416 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by Melville Chater 

 A BUUOCK TRAIN LADEN WITH AMERICAN FLOUR GOING TO THE RESCUE 



The slow progress of these plodding cattle makes little difference, for with swifter methods 

 the relief stores would be exhausted before more aid could come. 



the first promise of hope which had 

 passed through that desolate section in 

 many weeks — and he was telling us of 

 the many refugees who lived over there, 

 among that cluster of war-demolished 

 mud huts, starving in this wilderness. 



"We are dying, all dying!" he reiter- 

 ated in a kind of delirium. And, though 

 we told him we had not bread, it became 

 necessary to remove him from the road, 

 where he had thrown himself face down- 

 ward tinder the car's wheels to prevent 

 our departure. 



Another, and a happier figure, was 

 thai of an old woman who hobbled up 

 with a bright smile on her face to show 

 us that day's bonanza — a miserable apron- 

 fnl of the roots which would keep her 

 three motherless grandchildren alive for 

 twenty-four hours more. Indeed, watch 

 those painfully scrutinizing diggers, and 

 the way they Hock from spot to spot 

 whenever some luxurious patch is de- 

 fected, and you would think that they 

 were searching for yellow metal, not 



mere roots, in the first feverish hours of 

 a gold rush. 



"dying or deads?" 



As we neared Igdir our interpreter, a 

 cheery, affable young Armenian, who had 

 long since grown accustomed to the hor- 

 rors of this famine-blighted land, turned 

 to us from the front seat and inquired 

 with just a trace of the showman's man- 

 ner: 



"What you like to see, gentlemens?" 



"Conditions," snapped the doctor. 



"You like best conditions of dyings or 

 deads ? Dyings is easy to see everywhere 

 in the streets. But I know where many 

 deads are, too — in what houses — if you 

 like." 



"Drive on !" I said hastily. "We'll de- 

 cide later." 



The town of Igdir, with its local and 

 near-by populations of 30,000 Arme- 

 nians, 20,000 Tatars, and 15,000 Yezidis, 

 revealed some squalid streets with but a 

 few people seated disconsolately here and 

 there, as we drove in. Throughout those 



