat is, the poorer ones. of the most feck- less A4oniescript description. The Kurds ride the best horses; they are always armed; they bully the Ar menians, the travellers, and the over lord Turks themselves.
 The Turks have been unable to ob- tain a complete mastery over the Kurds, and have employed an ad- ministrative policy towards them of letting them alone Thus the Kurd massacres Armenians. robs Arme- nians and travellers, and considers both his just right. In useful state, the Kurd lives in tent and herds sheep. In the winter he moves to the Mesopotamian plains and lives in his tent or turns the owner out of a selected house. His tent is of black homespun goats hair and it's furniture is mats, quilts and cooking pots. His children go naked and his wife ragged. His board is set with sour goats milk, and when by chance he builds home, it consists of a hole in the ground with fiat roof of wattle and clay, air-tight, smoke tight, light-tight. There are small smoke-vents in the roof, but the ef- feet is that of a prairie dogs dwell- ing. It is as light and airy within as a low-level coal mine.
 "To be of Ashirat blood. in Kurd- ish estimation is to be really worth while. The Kurds have conscious superiority which gives them a cer- tain bearing of nobleness and dig nity. A Kurdish chief is an impress sive, often an affable individual. They are not inclined to settle down and do not want anyone else to settle down. {, In some districts, however, they have taken lands wholesale from the Armenians, massacreing the own CTS, aud have become rich landown- CTS. Occasional Kurds attempt civ ilization.
 "Oficially at least the kurds are Mohammedans. They reject the cus- tom of yelling their women, reyer- ence fire, and are, on subjects of re- ligion, altogether liberal. Many of them are Kililbashas, heretic Mos- lems, and some few are Christians. Their little fuedal organizations are their nationalities, and the patriotism is . devotion to the privilege of be- CTS. They are medieval, with all the