A teacher was not obtained until October, 1839, and then only with the aid of Mr.Perdicaris, the American consul; but before the end of the year, the pupils numbered one hundred and seventy, filling the house.

Among them was a youth named Kalopothakes, a native of the place, who afterwards became the bold friend and efficient helper of Dr.King.A school for teaching ancient Greek with thirty scholars, had been in operation a year or more.

King Otho visited the place early in 1838, and commended the school.

The descendants of the ancient Spartans boasted that he was the first monarch they had ever permitted to tread their soil.
Mrs.Houston being threatened with consumption, her husband took her to Alexandria, and afterwards to Cairo, where she died peacefully, on the 24th of November, 1839.

After depositing her remains in the Protestant burying-ground at Alexandria, the bereaved husband and father returned, with his child, to his station in Greece, and in the following year visited his native land.
The Greek mission was always affected more or less by the changes of political parties.