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CLAUDE DELAVAL COBHAM
Exerpta Cypria
page 465 View PDF version of this page POUQUEVILLE.
455
receiving the news oi the retirement of the Mohammedan army which had been collected on the Ionian coast, and that the Sannaus had landed in Asia Minor and were taking a bitter revenge. They resolved to reply by murder to the Greek successes. Mad with rage the barbarians had seized an Archbishop, five Bishops and thirty-six ecclesiastics, whom they hanged about October 15. Most of the Greeks in Larnaca and the other towns were strangled at the same time. The Europeans were in the utmost danger; a Cypriot who for thirty-six years had been recognised as honorary Consul for Spain was put to death, and several French proteges, and the mob rushed to the Consulate, calling on M. Méchain to give iip to them a crowd of Greeks who had taken refuge under the French flag.
Urged on by the Governor against whom M. Méchain had obtained firmans—documents which are never worth much unless supported by something more weighty than the mere name of the Sultan—they had determined Fo carry off the refugees by force. They brought up cannon, but night fell, and the attack was deferred to the morning. Encamped round the Consulate they lay like soldiers waiting a battle, but during the night the Christians found an unexpected succour. Forty boats from Psara entered the bay; the brigands ran pell-mell to the hills; and the Greeks snatched from certain death got on board the vessels, which at once set sail. The Consul saw them disappear, without fearing the return of the barbarians who oaine back to the town covered with shame, never daring to reproach hiin with a deed which might have shed glory on the Consuls of France in the East, had not these all vied with one another to make the Bourbons blessed for ever in the countries where their name is linked with memories of the exploits of S. Louis, that king of sainted and immortal memory.
Vol. m. pp. 247—249.
The reports from abroad, submitted to the Hellenic Senate in September, 1822, spoke of Chios as strewn with the bones of its former inhabitants. Cos and Rhodes were in the hands of the Turks, who had killed a part of the population. So too in Cyprus, where sixty-two villages and hamlets had entirely disappeared. The Turks, in their familiar phrase, continued to hunt down the Christians. Many churches had been tnrncd into mosques, others into stables; and the Pasha of Cœsarea, to outdo his fellows, had pushed his mad cruelty so far as to saddle and bridle the monks of S. Pantalaemon. His officerà had taken a fancy to go for country rides on the backs of these wretched creatures, many of whom died of fatigue or under the whip, or were choked by the bite which were forced into their mouths by breaking their teeth. In some parte of the island the vineyards were burnt, the forest trees were cut down, and this rich island shorn of its groves left nothing to the eye but ruins and graves.
Vol. IV. pp. 1S1, 1S2.
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