from the mountains and the people in
panic threw away their goods and hurried in a frenzy of fear down the
mountain passes. They passed on to the plain, and then as they were
in a village guns began to be fired. Three hundred Turks and Persians
were attacking under Majdi--Sultana of Urumia. Dr. Shedd, riding his
horse, gathered together some Armenian and Assyrian men with guns and
stayed with them to help them hold back the enemy, while the women
drove on. He was a good target sitting up there on his horse; but
without thinking of his own danger he kept his men at it. For he felt
like a shepherd with a great flock of fleeing sheep whom it was his
duty to protect.

Panic seized the people. Strong men left their old mothers to die.
Mothers dropped their babies and ran.

"One of my school-girls," Mrs. Shedd says, "afterward told me how she
had left her baby on the bank and waded with an older child through
the river when the enemy were coming after them. She couldn't carry
both. The memory of her deserted baby is always with her."

The line of the refugees stretched for miles along the road. The enemy
fired from behind boulders on the mountain sides. The Armenians and
Syrians fired back from the road or ran up the mountains to chase
them. It was hopeless to think of driving the enemy off but Dr.
Shedd's object was to hold them off till help came. So he went up and
down on his horse encouraging the men; while the bullets whizzed over
the wagons.

"I feared," said Mrs. Shedd, "that the enemy might get the better of
us and we should have to leave the carts and run for our lives. While
they were plundering the wagons and the loads we would get away. I
looked about me to see what we might carry. There was little May,
six years old (the daughter of one of their Syrian teachers) who had
unconcernedly curled herself up on the seat for a nap. I wrapped a
little bread in a cloth, put my glasses in my pocket, and took the bag
of money so that I should be ready on a moment's notice for Dr. Shedd
if they should swoop down upon us."

All day long the firing went on from the mountain side as the tired
horses pulled along the rough trail. The sun began to sink toward the
horizon. What would happen in the darkness?

Then they saw ahead of them coming from the south a group of men in
khaki. They were nine British Tommies with three Lewis guns under
Captain Savage. They had come ahead from the main body that had moved
up from Baghda