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CLAUDE DELAVAL COBHAM
Exerpta Cypria
page 478

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follow. He published at once an order, which was circulated in all the towns, villages and hamlets, announcing that the Snltan had observed with very great satisfaction the readiness of the rayahs to surrender their amis, and had given the strictest orders that euch faithful subjects shonld receive from tlie local authorities every protection for their lives, their honour and their property. At the same time he threatened with the heaviest penalties anyone who shonld dare to injure or annoy anyone of these loyal Christians. After its publication he even took care to pnnisli a few Turks for some trifling offences against the Christians, so .is to remove any suspicion of the truth of his written promises. A little later he summoned to the capital the prelates, abbots and notables, on the pretence of Bending to the Porte a general manorial, offering thanks for the gracious intentions of the sovereign towards the rayahs, and assuring him of their unshaken loyalty and submission. Abont the beginning of June those who usually took part in such conferences assembled at Nicosia, and after this wily fashion the MnteeeUm misled thcin all. Many of those whoso names were set down among the proscribed were missing, because they were living retired lives, and conld not have been summoned without exciting suspicion. Wherefore on a given day, Snnday, Jnne 12, officers sent by Kuchuk Mehmed came to the place where each dwelt, and forcibly arrested them all, catching thein as they left their chnrches after the early cele-bration of the Holy Mysteries. Their houses, stores and places of business were sealed nntil further orders : their wives and children were turned out into the streets in the last extremity of penury aud distress, and the men themselves were carried off bound to Levcosia. Sixteen only escaped arrest in various ways, while four hundred and seventy of the proscribed were thrown into prison. The principal Turks residing in the capital were convoked by the Mitteeelim, and to give an air of regularity to the business, the Sultan's decree was read, and its execution ordered. The city of Levcosia was thns destined to be turned into a hnman slanghter-honse. On the first day, in the square in front of the Serai, the Archbishop Cyprianos was hanged, the three bishops of Paphos, Citium and Kyrenia, with the other higher clerics, were beheaded : their bodies being exposed with the head of each on hie back. On the day following all the rest were beheaded, with the exception of thirty-six, men of inferior rank, who through weakness of diameter forswore their faith. The barbarians nut only slew but hewed in pieces many of the victims. Of Cypriote of any position those only survived who were concealed, and escaped from the island, through the kindly help uf certain consuls, especially the French consul Méchain. The personal and landed property of all the victims, the sacred vessels of the monasteries, and their precious ornaments of silver and gold were confiscated to the Porte, and were sold by auction to swell the wealth of those who had contrived the seizure, while the lands and honses passed into the possession of the local aghas. Their every wish was thns fulfilled. Lapicrre, who had been the chief cause of the slaughter of so many innocent persons, failed not of a rich reward. Especially on those two ghastly days of June this Christian in name was seen walking about with that Musalman in deed Kuchuk Mehmed in the part of the palace which looked on the square, where, as I have said, the executions took place, and whence the groans of so many victims could be heard. After the massacre, and the confiscation of the property not only of the slain, bnt of the sixteen who escaped, to complete the savage orders of the barbarous Governor, followed the arrest and enslavement of the women and children. This last measure however was only very partially effected, thanks to the intervention of the Christians who were called to the offices left vacant by the murdered notables, and to the payment of a million (of piastres?) collected by a poll tax on all the male inhabitants of the island. Such was the reward of the submission and obedience of the Christians of Cyprns to the Turkish Sultan. 468 EXCERPTA CYPHIA.

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