And when the first greetings were over, the full chorus of manly voices--"Home Again," "Sweet Land of Liberty," "Nearer My God to Thee"--that rolled out through the open windows of the Red Cross headquarters in Constantinople fell on the listening ears of Christian and Moslem alike, and though the tones were new and strange, all felt that to some one, somewhere, they meant more than the mere notes of music.
On our return to "civilization" we were rejoiced to find that as a result of our three months' labors, the former tumult of Armenia had died away into a peaceful echo, but a new murmur fast growing to clamor had taken its place. Cuba had entered the ceaseless arena of American, gladiatorial, humanitarian contest. The cruelties of the reconcentrado system of warfare had become apparent, and methods of relief were uppermost in the minds of all persons.
These methods were twofold and might well be classed under two distinct heads: those who for mere pity's sake sought simple relief; those who with a further forecast sought the removal of a cause as well as its effect, and "Cuba Libre" was its muffled cry. They asked money for arms as well as bread, and the struggle between the two held the country in a state of perplexed contradiction for months running into years.
Our great-hearted President asked simple aid and was distressed at the doubtful response. At length he suggested and we proffered the aid of the Red Cross on a call to the country, and the establishment of the "Central Cuban Relief Committee" in New York, within three days, was the result.
The activity and success of that committee are too fresh in the minds of all our people to require the smallest description from me. Too much praise can not be given to our Auxiliary Societies from the Atlantic to the Pacific for the splendid work in the camps at home, in Cuba, Porto Rico, and in the care of our soldiers in transit to the Philippines. Their full and complete reports show the great work accomplished. The memory of the work of the busy men and tireless women who joined heart and hand in this Heaven-sent task still brings tears to the eyes of a nation at its recall.
The service assigned me by our anxious President, and gladly accepted, was the distribution on the pitiful fields of Cuba. These scenes I would not recall. The starving mothers and motherless babes, the homelessness and squalor, the hopelessness and despair, are beyond all words and all conception, save to those who saw and lived among them. It is past and let it rest.