, or by a rare inspiration, such as we do not see
elsewhere in the East, these people have almost entirely assumed the
financial burdens of their own religious training and institutions,
and are always quick, even beyond their means, to respond to every
Gospel claim upon their purse. The story of their offerings, in view
of their extreme poverty, is marvellous in its self-denial and
outgoing generosity. The writer spent a few days at the missionary
centre in the outskirts of Rangoon. Upon that compound there was a
memorial church that had cost $30,000, of which the Karen Christians
had given all, save a grant made by government for a few adjoining
class-rooms. Three bungalows and other buildings of value are also
found there, and the whole property is owned, not by the mission, but
by the Karens themselves. Ten miles away from this is the largest
theological seminary in the East, with more than one hundred and forty
students under training. For the maintenance of this, again, those
poor Karen Christians gladly impose upon themselves a family tax, and
have the sweet consciousness that their youth are being trained for
Christian service through their own self-denying endeavour.

These people were in social scale so low that they had practically no
music of their own. They have therefore readily taken to western
music. And it is astonishing to hear how well they sing our western
tunes, and even render solos and quartettes at public European
functions in a way that calls forth hearty encores. It is verily the
birth of a nation in a day. So that in this land of many wonders the
movement among the Karen people seems to be the most wonderful of all.

Among the Karens, Ko San Ye stands forth as a unique figure of intense
interest. He has been called the "Moody" of Burma. He is absolutely
illiterate. When about thirty years old, he lost his wife and his only
child; and finding no comfort in his ancestral demonolatry, he turned
to Buddhism for relief and retired to a mountain retreat and became
known and esteemed among his people as a devout ascetic and a holy
man. With the offerings of his people he built two pagodas and a
monastery. But his soul found no rest there. In 1890, he was baptized
as a Christian, with one hundred and forty of his followers. He then
obtained a grant of twenty thousand acres of waste land from
government, and established a village which now numbers several
hundred houses. His influence over his own peo