Dr.
Smith, who established the mission at Ain-tab (two days' journey north of
this), where he died last year, was very successful among these sects, and
the congregation there amounts to nine hundred. The Sultan, a year ago,
issued a firman, permitting his Christian subjects to erect houses of
worship; but, although this was proclaimed in Constantinople and much
lauded in Europe as an act of great generosity and tolerance, there has
been no official promulgation of it here. So of the aid which the Turkish
Government was said to have afforded to its destitute Christian subjects,
whose houses were sacked during the fanatical rebellion of 1850. The world
praised the Sultan's charity and love of justice, while the sufferers, to
this day, lack the first experience of it. But for the spontaneous relief
contributed in Europe and among the Christian communities of the Levant,
the amount of misery would have been frightful.

To Feridj Pasha, who is at present the commander of the forces here, is
mainly due the credit of having put down the rebels with a strong hand.
There were but few troops in the city at the time of the outbreak, and as
the insurgents, who were composed of the Turkish and Arab population, were
in league with the Aneyzehs of the Desert, the least faltering or delay
would have led to a universal massacre of the Christians. Fortunately, the
troops were divided into two portions, one occupying the barracks on a
hill north of the city, and the other, a mere corporal's guard of a dozen
men, posted in the citadel. The leaders of the outbreak went to the latter
and offered him a large sum of money (the spoils of Christian houses) to
give up the fortress. With a loyalty to his duty truly miraculous among
the Turks, he ordered his men to fire upon them, and they beat a hasty
retreat. The quarter of the insurgents lay precisely between the barracks
and the citadel, and by order of Feridj Pasha a cannonade was immediately
opened on it from both points. It was not, however, until many houses had
been battered down, and a still larger number destroyed by fire, that the
rebels were brought to submission. Their allies, the Aneyzehs, appeared on
the hill east of Aleppo, to the number of five or six thousand, but a few
well-directed cannon-balls told them what they might expect, and they
speedily retreated. Two or three hundred Christian families lost nearly
all of their property during the sack, and many were left entirely
dest