The Editor of the "North-China Daily News" has kindly invited me to write an article on the needs vf the Church Missionary Society, made urgent at this time by the great rise in exchange.
The generous Shanghai people lately gave us a Cathedral offertory of $300 and our appeal in Mrs. Marsh's drawing room produced over, $350, and I know that anghai liberality is good for much more than this; I am, however, reluctant to put the needs of one Society, forward, "When all British Societies, and American ones too, are hard hit, but my appeal will not harm and may help cthers. Every dollar that our Missions use now in China costs four times as much to the English donor as it did before the war. If this high exchange continues, and the supporters cannot greatly increase their gifts, much of the work must be closed down. Bisho} Norris in Peking feels it as mu as we do in Chekiang, so does the C.ILM. throughout China (Office, 9 Woosung Road), so also do the London Mission (Office, 9 Hankow Road), the English Methodists (Ningpo and Wenchow) and many others. Let my appeal, such as it is, help all, and let friends send their gifts wherever their warmest sympatl lie.
Tie Missionary axp wis Critics.
We are pretty well hardened to criticism, and don't generally reply to it, but what is useful - sticks, and we get on our work. Much of it is obsolete, as that of the friendly critic, who wrote lately by. request in a missionary magazine, and was quoted in your honourable paper, about the convert and the back door. In earlier days most of the converts were from the lower classes, owing to the relentless opposition of the Manchu Government, and the convert found it convenient to go to the cook, vho was probably also a convert. first. Now the educated man or women generally walks. up to the hall door and the bell, and others, who, with the diffidence so characteristic of the courteous Chinese. may have sought an entry at the back, will be shown out at the front door by the missionary himself after they have drunk tea with him and had their talk. I think that most missionaries nowadays will not be found to be wanting in sy.
A gentleman who spent a few days with us some time ago went away delighted with "the enthusists." I think it does want some enthusiasm for two ladies to spend their lives among Chinese school. girls on a salary which admits of no savings to be turned into gold but only enough to be spent on a summer holiday, It wants some enthusiasm for a lady of nearly 60 to live by herself out in a small country town, the only foreigner in the place, going in and out of the homes of the Chinese day by day, or for another lady to spend weeks on end by herself out in the villages.
And these are not isolated cases, though generally they try to go two by two, Life in most missionary spheres in China would be intolerable, but for the steady enthusiasm aroused by the love of Christ in the heart, attachment to the people, and the knowledge that something is getting done, Recorp or a Year's Work. the Chinese, and we know that Our work is to put character int
spite of failures, we are succeeding. We believe that this can only be done by winning them to the allegiance of Christ. We preach in Church and Hall, we teach in schoo] and hospital; by our own words, by the words of Chinese Fastors, doctors, preachers and teachers; and by literature, In Chekiang we of the C.M.S. have 78 schools from primary middle grade, and for. training evangelistic, educational and medical workers, and in these institutions there are 1,320 male and 655 female pupils, we have three hos-. Pitals with 473. beds and 3,976 in-paSente last year, each hospital aving its dispensary with 43,833 visits of out-patients in 1919.
We have 27 Chinese clergymen work, more than half of whom are in settled - parishes meeting already a large part, and in some cases the whole. of their own ex-Tenses, so that it may be said that Christianity is rapidly becoming indigenous in this part China.
Tue Upkeer or tan Work. _I am not pleading for the missionaries' personal allowances, but for the upkeep of - the work. As regards ourselves we are not yet affected. The policy of the C.M.S. is not to reduce our salaries but to recall us if necessary. At pre, sent the Society is lessening its expenses under the head of missionaries by asking those on furlough to find remunerative occupation, which clergymen and doctors can generally do, and by, sending out very few new missionaries. This reduces the bill at the Home end considerably, but if it goes on it will gradually stop all the work out here, except that done by the hinese. Our own pockets then are not affected, except as We ourselves give to the work.
It is the working expenses on the field that have already been cut down by 10 per cent., and which are threatened with further curtail. ment. This involves the salaries of Chinese workers (a heading which is reduced not by docking the individual but by employing fewer workers), the extenses of schools, repairs of buildings, rents, itinerating expenses, medical expenses and all-the miscellaneous details,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.