alloping through the gap with a little slip of
twisted paper in his teeth.

"Bring them along," said the message. "Don't halt again until you
overtake me."

So I made every one of the mounted men take up a man behind, and the
rest of the unmounted men I ordered into the carts, including
Tugendheim's Syrians, judging it better to overtax the animals than
to be too long on the road. And the long and short of that was that
we overtook Ranjoor Singh at about four that afternoon. Our animals
were weary, but the men were fit to fight.

Ranjoor Singh ordered Abraham to take the Syrians and all the carts
and horses down into a hollow where there was a water-hole, and to
wait there for further orders. Tugendheim was bidden come with us on
foot; and without any explanation he led us all toward a low ridge
that faced us, rising here and there into an insignificant hill. It
looked like blown sand over which coarse grass had grown, and such
it proved to be, for it was on the edge of another desert. It was
fifty or sixty feet high, and rather difficult to climb, but he led
us straight up it, cautioning us to be silent and not to show
ourselves on the far side. On the top we crawled forward eighteen or
twenty yards on our bellies, until we lay at last gazing downward.
It was plain then whence those half-gorged vultures came.

Who shall describe what we saw? Did the sahib ever hear of Armenian
massacres? This was worse. If this had been a massacre we would have
known what to do, for our Sikh creed bids us ever take the part of
the oppressed. But this was something that we did not understand,
that held us speechless, each man searching his own heart for
explanation, and Ranjoor Singh standing a little behind us watching
us all.

There were hundreds of men, women and little children being herded
by Turks toward the desert--southward. The line was long drawn out,
for the Armenians were weary. They had no food with them, no tents,
and scarcely any clothing. Here and there, in parties at intervals
along the line, rode Turkish soldiers; and when an Armenian, man or
woman or child, would seek to rest, a Turk would spur down on him
and prick him back into line with his lance--man, woman or child, as
the case might be. Some of the Turks cracked whips, and when they
did that the Armenians who were not too far spent would shudder as
if the very sound had cut their flesh. How did I know they were
Armenians? I did not know. I learned that af