Christian-hearted Nora! The Christ-spirit shines forth
unmistakably through thee,--praying for and seeking to save husband and
children, enduring trials and miseries by the aid of communion with thy
Lord, weeping over the degradation of thy people, and seeking to lift
them up by telling them of the true God and of His love to Mankind
through Jesus Christ.

CHAPTER LI.
BACK TO SCOTLAND.

EACH of my Australian Committees strongly urged my return to Scotland,
chiefly to secure, if possible, more Missionaries for the New Hebrides.
Dr. Inglis, just arrived from Britain, where he had the Aneityumese New
Testament carried through the press, also zealously enforced this
appeal.

Constrained by what appeared to me the Voice of God, I sailed for London
in the _Kosciusko_, an Aberdeen clipper, on the 17th May, 1863. Captain
Stuart made the voyage most enjoyable to all. The Rev. Mr. Stafford,
friend of the good Bishop Selwyn and tutor to his son, conducted along
with myself, alternately, an Anglican and a Presbyterian Service. We
passed through a memorable thunder-burst in rounding the Cape. Our good
ship was perilously struck by lightning. The men on deck were thrown
violently down. The copper in the bulwarks was twisted and melted--a
specimen of which the Captain gave me and I still retain. When the ball
of fire struck the ship, those of us sitting on chairs, screwed to the
floor around the cabin table, felt as if she were plunging to the
bottom. When she sprang aloft again, a military man and a medical
officer were thrown heavily into the back passage between the cabins,
the screws that held their seats having snapped asunder. I, in grasping
the table, got my leg severely bruised, being jammed betwixt the seat
and the table, and had to be carried to my berth. All the men were
attended to, and quickly recovered consciousness; and immediately the
good Captain, an elder of the Church, came to me, and said, "Lead us in
prayer, and let us thank the Lord for this most merciful deliverance;
the ship is not on fire, and no one is seriously injured!"

Poor fellow! whether hastened on by this event I know not, but he
struggled for three weeks thereafter in a fever, and it took our united
care and love to pull him through. The Lord, however, restored him; and
we cast anchor safely in the East India Docks, at London, on 26th
August, 1863, having been three months and ten days at sea from port to
port.

It was 5.30 P. M. when we