Forty Days of Musa Dagh

by Franz Werfel

  Vehemently he beat upon his breast, again and again, to punish at least himself for the mocker and still his rage. Then, in the resumed stillness, he went across to Harutiun Nokhudian and his band, stopped a little distance away from them, bowed very low, and said in his resonant, priestly voice: "To us you will always be holy. May we be holy to you."

  Bagradian was thinking feverishly. An unstemmed rush of new ideas swept him along. The great work of defence went ardently forward in his mind. Ever since the decision had fallen, he had been only half listening to what happened. His whipped-up thoughts noted and reflected simultaneously. What a giant of inspiration this Ter Haigasun had shown himself to be! "It's invaluable," the thought flashed through him, "that I should have this authority rooted in the soil behind me." And it seemed a further stroke of fortune that the good Nokhudian, and a few hundred more non-combatants, should have chosen otherwise. "They'll be useful in keeping our movements and decisions from the saptiehs till the very last minute. The villages mustn't be empty. The Turks mustn't begin to suspect before we're ready for them." Gabriel's plan went on unfolding itself. His forbears' calculating intelligence, all the shrewdness of grandfather Avetis, were uppermost now in this, their other-worldly grandson, that simple idealist at whom his more distant relations, hardheaded merchants, had always smiled. From every considered actuality there spun forth its inevitable series of ghostly threads of future consequence, and not one thread was inessential. An impetuous ambition took hold of Bagradian. So, according to Ali Nassif's report, the müdir would arrive with his escort three days after this present Sunday. By Wednesday, therefore, all the foundations would have to be laid, from which to build in the days that followed. Now was the moment to test what he had always believed, that mind must triumph over matter, even in its highest, most intense manifestations -- force and chance.

  No wonder that, held fast by his scheming thoughts, intoxicated with self-reliance, he should have forgotten even his wife, been scarcely conscious of all the bustle surrounding him. All this was sheer waste of time. A few village speech-makers were still talking. But what, now that the great die was cast, did their clumsy, empty words matter to him? They were all equally bellicose -- not a single voice in opposition. Ter Haigasun gave the people plenty of breathing-space for this spirit of valiant resolution to take deep anchorage in their midst, so that the hesitant and timid might be drawn in. But, before the first wave of exhaustion threatened, he stepped forward, interrupting the speaker, and decreed that they should at once choose representatives. The village clerk of Yoghonoluk went round with a basket, collecting voting-papers. The schoolteachers, helped by Avakian, lost no time in beginning the count inside the villa.

  It goes without saying that the majority of votes went to Ter Haigasun. Immediately after him came the doctor. Then the seven mukhtars and three village priests, with the votes of their congregations. Then, with a considerable gap, Apothecary Krikor, and some of the schoolteachers, among whom, of course, were Shatakhian and Oskanian. Gabriel got about the same number of votes as Pastor Aram Tomasian. Among the non-official villagers old Tomasian and Chaush Nurhan, the ex-regular sergeant, were elected to leadership. One woman, Mairik Antaram, received a large number of votes -- in these parts a decided innovation. She energetically refused to accept. Shatakhian read out the results. Those selected retired into the house to draw up their rules as a corporate body. Gabriel had told Kristaphor and Missak to have everything ready for a sitting in the big selamlik -- cold food, wine, and coffee. The crowd -- even those mothers with small children at home to be looked after -- remained in the grounds, encamped here and there in the big garden. Comestibles were sent for, from Yoghonoluk. The master of the house sent out a ration of water, wine, fruit, and tobacco. Soon gossip, mingled with cigarette smoke and the bubbling of comfortable chibuks, rose in the evening air, as though nothing had happened. Pastor Nokhudian's adherents left with their leader to go home to Bitias. It was a quiet and dreary setting forth. A few of the younger of this band turned back at the garden door and joined the main encamped body of the people, whose zest for life, after weeks of coma, seemed for the first time now to have returned. Now in this short, fugitive interval between everyday routine and the unknown, incomprehensible pleasure invaded their souls. Why? Because more than mere suffering lay before them, because, though they suffered, in and above their pain there would be action.

  The night of Musa Dagh quickly absorbed the July twilight. Eastward, a horizontal half-moon pushed off from the ragged peaks of the Amanus and sailed into open sky. The doors of Villa Bagradian stood wide open. The inquisitive might go in and out unhindered. The leaders of the people had gathered in the big selamlik. This council of leaders, a group of thirty, seemed to itself at first very helpless. The mayors of the other villages, the priests and schoolteachers, who were in this house for the first time, sat or stood about in awkward silences. Some may only now have become aware of the full audacity of this step to which the unexpected, impetuous course of the great assembly had committed them. Gabriel instantly sensed an acrid stink of flickering courage, given off by certain of the chosen. The lukewarm must on no account be allowed to "come to their senses"; no fundamental "if's" or "but's" must be spoken. The people had taken its lawful decision; there could be no vacillations now; these fires of defensive resolution should be fanned into a towering flame. It was Bagradian's job as master of the house to put an end to this shapeless hanging about of tepid men, to get the people's council under way, and to have fruitful tasks ready for all. Every advantage of his Western education must make itself felt. He did the only thing that was to be done. He turned with solemnity to Ter Haigasun.

  "Ter Haigasun, it was more than the people outside that elected you. I speak for all here, when I say this: We beg you to be the supreme head of our struggle. In peacetime you held an office of leadership and, as spiritual head of the communes, you have done your duty with the greatest self-sacrifice till today. It is God's will, by the cruelty of men, to extend your powers. We all want to make you the solemn promise that, in every decision we may make, in every precautionary measure on which we decide, we will submit to your final veto without a murmur. Not until you have endorsed them, shall the resolutions of this council of leaders become valid and so be given the power of laws, binding on our whole people."

  This little speech brought its self-evident result. Nobody else but Ter Haigasun could possibly have been chosen supreme head. Not even Mr. Schoolmaster Hrand Oskanian would have ventured a secret sneer at this established fact. And Gabriel's words sounded agreeably in the ears of his listeners, especially of those to whom he was still a mistrusted foreigner. Two trains of thought brought this soothing effect: Many had been expecting that "the Frenchman" would snatch the leadership on the strength of his Western superiority. And then -- an even deeper reason -- Bagradian's speech, its solemn form as well as its legal content, prepared the ground on which all future decisions could be built up. These few words had quite imperceptibly laid down the fundamental law for this newly constituted entity about to form itself. Ter Haigasun made the sign of the cross in silence, to show that he consented to take office, with all its heavy responsibility. From this moment there were two legal powers -- the Council of Leaders and the Supreme Head of the People, who, though he presided over the council, had alone the power to make its resolutions legally valid. Every member came up to Ter Haigasun to kiss his hand, according to custom, and took the oath. Only when this ceremony was over, did a wide circle take form along several tables set end to end. Gabriel Bagradian had war maps and complete data in front of him. Samuel Avakian stood behind him, ready to be consulted. When Gabriel, with a look, had asked for silence, he stood up.

  "My friends, the sun went down two hours ago, and it will have risen again in another six. We have only about six hours to get through the whole of our thinking. When we go out tomorrow morning, to face the people again, there must be no more uncertainty. Our will must be clear and unanimous.r />
  "But this is the most necessary measure. In the very first hours of tomorrow morning all who are young and strong enough must go up to the Damlayik and begin to build the fortifications. I beg you, therefore, to save time. It is an advantage to all of us that some time ago I worked out all the details of our plan of defence. I can give you my suggestions at once, I think that in these sittings it will be best to work by the same rules as those at our communal meetings. I ask Ter Haigasun's leave to explain my plan. . . ."

  Ter Haigasun, as his habit was, half shut his eyes, giving his face a tired and agonized look. "Let us hear Gabriel Bagradian."

  Gabriel spread out the best of Avakian's three maps. "We shall have a thousand minor tasks to perform, but, if once we look at the thing correctly, we find that they all come under two main headings. The first and most important is our actual method of defence. Even our second, the way we organize our life together, must serve that struggle above all. I'll begin with it. . . ."

  Pastor Aram Tomasian raised a hand to interrupt. "We all know that Gabriel Bagradian, as an officer, knows most about military matters. The fighting leadership goes to him. . . ."

  All hands went up in assent to this. But Pastor Aram had not done yet: "For some time Gabriel Bagradian has been concentrating his whole mind on the plan of defence. It would be best to leave him to arrange our resistance. I therefore suggest that we postpone all discussion of his tactical scheme till we've a clear idea how, and for how long, five thousand people, cut off from the rest of the world, can live on the Damlayik."

  Gabriel, who had been in full spate, sighed and let his maps fall back on the table. "My arrangements included that problem. I've made notes on these maps for everything necessary to maintain life. But, if Pastor Tomasian likes, I'm perfectly ready to put off explaining my scheme of defence."

  Bedros Altouni, the doctor, had not long managed to sit quietly in his parliamentary seat. He wandered, growling, about the room, to suggest that, at this moment of urgent peril, debates, with a show of hands and speeches, seemed to him ridiculous frivolity. His growling impatience was in sharp contrast to the dignified impassivity of Krikor, who sat immobile, in an attitude which seemed to ask: "When shall I be free to escape in peace from this barbarous encroachment on the one thing in life which beseems me or makes it worth living?" The doctor, fidgeting round the room, made a sudden remark, which had nothing whatever to do with present business: "Five thousand people are five thousand people, and the heat of the sun's the heat of the sun. And cloudbursts are cloudbursts."

  Gabriel, to whom these problems of housing, of the town enclosure, the care of the children, had caused so many sleepless nights, took up this remark of the doctor. "It would be best for our protection to keep all the children between the ages of two and seven in one shelter."

  The hitherto silent Ter Haigasun rejected this suggestion most decisively. "What Gabriel Bagradian has just advised would mean the beginning of very dangerous disorders. We must not sunder what God and time have bound together. On the contrary, it seems to me highly essential that single parishes, and in fact, single families, should not be separated more than is absolutely necessary. Relations ought all to have their own separate encampment, every village its camping-ground. The mukhtars to be responsible to their own people, as usual. We ought to change the relationships to which we are accustomed down here as little as possible."

  Emphatic, unanimous assent, which implied a minor failure for Bagradian. Ter Haigasun had guaranteed them as close an approximation as possible to their normal life. The prospect had a very soothing effect. For, to peasants, the worst, most cruel thing that can befall them is expressed in the one word -- change. But Gabriel would not give way so easily. He sent round the map, with his drawing of the town enclosure. Everyone recognized the wide meadow pasturage of the communal flocks. It began to dawn on them that this big, stoneless expanse of grass was the only possible camping-ground. There would have been room enough for two thousand families, let alone one thousand, on it. Gabriel skilfully compromised with Ter Haigasun. The allotment of family and communal camping-grounds could easily be arranged as the priest desired. And he found himself agreeing with Ter Haigasun. On the other hand, they would have to admit that the thousand families could not possibly run separate establishments; that it would never work if the common resources were not pooled. They need only work out the saving in food and fuel, the gain in free labor power. Apart from this, there would really be no possibility of holding out for a long time if it were not arranged that beasts must be slaughtered, bread and grain distributed, goat's milk allotted to children and invalids, only according to strictly determined regulations. Whatever else might be done to classify people according to family, the ticklish question of private ownership could not be got round. Since he, Bagradian, was willing to place his whole possessions, in so far as they were obtainable and divisible, at the disposal of the common defence -- all the cattle on his farm, all the supplies in his house and cellar -- everyone else must contribute his share. These circumstances imperatively demanded the communal distribution of goods. It would be quite impossible for each individual family to slaughter its own sheep. Milk must go to those who needed it, and not, for instance, to any strong, well-fed people who happened to own a couple of goats. The notion, which some perhaps still cherished, that up on the Damlayik it would still be possible to buy certain privileges for money, was a childish dream. From the instant the communes arrived in camp, money would cease to have the remotest value. And all barter would have to be strictly forbidden, since from that day on all goods would be the goods of the people, to be used to defend their lives in battle. No one who had clearly perceived that exile meant the loss of all he possessed would surely think the demands of Musa Dagh worth another second's hesitation.

  But at once it was plain that in making these just demands Gabriel had erred most sadly. It had not so much as entered these peasant minds -- though a few hours back they had known with such inevitable certainty that they stood face to face with exile and death -- that now their own would cease to belong to them. It was more than the mere loss that produced their obstinacy -- it was the disciplined inevitability, the "European," in Gabriel's words. This led on to a time-wasting argument, which was fruitless, if for no other reason than that the most determined peasant skull could conceive no alternative. A bandying of words which only served to vent disgruntlement. Ter Haigasun waited a certain time. A short, warning glance across to Gabriel: "It's necessary to be rather careful in making these people see the obvious." Then he interrupted their empty chatter:

  "We are going up to the mountain and shall have to live there. Many things will arrange themselves which we needn't bother our heads discussing at present. It would be better if you mukhtars would begin to think out the most urgent matters: Will it be possible to have enough supplies taken up there? For how many weeks do you think they'll be likely to last? Is there any possible means of supplementing them?"

  And here Pastor Tomasian had another, very feasible suggestion. It was the mukhtars' business to get together and work out their own estimate of provisions, and scheme for the commissariat. And this not only applied to the commissariat, but to all other matters to be discussed. This general council was unwieldy. They were not here to talk and argue, but to work. He, Aram Tomasian, therefore proposed that the various departments should get together, and each form a separate committee. Each of these committees to be presided over by a head, named by Ter Haigasun. The heads to form a closer, separate council which should have in its hands the actual management of affairs. There would be five departments: First, Defence; second, Legislation, which concerned Ter Haigasun alone; then came Internal Order; then all that concerned Public Health and Sickness; and lastly the special affairs of single communes, as against those of the whole community. Gabriel enthusiastically welcomed the young pastor's inspiration, and for the first time Dr. Altouni also gave some signs of assent. No one demurred. Ter Haigasun, to whom the inev
itable chatter of a big council was as uncongenial as to Aram, at once endorsed this legislative arrangement. Chaush Nurhan, the teacher Shatakhian, and two younger men, whom he selected, were assigned as a military committee to assist Gabriel. Aram Tomasian also made one of this Committee of Defence. In the same way Gabriel was himself a member of the Committee of Internal Order, led by the pastor. This committee made itself responsible for everything connected with the obtaining and rationing of supplies. Therefore, Thomas Kebussyan and the other mukhtars were members. The elder Tomasian, the builder, found himself solely entrusted with the business of erecting huts. It need scarcely be said that Dr. Altouni and the detached apothecary, Krikor, had to form the Committee of Public Health. With that they had all achieved a rough and ready division of labor. In the next few hours these isolated groups were to make what provision they could for their departments. So that then, in the early morning, a short sitting of the General Council would be enough to estimate results. The mukhtars went outside to get directly from their villagers a possible estimate of supplies. Gabriel was to follow them later and, with their help, to muster the youngest, strongest men, who, early next day, were to begin digging-operations on the main line of trenches between the north peaks. Meanwhile, map in hand, he eagerly explained his plan of defence to Ter Haigasun, Aram Tomasian, and the rest. Even Krikor began to be curious and came across to listen.