department, I would, at the very outset, make the pupils pay-it might be a small sum-for the education given to them. The Romanists have a very large school, and all the pupils pay. The Greeks have a school in which a certain number receive a gratuitous education, and the rest pay. The American missionaries have opened a school in the Turkish quarter, and are giving free instruction; but I think we ought to try the paying principle, of course giving as good value as possible in the way of teaching. The first difficulty we would have to encounter would be procuring a suitable house, and I do not know of any place at present eligible. Some friends have suggested, in the event of the Committee coming to the determination to have a school, that we should apply to the Pasha for a grant of a piece of ground on which to build a house, which would answer for a church and school. It is thought that as grants have already been made to the Greeks, Romanists, and Church of England, we might obtain one also. I am not prepared to ask the Committee to begin any building just now. If I could get an interview with the Pasha, I would ask for the ground, and if I got it, so much the better. I do think, however, that we should set about a school, or rather schools, male and female, at once; and what I now wish to know is, whether the Committee will authorise me to look out for a house, at a rent say of £60, or under, engage an Italian and Arabic master for the boys, as well as send me a teacher for the girls if required. Mrs. Yule would, in the meantime, see to the female department. I know that I am making a large demand, but I do not see at present how the work can be carried on without something like what I now seek. GOSPEL TRIUMPHS. Let thy glorious dawning come. Let the Indian, let the negro, Loud resound from pole to pole. Fly abroad, thou mighty Gospel! Sway Thy sceptre,. Saviour, all the world around! M Y DEAR MRS. M SCOTTISH ORPHANANGE, was acknowledged last month, but the steamer, "Ava," on which it was sent, was lost; and so the mail also has gone to the depths of the ocean; and, therefore, to clear myself of seeming neglect, I hasten to write a few more lines. I had known you by name as Peggie's kind supporter; and I think it very kind of you to write, for I ought to have made her write to you on her marriage. Joseph is a good steady man, and I think makes her very happy. He has two boys by a former marriage, and Peggie is very kind to them. He was a Scripture reader; but after six months he left Calcutta with his family, and took employment at Chittagong. She used to come to the Orphanage to see her old companions; and I called several times at their house, to see how they were getting on. You ask if she had adopted European habits? Not quite. We do not VOL. VII. No. VII. JULY 1, 1858. like them to make a great change in their habits, as it would make their mode of living more expensive than was necessary. Some of the Christians, I am sorry to say, have adopted European habits and style of living, and so, of course, their salaries are not sufficient, and their employers are constantly teased to increase their allowance. The poorest Christian's house is always neater and cleaner than their heathen neighbours'. Peggie's house had two rooms; one was the kitchen, and the other the best room, in which was a bedstead, a table, and a couple of chairs; also a small book-shelf, with a few books; and they took their meals in the kitchen on a mat; they ate with their fingers, as all our children do in the Orphanage, sitting on mats. The girls wear petticoats, either of calico or print, and a calico vest which has short sleeves, and fastens round the throat with a band. The elder girls have a covering, sometimes, called a chudder or veil. Peggie looked very elegant on her wedding-day. She had on a very full muslin petticoat over a thick calico one; she wore shoes and stockings (which is not their custom, except when I take them to St. Andrew's on a Sabbath evening; I always take two of the elder ones alternately); she had on a muslin vest, and, over all, was a chudder or veil, which enveloped her whole person. Several friends were present, and Mr. Herdman performed the ceremony. It was a happy occasion for the children; they had a holiday, and were treated with sweetmeats. Last month we had our annual examination. Rev. Messrs. Herdman, Ogilvie, and Wenger examined them in English and Bengali, in the presence of friends, and all seemed pleased. These children are cared for, instructed, fed, and clothed, like any English school, though we try to keep them to the native habit as much as possible, by cooking, and drawing water, and cleaning their apartments. Oh! may the love of Jesus touch their young hearts, and then they will truly feel grateful to their kind supporters. How amused your little boy would be to see our school full of black children, and to hear them speak in their own native tongue. When I have been in the Mofussil, the children, sometimes, on seeing me, would run and hide themselves for fear; even now, when they first come to our day-schools, they look quite frightened; but by degrees they gain confidence. I must now conclude with my kind Christian regards, and, believe me,-Yours sincerely, FRANCES HEBRON. CAN NO ONE STOP THE WHEEL? Not long since I was passing along the Westminster Road, in an omnibus, and I looked out and saw a sad sight. A little girl, with no father's or mother's hand to guide her, no elder brother or sister to protect her, was wandering in the streets, and as she was trying to cross, she was knocked down by a cart. There she lay, with outstretched arms, between the hoof of the horse and the wheel of the cart. It was but an instant of time, but it seemed an age, as I saw that wheel remorselessly passing on to crush those tender limbs. Could no one stop that wheel? Could no one save that little one from peril? It was impossible; all shuddered as they looked, and there was not one but would have risked his personal safety to rescue the poor child. But what shall we say of thousands of children in London and elsewhere, exposed to far greater perils every day? The wheel of ruin-physical, moral, and spiritual ruin-is rolling over them; hunger and nakedness is crushing them; early bad example is crushing them; fearful ignorance is crushing them; infernal training in human vice is crushing them; most degrading and abominable juvenile amusements are crushing them; early tippling habits are crushing them. There they lie, poor little things, in the dirt in the kennel. Shall we condemn them? Shall we scorn them? Should we be better than they, had we been in their circumstances,-cradled in corruption, schooled in sin? May they not become better than we are? Rough, lustreless, mud-begrimed, your diamond is capable of being cut and polished, so that it may yet glisten in the crown of the Great King. Drooping, dying, they are yet flowers; lilies, roses, capable, by your cultivation, and by the genial influences of the Spirit of God, of putting forth a beauty and a fragrance meet for angels, meet for heaven. Every one of them has an immortal soul, more valuable than all those jewels reported as captured at Lucknow; more valuable than the great Indian Empire, for the preservation of which we are lavishing so much treasure and so much blood; more precious than the great globe itself. Those little ones, since Christ created them, since He redeemed them, and invites them to Himself, we need not hesitate to say are Christ's little ones. We seem to hear Him say, "These are mine; preserve them for me; take these children, nurse them, train them for me." There comes the ponderous wheel of the devil's car rolling on, rolling on, crushing them down, from his memory, and left no mark behind. But you will often find it is far different with his first prayers. He will often be able to tell you where he knelt, and what he was taught to say, and even how his mother looked all the while. It will come up as fresh before his mind's eye as if it was but yesterday. Reader, if you love your children, I charge you, do not let the seed-time of a prayerful habit pass away unim proved. If you train your children to anything, train them at least to a habit of prayer.-Home Truths. THE TRUE RICHES. HE that has Christ has the true riches. A gentleman one day took an acquaintance out on the roof of his house, to shew him the extent of his possessions. "There," says he, "that is my estate." Then, pointing in another direction, "Do you see that farm ? " Yes." "6 Well, that is mine. Do you see that house?" "Yes." That is mine, too." Then said his friend, "Do you see that little village out yonder? "Yes." "Well, there is a poor woman in that village who can say more than all this." "Why, how is that! what can she say?" 'Why, she can say, Christ is mine."-Union Magazine. 66 GOD'S GIFT. GIVE all Thou canst,-without Thee we are poor, EACH PUPIL. A LADY had a Sabbath class, to teach which she made diligent preparation; the instructions in the class were necessarily of a somewhat general nature, but she desired that each of her scholars should be converted to God. Therefore it was her habit to pray specifically for each scholar, and then to visit each one in her home, for the purpose of special religious conversation. She laboured to save not her class, but the particular souls in her class. It is worth repeating, that this humble, faithful teacher had reason to believe that each of her scholars had become a true Christian.-Union Magazine. |