ght to
purchase the book, and for many days the missionaries house was more
like a bazaar than a private dwelling.

"One day a messenger at full speed arrived from the old chief Tinomana.
Seating himself cross-legged on the floor, he asked if a missionary had
arrived for his part of the island. On one being pointed out to him as
destined to labour in his settlement, he sprang up with an expression of
joy, and hastened back at full speed with the intelligence to his chief.
This was at Avarua, where a chapel had been erected worthy of
description. It was built in a frame, a hundred and forty feet long and
forty-five feet wide, filled up with wattle and lime plaster, white as
snow. It was well floored, surrounded by a gallery, and had a pulpit
and desk at one end. On the day I was there it was filled with sixteen
hundred natives, mostly clothed in home-made cloth, the greater number
really thirsting for religious knowledge. Next to the chapel stood the
school-house filled in the morning with seven hundred children, each
class of ten or twelve having its teacher. Near it was the
missionaries' cottage, neat, clean, and commodious; and not far off that
of the chief, which was large, well-built, and convenient. It was
thoroughly furnished with chairs, sofas, tables, and beds, and the
floors covered with mats; while on the tables were several books, which
he could read with fluency. Ten years before this he and his people
were naked savage cannibals. Missionary meetings were held in the
island to assist in sending the gospel to other lands. Thus spoke an
aged native at one of them to the young people: `Exalt your voices high
in praise of God. He has saved you from the pit of heathenism. We your
fathers know the character of that pit; some of us were born there. The
place on which we are now met was once a place of murder; spears and the
sling and stone were our companions; we ate human flesh, we drank human
blood. Let us do what we can to send the word of God to those who _are_
as once we _were_.' That year three thousand pounds of arrowroot were
subscribed for missionary purposes.

"More effectually to carry out this object, it was resolved to establish
a missionary college. A piece of ground was purchased, a number of neat
stone cottages for the students and a house for resident missionaries,
and lecture-halls, one of which was for female classes, were erected.
The latter were under the charge of the missiona