Early Relations between the United States and China. 97 



Singapore,'* and settled at Macao, where they began their work. 

 Shuck baptized his first convert, Ah Loo, February i, 1837, 

 numerically a larger showing than Bridgman had had in the 

 first five years of his missionary career, but the step proved hasty, 

 as the fellow apostatized within eighteen months." Life in 

 China proved to be rather trying to Mr. and Mrs. Shuck. Rela- 

 tions with the other missions were not always cordial, the older 

 workers being inclined to look upon these younger ones as unduly 

 insistent on denominational differences, and perhaps superficial 

 in their methods'® ; living expenses were high and salaries 

 inadequate— $750 for the married missionary as contrasted with 

 the $1,000 which the American Board found it necessary to pay 

 its unmarried men. The restless Shuck attempted to get to 

 Hainan by native boat to see if it could be opened to missionary 

 enterprise only to be forced to return without having reached 

 the island. '^^ 



As an independent worker afiiliated with this Baptist mission, 

 there arrived in 1837, Rev. Issacher J. Roberts, a man of great 

 religious zeal, but of unbalanced optimism. He was born in 

 Tennessee in 1802^* and obtained an imperfect education in the 

 Furman Theological Institution of South Carolina. He began 

 his preaching career in 1825, and worked in the South as pastor 

 and as agent of the American Colonization Society and of the 

 Sunday School Union.'^ He thought for a time of going to 

 Liberia as a missionary. A year or two later he organized the 



'* Baptist Missny. Mag., 17:174, Extracts from Shuck's Journal. 



"Jeter, Memoir of Mrs. Shuck, pp. 103, 121. 



"In Corres. of the A. B. C. F. M., Foreign Vol., p. 37, is a letter of 

 Anderson to the China Mission, Mar. 13, 1838, in reply to a letter of 

 Parker, who was somewhat irritated, trying to smooth things over. 

 In the correspondence of the American Baptist Missionary Union, Mss., 

 in their rooms in Boston, there is a letter from Shuck, Jan. 14, 1842, telling 

 how he had immersed an American ship-master, T. Rogers, a former 

 Presbyterian, and of the consequent displeasure of the "pedo-baptists." 



" Letter of Shuck to Secy. Peck, Feb. 21, 1837, in Corres. of A. B. M. U. 



'* Wylie, Memorials of Prot. Missionaries, p. 94. Hervey, The Story 

 of Baptist Missions, p. 512. 



"Corres. of A. B. M. U., Roberts to Bolles, July 5, 1834. Wylie says 

 that he was ordained in 1833, but he may have been licensed before this 

 year. Wylie, Mem. of Prot. Missionaries, p. 93. 

 Trans. Conn. Acad., Vol. XXII 7 1917 



