ries with a bare subsistence only, and are unsparing in our
laudations of some for not being worldly-minded whom our niggardliness
made to live as did the prodigal son. I do not speak of myself, nor need
I to do so, but for that very reason I feel at liberty to interpose a
word in behalf of others. I have before my mind at this moment facts and
instances which warrant my putting the case in this way: The command to
"go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature" must be
obeyed by Christians either personally or by substitute. Now it is quite
possible to find men whose love for the heathen and devotion to the work
will make them ready to go forth on the terms "bare subsistence", but
what can be thought of the justice, to say nothing of the generosity,
of Christians and churches who not only work their substitutes at the
lowest terms, but regard what they give as charity! The matter is the
more grave in respect to the Protestant missionary, who may have a wife
and family. The fact is, there are many cases in which it is right,
virtuous, and praiseworthy for a man to sacrifice every thing for a
great object, but in which it would be very wrong for others, interested
in the object as much as he, to suffer or accept the sacrifice, if they
can prevent it.

* The Dutch clergy, too, are not wanting in worldly wisdom. A
fountain is bought, and the lands which it can irrigate
parceled out and let to villagers. As they increase in
numbers, the rents rise and the church becomes rich. With 200
Pounds per annum in addition from government, the salary
amounts to 400 or 500 Pounds a year. The clergymen then preach
abstinence from politics as a Christian duty. It is quite
clear that, with 400 Pounds a year, but little else except
pure spirituality is required.

English traders sold those articles which the Boers most dread, namely,
arms and ammunition; and when the number of guns amounted to five, so
much alarm was excited among our neighbors that an expedition of several
hundred Boers was seriously planned to deprive the Bakwains of their
guns. Knowing that the latter would rather have fled to the Kalahari
Desert than deliver up their weapons and become slaves, I proceeded to
the commandant, Mr. Gert Krieger, and, representing the evils of any
such expedition, prevailed upon him to defer it; but that point being
granted, the Boer wished to gain another, which was that I should act as
a spy