THE MISSIONARY HERALD,

OUR FUNDS.

A DEFICIENCY OF SEVEN OR EIGHT THOUSAND POUNDS IS ANTICIPATED IN THE INCOME OF THE BAPTIST MISSIONARY SOCIETY FOR THE PRESENT

YEAR.

At the annual audit, in March, 1863, a balance of £1,176 10s. 5d. was found to be due to the Treasurer. As the year began with a surplus of £3,707 14s. 7d., the excess of expenditure over income had been nearly five thousand pounds. Unless, therefore, some immediate and vigorous measures are taken to increase the income above that of 1863, the present year must close with a very large and oppressive debt.

This deficiency may partly be traced to the influence of the late Cotton Famine, which straitened the means of many wonted liberal supporters, and diverted into other channels the contributions that otherwise might have been devoted to missionary extension; but partly, also, to a large diminution of receipts under the heads of Donations and Legacies, amounting last year to £3,252. Christian societies and churches on the Continent also made earnest appeals to the liberality of our friends, owing to the falling off of their usual receipts from America.

The present difficulty is further increased by the extension given of late years to the Society's operations. Encouraged by the enlargement of the funds placed at their disposal during the five previous years-the income rising from £22,943 15s. 10d. in 1858, to £33,151 4s. 10d. in 1862-the Committee from year to year added to the number of their missionaries and native agents. In 1858 there were forty-eight missionaries employed; now, there are sixty-three, with a staff of two hundred and eight native preachers and ninety-six schoolmasters.

The quelling of the Mutiny in India opened new fields of missionary enterprise, and gave intense urgency to the claims of that land of idols on British Christians. Ceylon, Africa, Hayti, and Brittany, demanded more labourers. The remarkable events which burst through the barriers that ages had excluded the Gospel from China, gave fresh force to the appeal for help so often made without avail to our churches. These appeals were felt to be irresistible, and a new mission was begun amongst the thirty millions of people in the province of Shantung.

for

Now, unless the income of the Society can be raised to that enjoyed in 1862, many of the missionaries sent forth in answer to these providential openings must be withdrawn.

The Committee dare not take upon themselves the responsibility of doing this, without first solemnly appealing to the friends of the Society for aid. If this be withheld, there is no alternative. Promising fields of VOL. VII., NEW SERIES.

60

missionary labour must be abandoned; the staff of labourers must be reduced; the Committee must be deaf to the cry of the perishing!

Shall it be so? Can it be right to recall brethren from the work of God, to which they have given their lives, and have been consecrated by the prayers of the churches? Does the necessity really exist? Are the missionary resources of Christ's Church exhausted? The Committee ought not to assume this. They will, therefore, await with the deepest solicitude, yet with trust in God, the response that the churches give to their appeal

THE NATIVE CONVERTS OF BARISAL

BY THE REV. J. C. PAGE.*

You ask what these people are like at home. Well, look in, if you please. You will be welcomed with salaams, and by several joyful countenances. You will be made to feel that you confer an honour by your visit, instead of being told that you by your white face defile a Bengali hut! Doubtless, you will meet with people laborious or lazy, loving or quarrelsome, cleanly or dirty, neat er untidy, as all even in England are. Still, think a little. Here are facts. Women at home are no longer slaves. The privileges of social or religious life do not belong solely to their lords. Men address their neighbours' young wives by the word "sisters;" the elder wives, occasionally, by a word meaning "eldest sister," implying respect; the old women by the term "mother;" and, withal, there is intercommunication of a right kind. At meals, though, mostly, for lack of ser vants (!), the wife (as in Abraham's day) serves the husband, the two will not object to eat together. And over twice two thousand meals every day, "the blessing" is asked of the God of heaven by those who, not very long back, never dreamed of any one greater or more beneficent than the gods or goddesses, or the "five elements." In hundreds of families, husband, wife, and children meet together, once (if not twice) a-day, and have "family worship,"-that blessed ordinance of domestic life. In hundreds of homes there is the Bible, so long unknown, unseen, unpossessed; and this precious volume constitutes the book of the family. The oft-questioned missionary will still be asked, "How many real Christians have you got?" "Really, have you any true Christians?” We are, I am bold to say, not wholly unprepared for such inquiries. At the same time, I may be pardoned if I say that like questions might be asked in other lands, and among more favoured communities. Still, we can point you out some four hundred persons, to whom we might use the words of the Apostle, "Ye are washed, ye are sanctified; ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus." And these four hundred men and women we would in charity hope fear God, love Jesus, and understand why they love Him who so loved them. It is not easy to get a complete view of them in a hurry, for they constitute fifteen different churches, each having its own teacher. But their characteristic habits or customs are alike. Every month they "remember" Jesus's death in the ordinance of the Lord's Supper. They periodically hold "church-meetings," and maintain discipline among themselves, excluding the unworthy, bringing home the penitent, or encouraging the inquirer. Their law is the Bible, and the Bible alone. They live, generally, in love among themselves, and in peace with all men. They are often jealous of one another, lest any one should, through temptation, bring dishonour on the Name. They strive, in some degree, to bring in their heathen neighbours to a participation of their own privileges, and many a whole night have many of them sat up, or travelled from place to place, to encourage a man to cast away Hinduism and become a Christian. They are a marked people, strange, and differing. The heathen know them to be not of their own; sud

* From Dr. Mullens' "Ten Years' Missionary Labour in India,”