414 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by Melville C hater 



SEEKING WHAT WARMTH THE SUN CAN GIVE 



Alexandropol, whose people are dying at a rate of 200 to 250 a day, is almost a mile 

 above sea-level. Refugees are forced to sleep in the open, and their weakened bodies eventually 

 give up the fight for life. Note the snow on the hillsides, indicative of the bitter nights, for 

 the variation between the warmth of noonday and the marrow-chilling cold of the darkness 

 is unusually great at such a high altitude. 



Erivan. From a free discussion of topics 

 our relations had somehow changed to a 

 rigid silence ; and whenever we did speak, 

 it only augmented a certain undercurrent 

 of mutual irritation. 



TO [GDIR THROUGH 40 MILES OF 

 DESOLATION 



A war-battered motor of American 

 body, Russian tires, and second-hand* 

 parts from every country in the world 

 jounced us to Tgdir, across forty miles of 

 flat country, throughout which mud-hut 

 villages clustered and old trenches scored 

 the plain, while Ararat loomed ever 

 ahead, more dazzlingly white and sky- 

 filling, as morning turned to noontide. 

 Cutting his right shoulder, a faint line 

 betrayed the cleft through which the 

 great hordes of refugees had filed in their 

 flight from Turkish Armenia during the 

 massacres of [915. 



Three times in as many years have 

 masses of these 300,000 people crossed 



and recrossed the mountains, advancing 

 and retreating, as Russia threw the Turk- 

 ish armies back or withdrew before them. 

 In 19 16 the refugees were even repatri- 

 ated long enough to sow the soil, but not 

 to reap the crops, which were abandoned 

 to the enemy. Finally, at Bolshevism's 

 outbreak, the disorganized Russian troops 

 went home, leaving the Transcaucasus 

 undefended. Of its main peoples, the 

 Georgians welcomed the Germans, while 

 the Tatars were coreligionists with the 

 Turks ; wherefore the latter's despolia- 

 tions were directed solely against the Ar- 

 menians. 



The country through which we were 

 passing revealed neither sowed acres nor 

 cattle, nor sheep at graze ; for seed, agri- 

 cultural implements, and all else had been 

 swept away by the enemy. 



Once the Arax River was passed, how- 

 ever, one could recognize the Tatar vil- 

 lages by the presence of field animals and 

 husbandry. Still farther on, the popula- 



