[1] The four jars, when full of water, weighed more than one hundred and fifty pounds.
It was on Monday that Suleeba was sent to the camp, and things remained thus till Friday. "A little after sunrise on that day, a gendarme came and said, 'The Protestants are wanted at the palace.' We were taken to the Muteserif, and he began to curse us in the vilest manner for not giving the money. I said, 'Examine our accounts, and if you find that we owe anything we will pay it.' He then ordered a stick to be brought,—it was a strong one, thicker than my thumb,—and telling a soldier to take me by the head and bend me forward, he gave the stick to a centurion, who gave me ten or twelve blows. I still feel the soreness, though he was not violent in his beating."
"About nine o'clock they called us to the Mejlis, or city council. After a careful examination of the documents, in which the Pasha's scribe, Fettah Effendi, took a prominent part, the Mejlis said with one voice, to those on the other side, 'You have no claim whatever on the Protestants.'" This decision was not accepted by the enemies of the Protestants. In the afternoon of the same day, Suleeba writes: "The Patriarch and the Papal Armenian Bishop called on the Pasha. They stayed about half an hour. Before they left, a lieutenant came from the Pasha, accompanied by two priests, and said to the Muteserif, 'The Pasha orders that you instantly deliver each one of the Protestants to two gensdarmes, and collect the money from each one at once, according to this paper.' The Muteserif replied, 'There is no claim upon these men. What shall we collect?' He replied, 'This is the Pasha's order.' The Muteserif said, 'We have just examined these men's accounts, and have found that the Protestants do not owe a para. Tell the Pasha so.' The Lieutenant replied, 'The Patriarch and Bishop were with the Pasha just now, and he told them that this money should be collected.' The Muteserif then turned to Fettah Effendi, of Diarbekir, and urged him to go and explain to the Pasha, but he did not wish to go. He then called out, much excited, 'Come, gensdarmes, take these men and kill them.' I then said, 'How much money do you want? Tell us, and we will give it.' The Muteserif said, 'I don't know.' I said, 'You are delivering us over to these soldiers. Tell us how much you want and we will give it, and save ourselves from them.' The Muteserif then asked Fettah Effendi, who had looked over our documents, and who had said that the Protestants owed nothing, 'How much are these men to pay?' He said, 'I don't know.' He then turned to the members of the other sects and said, 'How much do you want of these men?' They said, 'Let them come to the market [where the chief of police was receiving taxes], and we will see.' So we were hurried off there. This was less than an hour before sunset. We were taken to the shop occupied by Daoud Agha, the chief of the police. A great crowd gathered as we went along, and afterwards, which completely filled all the streets in that vicinity. As we entered, Daoud Agha, who is an old enemy of the Protestants, said to his men, 'Bring me two bottles of raki and three or four candles, and I will collect this money before morning."
The reader will remember the interesting account Mr. Williams gave of the conversion of an influential merchant at Mardin named Meekha.[1] This is the old man, Muksi Meekha, whom the chief of the police delivered over to the gensdarmes, with the charge to collect six thousand piasters from him. Mr. Barnum thus describes the treatment he received: "They took him out into the street and began to beat him with their gun-stocks. This is done by taking the gun in both hands and striking with it endwise. He promised to give security for the payment of the money in the morning, and begged to be allowed till morning to raise the money, as the shops were all shut; but they said, 'We must have the money now.' He wandered through the market in the vain hope of finding somebody who would advance the money, the guard all the time beating him, and so severely that he several times fell down, and his outer garment was torn into shreds; and he has since that time, now more than a week, kept his bed most of the time. At last he met a member of the Mejlis (a Turkish member), who told the guard that if it was money they wished they must take kefil from him, and wait till morning, as it was now evening, and nobody could raise money at that time; 'but,' he said, 'if your object is to kill him, take him back to the chief of police and butcher him there.' They then took him back to the crowd, and he found a man who gave a part of the money and a note for the payment of the rest in the morning, and he was released. He thinks that he would have been killed but for the intervention of the Turk.
[1] See Chapter xxvii.
"Each one of the prisoners was then passed over to two gensdarmes. Some of these were at once delivered, by their friends advancing the money; but four of them, besides Muksi Meekha, were treated just as he was, and all of them have kept their beds most of the time since.
"The police were at the same time sent to the houses of all the other Protestants, and they were brought, and the money which the sects demanded collected from them, by their paying the money or getting security for its payment in the morning. In this way, in the space of a few hours, and that evening, nineteen thousand piasters were collected."
Only a very small portion of this money was ever refunded.
Mention was made, in connection with Dr. Goodell's visit to the central mission in 1862, of the progress of the evangelical reformation at Oorfa. Two years later, Mr. Nutting, the resident missionary, announced an interesting revival of religion among his people. Both church and congregation were aroused, and the missionary had never seen more thorough conviction of sin, than was apparent in many. They had been studying the Westminster Assembly's Catechism for two years, and recently had attended lectures on the Epistle to the Romans; "and the fundamental truths thus lodged in their minds," writes Mr. Nutting, "had been greatly blessed." They met entirely the expense of their own religious and educational institutions. In February, 1865, the church numbered forty-two, and as many more were known to be inquirers.
About this time there arose considerable uneasiness in the mission from an apprehension of doctrinal errors in a candidate for the pastorate of this church. To what extent such errors actually existed, was never determined with certainty, but there was a spirit of alienation and division, which was regarded with concern. The churches in Oorfa and its four out-stations contained a total, in 1870, of one hundred and sixty-one members, of whom twenty-five had been received in the previous year. The Report of the Board for 1871 declares the difficulties of former years to have happily passed away; except that unsound doctrinal views continued to disturb the harmony of the church at Severek, and that this place was noted, in early times, for the prevalence of similar errors.