bishop, who had been sent to Malabar by the Jacobite patriarch of Antioch to supersede the native metran, but who turned out to be a very undesirable personage. In the year 1835, Bishop Wilson held a conference with the Syrian clergy, and gave them some excellent advice on the need of ministerial training, the establishment of schools, the use of the vernacular in the prayers, instruction in the Gospels, and other improvements, in which they appeared to acquiesce, but which they entirely repudiated as soon as he had left them, even sending him back the 1,000 rupees he had given them. Perhaps something may be said for the Syrian side of the case. Excellent as was the good bishop's advice, he had come on a tour of inspection as the first "Metropolitan of British India." We can understand with what feelings the leaders of an ancient Church, proud of a history they dated back to the Apostolic Age, would regard a visit from this English clergyman with his high-sounding title, especially if we allow that Bishop Wilson was—as it is asserted—not deficient in British masterfulness.
After this the Syrian Church broke off relations with the Church Missionary Society. A little later. Mar Athanasius Mathew, a native of Malabar, became metran. This good man worked for years for the reform of his Church, in spite of local opposition and rivalry. His position was rather ambiguous, because, after priding himself on having been consecrated by the patriarch of Antioch, he denied that prelate's authority to depose him. After his death the question of the succession to the bishopric came into the law courts and gave rise to ten years of litigation. This question turned mainly on the right of the Jacobite patriarch of Antioch to supremacy over the Syrian Church in India. In point of fact, he had only ordained one metran accepted by that Church, Mar Athanasius, during the whole Jacobite period. The opposing party based their claim for independence on the earlier history of the Church when it was in communion with the Nestorian catholicos at BabyIon and derived its orders from him, as well as on its own
