In a letter to an indignation meeting held in London, December 17th,
1894, Mr. Gladstone wrote denouncing these outrages of the Turks. The
reading of the letter was greeted with prolonged applause.
A deputation of Armenian gentlemen, residing in London and in Paris,
took occasion on Mr. Gladstone's 85th birthday, December 29th, 1894, to
present a silver chalice to Hawarden Church as "a memorial of Mr.
Gladstone's sympathy with and assistance to the Armenian people." Mr.
Gladstone's address to the deputation was regarded as one of the most
peculiar and characteristic acts of his life. He gave himself wholly to
the cause of these oppressed people, and was stirred by the outrages and
murders perpetrated upon them as he was 18 years before. He said that
the Turks should go out as they did go out of Bulgaria "bag and
baggage," and he denounced the government of the Sultan as "a disgrace
to Mahomet, the prophet whom it professed to follow, a disgrace to
civilization at large, and a curse to mankind." He contended that every
nation had ever the right and the authority to act "on behalf of
humanity and of justice."
There were those who condemned Mr. Gladstone's speech, declaring that it
might disrupt the peace of Europe, but there were many others who
thought that the sooner peace secured at such a cost was disturbed the
better.
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