tion, my prayer was granted; but in half-an-hour
afterwards this poor woman repented of being unfaithful, as she termed
it, to her husband, and insisted on being strangled, which was
accordingly done.

"All this time the chief's son was walking up and down before his
father's house with a brow black as thunder. When he entered I went in
with him, and found, to my surprise, that his father was _not_ dead!
The old man was sitting on a mat in a corner, with an expression of
placid resignation on his face.

"`Why,' said I, `have you strangled your father's wives before he is
dead?'

"To this the son replied, `He is dead. That is no longer my father. He
is as good as dead now. He is to be _buried alive_.'

"I now remembered having heard that it is a custom among the Feejee
Islanders that when the reigning chief grows old and infirm, the heir to
the chieftainship has a right to depose his father, in which case he is
considered as dead, and is buried alive. The young chief was now about
to follow this custom, and despite my earnest entreaties and pleadings,
the old chief was buried that day before my eyes in the same grave with
his four strangled wives! Oh, my heart groaned when I saw this! and I
prayed to God to open the hearts of these poor creatures, as He had
already opened mine, and pour into them the light and the love of the
Gospel of Jesus. My prayer was answered very soon. A week afterwards
the son, who was now chief of the tribe, came to me, bearing his god on
his shoulders, and groaning beneath its weight. Flinging it down at my
feet, he desired me to burn it!

"You may conceive how overjoyed I was at this. I sprang up and embraced
him, while I shed tears of joy. Then we made a fire and burned the god
to ashes, amid an immense concourse of the people, who seemed terrified
at what was being done, and shrank back when we burned the god,
expecting some signal vengeance to be taken upon us; but seeing that
nothing happened, they changed their minds, and thought that our God
must be the true one after all. From that time the mission prospered
steadily; and now, while there is not a single man in the tribe who has
not burned his household gods and become a convert to Christianity,
there are not a few, I hope, who are true followers of the Lamb, having
been plucked as brands from the burning by Him who can save unto the
uttermost. I will not tell you more of our progress at this time; but
you see," he sa