THE PROBLEM OF TURKEY 213 



Another example of the workings of the Turkish mind is seen 

 in the relation of the government to the nomadic Kurds of the 

 mountains and the wandering Arabs of the desert. Take the case 

 of Dersim, a rugged tract of high mountains between the two 

 branches of the upper Euphrates. The Kurdish inhabitants 

 raise some grain, but depend in large measure on flocks. In 1907- 

 1908 the crops were bad and the sheep did not do so well as 

 usual, for grass was scarce. The Kurds needed suppliies from 

 without. In the old days they would merely have robbed the 

 neighboring villages. I myself have been in a village on the 

 Dersim border when the Kurds drove off the flocks, killed a shep- 

 herd, and had a fight with the villagers. In 1908, however, having 

 recently been chastised by the government, they purchased grain, 

 and made up a great caravan to bring it home. Instead of helping 

 them in this peaceful and righteous course and thus paving the 

 way for permanent good relations, the stupid ofiicials said: "Aha, 

 now is our chance. We can strike a blow at the Kurds without 

 injuring ourselves." 



So the caravan was seized. Naturally the Kurds flared up, 

 and began to rob and plunder on all sides. The authorities sent 

 a large body of troops, 20,000 it is said, who hung around the 

 borders of the mountains, not daring to penetrate the fastnesses. 

 Half a million dollars was spent. The only result was to em- 

 bitter and impoverish the Kurds, and encourage them to engage 

 in further raids. A few years later those same Kurds were turned 

 loose to kill the Christians, and blot the page of history with the 

 last — let us hope — of the fiendish massacres which have been one 

 of the chief entries on the debit side not only of the Turks and 

 Kurds but of the land in which they dwell. 



We might go on to tell a hundred tales of the way in which 

 Turks mistreat Arabs, Arabs plunder Syrians from whom they 

 might otherwise buy bread, while Syrians use every petty con- 

 trivance to get, the better of one another or of the government. 

 But is there no race in the whole Turkish Empire that lives up 



