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THE JEWS

[From the New York Herald.]

LONDON, June 6, 1882.

At a meeting of the Mansion House Committee for the Relief of the Russian Jews, it was stated that the amount of L.82,458 had been collected, of which there remained L.25,000. It was resolved to send commissioners to Hamburg to superintend the departure of the emigrants.

THE REFUGEES IN TURKEY

Our Constantinople correspondent sends the following:—”Turkey is about to share with the United States the honor of providing an asylum for the Jewish fugitives from Russian and Roumanian intolerance and persecution. Mr. Lawrence Oliphant and Mr. James Alexander—the Moses and the Aaron of the situation—are now here, and several hundred half-naked and starving men, women and children, forming the advance guard of the exodus, have already arrived in Constantinople. All the emigrants with whom I spoke expressed their joy at getting out of Russia, and declared that they had left behind them thousands of their co-religionists whose only immediate object in life was to get out of Russia, no matter how, even if they knew they must die of want in any other country. A general influx of Jewish refugees in Constantinople would involve the greater misery and suffering where there is already great privation and want among the poorer classes of the regular inhabitants. Such an influx is, however, deemed inevitable, and the only hope is, that the general stampede toward Constantinople can be retarded for a few months, when preparations of some kind can be made to lessen the suffering. In the meantime the Jews already arrived are provided with food by means of local subscriptions, and the Mansion House Committee has been applied to for funds. Besides an exodus from Russia, we are threatened with an exodus from Roumania.

MR. OLIPHANT’S MISSION

“Mr. Lawrence Oliphant, who recently arrived here from Jassy, states to me, that although no violent outbreak has yet occurred in Roumania, nevertheless the entire Jewish population is in hourly dread lest the outrages which spread like a contagion from Balta to Bessarabia shall in turn extend to Roumania, where, within the past few weeks, the Jews have been deprived of almost all their civil rights—where they cannot hold land, nor pursue their trades or ordinary occupations, nor even peddle their wares in the street, and where life has become intolerable. There are over two hundred and sixty-five thousand Jews in Roumania, and Mr. Oliphant believes that over two hundred thousand of them will emigrate. Sentiment and reverence for the traditions of their race draw them to Palestine rather than toward America. Last week the Central Jewish Committee, which represents forty-nine local committees, met at Jassy, and 200,000f. were at once subscribed to start an exodus fund. The Roumanian Jews added to the Russian Jews, will so augment the numbers coming to Turkey that all preparations for caring for them will probably prove inadequate; and Mr. Oliphant issued circulars from Jassy begging and imploring them to delay their departure for at least four months. The Sultan does not want to have another imperium in imperio in his dominions, and consequently will never consent to the formation of any autonomous colonization scheme in Palestine. He has, however, expressed his warmest sympathy with the oppressed Jews, and the Turkish authorities are instructed to issue Ottoman passports to all Russian and Roumanian Jews who express a desire to settle anywhere in the Ottoman dominions, with the sole exception of Palestine.”

CONSTANTINOPLE, June 7, 1882

A deputation representing over forty Russian and Roumanian Jewish communities, waited on General Wallace, earnestly urging him to exert his good offices with the Sultan to enable them to colonize Syria in groups of 200 to 500 or 1,000. The Jewish refugees here are starving, and more are still coming. General Wallace has asked for instructions from Washington.

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— August, 1882 —