Photo by Stephen Van R. Trowbridge 

 ARMENIAN BRIDAL PROCESSION TO THE CHURCH 



"Like the Jew, the Armenian has been oppressed and persecuted, and has developed a 

 strength of nationality, a love for his own people, and a persistence of type rarely seen 

 elsewhere. Like the Jew, he has learned to bend, not break, before the oppressor" (see text, 

 page 335). 



which arise from the weakness and in- 

 efficiency of the government. To the 

 former class belong the massacres, the 

 impoverishment of the peasantry by tax- 

 ation, and the impunity granted to the 

 crimes of Kurds against the Christians, 

 together with the disarming of the latter 

 and the supplying of rifles to the former. 

 To the second class belong disorders, 

 utter failure of justice, wretched and 

 unsafe transportation, and brigandage. 



In the courts of justice the word of an 

 Armenian will not be taken against that 

 of a Moslem. The Armenian peasant or 

 trader has to pursue his calling knowing 

 that he cannot travel freely in the em- 

 pire, recognizing that he will be so heav- 

 ily and so unfairly taxed that he can 

 scarcely make a living, and then when 

 the struggle of the year is nearly over 



perhaps the Kurds sweep down from the 

 mountains and seize his home for their 

 winter shelter, take his crops, and even 

 carry off his daughters. No Armenian's 

 life, his property, nor the honor of his 

 women has been safe in Turkey for a 

 century. 



The misgovernment of Turkey has 

 found, of course, other victims beside 

 the Armenians. Patriotic Turks have 

 seen their country impoverished, their 

 people oppressed, their trees cut down, 

 their mineral resources undeveloped, 

 their government despised by Europe, 

 and their patriots and statesmen exiled. 

 But hard as was their lot, it was not so 

 hard as that of the Christians, and of 

 the latter the Armenians have suffered 

 the most. The case of the Turkish peo- 

 ple got so bad that in 1908 there broke 



354 



