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I inquired why Dr. M'Caul did not take the whole before you. The reply to which was, because it would be of no use, and to this Mr. R. and the third gentleman cordially assented, telling me that my surprise made it clear that I did not know the real state of things.
5. Dr. Macgowan was well known to Dr. M'Caul, as being the chief accuser and opposer of the Rosenthals, not only of Simeon Rosenthal, but of the whole family, whom he desired to get out of Jerusalem. Many instances in proof of this have been stated to me at times by Dr. M'Caul, but I do not remember him to have mentioned the indiscretions and infirmities recently alleged against Dr. Macgowan. I now know the reason why he did not name them—he was not aware of their existence. His widow has stated to me that Dr. M'Caul's silence respecting Dr. Macgowan's failings existed simply because ‘the details respecting them were never communicated to him.’ Mr. and Mrs. Finn did not inform him, and he had no other correspondent in Jerusalem. The grave charges were not raised until recently.
In confirmation or illustration of what precedes, I request attention to the following statements:–
As to Mr. Reichardt's position, his own account to me was:
“I have been connected with the Society for forty-two years, and enjoyed their confidence to the fullest extent. It is not a little trying to find that that confidence has in some measure of late been withdrawn.”
In support of this may be remembered the unseemly outbreak of Mr. Cohen against Mr. R. the first day of the Conference, when he (Mr. C.) was deservedly reproved, and the following account of Mr. R. by one who always attends the meetings of the Section: “Mr. R. is an excellent, amiable person... but he so loves the Jews that, with occasional exceptions, where he has detected them, and sometimes even then, he is blind and lenient to a fault to their shortcomings, and will try to excuse them by every possible or probable explanation.”
With regard to the partial view which your Lordship has been forced to take of matters in the hands of the Jerusalem section, I tacitly observed distinct proof of it, when the Conference commenced by your Lordship assuming that we, the remonstrants, were identified with articles and letters from the newspapers, whereas we were of course only responsible for the MS. Statement (see ante, pp. 7–11) which we had put into the hands of the Jews' Society. The paper of extracts from newspapers, &c. was then laid open before your Lordship, and was often referred to, and shewed me how the case stood, because I was persuaded that you would never have placed yourself in the erroneous position of charging me and my friends with what we never had affirmed.
That I or others sought to compromise the name of Dr. Macgowan has been so fully met and answered in a paper prepared for the Conference on 8th May, and since sent in, that it is needless for me to refer to it. His name was omitted in my first written proposal for a compromise to Mr. Goodhart, and again in our Statement, and might now be omitted in a settlement of the business by merely acknowledging that information had been brought forward in our Conferences, of which the Society was not cognisant before.
The following statements have been placed before me, not from the clerical members of Dr. M'Caul's family, but from the female branches of his house:—
