4

procuring an answer from his Majesty.
He then proposed that I should telegraph
to the President and ask him to personally
select an American Director for the Commercial
College here (whose selection I had requested
him to make) and that on his arrival here the
Sultan would place him on the Turkish Commission.
This proposition seemed so transparent, that
I declined to entertain it.

Finally the Sultan said that he would [ab....]
take the judgment of his Council of Ministers
to day, and then give me his answer.
In a lengthy conversation that followed in
regard to the Armenian question, he emphasised
the fact that it was unjust for Christian nations
to charge any irregularities in Sassun, to religious
prejudice - that religious toleration was more pro-
nounced in Turkey than in any Government in
Europe. All who worship the one God are
alike free, and only the idolatrous fire-worshiper
prohibited; that there were over seventy
Armenian Christians on his Civil list, many