913
THE KING’S BUSINESS
and that the native Christian men and boys Were to be taken in large numbers, he came to the conclusion that the Gospel-would have to go along also with the tramping and the camping troops. He therefore pro posed to Mr. Ainsworth, the Secretary of Foreign Affairs, to raise and organize a band of 1,000 native Christian boys for the great Carrying Corps which it is proposed to use in transporting the baggage and supplies of the troops. The Government was quick to accept this offer, and to util ize the valuable executive abilities of Dr. Arthur. He will himself go with the Car rying Corps. Practically all of the choicest spirits among the* native “boys” on the A. I. M. field are volunteering for the Carrying Corps. The going of both the white and the native mission workers pre sents a serious problem at the stations they are leaving, and presents a tremendous call to prayer to the Church at home .—Inland Africa. The Home Secretary of the American Board tells us of the contrast between pagan and Christian African and gives a vivid picture of an African war dance— “horribly heathenish and mighty interest ing”—-and follows this with an inspiring story of how the great Zulu choir sang great anthems of the church, like Stainer’s “Who are These,” and Grieg’s “The Ran somed Hosts,” and others, till the audience which filled the Durban City Hall at the celebration of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the founding of the American Board’s Zulu mission could not be restrained in it* applause. INDIA. A woman missionary doctor •in Jaipur, India, contributes 'to Medical Missions in India an interesting article on a custom which does untold harm to the children of India. She says “The habit which prevails in Jaipur State of drugging infants with opium is widely prevalent, I fear, through out India. Probably forty percent of children iii Jaipur, between the ages of three months and two years, are given reg-
custom house to help erect a church or school in his home village. The whole tide of Chinese life is near the turn. Bah- hung-do, the richest town in the country, will loan a splendid furnished house if we will send a pastor. Sen Chiong offers a house for a church and forty dollars towards the sixty of a preacher’s salary. The last day of March, 1917, saw the end of the opium infamy in China. The Repub lic issued an edict closing all ports to the importation .of opium from other countries and this clinches the matter. If other nations were disposed to interfere,, the embarrassments of the world war make it impossible. It is a tribute to Chinese char acter that when the foreign syndicate in Shanghai offered the government seven mil-*;' lion dollars for the privilege of a six months’ extension of time, in order' to work off stocks on hand, the government refused, even while begging from the United States the loan of five millions to cover some pressing emergency. Mr. James Hudson Taylor, the grandson of Hudson Taylor, the founder of the China Inland Mission, has, at the age of 23, just been accepted for service in that mission. AFRICA. Putting forth 'a tremendous effort to clear German East Africa once for all of German troops at the urgency of both the Home Government and the Belgian Allies in the Congo, the British authorities in British East Africa some weeks ago decided to draft every available British sub ject in Africa for the war. The result was that the British and Canadian subjects con nected with the Africa Inland Mission were ordered to report for this duty. Not only so, but the native evangelists and workers wherever available at every station have been conscripted and will be organized into a big “Carrying Corps.” It is said that this carrying corps will number 300,000 for the entire German East African work. When Dr. John Arthur, of the Scottish Mission, learned of this drastic decision,
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