ROME IN GUATEMALA

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Dec 24, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 59.

ROME IN GUATEMALA.

Brother F. Bishop, one of the book agents who recently went from California to Chile, notes a few days' stop at the port of Guatemala. Here is an extract from his letter to the Missionary Echo:—

A number of Indians came on board the vessel, and I showed them some of our books. They took them and looked at them, and began reading, as they are able to read and speak English. I had told them they were for sale, and soon I saw them in a crowd, and a black-robed priest in their midst. I was surprised, not knowing there was one on board. The priest soon sent one of them back with the books, which was the end of my prospect for making a sale, and showed that Rome rules in small as well as in great affairs.

The priest, I was informed, speaks eleven different languages, and has lived for ten years in the country of Guatemala, and among the Indians a part of the time. While there he gathered about 8,000 plants and flowers which have no names, also thousands of butterflies, and insects of various kinds. He brought with him as he came on board five Indians and two other men. He had also in his train two monkeys with immense tails, several different kinds of birds, and a Japanese pug dog, besides plants and curios of many kinds. It puts me in mind of a traveling show. This priest is on a pilgrimage to Rome, and on the way expects to give scientific lectures. The menagerie is, no doubt, to attract the crowds.

When he found out our business, and where we were going, he waxed very warm, telling us we would not earn our salt. He said he burned $30 worth of books sold by a man in Guatemala, and of course he would do the same with ours if he found any. He lost his good frame of mind and railed on us, comparing our few numbers with his multitudes. This was a little foretaste of what we expect to meet farther on.