great excitement; men shouted and bellowed forth congratulations, or orders, or curses, in various tongues, and in the most vehement manner; and last, but by no means least, the rifles cracked, and cracked again, now at one's very ear apparently, anon at a mile's distance; whilst the entire country seemed animated with living beings, in mad warfare, of all kinds and orders. To swell the wild chorus of sounds, ravens croaked incessantly above us, whilst kites and hawks, uttering their shrill, prolonged cry, gyrated above the plain in uneasy whirls.

Το me, sitting down in England in a peaceful English home, and looking out upon the glorious sunshine lighting up the country brilliantly, whilst oxen and sheep browse in the meadow opposite, as peacefully as the very trees themselves-to me, looking at all this, that Cypriot hunt was a mad wild butchery-a thing to be deplored and grieved over. Had the deer been tigers, the jackals lions, the hares leopards, then, indeed, our victory would have been a thing to rejoice in and exult upon in thought; but as it was, what with dogs tearing them to pieces, badly trained as many of them were; what with men shooting at them, horses trampling them down, there is little to call to remembrance of the events of that day in which one can glory now. It was altogether different then, however. Every one was excited, so were we. Not a thought of the barbarity of the butchery intruded itself into the mind. All was wild bounding of the blood,

wild scampering hither and thither after the recreant game, wild shouting to each other with animated gestures.

And now the slaughter was ended. Dogs, horses, men, all were tiredsatiated. The game had been destroyed. A few, three or four perhaps, still pursued some animals that had broken from the field, and were scouring the country for their lives. The rest rode slowly from the scene of their exploits to the distant hill whence the visitors from Nicosia had was

inspected the fray. The sun shining upon us with meridian splendour; the parched up ground reflected his beams too warmly for our comfort; we were in a state of incipient liquefaction. The consumption of camandria and mastic raki, and the commoner black wine that the throats of the canaille were more intimate with, must have been enormous. Certain I am that it was not water His Highness so diligently wetted his lips with; whilst the bottle from which His Grace the Archbishop replenished his glass, looked as if it contained better things than the clearest streams of Cyprus could have afforded.

Our servants collected a portion of the game for us. Great was the contention on the conclusion of the foray between rival Jenkinses as to which should bear off this hare or that deer -but all was ultimately accommodated, and we did not think ourselves unfairly dealt with when four jackals, two deer, and eighteen hares were brought in as the proceeds of the morning's work of our party.

THE flies which abound during the summer and autumn in the plains of Messarea form one of the most unpleasant features of life in Nicosia. The great number of people afflicted with diseases of the eyes prove that these flies (which are justly regarded as the cause of these diseases) are by no means innocuous.

With the last days of September a more agreeable temperature was ushered in, which enabled us to make mumerous excursions, under the guidance of Captain Jones, to celebrated

VOL. XLVIII.- NO. CCLXXXVI.

places in the vicinity of the capital. There was so much similarity, however, about these half-antiquarian, half-pic-nic parties, that it would be tedious to enter into any n inute detail of them. Suflice it to say that the fortnight we spent in the city was a fortnight of varied pleasures and excitement. We visited the base of the Mount Olympus--the lofties summit in the island-and witnessed there a description of scenery ro before discovered in the island. In the ravines of the mountain's side the

ин

cypresses and dwarf oaks formed a complete covering for the sides of the mountain, and contrasted pleasantly with the rugged rocks and still more bleak-looking snowy ridge above. Several of the villages in the neighbourhood are exempted from taxation, on condition of supplying the Pasha's palace in Nicosia with constant stores of ice and snow. The village of Lascara, situated nearer to the capital, has extensive poppy plantations in its neighbourhood. The manufacture of opium is carried on there extensively. We did not see the poppy an object of cultivation anywhere else in the island.

The summit of the mountain called the Holy Cross still contains the ruins of a church erected by St. Helena, the mother of Constantine, on her return from Jerusalem. This church was said to contain a portion of the true cross, whence doubtless the name. Mariti tells us that the Church of St. Lazarus, in Larnacca, also claimed, falsely, to have a portion of the true cross; and having taken care to provide themselves with a piece of wood exactly similar to that of the church of Holy Cross Mountain, the monks in Laruacca invited its guardians to a public exhibition of both specimens. The funds which would flow in amply on such an occasion were to be distributed between both churches equally --so the priests of Holy Cross Mountain assented. All Cyprus flocked to the sacred exhibition, giving abundantly of their substance. The wily monks of Larnacca got the two pieces of wood placed together, and interchanged them, so that the priests of Holy Cross Mountain returned to their church with ample supplies of revenue, and the spurious piece of wood, which the crafty monks of Larnacca had made in imitation of their piece of the true cross. So low was the morality of the Christian priests in those early days! Nor is the state of Christianity in the present day in Cyprus much better. The Protestant churches seem to have quite neglected the island, whilst the emissaries of the church of Rome are busy and successful in proselytizing.

A hundred years ago, Mariti, a zealous Roman Catholic, wrote thus of the Mohammedan services, evidently contrasting them with those of his own church. "The Turkish moollahs do not confine themselves in their discourses to proving some doctrine which nobody doubts. Morality is the basis of their discourses, whence they draw rules of conduct for the ordinary circumstances of life, as well as consolations for misfortune. The person of the preacher is as plain as his discourse. You hear no young exquisite declaiming against luxury--no wealthy priest exhorting against the snares of riches-no proud man preaching humility-or licentious profligate denouncing lust."*

A hundred years later, an intelligent English traveller writes thus of the Greek and Roman Catholic priesthood:

The priests, mainly, if not entirely, subsist by the assistance they squeeze out of their poorer parishioners (miserable and povertystricken though they be) and upon what the wealthier class deem fit from time to time to confer upon them. There is no class in Cyprus more prone to crime than these very priests; none that seem to have retained with greater avidity and cunning the relics of every infamy practised by the ancient inhabitants of the island. Honor is a word unregistered in their catalogue of hunan requisites; chastity not to be found in their vocabulary; extreme artfulness, excesses on the sly in every vile practice. How can it be imagined, with sneh examples, with such patterns to follow through life, that the unfortunate natives should be anything but the deceitful, iminoral people they are; and that their education, such as it is, should tend only to inflame an ambition to outrival each other in the most abominable deceits and iniquities? And yet these people are not wholly wanting in those sentiments of gratitude and affection which, if properly nurtured, might be turned to good account indeed. †

In so far as the priests are concerned, this is a hard verdict; and yet, from what I witnessed and what I heard, I cannot say that it appears to me to be an unjust one.

There was no subject on which my friend Captain Jones spoke with so much energy and indignation as the

conduct of the Greek and Latin priesthood in the island. "It would be well for the poor Cypriots," he exclaimed on one occasion, "if they were all Mohammedans rather than what they are. They would then at least learn some morality-as it is, the priests prevent their learning any. As Moslems, the women would be safe from their pollution, for they are all alike vile. The men would learn at all events to tell the truth, and to hate stealing. The word of a Turk is proverbially better than the oath of a Greek-but no attestation that a Cyprus Christian can give you is worth the hesitating promise of the Moslem. I had rather transact business with fifty different Turks than with one Greek." There was, doubtless, some keen remembrance of recent deception to give bitterness and poignancy to these remarks, but in the main there can be little doubt that there was truth in their foundation. There are few countries in which profligacy is so open and unblushing as amongst the Christian population of Cyprus, and on all hands you will hear this lamentable state of things attributed chiefly to the pernicious influence of the priesthood.

Turn we now to the Moslem population. We were invited by our Anglo-Indian friend to an entertainment at the house of a wealthy Turk of his acquaintance. It was in fact one of a succession of fêtes and balls continuing for eight days without intermission. There is probably no Moslem population which celebrates the circumcision of its male children with so much public ceremonial as that of Cyprus. The ceremony is observed in the child's seventh year; and for eight days previously there is a succession of rejoicings and receptions of friends that must entirely interfere with, if not altogether interrupt, the ordinary business of life. The regularity with which these customs are complied with, involving as they do so much expense and trouble, proves the hold which their religion has taken upon the minds of the Moslems. At five, the youth begins to learn his Koran; at seven, he is formally inducted by this rite, with ceremony, parade, and rejoicings, into the body of "the faithful."

On the eighth day of the feast the neophyte is decked out in his rich

est costume, and placed upon a richly caparisoned horse, in order to be conducted, with music and congratulations, to the mosque. There, having said his prayers, and been a witness to the devotion of his relationshaving made his offering too to the temple, he is cheered by the Moollah with encouragement and incited by exhortation. He returns to his home attended by the same array, and with the same noisy demonstrations of applause. The ceremony is performed in the presence of the household and visitors, and doubtless the conviction that he is leaving the state of infancy and emerging into the body of the believers, nerves the youthful aspirant with resolution and self-reli

ance.

Loud voices proclaim the simple creed of the Moslems as the ceremony is performed. There is no God but God, and Mohammed is the prophet of God, is shouted forth with stentorian lungs on all sides, amply sufficient to drown any cries that may escape him.

He is then seated on a sort of temporary throne made for the occasion; where when admitted, we saw the youthful hero, on the conclusion of the ceremony, looking not a little proud of the importance attached to himself. Like the rest of the friends of the family admitted, we gave him presents, which were eagerly anticipated and received with a flush of youthful pleasure, whilst the relatives of the child watched his countenance admiringly, and shared his delight. A feast was given in the evening in honor of the occasion, a feast at which the poor were not forgotten. Such was the conclusion of the circumcision festival.

The peculiar institutions of Mohammedanism do not appear to us to be favorable to the domestic virtues or their proper cultivation, and doubtless there is some truth in this impression. With our western ideas of what happiness is--domestic happiness especially-and how to be secured, we are disposed to pronounce it simply impossible that the Moslem's home can be one in which the holier affections are roused and exercised, or the sweet virtues of domestic life fostered. But we regard the institutions of Moslemism from a point of view which exaggerates its evils and hides its advantages. We look upon

them something as one looks at a distant landscape through a piece of defective glass, which distorts and disarranges. We see the features of the landscape, it is true, but not in their true relation; we are aware of the separate existence of each object, but how each harmonizes, or rather how each can possibly harmonize with the other, we are at a loss to discover. It is precisely so with the aspect of Moslemism seen from an English point of view. Much of the delightful fireside happiness of English life the Cyprian Moslem cannot have, for he is innocent of a fireside altogether. Habits, feelings, convictions are so contrasted between the two, that it is impossible for the one to judge impartially of the other without actual experience. The Moslem would be disposed to look upon English life as insipid, artificial, hypocritical and monotonous; whilst the untravelled Englishman retorts upon the Moslem by pronouncing his existence debased, sensual, and unnatural.

But it was the life of the Cypriot Greek, not that of the Englishman, that I intended to contrast with that of his fellow islander, the Moslem. That the Moslem is, as a general rule, the honester, nobler, and more trustworthy character, is an undoubted fact, which no one will be hardy enough to deny. But I would go much further than this. I would unhesitatingly declare the life of the Moslem to be a more useful, a more virtuous, and a more consistent life than that of the Cypriot Greek. The ties of family are stronger, strange as it may seem, amongst the Mussulmans than amongst the island Christians. Religion, which is wholly inefficacious amongst the latter, is powerful amongst the former; and although Moslemism be a corrupt system, yet it is preferable in practice to the hollow deceits and pernicious principles prevalent amongst the Cypriot Greeks. Ask the Turk of Cyprus to become a Christian, and he points to the Greek with contempt, and asks, "Is it such a thing as this that you would have me to become?" The answer must be emphatically, "No."

Lastly, in connexion with this subject, one word respecting the kind of missionary likely to be of use in Cyprus. Abstract tenets are matters of utter indifference to the island Christian. He will listen to no reasonings on the subject, let them be never so just or conclusive-he cares for none of these things. It is through his body, not through his mind, that he must be won. Let him see that the missionary has the power to benefit him physically, to cure his sore eyes, or to drive off his tertian or quartian fever, and he will then listen to his doctrines at first perhaps with the intention of deceiving, but at all events he will listen. If the missionary could invent a new pleasure for him, that would be another method of taking possession of his attention for a time; but, supposing that to be out of the question, for the Cypriot Greek cares for no other pleasures than physical, I see no means of forcing him to attend but by calling in the aid of medicine.

I have been anticipated in the expression of this opinion by a writer previously quoted:

Should a mission be undertaken to this island (a Protestant mission), it must be borne in mind that an indispensable requisite for the missionaries employed is a long-suffering forbearance, no rash launching out into a system of conversion, no holding forth of doctrines so utterly at variance with the belief, the views, and inclinations of the people and the priests. These would utterly and for ever annihilate their hopes of success, and hinder them from affording to coming generations the only gift in their power-an education which must eventually open their eyes to the follies and wickednesses that surround them, and be the sure means, under God's blessing, of bringing them to salvation. The missionary fitted for Cyprus should therefore, in the first instance, be a physician; then one a little skilled in chemistry, a few of the effects of which would be amu. sing and attractive to both old and young.*

In other words, physical advantages or the opening up of new pleasures to them are the only means by which the Cypriot Christians can be lured to hear of, and think of, better things than their Greek or Latin priests or b.shops can teach them.