"We have only to say that I and my child are living. No male population has been left in our town. They have killed my father. I took the child with me and sought refuge in the church. Our cousin also has been killed. Of our three families, only one family has partly a shelter, but we have not even a piece of a blanket to cover our nakedness! We have nothing to eat. The government is giving a small piece of bread for each living person. No physician has been left. Our child has not a book to study from or to read. Everything has been destroyed. They have plundered even the goods which were concealed in the ground. There is no life for us here. In our three families, there is not a lamp to give light. For God's sake send help or else we will die of starvation." A letter from a young man in the same town to an Armenian in New York, said: "You have no doubt heard of the terrible events that have taken place in our town. They have not left anything in our house. They killed your brother and sister. They have burned our stable and woodhouse and our winter house. We are in terrible distress. We have no bedding, no clothes. We have not even the means to procure a piece of dry bread. Rich and poor are all alike, and our generous neighbors are not any better off than ourselves, so that they cannot help us. No merchant or broker has been left." A few extracts from another report of Mr. W. W. Howard, sent from Urumia in December, 1895, will fitly close this chapter of woe and destitution. "The American mission work at Van has been suspended, and all the schools closed. The closing of the schools, however, has not been confined to the American mission, but has extended to every school in the city, of whatever race or creed. All the shops have likewise been closed, both Armenian and Turkish. Even the Turkish shops in the bazaar proper have been shut, so great is the fear of massacre. The Turkish Government ordered the Armenian merchants to open their shops, and the Armenians obeyed, but when the shops were opened they were entirely empty, the goods having been removed to the merchants' houses. The merchants then sat in their empty stores with nothing to sell. "With the money already sent to her, Miss Kimball has done a large work in the supplying of bread for the starving, and she is now at work on a soup kitchen. Her plan of relief is to furnish work to such of the poor as are able to work. Business in Van and the province of Van has been dead for months. Nothing is being bought or sold except the simplest articles of food that will sustain life. Miss Kimball is, therefore, distributing these articles of clothing free to the wretched village refugees who are flocking to Van in rags and nakedness.