ve."

Almost without a breath he replied: "And you shall have it. We honor
your position and your wishes shall be respected. Such aid and
protection as we are able, we shall render."

I then asked if it were necessary for me to see other officials. "No,"
he replied, "I speak for my government," and with cordial good wishes
our interview closed.

I never spoke personally with this gentleman again, all further business
being officially transacted through the officers of our legation. Yet I
can truly say, as I have said of my first meeting with our matchless
band of missionary workers, that here commenced an acquaintance which
proved invaluable, and here were given pledges of mutual faith, of which
not a word was ever broken on either side.

The Turkish Government, when once it came to understand American methods
and enthusiasm was forgiving and kind to us. No obstruction was ever
placed in our way. Our five expeditions passed through Armenian Turkey
from sea to sea, distributing whatever was needed, repairing the
destroyed machines, enabling the people to make tools to harvest their
grain, thus averting a famine; providing medical help and food as well
for thousands of sick; setting free the frightened inhabitants, and
returning them to the villages from which they had fled for their lives;
restoring all missionary freedom that had been interrupted; establishing
a more kindly feeling toward them on the part of the government; and
through all this, we had never one unpleasant transaction with any
person of whatever name or race.

While our expeditions were getting ready to go out by the Black Sea, a
request was brought to me by Dr. Washburn, of Robert College, from Sir
Philip Currie, the British Ambassador at Constantinople, asking if I
could not be "persuaded" to turn my expedition through the
Mediterranean, rather than the Black Sea, in order to reach Mirash and
Zeitoun, where the foreign consuls were at the moment convened. They had
gotten word to him that ten thousand people in those two cities were
down with four distinct epidemics--typhoid and typhus fevers, dysentery
and smallpox--that the victims were dying in overwhelming numbers, and
that there was not a physician among them, all being either sick or
dead, with no medicine and little food.

This was not a case for "persuasion," but of heartfelt thanks from us
all, that Sir Philip had remembered to call us, whom he had never met.
But here was a hindrance. T