ld, whom he
threw behind the house. We asked him about it, and he said that there
were three sick Armenian women in the house, who had lagged behind their
companions, that one of them had given birth to this infant, but could
not nourish it, owing to her illness. So it had died and been thrown
out, as one might throw out a mouse.

DEMAND FOR RANSOM.--Whilst we were at Sivrek, Aarif Effendi told
me--after he had been at the Government offices--that the Commandant of
Gendarmerie and the Chief of Police of that place had requested him to
hand over to them the five Armenians who were with him, and that on his
refusal they had insisted, saying that, if they were to reach Diarbekir
in safety, they must pay a ransom of fifty liras for themselves. We went
to the _khan_, where the officer summoned the priest Isaac and told him
how matters stood. After speaking to his companions, the priest replied
that they could pay only ten liras altogether, as they had no more in
their possession. When convinced by his words, the officer took the ten
liras and undertook to satisfy the others.

This officer had a dispute with the Commandant of Gendarmerie at Aleppo,
the latter desiring to take these five men on the grounds that they had
been sent with a gendarme for delivery to his office. Ahmed Bey, the
Chief of the Irregular band at Urfa, also desired to take them, but the
officer refused to give them up to him--he being a member of the
Committee of Union and Progress--and brought them in safety to
Diarbekir.

After passing the night at Sivrek we left early in the morning. As we
approached Diarbekir the corpses became more numerous, and on our route
we met companies of women going to Sivrek under guard of gendarmes,
weary and wretched, the traces of tears and misery plain on their
faces--a plight to bring tears of blood from stones, and move the
compassion of beasts of prey.

What, in God's name, had these women done? Had they made war on the
Turks, or killed even one of them? What was the crime of these hapless
creatures, whose sole offence was that they were Armenians, skilled in
the management of their homes and the training of their children, with
no thought beyond the comfort of their husbands and sons, and the
fulfilment of their duties towards them.

I ask you, O Moslems--is this to be counted as a crime? Think for a
moment. What was the fault of these poor women? Was it in their being
superior to the Turkish women in every resp