A History of Protestant missions in the near East

96 History of Protestant Missions in the Near East
Christian books into Turkey, yet these publications were
largely bought in the countries bordering the Mediterranean.
In 1819 Constantinople was occupied as a second mission
centre, but was abandoned again in 1821 in consequence of an
outbreak of fanaticism among the Turks, caused by the Greek
War of Independence. Another station was established in
1828 on the island of Syra, where Kev. F. A. Hildner, coming
from the seminary in Basle, founded a secondary school, the
so-called Pedagogium, of which he was principal for forty-five
years, until 1876. In 1830 Kev. J. Zeller and Kev. P.
Fjellstedt were stationed in Smyrna, the centre of Greek
culture in Asia Minor. Thence they travelled through Asia
Minor and the neighbouring countries, preaching everywhere,
distributing Christian literature and founding schools, which,
however, dwindled away under the opposition of both Greeks
and Jews. In Egypt Kev. J. K. T. Lieder and Kev. W.
Kruse had begun somewhat earlier, in 1825, to work among
the Kopts, meeting with no opposition from the Koptic
Patriarch Butros (Peter) YII (1809-1854). They were permitted
to distribute Protestant literature, and to preach in
Koptic churches and even in the monasteries. Lieder founded
a training-school for boys in Cairo, which gradually developed
under his care into a theological institution for
training priests for the Koptic Church. His college, however,
could not be maintained because the Koptic bishops refused
to ordain candidates from a Protestant school, although they
were otherwise not very particular with regard to the character
of candidates for the priesthood ; yet one of Lieder's
pupils became Abuna of the Abyssinian Church. Lieder
and Kruse laboured in Egypt unwearyingly for thirty-five
years, in face of many disappointments. Their work laid the
foundation of the mission in Abyssinia.
Although the " Mediterranean Mission " was founded by
English missionaries, of whom Kev. Wm. Fowett, who
eventually became its superintendent, may be specially
mentioned, its agents were almost all of them Germans,
trained in the mission college at Basle. Such were Kev. C.