prevent unnecessary waste of money and effort on things which are not essential to the main undertaking. The French spent vast sums in banquets, in buying needless machinery, in making lateral ditches, in drawings, and in numberless other ways. Never employing more than 30,000 workmen, they had an army of 3,000 or 4,000 clerks and office men. The chief function of most of these worthies appeared to be to wear silk hats, drink champagne, and draw big salaries. The plans alone of the Canal, made by the French, would fill a large room, and cost several millions of dollars. Why they should want the hundredth part of those plans, no practical contractor can imagine. A profile of the Canal itself ought to be almost as simple as that of a railway of the same length; while, according to my views, no plans at all are needed of the auxiliary works, for the simple reason that the works themselves are unnecessary. It is to be feared that the American engineers will follow in the footsteps of the French, in the production of vast numbers of elaborately detailed but unnecessary drawings. There has been so much time and money spent in this sort of work that I am almost tempted to say that we should go ahead and dig the Canal first, and make the drawings of it afterwards. A man who knows anything of construction work becomes disgusted at the evidences of French mismanagement visible everywhere along the line of the Canal, and impatient of anything which savors of delay. Millions of dollars' worth of machinery are scattered for fifty miles in utter ruin. Everywhere there is proof that the French spent money on every imaginable side issue, and on every scheme conceivable except the main work. It is evident that there is only one way to finish the Canal, and that is to dig dirt, but the French seem to have tried every other method. Shall we follow in their footsteps? Shall we waste millions on collateral issues, such as dams, reservoirs, locks, aqueducts, etc., instead of digging dirt as we ought to do? Shall we fuss along with this work for the next quarter of a century with a handful of Southern negroes? I believe that from 100,000 to 150,000 men can be advantageously employed on this Canal, and that it ought to be finished before the end of the next Presidential Administration.

The construction of the Canal should be regarded in precisely the same manner as the prosecution of a war. The sooner it is finished the better. It would be wiser to spend $200,000,000 or

even $300,000,000 and get the Canal completed in three or four years, than to have it drag along for twenty or thirty years at any price. The contractors doing the work should be paid good prices, and the most untiring activity should be demanded of them. In a battle, no general requires his officers to make detailed reports of the number of ounces of powder consumed, or calls them to account for having fired more shots than were probably necessary. On the contrary, his chief concern is that the enemy shall be defeated and at once. Having due regard to correct business principles and honest administration, the United States should avoid picayunish methods in connection with this great work. The proper policy is to pay good prices to the contractors, treat them liberally, and insist upon the best and promptest service possible. Contractors should be required to pay good wages to their men, and treat them fairly and liberally, giving employment to every man who can be advantageously used. Niggardliness should be avoided on the one hand, and the extravagance of the French on the other.

The United States ought to be advertising to receive bids at the present moment on all sections of the Culebra Cut. That work is perfectly simple, and any engineer ought in a month's time to draw specifications for it. Contractors should have sixty days in which to submit bids, and in ninety days after the award of the contracts, they should commence work. Within four years after work is commenced, the biggest steamship in the world ought to be able to pass from one end to the other without interruption. With from sixty to a hundred contractors, each working in three shifts daily, and employing from 1,000 to 2,000 men, with adequate machinery, there is no reason why this work should drag along for any great length of time. But if our engineers spend another year or two getting up plans, and the Government does the work with 8,000 or 10,000 Southern negroes, supplying them with "good food" and "clothing," our great-grandchildren will probably not see the work finished, nor will their great-grandchildren see the end of the payments on account of the expense which it will involve.

GEORGE W. CRICHFIELD.

THE ARMENIAN CHURCH IN ITS RELATION TO THE RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT.

BY SAMUEL GRAHAM WILSON.

A CRISIS has arisen in the history of the Gregorian-Armenian Church. This crisis pertains to the whole Armenian Church, but has special relation to the million and a half Armenians who inhabit Transcaucasia. Etchmiadzin, the primitive seat of Gregory the Illuminator, and the six dioceses into which the Armenian Church is divided, have during the past year been the scene of agitations and protests, of demonstrations, popular and clerical, and of incipient rebellion against the Czar and his administration. The Armenians of Transcaucasia are stirred to their hearts' depths, and moved to action as even the massacres in Turkey did not move them.

What has precipitated this crisis? What has occasioned such a sudden and unexpected ecclesiastical and national ferment? I shall answer these questions, not as an advocate of either side, but letting the facts speak for themselves.

I. The immediate cause of this ferment is an ukase of the Czar regarding the properties of the Gregorian-Armenian Church and its endowment. This edict was issued on June 12th, 1903, in accordance with a decision of the Administrative Council, acting on the advice of Prince Galitzin, the Governor-General of the Transcaucasus. It decrees that the Russian Government shall take immediate possession of all the properties and funds pertaining to the Armenian churches, monasteries, religious institutions, church-schools, and seminaries—namely lands, cultivated or uncultivated, of whatever name or kind, forests, fields, fisheries, mills and shops, and cash funds. These shall be taken from the control of the Armenian clergy and institutions. Endowments and funds at interest shall be delivered to the Minister

of the Interior, while properties shall be given over to the administration of the Minister of Agriculture and Government Properties. The decree applies also to all properties and funds that may in future be donated or bequeathed to the Church or its Institutions. It does not apply to properties in St. Petersburg and Moscow, nor to land actually occupied by churches, monasteries, parsonages, and parish schools, or in use for cemeteries and gardens surrounding them which are not a source of income. It professes to preserve the right of ownership to the Gregorian Church, but declares that the present administration is contrary to the interests of the Government and even of the Armenians themselves. It assures them that the income and interest shall be paid to the Church institutions, priests and parishes, after deducting the cost of administration, taxes and repairs, and five per cent. to be used for a capital for the benefit of the Church. Any questions or doubts about the interpretation of this ukase shall be decided by the Minister of the Interior, and not referred to the courts for decision.

The

These Church properties consist of such remnants of donations and bequests from the faithful during sixteen centuries of the Church's history as have escaped the hands of the spoilers. Some villages, mills, and water-rights belong to the monasteries, and the villages have in the past paid their rents to the Church. These lands are, however, small in amount and do not in themselves create any question. Of late years, considerable endowments have been given for the schools and seminaries. amount involved is not more than $75,000,000. The grief and indignation of the Armenians arise not so much from the loss of the property, though they regard that as virtually confiscated. Their sorrow proceeds from the fact that they see in the decree a forceful measure against the independence of their national Church, whereby their clergy, from the village priest to the Catholicos, with their monasteries and seminaries, are bound to and made dependent on the Russian Administration, and the whole Church prepared to be more easily constrained to enter the fold of Orthodoxy. They see in it a further advance toward crushing out their national life and amalgamating them with the Russian race.

II. Let us briefly indicate the conflicting desires and aims of the Russian Government and the Armenians.

After the Russo-Persian war of 1828, the Armenians of Transcaucasia, with Etchmiadzin, their ecclesiastical centre, and their Catholicos, passed under the rule of Russia. Then Czar Nicholas I. gave a constitution to the Armenian Church, called Polojenya. In it Russia assumed the right to direct the internal affairs of the Church. It appointed a Russian procurator to reside at Etchmiadzin, to supervise all proceedings of the Synod, and especially to control the election of the Catholicos. The power of the latter was gradually restricted. Continual friction between the Church and the Government caused increasing irritation and distrust.

The Czar's Government has a definite and decided purpose. It aims to amalgamate the Armenians with the Slavic element, first by extending the Russian language among them, and secondly by bringing them into the Orthodox fold. When schools were authorized among them, it was stipulated that the Russian language should be taught. Undoubtedly, a knowledge of Russian is advantageous to the Armenians, yet after seventy-five years, it is estimated that only three or four per cent. of them read or speak Russian. Bringing the Armenians to accept the Græco-Russian faith was regarded as hopeful, because the Georgians had been so easily converted. There was organized in the Caucasus a "Society for the Propagation of Orthodoxy," which receives funds from the Government, but its conciliatory advances have not met with any marked success. Russian efforts have rather been of a repressive nature. They have striven to strangle Armenian national aspirations and check their national development. Regarding the Church as the head and centre of the race, they have sought to curtail its privileges, abridge its ancient prerogatives, and bring it into submission, with the hope of ultimate organic union.

On the other hand, the Armenians were alert and active, not only to resist these endeavors, but to work out an ideal of a greater future for themselves. The national spirit manifested itself in the founding of schools, libraries, theatres, newspapers, and philanthropic and publication societies. These in turn have helped to develop the national spirit. The watchword of the movement has been, "Our Race." It has developed a patriotism which is intense, fervid, overpowering. It has aimed at the preservation of their language and the development of a new national literature, and at keeping the race free from admixture with Georgians and Russians. Many families who had forgotten