K The C.M.S. Mission in Krishnagar. RISHNAGAR is a town and district in Bengal, sixty miles north of Calcutta, which you, of course, know is in North India. The C.M.S. planted a Mission in Krishnagar in 1831, and, two years after, thirty persons were baptized. Although they were much persecuted, many others joined them; and in 1838 the benevolence of Christian people to the sufferers from a famine led to an extensive movement in favour of Christianity. Some 3000 persons placed themselves under instruction, and when Bishop Daniel Wilson, of Calcutta, visited the district in 1839, no less than 900 converts were baptized on one occasion. But these people were mostly poor labourers, and with but little knowledge; and as that generation passed away, it was followed by another, consisting largely of people who had been baptized in infancy, and were only Christians in name, just like so many thousands in England. In after years many excellent missionaries laboured among them, such as the late Rev. C. H. Blumhardt, and the Rev. A. P. Neele (now of Liverpool); but there was little true spiritual life to be seen. When the late Rev. J. Vaughan took charge in 1877 he found much to sadden him, but he threw himself into the work of revival with prayerful energy, and God blessed his efforts. The Christian community has distinctly improved in the last three or four years. Since Mr. Vaughan's lamented death, the Rev. A. Clifford has had the principal charge of Krishnagar; the Rev. H. Williams is an evangelistic missionary, and itinerates from village to village all through the cold season; and the Rev. J. W. Hall has the Training Institution for Native teachers. The Mohammedans, who are threefifths of the population in this part of Bengal, are showing a readiness to hear the Gospel; and we are thankful to say that it has pleased God to call out some converts from among them. Moslem bitterness is often encountered. The Rev. J. W. Hall relates an incident which illustrates both this and the meek spirit of some of the Christian agents: were Manick, who was acting as our dak (messenger) between Bollobpore and Tertulberia, had left us in the morning; but long ere he reached the Bhairub (a then swollen river, and consequently dangerous to cross) night came on, forcing him to seek shelter until dawn. Going to the house of a Mussulman, he asked for a lodging (which, I may say, is never or seldom refused). The Mussulman, however, turned a deaf ear to his request, on the ground that his masters up in Tertulberia making Christians of the people. "You are a low, mean lot, you Christians," said the man. Ay," replied Manick, "I own we are a poor despised people." When the man found that his thrust had not gone home, he said, "Nay, you are a great people." "True," replied Manick, "we are a great people; we are the sons of the living God;" and the angry Mussulman turned him out into the dark night. 66 the first commandment, "Thou shalt have none other gods but Me." A bright, happy-looking Brahmin girl, of about eleven years of age, said, "I do not make 'puja' [worship] now, because I have no faith in our gods: I know the one true God;" and the young Brahmin widow, who assists my head Christian teacher, remarked, "You all know that I never enter any temple, nor do I perform our rites privately;" and another girl added, "Yes, there is only One who can do anything for us, and everything else is A Group of N the group presented in our engraving you see some dancing dervishes of Egypt. They are not now engaged in what they consider to be their religious service, but are evidently rehearsing for the time when they shall perform their strange worship in public. The dervish holds the same place among Mohammedans that the fakir does among the Hindus, or the mendicant friar among the Romanists. Arrayed in a sugar-loaf cap, and a coarse serge cloak fastened round his waist, the dervish wanders through the country, visiting the villages and cottages. He pretends to revelations, and, practising upon the credulity of the people, lives upon the offerings presented to him. The following account of the worship of the dervishes was written some years ago by a former secretary of the C.M.S. who visited one of the mosques in which they worship. "I witnessed," he wrote, "the worship of the howling dervishes-an awful exhibition of ignorance and fanaticism, which I should hardly think any heathen orgies, that were bloodless, could possibly exceed. The mosque they occupied false." Such is the encouragement one gets in the Lord's work by the way. These girls may never be able to break the fetters with which Hinduism has bound them, for there are difficulties in the way an outsider cannot realize. The Lord, however, knows exactly how they are situated, and will, I am sure, in His own time, bring things to a happy issue. The next generation will, doubtless, be wiser and better than the present one, and the minds of their children will be more at liberty to judge and act for themselves. Dervishes. was a low square room, hung round with tambourines and other instruments; and within a wooden railing, along one wall, sat on their heels about a dozen men and boys, swaying themselves backwards, forwards, and sideways, and chanting in a low and not unmusical tone-opposite them their chiefs, or mollahs, the youngest with a strange, half-unconscious look of wild excitement in his eyes. Presently, one, and then another, clapped hands to quicken the time of the movements and the songs. Then suddenly all rose to their feet, swaying to and fro vehemently, and intermingling their chant with deep guttural gulpings, which seemed to come from the very pit of their stomachs. Some then squatted in front of them, shrieking every now and then rapidly, while the mollahs went in turn to others, whispering something into their ears, with an insane smile, which seemed to excite them to still greater fury. Gradually the mollahs stripped themselves, and took their place amongst the dancers. One after another of the bystanders slipped in amongst them, as if sucked into the same whirlpool of enthusiasm. They seemed to Îose all control of themselves, and the |