806 



TURKEY. 



times retired, but afterward regained the lost 

 ground, hemming the Druses more closely in 

 their mountain valleys south of Damascus be- 

 tween the Jordan and the desert. 



Armenian Troubles. The trial of the Kur- 

 dish chieftain Moussa Bey, who had been the 

 leading spirit in the systematic outrages com- 

 mitted on the Christians of Van, Bitlis, and 

 Mush, was such a mockery of justice that Sir 

 William White, the British ambassador, who 

 wrote to his Government that there was a pow- 

 erful clique at Constantinople ready to go any 

 length to prevent him from being punished, ob- 

 tained the unhesitating support of his diplomatic 

 colleagues for his demand for a fresh trial, which 

 the Sultan promised, despite the objections of 

 the Minister of Justice, Djevdet Pasha, who was 

 eventually dismissed from office. The effect of 

 the acquittal in Armenia was to rekindle the 

 revolutionary desire for the re-establishment of 

 the ancient national independence of the Arme- 

 nians, which was assiduously fomented by the 

 Armenian committees in London, Paris, and other 

 foreign cities. This revival of the national aspi- 

 rations of the down-trodden race provoked the 

 martial Kurds and Circassians to fresh acts of 

 cruelty and oppression. On Feb. 26 Monsignor 

 Achikian, the Armenian Patriarch, delivered to 

 the Porte a report of a council of the Armenian 

 archbishops and bishops on Kurdish outrages 

 and the maladministration of the Ottoman au- 

 thorities ending with an appeal to the Sultan to 

 grant the complete restoration of the privileges 

 of the Armenian Church and to execute the re- 

 forms provided for in the sixty-first section of the 

 treaty of Berlin. The Sultan on the recom- 

 mendation of a commission on Armenian affairs 

 that met at Yildiz Kiosk, ordered the magistrates 

 serving in Armenia to be replaced by others 

 who possessed special knowledge of the condi- 

 tions with which they had to deal. In the north- 

 ern vilayets of Van, Erzerum, Bitlis, and Diar- 

 bekir, where the Armenian race is most numerous, 

 being nearly equal to the Mussulmans in num- 

 bers, and where the revolutionary propaganda 

 has taken root, the Christians have been forbid- 

 den to carry arms, while their Mussulman neigh- 

 bors are armed and are beyond the control of the 

 imperial authorities. Murder, outrage, robbery, 

 and arson drove some to seek new settlements in 

 Persia, but they were turned back at the frontier 

 by the Turkish officials. One village petitioned 

 in a body to be taken into the Orthodox Greek 

 communion in order to enjoy the protection of 

 the Russian Government. 



The Gregorian Christians number about 2,500,- 

 000. Nominally they possess considerable rights 

 of self-government. There is a National Assem- 

 bly, consisting of .120 lay and 20 ecclesiastical 

 members, sitting at Constantinople and Ephori, 

 or subordinate councils in the provincial centers. 

 Like other representative institutions introduced 

 in the Orient, the system is a failure in practice. 

 The National Assembly, which elects the patri- 

 arch, meets very seldom, and the local assemblies 

 are deaf to the complaints of the poorer mem- 

 bers of the community. In 1890 the National 

 Assembly had a meeting to give its support to 

 the demands of the Armenian community. The 

 wealthy and influential Armenians had no sym- 

 pathy with the ideas of national independence or 



autonomy disseminated from London, for their 

 people are the minority in every district, trampled 

 upon by warlike races that the power of the Otto- 

 man Government can not hold in check. 



In June an anonymous informer wrote to the 

 Civil Governor of Erzerum that the Armenians 

 were preparing an insurrection, and had a store 

 of arms and ammunition in their church and 

 school, and sent a similar communication to the 

 commander of the troops, who forwarded it 

 to the imperial palace at Constantinople. The 

 Governor paid no attention to the matter till 

 he was ordered from Constantinople to make 

 an investigation. The Armenians raised a 

 public clamor when their church was searched 

 by the police, who found no weapons there. 

 The notables of the community sent a protest 

 against the desecration, and two days after the 

 occurrence a mass meeting was held in the 

 churchyard for the purpose of signing a peti- 

 tion to the Sultan. The Mussulmans gathered 

 to attack the Christians, who had closed their 

 shops as a part of the demonstration, some will- 

 ingly and others under the compulsion of their 

 compatriots. A detachment of troops was sent 

 to preserve order. The officer in command, after 

 holding in check the Mussulman mob for a time, 

 ordered the Christians to go to their homes, and 

 when they refused the soldiers advanced to clear 

 the churchyard. The Christians resisted, firing 

 revolvers, and killing and wounding some of the 

 soldiers, who drove them out finally with their 

 bayonets. The collision was the occasion of a 

 general onset of the armed Mohammedan popu- 

 lace, who massacred several hundred Christians, 

 and plundered shops and houses. Riots followed 

 in other places. The Valis of Erzerum and Van 

 were dismissed in consequence of the disturb- 

 ances. On July 27, during the regular Sunday 

 service in the patriarchal Church of Koum 

 Kapou, a young Armenian, advancing to the 

 altar, read a proclamation recapitulating the 

 persecutions to which the Christians in Armenia 

 were subjected, and insisted on the Patriarch go- 

 ing at once to the palace with a petition to the 

 Sultan. The Patriarch, who refused and tried 

 to escape, was seized and driven on a carriage 

 in the midst of a shouting mob toward Yildiz 

 Kiosk. The procession was met by two battal- 

 ions of troops and dispersed after a fight,' in 

 which 4 soldiers and 3 Armenians were killed, 

 and many more received bayonet wounds. About 

 400 persons were arrested for being concerned in 

 the riot, and the Armenian quarter was declared 

 under martial law. On July 31 the Patriarch 

 sent his resignation to the Sultan, who refused 

 to accept it. On Aug. 12 Monsignor Achikian 

 sent a communication to the Porte persisting in 

 his resignation of functions that could not be 

 discharged so long as the needs and desires of 

 the Armenian people were neglected. On Aug. 

 19 Artin Djangulian was found guilty of having 

 incited the riot at Koum Kapou, and was sen- 

 tenced to death by the military tribunal. His 

 sentence was commuted into imprisonment for 

 life by the Sultan, who confirmed the sentence 

 of fifteen years' imprisonment pronounced against 

 three, and five years against five others. A spe- 

 cial commission was appointed to inquire into 

 Armenian grievances, of which Artin Pasha, 

 Agob Pasha, and Vahan Effendi, the three most 



