Soon after this Suleiman Paša of Bagdad sent a large army to Sinjar under the command of Lutfee Effendi, who set fire to the Jabal Sinjar and caused all the inhabitants to flee. Then Ḥafiz Paša of Diarbeker attempted the subjugation of the Yezidis of Sinjar, on the ground that they were plunderers. After meeting some resistance, he accomplished his purpose in 1837, and appointed a Moslem to watch over them. At another time Mohammed Rašid Pasha of Mosul attacked Sinjar. On both occasions there was a massacre. The Yezidis took refuge in caves, where they were either suffocated by smoke or killed by the discharge of cannon. And thus the population was reduced by three-fourths. These and other similar injustices at the hands of the Pašas of Bagdad and Mosul and the Kurdish chiefs led the Yezidis from time to time to send a deputation to lay their grievances before the agents of the European powers, and they have even sent commissioners to the Sultan. They finally succeeded in enlisting the interest of Lord Stratford in 1847 to obtain at Constantinople a proper recognition of their religion and exemption from military service. But the severest of all persecutions, to which I was an eye-witness, was perhaps the one which the Yezidis of both Šeiḫan and Sinjar suffered in 1892 at the hands of Fariḳ ‘Omar Paša, Lieutenant-General of the Turkish Army. This Fariḳ was sent in the summer of 1892 as a special commissioner by the Sultan to accomplish certain definite things in the states of Mosul and Bagdad: to collect twenty years’ unpaid taxes; to induce the Bedouins to exchange their nomadic life for village life; to convert the Yezidis of Šeiḫan and Jabal Sinjar from their idolatry to the true faith. He was a harsh man in his manners and methods. He first invited some of their chiefs to Mosul. They came and listened to what the new Paša had to say. They met him when Mijlis al-Edarah, council of the state, composed of ‘Olama and a few Christians, was in session. In the presence of these noblemen he began to tell them that if they would give up their devil-worship, they would be rewarded with high place and rank, and would please the great Allah. But they answered not. When the Fariḳ saw that his words failed to persuade them, he began to apply the weapon of cruelty. He cast them into prison; some died; others fled; and a few, through the fear of torture and painful death, pronounced al-šehâdah[165] with their lips but not from their hearts. Then he sent an army to their villages, and commanded them to choose between Islam and the sword. ‘Omar Beg, his son, who was commanding the soldiers, directed them to slaughter the men, and take captives the pretty women and girls and marry them. He slew about five hundred men. Many became Moslems from fear, among these Merza Beg, their civil chief.