Page:Distinguished Churchmen.djvu/186

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DISTINGUISHED CHURCHMEN

there should be more thorough sympathy on the part of the British public with those who give their lives to the evangelisation of that continent, and with their efforts to raise the native people in the scale of humanity. Not only sympathy, but actual support, is required—that men should not be so niggardly in their gifts, that they should not be so sparing in their efforts, and that, although we may make mistakes from time to time in our methods, we should be given credit for having but one desire and one hope—that Africa, which has so long suffered from what someone has called the 'open sore'—that is, slavery—should be rescued, and the whole country won over to Christ." A message such as that cannot fail to carry weight.

By way of introducing the reader to the remarkable work of evangelisation which has gone on in East Africa, one cannot do better than quote its history in summary from the last annual report of the C.M.S. respecting Africa and the East:—"The first impetus to the exploration of Africa from the East Coast was given by the C.M.S. missionaries, Kraff and Rebmann. In November 1875, in consequence of information sent home by the traveller Stanley of the readiness of Mtesa, King of Uganda, to receive Christian teachers, and of two anonymous donations of £5000 each being offered in order that a missionary expedition might be sent to his dominions, the Society resolved, in dependence upon God, to organise a mission in Uganda,