of denouncing every one who had incurred their hatred for any reason whatever, so that the prisons were soon crowded with their unfortunate victims, all of whom suffered the penalty of death. The patriarch pronounced a sentence of major excommunication against Prince Ypsilanti, and all the Greeks who {9} took part in the revolt. A few days afterward, on the first Sunday of Lent, during the solemnities of the pontifical mass, the patriarch, his eight chief metropolitans, and fifteen other bishops, pronounced the same sentence of excommunication, together with the sentence of deposition and degradation, against seven bishops of Greece, partisans of Prince Ypsilanti, and all their adherents, signing the decree on the altar of the cathedral church. Such a storm of indignation was raised by this nefarious act, that the prelates were obliged to pacify their people by pretending that they had acted under the compulsion of the government. A few days after, the patriarch and the majority of the bishops who had signed the decree were condemned to death and executed, on the charge of participating in the revolution. Even after the great powers of Europe had acknowledged the independence of Greece, the ruling clergy of Constantinople endeavored to curry favor at court by sending a commission, under the presidency of the metropolitan of Chalcèdon, to recommend to the Greeks a return to the Turkish dominion! It is needless to say that this invitation was declined, although we cannot but admire the self-control of the Greek princes and prelates when we are told that it was declined, and the ambassadors dismissed, _in the most polite manner_.