The Secretary of State to Chargé Jay .
Washington , April 17, 1906.
Sir: I have to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch No. 1346, of the 30th ultimo, reporting that the new governor-general of Damascus has closed the American school at Mahardeh, on the ground that it had no permit; and inclosing a copy of your note to the Turkish minister for foreign affairs in which you remonstrate against the closing and request that orders be telegraphed for the reopening of the school, and that stringent instructions be sent to prevent any further interference with existing American institutions.
It is hoped that the conjecture with which you conclude your dispatch, namely, that “this school may turn out to be one of purely native Protestant institutions which, as Mr. Leishman stated in his dispatch No. 1275, of February 7, page 2, are now admitted by the missionary representative at Constantinople to have been erroneously included in the long list of genuine American institutions filed with the Porte,” may not prove to be the fact; but even in that case the Porte should consult the legation and adduce proof before taking steps to close a listed American school.
I am, etc.,