The news scimitar. (Memphis, Tenn.) 1907-1926, 1918-12-28

naturally rushed toward 1t. But here
the policemen barred the way and for
babe them to take a single drop of wa
ter. Their purpose was to sell it at
from one to three liras a cup and some
times they actually withheld the water
after getting the money. At another
place, where there were wells, some
women threw themselves into them, a
the water. These women were drowned
and, in spite Of that, the rest of the
people drank from that well, the dead
bodies still remaining there and pollut-
ing the water. Sometimes, when the
wells were shallow and the women could
go dow into them n come out again,
the other people would rush to lick or
suck their wet, dirty clothes, in -" ef-
fort to quench their thirst. When they
passed an Arab village in their naked
gave them old pieces Of cloth to cover
themselves with. Some OF the exiles
who still had money bought some
clothes; but some still remained who
Travelled thus naked all the wo" to the
city Of Aleppo. The poor women could
hardly walk for shame; they all walked
bent double"
On the SEVENTEEN day a few creatures
reached Aleppo. Out Of the combined
convoy of $4,000 souls just $50 women
and children reached their destination.
A few Of the rest, the most attractive,
Kurds and Turks; all the rest were
dead.
My only reason for relating such
dreadful things as this Is that, with
out the details, the English-speaking
public cannot understand precisely
what this nation Is which we call
Turkey. I have by no means told the
most terrible details. for a complete
narration Of the sadistic orgies of which
these Armenian men and women were
, the victims can never be printed in an
American publication. Whatever crimes
the most perverted instincts of the
human mind can devise, and what
ever refinements of persecution and in
, justice the most debased imagination
can conceive, became the daily mis-
, fortunes Of this devoted people. | am
( confident that he whole history Of the
; human race contains no such horrible
t episode as this. The great massacres
and prosecutions of the past seem
almost insignificant when compared
! with the sufferings OF the Armenian
1 bigenses in the early. part of the
! thirteenth century has always been re-
; garded as one of the most pitiful events
In history. In these outbursts of fanat-
,, i i2IsT The "G %asss SC Zoo Of PeSsPP ST. B SsFs si15s1;
! about 10000 human beings lost their
. lives. The Sicilian Vespers, which has
: always Figured as one Of the most
0 fiendlsh %outbursts Of oo this kind, canse &c
d.. lIlS uVOIl uSNloi u ptONN' YIN 49,
4 been written about the Spanish inquisi'
tlon under Torquemada. yet in the
y eighteen years of his administration
g only a little more than 5000 heretics
: event in history that most resem'
y bles the Armenian deportations was
d the expulsian Of the Jews from
n Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella
d uprooted from their homes and scat.
y tered broadcast over Africa ant
y Europe. Yet all these previous perse'
cutions seem almost trivial when w
the Armenians, in which at least 10000
people were destroyed and perhaps a
many as 1000, 900. And these earle
massacres, when we compare the
with the spirit that directed the Arme
MAN atrocities, have one feature tina
we can almost describe as an excuse
- they were the product of religion
fanaticism and most of the men an
women who i~nstigated them sincereL
believed that they were devoutly serv
ing their Maker. Undoubtedly religion
fanaticism was an impelling motiv
with the Turkish and kurdish rabbi
who slew Armenians as a service
Allah, but the men who really con
ceived the crime had no such motive
Practically all OF them were atheists
with no more respect for Mohamme
danism than for Christianity, and wit
them the one motive was cold bloodeC
calculating state policy. .
The Armenians are not the only sub
ject people in Turkey which have sui
fered from this policy Of maxim
Turkey exclusively the country of tn
Turks. The story which | have tol
about the Armenians | could also tie
with certain notifications about tn
Greeks and the Syrians. Indeed III
Greeks were the first victims Of tn
Matchmaking idea l have already de
scribed how, in the few months pre-
ceding the European war. the Otto
man government began deportirg il
~ Greek subjects along the coast of AS
Minor, These outrageS aroused lit
interest in Europe or the United State
yet in the space OF three or fol
months about 400, 900 Greeks we
taken from their age-long homes in Il
Mediterranean litoral and removed
the Greek islands in the Aegean Sc
For the larger part these Sere hor
fide deportations; that is, the Gree
inhabitants were actually removed
new places and were not subjected
wholesale massacre. 1t was probab
for the reason that the civilized wor
did not protest against these deport
In tions that the Turks afterward deCid,
to apply the same methods on a larg
zen scale. not only to the Greeks but
1as the Armenians, Syrians, HISTORIANS a,
nd Others of its subject peoples, In faC
-, Bedri Bey. the project eli police
~ Constantinople, himself told one of n
10 secretaries that the Turks had expell
ley the Greeks so successfully that IN,
nto had decided TO apply the same meth,
IFS | 10 all gHA AIhnr in fhA -1r,s.