Adventures in New Guinea by James Chalmers
page 6 of 137 (04%)
page 6 of 137 (04%)
|
farthest point reached by Captain Armit was about Lat. S. 9 degrees 35'
and Long. E. 147 degrees 38'. Mr. Morrison merely reached a point on the Goldie River, when he was attacked and wounded by the natives. This compelled the party to return to Port Moresby. Mr. Chalmers is still actively engaged in his work on the great island, and he has placed many of his journals and papers at the disposal of the Religious Tract Society, in the hope that their publication may increase the general store of knowledge about New Guinea, and may also give true ideas about the natives, the kind of Christian work that is being done in their midst, and the progress in it that is being made. The prominence which New Guinea has assumed in the public mind lately is due much more to political than to religious reasons. England is a Christian nation, and there are numbers who rejoice in New Guinea as a signal proof of the regenerating power of the Gospel of Christ. Yet, to the Christian man, it is somewhat humiliating to find how deeply the press of our country is stirred by the statement that Germany has annexed the north coast of New Guinea, while it has hardly been touched by the thrilling story of the introduction of Christianity all along the south coast. The public mind is much exercised in discussing whether Her Majesty's Government should annex the whole rather than proclaim a protectorate over a part; it hardly cares to remember the names of those who have died in trying to make known to the fierce Papuans our common brotherhood in Christ Jesus. One can understand that this is natural; still it will be an augury of good for the future of the English people, when, without losing any of their legitimate interest in public affairs, they care more for the victories won by faith alone, over ignorance, vice, and barbarism, than for the victories won by the rifle and sword, however just the cause may be in which these weapons are used. |
|