Adventures in New Guinea James Chalmers

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visited further on to the east, and we were a week away on our return to
East Cape, and after close examination of each candidate we decided to
baptize them on the following Tuesday. The service was most interesting,
and well attended by persons from various places. At night we examined
the children and grown-up people who attend school, and were much pleased
with them. A few can read in the Motu dialect; others know how to put
letters together and form words. We hope soon to have one or two books
in their own dialect. Of those baptized several are anxious to be
instructed, that they may be better fitted to do work for Christ amongst
their own countrymen. Already they hold services, and exhort in other
villages, and when travelling they do all the good they can to others.
We are in hopes soon to receive a number of young men and women at Port
Moresby, and begin our Institution, to be called "The New Guinea
Institution for Training Evangelists." At present we shall proceed
quickly, building native houses for students, and a class room to be
bought in the colonies, towards which our true friends in North Adelaide
contribute largely.
The harvest ripens fast: where shall we look for labourers? The Master
has said, "Pray." May they soon be sent! The light is shining, the
darkness is breaking, and the thick clouds are moving, and the hidden
ones are being gathered in. We have already plucked the first flowers;
stern winter yields, and soon we shall have the full spring, the singing
of birds, and the trees in full blossom. Hasten it, O Lord, we plead!