At the conclusion of an animated debate between a dollar and a penny, the dollar was heard to remark, “And you, a despised, blackened, copper penny, whose intrinsic value is but a hundredth part of mine, you who are shunned by all, and loved by none, whose occupation it is to cumber people’s pocketbooks, will presume to impudently withstand me, when I am loved by all and hated by none, so dearly cherished that tears are shed at my departure, have been loved by millions of earth for centuries, adored and worshiped by the innumerable descendants of Adam, how can you, in the wildest flights of your erratic imagination, attempt to make a comparison?”
The penny, chagrined, abashed, confounded, paused a moment until time in its friendly lapses should restore its reason, when it was heard to tremulously reply, “I know, most honorable dollar, that all this is true. You are a hundred times greater than I, are loved by all, and hated by none, lauded by millions, and cherished most tenderly, have been adored for centuries, and worshiped by the innumerable descendants of Adam; but after all, I count one virtue in my favor. I go to church every Sabbath, and am invariably most tenderly presented to the usher, and that is something that you never do. Is not my piety recognized by every parishioner?”—Selected.
Children of Promise
By L. F. Starr
THE children of promise are those who submit absolutely to God, that his will may be wrought in and through them. Such will truly keep God's commandments, because they keep the faith of Jesus. But Ishmael persecuted Isaac, and so will those who seek the kingdom of God by any other means than by his everlasting covenant persecute the children of faith and obedience. Persecution is ever a sign of unbelief. But when the day of judgment comes, God will say, Cast out the bond servant of sin and self; give place to the righteous and free.—L. F. Starr.
The Dear Togetherness
By James Buckham
Of all heav’n-hopes is not this hope most sweet—
That “dear togetherness” when we shall meet?
O, everlasting joy of dwelling fast
With all our loved ones in one home at last!
What matters then the task we’re set to do,
How high or lowly, old as earth’s, or new?
What matters whether crown or yoke we wear,
Since evermore we’ll have our dearest there?
To cry, each morn, “My own! my own!” and gaze
On unforgotten faces all the days;
To know that death no more can make love plead,
That were enough—yea, heaven were heaven indeed!
O Thou, sometime, we trust, to set all right,
O Thou, not bound fore’er by death’s despite,
One thing we crave—let heaven be aught beside—
No parting more—beyond that darksome tide!
—James Buckham, in “Wayside Altar.”
The Boy as a Son
By Mrs. M. C. Du Bois
“A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.” “A foolish son is a grief to his father, and bitterness to her that bear him.” Prov. 10: 1; 17: 25.
What parent has not felt the truth of these words of “the wise man”? “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” So we conclude that a wise son is a Christian; but a foolish, wayward son always brings grief to the hearts of his parents.
The brother has his part in the home making, just as truly as the sister has hers. He can be a joy or a sorrow to his parents, a blessing or a curse; and which it shall be depends largely upon the training he is given. Many parents find their boys hard to manage; so they give them the loose rein, and let them manage themselves, with little or no home training. Many a bright, headstrong boy has made shipwreck of himself because he has not been restrained and taught self-control.
If parents expect the boy to pay, they must invest in him time, earnest prayer, care, and painstaking. If father is taken up with politics, business, and pleasure, and mother with her housework or sewing circle, or is all interested in Katie and Jennie, and has no time to devote to her boy, is it to be wondered at that he should take the downward road? When a farmer has a colt or a calf from which he expects to reap a good profit, he gives it the best of care; but how often is the boy sadly neglected, left to follow his own will, and wander in idleness! Then we hear the parents cry out in bitterness of soul, “O that boy! he is not worth his salt.” Who is to blame?
To be a good son the boy must be taught obedience even in the smallest things. He should be taught self-denial, also to respect the rights of each member of the family, even the domestic, if one is employed.
The model boy is willing to do his part, and is no shirk. He will not snarl if asked to bring a pail of water, to fill the wood-box, or to do anything in the line of housework that may be required of him; for the boy should be taught to make himself useful in the home; and it is not belittling to any boy to know how to cook and to do general housework. The boy who will see his mother or sister bring in the wood and water, dig the potatoes, or do other similar work, is lacking in respect for mother or sister. The mother who brings up her boy to sit around in idleness, to be waited upon, makes a sad mistake.
A boy has rights which should be respected in the family. He ought to have a room all his own if it is possible, furnished as well as the parents’ means will allow. Most generally anything is thought good enough for the boys’ room. Old cast-off furniture, a dingy carpet (often no carpet at all), faded curtains, a faded and worn quilt for his bed, walls bare, no bright, tasteful ornaments—such is the picture of more than one boy’s room. Is it any wonder that he slips away from his room to go “just a little way down street,” where the saloon is fitted up to entice just such boys? Boys love pretty things, and the parents who invest something to make home attractive to their boys will, I believe, find it less trouble to keep them at home.
The boy as a son should be a comfort and help in his home. The father ought to be able to look upon him with joy and pride, as the one who is to take his place and carry out his unfinished plans. The mother should be happy to point to him and say, “Yonder is my son, a joy and comfort to my aged heart.” A wise son will not bring the gray hairs of his father and mother in sorrow to the grave.—Mrs. M. C. Du Bois.
The Love of Home
A HOME is not a home where the love of home is wanting.
Getting Hold of the Boy
By N. H. Burdick
MANY times the appeal comes to a pastor to get hold of some mother’s boy. “I want you to get hold of my boy,” says the anxious mother; “he is getting out of the notion of going to Sabbath-school, and he is keeping company with boys that are careless.” Then the pastor may ask, “How old is your boy?” And the mother replies, “He is about fourteen,” or fifteen, or sixteen, as the case may be; just at that critical age when he is starting on life’s path of right or wrong.
Now a word to the fathers and mothers of all such boys. What has been your example before your boy? Not what has been your teaching. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the precepts you have been giving him are correct. But what has been your example? Have you been faithful yourself in supporting by your presence and your means the church of your Lord? Has your boy found, by experience, that, unless sickness or other unavoidable reasons intervened, your attendance at the Sabbath services was one of the inevitable things of the week? In short, while your preaching has been as it should be, have you before him practised what you preached?
You know yourself what the effect would be upon you if, for instance, your pastor preached Sabbath observance, and then went picnicking on that day. You would not tolerate his preaching one thing and practising another. If you, as a parent, allow small things to interfere with your church obligations, you must take into consideration, as a part of the price you will have to pay, the fact that your boy will manifest indifference also when he arrives at that critical age when he begins to make his own choices.
All this is said in a spirit of kindness, and in full sympathy with that parental anxiety which a father and a mother must feel when they realize that the boy by whom they have set such store is beginning to turn in the wrong direction. For one of the earliest symptoms of going wrong that a boy manifests is distaste for church and Sabbath-school. A true pastor will certainly do all in his power to save any boy. But remember that when you, as a parent, neglect the church, you have, by your neglect, put up a barrier between the pastor and the boy that in the majority of cases it is almost impossible for him to overcome. The boy has been taught by your example to consider the church, and all that appertains unto it, of secondary importance, and the influence of the pastor is greatly weakened by that lack of respect that such a course upon the part of the parent can not help but produce. The influence of your example counts for vastly more in the life of your boy than that of any one else, be he pastor, Sabbath-school superintendent or teacher, or any one else. Is not the application of all this too obvious for need of enlargement?—Rev. N. H. Burdick.
G. A. IRWIN
By George A. Irwin
From Kimberley to Barotseland Mission, Northwest Rhodesia
G. A. IRWIN
THE evening of February 12, I went to Beaconsfield with Brother Austin. This is a suburb of Kimberley, and the place where the first Seventh-day Adventist church was erected in South Africa. Their church building is a modest-sized structure, well and substantially built, and has a wing in which a church-school has been carried on for some years, being taught by Brother Austin’s oldest daughter. That evening I spoke to them from the map of the world, showing the advancement the message had made since the organization of their church, and the erection of their church building, and exhorted them to hold on faithfully a little longer, for He that shall come will come in this generation, and cut the work short in righteousness.
Wednesday evening, at seven o’clock, W. H. Anderson and I bade farewell to Brother and Sister Willson, and boarded the train for a three-days’ ride to Monze, in Barotseland, two hundred miles north of the Zambezi River.
Our first stop was at Buluwayo, the former capital of Matabeleland. This place has received considerable notoriety in the past from being the center and base of operations during the last Matabeleland uprising, under the leadership of the old king, Lobengula. The town is located on a high and rolling veldt, with an altitude of 4,469 feet above sea-level. The place is laid out on a broad scale, with wide streets running at right angles; and were it reasonably filled with houses and inhabitants, it could easily contain a population of 25,000, but the present population is only 3,840.
Buluwayo is a Zulu word which, literally translated, means, “the place of killing,” a very significant word in view of the fact that near the place, under a tree that is still standing, Mo-sil-i-kat-se and Lobengula dispensed judgment, and many a poor native, who was so unfortunate as to displease either of these great chiefs, lost his life. Buluwayo is the most important railroad center in all southern Rhodesia. All passengers going to Victoria Falls and north of the Zambezi River must change cars here, as must also those going northeast and east to such places as Gwelo, Salisbury, Umtali, and Beira. No public effort has as yet been made in Buluwayo by our people, although the place has been partially canvassed, and a few of our health books sold.
Friday afternoon, Brother Anderson and I left Buluwayo for Victoria Falls, on the Zambezi River, three hundred miles farther north. We arrived at the Falls next morning at 7:30. The train stops for a few minutes at the station on the south side of the river. Near by is a large hotel operated for the accommodation of tourists and others who come to see these famous falls.
Leaving the station, the train, after a few minutes’ run, comes in sight of the falls, and passes over the river on a suspension bridge six hundred feet in length, four hundred and twelve feet above the water, and two hundred yards below the falls, but in plain sight of them. Of this most superb wonder of nature, the pen and camera can give but a faint idea. Only by gazing upon each section and phase of the cataracts, rapids, and immense gorges can one comprehend their marvelous vastness and grandeur.
The river above the falls is approximately one mile wide, and this immense volume of water falls perpendicularly a distance of four hundred and twelve feet before it strikes the whirlpool, or “boiling pot” below. Gigantic columns of vapor continually rise to a great height, which in the distance resemble light-colored smoke or steam. From this vapor and the ceaseless and almost deafening roar of the water, the falls has evidently derived its native name, “Mosi-ao-tunga,” or “the smoke that sounds.” The Arab name for the falls is “Musa-i-nunya,” “the end of the world.” The great peculiarity about these wonderful falls is that the general level of the country is the same both above and below the falls, the water disappearing into a narrow fissure, or canyon, whose precipitous sides rise upward four hundred feet in height. Through this cleft in the plain, which is sometimes less than four hundred feet in width, this vast volume of water is forced a distance of nearly eighty miles. Taken as a whole, Victoria Falls is a great natural phenomenon, and should be classed as one of the great wonders of the world. The place was discovered by Dr. Livingstone, in the year 1855.
Passing on from the falls, our train stopped at Livingstone, a small town on the north bank of the river, five miles above the falls. Livingstone is the most important post-office in Northwest Rhodesia. From here mails are dispatched weekly to the north through Barotseland as far as the railway is finished, and thence by runners to the different districts as far north as the Tanganyika concessions and the limited Kongo Free State.
After two hours of waiting at Livingstone, we boarded a mixed passenger and goods train, which runs semiweekly from this place to Broken Hill, three hundred and sixty miles farther north, as far as the road is at present finished. The general appearance of the country in Northwest Rhodesia is very similar to that in southern Rhodesia, with the exception perhaps, of taller grass, and in some sections larger timber. In many places the grass was so tall, and stood so close to the track, that the wind would blow it against the car window. Just before sunset we reached Kolomo, the capital of Northwest Rhodesia, which is eighty-seven miles from Livingstone. The town is located quite a distance from the railway line, on a beautiful, high plateau, which is five thousand feet above sea-level. The place has a white population of sixty, most of whom are in some way connected with government affairs.
The native commissioner having charge of the district in which Brother Anderson’s mission is located was on the train, returning from a three months’ vacation in Australia. Just before leaving for his vacation he came near losing his life by an attack from a large lion. He had shot and wounded the animal, and was following it up in the jungle. Suddenly he came upon it, and before he could raise his rifle to fire, it sprang upon him, knocking him down, and at the same time knocking the rifle from his hand, and out of reach. As he was falling to the ground, he grabbed the lion by both jaws, and held his mouth open, calling at the same time loudly for his native attendants to come quickly and take his rifle and shoot the lion. The natives succeeded in killing the lion and rescuing their master, but in the encounter he lost two fingers, and his arms and breast were badly lacerated by the claws of the lion. In telling me of the affair he said this was the twelfth one he had killed in the few years he had been in the country, and considered himself fortunate to have gotten off with but one personal encounter.
In shaking hands with me when leaving the train at Kolomo, he expressed the hope that I would be pleased with the country, and on my return to the States would use my influence to send out some more energetic American missionaries, like Mr. Anderson, to teach the natives in his district how to work, live, and dress like civilized people. I find in conversation with these commissioners that they are well pleased with our methods of conducting missions. The industrial feature especially commends itself to them. They say that if the natives can be taught to be even partially industrious, it will assist them very much in their government of them, and in the collection of the hut tax of one pound assessed by the government upon each male person above twelve years of age, and the additional ten shillings they compel the men to pay for each surplus wife.
At 2:30 Sunday morning, February 17, our train stopped and let us off at a siding, eight miles from Brother Anderson’s place, where three of his boys were awaiting us, with a transport wagon, drawn by sixteen oxen. A gentle rain was falling, and the night was very dark. There being no place for us to stay overnight, our only alternative was to start at once for the mission. Brother Anderson and I seated ourselves as best we could upon our luggage under the canvas cover that was over the back14part of the wagon bed, while the principal driver seated himself on the front end, with his long whip in hand, by means of which and an occasional peculiar yell he succeeded in keeping the oxen in their places and guiding the wagon past stumps and rocks. The other two boys went ahead of the oxen, one to lead the head yoke, and the other to carry a light for the double purpose of keeping the team in the dim road, and to frighten away lions and other dangerous animals that roam through this country at night.
At half-past seven we arrived in safety at the mission home, where we received a hearty welcome from the mission boys. During Brother Anderson’s absence at the conference, the heavy rain-storms had washed away one end of his mud house, and demolished the chimney, which had been made of sun-dried bricks. Their cook-stove being useless without either pipe or chimney, our meals had to be cooked in an iron pot over an open fire out of doors. Fortunately, they had plenty of such staple articles of food as milk, eggs, new potatoes, and sweet corn—foods that could all be prepared in a palatable way under such conditions. The damp, chilly, and musty condition of the house was a more serious proposition than the primitive way in which the cooking had to be done, for such conditions are conducive to malaria and fever.
And right here I will take occasion to remark that our Mission Board should make provisions for, and insist upon, our missionaries in such unhealthful countries as Africa, providing themselves with dwelling-houses in which they can be protected from the elements, and be made reasonably comfortable. And this should be the very first thing done in establishing a new mission; for what will a mission amount to, be it ever so well equipped with other necessary buildings, or well supplied with students, if the missionaries are down sick, or so filled with the poison of malaria that they have neither strength, energy, or heart to do anything? In my opinion it is the height of folly, to say the least, to go to the expense of sending missionaries to such places, and then allow or compel them to jeopardize both their lives and health for the lack of the necessary means to build proper houses to protect them from the elements. Even after all is done, and every precaution taken that can be taken, there will still be risk enough for them to run in the malarious atmosphere encountered during one half of each year.
Monastic Life in the Church of Rome
By Chas. T. Everson
CHAS. T. EVERSON
FATHER DENIFLE, of the order of Dominicans, in his recent onslaught on Luther, in a voluminous work entitled “Luther and Lutherdom,” makes the statement that in attacking monasticism and the rules of celibacy, Luther was striking at one of the citadels of the church. The truth of this statement is not difficult of verification.
Monasteries and convents represent to the Church of Rome recruiting stations and centers of influence. As the monks and nuns have no family ties, they can be called upon to change their field of labor at almost a moment’s notice. The celerity with which the orders of the superiors can be obeyed, contributes very much toward the success of the Catholic cause.
The clergy of the Catholic Church are therefore much in the position of an army which can be sent here or there almost immediately when a point is endangered by the enemy, or vantage-ground can be gained. This is one of the great secrets of the success of the church, and the foundation of that remarkable, organization for which the church is famous.
ONE OF THE CHIEF SQUARES IN ROME
However, the monastic life and the celibacy of the clergy carry a tremendous amount of corruption in their trail; but for a church that seeks aggrandizement and political preferment rather than godliness and purity, they attain the end aimed at in a remarkable way under this system.
The power that the papacy exerts in its monastic system and over the inmates of the convent is almost incredible. Just across the street from where we live there is a reclusory convent of nuns. They are counted as dead to the world. The shutters on the windows are so made that the nuns can gaze upward, but not downward into the street. It is impossible to get a glimpse of them. Under long training, they have acquired an adroitness in their movements that is remarkable. The windows are opened and the curtains drawn as if by magic, as the nuns dexterously elude discovery even under the gaze of the most curious and persistent observer. Also in the chapel that is attached to the convent no trace of them is to be discovered. The church is so arranged that they sit back of a partition and hear the mass, or are back of iron bars in the upper part of the church, where they are equally well hidden from view. They are really in a living death.
By this means they hope to gain merit before God and assure themselves a place in paradise. But he who thinks that by shutting himself up between convent walls he can shut the world out, does not know that the world is within him. We may shut ourselves up in the narrow confines of the reclusory cell, but the world is shut in with us; for, after all, the real battle lies in the heart.
These poor souls that are striving by every means in their power to gain heaven by works of penance and abnegation, sink into despair, realizing that their works of merit fall far short of the divine requirements. In the gloom of the convent cell they find darkness without and warrings within. They, as a consequence, sink into a profound despair or become indifferent to heart religion. They become mere machines, mumbling their prayers, and hurrying through their genuflections; and many of them lose themselves in lives of sin. In fact, we have often marveled to see the hard look that characterizes the faces of the nuns we meet in the streets of Rome.
We have a young lady attending our meetings who has had the monastic life depicted to her in such glowing colors that she was determined to make herself a nun. The priests and the nuns instil into the minds of the young a desire to enter monastic orders. They teach them that the nun is more holy than other women, for she has Christ only for her husband. The life in the convent is represented as one of tranquillity, holiness, and freedom from the worries and the perplexities of the world. Through these flowery representations, the young come to see almost paradise itself in the convent life. But once inside, how quickly the sad reality dawns upon them! They awake to find that the flowery dreams melt before a life of rigorous discipline and empty formality. The head of the convent rules with an absolute sway, and often with a hand of iron. Petty jealousies and surmisings render their lives miserable; while the corruption and sin that abound put an honest soul in torment, or cause her to lose herself in the vices of the convent.
We have tried our best to show this young lady the real conditions of the monastic life, but it has been a long struggle to save her from falling into the convent abyss. The virus of Babylon is infused into the young minds, and it takes a great measure of the grace of God to act as an antidote against that diabolic poison. This is one thing that makes the work go slowly in these countries; we have so much to undo before we can do anything. We ask the prayers15of God's people upon our work in the proclamation of the message in the center of Catholicism.
Rome, Italy.
Notes of Travel
By G. B. THOMPSON
G. B. THOMPSON
MARCH 28 I left Rangoon, on the “Cheshire” of the Bibby Line. Most of the workers, and a number of the Burmese brethren and sisters, came down to the wharf to see me off. A feeling of sadness came over me as I bade all these dear souls good-by, and went aboard the tender to be taken to the ship. I felt thankful that a day was now near at hand when all these separations will be at an end, and a new determination seized me to be faithful, and have a place with the people who will be translated when the Lord comes. I greatly enjoyed the time spent with the workers in India.
Four days’ sailing brought me to Colombo on the island of Ceylon. As the ship remained here for a day, I went ashore and looked over the city, and by means of a jinrikisha went several miles into the country. Ceylon is a beautiful island called the “pearl of the ocean.” It is a crown colony of England, and has a population of about four million people, mostly natives. The larger part of the population speak the Tamil language; the Cingalese language is spoken by about one million.
BUDDHIST, PAGODA IN RANGOON, BURMA. PROBABLY LARGEST IN THE WORLD
Our work has been started here, and some, I believe, are keeping the Sabbath, but at present we have no worker. A capable worker should be selected and sent to labor in Ceylon without delay. The needs of this field were carefully considered at the meeting in Calcutta, and a most urgent request was made for some one to be sent to India who can superintend the work in this field. I believe the Lord will raise up such a worker without delay. Ceylon affords a good field for labor. Much of the island has a high altitude and a good climate.
Colombo is hot, but is not an unhealthful city.
We left Colombo April 2, and reached Port Said, Egypt, the fourteenth. The voyage of seventeen days from Rangoon was a very pleasant one. The sea was like a pond all the way, and the heat of the tropics was in no way uncomfortable. We also had a very desirable class of passengers, and the officers of the ship did everything they could to make our voyage pleasant.
I left the ship at Port Said to spend a few days in Egypt. Brethren Jay and Robert Nethery met me here, and the same evening found me in their comfortable and hospitable home in Alexandria—the city which was founded by Alexander the Great. This is a large city, and in many respects it is quite modern. On reaching here I received mail from home, and seven copies of the good old REVIEW that I had not seen. To see the REVIEW was like meeting an old friend, and I read with much interest the many excellent reports of the progress of the work. Surely the Lord is greatly blessing his work.
I spent the Sabbath, in company with Brother and Sister Nethery, with the church at Cairo. As we celebrated the ordinances, and studied the truths which stand as the foundation of this message, we enjoyed much of the Holy Spirit’s presence. Cairo is a large city; it claims a population of a million.
The work in Egypt has been passing through a crisis, on account of some having received “new light,” which means the giving up of the Testimonies and other cardinal points of the faith. As usual, the message of those who have embraced “new light” is for the Seventh-day Adventist denomination only. Their work is to confuse and unsettle as many as possible on the message. It is marvelous how heresy of the most foolish kind will fasten itself in the minds of those who yield to it. But the Lord has some faithful children here who love the truth. Elder Nethery is now in the field to direct the work. He and his wife are learning the Arabic language, and getting a good hold on the work. Some persons of talent who know the language are coming into the truth, and I believe the Lord will raise up laborers to carry the message in this difficult field. The great need here is for laborers. Some good workers should be sent to assist in the work without delay. The Lord will yet do great things in Egypt through this message. He delivered a people from this land once, and he can, and will, do so again. Though, as the prophet declares, it is the “basest of kingdoms,” there is much evidence that the nation is waking up, and being prepared for the rapid spread of the message.
In company with Dr. Hoenes, I went up the Nile some three hundred and fifty miles above Cairo to Luxor to visit Brother Awada Elshaheed, one of our laborers in the Arabic tongue. I was very glad to meet this brother. He and his family all keep the Sabbath. He is doing what he can to spread the truth in this part of the field. He is also translating some of our literature into the Arabic tongue.
Luxor is on the site of the ancient city of Thebes, and I was much interested in visiting the ruins of temples, built before the children of Israel left Egypt. The tombs of the kings who reigned before the days of Moses were also of much interest. These tombs consist of subterranean passages hewn in the solid rock in the sides of the Lybian hills, and descending for several hundred feet. The walls and chambers are covered with the writings of this time, and much information concerning this ancient period has been gleaned by Egyptologists who are able to read these hieroglyphics. The pick and spade of the explorer have revealed some wonderful things here. These ruins speak of grandeur and power long since departed, and are a striking object-lesson of the vanishing, unenduring work and glory of puny man.
This trip up the Nile was attended with much interest, and I trust with profit as well. It is a fertile region, and by means of irrigation is being brought to a high state of cultivation, but the methods of agriculture, etc., do not seem to have undergone much, if any, change for centuries. They seem to be about the same as when Jacob sent into the country for corn.
I am leaving Alexandria to-day on the “Regent Margherita” of the Italian line, for Naples. From here, after a short stop in Rome, I will go on to the meeting at Gland, Switzerland.
The Gospel Harvest in Burma
Brother H. H. Votaw is planning a trip to the jungle soon. Results are being seen from Brother Maung Maung's pioneer efforts, in calls from various places. Some Buddhists are now requesting baptism. “This message will reap a bountiful harvest in Burma,” says Brother Votaw. “The devil is wroth, and is doing all he can to hinder the work. But we are only glad for this. We have never been more hopeful.”
San Francisco
By E. J. Hibbard
Since April 18 last year, San Francisco has been a city much spoken of. Earthquake, political graft, strife between capital and labor, robbery, pugilism, murder, have attracted the attention of the world to this place.
Just yesterday, the erstwhile political leader here, who has been under some sixty-odd indictments for receiving and disbursing bribe money for the purpose of granting illegal franchises, etc., made a complete confession to the grand jury, after first reversing his former plea of “not guilty,” in Judge Dunn’s court. His confession fastens guilt on the mayor, also on many high officials of the united street-railways, the telephone companies, fight trust, and so on to the end.
With this before and about us, we are enjoying the pleasure of walking to and from our several appointments in the city, as are most others who have to move about to their work. You have read of the strike by the street-car men. There is as yet no indication of a settlement. Strike-breakers are here; the company is running some cars from about 8 A. M. to 6 P. M. The papers seem optimistic about a speedy breaking of the strike, but there is no ground for cherishing such a belief. It is said that there are ninety thousand union men here. These with their families are prohibited, under heavy union fines, from riding on a car. Money is flowing in by the thousands of dollars from union carmen and others to support the strikers and their families while they are out of work. If this continues, the strike can hold out indefinitely.
But with their cars all boycotted by the trades unionists and their families; others refraining from their use, either from sympathy with or from fear of these unions, the cars can not begin to pay running expenses. However, the millions behind the trusts involved, together with their determination to win, will lead them also, no doubt, to continue a long and fierce fight.
Our tent, where Elder Shultz, myself, and others are holding a series of meetings, is situated about a half block from the car barns, whence the company first started cars after the strike began. Thousands of people were in the streets to oppose or to gaze as the cars first made their appearance. In the strife which ensued, bullets fell like hail all about our tent. One person in the street was killed outright, and others were fatally injured.
It seems to us that the perils of the last days are thick about us. Few in the city have any regard for God or truth. A careful house-to-house canvass in the vicinity of the tent scarcely reveals one in a hundred who does not sneer at the very name of God or the Bible. Yet, somehow, I scarcely know how, the Lord nearly fills our fifty-by-seventy-foot tent each evening. This, too, in spite of the fact that all who come must walk.
The meetings began April 14. To the present, six or more have begun the observance of all God’s commands, though we have not yet presented the law or Sabbath directly — only as it came in connection with the prophecies.
Expenses here are heavy. To one accustomed to country work, they are startling. Our tent site costs one hundred dollars a month; our house rent for workers, eighty dollars a month, and other things in proportion.
But we must be true to our trust. The Spirit constrains us to feel thus. There are here more than the “required ten” who fear God and obey his will. The outlook is favorable for a splendid harvest of souls. But the angels must hold the winds, else we can do nothing.
The prayers of all are earnestly desired. Financial assistance from any in this conference whose hearts God may move will not be refused. “The coming of the Lord draweth nigh.”
