Naismith History of the RP Church VI.
James Dodson
CHAPTER VI.
THE REVOLUTION OF 1688–1863.
Arrival of Prince of Orange—James VII. deposed—Cameronian Regiment—Defence of Dunkeld—Revolution Settlement—Reasons why the Cameronians would not enter the Church then established—Objections subsequent—Rev. John Macmillan—Rev. J. MacNeil—They present a Paper to General Assembly—A similar Paper presented by the United Societies at the Revolution—Early desire for Union—Covenant renovation at Auchensaugh, 1712—Formation of first Presbytery, 1743—Formation of similar Church in America, 1752—Case of Messrs Hall and Innes—Publication of Testimony, 1760—The ‘Four Johns’—Subsequent increase of the Church—Home Mission work—Foreign Missions—Canada, New Hebrides, and Livingstonia in Africa.
THE glorious Revolution, as it has been called, was indeed a great deliverance to the three kingdoms, but especially to Scotland. James had become religiously too bigoted and politically too tyrannical even for the English peers and bishops. In general, therefore, they welcomed the warlike advent of his brave son-in-law, William of Orange. The motto on his standard, ‘The Protestant Religion and the Liberties of England I will maintain,’ was a welcome sight to the crowds who gazed on his fleet from the Kentish shore. Even half a year before his arrival, when a false alarm was given by beacon-fires blazing on the Scottish hills, the people gave evidence that these fires gave them more joy than alarm. They regarded them as the dawning lights of liberty.
Immediately after the welcome arrival of William, the ruling party, both in England and Scotland, declared for the change, in words that fully confirmed the justice of the principles which the Covenanters had long professed, and for which they had severely suffered. The
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English Parliament declared that ‘King James II., having endeavoured to subvert the constitution, by breaking the original contract between the King and the people, did abdicate the crown.’ The Scottish Convention unanimously declared that ‘King James VII., being a professed Papist, having assumed the regal power without taking the oath required by law, having invaded the fundamental constitution of the kingdom, and changed the government to an arbitrary, despotic power, to the subversion of the Protestant religion and violation of the laws and liberties of the kingdom, had forfeited the crown.’ Both of these assemblies—the supreme courts of these two kingdoms for the time—agreed in declaring these two principles of the Covenanters—(1.) That regal authority is forfeited by the abuse of it; and (2.) That subjects thus misruled have a right to depose their rulers. Knox asserted such doctrines in his conversation with Queen Mary; Melville did the same in his conversation with her son, James VI. The Covenanters repeatedly did the same in reference to the gross misrule of Charles II. and his brother, James VII. The highest legal and legislative authorities confirmed these opinions at the Revolution of 1688.
The Covenanters, or, as they were now commonly called, Cameronians, heartily welcomed King William. In a paper which they sent to the King, they said, ‘We have given as good evidence of our being willing to be subjects to King William, as we gave proof before of our being unwilling to be slaves to King James. Before we offered to be soldiers, we first made an offer to be subjects.’* These Cameronians, however, were men of deeds as well as words. The Castle of Edinburgh was still held for James by the Duke of Gordon, a Popish partisan. He overawed and threatened the Scottish Convention or Parliament, now taking the side of William. Knowing this, the members of the United Societies, to the number of several thousands, mustered on a moor near Douglas. From this multitude, long inured to hardships equal to
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* Memoirs of the Church of Scotland, p. 301.
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those of war, and even accustomed to war itself, eight hundred volunteers were formed into a regiment under command of the Earl of Angus, only son of the Marquis of Douglas, and the brave Colonel Cleland. These marched to Edinburgh, and defended the Government against the adherents of James. This regiment, probably the first regiment of volunteers formed in Scotland, now forms the 26th of the line, and is still known by the name of the ‘Cameronians.’ Space will not permit us here to trace its subsequent history, but we may briefly refer to one affair in which it acted bravely and brilliantly, even in the estimation of its Jacobite enemies. It was the defence of Dunkeld. After the victory of Killiecrankie, the army adhering to James, to the number of about 5000, continued in the neighbourhood of Dunkeld. The inhabitants of the district were chiefly Jacobite in sympathy. In opposition to the remonstrance of General Mackay, the rulers at Edinburgh, ignorant of the dangers of the situation, sent the Cameronian regiment to occupy Dunkeld. They were commanded by Colonel Cleland. Seeing their very dangerous position, in a town where they had no ramparts, little ammunition, and were surrounded by an enemy six times as numerous, they complained to their commander of the trap into which they seemed to have been led. He answered them in words that greatly encouraged their hearts. That night the regiment lay under arms; next morning, the 21st of August 1689, they saw the surrounding heights swarming with their armed foes, apparently eager to annihilate them. Of all the foes of William none were more bitterly hated by the Jacobites than the Cameronians; but for them, James might still have been King in Scotland at least. The assailants came furiously on from different sides; they entered the streets, the outposts having been driven in. Some of the defenders were in the Church, a greater number behind a wall belonging to the Marquis of Athole. This wall was newly and loosely built, but was desperately defended with such arms as the Cameronians had. When their
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bullets were spent, they made slugs of lead, cut from the house which the wall surrounded. The Jacobite soldiers now filled many of the neighbouring houses, and from their windows kept up a galling fire on the Cameronians. The brave Cleland was shot dead; Major Henderson, who succeeded him in command, immediately fell mortally wounded. Captain Monro took his place, and the combat continued. The Cameronians set fire to the houses from which they were fired on, and soon half the town was blazing. When the struggle had lasted furiously for four hours, the Cameronians found their powder nearly exhausted; a barrel of figs had been sent to them in mistake for powder. They resolved, however, to fight with such weapons as they had till death, rather than surrender. Seeing such invincible courage, their assailants became disheartened and withdrew from the attack, leaving many dead and wounded behind them. In vain General Cannon urged them to renew the attack. In vain did the Cameronians rush out after them, and challenge them again to fight. They fled from the scene; and soon afterwards returned to their homes. The victorious Cameronians sung a psalm of praise to the Lord of Hosts for a victory which not only counterbalanced Killiecrankie, but virtually ended the war in Scotland. The gallant young Colonel Cleland, who fell at Dunkeld, had been well educated at St Andrews, and was known as a poet, as well as a soldier. A brother officer in the regiment was Captain, afterwards Colonel, Blackader, famous for his piety as well as bravery.
Although the Cameronians hailed the advent of William, and bravely fought for his cause, they were not satisfied with the Church Establishment which he gave to Scotland, shortly after the Revolution. As this dissatisfaction was the reason why they, as a Church, represented by the United Societies, refused to enter that Establishment, we may here refer to this matter more particularly. The Cameronians refused to enter the Established Church at the Revolution, on account of the character and history
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of those of whom it was composed. The first General Assembly, which met in 1690, was composed chiefly of ministers who had been resolutioners in 1651—that is, those who were in favour of admitting malignants into offices of trust, civil or military; of those ministers who had accepted of some of the sinful oaths or bonds imposed by the Government during the time of the persecution; of those who had accepted of the various Erastian indulgences granted by Charles; of those who had accepted of the Erastian toleration granted by James, which was meant more for the Papists than for the Presbyterians; of elders, many of whom had been engaged in the late persecution; and of some who were lately immoral curates, who, without any evident change of character, had conformed to Presbytery for the sake of retaining their parishes.
Further, they objected to this Establishment, because its Assembly, when met, tamely submitted to the dictation of the civil power in matters religious—matters that belonged exclusively to the jurisdiction of a Church Court.
Before the Assembly was permitted to meet, the civil Government had, by its own authority solely, abolished Episcopacy and restored Presbyterianism, as the Established Church of Scotland; and prescribed to that Church the doctrine it was to believe, and the form of worship it was to observe. The civil Government thus practised the very Erastianism, to which the Covenanters had always strongly objected, but to which the Assembly made now no objection.
Further, they objected that in the Establishment there was no recognition of the attainments or principles of the Second Reformation—an ignoring of the best period, 1638–49; and a going back to the inferior principles of 1592. Nay, more, a union between the Church and a State which still retained in its statute-book the Act Rescissory, by which all these attainments were condemned and annulled—and the Reformers themselves
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left under the charge of treason. Covenanters could not consistently consent to an Establishment, in which their Covenants were not only ignored, but practically condemned.
Further, they objected that the principles of this Church Establishment were rather political than religious. Episcopacy was abolished because opposed to, and Presbyterianism established because agreeable to, the inclinations of the generality of the people.
They also objected because the terms of the Establishment interfered with the independence of the Church. In the Act of 1592, which was confirmed in 1690, in this very connection, the King claimed the right of being present personally, or by commission, at the meetings of Assembly. That this was not a mere formal claim, the history of the Established Church of Scotland has proved. In 1691–5, the meeting of Assembly was dissolved, prorogued, or interdicted, by the Sovereign, the Church submitting tamely.
Lastly, they objected to the manner in which lay patronage was disposed of. In 1649, lay patronage was entirely abolished. At the restoration of Charles II., lay patronage was restored, and the Act that formerly abolished it, annulled. In 1690, when the Act of 1592 was ratified, the part of it which abolished lay patronage was excepted, and reserved for future consideration. Shortly afterwards, patronage was enacted, in a modified form, and afterwards, in 1711, in a worse form. In both cases the enactment, being ultra vires of the State, was Erastian.
Such were some of the reasons, on account of which the Fathers of the Reformed Presbyterian Church, kept aloof from the Church established at the Revolution settlement. The subsequent history of the Established Church, and the various secessions from her communion, have justified their wisdom. Such grounds of objection not only continued, but increased after the Revolution. The Established Church continued to be most unfaithful in regard to discipline. In 1712 it boasted, in a letter sent
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to Queen Anne, as a ‘pregnant instance of its moderation,’ that hundreds of the curates had been admitted to charges ‘on the easiest terms.’
Many of these curates had been among the vilest informers on, and persecutors of, the Covenanters, and they never gave evidence of repentance. In a similar loose discipline, it allowed Mr John Simpson to continue to be Professor of Divinity in Glasgow, though proved before the Church Courts, in 1714, to be teaching his students Arminian and Pelagian errors. The Established Church inflicted severe discipline on those it should have commended for faithfulness. Shortly after the Revolution, Messrs Shields, Linning, and Boyd were admonished, and Mr John Hepburn* deposed, for daring to speak against certain defections in the discipline of the Church. We see similar tyranny, under the name of discipline, in the treatment of the Rev. John Macmillan, minister of the parish of Balmaghie. In 1703, he with two of his brethren sought an acknowledgment by the Church of reformation attainments. For this faithfulness he was deposed—nothing being alleged against his life or doctrine. In 1732, the Rev. Ebenezer Erskine of Stirling was deposed for refusing to carry out the law of patronage in a tyrannical way. In 1752, the Rev. Thomas Gillespie, minister of Carnock, was deposed for a similar reason. These good men, disregarding such tyrannical and unmerited sentences, became, with other ministers who sympathised with them, the founders of two Churches—the Secession in 1732 and the Relief in 1752. We need not here refer to a larger and more recent secession, arising from the same cause—faithfulness to reformation principles.
The Reformed Presbyterian Church had, from the Revolution till now, other reasons for refusing to enter into connection with the Church established in 1688. To one of these only, I need here refer. There were and are several elements in the British Constitution, of which,
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* Dr Thomas Murray’s Literary History of Galloway.
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those who hold consistently the principles of the Second Reformation, cannot practically approve, by entering into union with the State, as a State Established Church. Without particularising these, we may instance such as the Sovereign being the head of the Church of England—the establishing of a Prelatic Church—and the national support of both it, and the Church of Rome in various places. In short, although the British Government is probably the best on earth, it has long supported legally or financially three evils, which consistent Covenanters have always sought to root out by moral means, Popery, Prelacy, and Erastianism. Even the connection existing between the State and the Established Church of Scotland, is, in itself, sufficiently Erastian to exclude those, who still testify against Erastianism. They have also derived a salutary warning from the fact, that all the past persecutions of the Church, in Scotland at least, have arisen from her connection with the State; and the State thus claiming a right to dictate doctrine and discipline to her, or to punish her for refusing to accept such dictation. The Covenanters were established before they were persecuted by the State. They may have held in theory, that there ought, under certain conditions, to be a connection between Church and State; but these conditions meant that the State, as well as the Church, should be thoroughly Christian in character. These conditions are not likely to be realised till the Millennium, when State support will not be needed by the Church. The nearest approach to the requisite conditions, was during the period from 1638 till 1649—the noonday of the Second Reformation.
It has been already noticed that the United Societies of those called Cameronians, consisted of many members, at the time of the Revolution, variously estimated at from 7000 to 9000. After the martyrdom of Renwick they had for some time the ministry of Alexander Shields—a man of considerable talent, who wrote a book called the Hind-Let-Loose, still referred to as a historical authority. Afterwards joined by Linning and Boyd,
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these three ministered to the Societies for some time. Yielding at last to the temptation, however, these three men joined the Established Church about the year 1690. For the following sixteen years, the Cameronians had no minister. In 1706, the Rev. John Macmillan, minister of the parish of Balmaghie, finding no sympathy with his Covenanting principles, but rather persecution on account of them, in the Established Church, joined with those who had never entered that Church.
After thus joining the Societies, then constituting the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Mr Macmillan had a numerous and widely-scattered flock, chiefly in the southwest of Scotland. Amongst these he visited and preached faithfully and laboriously. Soon afterwards, he was joined and assisted by Mr John MacNeil, a licentiate of the Established Church, who fully sympathised with him in opinion. In 1708, they unitedly laid before the Commission of the General Assembly a protest and declinature, and a statement of the grounds in which they differed from that Church. This was not the first paper from the Reformed Presbyterian Church laid before the Assembly. In a paper submitted in 1690, but the reading of which was refused, we find the following words, interesting in themselves, and more especially when viewed in connection with the union recently effected with the Free Church:—‘To conclude, right reverend, we expect and entreat that ye will not be offended at our freedom, in what we here represent; but our meaning and end being to have differences satisfyingly removed, will move you to put a favourable construction thereupon. But though we should be condemned and censured with the greatest severity, we must seek, we must cry, for the removing of these stumbling-blocks, and condemning those courses which have done our Lord Jesus so much wrong, and His children so much hurt, in their standing in the way of their comfortable communion with the Church. Let the famishing, starving case of our souls, through the want of the blessed Gospel, and our hungering to hear it preached by
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you, prevail with you to consider our complaints, and let the wounds of our bleeding mother, panting to be healed by the hands of the tender Physician, have weight with you, not to slight or despise our desires. But if ye shall shut your eyes and ears at them, then we know no other remedy left us, but to complain and to protest unto judicatories, and cry, groan, and sigh to the Father of Mercies, who is tender of all His little ones, and is the hearer of prayer, that He may see to it, and heal our backslidings and breaches, in His own time and way, and not lay it to your charge, that ye have had so little regard to the stumbling and saddening of so many of His poor, broken, bruised, and scattered sheep, and that ye have not had greater care to strengthen the diseased, and to heal that which was sick, and to bind up that which was broken, and to bring again that which was driven away, and to seek that which was lost.’* It is evident from this paper, that the maligned Cameronians were not schismatics, but sighed for union on Reformation principles with the only other Presbyterian Church then existing in Scotland—a Church from which they had not seceded, but which had abandoned both them and their principles. In a similar spirit Macmillan and MacNeil addressed the Assembly; but it was in no good mood to hear such faithful, though humble addresses, either in 1690 or in 1708.
The members of the Reformed Presbyterian Church were not satisfied with some of the terms of the Union between England and Scotland in 1707, which they believed to be inconsistent with Covenant engagements. They were also strongly opposed to the enactment of patronage in 1711. Partly as a testimony against such defections, they renewed their Covenants at Auchensaugh, near Douglas, in 1712. When the Rev. Ebenezer Erskine and others seceded from the Established Church in 1732, the Reformed Presbyterian Church hoped that their principles might be fully adopted by those who then
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* The Faithful Contendings, Edited by John Howie of Lochgoin.
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seceded, holding principles somewhat similar. In this they were disappointed, as they found these seceders clinging to views in regard to the civil government, to which they could not agree. One of the seceders, however, a Mr Nairn, acceded to their number, and thus enabled them to form a Presbytery. This Presbytery they constituted at Braehead, in the parish of Carnwath, on the 1st of August 1743, under the name of the Reformed Presbytery. This name they assumed as descriptive of their adhering to all the attainments of the Second, as well as of the First, Reformation in Scotland. Henceforward, the proper name of the Church was ‘Reformed Presbyterian,’ although, as already noticed, it has often been known by other names.
This Church being again in a position formally to license and ordain preachers to the Gospel ministry, Mr Alexander Marshall, having passed the usual course of study and trials, was duly licensed by this Presbytery. The Church again engaged in the work of Covenant renovation at Crawfordjohn, in the Upper Ward of Lanarkshire, in 1745. This Church believed that covenanting is an occasional duty, to be performed by Christian Churches or nations as circumstances may require; that it is expedient, in certain circumstances, to renew such Covenants, although their continued obligation does not depend on their renewal; and that the unfaithfulness of a majority in a Church or nation does not free the minority from Covenant obligation.
In the same year in which the Reformed Presbytery was constituted in Scotland, a number of persons, chiefly from Scotland and the North of Ireland, associated together for holding the same principles in the State of Pennsylvania, North America. In compliance with their request, in 1752 the Reformed Presbyterian Church in Scotland sent them the Rev. Thomas Cuthbertson, who, for the following twenty years, was the only minister connected with this denomination in the wide continent of America. Including two ministers, Messrs Linn and
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Dobbin, who had emigrated from the North of Ireland, the first Reformed Presbytery was formed in America in 1774. This Church in America continued to hold faithfully the Westminster standards and the other Reformation principles of the Church in Scotland. During the continuance of slavery, it strictly excluded all slave proprietors from its communion. It has, during the century and a quarter of its existence, far outgrown, in the number of its congregations, the mother Church in Scotland. In the two sections into which this Church has been divided in America, there are about five times as many congregations as in the same Church in Scotland. It may be interesting here to notice that the union movement, which has happily resulted in the lately united Church in America, now including more than five thousand Presbyterian congregations, commenced in the Reformed Presbyterian Church there. The first meeting for union, attended by delegates from about 350 presbyteries, was held in the First Reformed Presbyterian Congregation, Philadelphia, and presided over by Mr George H. Stewart, an elder of that congregation.
The Reformed Presbyterian Church in Scotland, though not free from occasional controversy, has been remarkably free from heresy. Nearly a century, however, before a similar discussion agitated a sister Church in Scotland, a protracted discussion took place in it, in regard to the extent of the atonement. About the middle of the last century Messrs Hall and Innes, who held the doctrine of an indefinite atonement, were separated from the ministry of this Church.
In the year 1761, the Reformed Presbyterian Church published its Act, Declaration, and Testimony—an authoritative exhibition of its distinctive and other doctrines, to which its members were required to profess adherence. This was republished, in a more modern form, about eighty years afterwards, along with another authoritative document, called the Historical Part of the Testimony, to which I have been much indebted in drawing up this brief sketch.
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The increase in the members and ministry may appear small, when compared with the age of the Reformed Presbyterian Church. Having no Gospel ministry from 1690 till 1706, the Church might be expected to diminish rapidly during that period. During the subsequent reign of moderatism, in the only other Presbyterian Church existing for the following thirty years, the country became spiritually darkened. After the first secession, the Gospel was faithfully preached in different parts of Scotland by such men as the Erskines, whose professed principles were more liberal and attractive than those of the Reformed Presbyterian Church. The Reformed Presbyterians were, moreover, deemed not only very strict in doctrine, and in their peculiar position in regard to the civil government, but also very rigid in discipline. It required an unusually strong attachment to religious principle, either to enter or to remain long in their communion. Such circumstances as these may partly account for the comparative fewness of their numbers. Within the last century, however, their congregations increased from four to forty—that is, tenfold. Some of the grandfathers of the present members remember a time when there were only four ministers, called the four Johns—John MacMillan, minister at Sandhills, near Glasgow; John Thorburn, minister at Pentland; John Fairlie, holding the double charge of Douglas Water and Penpont; and John Courtas, minister at Quarrelwood. Springing, in some sense, from the first of these charges, there are now the congregations of Eaglesham, Paisley, Port-Glasgow, Greenock, Renton, Rothesay, Lochgilphead, Lorn, Stirling, Airdrie, Coatbridge, Rutherglen, and five congregations in Glasgow; from the second, Edinburgh, Lauriston, Strathmiglo, Dundee, Wick, and Chirnside; from the third, Douglas Water, Penpont, New Cumnock, Darvel, Kilmarnock, Kilbirnie, Ayr, and Girvan; from the last, Hightae, Eskdalemuir, Dumfries, Dunscore, Castle-Douglas, Whithorn, Newton-Stewart, and Stranraer. In this number, several congregations which seceded from the Synod
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in 1863, are not included. Within the last ten years, the very small congregations of Kelso and Stromness, being, at the time their pastors were called to other charges, found too weak to support successors, their members were, in accordance with their own ascertained wishes, recommended to join congregations in their neighbourhood, connected with the Free or United Presbyterian Churches. But the loss in membership thus sustained has been, during the same period, more than ten times made up by the increase of congregations and members in more populous localities. During the same period, the liberality of the members, financially, has greatly increased, having gradually risen to an annual average of about two pounds per member. The ministers of this Church have always been credited with bearing a favourable comparison, in regard to character and ability, with those of other Churches. Such names as MacMillan, Fairlie, Henderson, Mason, Rowatt, Symington, Bates, and Goold were much respected by co-temporaries, and are not unworthy of being mentioned as the most direct successors of Cameron, Cargill, and Renwick.
Besides carrying on Home Mission work in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee, Coatbridge, and other populous places, the Reformed Presbyterian Church has also engaged in Foreign Mission work. Like other Churches, somewhat late in commencing this good work, she will, in proportion to her size, bear comparison with any of them in the energy and extent of her labours in the foreign field. About forty years ago she sent several missionaries to Canada, who afterwards became settled ministers there. About the year 1843, she sent the Rev. John Inglis and the Rev. James Duncan, as missionaries to New Zealand. The latter of these laboured for several years with considerable success, on the banks of the Manuwatu River. Episcopalian missionaries, of a High Church kind, having greatly marred his work there, he afterwards became a minister of the Free Church in New Zealand. After labouring some time in Wellington, Mr
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Inglis removed to Aneitéum, one of the islands of the New Hebrides Group. Here, for the last thirty years, he has laboured most successfully, and at the same time translated into, and printed in, the language of the natives, a great part of the sacred Scriptures. The Foreign Mission Committee of the Reformed Presbyterian Church has, from the first, been united in this Mission with a Presbyterian Church in Nova Scotia. At first, Mr Geddie, the missionary from Nova Scotia, occupied the one side of the island, and Mr Inglis the other. They found the inhabitants, amounting to several thousands, in a condition of dark and degraded heathenism. In less than twenty years their labours were so successful that all the natives were at least nominally Christian; several schools were well attended by scholars, old and young; two large churches, well filled every Sabbath with decently-clothed worshippers—Mr Inglis’ congregation having now about four hundred communicants—whilst, in almost every house in the island, family worship was daily observed. These two small churches, of Old and New Scotland, afterwards sent missionaries to other islands in the same group—such as Tanna, Erromango, Fatê Aniwa, &c. More than one devoted missionary suffered martyrdom in this good cause. The two mission boards built and maintained two mission ships, for sailing among the islands, and communicating with Sydney—first the John Knox, and then a larger schooner called The Dayspring. This schooner, costing about £1800 a year for maintenance, has been wholly supported by the gifts of children, chiefly Sabbath scholars, and is called the ‘Children’s Ship.’ It cost about £3000, and is insured for a similar sum. The missionaries have increased to nine, who have been chiefly educated in, and sent out by, the Reformed Presbyterian Church, but two-thirds of them are now supported by the Presbyterian Churches of Australia and New Zealand. Along with the Free Church, the Reformed Presbyterian Church recently commenced the Livingstonia Mission in Africa.