There are mercenary Armenian individuals as there are mercenary persons in every nation. It may be that, debarred from government posts except when he was indispensable, the town Armenian in Turkey, like the Greek and Syrian, has been compelled to direct his energies into commercial channels in a larger proportion than free and independent nations. Naturally, also, through generations of ruthless persecution, the Armenian nation has thrown up a flotsam and jetsam of indigents wandering far and wide in search of security and the means of earning a living. But to brand the whole Armenian race as "mercenary" is malevolent nonsense, or credulity due to a total ignorance of the facts. Seventy or eighty per cent. of the Armenians in Turkish as well as Russian Armenia are peasants, farmers and artisans. That is approximately true also of the Persian Armenians. Even in the United States the majority of the immigrants have taken to fruit-growing in California. Armenians who have the means to give their sons a good education almost invariably make them follow a profession in preference to commerce, as witness the number of Armenian university professors, doctors, lawyers and some artists and painters of considerable merit in the United States.[21] Probably no people have made the sacrifices made by Armenians, in proportion to their means, for the relief of distress during the war. There have been a few exceptions among the very rich whose moral sense has been blunted by luxury and self-indulgence. They can be counted on the fingers of one hand. They belong to that class of cosmopolitan financiers and traders who are no more thrilled by the music of their country's or any country's name; who are unmoved by the cry of starving women and children of their own or any race; whose home is the world and whose god is gold; who are no more the masters but the slaves of money. But this, again, is not peculiar to Armenians; very far from it. It is a fraternity that embraces members of every, or almost every, race; and Armenians are barely represented upon it. It is palpably misleading as it is inaccurate to assert that these represent the Armenian nation. In fact, as far as my knowledge goes, the masses of the Armenian people are ashamed of them, because their worship of gold and vanity are alien to the national spirit, and bring discredit upon the nation. For generations Armenian educational and religious institutions have been maintained by voluntary grants; and I do not know that any European citizen bears a heavier burden for the needs of his nation than does the individual Armenian.