202 FORESTRY IN LITHUANIA. 



In passing through Lithuania, they seem to swarm so as 

 to suggest the illustration of locusts eating up every green 

 thing. No one seems to have a good word for them ; while 

 every one seems to have something to tell against them. 

 On learning a little more of facts than can be gathered 

 only from finding the platform of a railway station 



The young man took the Bible regularly to the synagogue when he went to worship. 

 The Reader, observing this, demanded of him how he dared to bring the Christian book 

 into the synagogue. He replied, that he had read it through, and found nothing 

 ungodly in it ; and that he must and would read it. Many of the other Jews then 

 applied foi copies, with which they were supplied ; and the desire for instruction 

 hecame so great that the inhabitants of the town requested the missionary to organise 

 a school for the instruction of the young. He complied with their request, organising 

 one for the instruction of boys under his own superintendence, and another for girts 

 under the superintendence of his wife 



He met with opposition from quarters whence he had least reason to expect it, but 

 the great body of the Jews encouraged him ; and after some time a Jew of considerable 

 learning and influence came to him and said, ' One or other of us must leave this town. 

 If you don't go, I go ; for if things go on thus, my children also will be taught to 

 read, and to read the books of the Christians.' 



He also mentioned that he was appointed at one time to labour in Upper Silesia. 

 He went thither, and on approaching one town, the first he entered, he was informed 

 that all the inhabitants were Jews, but that he would have no opportunity of prosecu- 

 ting missionary labour there, for they were all rich and wanted nothing. On entering 

 the town he was soon convinced of the correctness of the information he had received ; 

 but as a few Christian Jews resided there he resolved to spend a few days in intercourse 

 with them. It was then Friday, and on the following day he went to the synagogue. Sevei al 

 of the Jews assembled there, observing him to be a stranger, welcomed him with the 

 usual salutation of, ' Peace be with you !' When, however, they observed that during 

 the prayer which was offered he stood devoutly and still, instead of looking about as 

 did others, they whispered aloud, ' He is not a Jew but a missionary, for all the 

 missionaries pray so.' 



What were the consequences ? In the course of the day many of the Jews visited his 

 apartment for conversation concerning Christianity ; and they spent the time not in 

 disputation as at other places, but in calm and dispassionate comparison of the Old 

 Testament prophecies, with the history of Jesus of Nazareth recorded in the Gospels ! 

 In the evening six Jews, whose heads were silvered with age, waited upon him, and 

 almost abdured him to tell them what had convinced him of the truth of Christianity ; 

 and they too spent their visit in a calm and apparently dispassionate examination of 

 the attestations of the Messiah. 



He assured me that ten times the number of missionaries now labouring in Poland 

 and Silesia might find full scope for their energies in cultivating that extensive and 

 hopeful field. The opinion prevails that the Jews present a hopeless field for missionary 

 culture, but there are many things leading us to a contrary conclusion. 



God hath not cast off his people, if, with the Apostle, we believe that God is no 

 respecter of persons, but in every nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteous- 

 ness is accepted with him ; and if we search amongst the Jewish people, we may find 

 luany like their fathers, who bowed not the knee to Baal ; many like the godly Jews of 

 former days men like Simeon, 'just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel.' 



I felt much interested in a description given to me by Pastor Boerling, of one of his 

 acquaintances, an aged Rabbi, who, like Anna the prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, 

 of the tribe of Aser, departed not from the temple, ' but served God with fastings and 

 pravers night and day.' Regularly at the hour of midnight was that aged patriarch to 

 be found in the synagogue making confession and supplication unto God. He was 

 accidentally overheard on one occasion by Mr Boerling, and he repeated to me the 

 prayer, which a retentive memory enabled him to recall. While I listened to it, I 

 thought I saw before me Daniel when he set his face unto the Lord God, to seek by 

 prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes. The spirit was the 



