Fuh-Kien Province, all of whom were ordained within the last dozen years, we have lost three. The Lord had need of them, doubtless; but these successive deaths have been a heavy trial to the Mission. One of the best of the catechists, Ting Ling-Soi, has also lately died.

It will be seen from the Minutes of the Committee in this number, that the position of the Fuh-Kien Mission has been occupying considerable attention. Plans have been matured for its development which will there be found summarized; but whether these plans can be carried out in their entirety depends upon various local circumstances, and, in particular, we now hear that obstacles are being thrown in the way of the Mission purchasing land even in the foreign concession outside the city at Nantai.

LIEUT. CUTFIELD, R.N., of H.M.S. London, who lately spent a few weeks at Frere Town, writes to the Society that he "cannot speak too highly of the way in which the work is carried on."

FROM the Annual Report of the Lahore Divinity School we learn that ten ordained Native clergymen have gone from it since it was opened by Mr. French ten years ago, besides several lay evangelists, some of whom will probably take holy orders hereafter. The ten clergymen are the Revs. John Williams, of Tank; Imam Shah, of Peshawar; Bhola Nath Ghose, of Narowal; Sadiq Masih, of Batala; Katwaru Lal, of Agra; Aman Masih Levi, of Benares; Yaqub Ali, of Lahore; and the late Samuel Carter, of Lucknow-all these connected with the C.M.S.; also the late Rev. Ilahi Bakhsh, whose name we do not remember hearing before, and the Rev. Asad Ali, ordained last year for the S.P.G. Mission at Delhi. There are now thirteen students in the College.

It will be seen from the Minutes of the Committee in this number that some useful work has been inaugurated in connexion with the Frances Ridley Havergal Memorial Fund, both in providing Native Bible-women in India, and in promoting the translation of some of the late Miss Havergal's works.

We are glad to report the first successful journey by an Englishwoman into the interior of Eastern Africa. The lady to whom Mr. Last, our missionary at Mamboia, was engaged, was sent out to him in August last under the escort of Mr. Taylor and Mr. Biddlecombe. In September the wedding took place at Zanzibar, and the married pair proceeded up country, reaching Mamboia safely on Nov. 20th. Mrs. Last suffered in no way from fatigue or sickness, and arrived at her new home in perfect health and excellent spirits. The Mission-house is in a most healthy situation, on a hill 800 feet high in a country which is itself very high ground.

Ir will be remembered that when Bishop Bompas crossed the Rocky Mountains, at the request of both the Bishop of Columbia and the C.M.S. Committee, to visit the Society's Missions on the North Pacific coast, he drew special attention to the hitherto neglected condition of the Kitikshean and other Indian tribes of the interior territories-interior, that is, as regards the coast, but west of the Cascade Mountains; also that the Rev. R.

Tomlinson, who had laboured some years at Kincolith, at the mouth of the Nass River, was commissioned to advance up that river, and seek an eligible spot for the establishment of a station similar to some of those in the older districts of the N.-W. America Mission, where the Indians settle down to agricultural pursuits. The farming operations would be to such settlers what trading and fishing have been to the settlers at Metlakahtla. Mr. Tomlinson selected a place called Ankihtlast, some 200 miles inland, and twenty miles north of the forks of the Skeena River, and after a toilsome and difficult journey he and his family reached that place on July 1st, 1879. Subsequently some questions arose regarding his plans for the working of the station, and a few months ago he came over to England to consult with the Committee. The result has been the maturing of a scheme which we trust may by God's blessing issue in the founding of an agricultural Metlakahtla.

At the same time, it appears important to occupy also the Skeena Forks itself, which is an important trading-post, and which Bishop Ridley is anxious to make a centre of active evangelizing work. To this end he himself has been spending the winter there; and the Committee hope to be able next autumn to send him out a missionary for the purpose.

THE REV. H. Maundrell paid another visit to Kagoshima (see our last number, p. 168) in December, and baptized five more adults and two children. He writes that the Russo-Greek Church is making vigorous advances in Japan, and that Bishop Nicolay is about to ordain several of its converts.

THE REV. T. P. Hughes, of Peshawar, writes:

On December 26th a family of Mohammedan Afghans were baptized by the Rev. Imam Shah at Peshawar. The head of the family is Munshi Hamid Ullah, who has for many years been a Government teacher in a village school. One of his former pupils was Yusab Ali, the young gentleman from Hushtnaggar, who was baptized about

four years ago; and it was interesting to see, in the present case, the old pupil standing sponsor for his former tutor. The baptism of Hamid Ullah and his family makes the seventh baptism we have had of Natives of Hushtnaggar, the most bigoted part of the district. Our other Afghan converts have been chiefly from the district of Yusafzai.

THE Rev. John Grundy, who has been in charge of the Hong Kong Mission since the Rev. E. Davys left for England in April last year, reports continued extension on the mainland in the Quantung Province. Twentyfive adults were baptized during the year, and there are now 183 Native Christian adherents. Mr. Grundy's case calls for our very special sympathy. Though a young missionary, and still but a stammerer in Chinese, he has been left alone for twelve months; and there is no prospect of his being reinforced before the end of the year at all events. With a large and growing Mission to superintend as best he can, progress in the language is impossible. Meanwhile the Rev. A. B. Hutchinson, whose work the Mission has been in a peculiar sense, has been called, in the mysterious providence of God, to suffer a yet heavier trial during his sojourn in this country, in the death of his wife.

THE Rev. A. Elwin's Report from Hang-chow is of a chequered character. There has been some advance in the interesting Great Valley district, but

not such as the previous two or three years witnessed, and we grieve to say that a few of the Christians have gone back. Mr. Elwin is not a little saddened by these disappointments, and would be more so but that he finds in St. Paul's Epistles ample evidence that exactly the same trials beset the first preachers of the Gospel, inspired apostles though they were. He gives one noble instance of fearless endurance of suffering for Christ's sake, which will probably be published in the Gleaner. Our friends must specially remember Hang-chow and its out-stations in their prayers.

Ar the close of the year, the Rev. W. R. Blackett moved the Bengal Divinity School into its new home in the buildings of the late Cathedral Mission College at Calcutta. The institution will now be called the Cathedral Mission Divinity College. The Rev. R. J. Bell, Principal of the Society's new Boarding School for Christian boys, and the Rev. Piari Mohun Rudra, Pastor of Trinity Church, have assisted Mr. Blackett in the lectures; but Mr. Bell has now gone to Agra, to take the place (temporarily) of the Rev. J. A. Lloyd, who has come home. Christ Church and Agarpara, which were for a time under his charge, have been handed over to the Rev. A. Clifford.

BURDWAN, the station formerly so familiar to us as the scene of the faithful labours of the late J. J. Weitbrecht, has now again a resident missionary, after being for several years unoccupied and only visited from Calcutta. The Rev. E. H. Thornton took permanent charge of the Mission in January 1880. "The place," he writes, "had a forlorn, ruined aspect about it, and, which was worse still, desolation reigned in the hearts and homes of the Christians". -a small company, ninety-two in number; but we are thankful to find that he is able to report a decidedly improved outlook after twelve months' work. Among the Brahmins resident at Burdwan, Mr. Thornton has found one who was educated under Dr. Duff, and who has been for twenty-five years a secret believer in the Lord Jesus," but shrinks from openly confessing Him in baptism; another, a graduate of Calcutta University, and the editor of a newspaper, who, "having been brought up in a Government school, has not much knowledge of the Bible," but desires to know more; and a third, who is "very far advanced, and always defends Christianity when it is spoken against." "I would earnestly ask you," says Mr. Thornton, "to pray for these men, that God may be pleased to open their eyes, and draw them to Himself as trophies of divine grace."

THE REV. V. Vedhanayagam, the senior missionary in North Tinnevelly and Chairman of the Native Church Council, sends a most interesting Report, which we hope to print in full shortly, together with some notes of a visit lately paid to this field of labour by the Rev. A. H. Arden, our Secretary at Madras. The country over which Ragland and D. Fenn and Meadows itinerated so diligently now presents all the tokens of a successful Mission. When the Itinerancy became a settled Mission with a station missionary in 1857, there were 1062 adherents; now there are 4900. Last year there were 101 baptisms.

THE REV. F. W. N. Alexander sends an encouraging Report from Ellore. There are now 664 baptized Christians and 185 unbaptized adherents in the district, a gain of 80 in the year. There is still a great want of men among

the Mala converts who are fit to be prepared with a view to ordination for the pastorate, but we are glad to see that two of that race have at length been selected by the Native Church Council to be presented to the Bishop of Madras after two years' further training. Meanwhile the work of Native evangelists under the Council is extending a very good sign-being supported by collections made throughout the Telugu Mission, aided by a grant from the Henry Venn Fund. The year has witnessed also an accession of strength in the engagement of four Tamil Christians, who have left their own country in the far south to labour among the Telugu people, one of them, the Rev. Sam Vores, a Tinnevelly man, having been ordained by the Bishop of Madras in the early part of the year as an assistant-missionary. He has had to learn the Telugu language, but has made rapid progress, and ere this was expected to have passed his final examination. This is a new and hopefully significant feature in our Indian Missions.

THE Rev. T. R. Hodgson sends an interesting Report from Jabalpur (Jubbulpore), our chief station in the "Central Provinces" of India, indeed the only one prior to the recent occupation of Mandla as the headquarters of the Gônd Mission. Mr. Hodgson is now able to give more time to evangelistic work, as well as to the important educational agencies of the station, having been relieved of the pastoral care of the congregation (numbering 91 souls) by the appointment of the Rev. Madho Ram, late of Agra, to the pastorate, in connexion with the N.-W. Provinces Native Church Council; concerning whom he says, "I cannot speak too highly of the good influence Madho Ram's faithfulness, earnestness, and lovable and consistent character has had over our Christians." " Harmony and Christian love among them has rarely been disturbed. At Christmas we had a great gathering of young and old in the manner of the Natives of this country, only sanctified in our case by prayer and praise. Funds to the amount of over Rs. 100 were liberally supplied by our friends in Jabalpur, and the day was spent among the lovely scenery of the Narbudda Valley, and ended by a magnificent display of fireworks. There is no reason why our Christians should not have their festivals and rejoicings as well as their heathen neighbours." The congregation contributed to various objects during the year no less than Rs. 300, showing a liberality which, says Mr. Hodgson, is to him, "knowing the Native character and its weaknesses, hardly less a matter of wonder than of thankfulness." Inquirers come forward from time to time: one respectable merchant is mentioned as a sort of daylight Nicodemus, who comes in the quiet of hot mid-day, when no one is astir to mark his visits to the Padre Sahib "; but Mr. Hodgson laments that so many "make I dare not wait upon I would." He concludes his Report by dwelling on the importance of Jabalpur, as "no decayed and crumbling seat of empire, but a vigorous and thriving town."

A NEW edition of the Rev. A. E. Moule's interesting work on China, Four Hundred Millions, has been published by Messrs. Seeley and Co.

By an accidental error, the increase in the C.M.S. Native clergy in India in the last twenty years was understated in our March number (p. 152). The number for 1880 should be 109 instead of 99.

SELECTIONS FROM PROCEEDINGS OF COMMITTEE.

General Committee, February 14th, 1881.-A letter was read from Mrs. Le Mare, announcing the death, on the 4th inst., of E. R. Le Mare, Esq., a Life Governor of the Society. The Secretaries were directed to convey to Mrs. Le Mare the assurance of the sympathy of the Committee, and their sense of the loss the Society had sustained in the death of so great a friend and helper.

The Rev. W. Gray was appointed the representative of the Society on the Council Board of the Christian Vernacular Education Society, in the room of the late Rev. Henry Wright.

A Report was presented from the Frances Ridley Havergal Fund Sub-Committee, and its recommendations adopted as follows: (1) That 1000l. Stock, out of the 15207., be retained for the purpose of using the interest in the support of Bible-women, and that the remainder of the Fund be expended as required in grants towards the translation and publication of Miss Havergal's works. (2) That as the interest on the 10007. Railway Stock will be about sufficient to maintain five Native Bible-women, at the average rate of Rs. 10 per month, the following grants of that sum monthly be made: (a) To the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, for a Bible-woman to work under Miss Ellen Lakshmi Goreh, at Jhandiala, in the Punjab-this grant having been specially asked for by Miss Maria Havergal (sister of the deceased) as a first charge on the Fund; (b) to the Indian Female Normal School and Instruction Society, for a Bible-woman at Bombay; (c) to the Rev. E. Champion, for a Bible-woman at Jubbulpore. (3) That two other grants of like amount be reserved for further applications. (4) That the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, and the Indian Female Normal School and Instruction Society be requested to furnish this Society from time to time with copies of any Reports received by them respecting the work of the Bible-women employed by them with the aid of the above grants, with a view to their publication by this Society. (5) That with regard to the second object of the Fund, the following, who have made applications for grants, be encouraged to proceed with the translation of Royal Bounty, or some other suitable work by Miss Frances Ridley Havergal, and short portions as tracts, and be requested to furnish esti mates for the consideration of the Committee, viz.: Mrs. Low, Urdu language; Mr. D. Anantam, of Masulipatam, Telugu language; Rev. S. Coles, Kandy, Ceylon, Singhalese language.

The following appointments were made in consequence of the Society's acceptance of special contributions for sending out at once four of the ordained men kept back, to the Afghan frontier, the North-West Provinces, and China (see previous Minutes):-The Revs. J. H. Knowles and H. Rountree to the Punjab, the Rev. F. E. Walton to Benares, and the Rev. C. B. Nash to the Che-Kiang Mission.

Committee of Correspondence, February 22nd.-The Committee took into consideration a letter from the Bishop of Rupert's Land, with regard to the reductions ordered last year. After full discussion it was resolved to recommend to the General Committee, (1) that in view of the pledges given by the Society in 1866 and 1879, the grant of 2001. per annum to St. John's College, in aid of the tuition fund, be restored; (2) that the Rupert's Land estimates for the current year be dealt with as favourably as possible; (3) that the Secretaries communicate with the Bishop of Rupert's Land, and after counsel with him present a scheme for the gradual