The community were likewise enjoined to institute a
diligent search for the criminals. In consequence of
this proclamation, a young man, a Jew, who kept a
tobacconist's shop in the Moslem quarter, close by one
of the city gates, came forward, and stated that the
missing priest and his servant had passed by his
door at six o'clock on the evening of the day on which
he was last seen ; that he had solicited them to pur-
chase twmbeki, but that they had passed on to the
house of a Turkish merchant, which they had entered.
88 The Life of Sir Moses Montefiore. [ch. vn

The young man was taken before the Pasha, to whom
he repeated his storj' ; but the latter, instead of in-
quiring into its truth, angrily accused him of being
an accomplice, and ordered him to be mercilessly
flogged. The youth perished imder the bastiaado.
He was the first martyr in this terrible tragedy.
Eatti-Menton lost no time in communicating to
Sheriff Pasha the nature of the barber's alleged con-
fession ; and seven of the most influential Jews in the
town — David Arari, his son and two brothers, Moses
Abulafia, Moses Saloniki, and Joseph Laniado, the
latter a man over eighty years of age — were forthwith
arrested. Examined by the Governor, they one and
all asserted their innocence. At the suggestion of
Ratti-Menton the bastinado was called into requisition ;
but still they denied all knowledge of the missing monk.
