The contention grew, and commissioners and consuls, with troops, Persian and Turkish, took part in it.

In the end it was made perfectly clear that the girl had gone off with Aziz, the Kurd, as the husband of her own choice, and had embraced the Mohammedan faith by her own wish.

The Kurds in Persian Kurdistan appear to live on friendly terms with their Armenian village neighbours, and on this occasion a runaway love-match became the cause of some popular excitement in England, and much trouble and tumult on the Perso-Turkish frontier.
The Armenian Archbishop in Persia, who resides at Isfahan, is always a Russian subject from the monastery of Etchmiadzin, near Erivan, the seat of the Catholicus, the primate of the orthodox Armenian Church, and this doubtless has its effect in suggesting protection and security.

France also for a longtime past has steadily asserted the right to protect the Catholic Armenian Church in Persia, and once a year the French Minister at Tehran, with the Legation secretaries, attends Divine service in the chapel there in full diplomatic dress and state, to show the fact and force of the support which the Church enjoys.

France similarly takes Catholic institutions in Turkey under her protection, and appears to be generally the Catholic champion in the East.
The careful observer in Tehran cannot fail to be struck with the religious tolerance shown to non-Mohammedan Persian subjects in the 'shadow of the Shah.' Amongst these, other than Christians, may be mentioned the Guebres (Parsees) and the Jews.