In the absence of Miss Gregory on account of failing health, Mr. and Mrs. Aramon carried on the school, with the assistance of ladies from the mission. The school increased in numbers and the examination in 1868 was attended by a great throng of the people, from all classes and all sects. It was a noticeable fact that Mohammedan parents in Beirut were beginning to insist earnestly upon the education of their girls. The Beirut Arabic official journal, the "Kadethat el-Akhbax," published a list of schools in the city,--possibly somewhat exaggerated,--in which it was said, that there were two thousand girls and three thousand boys and young men in the various Protestant, Greek, Maronite, Catholic, and Mohammedan schools. The school passed under the care of Misses Everett and Carruth on their arrival in Syria, and substantial progress was made towards self-support, but less than would have been but for the French, English, and German schools, which tended to draw away the girls, and the families they represented, from the influence of the missionaries. There was, also, a female boarding-school at Sidon, which had been growing in numbers and influence. The scholars were all Protestants, selected with care from the various schools of the country. "They have come," wrote Mr. Eddy, "from all parts of the land,--from Hums and Safeeta on the north, from Mount Lebanon on the east, and the district of Merj Aiyun on the south; and besides the good they gain for themselves while here, they will carry light and civilization, and we trust religious influence with them to their widely scattered homes." The school was in the immediate charge of Mrs. Watson and her daughter, English ladies, and more recently Miss Jacombs, for five years a teacher on Mount Lebanon, and supported by a society of ladies in England. It was fully in sympathy, however, with the mission, and had the sympathy, prayers, and aid of English Christians. The number of pupils was twenty. THE SYRIAN PROTESTANT COLLEGE. The desire for education had visibly increased, and was due, in part, to commercial intercourse with western nations, and the interference of foreign powers in the political affairs of the country; but far more to the schools, books, preaching, and personal influence of missionaries. Schools had been multiplying for elementary and high school instruction, but there was no provision for a liberal education. The Jesuits, indeed, had institutions, but their teaching was partial, fitted to repress inquiry, and exclusively to foster their own ecclesiastical and sectarian ends. THE SYRIAN PROTESTANT COLLEGE. [image] The demand for a Protestant college was discussed at a meeting of the mission, in the spring of 1861, and again in the following August, when an outline of the proposed scheme was presented.[1]