arrows, and rang out their war-whoop, | rather imposing appearance, and the many a North American incident I had method of fighting adopted by these read in my boyish days came vividly to Khond skirmishers, for such they really mind. It was an exciting sight, and are, is as uncivilized as their war dress although there was nothing in the scene is barbarous. They advance sideways which in these days of rifle cannon and to the attack at the blowing of a horn, turret ships one would dare to dignify letting fly their arrows from their left with the word martial, I confess, though shoulder. They turn their backs on the not being a "man of war from my approaching shafts of the enemy, receivyouth," it quickened the blood in my ing them harmlessly in the loose blanket, veins, and stirred up something akin to or squatting on their heels protect their a martial spirit within me. On reach- legs, or allow the arrows to escape over ing our tent they formed a circle, and their heads. Then, nearing their oppothe war dance commenced, and with nents, they suddenly spring to their feet little interruption was continued for an with the bound of an antelope, and hour and a half. The noise of tom toms battle axe in hand, rush whooping to the and cymbals, the clanging of tangies, charge. With such wild antics as part the long-drawn war-whoop, and the of their discipline, and a good share of beating of their kettle drums, was din-courage to back them, in their village ning in my head for hours afterwards. fights and boundary feuds they are no Spectators and dancers together num- doubt warriors not to be despised with bered over 1,500. Some of the weapons impunity. These Daringabadi Khonds with which they were armed were very formidable. There were battle axes with edges keen as a razor, others jagged, their handles variously ornamented and surmounted with a sharp spear head; bows there were of various kinds, several of immense strength; and arrows barbed or blunt, or pointed with steel spikes. Their war dresses were very peculiar and striking. The more showy consisted of a thick cloth wrapped two or three times round their bodies from hip to armpit, over which was laced a corset of thick buffalo's hide, reaching from hip to neck and hollowed under the arms. At their back a triangular framework of wood over which was stretched two thicknesses of hide, fitted by an angle into a socket, and was lashed tightly round their waists; to the other two angles defending the shoulders was attached a sheet of scarlet cloth, which hung down within four inches of the ground. These two corners were ornamented each with a polished bison's horn, or a bunch of peacock's feathers. A skirt, half a dozen thicknesses, very Khond. There is now at this place a like a Scotch highlander's, reached from their hips to the knees; and an enormous turban, decorated with white and coloured feathers, and ornaments made of pith, defended the head. From behind, the men wearing the dress are nearly hidden by the scarlet blanketnothing but a few inches of their legs and gay head dresses being visible. In front they have a thoroughly savage though are a fine race of men, very tall and exceedingly well proportioned-their average height being five feet eleven inches. They are fond of fighting, and rather haughty in their bearing. Last year they refused to come and pay their respects to the collector, sending this answer to his summons-"We have seen more white-faced sahibs than you have hairs on your head, and among so many, who are you that we should come to pay you obeisance?" This cold season when the order was issued for the burning of their village, several men from two streets in the outskirts came to the police officer and declared they had no sympathy with their rebellious neighbours; their houses were spared accordingly; but on seeing their friends compelled to seek shelter in a jungle, their native independence was aroused, and remarking "these houses are the leavings of the Sirkir; shame on us if we live in them," at once fired the whole. I understood little of their language, as it differs considerably from Goomsur guard of fifty policemen, an elephant, and the foundations of a small fort were dug when we were there, which will include within its walls accommodation for the police officer, native magistrate, a prison, and a court house. The mortar for this building will actually have to be carried on the back of elephants from below the ghauts, a distance of five-andtwenty miles. I was agreeably sur A Tour into the Interior of the Khond Country. prised on reaching this to meet Sarthi, a bugler in the police, and coming with a smiling face to give me a salutation. He was much astonished to see me. He is our approved candidate for baptism, and having been absent from Russell Condah for three months, was anxiously expecting to be relieved, stating how much he felt being away from all religious privileges. He has remained stedfast amidst his ungodly companions, and is much respected by them. Our journey to Gajeelabadi I shall not soon forget. I was never more weary than when tent below the ghauts in the dusk of we reached the the evening. We struck our tent early in the morning, and sent it by a very circuitous route two stages further on, not expecting to require it until the following day, as we had a small one pitched at the end of the first stage as a kind of half-way house. The first three miles of our journey, as far as a village called Kuseepunga, the descent was not more than two hundred feet. About a stone's throw from the village we sat down by the roadside to wait for a guide, the coolies carrying our breakfast. The latter had lingered behind to climb a sago palm, and quench their thirst by drinking of a vessel of the intoxicating liquor which exudes from it. sitting there one of the villagers told us While a Roman Catholic priest from Sooradah took up his quarters in the village a short time ago in a house not larger than a Khond hut. After a time he built a chapel, and by offering them four or eight anna pieces with holes in them to wear round their necks, said he wished to make them all Christians; but that only two or three accepted the present. These he taught to repeat a prayer before the image in the chapel in a language they did not understand. He said the priest understood but little of their language, and spent nearly all his time in kneeling before the same image. After a time the more respectable of the men grew suspicious of him, and looked upon him as an intruder. The sequel of this Roman Catholic mission to the Khonds was this—the priest was driven out of the village and compelled to descend the ghauts, and his chapel and house with all his goods and chattels burnt to the ground. We give our information as we received it. 435 fast bearers returned from their carousal As soon as our half inebriated breakand a guide had been procured, we resumed our journey. through tall jungle grass brought us to the head of the ghaut, and a wearisome Half a mile task it was to get safely to the bottom. Road there was none-to walk down quietly was impossible, the descent was so steep-and we had literally in some places to leap from stone to stone, and sent us spinning to the bottom of the in some places a false step would have gorge, full four hundred feet in depth! called high, but very little brushwood; The jungle on the mountain was what is consequently we could see a long way beneath us, and the path did not seem any more inviting on that account. I looked with wonder on our two Khond coolies as they bounded from stone to stone-they might have been taught their native dance by going up and down such roads as these. They never took a false step, whilst our legs were constantly shooting from under us. stones were brightly polished by the feet of the past generations of Khonds who Several of the had crossed and recrossed them in their journeys to and from the markets in the low countries. This real Khond turnpike was four miles in length, and in I was weary. Many a time when we that distance the descent was 3,500 feet. came to an opening in the jungle I looked out anxiously for the little tent we had sent on the day before, but in vain, and when I did at last catch sight of its white canvass top, it was 1,200 feet below me! Half an hour more of striding and jumping brought us to the desired restingplace. some straw inside, our knees shaking like We threw ourselves down on Belshazzar's through the severe exertion of our morning's travelling. It was our intention when we started to spend the night here, and go on to the encampment in the morning: but the valley was very limited, not five acres of cleared land visible. It was surrounded with mountains, the lowest 1,500 feet high, and looked a very likely spot to give jungle fever; so, weary and footsore though we were, our plans were altered, and the end of the next stage, eleven miles further on, fixed as our resting-place for the night. Our arrangements completed we sat down in the "shadow of a great rock" by the side of a murmuring moun tain stream, and thus picnicing in the Khond there is much one can really Khond valley under difficulties, broke our fast. It was a wild romantic spot, a piece of real forest scenery, and a very favourite haunt of tigers, bears, wolves, wild dogs, &c. love, and there need be no fear of its not being reciprocated. I confess I returned with an increased attachment to them, notwithstanding their uncivilized habits, and a more intense yearning after their eternal salvation. O for the zeal of an apostle and the gift of tongues, that soon from those "deep glens and mountains so rocky," may re-echo the praises of our ever-living Redeemer. TWENTY YEARS. We started at 3 p.m. for Gajeelabadi. The sun was very hot, for we had left the cool breezes of the Khond hills behind us. Although the road was very good in comparison with the one over which we had come in the earlier part of the day, the descent being very slight, the journey was after all a very severe one. Before we had gone far a very painful sensation of thirst, which had somewhat troubled me in the morning, Cuttack, Aug. 31st, 1864. returned, notwithstanding I had drunk Ir is twenty years to-day since I landed very freely of the streams before and at Madras.' What solemn thoughts are after breakfast. I never remember suf- suggested by this sentence! India has fering so much from thirst, for by the passed, during this time, through scenes time we had got through half our journey and changes which it would require my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth. volumes fully to narrate, and to which No amount of water relieved. Sixteen only a Macaulay's pen could do justice. times we crossed a stream, and each time Four Governors-General (Hardinge, I was powerless to resist the temptation to drink. What would I not have given for a bottle of lemonade or soda water, or better still, a lump of ice, but no such luxury was obtainable within hundreds of miles. When we reached the tent, a little boiled beet root and vinegar gave me instantaneous but temporary relief. All, no doubt, arose from fever in my system. On the morrow a journey of nineteen miles brought us to our homes, after an absence of three weeks, during which we had ridden ten miles, and walked one hundred and sixteen. The unusual thirst before mentioned troubled me for days after, and proved to be what was then feared, the germs of jungle fever, which have since strongly developed themselves. I was indeed charmed with the wild and beautiful country through which we travelled; with its mountain streams, rocky ghauts, and cloud capped mountains; still missionary tours in it will be very fatiguing and trying to the constitution, and not always free from danger-yet such journeys will necessarily form an important part of the Khond missionary's labours, and must be undertaken if Khondistan is to be evangelized. Withal there are attractions here to a Christian's heart, and objects worthy of his warmest affections. In the humorous and simple-minded Dalhousie, Canning, and Elgin,) have passed where the voice of praise or censure affects them not: but the humble missionary lives. Blessed be the name of the Lord for his great goodness! When twenty years of life have been devoted to any particular pursuit, it is natural for one who remembers his accountability to God to ask, whether the object is worthy of the time and attention which for so long a period have been devoted to it: and here I am thankful with advanced experience to say, that I have no misgiving as to the pre-eminent importance of the object. The work of advancing the kingdom of Christ among the alienated heathen appears to my mind as interesting and attractive as ever. I hope I can say with Paul, "Unto me who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ ;" and, in relation to this verse, I have often thought, that though the Missionary work of the Apostle was connected with perils and hardships far, very far, beyond what modern Missionaries know, and from which, I fear, most of us would shrink, still he regarded his appointment to this arduous service as an act of grace. He felt that his Lord had conferred a favour on him in calling him to a work in which strifes and shipwreck, bonds and imprisonment, were The Mission Debt, &c. THE MISSION DEBT. his lot. I desire daily to cherish the ed cause are those which have sustained The accounts we hear of the financial difficulties of the Society, and of the measures proposed to relieve them, are most distressing. After more than fortytwo years' labour in Orissa, it is indeed painful and humiliating, not only to have no prospect of extending our operations, but to see cause for apprehension that the present staff of Missionaries cannot be maintained. Our hands hang down and our hearts are discouraged when we think of these things. I know that the Lord can easily turn our dark and sorrowful night into a bright and cheerful morning. I know, too, that He can as easily give prosperity by a few as by many. Still the present is a sad and sorrowful state of things. The efficiency of the Mission is in imminent peril; and can those who have loved it, and prayed for it, be otherwise than affected? Let the churches be assured that if they reduce the Mission, they will from that time have a blight on their home efforts. The time of sending forth our first Missionaries was an epoch in the history of the Connexion-an epoch from which brighter days and greater successes were dated. Let missionaries be recalled, and stations be abandoned, and the consequences, though seas roll between us, will be as disastrous to the churches at home as to us. But I will not end with these gloomy thoughts. I hope better things though I thus write; and so I will continue to hope, unless stern facts should rudely dispel my confidence. May our God and our fathers' God appear for our deliverance at this time of trial; and may the dark clouds that are hanging over us burst in blessings on our heads! J. BUCKLEY. 437 Dear Sir, I am delighted to learn that upwards of £1,200* have been promised to remove this incubus on our Foreign Evangelistic work, and trust that the other £400 will be forthcoming, for extra efforts. Our church has forand that we shall have no more appeals warded 35 per cent. more than we promised; and the churches will greatly enhance the value of their aid by promptly remitting the money collected, thereby saving the interest that has to amount; and also by doing this they be paid to the bank for the borrowed will prevent their extra efforts interfering with the usual collections for the Mission. I presume I may venture to say that the Executive, from the esteemed treasurer and secretaries to every member, feel that on no account whatever will debt be allowed to accumulate for the future. This will therefore inspire confidence, and should make the watchword of the Connexion to be, "One and all," ," "Away with the debt and for ever be free." Adversity tests friends, and our dear brethren in India will not fail to recognise the spirit of generous sympathy which has been exhibited and largely by the churches in the time of the Mission's pecuniary trial. I am, dear Mr. Editor, yours truly, Paddington, Oct. 8, 1864. LOSS OF THE MISSIONARY SHIP "JOHN WILLIAMS." THIS admirable missionary ship, which was bought with the pence of Sundayschool children, was launched at Harwich, in 1844, having been built expressly for the purpose of taking out missionaries, and enabling them to pass freely among the islands of the Pacific. She was of some 300 tons burden, and was well suited for the objects to which she was devoted. After twenty years of the most useful service, the good ship has been wrecked on Danger Island, latitude 10 deg. south, longitude 160 deg. west. She had repeatedly visited the island in safety, having carried the first native teachers there in 1857. Happily all on board were saved, but that is all we know at present. The amount is now over £1,300. |