OUR FUNDS,

THE state of our funds has become alarming, and the Committee have been compelled to put forth an appeal. The estimated income of the year threatens to be £3000 below the average of the last few years. The cause of this may be assigned mainly to the continued depression which has followed the monetary calamities of 1866. But it would be well to inquire whether the Protestantism of England is not growing cold, and with it zeal for the faith once delivered to the saints? The Committee have seen a necessity for putting forth the question, "Is the conflict with Rome, so long and so successfully carried on by this Society, to be maintained ?" "Shall the faithful endeavour to rescue souls from her deadly grasp, and to repress her aggressions, be sustained or relaxed ?" These are serious questions for Christ's soldiers. Let us not put them from us unanswered.

To the kind friends who form our Auxiliaries, we would specially address ourselves. There is a falling off in the amounts received from Associations. Now these are, so to speak, the backbone of any Society. Vigour in these brings life to the work. We appreciate the difficulties of our Collectors. We know how self-denying is the task of a canvasser; but unless this work be faithfully performed, each death or removal leaves the Association weaker, and the result upon the general income is too painfully manifest.

We would say to our Collectors, ask with an earnestness which shall at once carry to the mind of the person asked the conviction of your own deep interest in the cause. Make the dishonour done to our Saviour by Rome's teaching, and the peril of precious souls led astray by her fatal perversion of the truth, the basis of your entreaties for help.

THE STORY OF THE IRISH CHURCH MISSIONS TO THE ROMAN CATHOLICS.

THE publication, in complete form, of "Part I."* of "The Story of the Irish Church Missions," obviates the necessity for a continuance of the fragmentary portions which, for some time back, have appeared periodically in THE BANNER.

The part now published, from the pen of the Rev. Alex. Dallas,

"The Story of the Irish Church Missions. Part I." Price, neatly bound in cloth, 2s. 6d. To be had at the Society's Office, 11, Buckingham Street, Strand; or of Messrs. Hatchards, Nisbet, Seeley, Macintosh, and all Booksellers.

contains an account of those providences which led to the formation of the Society. It is interspersed with a great deal of interesting and thrilling detail of circumstances connected with the establishment of the Missions. The fear of repetition prevents our making extracts from portions which have already appeared in our pages; but we may be permitted to make a specimen extract from the concluding chapters, which have not been before published, in the hope of stimulating in our readers a desire to peruse this little book. Our wish is that it may be largely read, for we feel that its perusal will remove much misapprehension which exists regarding the institution and working of these Missions; and that a correct knowledge of these points will draw a larger sympathy towards a work which, nurtured and carried on in prayer, has been blessed of God to the conversion to a scriptural faith of so large a number of our fellow-subjects, who, but for these Missions, would have probably perished in the fatal delusions of an apostate Church :

"In April, 1848, I (Rev. A. Dallas) obtained a grant and permission to commence a Mission at a place called Rooveagh, in the southern part of the county of Galway. The origin of that Mission is so remarkable, and has led to such consequences, that it requires to be stated at some length.

"At the end of 1847 and beginning of 1848, I heard of the conversion of a Roman priest, which made some noise in Dublin. He had been received by the Priests' Protection Society some time before, and was then living in Dublin, without any occupation, and exposed to much persecution in the form of calumny, and much distress from the small means that could be allowed him for support. He was introduced to me, and I had several conversations with him. My experience of Roman priests, both abroad and in Ireland, was not calculated to induce me readily to trust them. The manner of preparing the mind of a youth, and the training by which his character is formed and hardened for the peculiar work of the Roman priesthood, make it very difficult to soften it again into a fitness for the Christian ministry. This is peculiarly the case in the colleges in Ireland, and more especially at the College at Maynooth. My knowledge of this training, and the intercourse which I had occasionally with some priests of the Roman Church, did not dispose me to give a favourable reception to the convert in question. But there was a frankness in his manner, and an openness in his way of communicating his case, that attracted me, and led me to make more inquiries than I had been inclined to do at first.

"I found that he had not been brought up at Maynooth, that he was a native of the county of Galway, and had gone out to Canada,

where he was educated for the priesthood, and ordained to minister among the French Romanists there; that he had returned to Ireland, and had become the Roman Catholic curate of his native place. His account of his conversion was extremely interesting, and his manner of relating it gave me an impression of truthfulness. I well knew that the usual mode of treating a priest who showed any tendency towards Protestant doctrine was to asperse his character, and therefore it did not surprise me that such a course was taken in this case; but I took every means to ascertain the truth of what was said against him, and I could find no sufficient reason to justify the charges. Every time I conversed with him I was drawn more and more to take a favourable view of his case; and I began to hope that he might have been providentially brought into communication with me, in order to be made an instrument in carrying on the great work we were contemplating.

"But the more I felt this, the stronger I considered the necessity of proving the sincerity and capacity of this convert by some very strong test; and, after prayerful consideration, I did suggest to him a proof calculated to try him to the utmost. He had for a long time been the Roman Catholic priest of the village of Rooveagh, where his relations resided. He had been very active in the discharge of his duties there. The large village of Craughwell within his district had no chapel, and he had determined to build one. He had diligently gathered contributions for this purpose, and carried on the building as the money came in. It was intended to be a more decent edifice than the chapels in the neighbourhood, and the walls were raised six or seven feet high, when, while waiting for more funds for his building, more light was given to his own mind. I remember to have seen the unfinished building in travelling by the road from Loughrea to Galway. The active priest, who had carried on the work so far, had been obliged to escape from the dangers which threatened him on leaving the Church of Rome. I was acquainted with the rector of the parish, and knew something of the locality, and I made up my mind to propose to this convert-priest that he should undertake a Mission at Rooveagh.

"The conversation in which I made this proposition will not easily pass from my memory. I talked to him of the value of a testimony for Christ among the same people where, in days of ignorance, a man had given a testimony against Him. I referred to the scriptural account of the early confessors of the truth, and when I had prepared the way in this manner, I asked him whether he felt courage enough to undertake a Christian and scriptural mission to the same people to whom he had administered the Mass. I told him that if he would go to Rooveagh on such an errand, I would go with him and support him; that I would give him the assistance of two Agents, and visit the

Mission myself at every emergency. He was agitated as I went on detailing my proposition, interspersing my statement with scriptural assurances of the protecting hand of God by his Providence, and of the comforting support of his Holy Spirit. He told me that I was sending him to martyrdom-that I did not know the positive danger into which I wished him to rush-that all the power of the priests would be exercised against him, with all the submissive fanaticism of the people for their agency. I assured him that I was fully aware of the danger, but that I also knew the power of God, and added that I had no other employment to offer him, but that I would undertake a Mission at Rooveagh if he would undertake to conduct it. I closed the conversation by telling him that I did not wish him to decide upon an impulse, and that therefore he should take time to consider the matter. We then knelt down together, and I commended him to God earnestly in prayer, specially asking for that wisdom which is promised to all that seek it by Him who giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not.'

"I confess that I had expected that my proposal would be rejected, while I felt that nothing less than the severest test would justify me in engaging the services of one who had been a Roman Catholic priest. I was encouraged to hope that this was a true man and a true Christian by the manner in which he did not reject my proposal, and I continued my prayer that he might be guided aright in his decision. I had not to wait long. On the next morning, at eight o'clock, I was dressing myself at an hotel in Dublin, when I was told that a gentleman wished to see me. "Let him come up," and my convert friend appeared in my bed-room. He spoke with great emotion, and told me that he had not closed his eyes all night, and that after much prayer he had made up his mind to agree to my proposal-to cast himself upon God and do his best, though he fully believed that nothing short of divine interference could save his life. I warmly encouraged him, and thanking God, we knelt again, and solemnly committed the Rooveagh Mission to his special care and blessing.

"On my return to England, I stated the case to the two committees in London, and was, in February, 1848, authorized by them to take steps for commencing the proposed Mission. The preparations were made, and in the following April I went down to Rooveagh with my convert priest. I have avoided mentioning his name till now, as all who know anything of the present state of the Irish Church Missions would have anticipated the result on reading the name of the Rev. Roderick Ryder. He is now the efficient and diligent incumbent Missionary of Errismore in Connemara, and has long been an active minister in the great work of the Missions.

"The difficulties that attended this Mission may be easily imagined, though it would not be easy to detail them. I felt that Mr. Ryder required especial countenance and encouragement, and I gladly made every effort to afford them to him. I visited Rooveagh as often as I could, and I found that while my expectations of the opposition were fully realized, my best hopes were not disappointed. Mr. Ryder went to work judiciously as well as actively. The clan feeling of his relatives in the place was of some advantage, and the surprise of the people to find their former priest inviting them to read the Scriptures, often counterbalanced the dread of their present priest's curse. It may be enough to relate the circumstances which occurred in the autumn of 1848, not six months after Mr. Ryder's appearance as a Missionary at Rooveagh, to convey a just impression of the effect he had produced, and the progress he had made.

"At that time Mr. Ryder reported that there were between forty and fifty persons to whom he and the Agent had been teaching the Scriptures, and who were willing to learn of them in spite of the denunciations of the priests. I asked him whether he thought he could bring them together to meet me on a certain day, and let me address them, and examine them as to the knowledge they had attained. He wrote in answer that he thought he could. The day was fixed, and I went to Rooveagh to keep my appointment.

“When I arrived I found the people already gathering awaiting me. They were assembled in the loft of a barn, to which the only access was by a ladder. There were about forty persons present; most of them had Bibles or Testaments. They read for me verse after verse, and answered well the questions I put to them respecting salvation in Christ and Christ alone. They all spoke Irish; and while I endeavoured to accommodate my English to their idioms, I put in a word or two of Irish which I had learned, and I remember that an interesting. discussion took place with reference to the Irish word which I had used to signify Christ as a 'Substitute.' This brought out an amount of knowledge which satisfied me that the Missionary work had not been neglected. I thanked God, and took courage, and after about an hour and a half's conference with them they joined me in prayer, and I dismissed them.

"I continued talking with Ryder for some time in the loft, when a man came up the ladder in haste and alarm, telling us that the priest was 'down there in the road terrifying the people.' We hastened down, and on getting into the road we saw the priest on horseback, with his hunting-whip in his hand, a few yards from a man who stood with his back close to a wall, while the priest was scolding him; a few other people were standing about, evidently terrified, and as if they