To the Editor of the "NontH-CHINA Dany News."
Sim—One of the unsolved pro: blems of comparatively modern Chinese history. is the disappearance of nearly every trace of the Nestorian Christiana between the collapse of the Mongol dynasty in the middle of the 14th century and the earliest European contacts with China.in the middle of the 16th century. Nearly every missionary who knows even superficially what full records there are of the wide Giffusion of Nestorian Christianity in China throughout the middle ages must at some time have been sufficiently puzzled and interested to have made inquiries in his local field for servi 1 or traditional; thal vague traces scarcely worth reporting in themselves perhaps, but which might be of value if linked up with other evidence or hints at evidence, 'Now that many missionaries who have long been resident at station in the remote interior are in the heir opportunity to it posts, would it not be a favourable opportunity, Mr. Editor, to open a symposium' upon this subject, upon which assiduous scholarship has made a0 little pression, and to solicit contributions of whatever vague evidence your 4, Fenders may have found or such hypotheses as they ha evolved to account for the di ippenrance of Christianity during the Ming dynasty? Just to start the ball rolling, if you have space for my opinions, T shall advance my own it of guesswork on this subject and give some of my you sons for my opinions.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.