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THE CHURCH MISSIONARY GLEANER.

OUR ONE HUNDREDTH NUMBER.

APRIL, 1882.

N the 1st of January, 1874, appeared the first number of the present CHURCH MISSIONARY GLEANER. There had been a Gleaner before, indeed; but it was a small magazine, and it had been dropped for three or four years. Eight years and four months have since been counted, making one hundred months; in which time, by the good hand of our God upon us, we have issued a thousand pictures and some fourteen hundred columns of letterpress for the sum of eight shillings and fourpence. The whole number of copies printed has exceeded three millions; and nearly £10,000 has been paid in cash by the public for numbers purchased. The Society's agencies are so numerous and varied that it is not possible to trace out the results of this particular agency; but we do know that there are missionaries now in the field who owed their missionary impulse, under God, to the GLEANER ; and when we find that the average income of the Society is now £40,000 a year more than it was in 1873, we cannot doubt that the GLEANER has worked hand-in-hand with other instrumentalities in so extending and deepening interest in missionary work as to produce a result like that.

To signalise the appearance of the Hundredth Number, we devote this month to sketches and illustrations of the Society itself, its history and its work; and we trust that both pictures and letterpress will prove interesting and helpful. It will be seen that we give four extra pages, sixteen inside the wrapper instead of twelve; and as we are printing an edition many thousand copies larger than usual, we hope our friends will make some little effort to push the sale, and in this way obtain regular subscribers for the periodical.

But let us all remember that these agencies are but means to an end. Not for its own sake do we wish the GLEANER to flourish, nor even the Church Missionary Society; but that they may be used of God to help forward the accomplishment of His own gracious purposes to a lost world. May editor, and writers, and readers, and circulators, never aim at anything lower than that!

HOW THE MONEY IS RAISED.

OT redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold. No, certainly not; and we all feel how helpless money is to work any spiritual result whatever. And yet, in the providence of God, the course of this world is so ordered that the good news of the redemption cannot be proclaimed to every creature under heaven without money. It is one of the happy features of the Church Missionary Society that its organisation gives all ranks and classes, and ages, in every corner of the land, the opportunity of joining in the work by providing some little fragment of the great sum needed. Let us see how this is done, and the result in the year 1881.

The number of parishes in England and Wales may be taken as a little over 15,000. From just one-third of these the Society received support, in one form or another, in the year 1881. Thus

2,010 parishes had sermons and meetings for the Society.
2,210

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gain of 107. About two-thirds of the whole number are more or less regularly organised as Associations, with Treasurer, Secretary, &c. Of these Associations there are 3,663; and of this number, 2,669 are affiliated as branches of larger Auxiliaries, and remit their contributions through them, while the remainder, 994, remit direct to Salisbury Square. Of the larger aggregate Associations-more often called Auxiliaries-there are 286. Some of these comprise the area of an old parish with its district parishes, as Islington and Paddington; some are Town Associations, as Birmingham and Sheffield; a few are much larger, as "Norfolk and Norwich" and "East Kent."

The total number of sermons known to have been preached for the Society in 1881 was 7,366; and of meetings held, 2,775. These figures, however, are rather short, owing to the returns from two districts being imperfect; besides which it is certain that many parochial meetings take place without being officially noted. We may therefore safely say that the sermons exceeded 7,500 and the meetings 3,000. Of the sermons, about 2,300 were preached by regular agents of the Society, i.e., Missionaries at home and Association Secretaries, leaving more than 5,000 which were preached by volunteers, the clerical friends of the Society generally.

The counties of England differ very much in the interest their clergy and people take in the Society's work, as judged by the number of sermons and meetings. Of the sermons, 901 belong to Yorkshire, 566 to Lancashire, 343 to Kent, 278 to Norfolk, 266 to Surrey, 265 to Middlesex, 258 to Hants, 250 to Durham, 231 to Somerset, 225 to Lincolnshire, and so on down to 27 for Monmouthshire and 23 for Rutland. Of the meetings, 255 belong to Yorkshire, 160 to Middlesex, 157 to Kent, 130 to Surrey, 128 to Norfolk, 126 to Lancashire, 116 to Hants, 109 to Somerset, 99 to Durham, and so on to 8 for Monmouth and 6 for Rutland. Taking the whole number of churches in a county, and comparing with it the number supporting the Society, the proportions are different. Only in Lancashire, Cheshire, and Durham do more than one-half the churches send contributions : viz., in Lancashire, 370 out of 706; in Cheshire, 112 out of 216; in Durham, 162 out of 269-or sixty per cent., the highest of all. Yorkshire is very near the half, 571 out of 1,161; and so is Northumberland, 90 out of 184.

With regard to the average amount per sermon, Middlesex stands alone, its returns per sermon averaging £17 3s. 6d. Sussex stands next, though with only £8 5s. 7d. Then Surrey, with £7 10s. 3d.; Westmoreland, £7; Channel Islands, £6 10s.; Bristol (which is always reckoned as a separate county in C.M.S. accounts), £6 9s. 11d.; Kent, £5 17s. 5d.; Lancashire, £5 10s. 4d.; Warwick, £5 5s. 6d. The average for the whole of England and Wales is only £1 12s. The only other counties above the average are Cheshire, Devon, and Stafford.

An analysis has been made of the sources of the Society's income, so far as it comes through Associations-i.e., excluding Legacies, Benefactions, Subscriptions, &c., paid direct to SalisMeetings, £9,261; Donations, £9,844; Annual Subscriptions, bury Square. The result is as follows:-Sermons, £34,430; £35,237; Missionary Boxes, £18,184. The remainder, about £32,000, is made up of "collections" (i.e., by individuals, not in churches-and not by boxes), sales of work, &c., and also a considerable amount not properly specified in the accounts received from the Associations, part of which ought no doubt to

neither sermons nor meetings, but remitted belong to the five heads above mentioned. Roughly speaking, contributions from other sources.

During the year, 150 new parishes were gained, and 43 which had previously supported the Society failed to do so, making a nett

it may be said that one-fourth of the Association funds come from sermons. Now this proportion ought to be a great deal less. In a parish well worked for the Society, with its quarterly meetings, boxes, cards, juvenile and Sunday-school organisations,

working-parties, &c., &c., as well as the ordinary subscriptions and donations, the total amount raised is often six, seven, eight, or ten times that raised by the sermons; that is to say, the sermons ought to give a much smaller proportion than one-fourth. Yet in Cheshire, Stafford, Salop, Westmoreland, Monmouth, and in South Wales, the sermons give one-third or more of the whole; and in Middlesex they give 31 per cent.

It is quite certain that much more can be done for the Church Missionary Society by its own friends. If not one new parish ever contributed, if not one which now contributes in a halfhearted way ever moved an inch forward, still the increase might be great in those where the Society is heartily supported. Even of these, only a small proportion are really worked as they might be. Without any undue pressure, and without any interference with other causes needing help, many a parish might, by simply setting on foot fresh agencies, double its returns in a single year. Is it not worth trying?

OF THE SOCIETY.

N the next page of this number are portraits of twenty of the leading men in the Society's ranks in the first few years of its existence. A brief notice of them, and of some who worked with them, will not be unacceptable.

Comparing the income raised in the various counties with their population, we arrive at very interesting results. Westmoreland sends much the largest contribution, 333. 1d. for every 100 souls. Herts and Sussex come next, 26s. 73d. and 24s. 3d. respectively; and then Gloucester, Hunts, and Somerset, each a little over 20s. Of those under £1 per 100, Rutland SOME OF THE FOUNDERS AND EARLY FRIENDS stands first, 19s. 73d.; then Norfolk, 17s. 10d.; Kent, 17s. 3d.; Dorset, 16s. 11d.; Suffolk, Cambridge, and Hants, between 15s. and 16s. each. These, it will be seen, include the three counties that have the smallest population in England-Rutland, Hunts, Westmoreland; and evidently the efforts of a few friends in them have lifted up the percentage. Herts is a well-known C.M.S. county. Sussex, Gloucester, and Somerset, owe their position to such places as Brighton, Cheltenham, Bristol, and Bath. It is noteworthy that Norfolk should stand next after these, even before Kent, which has Blackheath, Tunbridge Wells, &c., to swell its figures. Dorset is unexpectedly good, owing to the good work of a few friends in what they themselves regard as a not very fruitful district. But it is surprising altogether to find these agricultural counties in the forefront, and such others as Berks, Hereford, Oxon, following next, while the great centres of population come far behind. That such strongholds of the Society as Lancashire and Durham should only give about 7s. per 100 each, considerably less than half the proportion of Cambridgeshire or Dorset, is contrary to all expectation; and scarcely less so, that Middlesex and Yorkshire, with 10s. 2d. and 9s. 11d., should be only half of Gloucester, Hunts, or Somerset. And why should Stafford give only 4s. 3d.? Evidently the immense growth of the population of late years has baffled the best efforts to keep up with it.

It is interesting also to notice the relative progress of the counties during the last thirty years. In that period the gross income of the Society from all sources has just doubled itself; but the most rapid rate of increase has been in Legacies and large Benefactions, and the rate of increase in the returns from local Associations has been 78 per cent. The question now is, Which counties show a rate of progress higher, and which a rate lower, than this general rate of 78 per cent.?

Of the forty-one counties (Bristol being again taken as a separate county), only sixteen exceed the average rate of increase; one equals it; twenty have a lower rate; three (Cornwall, Rutland, Wilts), have not increased at all; and two (Monmouth and Worcester), have actually given less now than they did thirty years ago. The first of all is again Westmoreland, with an increase of no less than 209 per cent. Kent is close behind, with 205 per cent. Then come Northumberland, 181 per cent.; Durham, 177 per cent.; Herts, 171 per cent. ; and then, after a long interval, Cumberland, 135 per cent., and Norfolk, 134 per cent. The two metropolitan counties of Middlesex and Surrey, together with Devonshire and Notts, follow; and then Bedfordshire, Hants, Sussex, the only others that have doubled their contributions in the twenty-nine years. Hereford and Derby are the remaining two that have exceeded the general rate; and Lancashire is the one that has just kept abreast of it. But the increase in Ireland far exceeds that of any part of England, being no less than 360 per cent., viz., from £1,659 in 1850-51 to £5,996 in 1880-81. It should, however, be added that the whole of this was gained in the first decade; and that in the last few years, the Hibernian Auxiliary has been engaged in recovering the ground lost at the time of the Disestablishment.

In the first line across the top of the page, we see the four men who, before any others, merit the title of Founders of the Society. JOHN VENN, Rector of Clapham, son of the great Henry Venn of Huddersfield, and father of Henry Venn, the Hon. Secretary in after years, was in the Chair at the inaugural meeting on April 12th, 1799, and signed the Committee's letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury. A very curious illustration of the estimation in which Evangelical clergymen were then held is given by his son Henry. A relative of the then Bishop of London was going from Fulham Palace to visit Mr. Venn at Clapham. The Bishop's carriage must on no account be seen to draw up at Mr. Venn's door, so it set down the lady at a public-house near, whence she was fetched to the Rectory by young Henry himself!

THOMAS SCOTT, the author of the well-known Commentary-which has done a noble work, although now in some respects out of date-was Secretary of the Society for the first three years, and preached the first Annual Sermon on May 26th, 1801. Some of his sayings have often been quoted. One was, "I wish to do what I can; I have no money to give, and I cannot become a missionary; but I can labour, and I have a little influence." Again: "It is our duty to go forward, expecting that our difficulties will be removed in proportion as it is necessary that they should." Again : "Those who most pray for us are our best benefactors."

CHARLES SIMEON, of Cambridge, who, by his work among University men, and by his purchases of the patronage of important livings, did perhaps more for spiritual religion in England than any other man of his age, was less identified with the Society than some others, and not being in London, was not a member of the original Committee. But the movement which resulted in the formation of the Society owed its first impulse to a paper read by him before the Eclectic Society three years before, on Feb. 8th, 1796, and in 1802 he preached the second Annual Sermon. JOSIAH PRATT succeeded Scott as Secretary in 1802, and continued in office twenty-two years. Under his vigorous administration the first ninety missionaries were sent forth; Missions were begun in West Africa, the Levant, India (North, South, and West), Ceylon, New Zealand, and NorthWest America; and the income multiplied just a hundred-fold, rising from £370 to £37,000.

The second row of portraits shows us four other of the earliest and most active clerical friends of the Society, viz., JOHN NEWTON, once a slavedealer, then a faithful minister of Christ and author of "How sweet the name of Jesus sounds" and other favourite hymns, and a member of the original Committee; RICHARD CECIL, of St. John's, Bedford Row, the leading evangelical preacher of the day, who delivered the third Annual Sermon; T. T. BIDDULPH, of Bristol, who preached the fourth Annual Sermon, and afterwards founded the first great Branch Association in that city; and BASIL WOODD, an active member of the original Committee, and the first clergyman to make a church collection for the Society, in his church, Bentinck Chapel, Paddington.

The third row brings before us some of the Society's leading lay friends. WILLIAM WILBERFORCE took the deepest interest in the cause from the first, and his influence in Parliament and in high quarters generally proved of essential service; and the Society on its part crowned the great work of his life in the abolition of the Slave Trade by taking charge of the rescued slaves. HENRY THORNTON, M.P., of Clapham, was the first Treasurer, and held that office sixteen years, until his death. JOHN BACON, R.A., the famous sculptor, was one of the original Committee, and a man of singular piety. ZACHARY MACAULAY had been governor of Sierra Leone, and on his return to England in 1801, he at once joined the Committee, and was for many years a leading member. He also wielded an important influence as editor of the Christian Observer. The great Lord Macaulay was his son.

In the fourth row we find four eminent men who may be called foreign

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friends. The first three were East Indian chaplains. HENRY MARTYN, whose name is universally accorded the first place in the ranks of English missionaries, was Senior Wrangler, and curate to Mr. Simeon at Cambridge. He offered himself to the Society at a time when an avowed missionary was not permitted to land in British India, and his friends advised him to accept a chaplaincy there instead. But he was a member of the first C.M.S. Corresponding Committee at Calcutta. So was DANIEL CORRIE, the real founder of C.M.S. work in North India, under whose auspices the first Mission was begun at Agra by Martyn's convert, Abdul Masih. He afterwards became the first Bishop of Madras. CLAUDIUS BUCHANAN, another Calcutta chaplain, was the first to advocate, in a pamphlet written at the Society's request, the establishment of the English Episcopate in India; also to evoke sympathy for the ancient Christian Churches of the East, which led on to the Mediterranean and Travancore Missions. He preached the tenth Annual Sermon. SAMUEL MARSDEN was for forty-five years a chaplain in New South Wales, and is justly termed the Apostle of New Zealand. He persuaded the Society to send out men to venture among the dreaded cannibals; he took them there himself; he preached the first Christian sermon there, on Christmas Day, 1814; and he made the voyage thither six times, to direct and encourage the missionaries.

In the lowest row we see four most valuable and influential labourers, who come on the scene a little later in time. ADMIRAL LORD GAMBIER, indeed, was a Governor from the first, but it was not till 1811 that he became the first President. EDWARD BICKERSTETH was Secretary from 1815 to 1830, first with Pratt and then in succession to him. No man did more, both by praying and by working, for the Society's cause. He went to Africa and established the Sierra Leone Mission. He trained many of the earlier missionaries, who resided in his house as students. He travelled all over England founding local Associations. And at the Jubilee Meeting in 1848 he delivered his last great missionary speech. DANIEL WILSON, the elder, was an early member of the Committee, and, as Cecil's successor at St. John's, Bedford Row, where most of the leading Christian laymen in London then attended, he exercised important influence. He became Vicar of Islington, which parish from that time to this has been a centre of C.M.S. interest. And as Bishop of Calcutta he did a noble work for the spread of the Gospel in India. His is the only name that appears twice on the list of preachers of the Annual Sermon, in 1817 and 1846, the first time as presbyter, the second

OUR TREASURER.

URING the eighty-three years of the Society's existence, it has only had two Presidents and three Treasurers, and in the case of the latter, the three periods of service cover the whole of the eightythree years. The first was Henry Thornton, whose name occurs in the preceding article, on the Society's Founders and Early Friends. On his death, in 1815, his nephew, John Thornton, was appointed, who held the office for forty-six years. He died in 1861, and was succeeded by the present Treasurer, Captain the Hon. Francis Maude, R.N.

Captain Maude is in his eighty-fourth year, although his quick and elastic step is that of a man twenty or thirty years He was the youngest son of the first Viscount younger.

a very

Hawarden, and was born in 1798. There can scarcely be another man in England who can boast that his grandfather was born in the reign of Charles II., more than 200 years ago; or that there are now living 450 descendants of his father, that is to say, his own family and those of his brothers and sisters and their children, besides 110 who are dead! The genealogy has been printed, and remarkable document it is. Captain Maude well says, "Dr. Colenso affirms that since Moses and Aaron were only the fourth generation from the time of Jacob going into Egypt, the Israelites only increased at the rate of four generations during their sojourn there, and therefore an army of 600,000 fighting men was an impossibility. So, as I am only the second generation from Charles II., therefore this nation has only increased at the rate of two generations, and one-half of those present at a recent large dinner-party were amongst the impossibilities -were, in fact, myths!" Francis Maude entered the Royal Naval College in 1811, and went to sea in 1814. He had, however, been afloat before that, for when only eight years old, in 1806, the year after Trafalgar, he was three months with his brother-in-law, Lord W. Stuart, in H.M.S. Lavinia off the coast of Spain. Another reminiscence he sent only two years ago (June 30th, 1880) to the Editor of the GLEANER :- "This day sixty-five years ago, June 30th, 1815, I sailed (it was long before steam was invented) from Spithead for India with three sets of despatches-Buonaparte's escape from Elba, the Battle of Waterloo, and the Peace."

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CAPTAIN THE HON. FRANCIS MAUDE, R.N., Treasurer of the Church Missionary Society.

time as Bishop. Lastly, THOMAS FOWELL BUXTON, upon whom fell the mantle of Wilberforce, and who followed up the abolition of the Slave Trade by obtaining the abolition of Slavery after many years' struggle, was a warm supporter of the Society, especially in its West African work; as his son and grandson, the late and the present Baronet, and many other members of his family, have been ever since.

We wish we could also have given portraits of others: of W. Goode, at whose church, St. Ann's, Blackfriars, the first sixteen Annual Sermons were preached; of Legh Richmond, author of the Dairyman's Daughter, who preached the ninth Annual Sermon; of Charles Grant, father and son, and James Stephen, father and son, who used their official and political influence for the cause, and were constantly consulted by successive Secretaries; of Bishop Ryder, of Lichfield, the first Bishop to patronise the Society; of William Jowett, the first University graduate to go out as an actual missionary, the founder of the Mediterranean Mission, and afterwards Secretary of the Society; not to speak of many less known clergymen and laymen. But their record is on high, and their works do follow them.

Captain Maude has nearly completed half a century of service for the Church Missionary Society. He became a member of the Committee in 1833; and after his appointment to the Treasurership in 1861, he for many years acted as Chairman. The Society has had no stauncher supporter-no truer friend.

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