4 In Great Waters

Oliver. They travel about on the Thomas Crosby,
54 feet long, 13-foot beam and well engined, the
largest, strongest boat of this Marine Mission.
The seagoing qualities of the boat, and the men too,
are often tested to the utmost. Of all our mission
boats and men, of to-day and past days, it can be
said that many times, unrecorded save vividly in
the memory of the missionary, has it seemed that
God’s good providence alone brought them back
from the threat of a watery grave. I have been
through the War, but some of my experiences, afloat
and ashore, in storm and fog, along this coast, tried
me as much, as far as the strain on my nerves was
concerned, as those wretched days in front of Lens
and Paschendaele.

What I have written will serve to give you some
idea of the territory through which your missionaries
travel; the charm and infinite variety of it, the reach
of its thousands of miles of mainland coast-line and
island shores, the loveliness of its placid moods, and
the mighty, destructive power of its storms, its reefs,
its fogs, and its tides.

All Sorts and Conditions of Men. But mission-
aries do not go a-seeking scenery or adventure.
These are only incidental to their search for people
to whom they can minister in the Master’s name.
And we find them here with much the same needs of
body and soul that other people have. But there
are some features peculiar to the population of
this field.