Page:Williams and Calvert, Fiji and the Fijians, New York, 1860.djvu/566

528 FUI AlO) THE FIJIANS. take up arms in defence of themselves, and their dependencies. This state ofthings crippled the Mission-work. The latest intelligence from this Station is from Mr. Wilson, in a letter to Mr. Calvert, dated April, 1858 : — " We are now the only Mission-family on Vanua Levu. Our posi- tion is solitary, and we are surrounded by war ; yet in the midst of it we are saved from alarm, are happy, and doing good every day. It is a great mercy that Mbua is united, and that the Chief Ra Masima [Tui Mbua] is becoming more in earnest, and, I fondly hope, is growing in religion. Cornelius has just come from Mouta, having sailed by llndu Point and Somosomo, to avoid Ritova. There are four hundred lotu at Mouta. Naviu, the extremity of this Circuit, is lotu. There are five hundred professors, and no Teachers, there ; and I have none to send. A Tongan has assumed the office of Teacher : I hear that he is a vile fellow ; but, as he is a hundred miles distant, I cannot easily pay him a visit. The old quarrels at Ndama are being renewed ; but as a very great number are now really religious, I hope, by patient endurance and prayerful resistance of evil, they may avert the threatening storm. We know who has said, ' All things shall work together for good to them that love God,' and labour on, knowing that truth shall triumph. I am blessed with one of the most courageous wives of any man living, a help-meet in peace and prosperity, or in war and adversity ; and this is no small blessing in Eiji. "I am not without hope that you may succeed in getting some more men yet for Fiji from England. If we do not get a strong rein- forcement, Fiji will be damaged ; the progress of this work will be arrested, and will take years to raise again ; indeed, in that case, it would be as great a catastrophe as it is now a victory. Just point our honoured and kind fathers in Bishopsgate Street to the facts that have transpired, and are likely to be multiplied in quick succession : — Two faithful Teachers murdered and eaten ; the Christian town of Nasavu (Nandi) destroyed ; the five young women who have grown up, under the protection and teaching of the Missionary and his wife, as their own children, now dragged away by heathen cannibals to suff*er martyrdom, or yield to treatment which you will excuse me from writing, as you can so well describe what of it is describable ; other villages have been burned, and about one hundred persons have been killed, chiefly in the Nandi Circuit, within twelve months. Why are these things so 1 Be- cause we have too few Missionaries. If a Missionary had been at Nasavu, this would not have happened ! I wonder how the Committee in England could give up Fiji. The Colonies are doing nobly : but