Generally in INDIA and CHINA the Directors have been enlarging their operations by the completion and filling in of existing agencies. New chapels at Tientsin; a chapel and dwelling house in Wu-chang; two houses in Canton; a school and dwelling in Almorah; a house at the newly-founded station of Ranee Khet; a new High School in Benares; a medical missionary in Singrowli; an additional house in Calcutta; additional missionaries in South India and Travancore; all have been asked for: and the greatness of the requirements bears testimony to the importance of the sphere and of the opportunities which are open to the Society in these Eastern Empires. Several of the buildings have already been provided or have been sanctioned: others are under consideration. But any solid extension of these two great missions must for the present be deferred.
The needs of MADAGASCAR cannot be overlooked. The call of God's providence and grace is so clear that the Directors have not hesitated to arrange for a decided increase of the English staff. Five ordained missionaries will proceed to the Island early in the coming summer; and one, if not two, medical missionaries. The Betsileo province has long waited for help, and it is proposed to place, if possible, four ordained missionaries and one medical man amongst its important and populous towns. The mere sending of these brethren will cost a sum of £1,500; their maintenance will require £2,000 a-year. The Directors however cannot hesitate to offer this aid to the churches and people among whom the Spirit of God is so powerfully at work: and they do it in the faith that the Lord to whose call they listen will prompt his people to provide the means by which the brethren shall be sustained. They have had great difficulty in finding suitable medical missionaries, and they ask their friends to make it a matter of earnest prayer that the Spirit of God will touch the hearts of the right men to offer their service to His cause.
The Directors adopt these moderate measures for the extension of the Society's usefulness in hope. From every quarter they continue to receive gratifying proofs of the increased interest taken in their work. The attendance at the autumn gatherings of country auxiliaries has been large, and the spirit that has been displayed was generous and earnest. At Birmingham and Bristol; at Hastings and Halifax; at York and Leeds this spirit was specially manifest: the Bristol meetings, always warm and earnest, were this year enthusiastic. And everywhere the missionary brethren testify to the kindly manner in which they are received and heard.
God is giving us the means of usefulness. He is also bringing a steady supply of suitable men. But the fields are "white unto the harvest," and we must pray the Lord of the harvest to send more labourers to reap in his name. To extend our work larger means are required; and the friends of the Society will see that all additions to the present income will be available for the extension so desirable. Never were the exhortation and prediction more applicable: "Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations; SPARE NOT, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes." "And their seed shall be known among the Gentiles, and their offspring among the people: all that see them shall acknowledge them, THAT THEY ARE THE SEED WHICH THE LORD HATH BLESSED."
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