I WRITE from the hills, where I am getting a bit of change from the heated plains, and a chance to study. One thing is sure: the time to study the languages of India is immediately upon arrival in the field. We find that our vitality and energy are so much less than when we first arrived that there is a very appreciable difference in our ability to get right down to hard work in language study.
While at Karmatar, in Bengal, I had the privilege of baptizing the first fruits of our efforts there—two from Hinduism, and two from the lower form of heathenism represented by the Santal worship of devils. An encouraging feature is the fact that the candidates were two men and their wives; so this was the baptizing of families, instead of merely the men.
I am glad to give a good report of Brother A. C. Mookerjee's labors in Calcutta. They have been without much public display, consisting mostly of Bible readings with Bengali interested ones, and the preparation of literature. But I believe the time is near when we should permanently organize in Calcutta, getting some regular place of meeting for our Bengali church, and thus affording a hall where we can invite people to hear the truth that we represent. We shall meet, in fact are meeting, the greatest opposition from various churches of Calcutta; and if our work there takes the substantial character it should, it will inspire confidence in the minds of the people that we are not religious nomads, but have a truth that is firmly grounded and will bring permanent results wherever it is established.
There are problems mountain high here. One of the greatest that we shall have to face in the near future is that of education. As our people accept the truth, their children are at once shut out of the mission schools which they have been attending, and they ask us what to do for the education of their young people. I wish we had a young man of some experience in educational work, to put at once into a study of Bengali, with a view to entering school work for us within the next two or three years. It needs a man who is not afraid of difficulties and discouragements; for there would probably be plenty of them.
Out at Gopalgunje, in East Bengal, we have been experimenting during the past year, and it has not been altogether satisfactory from a health standpoint. Therefore, in our board meeting it was voted that Brother A. G. Watson should look about for a more healthful location for the East Bengal headquarters, and in all probability it will mean in the end the erection of a bungalow in the most healthful location that can be found. That whole country is very malarious and sickly, and we must provide a place that will be central and at the same time favorable from other standpoints, such a place, too, that the laborers will be able, with ordinary care, to live free from sickness. The message has been making advancement there, and calls are so many from different places where people have become interested in the truth, that Brother Watson is entirely unable to meet them. His family is now here in Darjeeling for a change, and he is out making a short tour of East Bengal.
About a year ago we had translated and published a pamphlet written by Brother J. L. Shaw on man's creation, fall, and redemption, and we have had our helpers in Bengal out selling this everywhere, and especially in East Bengal. As a result, interests have sprung up everywhere, and people have urged that some one be sent to further instruct them. One of the mission schools near Calcutta has bought a large number of these Bengali pamphlets for use in its primary department; so the truth is going not alone through our own efforts, but also through those of others.
