It was decided that none but Protestant girls should be received into
this school, that no English should be taught, and that the style of
eating, sleeping and dress should be conformed as much as possible to
the standard of native customs in the country villages, in order that
the girls might the more readily return to their homes as teachers,
without acquiring European tastes and habits. Miss Mason carried on this
school until 1865, when she returned to the U.S.A., and it was decided
if possible to carry it on with native instructors under the supervision
of Mrs. Eddy.
In the winter of 1867 it was under the kind charge of Mrs. Watson of
Shemlan and her adopted daughter, Miss Handumeh Watson, and is now
conducted by two English young ladies, Miss Jacombs and Miss Stanton,
who are supported by the London "Society for the Promotion of Female
Education in the East." On the removal of the girls' Boarding School to
Sidon, it was evident that the Female Seminary must be re-opened in
Beirut. Owing to the depressed state of Missionary finances in America,
arising from the civil war, it was deemed advisable to reorganize the
Beirut Seminary on a new basis, with only native teachers. The
Providence of God had prepared teachers admirably fitted for this work,
who undertook it with cheerful hope and patient industry. It was decided
to make a paying Boarding School of a higher order than any existing
institution in Syria, and to resume instruction in the English language,
giving lessons also in French and Music to those who were willing to
pay for these branches.
Mr. Michaiel Araman, for many years a teacher in the Abeih Seminary with
Mr. Calhoun, and for some time a native preacher in Beirut, was
appointed instructor in the Biblical History and the Higher Arabic
branches; his wife Lulu, the Matron, and Miss Rufka Gregory, the
Preceptress. Rufka was an orphan, as already stated, and was trained
with her sister Sada in the family of Mr. and Mrs. Whiting for many
years. As a teacher and a disciplinarian she had not an equal among the
women of Syria, and under the joint management of this corps of
teachers, aided by competent assistants in the various branches, the
Seminary rose in public esteem, until it became one of the most
attractive and prosperous institutions in Syria.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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