I may also remind the Congress that when Greece achieved her independence, the population of Greece proper did not exceed 400,000. Another important point bearing on this question of population is the fact, to which most students of Near Eastern affairs have borne witness, that the Armenian race is endowed with extraordinary powers of recuperation, is almost entirely free from the diseases that impede the rapid growth of population, and is one of the most prolific races in the world. Their neighbours, on the evidence of travellers and students, are less free from disease and, in spite of polygamy, or perhaps partly because of it, are much less prolific. But apart from mere counting of heads, it is, I believe, generally known and admitted that there is a vast difference between the moral, intellectual, economic, and industrial value of the Armenian population as compared with most of its neighbours, the Armenians being markedly superior in every field of human activity. They have proved this even under the most trying handicaps, and when they have had a fair field they have easily proved themselves the equals of Europeans. In fact, the Armenian mind is much more European than Asiatic.[31] Lord Cromer has said that "the Armenians with the Syrians, are the intellectual cream of Near Eastern peoples." But apart from all these practical and certainly essential and vital considerations there remains, messieurs, the moral argument which, I feel quite certain, this august Conference, representing the will and the conscience of Europe, is not minded to ignore. After the massacres and deportations of 1915 Talaat Bey is reported to have said: "I have killed the idea of Armenian autonomy for at least fifty years." Whether he said it or not, that was clearly the object--to kill the Armenian question by wiping out the Armenian race, and incidentally to destroy the roots of Christianity in Asia Minor. Is this Conference going to condone and justify the barbarous and revolting practice, as a State policy, of the deliberate attempt to murder a whole nation in cold blood, by permitting that infamous policy to succeed in its object? Is it conceivable that this historic Conference can bring itself to decree that the myriads of our brothers and sisters who have fallen victims to the super-tyrants' fury, for their religion and their nation, as well as those who have fallen in the common struggle for Right, have suffered and died in vain? In the name not only of the living, but also of the dead, I appeal to you; I appeal to the heart and conscience of Europe to desist from enacting such a flagrant and cruel injustice.