Including contributions from all other sources the total amount would not be less, probably, than £200,000.

Perhaps it may give a clearer idea of the way in which the income has been raised if we present a table showing the amount obtained every tenth year, with the number of members in our churches at the time.

member

From the above table it will be seen that the average per is considerably higher now than it has been for fifty years. It is still, however, below what it was at the end of the first decade of your Mission, even including the amount raised by the Juvenile Societies. Were the twenty-four thousand members of our churches to contribute after the same ratio as was done in 1827, the total income of the Society from this source would be £4,200; or, including the £1,200 collected by the juveniles, we should have an annual income of £5,400. With the increased wealth of the country, and the improved circumstances of the members of our churches generally, surely this is not too much to expect, or even to ask for the best of Masters, or the noblest of causes. Now let us take a brief glance at

The Foreign Field.-Although the Society was formed in 1816 it was not until June, 1821, that Messrs. Bampton and Peggs, with their noble wives, embarked for the East; and not until the 12th of Feb. in the following year that they landed on the coast of Orissa. Nor was it until December 25th, 1827, that Mr. Bampton had the unspeakable pleasure and honour of baptizing Erun at Berhampore, the first baptized convert of the Mission. Since then there has been steady, if not rapid, progress, as the following table will show :

From 1821 to 1840 there were baptized, 123

Nor can we forget, in this survey, the Orissa Mission Press (the first, and for many years the only press in the province,) which since its establishment in 1838 has been a powerful instrument in the enlightenment and elevation of the people. Prior to 1838 our Scriptures and tracts were obtained from Serampore and Calcutta; and to the Serampore missionaries belongs the honour of having first translated and printed the Bible in Oriya. One edition of the Old Testament, and two editions of the New, were issued from the Serampore press, and before our Society was formed the "Serampore brethren" had sent their Scriptures and messengers into Orissa.

As nearly as can be ascertained there have been issued from our own press

3 editions of the Old Testament in Oriya.

7

50

ditto of separate, or several, portions of Scripture. 7,797 separate pages.

166,150 different copies, and

30,921,000 pages.

In addition to the above, school books and general literature by tens of thousands, and tracts by hundreds of thousands, have been issued from the Cuttack press..

In contrast with the foregoing statements we will now quote the first two sentences from "The First Report of the General Baptist Missionary Society, June 24, 1817." "In compliance with their duty," the Report goes on to say, "your Committee now report their proceedings since the time when the infant Society, for which they have acted, was formed at Boston. It has not, in the past year, fallen to the lot of your Committee to be engaged in those repeated and active services in which the real friends of God and man delight to be employed; but little has been done: and, with respect to the final objects of the Society, nothing."

Thank God! the Sixtieth Report differs from the "first." Your Committee have something to report. They have to report not merely that money has been raised, but that men and women have entered the mission field: they have to report that infanticide has been abolished, and that infant lips are singing the praise of Jesus instead of Juggernath; they have to report that the fires of the suttee have been extinguished, and that, from the altar of widowed hearts the flame of Jesus' love is ascending to the skies: they have to report that human sacrifices have been abandoned, and that victims, rescued from a barbarous death, have presented themselves as living sacrifices unto God: they have to report that the churruck poojah, or swinging on hooks, has been suppressed, and that men have found rest in Him whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light; they have to report that "the regent of death" has been disarmed of his terrors, and of converts

who, in the hour of mortal dissolution, have been able to say, "Glory to Jesus! Glory to Jesus!" In a word, they have to report of orphanages and schools, of churches and villages, of the extensive circulation of the Word of God, and of the spirit of hopeful inquiry among the people.

The saddest and most discouraging aspect in connection with Orissa is the lack of suitable men. Your brethren Brooks, Buckley, and Miller, have been engaged thirty-six, thirty-three, and thirty-two years respectively; and in the natural order of things they cannot be expected to render many more years of active service. Besides these there is Mr. T. Bailey, who has been out sixteen years, Mr. Pike who has only been out three, and Mr. Wood who has only been out a few months. Unless, therefore, a speedy reinforcement be sent there will be danger of an utter collapse, as regards European agency. The money we have! The MEN we need. "The harvest is plenteous. The labourers are few. Pray ye, therefore, the Lord of the harvest that He will send labourers into His harvest.'

With the following testimony to the Orissa Mission, from General Sir Arthur Cotton, K.C.B., your Committee would conclude. Sir Arthur, in presiding at a missionary meeting held in Church Street Chapel, London, a few weeks ago, said

"It is a great honour to be allowed an opportunity of telling you what my ideas are of the work and progress of missions in India. I have had very good opportunity for observing these during so many years' acquaintance with India. I have been in the Indian army now fifty-eight years, and during that time have had many advantages for observing the changes that have passed over India. I have visited many missions in various parts of the country, and have obtained information in every way I could. I have been twice for some little time in Orissa, and am especially interested in that province on account of our engineering works there. As an engineer, I always like to begin speaking of the work of missions with stating my opinion of the soundness of the foundation which has been laid, and I cannot but declare my entire satisfaction in respect of this Mission. It is founded simply and solely upon the word of God; and every listener is brought to the test of that, and challenged, as Paul's hearers were, to try all they heard by it. Where there is this living word at the root, the work must stand. Nothing can destroy it. The converts may give up their teachers, as the Asiatics gave up Paul; but if they are rooted and grounded in the living word, they won't give up Him whom that word reveals to them. It is often said that you must not put implicit confidence in the missionaries' own reports, and I must say I concur in that view. I think I must say that I never read a mission report that did not greatly underrate what had been effected. It must be so. Those who are in the midst of the fight and actually encountering all the difficulties, disappointments, and sources of depression that are inseparable from such warfare, cannot possibly take such a fair view of the matter as a looker on, and especially one who has been looking on for more than half a century, and has thus witnessed the amazing change that the preaching of the gospel has produced in that long time.

"What I honour above all in the missions is the indomitable perseverance with which your missionaries go on with their work, whether their success is apparent or not. I consider the greatest hero in the world is the man who, taking his stand upon the word of God, perseveres for years without the encouragement of confessing converts. They read, and this is true, that one soweth and another reapeth; and they know that in due time he that soweth and he that reapeth shall rejoice together. It is a great matter of thankfulness that so small a body as yours should have been enabled so many years to support in great efficiency so important a Mission. I wish other Christian churches in England showed as much vitality. If they did, the missions in India would be trebled or quadrupled, and the whole country would be effectually inoculated with the truth."

Our Home Mission Work in 1877*.

THOMAS CARLYLE says, "You ought not to judge of a building whilst the scaffolding is up." That advice is as opportune as it is wise, and for our Home Mission work just now no more wise than it is absolutely urgent. If not taken, ten chances to one our judgment will be unfair; unfair to the architect who has designed the edifice, unfair to the actual work already done, for much of it is sure to be out of sight, and unfair to the serviceable, and, perhaps, attractive structure that will ultimately be reared. The presence of the ungainly scaffolding is, at once, an invitation to suspend final judgment, and a demand for the exercise of a large confidence in the ability and perseverance of the architect and builders.

All interested in the General Baptist Home Mission edifice scarcely need to be told that the scaffolding recently put up for effecting certain changes is still within sight. The ghastly but promising poles and ropes speak for themselves, and I hope they will not speak in vain. Six years ago we commenced the calm but earnest consideration of plans for removing the several good old structures which had usefully occupied Conference territory for a long period, and the substituting of one strong, solid, and compact building, coherent as granite, spacious as a palace, and happy as the blithest and merriest home.

SIX YEARS!"

That fact means something. "Six years" deliberation, and counseltaking! It speaks well for our patience, our thoughtfulness, our unadulterated conservatism. It proves our genuine English blood. The mercurial vivacity of the French has not crossed the channel to us. The "go-a-head," irrepressible eagerness of the "States" has not Americanized our institutions. Six days would have sufficed for them to deliberate, and in as many months the building would have been completed and the family in it. But as we do not believe in revolutions made by the guillotine, so we are afraid of streets of houses built before breakfast. We have taken time, looked around us and within us, and at last chosen well, believing that our choice is endless. The creed which has governed our denominational conduct is expressed by Ruskin when he says, "the length of the time between the planting of a seed and the raising of a crop is generally connected with the ripeness and fulness of the fruits; and just in proportion as you can place your end ahead of you and your religion, and patiently watch for it, so will be the completeness of your reward." Hence we gave these years to thinking and planning, arranging and discussing; and having duly finished this preliminary toil, we turned the first sod at Derby last year, dug out the foundations, put in the concrete, reared the scaffolding, and have been trying, in spite of a little bad weather and some other obstructions, to do some good work ever since.

*Statement made at the Annual Home Missionary Meeting by the Secretary. GENERAL BAPTIST MAGAZINE, AUGUST, 1877.-VOL. LXXIX.-N. S. No. 92.

Not yet can we take the scaffolding down. The unifying principle has been adopted with enthusiasm, but the unifying process remains to be completed. Our denominational solidarity in Home Mission work is not yet an accomplished fact. We have been in a state of transition, are still in transition, and shall be for some short time to come. "The old order changes," but it changes slowly; it creeps off old and reluctant areas often with much difficulty, and some pain. Denominations, like men, are the creatures of habits; and habits are our second nature, and form a fountain of force often stronger than the first. We cannot pass from an old institution, or set of institutions, to a new one with the ease that a man gets out of an old coat into one just fresh from the tailor.

I

And though this is a greedily assenting age to almost everything that is new, or seems new, yet, I am glad to say this for ourselves, that you cannot get 25,000 General Baptists to say "amen" to any conductors bâton without a considerable number of preliminary rehearsals. rejoice that it is so. It is dangerous to assent too easily. People who do that sort of thing are likely to be of a limp, molluscous order, moved about by any current that may be loaded to suit their palate. No! Give me men who think, make up their minds, and then affirm their "Amen" with a resonance distinct, full and emphatic as the booming thunder in God's heavens. That is the sort of "amen" we are going to have. We have already caught the promise of it from the fertile and populous Midlands. It has been vigorously started in the vales and along the hill sides of Yorkshire; hesitatingly whispered in the tempting fields of Cheshire; and though wavering just a little in the East, yet it is gathering strength and volume, whilst in the needy South and West our churches have stood with parted lips ready to utter their hearty assent these many days; so that we are sure that, in two or three years time, it will be recorded in the chronicles of this Reformed Society that ALL THE PEOPLE said " Amen," and meant all that they said.

For this change in our way of working, everybody will admit has been made in a spirit as considerate and kindly as it has been enthusiastic and resolved. No one has even suggested that the old modes of working should be forgotten in making a departure for the new; but our solicitude has been extreme that not a solitary item of real advantage in the former methods should be lost in our eagerness for consolidation. We have taken every groat of responsibility borne by the Conferences in their respective districts, and shall discharge it to the uttermost farthing in a spirit of generous and overflowing loyalty. So that whilst getting the heart of every church within the borders of our Israel into this evangelising enterprise, we hope to multiply five-fold the work the Conferences shall have to do. We seek to increase the working power of the limbs by securing a larger access of force to the heart.

CONCENTRATION.

The principle of our new departure in Home Mission work is that of CONCENTRATION; the principle which welds us into a coherent