places, that they are generally overlooked and often underestimated. They
receive only bare support and no salary, and get along in the most
self-denying way by fasting and living all together, packed like herring
in a dark, close room, except when they go out into the sunshine on their
journeys.

Most of them came out in the steerage of the big ships from London, but
none of them were seasick at all throughout the entire voyage. They do not
go about two and two unless it is that one of the old ones goes hand in
hand with a younger brother for support. Generally a score or more travel
together. They never complain of being tired or discouraged, and never get
fever or cholera, although I have talked and slept with them at Bahrein
when I had fever myself. Never yet has one of them died on a sick-bed,
although they often hide away and disappear for months. On one or two
occasions I have heard of a small company of them being burned at the
stake, but I was told that not a groan escaped from their lips, nor were
their companions frightened the least bit. With my own eyes I have seen
one or two of them torn asunder and trampled upon by those who hate Jesus
Christ and His kingdom and His little missionaries. Yet the only sound to
be heard was the blasphemies of their persecutors, who could not answer
them in any other way.

It is very strange indeed, that when once one or two of them get
acclimatised and learn the language, they are bound to their work by so
many tiny cords of love that they seldom fall apart from their work or
fall out one with the other. There are more than sixty different names and
ages among them, and yet they all have one family accent. Some of them are
medical missionaries and can soothe and heal even broken hearts and
prevent broken heads. There are two ladies among them, but they seldom go
about alone, and, especially in Arabia, the men do most of the preaching.