Claudius James Rich, Alexandria, to John Ryland, [Bristol], 22 May 1806.

Alexandria   May 22nd 1806

My dear Sir,

It is with great Pleasure I have to acknowledge the receipt of your Favor of the 6.th of Sep.r last, which I received while I was waiting in Cypress for a Passage to this Place, where I arrived last Month, after having performed a Journey of seventy five days across the interior of Anatotia, Armenia minor &c from Constantinople to Aleppo and thence to Antioch, where I remained above two months.— 

This Journey, tho’ fatiguing, has given me great Satisfaction, and I lament that the limits of a Letter will not permit to give you a Sketch of it. [I am much concerned to find that Mr Hall has been so afflicted.  I trust that long ere this he is perfectly recovered.  The presence of Business prevents me writing to him on this occasion but by the next I certainly will not neglect doing it.]

It gives me very great Pleasure to hear that the Missionaries go on so well.  With respect to my opinion of the practicability of a Protestant Missionary’s residing in the Levant—he would certainly be safe, so long as he did not offer to meddle with the Turks—He would not indeed meet with the least encouragement from the Greeks, rather with opposition, but it could not be in their power to annoy him materially—but I think he would not succeed much in making proselytes, and any attempt to convert a Turk would be atttended with the most fatal Consequences.

There are certainly some very superior men [crossed out word] Greek communion, who would do honor to any society, but the generality are a bad set, superstitious and ignorant in the extreme— before a Turk meanly abject— but when any little Power is vested in heir hands tyrannical and oppressive, and full of low cunning— They alway allow the English Communion to bear a greater affinity with theirs than of the R. Catholic, on account of their Ideas respecting the Sacrament and the marriage of their Priests, which they permit in a limited Degree and when any of the rites of the Church (as Marriage, Baptism, Burial, &c) is to be performed for the English, and no English Minister happens to be at hand, it is always performed by Greek Priests as Roman Catholics of course will not officiate for a Protestant.

Time does not permit me to be fuller on the subject at present, but I was unwilling that your Letter should lie so long unacknowledged— In my next however I hope I shall not be so hurried.

Begging you to excuse the great haste which I am in, believe me

my dear Sir

Your most ob.t faithful hum.le Serv.t

Claudius James Rich

P.S.  Pray present my grateful remembrances to Mr & Mrs Page, [paper torn] and love to your Sons—   

Text: MS. 14348D--Ryland MSS., National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth. Rich (1787-1820) was the son-in-law of Sir James Mackintosh, a former classmate of Hall's at Aberdeen.