The Turkish escort had apparently given these prisoners nothing to drink on the way--although the Turk, being a great water-drinker himself, knows only too well what a man needs on a dusty journey of several days on a transport train--for with my own eyes I saw dozens of them simply flinging themselves like animals full length on the ground when they reached the Taksim Fountain, and trying to slake their terrible thirst. It was with pitiable trickery like this--for which no doubt Enver Pasha was responsible, for the simple Turkish soldier is much too good-natured not to share his bread and water with his prisoners--that attempts were made, at the expense of all feelings of humanity, to cheer up the uneducated masses. The Turkish Government, however, apart from a few cases of reprisals, where the prisoners were treated in an even more barbaric and primitive manner, did not, as a general rule, go the length of interning civilians. This was not without its own good grounds. In the first place, a very large part of the trade of the country lay in the hands of these Europeans, and they were consequently absolutely indispensable to the Turks in their everyday commercial life; secondly, a Government that had systematically rooted out the Armenians, hanged Arabian notables, and brutally mishandled the Greeks, could scarcely dispense, in the eyes of Europe, with the very last pretence of being more or less civilised; and, lastly, perhaps the fear of being brought to book later on may have had a restraining influence on them--we saw how growing anxiety about the Russian advance on the Eastern front led, at any rate for a time, to a discontinuance of Armenian persecutions. Besides all this, hundreds and thousands of Turks were resident in enemy countries, and of course the desire was to avoid reprisals. So the Government contented itself with threats and subterfuges, after a first unsuccessful attempt to expose a large number of French subjects to fire from the enemy guns in Gallipoli--a plan which failed entirely, owing to the energetic opposition of officials of the American Embassy who had accompanied these chosen victims to Gallipoli. Every means was used, however, even announcements in the newspapers and a Vote of Credit "for the removal of enemy subjects to the interior," to keep the sword of Damocles for ever hanging over the heads of all subjects of Entente countries, even women and children.