to Fettah Effendi, of Diarbekir, and urged him to go and explain to the Pasha; but he did not wish to go. He then called out, much excited, 'Come, Gensd'armes, take these men and kill them.' I then said, 'How much money do you want? Tell us, and we will give it.' The Muteserif said, 'I don't know.' I said, 'You are delivering us over to these soldiers. Tell us how much you want and we will give it, and save ourselves from them.' The Muteserif then asked Fettah Effendi, who had looked over our documents, and who had said that the Protestants owed nothing, 'How much are these men to pay?' He said, 'I don't know.' He then turned to the members of the other sects and said, How much do you want of these men?' They said, 'Let them come to the market [where the chief of police was receiving taxes], and we will see.' So we were hurried off there. This was less than an hour before sunset. We were taken to the shop occupied by Daoud Agha, the chief of the police. A great crowd gathered as we went along, and afterwards, which completely filled all the streets in that vicinity. As we entered, Daoud Agha, who is an old enemy of the Protestants, said to his men, Bring me two bottles of raki and three or four candles, and I will collect this money before morning.' I then advanced and asked how much money they wished from me. They said, 'Nothing. You do not belong to this place-you may go.' As I went out, the police punched me with their gun-stocks. I was then called back, and again beaten on the way back. They merely told me, 'You may go,' and again, after I had reached the street, the police turned me back, beating me severely with their gun-stocks. It seems that this last call was not at the order of those in the shop, but the work of persons in the crowd outside. They then delivered the old man, Muksi Meekha, to two Gends'armes and said, 'Collect 6,000 piasters from this man.'""

Mr. Barnum states, at this point: "The statements of the preacher and Muksi Meekha are here combined. This case is not the worst, but is given as a fair sample of the rest. The two Gensd'armes took him out into the street and began to

This is

beat him with their gun-stocks. done by taking the gun in both hands and striking with it endwise. He promised to give security for the payment of the money in the morning, and begged to be allowed till morning to raise the money, as the shops were all shut; but they said, 'We must have the money now.' He wandered through the market in the vain hope of finding somebody who would advance the money, the guard all the time beating him, and so severely that he several times fell down, and his outer garment was torn into shreds; and he has since that time, now more than a week, kept his bed most of the time. At last he met a member of the Mejlis (a Turkish member) who told the guard that if it was money they wished they must take kefil from him and wait till morning, as it was now evening, and nobody could raise money at that time; but,' he said, if your object is to kill him, take him back to the chief of police and butcher him there.' They then took him back to the crowd, and he found a man who gave a part of the money and a note for the payment of the rest in the morning, and he was released. He thinks that he would have been killed but for the intervention of the Turk.

"Each one of the prisoners was then passed over to two Gensd'armes. Some of these were at once delivered, by their friends advancing the money; but four of them, besides Muksi Meekha, were treated just as he was, and all of them have kept their beds most of the time since.

"The police were at the same time sent to the houses of all the other Protestants, and they were brought, and the money which the sects demanded collected from them, by their paying the money or getting security for its payment in the morning. In this way, in the space of a few hours, and that evening, 19,000 piasters were collected."

STATEMENTS BY MR. WILLIAMS.

AFTER the foregoing was prepared for the press, a letter was received from Mr. Williams, dated at Harpoot, August 21, from which also a few paragraphs should be given. He writes:

"It is now a week since Mr. Barnum and I returned from a second visit to Mardin. We went to that hot side of the Taurus, in the hottest part of this hot summer, to comfort the brethren there in their bitter persecution, and possess ourselves exactly of the facts in the case, which is one of the greatest outrages which the truth has yet been called upon to encounter in Turkey....

“The aim is clear, it is to crush out Protestantism. Not a man has yet gone back, though constantly told, Come back and you need pay nothing.' Besides the 24 registered Protestants, there are 29 whose tax rates have not been transferred, and who therefore are legally in the hands of these men. But they have been so occupied trying to annihilate the community that they have given them little attention. From one whose yearly tax was 38 piasters they have taken 400, and claim 250 more, - for three years' taxes. From another poor man, a cripple from having lost his toes by frost when a muleteer, they took 132. Another weak and almost totally deaf son of a poor washerwoman was brought up, and 400 piasters demanded of him. It is doubtful if all the family own would sell for 150. He said, 'I have no money, I have nothing. Here is my body; take it; sell it; beat it; kill it; do what you will; but from this religion I will never part.' This though the Protestants knew, by a week's experience, what beatings mean, and a dozen of them were black and blue from head to foot, and three could not leave their beds. When the young pastor last winter received this 'feeble mind' into the church, I told him I thought he had made a mistake. I don't think so now. The lad was put into the hands of the Gends'armes, and going to his house took his bedding, went to the market and hawked it up and down. The highest bid he could get was 30 piasters. And this was the most salable thing he owned! At last a man stepped up to them, and said, ' Will you never feel shame? How much was this lad formerly taxed?' They said 20 piasters. 'Take it,' he said, and let the lad go! Here, boy, take your bed home and sleep on it.' "Of these 29 also, not one turned back,

at least had not when we left. All the Protestants, except the three who could not leave their beds, were at worship on the Sunday following the beating, and one new one joined them that day.... Though the Protestants were the only community in Mardin which owed to government no arrearages for taxes, they were the only ones imprisoned! Not a Moslem, Jew, Papist, Jacobite, or Armenian was imprisoned, though every one owed large arrearages."

On the 9th of September Mr. Williams wrote again: "I lately sent an account of the terrible persecution at Mardin. One way of putting it will help you to gauge the extortion. From nineteen families there were taken 19,702 piasters, or, on an average, more than a year's labor (of common day laborers) from each house. Of these nineteen, seven have, since they became Protestants, been aided by gift or loan from the 'poor-box' of the community. One man is still confined to his bed from the effects of the beating he received six weeks ago, and is not getting better. The villages about are following the example of Mardin, and Protestants generally, in that region, are having a very uncomfortable time. This is the liberty and equality which Papacy gives, where it has the power or influence."

ing been in this country thirty-one years; and during all this long period, he has been unwearied in his efforts to protect and aid our mission.... He displayed no insignia of his office here, and his bearing was very quiet and unobtrusive. Poor, suffering Nestorians often made their way to him, with the tale of their wrongs and sorrows, and we are thankful that he had an ear to listen to them.

"We might expect great good to result to our mission, and to the Nestorians, from this visit; but we greatly regret to state, that this very kind and life-long friend is soon to leave Persia, having just received notice of his appointment as Consul-General at Odessa. We trust, however, that his report to his government of the suffering state of the Nestorians, as he has seen it, may not be in vain."

As suggesting the economy of the Board's missionary operations, Mr. Perkins notices the fact, that the salary of the Consul “has been about as much as is expended by the six families of the mission," and states other particulars in regard to their expenses, which it cannot be needful to repeat here in order to convince readers of the Herald that they "could not make any great display of wealth," though their "equipage, and expenses for comforts, necessary to the preservation of health, are above those of the down-trodden Nestorians, in their mud hovels."

Civil Affairs - The Ardishai Church. "Prince Ahmed Meerza, after an absence of a few months, returned to Oroomiah as Governor several weeks ago. He was soon driven from his place by a mob, under direction of the Mollahs, ostensibly on account of his attempt to collect an extra government exaction of about six per cent. on the taxes, but really at the instigation of a powerful rival. The expelled Prince retired to a village eight or ten miles from the city, to await the result of his report of the state of things to his superior at Tabreez.

"The walls of the new Ardishai church, which is being built by contributions from the Shah, the British Ambassador, and others (in place of the one fraudulently taken by the Papists), are successfully ris

Energy of a Native Helper. "Midsummer is not usually a season fruitful in missionary incidents here. I will, however, copy a scrap handed to me by an associate, illustrating the energy of a helper in preparing a place of worship. Deacon Yedgar, of Mooshava, is trying to build a little room where he can gather people for prayer and preaching. No one in the village sympathizes with him. With difficulty he has persuaded his father to give him the place, and to assume the greater part of the expense, the mission aiding him to the amount of eight dollars only. His uncle, who lives in the same house, opposes most bigotedly. In the face of all these embarrassments he is pushing the work forward, which, with his faith, augurs well for the success of his little enterprise. A few days since he started out alone, to obtain the necessary timbers for the roof. His bargain made, he availed himself of the swollen river to float them down to his own village. With difficulty he got them to the river bank, and then, lashing them together in two rafts, he set them afloat, himself aboard to guide them, commending himself and his logs to the care of God. The task proved more formidable than he had imagined. Every little while his rafts stranded on the shoals, requiring his utmost strength to get them afloat again. One of them escaping out of his control, was borne rapidly out of his sight, and he feared that nothing would check its career until it reached the distant lake. Happily he soon came upon it, securely stranded. Once afloat again, and getting into the deepening current of the river, he was in consternation at the approaching difficulties of safely terminating his voyage and bringing his hard-earned timbers to shore at the proper place. But here, as before, he committed his case to the Lord, in whose cause he was embarked,

confident of help from him. True enough, the Lord had prepared a party of boys, herding cattle, who were whiling their time in swimming, and who came to his aid; and after much effort the rafts were beached. His uncle refused to allow him the use of their own buffaloes to drag them from the river to the village, but begging aid of some of his friends he finally got them home, many declaring that he had accomplished the work of ten men."

Mr. Perkins notices that, "in the department cf the press," about half of his Commentary on Exodus has been printed, and says: "Twenty-one wood-cuts, prepared by our self-taught Nestorian artist, will add much to the interest and value of the volume." He is now preparing a Commentary on Daniel. He states: "The American Tract Society (New York) has assumed the expense of our monthly mission paper-the Rays of Light, also of our Christian Almanac, so far as sales do not meet the cost."

Mahratta Mission-Western Endía.

RAHOORI.

(25 miles N. W. of Ahmednuggur.) LETTER FROM MR. BRUCE, August 26, 1868.

MR. BRUCE mentions the recent severe prevalence of the cholera at Rahoori, where "about 50 persons died in the village within a month," "great consternation prevailed, and many fled to other places." The heathen who remained "were very diligent in the worship of the goddess of cholera," "remedies were neglected," and medicine, when left, was "generally thrown away," "lest the goddess should be offended by any attempt to diminish her power"; while the sick and dying were often neglected, "deserted by their nearest neighbors and friends," through fear of contagion. He then mentions a more pleasing fact; and then the sadly weakened condition of the mission.

Elevating Influence of Christianity. "An event occurred some months ago, during our absence from Rahoori, which

was very encouraging to us. The oldest child of the native pastor had been sick for some months, and had become very much reduced in strength. His difficulty was such as to require a severe operation to save his life. They therefore called a native surgeon, who was possessed of unusual skill, and arrangements were made for the operation. At the appointed time many of the village people assembled at the pastor's house, especially the women, who came to sympathize with the pastor's wife. They were surprised to see her so calm, and asked why she should allow the operation to be performed, when it would certainly result in the death of the child. But the parents had a support which their sympathizers knew not of. They wished to do all in their power for the child, and were willing to leave the result with God. When all things were ready the company was silenced, and the pastor lifted up his voice in prayer for the success of the operation, and for the life of the child. simple exhibition of faith made a deep impression upon the people, especially upon the women who were present; and when they afterwards saw the child recovering his usual health, they began to think that the Christian's God was indeed a hearer of prayer. As the result, a goodly number of the village women, of the higher castes, began to attend the weekly female prayer-meeting at the pastor's house. They continued to come for some months, sometimes filling the house uncomfortably full.' They still manifest a very friendly feeling, though the attendance at the meeting has considerably fallen off.

This

The Missions' Extremity. "A question arose a few days ago which led us all to survey anew, as we have done before, perhaps a score of times, our whole mission field, and to consider what arrangements could be made to enable our rapidly decreasing numbers to hold on a little longer. We have to meet not only the demands of the work, but the equally imperative demands of health. Never did I feel our own weakness as at present. The death of Brother Munger has left Bombay vacant, and the expected return of another brother to America, in a few months,

will leave Satara and Bhuinj vacant also. Still another brother finds that his days in India are numbered if he remains on the dry plains of the Deccan, but thinks he can hold out a while longer if removed to Bombay. One of the Ahmednuggur brethren must of necessity assume the charge of the work at Satara and Bhuinj; hence there will be but three of us left for the eight districts in the Ahmednuggur Collectorate. Of these three, one is Brother Atkinson, who has been in the country only a few months. We thank God for sending us this recruit, and we shall endeavor to take good care of him; but for the present he has his hands full, and his head too, in the acquisition of the language. I cannot look forward to the changes that must shortly take place without much sorrow and some gloomy forebodings. Two years ago, when I was placed in charge of the three districts of Rahuri, Khokar, and Pimplus, I could anticipate my greatly increased burden with considerable courage. I had a good degree of health and strength with which to labor. But at present, my health is such as to render it extremely doubtful whether I shall be able to pass the next hot season in the Deccan.

"I have made these statements with much sadness of heart, yet I have no disposition to complain. I know that you and the Prudential Committee fully appreciate our difficulties, and that you will send us help at the earliest possible moment. But as our representatives before the churches to which, under God, we must look for relief, it is well that you should have all the facts in the case. The missionary work is a work of faith. While we mourn over the desolations around us, we know that it is of the Lord to save, either by many or by few. We are, therefore, resolved to hold on to our work as long as possible, and when we are called to leave it, to go either to America or to the 'Better Land,' we can leave it with confidence in the promises of Him who loves his church infinitely better than we do; and with the assurance that he will, in his own good time, bring all the heathen to acknowledge him."

AHMEDNUGGUR.

(140 miles east of Bombay.)

LETTER FROM MR. WOOD, September 5, 1868.

ONE extract from this letter from Mr. Wood will appropriately follow the last paragraphs of Mr. Bruce's letter above. "Could you read the remarks of all the brethren on a recent circular, you would no doubt be interested, and at the same time would see what shifts we have to make to keep our principal stations manned. Manned! Excepting Ahmednuggur, we have not had a single central station more than half manned for years. We have all double work to do most of the time. We can't stand it. Just look at this inclosed map, and see these four great fields of labor-Bombay, Ahmednuggur, Sholapoor, and Satara. No one at Bombay, one at Satara, one at Sholapoor, one at Wadale, one at Rahuri, two at Ahmednuggur, and Mr. Atkinson, studying the language! In writing this, don't think I despair. God will, in some way, accomplish his great work of regenerating this people, if the present instrumentalities are set aside, and we have none to come to our help. We must, however, let you know how matters stand with us. Otherwise we should not be faithful to our trust.

Fruit of a Catechist's Labor. "I have not much time left to-day to tell you of my labors. I will, however, say a few words about Latinwadi, a little hamlet outside of the city, to the north, where Vithaldas, one of our catechists, lives. We bought a nice little house for him there, at a cost of about 75 rupees, two years ago. He says the place was a real Sodom. The people were vile and abusive; and the catechist and his family shut themselves up in their own little yard, to keep out of sight and hearing of the people. Through his influence a great change has come over them. Sixteen boys from that place are now in government schools. A few months ago an ota, or earthen platform, about a foot and a half high, was built up at the side of his house, at the expense of the mission, for the people of the hamlet to come and sit upon, to talk and hear the