Several high ecclesiastics were on terms of intimacy with the missionaries, and some of them seemed on the point of yielding to the influence of the truth.

But generally they were without fixed religious principles, and were ready to follow the lead of the men most able to favor their own advancement in office or emolument.

Matteos, the newly appointed bishop of Broosa, was one of these.

While residing on the Bosphorus, he was a professed friend of the mission; and after his removal to Broosa, he expressed by letter the most friendly sentiments, and assured Mr.Schneider of his approbation of the school then recently established in that city.

But this school, after a few months, was entirely broken up through the agency of this same prelate, who also sought in other ways to weaken and destroy the influence of the missionaries.
Somewhat later, having been elevated to the Patriarchate, he became a reckless persecutor of the Protestants of Turkey, as will appear in its proper place.
The beautiful type used by the Catholic-Armenians at Venice, made it necessary for the mission to procure new fonts of type adapted to the taste of the Armenians.