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bishops—hence this ignorant people began to nourish a secret hatred against the Ijatins, as persons excommunicate and accursed. So our Lord God, yielding to their impious wishes, and to indict upon them lasting pain and chastisement, remo veti nearly all the Latins from before their eyes, left thein at liberty to subject themselves to the divided members of the Church, and made them for all time the wretched slaves of the Turks. These Greeks thon, as soon as the Grand Turk had seised the whole kingdom of Cyprus, ran straightway to that foul limb Mehined Pasha, Vassir of the Turkish Empire, and begged him that the bishoprics of Cyprus might be filled up, as though this Mehined were the Vicar of Christ, and for ecclesiastical confirmation or rather consecration they applied to the Patriarch of Constantinople. At this time there went a Syrian monk, a scion of those old heretics who were condemned in the early councils, and offered to Mehined Pasha three thousand sequins, fur which sum he obtained from the said Pasha the Archbishopric uf Cyprus, and never considering that the island had still its illustrious Archbishop alive, was appointed and consecrated, and went to Cyprus with the Janissaries assigned him by the Porte. As soon as he arrived he began to govern the few people left iu the towns with strictness and tyranny, tryiug to recover not only those three thousand sequins, but to get the double of what he had spent. For this cause and also because he was a barbarian, a stranger to the Cypriots, of another race and ignorant of the Greek language aud letters, the people turned their attention to a certain Cypriot monk, who sought their suffrages, and seut hiin to Constantinople to Mehmet! Pasha, that he might dismiss his former nominee and confirm the priest they now sent. He came to see me on his arrival at Constantinople, to ask my opinion and advice, for he was anxious not tu throw away the large sum which it was usual to give as a present to the Pashas to secure his nomination to this see. What he sought chiefly to know was if the Christians, supposing they recovered Cyprus, would confirm him as Bishop, or despise him as the nominee of the Porte : also if they could injure hiin personally. I replied that he should let the matter stand awhile, and nut seek a bishopric by these underhand means, for I knew that there was a monk in Constantinople, a Cypriot of good family named d'Acre, a friend of the Patriarch of Constantinople, and he too was eager to get this Archbishopric. The priest understood my meaning, and set uff at once fur Adrianople where the Court then was, taking with him a large snm in sequins which he had borrowed at interest, for the money he had brought from Cyprus was not enough, and with these he obtained the promise of Melimed that he should have the Archbishopric. But the other monk d'Acre worked so upon the Patriarch that the priest was obliged to give way, and iu lieu of the Archbishopric to be content with the Bishopric of Paffo. The Abbot of Cuzuventi in Cypras happened to be in Constantinople just released from captivity; he got the Bishopric of Limisso, and the see of Famagosta was given to a Candiot monk, who was serving the church tif S. Simeon in that city. That was the new order taken for the creation of the Greek Church in Cyprus. But again this Pentecost, Catacnsino, who watches the interest of the Grand Turk in the Mediterranean, and supplied twelve galleys for the service of that dog, forced the Patriarch to resign his office, and caused a creature of his own at once to be elected in his place. This he does often, every four years about, because he gains ten or twelve thousand sequins, the gift uf those who assume the Patriarchate. Look aud wonder, my gentle readers, at the utter blindness of these poor Greeks in the administration of their spiritual affairs. In February of 1572, after the victory which so terrified the Turks, certain Turkish vessels went to Cyprus. The Turks of Famagosta, iu terror lest these should be the pre-cursors of the Christian fleet, made terms with the Christians in Famagosta fur their safety ; c. 21 CALEPIO. 161

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