The Hastings Standard Published Daily. TUESDAY, MARCH 2, 1897. THE GREAT WAR OF 1898.

Hastings Standard, Issue 260, 2 March 1897, Page 2

The Hastings Standard Published Daily.

TUESDAY, MARCH 2, 1897. THE GREAT WAR OF 1898.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the wrongs that need resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

A few years ago Captain ile Quoux published a book entitled "The Great War of IH9H," and it depicted, with the realistic aid of lifelike engravings the wholesale slaughter and rniii that had resulted. The great war of IB9H is predicted from more than one source and everything points to its fulfilment, and the total dismemberment of the Turkish Empire. At the present time all the civilized nations are in horror at the attempts of the Mahonmiedan Government to destroy the Christians in Armenia. It may be thought that t he Tu r k i s h Go ve rn 111 en t h as take 11 a 11 e w of tragedy on the stage of nations. No, no! Shts is at the same old business. Overlooking her diabolism of other centuries, we come down to our century to find that in IN'2'2 the Turkish Government murdered •>O.OOO antiMoslems, in is 10, 10,000; in I*oo. 11,000, and in 1*76 she slew 10.000. Anything short of the slaughter of thousands of human beings does not put enough red wine into her cup of abomination to make it wortli quailing. Nor is this the only time she has promised reform. In the presence of the warships at the mouth of the Dardannelles, she has promised the civilised nations of the earth that she would stop her butcheries, and the international and hemispheric farce has been enacted of believing what -he say-;, when all the past ought to jxr-iiade us that she is only pausing in her atrocities to put nations off t!ie track and then resume the work of death. In In'2o Turkey, in treaty with Russia, promised to alleviate the conditions of Christians, but the proini-e was broken. In 1 H '>t> the then Sultan promised protection of life and property without reference to religion, and the promise was broken. In 1 aft-1 the Crimean war, Turkey promised that no one should be hindered in th< e\en*i<e of the religion hi- profe»eJ. and that promise has been broken. In IS7*<. at the memorable treaty of Heriin, Turkey promised religious liberty to all her subjects in every part of the Ottoman Empire, and the^

promise was broken. Not once in all the centuries has the Turkish Government kept her promise of mercy. So far from any improvement, the condition of the Armenians has become wor.se and worse year by year, and all the promises the Turkish Government now make are only a gaining of time by which she is making preparation for the complete extermination of Christianity from her borders. These are some of the modes of extermination resorted to : Hundreds of villages destroyed ! Young men put in piles of brushwood, which are then saturated with kerosene and sc-t on tire ! Mothers, in the most solemn hour that ever comes in a woman's life, hurled out and bayonetted! Eyes gouged out, and dead and dying hurled into the same pit! The slaughter of Lucknow and Cawnpore, India, in 1857, eclipsed in ghastliness ! The worst scenes of the French revolution in Paris made more tolerable in contrast ! In many regions of Armenia the only undertakers to-day are the jackals and hyenas. Is it to be marvelled, therefore, that the war-clouds of Europe are to-day arising from the horrizon like grim worriers ready for battle. And is it not safe to predict " The meeting of nations" at an early period. Turkey, as a nation, will sink into oblivion and her territory will be fought for between the Powers. The great war will affect every quarter of the earth, and commerce will for the time, stand still. The day is not far distant when the collision of nations will take place.