Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 1.djvu/54

20 district. It contains two large and well-built mosques, besides many smaller ones, the bulk of the population being Mohammedan. The Armenians at Amasia number five hundred families, who possess three churches, and are under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Tocât,6 the person at present filling that See being a deposed Patriarch. There are also fifteen families of the Greek rite at Amâsia, who have a church, a priest, and a school. These know no other language than Turkish, which is spoken by all the Christians in this district. I was told that there were three villages in the vicinity inhabited entirely by members of the same community, who as well as those of Amasia belong to the diocese of Sinope.7

The Mutsellim gave us a lodging in a house annexed to one of the Armenian churches, where we were kindly entertained. In one of the lower rooms was a school in which upwards of sixty boys were assembled. On the master's table I observed a number of books and tracts in Armenian and Armeno-Turkish from the press of the American Independents at Smyrna, which had been sent to Mr. Krug, a Swiss mercantile agent, and the only European in Amâsia, to be distributed among the people. On inquiry, I found that the introduction of these works had not received the sanction of the Bishop. The master's idea was, as it was the idea of the three Armenian priests who called upon me, that they contained the teaching of the English Church, and it was some time before I could convince them to the contrary.

In the evening we had a visit from Mr. Krug, accompanied by Yakoob Nuah Oghloo, a young Latin Armenian, and the son of a rich Baghdad merchant, who resides here for the purposes of trade. We received much courtesy and kindness from these gentlemen, which was the more to be appreciated as being shown to perfect strangers. The conversation soon turned upon Church matters, in which both appeared to be alike interested. The young Armenian was strongly prejudiced against the English, because, as he said, they denied the efficacy of the Sacraments, had no Bishops and consequently no valid orders, paid no reverence to saints, despised all pictures, even the emblem of the cross, observed no festivals or fasts; and several other cus-