Letter from Rev. J. Roberts. ^2)^ 



missionary, on the occasion of the arrival of the latter at 

 Nankin, in October, 1860, Hung narrates his heavenly 



ment, sustaining it by word and deed, as far as a missionary consistently could, 

 without vitiating) his higher character as an ambassador of Christ. But after 

 living among them fifteen months, and closely observing their proceedings — po- 

 litical, commercial, and religious — I have turned over entirely a new leaf, and 

 am now as much opposed to them, for good reasons, I think, as I was ever in 

 favour of them. Not that I have aught personally against Hung Sovv-chuen, he has 

 been exceedingly kind to me. But I believe him to be a crazy man, entirely unfit to 

 rule, without any organized government, nor is he, with his coolie kings, capable of 

 organizing a government of equal benefit to the people of even the old Imperial 

 Government. He is violent in his temper, and lets his wrath fall heavily upon his 

 people, making a man or woman ' an offender for a word,' and ordering such instantly 

 to be murdered without 'judge or jury.' He is opposed to commerce, having had 

 more than a dozen of his own people murdered since I have been here, for no other 

 crime than trading in the city, and has promptly repelled every foreign effort to 

 establish lawful commerce here among them, whether inside of the city or out. His 

 religious toleration and multiplicity of chapels tm-n out to be a farce, of no avail in 

 the spread of Cliristianity, worse than useless. It only amomits to a machinery for 

 the promotion "and spread of his own political religion, making himself equal with 

 Jesus Christ, who, with God the Father, himself, and his own son constitute one 

 Lord over all ! Nor is any missionary, who will not believe in his divine appoint- 

 ment to this high equaUty, and promulgate his pohtical rehgion accordingly, safe 

 among these rebels, in Ufe, servants, or property. He told me soon after I arrived 

 that if I did not believe in hini, I would perish, like the Jews did for not beUeving 

 in the Saviour. But little did I then think that I should ever come so near it, by 

 the sword of one of his own miscreants, in his own capital, as I did the other day. 

 Kan-Wang, moved by his elder brother (literally a coolie at Hong-kong) and the 

 devil, without the fear of God before his eyes, did, on Monday the 13th inst., come 

 into the house in which I was Uving, then and there most wilfully, maliciously, and 

 with malice aforethought, murder one of my servants with a large sword in his ow-n 

 hand in my presence, without a moment's warning or any just cause. And after 

 having slain my poor harmless, helpless boy, he jumped on his head most fiend-like 

 and stamped it with his foot ; notwithstanding I besought him most entreatingly 

 from the commencement of his murderous attack to spare my poor boy's life. And 

 not only so, but he insulted me myself in every possible way he could think of, to 

 provoke me to do or say something which would give him an apology, as I then 



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