66
THE KING’S BUSINESS
which pleased the miners particularly. The owner of one of the richest mines went back into the drift and returned with a pan • in his hand. This he gave to Dr. Bradshaw, saying, ‘What is in it is yours.’ The missionary ‘panned it down’ and dis covered that he had about $15 worth of gold. Hospitality was extended to him on every side, and when he held his Sabbath evening service, it was well attended, in spite of the fact that during the summer months the miners know no Sunday. The men listened with the closest attention.” W ar notes .— The Nord Deutsche Allge meine Zeitung informs us that the German army chaplains accompanying the troops to the front are holding religious services and preaching sermons in the very trenches. One of the curiosities of the crisis is the fact that 1000 Tibetan troops .have offered their ' services to the British government and, according to the Dalai Lama, the Lamas throughout the length and breadtn of Tibet are offering prayers for the suc cess of the British army! A striking parallel might be drawn be tween the events in Belgium today and those which occurred in the Congo Free States less than a decade ago. Thousands are being harried out of their homes as Congo blacks were driven from their vil lages into, the primeval forests. Men, wo men and children, in many cases of once prosperous families, are put to forced labor in the fields by their German conquerors. One recalls the forced collection of rubber by the great Belgian rubber companies. In the Congo baskets of hands were collected from regions where no more rubber was forthcoming and one hears today well au Count Tolstoi, the mayor of Petrograd, stated at a conference of Russian mayors in Moscow that more than 350,000 Jews were fighting in the armies of Russia. It is estimated that 100,000 more are enrolled in the Austrian service, so that the total number in all the armies engaged in active service at the present time cannot be far from a half million. This must be near a sixth or seventh of the entire male Jewish population of the world capable of 'bearing arms. And the tragedy of it is that they are fighting each pther for causes in which they have no racial interest. Further than this, the scene of the conflict in Eastern Europe is in the area of the pale of settle ment within which nearly half of the Jew ish race is at present massed. The eco nomic sufferings of the Jewish people in this region have been in peace time nearly unendurable. In war time, when all com merce is suspended and when armies are marching back and forth over the country, the state of things must be, for the Jews, indescribable .—Record of Christian Work. f rare 3 leaue with gnu, mg péare 3 gitie unto gnu: not aa % morii! gineth, gtue 3 unto goo. Eri not gnor heart hr tronhleh, neither let it be afraih. 3fohn 14-.2T thenticated stories of Belgian children whose hands are wanting. The Roman Catholic Church was archsupporter of Leo pold, ever defending him in his wicked courses. The Roman Church in Belgium has been a chief sufferer from the German invasian. Its great seminary at Louvain is a pile of waste brick; its churches through out the land are roofless. To complete the parallel. Almost the only protestants against the red rubber atrocities were the Socialists, with M. Vandervelde at their head. The same M. Vandervelde was re cently in the United States with the com mission which was laying before President Wilson the sufferings of harmless Belgian^ at the hands of the Germans.
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