England, whose official support of Turkey made it in large measure responsible for the wrongs and sufferings of the Armenians, now moved for reform in that unfortunate country. At the same time, the English people were helping the Armenians by contributions. On the occasion of opening a bazaar held at Chester, for the benefit of the Armenian sufferers, Mrs. Gladstone gave expression to the popular sentiment prevailing in England regarding Armenia's condition in these terms: "No words of mine are needed to describe the frightful need of help. You are all aware of the terrible details. I plead to-day in behalf of the poor sufferers--that we may be instrumental in allaying their sufferings. As my husband says, we cannot dictate to the government as to the time, but we pray that the Powers may soon take action to end Armenia's woes." But while this most blessed work of caring for these hunger-stricken, homeless and wretched Armenians was going on, the storm burst upon them in all its fury. The appetite of the Moslem had merely been whetted, not satiated. Following the massacres in Trebizond and Erzeroum all the villages about them were almost depopulated, the orders for the slaughter of the Christians, as the Moslem troops admit, having come from Constantinople. At Sivas the massacre was terrible, and a like horror occurred at Marash. The ungovernable fury of the Turks spared neither age or sex, and the brutalities practiced upon women and children could not be described. Bodies of little children, dead and mutilated, were found in the fields after the slaughter had ended. Large numbers of the victims of these atrocities died the death of martyrs. They fell in the Moslem war for the extermination of the religion of Jesus in Asia Minor. At Diarbekir, where the victims were numbered by thousands, there was abundant evidence that the massacre was premeditated. It was claimed that the Armenians had attacked a Moslem mosque, whereas the facts, as afterwards disclosed, showed the Kurds and Turks to have been the sole and intentional aggressors. The massacre began on Friday, and continued on Saturday and Sunday with insatiable ferocity. Meanwhile, the story of what was taking place in the villages and hamlets of the different districts had not reached the public ear. When it came, it disclosed a tale of suffering and savagism that had scarcely a parallel. Many hundreds of villages were literally swept out of existence. The story of one is the story of all: the Kurds, directed from higher sources, swooping down, rounding up the cattle, slaying the strong men, outraging and abducting the women, and killing even the children, concluded the satanic work by burning everything that would consume. In many places the Kurdish troops came equipped with empty sacks strapped to their saddles for the purpose of carrying off the plunder. The Kurdish chiefs openly declared that they were ordered to slay the Christians and take the plunder for their pay.