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THE NEW-ZEALAND CHIEF MAMAKU.

107 may see, perhaps, in this dispute and division between the priests of these idols, the indications of a tottering in the system. It is, at least, no ordinary thing to observe, that, for the first time upon record, the two idols have been separated, and their interests divided. May the time soon come when they may be utterly abolished, and Christ, the true Juggernaut (Lord of the world) be exalted upon their ruins! We returned to Calcutta early in the evening, with mingled feelings of joy and sorrow-joy that there was a shaking among the dry bones, and sorrow that there were no more reapers ready for the fields ripe unto harvest.

THE NEW-ZEALAND CHIEF MAMAKU.

THE name of Mamaku has often occurred in the Journals of our Missionary, the Rev. R. Taylor of Wanganui, as the name of a turbulent and fighting Chief, and one bitterly opposed to the Gospel. Mamaku headed the New Zealanders who fought the British troops in the valley of the Hutt, near Wellington, and on several subsequent occasions. When his party was defeated and broken up, and he was compelled to return to his own place up the river Wanganui, he could not rest quiet, but came down in the year 1846, at the head of 200 men, to plunder and burn the English settlement at Petre, at the mouth of the Wanganui, from which he was prevented only by the bold interference of the Christian Chiefs who live near Mr. Taylor, on the opposite side of the river. This man is now another proof of the power of the Gospel to change hard hearts, soften rugged tempers, and turn men's thoughts and desires into a channel different from that in which they had been wont to flow. Blessed be the name of our God! New Zealand affords many such: many a man whose name was "Legion" has become so changed as to sit meekly at the feet of Jesus. Whether Mamaku is changed, our readers must judge for themselves. Here we have him presented to us under a new aspect in Mr. Taylor's Journal. Mr. Taylor had reached Mamaku's Pa the evening before, and had occupied himself in giving instruction to the Natives, examining Candidates, &c., until after midnight. His account then proceeds

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Jan. 31, 1850-Mamaku called me before it was light; and, after prayers, we left for the Rakura about seven, accompanied by nearly all the people of the place. Mamaku went with me in the same canoe. said, "Now we will have a nice talk ;" and, whilst his nephew was poling the canoe, he came to my side, and, pulling out his Testament and Prayerbook, said, “Now, explain the 133d Psalm-the oil running down Aaron's beard, and the dew on Hermon ;" which I did. He seemed extremely interested. His nephew gave his pole to another, and asked me to explain it over again to him: he seemed jealous lest he should lose any portion of what was said. Mamaku again returned to his post, and proposed other questions; until, entering a rapid, where we were in some danger of being capsized, he immediately jumped up, and, seizing a pole, pushed the canoe through with great strength and skill, and then gave his pole to another, and resumed his seat by my side. He is an extraordinary man, with an excellent memory, and great shrewdness.

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"ALL SHALL KNOW THE LORD."

YES! all shall know Thee, Saviour!
The broad earth shall be Thine,
And o'er its ransomed myriads
The light of truth shall shine!
E'en now we see the earnest
Of this expected day,
When ev'ry land and kingdom
Shall own Messiah's sway.

Where, by the Brahmaputra,
The lofty palm-trees wave;
Or by the flowing Ganges
The Hindu finds his grave;
The message of salvation

By anxious crowds is heard;
The dead to life are wakening,
And torpid hearts are stirred.

From distant Abbeokuta
Is borne a mingled voice
Of gladness and of sorrow-
They weep, and yet rejoice:
The fire of persecution

Has raised its lurid flame;
The Christians have endur'd it;
Their faith is still the same.

Two warrior Chiefs are praying
On far New Zealand's shore;
The sun shines brightly on them,
More bright than e'er before.
They once were bitter foemen,
Each wish'd the other slain;
The love of Jesus chang'd them,
They ne'er will strive again.

Yes! all shall know Thee, Saviour!
Where southern breezes blow,
Or northern hills are shrouded
With oft-returning snow;
Where eastern summers lavish
A rich profusion round,
Or midst the vast seas westward
Man's island home is found;

Wherever bird hath wandered;
Wherever foot hath trod;
All flesh shall yield Thee homage,
The true and living God!
And he who sows with weeping
Shall come again with joy;
For thou, O Lord! the idols
Shalt utterly destroy !*

*Isaiah ii. 18.

VOL. I.

No. 10. NEW SERIES.]

[JANUARY, 1851.

THE

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CANOE-TRAVELLING IN RUPERT'S LAND-Vide p. 114.

LIVES OF MISSIONARIES.-THE MAYHEWS.

IN our last Number we presented a brief remembrance of the Rev. Thomas Mayhew, and his early labours among the Indians of Martha's Vineyard. On his death the work was not suffered to expire. Mr. Mayhew's father, the Governor of the Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, and Elizabeth Isles, originally a Southampton merchant, laboured amongst the Indians as a Lay-Evangelist, upholding the work by his prayers and ministrations, and cherishing it as the best memorial of his lamented son. In 1674 the native families in Martha's Vineyard, and a small island adjoining it, were about 360, of whom two-thirds, or about 1500 persons, were supposed to be praying Indians. The good old Governor died in 1680, in the 93d year of his age, to the great grief of the inhabitants.

Before his departure he had the satisfaction of seeing his youngest grandson, the Rev. John Mayhew, treading in the steps of his father. He knew the language of the Indians thoroughly; and, even when he was a very young man, they were wont to come to him for counsel and advice. After his grandfather's death, his interest in their welfare greatly increased, and he gave himself more unreservedly to the work in which his predecessors had so diligently laboured. Like his father's, his period of service in this world was brief. He died nine years after his grandfather, in the 37th year of his age, and the 16th of his ministry. During his last illness he expressed a wish, that, if it were the will of God, he might live a little longer, and do some more service for Christ in the world; but his heavenly Master saw fit otherwise to dispose of him. He had the consolation of leaving well-instructed Teachers over the Indians, 100 of whom were Communicants, walking in the fear of the Lord.

His eldest son, Mr. Experience Mayhew, was only sixteen years of age at the time of his father's death; yet, exactly five years after, we find him taking up the interrupted thread of the labours of his forefathers. During the previous quarter of a century, the number of Indians throughout the English Settlements had greatly diminished the Settlers and Natives had come into collision. In 1675, under the command of Philip, the Chief or Sachem of a tribe living within the boundaries of Massachusetts, the Indians rose against the Settlers, and many lives were sacrificed. The Settlers collected to defend themselves; and a desperate battle ensued, in which 1000 Indian warriors were slain. From that time the Indians began to withdraw themselves from amongst the Whites; and in 1694 the Indian families in Martha's Vineyard were only 180, precisely one-half of what they had been twenty years before. This rapid diminution of their numbers seemed to point out that the opportunity of usefulness among them would not be of very long continuance, and that, while it lasted, it ought to be diligently improved. Although only twenty-one years of age, Mr. E. Mayhew gave himself up to its improvement; and the Lord was pleased so remarkably to bless his labours, that, a few years after, only two individuals remained in heathenism. Being considered one of the greatest masters

CHINESE MISSIONARY WORK.

111 of the Indian tongue, he was employed to prepare a new translation of the Psalms, together with St. John's Gospel, which appeared in 1709, the Indian and English being printed in parallel columns. He died in 1754, after nearly sixty-five years' labour for the spiritual welfare of the Natives.

Nor was he the last Mayhew: one other was raised up to prolong the work-Zechariah, the son of the preceding. In the beginning of the present century this venerable man lived, an Indian Missionary, on the same spot where his forefathers had so diligently laboured, closing, by his death in 1803, the Missionary service of the Mayhew family, which had been shared by five successive generations, and extended over a period of no less than 160 years.

CHINESE MISSIONARY WORK.

THE Chinese are, in some respects, a civilized people, and very different in their manners from the wild Heathen of America or Australia. They are a social people, and like to crowd together in towns and villages. They are very quiet and orderly in their behaviour, and industriously pursue their occupations, of whatever kind they be, often with very small reward. The painful feature in their state is, that they are so completely without God in the world. Not only is it true that God is not in all their thoughts, but that He is not in any of their thoughts. Of one true and living God they have no distinct idea; and there is no word in their language which expresses the same with our word "God." The Missionaries have had great difficulty in fixing what word had best be used; and there is no word that is precisely what is wanted. The Apostle Paul tells us of God, that He is "not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being;" yet so blind have the Chinese become, that they have quite lost sight of Him.

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Instead of God they have many idols, to whom they make prayers and offerings, in the hope of obtaining a larger share in this world's goods, which is all they care for. The world is every thing to them, and they have no desire beyond it: they "mind earthly things,' and are as wholly taken up with them as if they believed that with the death of the body human consciousness terminated. Yet they do not think this, for they worship the spirits of their ancestors, believing them to be still alive. This is the kind of idolatry which has strongest hold on them. There appears to be something in this sin which remarkably suits the fallen nature of man; and, when Christianity was corrupted, this evil was introduced with many others. Thus we find large bodies of nominal Christians-such as Romanists and others as well as the heathen Chinese, worshipping the spirits of dead men and women. It is not more sinful and absurd for a Chinese to make prayers to the spirit of his ancestor, than for a Romanist to pray to his patron saint; nor is the invoking of Confucius a grosser error than the invocation of the Virgin Mary. Yet even in this, their strongest superstition, the Chinese are earthly

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