Making all due allowance for the relative magnitude and importance of the Near Eastern and the Western fronts, we may safely say without exaggeration that Van and Sasoun, on the Caucasian front in the year 1915, played exactly the same role which Liege played in 1914 and Verdun in 1916 on the Western front. Had it not been for these two points of stubborn resistance against the Turkish troops in the summer of 1915, the two Turkish offensives, already spoken of, would have had great chances of success. This is an undisputed fact with all the inhabitants of the Near East. And indeed, three months after these events, when the Armenian volunteers together with the Russian troops recommenced their drive and captured the cities of Moush and Bitlis, in the diary of a Turkish officer, who was taken prisoner in Bitlis, was found the following item, which appeared at the time in the Russian press: "We are asked why we massacre the Armenians. The reason is quite plain to me. Had not the Armenians fought against us, we should have reached Tiflis and Baku long ago." In addition to Van and Sasoun, during the same July when deportations and organized massacres were going on, three other places might be mentioned where hopeless attempts at resistance were made by the Armenians against the savage Turks and Kurds. These places were Sivas, Urfa, and Shabin-Karahissar. At Sivas the heroic resistance of Mourat and his comrades and their escape were so full of thrilling events that they have been likened to the adventures of Odysseus. Mourat is a brave warrior who, together with his companion, Sepouh, had fought at Sasoun, in 1904, and had taken part in the Armenian and Tartar clashes of 1905 and 1906 in the Caucasus. When deportations and massacres commenced in 1915, Turkish gendarmes were sent to capture Mourat, who was living with his wife and child in a village near Sivas. Realizing the coming danger, Mourat climbed the mountains with his band of warriors and resisted the raids of the enemy. After a year and a half of stubborn resistance, he descended one day to the shore of the Black Sea, captured a Turkish sail-boat near Samsoun, and, putting his comrades into it, ordered the Turkish sailor to steer the boat toward Batoum, a Russian port. According to cable messages, Mourat was chased by a Turkish gun-boat. Several battles took place in which he lost a few of his men, but finally repulsed the Turks and reached Batoum safe and sound. At Urfa the Armenians were able for forty days to repulse the attacks of one Turkish division, but finally fell heroically under the fire of Turkish artillery, commanded by German officers, having previously destroyed all their property so that it would not fall into the hands of their enemies. In the ruined Armenian trenches at Urfa, by the side of Armenian young men there had fallen dead also Armenian young women who, arms in hand, were found all mangled by the German bombs. At