had no idea what the man wanted. When they were alone with door locked
and with evidence of great agitation the young man said: "I have come
many miles to see you and ask you a question that means more to us
Filipinos than any other question that I could ask." Mr. Stuntz said
that as yet he had no idea what was troubling the man until he
continued: "I want to know, sir, if it is now safe--the soldiers say it
is, but I cannot believe it--to have a copy of the Protestant Bible in
my house and read it to my family?"

Mr. Stuntz said the whole thing seemed so strange to him that he was
silent for a moment, when the man continued: "Sir, this is a very
important question to us Filipinos. You know the law under which we have
lived here is this," and quoting from section 219 of the Penal Code of
Spain in the Philippines, said: "If any person or persons shall preach
or teach or otherwise maintain any doctrine or doctrines not established
by the state, he shall be deemed guilty of a crime and shall be punished
at the discretion of the judge." Then, to the amazement of Mr. Stuntz,
the man continued: "Under the operation of that law my own father was
dragged from our house and we never saw him alive again. That was when I
was eleven years old. I have supported my mother as best I could, and
now I have a wife and two children. I want to know if it is safe."

It was with a heart thrilling with pride that this great American took
the young man to the window and as he opened the blind and the window
itself and saw the stars and stripes proudly waving in the breeze and
with tears running down his face said to him: "My dear man, as long as
yonder flag waves over the city you may take the Bible and climb up on
the ridgeboard of your house at high noon each day, three hundred and
sixty-five days in the year and read it as loud as you can and no man
shall harm you." Three months later Mr. Stuntz went to that man's home
city, spoke from half past seven until midnight, announced that he would
speak in the same building at six o'clock the next morning, and an hour
before the appointed time five hundred people were in line waiting to
get in.

CHAPTER III

THE COUNTRY AMERICA OPENED TO CIVILIZATION--JAPAN

Three hundred and fifty years ago there were perhaps a million
Christians in Japan. The great Jesuit missionary, Francis Xavier,
introduced the religion of the Nazarene into Japan in 1849, and it
spread like a prairie fire. But