Mission Notes

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Mar 24, 1904

IN one of the cities of Si-chuan, China, nine families recently burned their idols. Among these, one man, formerly an exorcist, destroyed about five thousand cash worth of paraphernalia employed in his trade, and gave two gongs to be melted and made into a new one to be used in his own village to call the people to worship God.

A COMPARISON of the condition of Protestant missions in India now and fifty years ago has been published by Dr. George Smith, whose service as a missionary began at the earlier date. Then there were 373 ordained missionaries in the country, now there are 1,124, for 29 native pastors then, there are now 1,100; for 551 native catechists, 7,179; for 102,951 native Christian communicants, 1,013,463; for 1,900 students in colleges and high schools in 1851, 56,742; for 310 native churches, 6,783.—Selected.

IN the Central Sudan is a territory bounded by the Sahara Desert on the north, and by the two great rivers, the Niger and the Binue, which meet at Lokoja, three hundred and fifty miles from the northwest coast of Africa. Its people, the Hauses, are a Mohammedan nation of fifteen million, of whom it is estimated that two thirds are slaves. They live mainly in walled cities, some of them having two hundred thousand inhabitants. They carry on extensive manufactures, smelting iron from native ore, weaving cloth, cultivating fertile fields. Their ruling classes are strong, healthy, able men. They possess a literature of their own, and maintain schools for their boys. Polygamy flourishes, and their women are uneducated.—Selected.