Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 1.djvu/225

Rh

But the fears which were excited by these manifestations of opposition to Romish usurpation and error, induced the papal party to send Mar Zeyya to Constantinople, where through the influence of the French Embassy he obtained a firman acknowledging him as Patriarch of the Chaldeans. This was the first recognition by the Ottoman Porte of the new community.

The withdrawal of our mission from Mosul damped the energies of the reformers, who had hoped that the Church of England would have assisted them in restoring their Church to its primitive independence and orthodoxy. Moreover on the return of Mar Zeyya from Constantinople in 1845, fresh attempts were made to destroy the remaining influence of the Beit-ool-Ab. Mutran Elîa was not allowed to exercise his episcopal functions, and claims were set up by the monks of Rabban Hormuzd upon the property, consisting chiefly of houses, land, and several water-mills, which still continued in the possession of the patriarchal family. The French consul co-operated with the monks, and two hundred and fifty persons were deprived of their patrimony and reduced to beggary through this joint agency. I am happy to say, however, that energetic remonstrances from a different quarter have succeeded in reclaiming part of the wrested property, and in restoring it to the rightful owners, most of whom reside at Alkôsh and the neighbouring villages.

Mutran Zeyya did not long fill an ofiice, the functions of which were virtually exercised by the Propaganda, and he soon grew tired of the interference and espionage of the Latin missionaries, who criticised all his acts, and reduced him to a mere tool in their hands. His resistance alarmed the Romanists, and a charge was brought against him of having embezzled certain moneys which had been placed under his care, and which he had expended in restoring the convent of Mar Gheorghees, opposite