CHINA. -LETTER FROM Swatow, Nov. 12, 1866. MY DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS,-We have been working away here, ́preaching, teaching, and healing for more than a year since last I wrote you. In that time a few more men and women, and some children, have been baptized from among the heathen of Tiechien. The country has become more open too for the spread of the Gospel of Jesus; and several new preaching places have been opened in towns and villages around us, some within a few miles, and others thirty or forty miles distant. The people are not generally willing that we should thus settle down amongst them, and do what they can to prevent us, sometimes giving us a good deal of trouble; but the work must be pushed on, even against all opposition, seeing that its object is to save men from eternal woe, and bring them to eternal happiness. The Chinese heart is like that of all of us, young and old-very wicked; and so they oppose the Gospel because it is good. God is gracious, however, and sometimes the heathen-who at one time were most bitter against us-are led to become Christians, and leave their idols. Besides preaching places, we have boys' schools in several villages; and in Swatow there is a dispensary for giving medicines to the sick Chinese, along with two small houses for patients who wish to live in Swatow while their diseases are being treated. A new hospital is in With love to you all, HIS EYES WERE TOO THE eyes of an African boy were so very bright that the people thought he was not human. This led them to torment him very much. The Rev. E. Schall, of the Bâsle Mission, was quietly meditating in front of his house, when he suddenly heard a heavy fall, and at the same time the cry of a child. He ran to the place, and there lay this little bright-eyed boy on the ground with extended limbs. His wicked father had taken him up by the arm and thrown him out of the house. In the fall he had hurt his head against a piece of wood. The little one clung to the missionary as he picked him up, and as long as my child; Jesus loves you, my child; Jesus is your Father; Jesus is your Friend; Jesus will take you home to heaven, my child. Goodbye, my child, I shall soon come too." The next morning little Georgie bade good-bye to earth, and went to live in heaven. YOUNG ZEAL AND OLD YOUNG zeal and old knowledge make that Christian in whom they unite both happy and useful. MASSON. he stayed in the village he was DEATH OF THE REV. DAVID under his protection. When he spoke to the father about this cruelty, the inhuman parent said, "That is nobody: he cannot even stand." We have just received very sad intelligence, which will be read by with disappointment and sorrow. In the Presbyterian Church at Hampstead, on the 20th of last many LITTLE GEORGIE AND HIS June, the Rev. David Masson was INDIAN NURSE. ordained as a missionary to China. On Friday, the 13th of July, he left the Thames, on board the Peter Denny, a fine and well-appointed vessel, carrying to the same destination missionaries from other so LITTLE Georgie was only one year and nine months old when he died, but he knew as much as some children do who are three years of age. Ayah Kaatje was the name of cieties. His friend, the Rev. John his aged nurse. In the Mission-Matheson, of Hampstead, accomhouse she sat beside the dying child, and said, "So you are going to leave us, my child! Why are you in such a hurry to go? You should let me go first, my child. I am an old woman: my bones are already dead: I must die soon. Why are you in such a hurry, my child?" Then, pausing for a moment, she said, "Jesus calls you, panied him to the ship; he was in excellent spirits, and in the midsummer sunshine everything bade fair for a prosperous voyage. The hope was entertained that last mail would bring tidings of his arrival on Chinese soil, if not of his joyful welcome by the brethren whom he was eager to join. A letter came, but it was in an un known hand, and its sad announce- | parations were made for doing so, ment has filled many a heart with sorrow: "At sea, off the coast of China, "Dr. Hamilton, the helm was put down, and the topsail haulyards let go, until his body was seen to sink from the stern of the vessel, when the attempt was given up as useless. These are the simple circumstances associated with the calamity, and comment is almost unnecessary. I may, however, state that we (the passengers) have been accustomed frequently to go forward to the forecastle, where, although the motion of the ship is always more perceptible than in "This lamentable accident oc- the after-part, we have never supcurred on Saturday, the 10th inst. posed there was any special danger. During the whole week we had a No one can account for the accident. heavy cross sea and strong breeze, Even Mr. Huttlestone, who was and on Saturday, especially, the sitting by his side, says the wave sea boiled furiously. On the after- which came on board was not a noon of that day he went forward heavy one; he supposes that Mr. to the forecastle with another pass-Masson, seeing the wave, must enger, requesting me to accompany have been trying to save himself them as he went. This was shortly from a drenching, and, in so doing, after three o'clock. They sat down near the forecastle head, and engaged in conversation nearly an hour. Mr. Huttlestone (with whom he was conversing) says:-'We had been speaking of the theory of the Unitarians, that Christ was merely human, when Mr. Masson said, “I could not rest in the joyful hope of future happiness if I did not believe that Christ is the Son of God." These words wer scarcely uttered when the sea struck the ship, a wave rolled over the forecastle, the ship lurched heavily, and I saw him no more.' Mr. Huttlestone immediately raised an alarm, and, although it would have been very hazardous to launch a boat on such a sea, pre struck his head against the side, and with the lurch of the ship and the wave combined, was carried away. But this is mere conjecture. The circumstances are not and cannot be, more fully known than I have described them. "It will be gratifying to his surviving friends to hear that, from constant intercourse with him during the last four months, I have not the least hesitancy in saying he has entered his Sabbatic rest in heaven. I have been very intimate with him during the whole of the voyage, perhaps more so than any one else on board, as we were brethren in more respects than one. (I am going out to Tien-tsin as a missionary under the auspices of the | craved indulgence, and for the salMethodist New Connexion.) Many vation of the crew and passengers he has laboured with exemplary zeal. Truly of him it may be said, He rests from his labours.' "I sympathize deeply with his large circle of friends, in relation to whom he ever seemed so tenderly solicitous, frequently praying in our devotional service in the saloon, that they might be kept from be a night, when the weather has been unfavourable or cold, we have slept together in each other's cabins ; scores of hours we have spent in conversation; together we have sung the songs of Zion, and together we have wrestled before God. I was often struck with his unwavering confidence in God. On the Wednesday evening pre-ing over-anxious about him whilst vious to his departure we had a very heavy squall, when, joined by two other passengers, one of whom is a brother missionary, we held a brief prayer-meeting in his (Mr. Masson's) cabin. In the course of a brief but earnest prayer he said :— Lord, we do not fear whilst thou art with us, even death itself cannot harm us whilst thou art our de crossing the ocean.' Especially for "I remain, rev. and dear Sir, "W. B. HODGE." It seems but the other day when fence.' This trust was a prevailing his form was familiar in all the characteristic of his spirit, sustain- vigour of its youthful prime, and ing him under all circumstances. that in a moment suddenly, and Coupled with this lively confidence through a circumstance seemingly was deep humility. He has fre- so casual, all that life and energy quently said to me, 'I feel very should have disappeared in the inmuch humbled before God because exorable depths of the ocean, is a I fear my motives have not been so calamity hard to realize-a dispenpure as they ought to have been in sation which we can only receive offering myself for the work of God in silent unquestioning solemnity. in China.' And yet he has always "It is the Lord." He plants his evinced a determination both to do footsteps in the sea, and when that and suffer the will of God if he sea gives up its dead, the path will could only fulfil his mission, and be made plain which at present serve his generation according to seems so mysterious. David Sandethe will of God. He has been assid-man left mother and sister, house uous in labour. Ever seeking to become as thoroughly conversant with the language as possible, he has spent scores of hours in hard study when the flesh would have and lands, for Christ's sake and the Gospel; but he was scarcely at home in Amoy, and his closed lips were hardly opened in its strange language, when he ceased from his |