Chapter XIV A MODERN THERMOPYLÆ
"In yon strait path a thousand
May well be stopped by three;
Now who will stand on either hand,
And keep the (way) with me?"
—T. B. Macaulay.
Jack often went after this to the Protestant church to hear Pastor Stepanian preach. He had been much impressed by his words, and still more by his remarkable personality; and there was the added pleasure of worshipping with Shushan, who sat demurely by Miss Celandine on the women's side of the church. Oriort Elmas was there too—a noble-looking girl, a good deal taller than Shushan, and far less regularly beautiful, but with a face full of intelligence. He heard much of her courage and charity in ministering to the poor and sick, as well as of her loving care of her young brothers and sister. He met her once or twice at the Vartonians, with whom she was very intimate; and he thought Kevork a fortunate man; with the mental reservation that he was much more fortunate himself—a reflection which makes it easy to "rejoice with them that do rejoice."
Jack heard from Shushan, when he visited her, many lamentations over the departure of her beloved young teacher, Miss Fairchild. Many stories lingered in Urfa, and were told him by the Vartonians, of those loving ministrations to the poor, and especially to the Sassoun refugees, which had nearly cost the young missionary her life; and also of the gratitude and affection with which they were repaid. Once during her illness, when her life was almost despaired of, a poor man, a seller of antiquities, heard that she had asked for fish. This seemed impossible to procure, for it was summer, and the Euphrates, from which fish was brought in winter, was two days' journey off. But, in the midst of the city is the beautiful Pool of Abraham, where are kept the sacred fish, which every one feeds, and which the Moslems esteem so highly, it is death to touch one of them. The poor Armenian watched by the pool until the darkest and most silent hour of the night; then, at the peril of his life, he caught some of the fish, and brought them to the Mission House. David's Three Mighty Men, who brought the water from the well of Bethlehem, did no more.