In Armenia many families formerly could be found (still some may be found) living in a patriarchal style like the families of Abraham, Job and Jacob, who could raise a force and chase the invaders from their borders; the younger sons and grandsons with the hired servants tending the flocks and following the herds like Jesse’s younger son, and not a few of them had the fate that Job’s servants had. Many Armenian youths have been like Jesse’s youngest son, leading the sheep on the lonely hills of Armenia. Yet none finds the life of an Oriental shepherd an easy and pleasant one, not only because it is exposed to dangerous conflicts with robbers, thieves, wild beasts and ravenous wolves, but also the irksome anxiety to find green pastures and still waters to lead the flocks thereto. Added to this is the feeling of loneliness day and night and compulsive association with the mute creature whom they call by their names. Some shepherds again, like David, have a source of comfort, not the harp, but their flutes, and the sheep seem to delight to listen to those pensive melodies, when the shepherds play, while the shepherd-dogs with their accredited faithfulness, always follow the flocks. The farming implements are also in primitive simplicity, like the mode of cultivation. The western plows, planters, sowers, cultivators, reapers, and self-binders and threshing machines are comparatively unknown in most of the places in the Turkish Armenia. The employment of oxen and tamed buffaloes, instead of horses in some hilly and rocky districts, for hauling and farming might be justifiable, but in many places and for many many purposes on the farm the horses could be used with advantage. They are not, however, except for riding and traveling. It is due to the inexhaustive fertility of the land and to the industry of the people, and not to the modern improvements or advantageous circumstances, that the inhabitants of Armenia have not starved long ago. If we, moreover, remember the absence of railroads and good roads, the difficulty of transportation of the products into the market, the dangers from the highway robbers encountered in traveling which paralyze the spirit of enterprise and energy of the farmer, we well may be surprised to know that they not only make a living, but that thousands of bushels of grain were annually exported into the European countries. In every village, town and city of Armenia and in Asia Minor where there were and are Armenians, churches and schools are found, one, two, or more of them according to the numbers of the Armenian inhabitants. Some of these villages and towns are wholly inhabited by the Mohammedans who have seized the property of the Christians and have also converted their churches into mosques and their schools into _tekes_ (schools).