the Editor of the Norri-Cutva Darcy News.
Sim,—Whilst_ we well know that all Christians, whether foreign merchants native converts, as well as missioner ould endure wrong with patience, 9 our Lord nowhere inculcates that should never attempt to remove the of our wrongs. Moreover we are enjoined by every Divine law to strive after pence and goodwill by the removal of all hindrances.
The incessant persecution of Christians in some place or other in this empire, under various pretexts, and the common tardiness in the execution of justice, even when it is granted, grievously interfering with the peace of godly natives and the progress of the work of: the missionary, m to require more than a passing notice; with your kind permission 1 propose to state some of the grievances, their causes and remedies, in the hope that acme good Samaritans will ce-operate to pour healing oil on our wounds and eventually establish permanent peace between the now apparently contending parties.
Tt is with pleasure we state that there are a fow native officials who strive most earnestly to remove all the sources of irritation, But the main body of them, between their, prejudice againat us and their sincere belief that they are doing good to their own people in opposing Us, bring us missionaries face to face with the following difficulties whi Christia ight, their windows ate stopped up, water from the village well is refused to them, stocks of winter fuel are et on fire, their houses are burut down, some are sent to the city in chains without even a warrant, some swung up on beams, some compelled to subscribe towards theatricals which they hate, all more or less abused, some shire to be shot, tually cub swords—women as well as men—and thus are sometimes compelled to in the hope of more peace the above lias taken place in one mission in less than on" year. From this we can imagine the innumerable persecutions which endured in twenty years by twenty different missions—Protestaut and Roman In some of the instances mentioned above Tam glad to say that proclamations were put out and that some of the anti-foreign and anti-christ by the authori tional punishment and an occasional proclamation, to stop a flood of porsscution sal? One might as well stop the floods of the great Yang-tsz Kiang with a mill-dam, Besides, in the very place where proclamations are issued for the protection of Christians, and punishment administered to the persecutors what do we isting and therefore neutralizing them? A man comes on behalf of his wife, who has been cut ow the head with a award, to the Hsien magistrate. He waits two days before he can get the underlings to present his petition, and is abused right and Jeft,—become a disciple of the foreign devils; served him right,"" etc. When the official is seen, he is sent home with plaster to put on the wound. That i redress! In 8 cannot be punished for being Christi they are punished on some other excuse which is made up instead, Some are refused their degrees, ostensibly for not having anyone to be their surety, but really for being Christians. Again we are called by bad names. On arriving where no foreigners have been residing, we have often witnessed the respectful carriage, of the people and the respectful terms with which we are addressed, but ju a short time bad names spread about like a peati. lence to worry us wherever we go. immaterial whether the man be a foreign
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.