Our ride is now along terrace paths cut in the forests, everywhere embowered in trees. Every turn in the road opens up some new vista of beauty. The Greek villages on the hillsides present a prosperous appearance and an aspect of comfort. The faces that we see wear the bright, quick look which characterizes the Greek face. This is in striking contrast with the careworn look of the people of Armenia, where even the children had none of the brightness of other children: the life seemed too hard, the surroundings too dull, the lowering storms of persecution too near for even the children to smile. The appearance of Trebizond as we approach it from the east is singularly pretty. The suburbs, on that side, are the starting places of the numerous caravans that are fitted out for Persia, then comes the extensive Christian quarters and the walled town inhabited by the Turks, which is the site of an ancient Byzantine city. The total population is estimated at about thirty-two thousand, of whom two thousand are Armenians, seven or eight thousand Greeks, and the rest, with but a sprinkling of foreigners are Turks. The city was glorious in the days of Tamerlane. Ancient writers were enthusiastic in their praises of its lofty towers, of the churches and monasteries in the suburbs; especially charming were its gardens and orchards and olive groves which the delightful but humid climate is so well suited to foster. Nature lovingly smiles upon it still, but the handful of scattered Christians, the ruins of stately churches and monasteries and walls all tell the same story of the conquest and heartless rule of the Turk, and emphasize with silent but pathetic eloquence the moaning cry for deliverance that rose up from prostrate and bleeding Armenia. As we have traveled we have seen the helplessness of the unarmed Armenians when the Kurds went sweeping down the valleys upon the defenceless villages. How hopeless also any attempt at escape when the Kurds held possession of all the passes. Saddest of all there were no cities of refuge for them. Van alone of all the cities of Armenia was able to resist and drive back the hordes of mountain warriors, yet her fertile plains were swept naked of their beautiful villages. Thousands of refugees were, however, kept alive by the generosity of the tender hearted in America as the chapter on Relief Work will graphically portray. CHAPTER XI. THE REIGN OF TERROR. The time has come for every citizen to deliberately accept or repudiate his share of the joint indirect responsibility for a series of the hugest and foulest crimes that have ever stained the pages of human history. The Armenian people are being exterminated root and branch by Turks and Kurds--systematically and painfully exterminated by such abominable methods, and with such fiendish accompaniments as may well cause the most sluggish blood to boil and seethe with shame and indignation.