CHAPTER IV. 
ACCEPTED BY THE BAPTIST MISSIONARY SOCIETY, 
AND SENT FORTH TO WESTERN AFRICA. 
A lthough Mr. comber entered the College 
in RegenPs Park with the most settled pur- 
pose to become a missionary, and a missionary 
to Africa, the application to the Society with 
which he desired to be identified could not be 
entertained until near the close of his collegiate 
course. And when at length he appeared before the 
missionary sub-committee, probably not one of its 
members was very deeply impressed with the excep- 
tional fitness, the remarkable qualities of the can- 
didate. His devotion was readily recognised, his 
abilities and attainments were acknowledged, his 
natural disposition was approved ; but who sitting on 
that Board had the faintest idea that the young man 
upon whose merits they were called to adjudicate 
would so soon — in the course of a very few years — 
prove himself worthy to be classed amongst the 
heroes of the mission field? Circumstances, actual 
contact with the difficulties and demands of the 
43 
