which has deepened much in these last months, and we feel sure that they must make leaders of strength in the circles to which they shall belong in the years to come. At present their work will be teaching, giving help to which we have long been looking forward.

After the exercises in the church were finished, all the guests were invited to the school, which had been set in especially good order for their reception and inspection. In one room was a table on which were spread examina

tion papers, notebooks and essays, and many came here to look at the work that had been done. In another room tea was served, and this was indeed a busy scene. Here the younger pupils rejoiced in an opportunity to help, and it was a delight to watch them, in their eagerness to serve the guests in their best possible manner, and to see them later going about with different groups, showing them schoolrooms and dormitory. We note here a kind of democracy which is most pleasing. Sometimes it is embarrassing to have guests of different degrees, who are not willing to mingle with each other,

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but a result of the honor paid to education seems to be that they are willing now to talk with the students, who seem to stand apart from divisions of rank, a class by themselves. And so it comes that pupils from humble families may have most cordial conversations with ladies of rank and wealth on these special occasions.

It was long before all these ceremonies were over, and guests were gone, and pupils and teachers might pause and realize that the year was ended. It seemed good that it might end with so perfect a day, and it left us with joy and gratitude for the many blessings of the year, and with abounding hope for the year to follow.

The accompanying picture shows Miss Reed with a group of Mohammedan women from Peking and relations of theirs from the country. The country woman has bound feet. The city woman has the city dress. An interesting story is told in connection with the woman standing at Miss Reed's left. Having but one daughter, and no son, she was determined that instead of marrying her daughter out of the family, she would marry a son into the family. The betrothal was arranged with Mohammedan friends, and to carry out the fiction the daughter was taken to the young man's home, while he was brought to hers. It is the custom of the bride's mother to make humble salutations to the family into which her daughter marries. This the mother of the groom did, as if she were really the mother of the bride. During the wedding, which was held in the courtyard of the family, three Mohammedan Ah Hungs recited the Koran in turn, the two not reciting partaking of the feast. This woman has shown great hospitality to the missionaries, and as they pass her door going to one of the mission stations, she has often called them in for refreshments and a quiet rest in her comfortable home.

THE TRAGEDY IN TURKEY

(Miss Isabella M. Blake, of Aintab, has written to home friends a vivid description of the events of last April, as they affected our missionaries and their work. After telling of the horrors at Adana and Osmanié she gives some details we have not seen elsewhere.)

OUR mayor received telegraphic orders for a massacre but refused. He

summoned the head men of the wards, both Turks and Armenians, and told them that he wanted peace and order in the city, but he could not keep it alone. Each man must be responsible for quiet in his own ward. The mayor, like so many mayors at this time, tramped the city like a policeman night after night. The three troublesome effendis tried to get the

mayor out of the city under all sorts of pretexts, and fathered all sorts of nefarious schemes to make trouble. One fine Monday morning the commandant began to distribute Martinis to Turks and kept it up all day. Then began a panic. All the shops were shut, and in some streets one might see Turks fleeing one way with their household goods on their backs, and Armenians fleeing another with theirs. The Turks were afraid of resistance and revenge on the part of Armenians. Some people even began digging up silly little earthworks. The better class of people sat quietly in their homes, and the prominent Turks and Armenians went about urging the people to reopen their shops and go about their business. The commandant was quietly sent off in chains to his " baba" in Salonica.

Oorfa also had a good mayor, and there is a very interesting story told about him. I do not know whether it is true, but it might easily be, it is so thoroughly typical. As he was walking the streets of the city one night in policeman's dress (he really did that) he discovered and arrested three men who were engaged in painting the door of a mosque with filth. He put them under guard in separate rooms, and discovered then that the three men were three Moslem khojas, white fez bands and all. So the next day he summons the great Moslem congregation, describes what he has found without telling who the men were, shows the pails and brushes, and begins to stir up the mob. "What does our Koran say must be done to men who defile the mosque?" If you had ever seen an Oriental audience, you could just imagine the growls and groans of rage with which they answer such questions as these. Then they demand the three Armenians guilty of the crime, all ready to tear them to pieces, and the mayor produces—three Moslem khojas with white head bands. I do not really believe this story because I happen to have heard it about some other city in the old massacres, but it illustrates one true thing, that everywhere the lower mobs of Turks have tried hard to incriminate Armenians.

The emissaries of the Sultan came to Aintab and held two meetings of the beys and men of rank, trying to urge a massacre. Of course they went for the beys first, for these have scores or hundreds of villagers whom they can bring up to help. At the first meeting only three beys agreed and at the second only one.

I do admire the courage of the Armenians who first went down into the city and began to open their shops, not because they expected business but for the moral effect. For a long time it seemed as if the least incident would precipitate trouble, and once or twice the incident seemed to be forthcoming. One day a veiled Moslem woman rushed into the market and told the Armenians to go home because there would soon be an attack. Men began to

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shut up their shops and there was a great fright, when the mayor appeared on the scene, made a speech in which he told the people not to believe all the reactionaries told them, and quieted things. Another time a Turk killed his brother-in-law, dismembered the body and threw the head into the street, intending to do the same, one by one, with the other members of the family and lay the murder of several Turks on Armenians. The mayor seemed like one inspired. He went straight to the Turk's house, found the evidences of the crime and put the man in prison, and telegraphed to Constantinople for permission to hang him, which was done. This is true. Then we heard that the mayor had broken down from overwork, and was to leave the city, and everyone was mourning and worried except those who wanted him to leave. But he did not go.

We did not miss a day of school, though many girls were absent for a week or two. The girls were very much frightened naturally, but we kept them hard at work. One could hardly call them terrifying days but they were anxious days, and as reports began to come in, nothing less than heartbreaking. I do not think I was at all frightened at any time, but I was worried enough so that many times I would start awake during the night with some shout from the city ringing in my ears and think, "What was that?" Then of course as soon as I was fully awake I would know it was nothing. Then little by little the boarding school girls from that region began to hear about the burning of their homes and the killing of their fathers, mothers and brothers and so on. One girl has lost fourteen relatives, including father and brother. In all, eight of our girls have lost their fathers, others near relatives, and about ten have no homes left. We have only about eleven from that whole region. Yesterday I heard one girl jollying another, "Hoohanna, you've got a kitchen left in your house." It was just heartbreaking to try to comfort the girls. Even when they knew that some of their families, or all, were safe, they were obliged to think of them as utterly forlorn and destitute, often in danger, hiding in caves or huddled in crowded places of refuge, homeless, in need of beds, food and clothing. This was hard enough in itself, but we had one remedy that helped them a great deal-work for the sufferers.

As soon as Dr. Shepard's first letter came with a call for relief the people of the churches began to organize and collect supplies of money, bedding, clothing, wheat and cooking utensils. Supplies poured into the churches. It has been a winter of extreme poverty in Aintab, but the very poorest went down into their chests and brought out something-their best, too, because the women that inventories the goods say there was little mending to do. Our girls hemstitched twenty-five dozen handkerchiefs, gave a little more, and were able to send about twelve dollars.

"HOW THE GOOD NEWS CAME TO" VAN

BY ONE OF OUR MISSIONARIES

(Though the events occurred a year ago, yet the story is so vividly told, and the picture of conditions so clear, that it is full of interest to-day.)

YOU

write, "I would like to know how the good news came to you." In order to fully understand it, you must know that it takes the post ten or twelve days in the best weather to come from Constantinople to Van, and that the telegraph was under the closest espionage of the government, and so no one thought of telegraphing for information.

Monday, July 27th, at noon lunch one said, "There is a report around town that the Sultan has granted a constitution, but no one knows anything about it or how it has come about, or whether it is likely to last." Naturally it was the topic of conversation everywhere, but no further information could be gained, unless it was, "It is said the prisoners are to be released." The second day after an influential Armenian family received a telegram from a son in Constantinople, announcing his release from prison, and adding the words, Liberty, Fraternity and Equality. The fact that such a telegram had been sent-the more astounding fact that it had been delivered to an Armenian family-made us all feel something had happened, while we declared the last three words of the telegram was the greatest piece of folly, involving a great risk in such a city as Van.

For the last three or four years there has been a rich young Turk from Constantinople in exile here for his political opinions, and we all were more or less acquainted with him. Next he received a telegram announcing his pardon and freedom to return home, and congratulatory telegrams began to pour in on him. Reports began to spread that prisoners in Bitlis had been released. Prisoners in Erzroom had been released, but our prison bolts were as tight as ever. Armenians were impatient, and the question was often asked, "Why are not our prisoners let out?" The answer given, and I presume it was true, was, "The Van Turks don't fancy this change in the government, and the officials fearing a massacre dare not release the prisoners." For one or two days some anxiety was felt, and merchants did not go to the market to transact business. The consuls were three hours away at their summer resort, and we could get no news from them. After a week one of the English missionaries who was tenting with the consul came to the city, and he told us that the revolt of the Macedonian army had forced this step on the Sultan, and that the Young Turks were in power and that first congress or parliament was to be convened in November.