Note 267 — Chapter XXV · [267] MARIAM

[The statements at the beginning of this chapter are altogether inaccurate. From the religious point of view a good Mohammedan is as much, and more, bound than a Christian to encourage any form of missionary enterprise, seeing that all non-Moslems are destined to inevitable damnation. From the legal and practical point of view, the exercise of all religions is nominally free in Turkey and it is therefore illegal to convert a Christian at the point of the sword, but it will be sufficient to remind the reader that during the massacres of 1895–96 many thousands of Armenians turned Mohammedans, and that those who wished to subsequently return to their old religion found great difficulty in doing so.