"Miss Barton," he said, "we all appreciate this, and in the name of all I promise you that the pit shall be reverently planted, and I trust the time will come when I can tell you that our tree is not only bearing fruit for ourselves, but for all suffering brethren, as theirs have done for us."
I then handed them the check for $397. The moment seemed sacred when these poor dark figures, struggling toward the light, walked out of my presence. The pit has been successfully planted in Galveston, and we are from time to time informed of its bearing.
VII
ARMENIAN RELIEF
1896
Leaving the Port Royal field past midsummer of 1894, after an absence of nearly a year—at a day's notice—the remainder of the autumn and winter was scarcely less occupied in the details which had been unavoidably overlooked. Before spring our correspondence commenced to enlarge with rumors of Armenian massacres, and so excited and rapid was the increase that, so far as actual labor, consultation, and thought were concerned, we might as well have been on a field of relief.
Unfortunately, the suspicions of the Turkish Government had fallen upon the resident missionaries, both English and American, as favoring the views and efforts of its anarchistic population, or the "young Turks," as they were designated. This had the effect of placing the missionaries in danger, confining them strictly to their own quarters, preventing all communication and the receiving of any funds sent them from abroad.
England had a large waiting fund which it could not distribute, and appealed to the American Missionary Boards of Boston and New York, to find them equally powerless. The need of funds among the missionaries throughout Turkey was getting painfully urgent, and as a last resort it was suggested from Constantinople that the Red Cross be asked to open the way.