h of it we captured a good convoy of mules,
together with their drivers, headed toward Mosul, and the mules'
loads turned out to consist of good things to eat, including butter
in large quantities. We came on them in the gathering dusk, when
their escort of fifty Turkish infantry had piled arms, we being
totally unexpected. So we captured the fifty rifles as well as the
mules; and, although the mule-drivers gave us the slip next day, and
no doubt gave information about us in Mosul, that did not worry us
much. We cut two telegraph wires leading toward Mosul that same
night; we cut out two miles of wire in sections, riding away with
it, and burned the poles.

After that, whenever we could catch a small party of men, Turks
excepted (for that would have been to give the Turks more
information than we could expect to get from them), Ranjoor Singh
would ask questions about Wassmuss. Most of them would glance toward
the mountains at mention of his name, but few had much to tell about
him. However, bit by bit, our knowledge of his doings and his
whereabouts kept growing, and we rode forward, ever toward the
mountains now, wasting no time and plundering no more than
expedient.

We saw no more living Armenians on all that long journey. The Turks
and Kurds had exterminated them! We rode by burned villages, and
through villages that once had been half-Armenian. The non-Armenian
houses would all be standing, like to burst apart with plunder, but
every single one that had sheltered an Armenian family would lie in
ruins. God knows why! On all our way we found no man who could tell
us what those people had done to deserve such hatred. We asked, but
none could tell us.

One town, through which we rode at full gallop, had Armenian bodies
still lying in the streets, some of them half-burned, and there were
Kurds and Turks busy plundering the houses. Some of them came out to
fire at us, but failed to do us any harm, and, the wind being the
right way, we set a light to a dozen houses at the eastward end. Two
or three miles away we stopped to watch the whole town go up in
flames, and laughed long at the Turks' efforts to save their loot.

As we drew near enough to the mountains to see snow and to make out
the lie of the different ranges, we ceased to have any fear of
pursuit. There was plenty of evidence of Turkish armies not very far
away; in fact, at Mosul there was gathering a very great army
indeed; but they were all so busy killin