21 THE MICROSCOPE AND ITS LESSONS. 



I like that story which tells us how the gospel was 

 first introduced to the natives of the Sandwich Islands, 

 where, in 1778, our Captain Cook was murdered illus- 

 trative as it is of how valuable a knowledge of the appli- 

 cation of nature- teaching is in religious life; and the 

 relation of this story will prepare the reader for the lessons 

 he may expect to meet with in the following pages. 



The want of a good supply of water was a terrible 

 scourge to these uncivilized people, who, in my early life 

 that is, considerably more than half a century ago 

 were downright savages, as any one may see if he look 

 into the faces of their idols exhibited in our national 

 museum. Their greatest earthly want was drinking-water, 

 and when the Christian missionary first landed, he, too, 

 felt the same inconvenience; at last it occurred to him 

 to sink a well in his own garden, there hoping, at the sea- 

 level, to get fresh water. The people, never having seen 

 a well in their lives, came to the conclusion that he must 

 be quite mad, and imagined the world upside down, 

 indeed, to think of digging for water down in the dry earth. 

 Every day they gathered round and watched him digging, 

 though they were too much scared to render any help. 

 At last their old chief, who was more civilized than the 

 rest, spoke. " You must be mad, missi " (missionary), he 

 said ; " rain comes from the clouds here ; it does not rise 

 out of the earth." 



Day after day went by ; but at last, at a depth of 

 thirty feet, there were signs of a spring. 



Then the missionary told the savages that the next 

 day they should see water. On the morrow, in fear and 

 wonder, they came, and at thirty-two feet deep, lo ! there 

 was a spring of fresh water, which has ever since supplied 

 that particular island. 



It was this which finally conquered the savages. The 



