June 7.—To-day a letter has reached me from Major Taylor, being the first I have received since he removed his family from this place to Bussorah, on the breaking out of the plague here. In every one of the boats going down the river deaths occurred, but especially in theirs, they losing seven of their party. The plague broke out among the Arab sailors, who secreted a corpse in the boat several days, and from them it spread among his African servants, and seized Mrs. Taylor’s brother-in-law, so that I cannot see my early conclusions were wrong as to not moving at that time. And, moreover, the Pasha, or rather Motezellim of Bussorah, has been driven out by a party of Arabs, and he is now come against the town with another large body of Turks, to endeavour to recover it; so that even this evil of the sword we should not have escaped. The Lord, therefore, leaves me nothing to regret, unless it be that I ought perhaps to have kept myself quite apart from the rest of the family, after I had been obliged by a sense of duty to go out during the time the plague was raging. It is easy to be wise after the events are past. The more I contemplate the circumstances in which I have of late been placed, the more I see of the trials and anxieties of the missionary life, and of the mysteriousness of God’s dealings; I feel the more overwhelmed with the importance of the soul having a deep sense of the love of God in Christ, before it ventures upon such an undertaking. Our dear Father very often, in love, explains to us his reasons; at other times, he gives no account of his matters; in the one case to excite love and confidence, in the other, to exercise faith. It does seem to me, that no doctrines but those of the sovereign grace of God, and his love entertained towards the soul, before the foundation of the world, and the revelation by the Holy Ghost of the love and fellowship with Christ, and through him with the Father, so that we have thereby our life hid with him where no evil can reach us, can happily sustain the soul. There is something so filthy, so worthless in all our services, when events render it probable to the soul that soon it will appear before God, that the new creature cannot endure the deformity and defilement, and turns away its distressed sight to the love of the Lord, and the garment he has provided without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. The experience of my dear dear Mary on this head was most striking. She often said to me, “They often talked to me, and I often read of the happiness of religion—but I can truly say I never knew what misery was till I was concerned about religion, and endeavoured to frame my life according to its rules—the manifest powerless inadequacy of my efforts to attain my standard, left me always further removed from hope and peace than when I never knew or thought of the likeness of Christ, as a thing to be aimed after; and it was not till the Holy Ghost was pleased of his infinite mercy to reveal the love of my Heavenly Father in Christ, as existing in himself before all ages, contemplating me with pity, and purposing to save me by his grace, and to conform me to the image of Him whom my soul loves, that I really had peace, or confidence, or strength. And if in any measure I have been able to walk on with joy in the ways of the Lord, it has been from the manifestation of his love, and not from the abstract sense of what is right, nor from the fear of punishment.” This was the theme of her daily praise—the love and graciousness of her Lord; and I can set my seal, though with a comparatively feeble impression, to the same truths, that the sense of the love of Christ is the high road to walk in according to the law of Christ.
June 9.—I have heard from a German merchant, Mr. Swoboda, that above 15,000 persons, many sick with the plague, and others, were buried under the ruins of the houses that fell in the night the water burst into the city. Nothing can give a more awful impression of the mass of misery then in the city, than that such an event, which at another time, would have called forth every exertion to remove the sufferers, and have been the universal conversation and lamentation of the city, passed by without any effort to relieve them, and almost without a word of remark, but from those immediately connected with the sufferers. I hear that those who have closed their houses intend opening them on the 18th inst. I bless God for the intelligence; and trust the plague has quite left us. Mr. Swoboda tells me he does not expect to open his khan again for 12 months;—this, however, does not arise simply from the plague, but because the rich merchants have all left the city, and the principal Jews, from the apprehension of the coming of Ali Pasha from Aleppo, and that in consequence trade is at a stand.
June 10.—Last evening the guns of the citadel fired as for some good news, and we find, on enquiring, that a messenger has come from the Sultan, confirming the Pasha in his Pashalic.[33] The Tartars, who are the bearers of this intelligence, are expected to enter to-morrow or next day. This arrangement, it is reported, has been brought about by our Ambassador at Constantinople.—Should it be the Lord’s pleasure that we now have a little peace and quietness here, it will be a great mercy, and an inconceivable relief from the disquietude of the last 18 months; however, the Lord knows what is best for us. These difficulties have led my heart many times to him, when, perhaps, but for them, it would have rested on some lower object. This prospect of peace seems to bring nearer the possibility of our dear friends joining us from Aleppo, and this would indeed be a great comfort.
June 11.—This day has made manifest that more judgments are coming upon the city, and instead of a Firman in favour Daoud Pasha, bringing peace, we can hear the sound of the cannon of the new Pasha. He will little regard the Firman that has come from the Sultan, if it has really come, and which being here universally believed to have been procured through the instrumentality of our Ambassador, places the English in no very acceptable position; but the Lord is our tower, yea, our high tower, and into him we run. The enemy is now about six miles off, and the whole city is in a state of commotion that cannot be described, every one armed with swords, pistols, and guns, preparing for the expected contest. O Lord, we commend ourselves to thy holy keeping, for thou neither slumberest nor sleepest. When all the difficulties of these countries follow upon one another as rapidly as they have of late done here, it seems very difficult to see how the word of life is to go forth as a testimony. Yet it will; for the Lord hath said it; therefore let not our hearts fail, or our hands hang down, for the Lord of all circumstances, who governs the most disastrous as well as the most prosperous, is our own Lord, the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. All the bazaars are closed, and we are taking in water again at an advanced price. Oh! Lord, when will thy holy and blessed kingdom of peace come, when the nations shall learn war no more, but love and light shall flourish in the Lord! Wherever the blasting influence of Mohammedanism extends, how iron bound all appears against the truth: yet even this the Lord will soften by his love, or break by his power. May my soul be daily more and more sensible of their misery and pride. Poor Mr. Goodell says, in a letter, that after all the labours the American missionaries have bestowed in Syria, they scarcely know an individual to whom their message has been peace, saving in the case of two or three Armenians of whom they hoped well. No one can imagine the disheartening feelings that often try the missionary’s heart in the countries where Mohammedanism is professed and dominant, and where your mouth is sealed. Among heathens, and especially in India, you can publish your testimony, and this is a great comfort to the heart that knows what a testimony it is, and what promises are connected with its publication.
Shortly after we ascended to the roof for our evening walk, we heard the cannon and small arms begin to fire, which informed us that the contest was begun within the city. About eight o’clock we heard multitudes crying out and shouting before the seroy, or palace, and the account was soon brought us that the inhabitants had broken in and seized the Pasha. After this all became quiet, except the firing of guns from the tops of the houses, to frighten off the thieves, and the cry of the watchmen, whom all, who can afford it in these trying occasions, keep to protect them. The Lord has hitherto extended his sheltering wing over us, though without sword, pistol, gun, or powder in the house; and the only men besides myself, are Kitto, who is deaf, and the schoolmaster’s father, who is blind: but the Lord is our hope and our exceeding great reward.
June 12. Lord’s day.—The wretched Pasha has just passed our house under a guard to the residence of Saleh Beg, almost the only male relation he suffered to live of the family he supplanted. The Lord is now visiting on him his cruelty and blood; so that what with the plague and now the sword, there will hardly be one of the apostate Georgians left.
The day dawned quietly; but our house has just been attacked by a band of lawless depredators, asking for powder and offensive weapons. I told them I had none; but seeing a carpenter whom I knew, I told him I would let him and three others in, if they would promise me that no more should come in, which they did. So they entered, and were very civil, though they searched the house: I gave them some money, and they went away, promising that nothing more should be done to my house; but my only confidence is in the Lord. They wanted to go from the roof of my house to that of a rich neighbour’s of mine, but I told them I could not allow that they should make my house a passage to his, and they were very civil and did not press it.
A Frenchman who was teaching the Pasha’s soldiers European discipline, has had his house stripped, and when they were on the point of killing him he turned Mohammedan. Before he was professedly a Roman Catholic, but really an infidel.
Oh, my dear Mary, what a contrast to your kingdom of peace and love! Lord Jesus come quickly. For this I can now truly bless God that she is freed from this season of trouble and anxiety. The dear children bear it better than I could have hoped; but the Lord sustains and comforts us in the hope that as the new Pasha is near, this state of inquietude may not continue long. The Pasha of Mosul and an Arab chief have entered the city, and are now at the palace, so thank God, the state of anarchy is likely to be immediately put an end to. The crier has been publishing the determination of those now acting for the new Pasha, till he enters to punish all who commit any depredations, and desiring that the bazaars may be opened, and every one go about his own work. Should this be the end, we cannot but bless God that so great a storm has passed over so lightly. But the fact was, that the plague had destroyed all the powers of resistance. All Daoud Pasha’s soldiers were dead—all his public servants were dead—and he, though recovering from the plague, unable to take any active part for himself. When he passed our house this morning, he was supported on his horse by six men. He is not yet killed, and on his expressing a wish to have his son brought to him, he was sent for immediately. Should they spare his life, it may augur that even the Turks are coming to a sense of their barbarism. It has been a great comfort to me to-day, to think on Noah’s case, that God did not forget him amidst a condemned world.
June 14.—The people at the head of affairs have now begun to quarrel among themselves: some are for killing Daoud Pasha, some are for saving him, and the opposite parties are fighting in all directions; so when these troubles will terminate, or how, we have little knowledge. Our only resting place is in him who is the Shepherd of the fold of Israel.