BISHOP OF MELANESIA.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 532, 11 January 1913, Page 3

BISHOP OF MELANESIA.

VISIT TO KING COUNTRY.

LECTURE AT TE KUITI,

The missionary addresses of the Bishop of Melanesia, last Sunday, were attentively listened to at morning and evening service, and by the children at Sunday school.. In describing the growth of Christian influ-. ence over the native mind the Bishop gave three illustrations. A missionary was walking with a savage along the beach when he saw an enemy a long way off. The missionary looked at the man through a very powerful pair of field glasses, and then handed them to the savage, who, - seeing the man, as he thought, close to him,, lay down the g'ass and seized his bow and arrow to shoot, but the man was away where he was before he used the glass. Then he placed the bow ready to shoot and took the glasses again and brought the man close up to himself, laying down the glasses quickly, he seized the bow and arrow, but again the man was gone. Next time he put the glasses up and asked the missionary to hold them while he shot. This is one of those strange stories where truth is stranger than fiction—and reminds us of Bishop Selwyn's first teaching in Auckland, when an Island boy hearing of a . poison, wished to buy enough, ao that when he left New Zealand he could destroy the whole tribe of his enemies. This, said the bishop, is the first stage. The savage heart. The sedond anecdote was of a village where the missionary, was called to stop a fight-. A village was having a fierce fight with coral rocks, and many heads were broken. When the fight was over the question was asked, "I thoght you fought with bows and arrows?" "Yes," wan the reply, "but now we are Christians we must not kill, and so we^took-stones j" This, said the' bishop, showed the power of the Gospel' just beginning to get a hold. > ' And the third illustration is the often-told account of one of the greatest head-hunting chiefs of the Solomons, who became an earnest Christian. One.of his old enemies, hearing, uf this, and supposing that he would not longer be prepared for war, made up his mind to raid the village an I kill the inhabitants, and so wipe out any an old score. The war eandes swept into the ;bay, but Chrisr tianity aid not alter the fact that they, had come to attack one of the most guarded and able warriors 'of the Islands. They had only come into a trap. They were surrounded and outnumbered. Soga, the chief, said to them, "Now you will see what Christianity means. A few years ago I would have killed everyone of you. Bat now throw all your bows and arrows and clubs and- s-pears into the water, and you shall go free with your lives." Hopelessly outnumbered they reluctantly obeyed. That was the third stage, the heart changed. He told how, grdaually, fighting Was passing away, but still there, were tribes almost as wild as ever, and that one story would illustrate the courage needed and displayed by men in the mission. Two tribes in Santa Cruz were drawn up ready to fight, across a stream, and if the fight once began many would have been killed. The missionary took his rod and line and started to fish in the stream between the two hostile parties, and told them that if they were to fight he would be between. The fight did not come off. He told of the schools. The buys taught in their own villages and sent to one or other of the large central schools either in the Banks Islands or the Solomon Islands, and drafted out from there, if satisfactorv, to the school at Norfolk Island. That there were many failures the mission did not try to hide. One school in Wellington had under taken to support a scholar. The first boy was unsatisfactory, and after one term in Norfolk Island did not return. The next had to be sent away, and so the boys had written to him to say they were not going to subscribe any more. There were many disappointments, but the fourteen native clergy, and over seven hundred native teachers working in the mission showed the other,side. The many schools and churches built entirely by the people themselves, the islands, ot' long lines of coast where these now stand, and men go safely, show the enormous contrast between heathen villages and Chrißtian. The bishop made a very earnest appeal both to the adults, and „to the children, to take a prayerful interest in the work. At Otorohanga the lecture was of great interest as showing, what island life is like, and what work the mission is doing. After the bishop's lecture, pictures were shown which were explained by the Rev, E. S. Wayne.