No. 248.
Mr. Wurts to Mr. Fish.
Rome, August 14, 1872. (Received September 3.)
Sir: On the subject of your instruction No. 348, dated July 22, 1872, concerning the persecution of the Jews in the Danubian Principalities, I had yesterday an interview, in the absence of the minister of foreign affairs, with the secretary-general of that department.
He informed me that the Italian and British governments had already exchanged several communications relating to this grievance, which was an affair to be treated with great delicacy that it would probably require to be brought before a convention of the protecting powers for settlement; but, even then, the very action taken for the amelioration of the condition of the Jews in those countries might, it is feared, have the opposite effect, on account of the jealousy of the people of any foreign interference.
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The secretary-general expressed the opinion that the most efficacious action in this matter on the part of the Government of the United States would be through representations to the cabinet of St. Petersburg, whose voice among the members of the Greek Church, to which creed belong principally the persecutors of the Jews in those regions, would not be unheeded.
I left at the ministry of foreign affairs a copy of the instruction, which, the secretary-general assured me, will be referred to the minister on his return to the capital.
I have, &c,