In April, 1862, when Daud Pasha was governor of Mt.  Lebanon, a Druze, named Hassan, murdered a Druze girl of his own village, supposing that Daud Pasha would not interfere with the time-honored custom of killing girls!  Much to his surprise, however, he was arrested, convicted and hung, and the poor women of all sects in the mountain began to feel that after all they had an equal right to life with the other sex.

In most parts of Syria to-day, the murder of women and girls is an act so insignificant as hardly to deserve notice.  Mt.  Lebanon and vicinity constitute an exception perhaps, but woman’s right to life is one of those rights which have not yet been fully guaranteed in the Turkish Empire.

In October, 1862, the Arabic official newspaper in Beirut, contained a letter from Hums which illustrates this fact.  A fanatical wretch from Hamath, one of the infamous Moslem saints, set up the claim that he had received the power to cast out devils by divine inspiration.  He found credulous followers among the more ignorant, and went to Hums to practice his diabolical trade.  A poor woman had lost her reason through excessive grief at the death of her son.  The husband and others of her relatives went to consult the new prophet.  He refused to go and see her, stating that he would not condescend to go to the devils, but the devils must come to him.  The poor woman was accordingly brought to him, and left to await the opportune moment, when he could cast out the devils, which he declared to be raving within her.  After a few days, her father called to inquire about her, and found her growing constantly worse.  The Hamathite told him that he must bring a gallon of liquid pitch, to be used as a medicine, and the next day the devils would leave her.  The pitch was brought, and after the father had gone, the lying prophet tied a cord around her feet, and drew her up to the ceiling, and while she was thus suspended, thrust a red hot iron rod into one of her eyes, and cauterized her body almost from head to foot!  He then placed the pitch on the floor under her head, and set it on fire until the body was “burned to charcoal!” The next day the friends called, expecting to find her restored to her right mind, when the wretch pointed them to the blackened cinder.  They exclaimed with horror and asked him the reason of this bloody crime?  He replied that on applying the test of burning pitch, one of the devils had gone out of her, tearing out her right eye, and when he forbade the rest from destroying the other eye, they fell upon her and killed her!  The body was buried, but the government took not the slightest notice of the fact.  The official journal in Beirut simply warned the public against patronizing such a bloody impostor!

CHAPTER XVI.

OPINIONS OF PROTESTANT SYRIANS WITH REGARD TO THE WORK OF AMERICAN WOMEN IN SYRIA.

The following letters have been addressed to me by prominent native Syrian gentlemen, whose wives have been trained in the American Mission Seminaries and families.  They all write in English, and I give their own language.