ft
home. Three great churches had been consumed. Why this series of huge
calamities I knew not. Had I not made all the arrangements for
departure, and been assured by the trustees of my church that they would
take all further responsibilities upon themselves, I would have
postponed my intended tour or adjourned it for ever; but all whom I
consulted told me that now was the time to go, so I turned my face
towards the Golden Gate.

In a book called "The Earth Girdled," I have published all the facts of
this journey. It contains so completely the daily record of my trip that
there is no necessity to repeat any of its contents in these pages.

I returned to the United States in the autumn of 1894 and entered
actively into a campaign of preaching wherever a pulpit was available.
Of course there was much curiosity and interest to know how I was going
to pursue my Gospel work, having resigned my pastorate in Brooklyn. On
Sunday, January 6, 1895, I commenced a series of afternoon Gospel
meetings in the Academy of Music, New York, every Sunday. Because the
pastors of other churches had written me that an afternoon service was
the only one that would not interfere with their regular services, I
selected that time, otherwise I would much have preferred the morning or
the evening. I decided to go to New York because for many years friends
over there had been begging me to come. I regarded it as absurd and
improbable to expect the people of Brooklyn to build a fourth
Tabernacle, so I went in the direction that I felt would give me the
largest opportunity in the world.

I continued to reside in Brooklyn pending future plans. I liked Brooklyn
immensely--not only the people of my own former parish, but prominent
people of all churches and denominations there are my warm personal
friends. Any particular church in which I preached thereafter was only
the candlestick. In different parts of the world my sermons were
published in more than ten million copies every week. How many readers
saw them no one can say positively. Those sermons came back to me in
book form in almost every language of Europe.

My arrangements at the Academy of Music were not the final plans for my
Gospel work. I expected, however, to gather from these Gospel meetings
sufficient guidance to decide my field of work for the rest of my life.
I felt then that I was yet to do my best work free from all hindrances.
I looked forward to fully twenty years of good hard wor