GRACE ILLUSTRATED; 
 
 OK, 
 
 A BOUQUET FROM OUE MISSIONARY GARDEN. 
 
 MR. AND MRS. C. H. WHEELER, 
 
 MISSrOKARIES IN HARPOOT, 
 EASTERN TURKEY. 
 
 "I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse: I have 
 gathered my myrrh with my spice." 
 
 BOSTOiq": 
 CONGREGATIONAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY, 
 
 BEACON STEEET.
 
 COPTEIGHT. 
 
 CONGREGATIONAI- PUBLISHING SOCIETY. 
 
 1876. 
 
 BOSTON : 
 
 BTEEEOTTPED BY C. J. PETERS ANI> SOW, 
 
 73 FEDERAL STREET. 
 
 Franklin Press : Rand, Averi/, If Co., Boston.
 
 ^V 
 
 ^^\S ^'^^ 
 
 3110 
 
 CONTElTTa 
 
 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 1. 
 
 A WORD WITH THE READER. 
 
 . 5 
 
 II. 
 
 BLIND JOHN CONCORDANCE . 
 
 . 11 
 
 III. 
 
 BLIND DONABED . . , 
 
 . 58 
 
 IV. 
 
 THE VICTORIOUS BAKER 
 
 . 64 
 
 V. 
 
 CRITICISM DISARMED 
 
 . 72 
 
 VI. 
 
 LITTLE GREGORY . 
 
 . 77 
 
 VII. 
 
 SEED BY THE WAYSIDE 
 
 . 89 
 
 VIII. 
 
 DEACON HAGOP 
 
 . 99 
 
 IX. 
 
 THE BROKEN VOW . 
 
 . 123 
 
 X. 
 
 ONE OF god's " HIDDEN ONES " . 
 
 . 127 
 
 XI. 
 
 THE LITTLE HUMPBACK. 
 
 . 132 
 
 XII. 
 
 KOORDISH AMY . . . . 
 
 . 148 
 
 XIU. 
 
 A PILLAR REMOVED 
 
 . 166 
 
 XIV. 
 
 DEACON AVEDI3 . . . . 
 
 . 173 
 
 XV. 
 
 DER KEVORK 
 
 . 179 
 
 XVI. 
 
 "THE lord's BEDROS". . 
 
 . 190
 
 CONTEKTS. 
 
 xvir. "thief maghak ". 
 
 XVIII. DIVERSE GIFTS 
 
 XIX. GRACE ABOUNDING . 
 
 XX. PATIENT SARKIS 
 
 XXI. THE DESPAIRING SILVERSMITH 
 
 XXII. THE KOORDISH MISSIONARY . 
 
 XXIir. THE LITTLE SYKIAN MAID 
 
 XXIV. MISS M. E. WARFIELD 
 
 XXV. THE MAN WHO MUST PREACH 
 
 XXVI. OLD SARAH .... 
 
 XXVII. BEGO THE WIFE OF DONO 
 
 XXVIII. THE AGED AUCTIONEER . 
 
 XXIX. PILGRIM ANNA . . . 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 . 202 
 . 206 
 . 215 
 . 224 
 . 234 
 . 240 
 . 247 
 . 2.55 
 . 262 
 . 268 
 . 274 
 . 282 
 . 304
 
 GEACE ILLUSTEATED; 
 
 OK, 
 
 A BOUQUET FEOM OUR MISSIONARY GARDEN. 
 
 I. 
 A WORD WITH THE READER. 
 
 QINCE the enjoyment of a book by both 
 writer and reader depends much upon 
 their mutual good understanding, and as 
 the aim of this little volume is liable 
 to be misunderstood, before going out to 
 gather our missionary nosegay, let us have a 
 plain, frank chat about it. 
 
 Methinks I hear you asking, " Are not 
 you the same pastor whom we saw, some 
 twenty years ago, selecting a library for his
 
 6 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 sabbatli school, and casting out from the 
 hundred volumes before him more than a 
 score of " Memoirs " as not worth the labor 
 of examination ? And didn't this same little 
 wife of yours approve the deed? And do 
 you two now put your heads and pens 
 together to impose upon the long-suffering 
 pubhc a score or more of memoirs in a single 
 volume ! " 
 
 Yes, we are the same couple, and, strange 
 as it may appear, we're of the same opinion 
 still ; and that is one reason why, fearing 
 that our little book may fare like poor Tray 
 at the hands of other selectors of sabbath- 
 school libraries, we propose to protect it 
 from unsafe company by a different name ; 
 and rightfully, for we shall aim to make it a 
 different thing. 
 
 The purpose of these life and death 
 sketches is not at all to immortalize certain 
 surprisingly good little saints, or large ones,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 7 
 
 such as we iised to read about in our child- 
 hood, and despairingly wish that we too 
 might have been born such angels. For, to 
 tell the truth, though the gospel has in some 
 cases had wonderful power in subduing 
 stubborn hearts here, and though Jesus has 
 put his hands upon the heads, and by his 
 grace touched the hearts, of some little ones, 
 yet we have still to wait for the first saint, 
 large or small in all our mission-field, who 
 could equal the sample in most of those 
 old-style memoirs. It is a gratifying though 
 surprising fact, that, in more modern days, 
 professedly fictitious religious writers have, 
 while printing fiction on the titlepage, so 
 far removed it from their delineations of the 
 Christian life, as to give us a juster portrait 
 of the actually existing Christian militant 
 than had his preceding biographers. Bio- 
 graphical angel wings take time to grow now, 
 and are not made to order.
 
 8 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 We may as well confess to some perplex- 
 ing questionings in fixing upon a name for 
 our humble messenger. Nothing high-sound- 
 ing or pretentious will do, of course : so we 
 search on the common level. " Call it 
 ' Living Stones,' " says one. But we do not 
 feel at all in an architectural frame of mind. 
 " ' First-Fruits,' then, or ' Sheaves,' " adds a 
 second ; to which we reply, " ' Handfuls ' shall 
 be the name, if any thing in that line ; for 
 the sheaves are yet to come." — " But ' Bou- 
 quet ' is tame and commonplace." — " Yes, and 
 truthful and comprehensive too ; for, while 
 it hints just the thing we wish to do, it 
 suggests, also, the way of doing it.' We 
 don't propose to talk of missionary policy, 
 which some may think was done too exclu- 
 sively in a preceding yolume, nor of the 
 missionary work in any form as seen from its 
 human side, nor even to speak of results as 
 such, however heart-cheering this employ-
 
 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 9 
 
 ment might be, but only to take a quiet 
 stroll with you, if you will, in the garden of 
 the Lord, plucking, meanwhile, here and 
 there a flower, a bud, a twig, a leaf, a blade 
 of grass, as pleasant mementoes of our visit. 
 Wearied and harassed by the toils and 
 anxieties of even the joyous missionary 
 work, it will be well for us thus to turn aside 
 and rest a while, and not unpleasant for you 
 to join in contemplating these more spiritual 
 manifestations, which, though but incidental 
 to the one great result of missions, are more 
 potent than mere material effects to cheer 
 and sustain the followers of Christ in the 
 hard work of evangelism which they have to 
 do. As our bouquet is to consist of natural 
 flowers, not artificial, or, in other words, as 
 the aim of these sketches is to give the 
 reader a view of their subjects just as we 
 have seen or are seeing them, we shall try to 
 make the portraits true to life, even when
 
 10 GBACB ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 disclosing blemishes we would gladly conceal. 
 We shall thus gain a juster conception of 
 the character of the missionary work, and 
 be able more intelligently and heartily to 
 glorify the grace that is carrying it on, when 
 reminded that our bouquet was gathered not 
 from the primitive paradise, but from one as 
 yet but partially regained and restored.
 
 GEACE ILLTJSTEATED. 11 
 
 n. 
 
 BLIND JOHN CONCORDANCE. 
 
 TN the spring of 1864, when our theologi- 
 -*- cal seminary was four years old, and the 
 female seminary two, two equivocal candi- 
 dates knocked at their doors, — a blind man 
 and his wife from the village of Mashkir, on 
 the Euphrates, some thirty-five miles north- 
 west from Harpoot. The man, Hohannes 
 ("John") byname, had in early life, like 
 thousands in this land, lost his eyes by small- 
 pox, and then paid, if possible, a heavier 
 penalty for loss of sight and beauty by wed- 
 ding such a wife as he could get. 
 
 The unfortunate blind man — or " Enlight- 
 ened one," as the poetic sympathy of the 
 Orient names him — who has not wealth or
 
 12 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 high reputation, must accept a wife who is 
 at the same discount as himself, either by 
 loss of both eyes, or of one eye plus partial 
 want of beauty and brains, or, finally, one 
 who has two eyes, but very little or none of 
 the last two accomplishments. Unfortu- 
 nately, Hohannes, or his friends for him, had 
 only supphed his most sorely felt deficiency, 
 by taking a wife with eyes only; and the 
 result was, that the female-seminary candi- 
 date said by her first look, " To be sure, I 
 can't learn even my a, 5, c's ; but then I can 
 attract the attention of all by my Esqui- 
 mau style of beauty." Trial had proved 
 her truthful; and so she could not be ad- 
 mitted. 
 
 And what should we say to the other 
 candidate ? " Paradise Lost " and the " Iliad " 
 witness, indeed, that pre-eminent ability 
 may exist behind sightless eyeballs ; while 
 Milton, Socrates, and, for aught we know,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 13 
 
 old Homer too, combine to bid us beware 
 of rejecting, without further examination, a 
 literary aspirant because of conjugal infeli- 
 cities. But, then, they do not encourage 
 us to hope that blind men tied to uncon- 
 genial wives will be hopeful theological 
 students. Yet Hohannes was admitted to 
 examination, and, like Pope's traditional 
 toad, turned out to have, beneath his far 
 from handsome exterior, a very " precious 
 jewel " in both head and heart. While his 
 wonderful acquaintance with the Bible had 
 won for him in his native village the 
 surname of Hamapapar (" Concordance "), 
 subsequent events showed him to be pos- 
 sessed of an innate power of using his 
 acquired gift, which, in spite of all his dis- 
 abilities, made him surely the most gainful 
 candidate to the cause who ever spent two 
 years in Harpoot Seminary, or perhaps any 
 other, even if it does not justify " The New
 
 14 GRACE ILLTJSTRATED. 
 
 York Independent " in saying, that " perhaps 
 no man of the age has done a more impor- 
 tant work than blind Hohannes." 
 
 Surely, at least, that brother missionary 
 stands rebuked, who, alluding to our receiv- 
 ing him to the theological, and " Kohar" to 
 the female seminary, taunted us with " re- 
 ceiving the lame, the halt, and the blind to 
 our schools, because," as he said, " they are 
 cheaper ; " which reason is so far from being 
 true, that blind students cost us more than 
 others ; and this one, at least, was worth many 
 times what it cost to train him, and support 
 him in the work. He left the seminary in 
 October, 1865, and died in March, 1869 ; yet 
 in that brief time he made for himself a 
 name both in this and other lands, which will 
 not soon die. But we have promised to be 
 strictly truthful in painting our characters, 
 and may as well confess here, that, stored as 
 head and heart were with the word of truth
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 15 
 
 which sanctifies the soul, he was yet appar- 
 ently a good way from attaining complete 
 sanctification. His wife complained that he 
 didn't love her as well as he should, and 
 died — was it from a broken heart? — not 
 long after he entered the seminary. We are 
 quite sure, however, that if the philosophic 
 theory were true, which subjects the affections 
 to the will, the poor man would have been 
 less faulty here. But he was by no means 
 the exemplary student we wished to see him, 
 since he expected, and rather demanded, as a 
 condition of obedience to the few necessary 
 rules of the seminary, that we should imitate 
 his habit in dealing with those whom he 
 sought to win to the truth, and " satisfy his 
 conscience " by giving chapter and verse to 
 justify each requirement. I have sometimes 
 imagined that there is something in the loss 
 of the eyes which makes one unreasonably 
 exacting. Perhaps he was thinking of the
 
 16 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 scriptural declaration in regard to bestowing 
 more abundant honor on those members 
 which lack, and so felt that he had a biblical 
 claim to be petted. 
 
 He, at least, put in his claim as a blind man 
 to be excused from compliance even with 
 such rules as he could find no chapter and 
 verse to inyalidate. Annoyed by the fumes 
 of new, and the stench of old tobacco-smoke 
 elsewhere, we resolved to enjoy exemption 
 from it on the theological premises ; but " of 
 course the rule didn't apply to a man with- 
 out eyes." This notion, that no rules 
 applied to him, was indulged to such an 
 extent as to lead, at length, to a crisis, and a 
 somewhat ludicrous exorcism of the trouble- 
 some spirit. 
 
 Near by the door of the theological semi- 
 nary was that of the female-seminary harem, 
 over which all Oriental customs and j)reju- 
 dices, as well as our own promise to parents
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 17 
 
 to leave to tlie^n their daughters' matrimonial 
 arrangements, compelled us to write, " Taboo 
 to lovers and love-letters." Hohannes' 
 inability to love satisfactorily her who had 
 died did not prevent him from being 
 insnared by the sweet tones of the assistant 
 teacher, into whose hands, by lying in wait 
 at the forbidden door, he one day succeeded 
 in sKpping, not the usual romantic nonsense, 
 but a plain, outspoken epistle on the business 
 in hand ; and, having done this, he waited 
 somewhat impatiently for the expected repl}'-, 
 little suspecting that she, as in duty bound, 
 had handed the letter unread to her supe- 
 riors. So when, a few days later, the 
 students were sent forth, two and two, for a 
 brief vacation preaching-tour, and Hohan- 
 nes' name was not read with the rest, to his 
 prompt inquiry, " And where shall I go ? " 
 came the reply, " You, brother, can stay here, 
 and attend to your matrimonial affairs." 
 
 2
 
 18 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 The Harpoot parsonage was then in build- 
 ing, and a man needed to sift dirt for mortar : 
 so when Hohannes added, " But how shall I 
 earn my bread ? " we replied, " If you feel 
 penitent enough over that love-letter, we 
 suggest that you do it by sitting in dust and 
 ashes, and using that sieve." He did it ; but 
 the joke leaked out, and from that day to 
 this there have been no more liers-in-wait at 
 the tabooed door. 
 
 During his " short course " of two years, 
 Hohannes made more than average progress 
 in his studies, which were, exegesis of Scrip- 
 ture, theology, and preaching, and graduated 
 with his class in 1865. He had meanwhile 
 manifested much shrewdness and enthusiasm 
 in evangelistic labor in the vicinity, fre- 
 quently succeeding, partly from the fact of 
 his blindness, but mostly from his natural 
 sagacity, in gaining access to Armenian 
 churches. He was specially skillful in
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 19 
 
 silencing opponents, chiefly by a ready and 
 dexterous use of Scripture, but often by an 
 adroit turning of his antagonist's weapons 
 against himself. A single incident will 
 illustrate this latter trait. The priest of a 
 certain village frequently visited by the 
 students had a trick of asking them whether 
 they had studied a certain branch of knowl- 
 edge, of which he was, doubtless, even more 
 ignorant than most of them, and then, on 
 their confessing that they had not, turn- 
 ing to the people, who knew not even the 
 name of the wonderful study, with the 
 triumphant inquiry whether a man so igno- 
 rant as that was fit to preach the gospel. 
 When several unfortunate theologues had in 
 this way been worsted, Hohannes started for 
 the place, declaring that he would silence 
 the wily priest. So, having committed' to 
 memory a long list of authors who have 
 treated on the old man's favorite study, he
 
 20 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 replied to the usual question by glibly 
 rattling off those authors' names, and inquir- 
 ing to which of them he referred. It was 
 now the priest's turn to bear the laugh ; and 
 he never again dared attack a Protestant 
 preacher. 
 
 Hohannes' blindness, of course, caused 
 him much inconvenience in getting about, 
 sometimes even when he had companions. 
 Once, in a hilly region, his two fellow-travel- 
 ers left him for a moment, going in different 
 directions to decide on the correct road, and, 
 on their return, could find no Hohannes, but 
 at length tracked his mule down a very steep 
 hillside, into a ravine, at the bottom of which, 
 on one side they discovered the animal, and 
 on the other his master. When left alone, 
 the mule, with something of his rider's 
 originality of purpose, decided to choose a 
 path for himself, and, spite of all his opposi- 
 sition, had carried him off. Finding that
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 21 
 
 the beast was taking him down such a road, 
 and resolved not to be lost, even if the mule 
 was, he had shpped off to wait the issue of 
 events. 
 
 But, in spite of obstacles, his zeal and 
 energy carried him on, resolved to accom- 
 phsh feats of travel and evangelism deemed 
 difficult even for men with eyes. Among 
 other things, learning of the darkened con- 
 dition of the Armenians in Russia, he re- 
 solved, at all risks, to visit and supply them 
 with portions of the Scriptures. So he 
 ordered a box made of thick boards, so 
 hollowed out by mortising, that he might fill 
 the cavities with very thin copies of the 
 separate Gospels, and thus take them, undis- 
 covered, across the border. But by our 
 advice this plan was given up ; and, shortly 
 after graduation, he went to Shepik, a 
 wretched little village of some forty houses, 
 about fifty miles north-west from Harpoot,
 
 22 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 in wliich was a church whose pastor's lack 
 of energy had put to sleep that small part 
 of the people who adhered to him, and so 
 deprived himself of all support. 
 
 When he aj^pealed to the Evangelical 
 Union for aid, they advised him to leave for 
 a time, and go to a hostile village and get 
 roused up, and invite Hohannes to come and 
 wake up his people. He went ; and, when 
 the people met him with lamentations over 
 poor crops and poverty, he bade them begin 
 their lamentations at another place, and 
 remove the cause by repaying God that of 
 which they had robbed him. Then taking 
 for his text, " Bring ye all the tithes into the 
 storehouse," &c. (Mai. iii. 10), he enforced 
 the duty of paying into the Lord's treasury 
 one-tenth of all their earnings. 
 
 His sermon we reserve to be reported as 
 subsequently preached in the Harpoot pulpit ; 
 but its immediate fruit in Shepik was re-
 
 GRACE ILLTJSTRATED. 23 
 
 marliable.^ The pastor was called back to 
 find a different church from the one he left. 
 Would that as great a change might have 
 been wrought in his good but sluggish 
 nature! But Hohannes' work went on. 
 The little mustard-seed, thus sowed in this 
 insignificant village, soon became a tree of 
 so wide-spreading branches, that multitudes 
 of churches and communities in this and 
 other lands rested under the shade, and par- 
 took of the fruit of it. In the hard struggle 
 to lead the people out of the Egyptian 
 bondage of dependence on foreign aid, and 
 introduce self-support, and consequent inde- 
 pendence, among the churches, we mission- 
 aries had apparently reached a Red Sea, 
 through which God only could open a way 
 to go forward; and by the hand of this 
 humble man he did it, and we were soon 
 
 * Those wishing to do so can find the particulars in 
 chap. X. of "Ten Yeaxa on the Euphrates."
 
 24 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 singing songs of deliverance on the other 
 side of the flood. We have not, indeed, yet 
 crossed the Jordan, and begin to fear that 
 our sins may deprive some of us of the 
 privilege of leading the people into the 
 goodly land by completing in our field 
 the work to be done here by the American 
 churches. This is not the place to go into 
 particulars of results of the tithing move- 
 ment, the good fruits of which are increas- 
 ing with the advance of time. While no 
 attempt is made to constrain persons, church- 
 members or others, to pay tithes, yet the 
 feeling is becoming more and more wide- 
 spread, that while the giving of this exact 
 proportion of income is not divinely fixed as 
 an invariable rule for all, and while each 
 person may decide for himself to what 
 special department of Christian expenditure 
 he will appropriate his tithes, yet the system 
 offers the simplest and most practicable
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 25 
 
 method of providing for evangelistic ex- 
 pense, and is at the same time most beneficial 
 spiritually to the contributor. Though the 
 sermon of Hohannes, as reported by Miss 
 West for "The Missionary Herald," of 
 October, 1868, has been scattered by tens 
 of thousands of copies over England and 
 America, it may profitably find a place here. 
 We give, of course, only a brief abstract. 
 Blind men don't write their sermons, nor 
 even preach from notes. Miss West says, 
 " I wish you could have seen for yourself 
 how interested the people were in the dis- 
 course. The blindness of the preacher added 
 to the interest. Saying, ' We will read ' such 
 a ' chapter ' or ' hymn,' he would repeat the 
 same^ word for word. When he called upon 
 the people to read, it was for their sake 
 rather than his own ; and, when the reader 
 had reached just the point he desired, he 
 never failed to say, ' Stop,' that he might take 
 it up just there.
 
 26 GtlACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 " He began by repeating that striking pas- 
 sage, ' Will a man rob God ? Yet ye have 
 robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we 
 robbed thee? In tithes and offerings,' &c. 
 (Mai. iii. 8-10.) He then, in few words, 
 told us that he proposed to show from the 
 word of God that giving a tenth to the 
 Lord was a primitive institution, attended 
 with great benefits and blessings to the 
 givers, and perpetuated and enforced under 
 the new dispensation no less than the old. 
 ' Open your Bibles,' said he, ' at the fourteenth 
 chapter of Genesis, and let some one read 
 the eighteenth and twentieth verses.' Bibles 
 were instantly opened all over the house, and 
 the passage read in clear tones by one of 
 the congregation. ' Abraham gave tithes to 
 Melchizedek,' said the preacher, ' more than 
 four hundred years before the giving of the 
 law to Moses, — Abraham, "the father of 
 the faithful," whose children the Jews glory
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 27 
 
 in being, — Abraham, whom even Moslems 
 honor, and call " the blessed." Now turn 
 to the twenty-eighth chapter, and read the 
 twentieth, twenty-first and twenty-second 
 verses.' Jacob's vow was read, concluding 
 with the words, ' And of all that thou shalt 
 give me, I will surely give the tenth unto 
 thee.' He then rapidly drew the contrast be- 
 tween Jacob's going to Padan-aram, — alone, 
 and in utter destitution, — and the return^ 
 with his flocks and herds, and camels, men- 
 servants and maid-servants ; for, in spite of 
 Laban's covetousness, the man had increased 
 greatly. ' And now,' he said, ' open at the 
 twenty-seventh of Leviticus, and read the 
 thirtieth verse. "And all the tithe of the 
 land is the Lord's^'''' ' repeated the preacher. 
 * Nine-tenths for yourselves ; but one-tenth 
 "is holy unto the Lord." Open at Numbers 
 eighteenth, and read the twentieth, twenty- 
 first, twenty -sixth, twenty -eighth and
 
 28 GEACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 twenty-nintli verses.' This was done ; and 
 then Hohannes briefly commented on each 
 verse. He said the Levites, who ministered in 
 the house of the Lord, were to have no part or 
 inheritance in the land ; for the titlies of the 
 people were to be their inheritance ; and of 
 these tithes they were to offer a tenth to the 
 Lord, ' even of all the hest thereof.' ' Read 
 Deut. xiv. 22, and xxvi. 12. See the abun- 
 dant provision made, not only for the Levites, 
 but also for the " stranger, the fatherless, 
 and the widow." Read, also, 2 Chron. xxxi. 
 4-10, where the people are described as 
 obeying the command of God, and bring- 
 ing in "abundantly" of the "increase of 
 the land." And the chief priest answered 
 King Hezekiah, when he questioned him 
 concerning the " Aeops:" " Since the people 
 began to bring the offerings into the house 
 of the Lord, we have had enough to eat, and 
 have left plenty ; for the Lord hath blessed his
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 29 
 
 people; and that which is left is this great 
 store." Now read Neh. xiii. 10, 13, and 14. 
 Mark the contrast ! The people no longer 
 gave tithes : the house of the Lord was 
 desecrated; and the Levites had forsaken 
 their sacred office, and '■'■fled^ every one to his 
 
 01V71 FIELD." 
 
 " ' And now,' continued the preacher, ' we 
 will turn to the new dispensation. Open at 
 the twenty-third of Matthew, and read the 
 twenty-third verse : " These ouglit ye to have 
 done, and not to leave the other undone," are 
 our blessed Saviour's words to the scribes 
 and Pharisees. Ye do well to pay tithes: 
 it is your duty. But ye ought also to do 
 judgment, mercy and faith. Now turn to 
 Luke xi. 42 : " Woe unto you Pharisees ! for 
 ye tithe ... all manner of herbs, and pass 
 over judgment and the love of God : these 
 ought ye to have done^ and not to leave the 
 other undone." Read Luke iii. 7-12: " Bring
 
 so GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 forth fruits worthy of repentance^'''' ' repeated 
 the preacher. ' John the Baptist was a 
 connecting link between the Jewish and the 
 gospel dispensations ; and he spake as he was 
 moved by the Spirit of God. " Now, also, the 
 ax is laid at the root of the tree." What 
 tree ? It was nothing less than the tree — 
 the root — of self and selfishness. 
 
 " ' What this good fruit is he tells us in the 
 eleventh verse : " He that hath two coats, 
 let him impart to him that hath none ; and 
 he that hath meat [food], let him do like- 
 wise." Where, now, remains the tenth?' he 
 exclaimed. ' Under the new dispensation, 
 not one-tentJi merely, but one-HALF, is re- 
 quired.' (At this announcement, there was 
 an evident sensation in the audience, many a 
 face lighting up with a smile, as the electric 
 current shot through the assembly.) 
 
 " The preacher continued, ' Read now the 
 sixth of Luke, thirty-eighth verse : " Give,
 
 GEACE rLLUSTRATED. 31 
 
 and it shall be given unto you." G-ive. and 
 you shall have wherewith to give. Shut /our 
 hand and your heart, and you shut the 
 windows of heaven ; you keep back the 
 blessing of God. See what Christ saj 3 in 
 Luke xii. 33 : " Sell that ye have, and ,dve 
 alms," &c., which means, consider } »ur- 
 selves as steivards of God's grace ok the 
 earth, seeking your inheritance in the 'w jrld 
 to come. You are to set light store by ^ our 
 earthly possessions, and lay up treasui d in 
 heaven. Now read Luke xiv. 33.' Slnwly 
 and solemnly the preacher repeated the 
 words of the Master: '"So, likewise, who 
 soever he be of you that forsaJceth not ALL 
 that he hath, he CAK NOT be my disciple.' 
 Ah, my brethren,' said he, ' it is not merely 
 a tenth, or even a half, of our worldly pos- 
 sessions, that Christ claims: it is our all! 
 Think upon the meaning of those words. 
 It is thus he speaks to you: If you wish
 
 32 GEACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 to be my disciple, you must count the cost. 
 You can not serve two masters. You must 
 give up every thing that the children of this 
 world seek after. You must hold yourselves 
 aloof from jonv earthly possessions ' [such 
 is the Armenian version of Luke xiv. 33], 
 ' holding to them loosely, setting your affec- 
 tions on things above. Your comfort, pleas- 
 ure, honor, ease, yea, your ver^ life, you 
 must esteem as nothing in comparison with 
 my service. And in thus losing all, you will 
 find all, and that for ever. 
 
 " ' Open your Bibles at Matt. xix. 29, and 
 Mark x. 29, and read the glorious promise to 
 those who truly '■'' forsake all " for Christ and 
 his cause. See ! ' exclaimed Hohannes, after 
 solemnly repeating the passage, — ' see how 
 rich the reward! a hundred-fold in this life, 
 and Ife everlasting beside ! Now open at Luke 
 nineteenth, and read from the second to the 
 tenth verse. Note the words of Zaccheus,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 83 
 
 " The half of my goods I give to the poor," 
 and mark the answer of our Saviour. But 
 what say you ? Is salvation to be houglit 
 with money? We all know that it is " with- 
 out money, without price." Why, then, this 
 blessing upon Zaccheus ? ' — ' Because,' an- 
 swered one of the congregation, ' the giving 
 was the fruit of his faith.'' — 'Yes,' rejoined 
 the preacher, ' Zaccheus brought forth fruit 
 worthy of true repentance, and immediately 
 received the promised blessing. 
 
 " ' Now let me tell you a story. When I 
 was in the class in sermonizing, in the semi- 
 nary, our teacher was very anxious that we 
 who were soon to go forth as preachers, and 
 perhaps become pastors, should work upon 
 right principles ; and he often talked to us 
 of our duty as leaders to teach the people to 
 do for themselves. He sometimes told us 
 of places where much money (of the Board) 
 had been expended by missionaries, and but
 
 34 GRACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 little real good accomplished, because the 
 people had not been taught to give for 
 Christ's cause. " In one little village," he 
 said, " forty thousand piasters" [sixteen hun- 
 dred dollars] " of the Board's money was 
 spent ; the people only giving fifty piasters 
 during thirteen years. And the work in 
 that place amounts to nothing to-day, be- 
 cause of this unwise course." It so iiappened, 
 that, when my course of study was finished, 
 I was appointed to that village. It was the 
 last place I should have chosen. I had no 
 desire to go to that field ; but God had so 
 ordered, and I went. The missionaries told 
 me that my wages would be fifteen hundred 
 piasters per year, of which the people were 
 to pay six hundred ; and, before I left, one 
 of them took me aside, and counseled me to 
 make it as easy for the people as possible, by 
 eating at their houses, &c., because it would 
 come hard to them at first to do so much.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 35 
 
 " ' Soon after I went there, a neighboring 
 pastor came over to the village, and we held 
 a meeting with the brethren. We talked 
 about my support ; and it seemed that they 
 had, with much difficulty, subscribed five 
 hundred piasters per year. I told them 
 the missionaries had said they would pay 
 six hundred. '•'■ Never ! '^ they exclaimed. 
 *' We cannot raise another para " [one-for- 
 tieth of a piaster] . And pastor M said 
 
 it was impossible ; they were too poor. 
 "Where, then, shall I get my other hun- 
 dred?" I asked. " We will help you from 
 our place," he replied. 
 
 " ' But my mind was not at rest. That 
 night I thought much on the subject. I 
 said to myself, " Suppose the American 
 Board should one day withdraw its support 
 from this and other feeble churches, what 
 will become of them ? " And I prayed, " O 
 thou who knowest all things, and with
 
 36 GKACE ILLUSTKATED. 
 
 whom are all plans, sliow thy ignorant ser- 
 vant how thy kingdom can best be estab- 
 lished in this land." And it seemed to me 
 that a voice said in my soul, " It can be 
 done by giving one in every ten^ When I 
 thought it over, it occurred to me to test 
 it first in my own case. One-tenth of my 
 fifteen hundred per year would be one hun- 
 dred and fifty piasters. " No," I said, " I 
 can't give so much as that : I should suffer 
 for it." But, when I took it out of every 
 month's salary, it did not seem so much. 
 " One-tenth of my one hundred twenty five 
 will be twelve piasters and a half. / can do 
 it,^^ I said, " and I will, even if I do have 
 to pinch a Httle." It happened that pastor 
 
 visited us about that time, and I laid 
 
 the subject before him. " It can be done," 
 he said ; " and it must be. I will give a 
 tenth of my salary." And so said preacher 
 , who also came over. " Well, then,"
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 37 
 
 I said, " do you think it will do for me to 
 lay it before the brethren ? " — " Yes," they 
 replied : " it is the best thing you can do." 
 
 " ' So I prepared myself, and preached to 
 the people on the next sabbath. The Lord 
 blessed his own word. They accepted it, 
 and came together to be " written " for their 
 tithes. When we made a rough estimate, 
 it appeared that their tenths would exceed 
 my entire salary. " Why, how is this ? " 
 they all said. "It was so hard before! 
 but now it comes very easy, and it is truly 
 pleasant." 
 
 " ' Now, to show you how God blessed that 
 little flock, I will mention one case. One 
 brother had a vegetable-garden, which the 
 Turkish official, in assessing the tax, had 
 estimated at nine hundred piasters for that 
 year's produce, taxing him ninety piasters. 
 Others said it was too much : it would not 
 produce that amount. But mark the fulfill-
 
 38 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 ment of the promise in Mai. iii. 10. That 
 brother sold three thousand piasters' worth 
 of vegetables from that garden, besides what 
 was eaten by a household of thirty-two per- 
 sons, and given away ; amounting to full three 
 thousand more. Others were also blessed ; 
 and all acknowledged that they had never 
 known a year of such prosperity. The peo- 
 ple not only supported their preacher and 
 school-teacher, but also paid over two thou- 
 sand piasters for other purposes. 
 
 " The preacher was about to close his dis- 
 course, when a member of the congrega- 
 tion arose, and asked permission to say a 
 few words. ' I have learned,' he said, 
 'from one of the missionaries another 
 truth, which has great weight in this giving 
 of one-tenth of our income to the Lord. 
 Under the old dispensation, the Jews were 
 only required to care for their own nation ; 
 but, under the new dispensation, the com-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 39 
 
 mand is, " Go ye into all the world, and 
 preacli the gospel to every creature." There- 
 fore a tenth is not enough for Christians to 
 give. 
 
 " To this, the teacher responded, ' A tenth 
 is the very least that a disciple of Christ 
 can give. Over and above that, he should 
 give as God prospers him. And now,' he 
 added, ' let us seek the aid of the Holy 
 Spirit, that we, and all our offerings, may 
 find acceptance before God.' " 
 
 To this report, Miss "West adds, "It is 
 difficult to do justice to a scene and a ser- 
 mon so unique. When that sightless man 
 was led up into the pulpit, his appearance 
 was any thing but attractive. He looked 
 rough, and uncared-for, quite inferior in 
 person. But he had a message from the 
 Lord of hosts; and well did he deliver it, 
 reminding one of the words, 'God hath 
 chosen the weak things of the world to con-
 
 40 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 found the things which are mighty ; and 
 base things of the world, and things which 
 are despised, hath God chosen,' &c. It was 
 worth much to see and hear one who had 
 been so evidently taught of the Sjmit, and 
 made the honored instrument of laying a 
 new foundation-stone for the building of 
 Christ's church throughout the world. For 
 the new ray of light that dawned in that 
 obscure village of Armenia two years since 
 has begun to radiate from many distant 
 points ; and we believe that it will solve the 
 problem of the support of Christian institu- 
 tions in all lands, and hasten the day when 
 the earth shall be tilled with the glory of 
 God. Well may every worker in foreign 
 lands say with Jesus, ' I thank thee, O 
 Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because 
 thou hast hid these things from the wise 
 and prudent, and revealed them unto babes. 
 Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in 
 thy sight.' "
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 41 
 
 With his restless longing to preach the 
 gospel in regions beyond, Hohannes had re- 
 solved to go to Moosh Plain, a week's jour- 
 ney east of Harpoot, of the ignorant and 
 wretched condition of the Armenian inhabit- 
 ants of which he had heard from missiona- 
 ries and native pastors who had visited it 
 the year before ; and, at the date of preach- 
 ing this sermon (May 3, 1868), he, with 
 another missionary volunteer like himself, 
 was on his way thither. 
 
 Reaching the place, his companion, now 
 Pastor Garabed of Haboosie, was located 
 in the city of Moosh ; but Hohannes went 
 to what we may hope was the most wretched 
 spot of that pre-eminently wretched dis- 
 trict, the village of *Havadoric. Mr. Cole 
 of Erzroom, who visited the place in 1872, 
 thus writes of it: "It is a village of some 
 fifty houses, situated half a mile up a steep 
 mountain-side, where it overlooks most of
 
 42 GRACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 tlie great Moosh Plain. We saw tokens 
 of abject poverty in the whole region, 
 but in this village more than all. We 
 visited the people at their homes ; and 
 such dingy, dirty, dark abodes for human 
 beings, I have never seen in Turkey. In 
 all the village were only two guest-rooms, 
 — raised places in the corner of a stable, 
 inclosed by a low mud-wall, to separate 
 guests from the cattle. Others have nothing 
 but the poorest kind of '■ doon^ a sort of 
 sheep-pen affair, windowless, with only a 
 hole in the top to let the smoke out. And 
 in these hovels, such poverty ! As to cloth- 
 ing, I should say there was nothing you 
 could dignify by that title, — mere tattered 
 rags hanging from shivering forms. As 
 cold weather comes on, many of the children 
 must' stay in doors to keep from freezing. 
 At night, when you and I lie down in our 
 soft, warm beds, think of their lying down
 
 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 43 
 
 upon the cold, hard ground, with a few 
 squalid rags for their bed of down." 
 
 Of the Moosh Plain itself, Mr. H. N. Bar- 
 num, who visited it in 1867, wrote, " This 
 plain is about sixty miles long, and ten or 
 twelve wide, and contains about seventy 
 nominally Christian villages. More than a 
 week were we detained ; and I question 
 whether Providence did not detain us that 
 we might see and feel more deeply the 
 wants of that region. It was now genuine 
 winter weather ; yet I think I never saw 
 anywhere else, not even in the warm sun- 
 shine of Egypt, so much nakedness, total or 
 partial. Adults, of course, had the sem- 
 blance of clothing, though it was often a 
 mass of rags and shreds sewed or tied 
 together. But the poor children ! It makes 
 my heart ache to think of them. Some had a 
 tolerably whole shirt and drawers ; and some 
 had no drawers, and what was once a shirt
 
 44 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 was now a few shreds hanging from the 
 shoulders. Many had only a rag on the 
 shoulders, as a sort of jacket, with holes to 
 jDut the arms through ; and others had not 
 a thread upon their bodies. The people 
 seem to be almost wholly destitute of beds. 
 Wherever we went, we found that the beds 
 were a piece of carpet, or felt, or coarse 
 straw-matting, or a little straw, with a piece 
 of carpet as a covering. In six or seven 
 villages which we visited, we did not notice 
 a woman or a child who had either stock- 
 ings or shoes for the feet. They walked 
 about in the snow and mud, and over the 
 frozen ground, with bare feet. Our pastors 
 had never seen destitution like this, and it 
 made a deep impression upon them. And 
 the spiritual condition of the people is as 
 bad as the physical. In the three or four 
 monasteries surrounding the plain, there are 
 said to be fifty vartabeds, men of more or
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 45 
 
 less education. What a work they might 
 do in these seventy villages, in improving 
 the condition of the people, if they only 
 had the heart for it ! But they are in a 
 great measure responsible for this state 
 of things. They come down periodically 
 from their haunts of dissipation, and gather 
 up and carry off whatever the people can 
 spare ; and this has helped to discourage 
 the people, and repress enterprise. Tlie 
 great want notv is the pure gospel. This will 
 not only save their souls, it will give them 
 true civilization and refinement. To us 
 the people seemed ripe for the reception 
 of the truth. They are growing tired of 
 the yoke, and are beginning to murmur 
 against it. The pastors turned away from 
 Moosh Plain with the determination to in- 
 duce the Harpoot Evangelical Union, if 
 consistent with the work undertaken in 
 Koordistan, to do something for the Moosh
 
 46 GEACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 district. May the Lord strengthen them 
 for it ! " If Mr. Barnum's pen, by a more 
 vivid picturing of the poverty and degrada- 
 tion of the inhabitants of the plain below, 
 seems to dispute the pre-eminence in wretch- 
 edness of Havadoric, we must remember 
 that Mr. Barnum spent a cheerless, stormy 
 winter's week on the Plain, while Mr. Cole 
 saw the mountaineers only in their summer 
 Sunday's best. Mr. Knapp gives an inlook 
 upon an additional element of Havadoric 
 degradation. " As I sat talking with the 
 villagers about the necessity of educating 
 their sons and daughters, I noticed a couple 
 of the latter coming tugging up the exceed- 
 ingly steep mountain, each with a ponderous 
 load of brushwood and roots on her back, 
 which had been gathered on the adjoining 
 hills. As they came up, and threw their 
 loads down near my feet, an old man turned 
 round, and pointing to them, — down whose
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 47 
 
 faces the perspiration flowed, while they 
 were panting for breath, — exdaimed, ' Edu- 
 cate our daughters! Why, if we should 
 do that, who would bring our woodV'' 
 
 To the work, then, in this metropolis of 
 Turkey darkness and degradation, our mis- 
 sionary devoted himself. But hardly had 
 he reached his field when he gained his 
 most coveted prize — was he in error who 
 said missionaries always fare so ? — by get- 
 ting a first-rate wife. Visiting the city of 
 Bitlis, he met a pupil of the female sem- 
 inary, who had rejected desirable offers of 
 marriage, but, in spite of the opposition 
 of friends, at once accepted Mr. Concord- 
 ance, saying, "No matter if he is homely 
 and blind, he's a Christian; and I'll marry 
 him." 
 
 And thus, apparently, had Providence 
 not only provided him with eyes, but the 
 ignorant daughters of the village with an 
 educator.
 
 48 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 The stoiy of their labors must, of course, 
 be very brief; for Hohannes reached his 
 field late in 1868, and died March 31, 1869. 
 Mr. Knapp says of them, " They were doing 
 a great work there." Sure we may be, that 
 such a man, united to such a woman, could 
 do nothing less than a great work, even 
 when shut up in so sryiall a field of action. 
 Just how much of the striking spiritual 
 work in that village was due to their labors, 
 and how much to those of another " devot- 
 edly Christian helper," Arakial — Apostle — 
 by name, who had made his grave in that 
 stricken village, we can not say. But the 
 impress of one or both is indelibly stamped 
 upon the people. A colporter who visited 
 the place but a few days before the death 
 of Hohannes, and while he was, with his 
 characteristic earnestness, laboring to rouse 
 and enlighten the people, reported the vil- 
 lage as " a heaven on earth." Wrote Mr.
 
 ARMENIAN PRIEST.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 49 
 
 Knapp, in the same letter whose postscript 
 told of the death of Hohannes, " In that 
 village of fort}^ houses, where a few years 
 since the people were notorious for being 
 robbers and murderers, like their Koordish 
 neighbors, (how changed now ! ) there are 
 sixty just learning to read, some of whom 
 are upwards of eighty years of age." And 
 while doing his utmost for his little flock, 
 among whom his influence almost obliter- 
 ated the distinction between Armenian and 
 Protestant, he forgot not to labor for the 
 spread of the tithing principle. Writes Mr. 
 Knapp, " He earnestly besought us to throw 
 our influence in favor of the tithing system. 
 And he practiced what he preached. His 
 salary was only eight dollars a month ; and, 
 although he had a wife and a lad to support 
 from this, he gave without fail one-tenth 
 into the ' storehouse,' thus leaving seven 
 dollars and twenty cents for the monthly 
 
 4
 
 50 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 support of himself and family." When 
 seized with the fatal illness, which lasted 
 but three or four days, he at once expressed 
 the opinion that he should die, and made 
 such arrangements as he could for the future 
 comfort of his wife. Much of the time 
 on his death-bed was spent in giving counsel 
 to his little flock. So calm was he, and 
 so confident of his approaching end, that 
 he gave special directions for his burial, and 
 had himself clothed with the apparel in 
 which he wished to be interred! 
 
 When his fellow-missionary went from 
 Moosh for the burial-services, he expected, 
 that, as uniformly happens in similar cases 
 elsewhere, the Armenians would mani- 
 fest hostility. But, instead of doing so, 
 they vied with the Protestants in carrying 
 out to the letter Hohannes' particular re- 
 quests in regard to his burial ; carrying him 
 to their own cemetery^ and seeming to be as 
 genuine mourners as his own people.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 51 
 
 Such love had but four months of actual 
 labor among them inspired among tliis sim- 
 ple-hearted people ! A few months later a 
 little company, accompanied by Mr. Knapp, 
 gathered for the formation of a church 
 among them. Mr. Knapp shall tell his own 
 story of the scene. " The greatest feast of 
 good things we enjoyed in Havadoric. Our 
 own people " [of Bitlis] " had observed a 
 day of fasting and prayer for the village, 
 the villagers also observing the same day ; 
 and the presence of the Holy Spirit was 
 manifest. The worshiping congregation was 
 in tears before God, and a number were 
 converted. On the night of our arrival, we 
 called together eighteen of the most promi- 
 nent men ; and each one, in reply to the 
 question whether he desired a church to be 
 formed, rephed, ' Badvelly, I believe there 
 ought to be a church ; but / am not worthy 
 to be admitted to it.'
 
 52 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 " On a following day we spent ten hours in 
 examining twenty-two persons. Their history 
 and religious experience were exceedingly 
 interesting, and most stimulating to one's 
 piety. Their piety is characterized by si'm- 
 plicity. 
 
 " One, when brought under conviction, was 
 in great distress in view of his past life. A 
 notorious thief and robber, he with others 
 had stolen from the flocks in many villages, 
 often appropriating to himself but a small 
 portion of the slaughtered prey, leaving the 
 rest to be devoured by wild beasts. In one 
 of the prayer-meetings he stated this fact, 
 saying it would take half the village was 
 worth to replace what he had stolen, and 
 with tearful entreaty seeking forgiveness. 
 Tl>3y promptly replied, ' Brother, we most 
 cheerfully forgive you. Go to the other vil- 
 lages, and confess your thefts and seek for- 
 giveness ; and if they demand restitution, as
 
 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 53 
 
 you are poor, we will help you pay the debt.' 
 Another said he had defrauded government 
 of taxes to the amount of five piasters (twenty 
 cents), and he did not find forgiveness from 
 God until he resolved to refund the amount. 
 
 " One of two brothers, partners in business, 
 had stolen a sheep from a Turk fifteen years 
 ago. When brought under conviction, he 
 went and confessed the theft ; but the haughty 
 Turk would not forgive him on his restoring 
 the sheep, but demanded what would have 
 accrued as the product of that sheep during 
 the fifteen years. In great distress, he went 
 and confessed all to his brother also, and 
 asked what he should do. The brother 
 replied, ' Let us pray over it ; and, if the 
 Turk adhere to his demand, we must refund 
 the whole as he requires.' 
 
 " They prayed, after which the man again 
 sought forgiveness ; and, to his happy sur- 
 prise, the Turk released him on his paying 
 the sheep."
 
 64 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 SufSce it to say that a church of nine male 
 and two female members was formed, the 
 " delegates " from abroad being " surprised at 
 the simplicity of faith and strength of Chris- 
 tian character of the two latter." "And 
 now " — April, 1870 — " seventeen houses, 
 or one hundred and fifty souls, in the village, 
 are Protestant; and the whole village, five 
 persons excepted, are persuaded of the truth. 
 Of the Protestants, sixteen promise tithes to 
 the Lord. All the male members of the 
 church but one give tithes." 
 
 "Well might Mr. Knapp add, " What a 
 change has come over this village of Hava- 
 doric ! " and " the 28th " of April, 1870, "was, 
 I think, the happiest day of my life." 
 
 In the autumn of 1871 Mr. Cole of Erz- 
 room visited the place with Mr. Knapp, when 
 a simple epitaph was engraved to his memory 
 upon the flat stone that marks the grave of 
 Ilohannes, of whom he remarks, " The noble
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 55 
 
 man seems to have left his imprint on the 
 village." " Those," says he, " were happy- 
 days that we spent among that poverty- 
 stricken people. We found them so earnest, 
 so rich in faith, many of them, that we 
 thought little of the surroundings. The 
 sabbath, what a precious day it was to us all ! 
 A full house of such eager, earnest listeners 
 — who could help preaching the gospel to 
 them ! Their very presence seemed to be 
 mouth, tongue, utterance, to the speaker. 
 
 " Of the three exercises of the day, one 
 most of all touched my heart, and that 
 because of a smgle incident, which, perhaps 
 better than any thing else, illustrates the 
 utter poverty of the people. One of the 
 eighteen members of the church presented 
 his young babe for the seal of the covenant. 
 It was too much. The tears went coursing 
 down my cheeks in spite of me. I thought 
 of the English consul's little boy, whom we
 
 56 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 had recently baptized in Erzroom, of tlie ele- 
 gant baptismal robe that had come all the 
 way from England to grace the occasion. 
 
 " But here was a son of the faith, whose 
 sole costume would hardly be considered a fit 
 contribution to the kitchen mop in the West- 
 ern world, — a mere bundle of old tattered 
 rags! Thank God, I said, their robes will 
 be all one ' up there.' " 
 
 True, brother, and yet not true. We 
 query whether, " up there," some of these 
 humble ones, with the poor blind man who 
 "pointed the way" thither, will not wear 
 richer robes and brighter crowns than many 
 of the great ones of the earth. 
 
 God does not set his jewels here. 
 Earth's shming ore, treasure of worldly great, 
 Wherewith bedecked they walk in pride abroad, 
 Will be but pavement for the gorgeous courts, 
 Where, freed from all which weights and clogs them 
 here,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 57 
 
 Clothed iu the forms of heaven's own lusfrous life, 
 
 Endowed with affluence all unknown on earth, 
 
 And robed in raiment brighter than the light, 
 
 His chosen ones shall walk erect with him, 
 
 The difference all " discerned " 
 
 ' Twixt those who serve him, those who serve him 
 
 not. 
 When earth, with all its pomp and power and pride, 
 Shall fade and sink in the great final fire. 
 His own, his jewels, spared from every harm. 
 Who, scorned of men, oft to each other spake, 
 Who prayed and toiled in pain and weakness here, 
 Winning the wandering to the way of life, 
 Shall shine as stars for ever and for ever. 
 Their glorious setting then shall be 
 The glittering crown upon the head of Him 
 Who bought them with his blood.
 
 58 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 III. 
 
 BLIND DONABED. 
 
 OOME eight years since, a poor blind 
 beggar in Hoghi — there are multitudes 
 of such in this land — was induced to attend 
 a Bible-class opened by the Protestant 
 pastor, and to commit to memory some 
 verses of Scripture. Not long after, he 
 obtained a copy of a primer for the blind, 
 which he soon mastered ; and purchased all 
 the books which were to be found in Arme- 
 nian in that character, — the thirty-fourth 
 and eighty-sixth Psalms, and the third chap- 
 ter of John. 
 
 It was soon proved by practical illustra- 
 tion, that " the entrance of thy words giveth 
 light: it giveth understanding unto the
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 69 
 
 simple." Though now the poor blind man 
 has Matthew entire to read, and has good 
 ear acquaintance with many parts of the 
 Bible, it is deeply interesting to hear him 
 give enthusiastic expression to his love for 
 those " two psalms," which liis fingers first 
 read. " More to be desired are they than 
 gold, yea, than much fine gold, sweeter also 
 than honey and the honeycomb," seems 
 to him almost too tame to tell the precious- 
 ness of those two chapters. He soon 
 " tasted, and saw that the Lord is good, and 
 blessed is the man that trusteth in him." 
 
 Our first acquaintance with him was at a 
 visit to Hoghi, some four years since, when, 
 in a prayer-meeting, our attention was 
 attracted to his earnest and really eloquent 
 prayer, in which he was specially drawn out 
 for the missionaries, that God by his Spirit 
 would " sustain, comfort, and cheer those 
 who, for his sake, have left home, country.
 
 60 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 and friends, and in their loneliness need so 
 much that comfort which comes from on 
 high." 
 
 We began to query whether here might 
 not be a successor to " Blind John Concor- 
 dance." 
 
 Having, by inquiry, satisfied ourselves of 
 the integrity of his Christian character, we, 
 a year afterwards, admitted him to the 
 normal school. At the door of the school 
 a difiiculty arose. With a face full of 
 sorrow, he informed us that he was thirty 
 piasters (11.25) in debt. His begging in- 
 come, less the tithes paid into the Lord's 
 treasur}*, had been less by this amount than 
 Lis expenses for the year past. 
 
 A " farewell begging-tour " of ten min- 
 utes, taken by our leave among ourselves, 
 settled that matter; and he entered the 
 school free from debt, receiving for his 
 support four cents a day from the missionary
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 61 
 
 treasury. Let no one exclaim against the 
 meanness of this sum, till informed, that 
 having lived upon it for six months, and 
 spent the succeeding winter vacation in 
 labor on a salary of two dollars per month, 
 he, the following year, gave up in despair, 
 and went back to self-support at his old 
 trade, when told, that, fearing students lived 
 too poorly on their allowance, we had de- 
 cided to feed them at a table of our own 
 providing. " During the past year his four 
 cents a day had sufficed for food and shoes ; 
 and what should he do now for shoes ? " 
 
 Let no one here propose to condemn him 
 for going back again to begging, which is in 
 this land a usual and honorable profession 
 for " enlightened men." 
 
 But our candidate is back again, having 
 meantime fared better than did poor John 
 Concordance, by getting a wife with a fair 
 amount of brains plus one eye, and who has
 
 62 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 been received to the female seminary. 
 Protestant Christian blind men have a pros- 
 pect of faring better matrimonially than 
 have their predecessors. Whether this one 
 will prove to be a worthy successor of him 
 of Mashldr, we know not. Sure we are, that 
 while, like him, he will, by the mere fact of 
 his loss of sight, find access to some else 
 inaccessible, and while, by his simple, earnest 
 piety, he will be fitted to do good, he is not, 
 like John, a semi-son of thunder, and so 
 can not make the stir in the world which 
 he did. 
 
 Should he, a thing not improbable, finally 
 prove himself unsuited for systematic evan- 
 gelistic labor, and backslide into his old 
 business, sure I am that the comparatively 
 insignificant sum sj^ent on his Bible training 
 will pay as a missionary investment; for, 
 going with open mouth as he did, from 
 Marash on the south, to the Anti-Taiu-us
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 63 
 
 range on the north, he can not fail to drop 
 much precious gospel seed, some of which 
 must fall into good ground. He now goes 
 out, with a salary increased to five dollars, 
 to labor for a time, perhaps permanently, in 
 Komk, one of the wickedest towns ariong 
 the many wicked ones in our mission-fiel i. 
 
 We ask on his behalf the prayers of each. 
 Christian reader.
 
 64 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 IV. 
 
 THE VICTORIOUS BAKER. 
 
 OOME twelve years ago, when the doc- 
 trines and demands of the newly arrived 
 gospel were in the mouths of many who had 
 it not, — and in this way Christ was practi- 
 cally preached by many who were experiment- 
 ally ignorant of him, — a baker in Yegheki, 
 Melcone by name, became roused to the 
 question, whether it was not his duty to 
 keep the sabbath holy, and liis privilege to 
 enjoy one day of rest in seven. 
 
 Calling upon a priest to decide the ques- 
 tion, he was at first informed that to bake 
 and sell bread on the sabbath is sin ; and 
 then, again, changing sides, the priest com- 
 forted him by saying, " It is lawful to do
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 65 
 
 good on the sabbatli day ; and baking is a 
 good and necessary work." The command, 
 " Remember the sabbath day to keep it 
 hoi}*," still ringing in his ears, he called 
 upon a second priest, who assured him that 
 he was doing no wrong. But, as he says, 
 the more men said, " Go on with your bak- 
 ing," the more it appeared to him that he 
 must conform literally to God's command ; 
 and he decided to close his bakery on the 
 sabbath. Feeling that in so doing he had 
 done a good thing, he had a not unnatural 
 feeling of satisfaction, slightly tinged with 
 Phariseeism. In these circumstances, he one 
 day found in a neighbor's house a primer, 
 which, as he saj^s, " opened of itself to the 
 passage," which, after much effort, he spelled 
 out, " ' Be thou in the fear of the Lord all 
 the day long.' " He had supposed his duty 
 all done, and himself safe, in stopping bread- 
 baking on the sabbath ; but here was a new 
 
 5
 
 66 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 command, which at once condemned him as 
 a sinner. Borrowing the little book, he 
 conned it day after day in search of more 
 light, and at length decided to go at once to 
 the fountain head, by purchasing the Prot- 
 estant Testament. This done, he trem- 
 blingly went to the neighboring town of 
 Mezereh, and to the newly opened Protestant 
 place of worship there. 
 
 Ere long he had courage to visit the 
 Protestant preacher in his own town, and 
 finally to attend a meeting there on the sab- 
 bath. Spies, whom the priests kept on the 
 watch, at once reported the fact ; and when, 
 at evening, he appeared in church, his name 
 was read on the list of those whom the 
 priest cursed for adhering to the Protestants, 
 forbidding all persons to speak to, or to have 
 any dealings with, them. 
 
 This was just the thing needed to make 
 him decide, once for all, to waver no Ion-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 67 
 
 ger. He at once rose and went forward, 
 and demanded by what right these curses 
 were heaped upon him for reading a book 
 which differs in no respect from the Tes- 
 tament on the altar, except in being in 
 the modern, spoken tongue. And, having 
 shown that the priest had been acting con- 
 trary to the spirit of their own Scriptures, 
 he added, " Though I was not a Protestant, 
 I become such now. I go out of the church- 
 doors, and write upon them that I belong 
 here no longer." And he was as good as his 
 word. Henceforth he adhered to the little 
 company of despised, persecuted ones. And 
 now began his trials in the effort to keep 
 the sabbath. Those who would gladly have 
 had him close his bakery on the sabbath, 
 that their own trade might increase, resolved 
 now to prevent it, and complained of him as 
 a person who caused the people inconven- 
 ience by closing his bakery one day in seven.
 
 68 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 He was summoned before the pasha, and 
 commanded to keep his shop open on all 
 days. He pleaded his Christian faith as a 
 reason ft)r declining, but was told that other 
 Christians baked and sold bread on the sab- 
 bath, and he must do so. He was cast into 
 prison, and retained there a day, but, remain- 
 ing immovable, was finally discharged ; the 
 pasha concluding to let him have his own 
 way. Another and another effort was made 
 through successive pashas, with the same 
 result, till at length, after a four-years' 
 struggle, his enemies joined hands for a final 
 effort, and he was summoned before the coun- 
 cil, and bidden in the most peremptory man- 
 ner to keep his bakery open permanently. 
 His answer was prompt and decisive. Tell- 
 ing them that his religion forbade him to con- 
 tinue his usual occupation on God's day, he 
 added, " Though all the world unite in effort 
 to compel me to violate my conscience, and I
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 69 
 
 be forced to beg my bread ; though you beat 
 me, imprison me, and even take off my head, 
 — I shall be of the same mind. I wiU not 
 profane the sabbath." — " Close your bakery 
 then," they replied. " Give me a paper," he 
 replied, " certifj'ing that you compel me to 
 do this because of my adherence to my faith, 
 so that all persons may know the reason of 
 my punishment, and I will do as you bid." 
 They decUning to do this, he returned to his 
 bakery, and took his seat upon the elevated 
 platform from which customers are supplied, 
 ready to continue his business, but was soon 
 followed by an officer, wlio bade him close 
 his doors, and surrender the keys. " Here I 
 sit, and shall sit till removed by force," was 
 his reply. The officer, astonished at courage 
 so unusual, returned for further instructions 
 from his superiors, who said, " You need 
 not use force." He returned, and said to 
 Melcone, " Bake on : I am instructed to let
 
 70 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 you alone." And from that clay to this his 
 victory has been complete. Nobody now 
 imagines that he can be compelled to bake 
 or sell bread on the sabbath. 
 
 When the same officer was sent to com- 
 mand some butchers to keep open shop on 
 the sabbath, and they began to plead consci- 
 entious scruples, he replied, " You'll not get 
 off by that sort of easy, timid talk. If jou 
 expect to succeed, you must, like Melcone 
 the baker, take your lives in your hands, and 
 say, ' We will not.' " Hearing of Melcone's 
 success, the Armenian bakers resolved to 
 follow his example. 
 
 But the stuff reformers are made of was 
 not in them. Summoned before the pasha, 
 and attempting to plead conscientious scru- 
 ples, they encountered only ridicule. " You 
 talk of conscience ! " exclaimed the ruler, — 
 " you who manifest such scruples nowhere 
 else. Melcone shows clearly by all his con-
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 71 
 
 duct that he has a conscience ; and you, that 
 you are only pretending to have one. Stop 
 your foolish talk, and get you to your work ; 
 and, if I have any more trouble from you, 
 you shall be suitably punished." 
 
 To their work they went, and gave the 
 pasha no more trouble. 
 
 Melcone is now the chief baker in this city, 
 and known by all as a God-fearing man. 
 
 And he is no less bold and uncompromis- 
 ing in practical Christian work, ready to do 
 for Christ whatever his hand finds to do. 
 
 Would that all Christians, like him, hav- 
 ing succeeded in getting new-comers into the 
 house of God on the sabbath, would, like 
 him, at the close of service, take them aside 
 to talk and pray with them in hope of sav- 
 ingly impressing their minds with the truth 
 they have heard. 
 
 With even a few such faithful, earnest 
 workers in every church, the millennial day 
 would not long delay its dawning.
 
 72 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 • V. 
 
 CRITICISM DISARMED. 
 
 rriHE man who disarmed it was one who, 
 in all preliminary action, threatened to 
 make himself its victim ; but he is first to be 
 introduced to the reader. 
 
 Some score of years ago, a boy in Diar- 
 bekir, Geragose by name, and called, from his 
 father's business, Hoharrarian, (son of the) 
 " Cook," attached himself to the gospel party. 
 
 Such was his father's rage on hearing the 
 fact, that, seizing his carving-knife, he ran 
 to seek his son, declaring he would kill him 
 on the spot. Fleeing to the house of the 
 missionary, the boy lay concealed till his 
 father's wrath had sufficiently subsided to 
 allow him to come forth. The father died
 
 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 73 
 
 not long after ; and in due time the son, 
 grown now to manhood, and desiring to 
 enter the ministry, appeared at the door of 
 our Harpoot Tlieological Seminary, and was 
 admitted ; his wife also entering the female 
 seminary. With a personal appearance not 
 very prepossessing, his face quite badly 
 pitted by small-pox, and a somewhat hesitat- 
 ing utterance, he excited no brilliant hopes 
 for his future. As a scholar, he was not 
 above the average ; and when he entered 
 on his senior year, and began sermonizing, he 
 discouraged his teacher by the apparent lack 
 of definite thought in his " plans." This 
 was specially true when he was about to 
 prepare a written sermon for criticism, and 
 presented a plan on Exod. xvii. 5, 6 : " And 
 the Lord said unto Moses, Go on before the 
 people, and take with thee of the elders of 
 Israel ; and thy rod, wherewith thou smotest 
 the river, take in thine hand, and go. Be-
 
 74 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 hold, I will stand before thee there upon the 
 rock in Horeb ; and thou shalt smite the 
 rock, and there shall come water out of it 
 that the people may drink." 
 
 In vain did I endeavor to gather from his 
 " plan '" what he purposed to do with this 
 strilving text, and at last frankly told him I 
 feared he would " make nothing of it " in 
 writing, unless he succeeded better in putting 
 on paper the ideas which he proposed to 
 amplify. Confident, however, that he could 
 say at length what he could not in brief, he 
 went to work, and in due time presented 
 himself before his critics, his teacher and 
 fellow-students, with a sermon in which he 
 set forth in a clear, striking, forcible style, 
 the work of the ministry, that of guiding 
 and feeding the flock, under three heads : 
 (1) Man's part, " Go thou, take the rod, 
 smite the rock ; " (2) God's part, " I will 
 stand before thee upon the rock ; and (3)
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 75 
 
 the result, — " There shall come water out 
 of it." 
 
 " This result is sure to follow when the 
 antecedent conditions have been comphed 
 with ; and, if it follow not, either God is 
 false to his promise, or we to our duty. 
 Mere going is not enough ; nor is it sufficient 
 to take the rod : we must smites and when 
 and where God bids us. 
 
 " How solemn the responsibility of stand- 
 ing thus, with God before us, ready to bless 
 or curse, according as we do, or fail to do, as 
 he has bidden us ! " As he went on, open- 
 ing up and enforcing these ideas, one by one 
 the critics' pencils dropped from their hands; 
 and when, at last, he dwelt upon the awful 
 guilt of the unsuccessful minister, and the 
 blessedness of the privilege of being, with 
 God's help, a successful one, opening foun- 
 tains of living water for thirsty, perishing 
 souls, tears stood in all eyes. Teacher and
 
 76 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 pupils alike felt that we were in the pres- 
 ence of God, and, instead of criticising the 
 preacher, needed to look to our own case. 
 
 And when, at length, the usual criticisms 
 were called for, "It is a good sermon : let 
 us pray," was the only response. 
 
 Criticism had been disarmed in the most 
 effectual way, by making all feel that God 
 was in that place, ready to bring us all into 
 judgment.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 77 
 
 VI. 
 
 LITTLE GREGORY. 
 
 "Vr EARLY twenty years ago Mr. Dun- 
 more, then a missionary at Diarberkir, 
 a city on the Tigris, spent a night at Har- 
 poot. 
 
 The news soon reached the market-place, 
 and spread from shop to shop ; for in those 
 days a Frank was a new wonder in this city. 
 The people soon learned that the stranger 
 was a " missionary," one of the " wolves in 
 sheep's clothing " that had, "in these latter 
 days," begun to prowl about the Christian 
 folds. The pious and vigilant gave an omi- 
 nous shake of the head, made the sign of 
 the cross oftener, and passed their beads 
 through their fingers with greater rapidity^
 
 78 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 an evidence that they were fully aware of 
 approaching danger. 
 
 Doubtless the shepherds warned then* 
 flocks, and commanded that all precautions 
 should be taken, weak places strengthened, 
 and the feeble ones helped out of danger's 
 reach. Fathers carried the news to their 
 homes, and kept strict watch there, lest 
 some of their grown sons should be found 
 outside after nightfall, and thus become a 
 prey to the dreaded foe. Mothers listened 
 with hushed voices, and pressed their little 
 ones to their bosoms, lest some baleful influ- 
 ence should reach them even within their 
 home-circles. The grandmothers, too, were 
 all at church next morning, and forgot their 
 gossip and match-making during the service, 
 while, with unusual devoutness, they made 
 the sign of the cross on their breasts, and 
 many genuflexions of bending, bowing, kneel- 
 ing, and kissing the floor, which ' is their
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 79 
 
 yergur-hakootune (earth-kissing) ; or, as we 
 should say, worship. They believed all they 
 had heard about these "destroyers of the 
 religion of their fathers." This man was a 
 real specimen of the " infidel Protes." He 
 would have great influence over all who 
 ventured near him. If even one should 
 touch his books, or drink sherbet ^ with him, 
 he would become dazed, and an apostate 
 from the religion of his ancestors. 
 
 In spite of all these precautions, a few 
 sought out the stranger, and among them a 
 little tailor, who was from a neighboring 
 village. Was it because he had no father or. 
 mother near to watch over him ? We know 
 not ; but we do know that he will bless God 
 throughout eternity for what he obtained 
 from the despised missionary. He did not 
 rush forward, and demand that the mission- 
 ary prove his new doctrines. No : he was a 
 * A sweet drink.
 
 80 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. ^ 
 
 timid, shrinking youth, and listened in 
 silence. When those who had come in left, 
 he politel}' asked for a Testament, and, pay- 
 ing for and putting it in his bosom, went out. 
 
 Thus one little seed was sown that was to 
 take root in good ground, and bring forth 
 much fruit. 
 
 I feel very sure that you will all be inter- 
 ested to watch it, and see how God watered 
 it, till it burst forth into such a beautiful, 
 comely tree, that others sought to rest under 
 its shadow. A few years passed ; and we 
 find this same young tailor, with several 
 others, gathered into a class in Harpoot, and 
 receiving daily instruction from the mission- 
 aries, who are now not mere sojourners, but 
 permanently settled here. You will notice 
 him at once ; for his face is radiant and 
 earnest, and his bearing polite. But you will 
 see he is the same diffident young man that 
 we met at the room of the. missionary. A
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 81 
 
 lady enters the room. Oriental politeness 
 does not require him to rise, unless she is an 
 aged lady ; but at once he is on his feet, and 
 needs not to be told that Occidental polite- 
 ness requires it ; for his politeness is " love 
 manifested in a loving manner." In 1859 a 
 school for preparing young men for the min- 
 istry was opened at Harpoot ; and the " little 
 tailor," whom we henceforth called Little 
 Krekore (Gregory), entered with seventeen 
 others. Among this first class were some of 
 greater ability as scholars, but none that 
 seemed to come so near to the likeness of 
 the "beloved apostle." He graduated with 
 honor, yes, more, with the love of all his 
 classmates ; which is as rare a thing in the 
 East as in the West. 
 
 He was immediately called to labor in 
 Ichmeh, a large village about twenty miles 
 east from Harpoot. 
 
 He had spent one of his winter vacations 
 
 6
 
 82 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 there while in the seminary ; and the people 
 were all in love with him. Many who would 
 not receive his new doctrines were pleased 
 with his kind, polite, Christian bearing. A 
 prominent lady was induced by her son, who 
 had become a Protestant, to attend one of 
 his evening meetings. She was unwilling to 
 offend her brother-in-law, who opposed this 
 new faith : so she crept along under a high 
 wall that separated his shop from the street 
 that led to the little Protestant chapel, and 
 thus entered for the first time ; but it was 
 not to be the last. Like the " little tailor,*' 
 she heard things there that touched her 
 heart, if they did not daze her brain ; and 
 ^'I couldn't stay away," was her answer 
 when asked why she went. The little 
 Primer became from that day her daily com- 
 panion. It could be found on her table 
 when she kneaded the bread, or under the 
 cushion near her wheel. She was ever ready
 
 GRACE ILLTISTKATED. 83 
 
 now for her lesson when her elder son came 
 in from his Avork, or a younger one came 
 from school. 
 
 Soon this whole house, of some fifty souls, 
 was won over to " Krekore's side," and was 
 an acquisition worth having. Some of its 
 members were to be real pillars in Christ's 
 church here; and Hach Hatoon (Lady 
 Cross), who was the first to learn to read 
 among the women, was to be a real " mother iil 
 Israel." Soon one of the priests of the village 
 became uneasy. Secretly he bought a Bible ; 
 and after his children were all sleeping for 
 the night, and the outer door bolted, he drew 
 it forth from its hiding-place, and read to his 
 wife some of its, to them, new truths. " We 
 read and wept together," said the wife ; " and 
 the more we read, the sweeter it grew, and 
 the wider our eyes were opened. We looked 
 on our sleeping children, and knew, that, if 
 what we had been doing should be known,
 
 84 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 we should soon be without the bread to fill 
 their mouths. We carefully concealed the 
 Bible : but night after night we continued our 
 reading till we could endure it no longer ; 
 and I said to my husband, ' Emmanuel, we 
 will act as the Bible tells us to, even if, hand 
 in hand, we must beg our bread from door to 
 door.' " They were shunned, persecuted, 
 snowballed, and cursed ; but, with " Little 
 Krekore " to strengthen them, they were 
 firm. The time had now come to unite the 
 disciples into a church ; and the " beloved 
 teacher," as they had hitherto called Kre- 
 kore, was to be their pastor. The chapel 
 was small ; but it could be enlarged a little 
 by removing a partition. 
 
 A joyful crowd gathered, and among them 
 the missionary teachers, and the classmates 
 of Krekore. He was the first one from the 
 Harpoot seminary to be inducted into the 
 ofiice of the ministry. His chapel was a
 
 GRACE ILLTJSTEATED. 85 
 
 very mean building with mud walls ; and his 
 house was so small, that one of the mission- 
 aries gave it the undignified name of " mouse- 
 hole." We never knew him to falter but 
 once ; and then the missionaries voted to ask 
 his people to take more of his salary upon 
 themselves. He felt that they would not. 
 His wife was an invalid ; and he lacked almost 
 every thing that makes home comfortable. 
 The people had not then learned to give, or 
 to think of their pastor's wants, as they now 
 do. Washing-day found no tubs ; and once 
 Krekore, coming in, found his wife in tears. 
 Like some other ministers' wives, she did not 
 always find it so pleasant to borrow, even 
 though everybody was pleased with the 
 minister. He said, " Martha, don't weep. 
 If God sees it best for us to have these 
 things, he will surely send them." Not 
 many days after, a brother came from Har- 
 poot, bringing just the needed vessels, — a
 
 86 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 copper boiler and tub. Pastor Krekore met 
 this brother in tlie street, and came back 
 with quick steps to his house, saying, " Look 
 here, Martha : did I not tell you these would 
 come in God's time ? " 
 
 He felt the need of some books ; but how 
 should he get them ? They would cost two 
 or three months' salary ; and he could ill 
 afford so much at once. He thought it all 
 over, and then went to a brother, and asked 
 if he could lend him the money, and receive 
 his pay in small sums. " You can only live 
 on your salary now ; and how can you save 
 for the books ? Here, take this, and get the 
 books you need." The twenty dollars were 
 soon in the hand of the missionary, and the 
 books ordered. 
 
 He was npt content with the office of 
 pastor, but, like a faithful shepherd, Iniew 
 all about his sheep. Even the lambs were 
 not afraid of him.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 87 
 
 He tauglit tlie women, old and young, to 
 read, and opened a weekly meeting for tliem ; 
 for his wife was too mucli an invalid to help 
 him in this. He was so kind to his wife, 
 that the women said he must be a good man ; 
 and thus he won them over to his INIaster 
 and theirs. And some came to care for 
 the invalid wife who would not speak to her 
 or answer a question. One woman said, " I 
 used to fill my ears with cotton, so that I 
 could not hear what you said, I was so afraid 
 you would make a Prote of me ; but I 
 could not see you suffer, and that kind little 
 man wait on you alone." But a better day 
 was dawning for him who could always trust 
 in God, and wait his time. The old chapel 
 was full to overflowLDg, and the people felt 
 that they must " arise and build ; " and, with 
 some help from the missionaries, they bailt 
 a large, commodious church, very plain, but, 
 when finished, as good as is needed. The
 
 88 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 " mouse-hole," too, has given place to a nice 
 house of five rooms, and a nice court. 
 
 Many things are still needed to make this 
 house all that we can wish for this good man 
 and wife ; but God will send them all in his 
 own good time. The people are independent, 
 and hard to manage ; but God raised up this 
 patient, polite, lo"\dng Christian man for this 
 place. The church and community are both 
 growing ; and we can see no reason why all 
 of the nominally Christian inhabitants of 
 Ichmeh should not become Protestants from 
 the influence of this young man. Would 
 that the lone missionary who sold him the 
 Testament could come and see the results 
 with his own eyes ! But he has been called 
 to a higher service, and perhaps will receive 
 the joyful news from Pastor Krekore himself, 
 when they meet in some one of the " many 
 mansions " in our Father's house.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 89 
 
 VII. 
 
 SEED BY THE WAYSIDE. 
 
 "IVTOT siDii'itually did it tlius /a?Z, to be 
 devoured by fowls of the air ; but liter- 
 ally, and with intent, w^as it thus cast, and it 
 sprung up, and yielded a rich harvest. In 
 1860, when the village of Ichmeh was first 
 occupied as a missionary out-station, a per- 
 son passing through the village on horse- 
 back called out to a company of men by the 
 roadside, " A new missionary is going to 
 preach in the Protestant chapel, go and 
 hear him ; " and passed on his way, to learn, 
 years subsequently, the influence of that one 
 word. One from among the crowd started 
 for the chapel, when all broke forth in a 
 storm of ridicule against " the man who was
 
 90 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 turning Prote." "I am not such, and don't 
 propose to be," replied he. " But I am free 
 to go where I please ; and, as you try to 
 prevent me, I shall surely go and hear that 
 man preach." 
 
 He went, and continued to go, never 
 again going to the Armenian Church. And 
 he not only became a Protestant, but a sin- 
 cere Christian, and a j)illar in the church. 
 Of his three sons, the eldest, Bedros, had 
 become a Protestant before his father, and 
 borne bitter persecution from him. They 
 all became Christians ; and two of them, 
 preachers, graduating at Harpoot Theologi- 
 cal Seminary. Bedros ("Peter") did not, 
 while in the seminary, excite very brilliant 
 hopes for his future. His success as a stu- 
 dent was below the average ; and, when he 
 began to preach written sermons for criti- 
 cism, we came near feeling that we had lost 
 our labor, that his efforts would not repay
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 91 
 
 the interest of the money invested in edu- 
 cating him. By some who esteemed them- 
 selves, and were esteemed by us, hopeful 
 candidates, we were blamed for bringing 
 reproach on the seminary by retaining such 
 men in it. But, while he failed to write 
 sermons fit to criticise (the very idea of criti- 
 cism seeming to frighten away his clear, con- 
 nected thoughts, if he had any), he had two 
 redeeming traits, which induced us to be 
 patient to the end, and allow him to gradu- 
 ate. He had spent his winter vacations in 
 Aghansi, a village upon Harpoot plain, in 
 which a hopeful spiritual work had opened. 
 
 These two traits — plain, homely common- 
 sense, enabling him to adapt himself to all 
 classes of persons, and a burning zeal to lead 
 men to Christ — had won at once the hearts 
 of many of the simple-minded people ; and 
 we felt that such a man should not, because 
 of a little dullness in the class-room, be dis-
 
 02 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 missed to his saw, hammer, and planes. 
 The result justified our decision. Called at 
 graduation to go with his wife, a kindred 
 spirit, to a hard district of our mission-field, 
 he at once joyfully accepted; his only regret 
 being, that he could not continue the good 
 work begun in Aghansi, where the people, 
 who, but a short time before, had in vain 
 striven to drive him from their town, now 
 even more earnestly desired his coming, 
 pledging a part of his sup^Dort from the first. 
 Located in Horhor, an Armenian town in 
 the midst of the Koordish mountains, some 
 eighty miles north-east from Harpoot, he had 
 about him, within a radius of thirty miles, a 
 large and almost totally benighted popula- 
 tion of Armenians and Koords, among whom, 
 for the space of a little less than four 
 years, he labored with the zeal of a Paul, 
 seeking by all means to win some to Christ. 
 And it was a peculiarity of his labors, that,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 93 
 
 while tliey did not result in large accessions 
 to the nominally Protestant ranks, most who 
 were won were won to Christ. His was a 
 weeping, as well as earnest, ministry. He 
 spent hours in praying and weeping over 
 special cases of persons whom he felt that he 
 must see in the kingdom. 
 
 One " thorn," for the removal of which he 
 besought the Lord more than thrice, were 
 two brothers in Horhor, the only nominal 
 adherents of the gospel at his arrival there, 
 but who he felt, and felt truly, were mere 
 Protestants, not Christians. They felt that 
 they were safe, and were loud mouthed in 
 proclaiming the excellences of the new sys- 
 tem ; while, by their worldly-mindedness, 
 covetousness, and dislike of Bedros' plain, 
 searching preaching, they proclaimed them- 
 selves strangers to the power of the gospel. 
 Never did we visit him in his mountain 
 home, without bringing away cheer from
 
 94 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 some story of the hopeful conversion of some 
 one for whom he had been praying and 
 laboring. It was his pleasure to guide " old 
 Sarah " of Temran to Christ, after she had 
 been intellectually won to the truth. Among 
 others in Horhor for whose conversion he 
 labored and prayed specially was an aged 
 man.- At last the poor old man was taken 
 suddenly ill, and at midnight sent for Be- 
 dros, who, going at once, found him dead, 
 with his Testament opened, and marked at the 
 text, " Come unto me, all ye that labor and 
 are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 
 His converts caught something of his spirit ; 
 and we hear of one of them, who, having 
 labored to lead a fellow-traveler to the 
 truth, at length knelt and praj^ed with him 
 by the roadside, and at rising threw his arms 
 about him, exclaiming, " Oh, I do so much 
 wish to see you a Christian ! " 
 
 He won throughout all the district the
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 95 
 
 name of being a saint ; and many who pro- 
 fess to hate Protestantism bear witness 
 that there was one Cliristian among them. 
 " Bedros," say they, " was a truly good man. 
 He was what he professed to be." He was 
 specially careful to consecrate a portion of 
 his earnings to the Lord's treasury, and from 
 his salary of ninety-six dollars per annum, 
 he, with a family of seven to support, paid 
 tithes for Christian work ; though we may as 
 well acknowledge, that, when his tithes fell 
 into our hands, we indirectly turned them 
 back into the treasury of the giver, as the 
 man engaged in the most Christian work we 
 could find, and most in need of the money. 
 Of his four sons, too, he consecrated the 
 two brightest to the special service of Christ 
 in his ministry, saying, " He shall have the 
 best." In like manner, his first-born daugh- 
 ter was specially set apart for "Christ to 
 use in some way in his ministry." These
 
 96 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 three, lie felt, must have a good education 
 to fit them for tlieir work ; and he trained 
 them as if he expected the consecration to 
 be accepted. 
 
 And lie not only taught, but lived, the 
 gospel before them. He always seemed full 
 of Christ and his precious work, loving to 
 talk of nothing else. He, with more right 
 than any one else among our Christian labor- 
 ers, might have uttered the sentiments of 
 the hymn, — 
 
 " My Jesus shall still be my theme 
 While on this earth I stay: 
 I'll sing my Jesus' lovely name, 
 When all things else decay. 
 
 When I appear in yonder cloud, 
 With all his favored throng, 
 Then will I sing more sweet, more loud; 
 And Christ shall be my song. ' ' 
 
 And such, we doubt not, he is now. The 
 Master at length removed the " thorn; " and
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 97 
 
 in Bedros' last letter to us, dated July, 1873, 
 he tells his joy in the hopeful conversion 
 and happy death of one of the two " Prot- 
 estants " of Horhor, and the changed appear- 
 ance of the other, tind of the happy death 
 of one of his sabbath-school scholars. 
 
 Shortly after, he made a missionary visit 
 to Hopoos, a hostile town in which we have 
 for years vainly tried to locate a preacher. 
 Whether he there had unusual excitement 
 and hardship, we know not ; but he returned 
 with fever upon him, which at once assumed 
 the typhus form, and ended his life in a 
 week. He at the first told his wife he 
 should die, and was happy in the thought of 
 going, and assured her that the widow's and 
 orphan's God would care for her and the 
 little ones ; and to him he commended them. 
 There was little time for dying testimony; 
 for the dread fever speedily asserted its full 
 power ; and happily there was no need of it.
 
 98 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 His had been an unmistakable life-witness. 
 And, while he lay u^Don his death-bed in 
 Horhor, his father was, in like manner, pros- 
 trated in Ichmeh, having, like the son, 
 though in a diiferent sf)de, borne testimony 
 to the power of the gospel. Neither, proba- 
 bly, knew here of the other's illness, which 
 they first learned from each other's lips in 
 that world where " there shall be no more 
 death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither 
 shall there be any more pain ; for the former 
 things are passed away." 
 
 " Who shall weep when the righteous die? 
 Who shall mourn when the good depart? 
 When the soul of the godly away shall fly, 
 Who shall lay the loss to heart? " 
 
 " He has gone in peace; he has laid him down 
 To sleep tiU the dawn of a brighter day; 
 And he shaU wake on that holy morn, 
 When sorrow and sighing shall flee away."
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 99 
 
 VIII. 
 
 DEACON HAGOP. 
 
 TN the Orient 'tis sometimes hard to tell 
 by which of his many names to call a 
 man, who, like our deacon Hagop (" Jacob "), 
 is an immigrant, has a trade, and happens 
 to have seen Jerusalem, and won the title 
 of Mahdesi (" seer of the death "), or its 
 equivalent Turkish, Haji ("pilgrim "). Thus 
 the deacon was knoAvn as Mahdesi and Haji 
 Hagop, Hagop of Maden, (the place from 
 which he emigrated to Harpoot), Saatji 
 (" watchmaker ") Hagop, Haji Agha (" pil- 
 grim, esquire "), a name given by his friends 
 to any one, Armenian or Turk, who has seen 
 Jerusalem or Mecca, and lastly, in old age, 
 as Deacon Hagop, and Haji Baba (" pilgrim
 
 100 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 father"), the latter a pet name given him 
 b}^ the Protestant community. 
 
 The most singular fact in regard to this 
 medley of names is, that none of them was 
 the true one, which would have been, in real 
 Scripture style, Hagop, son of — his father, 
 or grand, or some great-grand sire, according 
 to the taste of himself or parents. Here we 
 get an inlook into the biblical style of calling 
 persons by different names. 
 
 The time of our hero's birth let some 
 Yankee " guess " (we forgot to ask him to 
 do it in time) ; the place, some town of the 
 mountainous district lying between the two 
 branches of the Euphrates, to the north of 
 Harpoot. 
 
 Those who, half a century ago, were fer- 
 ried over into this region of hopeless oppres- 
 sion, to remain there, might well recall 
 Dante's awful inscription over the entrance 
 of his Inferno ; for, with its pitiless oppres-
 
 GRACE . ILLUSTRATED. 101 
 
 sion, its cruelties and hopeless miseries, it 
 was indeed a 
 
 " Region of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace 
 Aiid rest could never dwell, hope never came, 
 That comes to all." 
 
 The Mohammedan owners of the soil, 
 haughty despisers and fanatical haters of the 
 Christian ryots, whose ancestry had been 
 conquered and despoiled by the Moslem 
 invaders, would neither suffer them to emi- 
 grate, nor to enjoy at home any of the rights 
 of manhood. The present inhabitants tell 
 of the time, not yet wholly past in the dark- 
 er corners of the district, when they ima- 
 gined they had been born only to be tied up 
 by the hands, and beaten at the bidding of 
 their oppressors ; and I have myself seen the 
 bruised and blackened body of a poor victim 
 who had died under blows thus inflicted by 
 a fellow Christian, at the bidding of their 
 Turkish master, for a slight offense.
 
 102 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 From this region, while little Hagop was 
 yet an infant, his parents, leaving all behind, 
 escaped to Maden, then the capital of the 
 Harpoot district. His own memory did not 
 reach back to those days of fear and flight ; 
 but some modern scenes on the same road 
 aid us in vividly picturing the anxiety and 
 alarm of the fleeing familj", especially as they 
 neared the ferry, where, to this day, families 
 not evidently under powerful protection are 
 obliged to pay illegal and exorbitant toll to 
 the ferrymen for the privilege of escape 
 from this land of bondage. 
 
 The penalty of failure to satisfy this 
 rapacity ^vould have been betrayal into the 
 hands of their pursuers. Nor, in escaping 
 to the capital town, had they escaped from 
 scenes of oppression and bloodshed. At 
 least, so thought young Jacob, when, day 
 after day, he saw the bloody cimeter sever 
 the heads of victims innocent or guilty,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 103 
 
 according as the whim took the pasha and 
 his brother rulers, till the work of blood 
 reached a climax in a rebelUon, and the roll- 
 ing of some threescore and ten heads down 
 the Euphrates' banks together, — whether 
 for real rebellion, or to inspire fear among 
 supposed would-be rebels, is imcertain. 
 This, however, was the end of Maden's day 
 as capital, the chief vestiges of whose former 
 glory are now scores of roofless houses, and 
 a still greater number of pretentious tombs 
 of big Turks of the olden time, few if any 
 of whose posterity remain ; for the central- 
 ization of the rebellion in Harpoot, under the 
 leadership of a pasha's widow, led the ruling 
 pasha hither with his army, where he felt 
 compelled to remain, thus making this city — 
 or rather the village of Llezereh, three miles 
 to the south — the new capital of the dis- 
 trict, and leaving Maden to sink to its 
 present obscurity.
 
 10-1 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 We know not whether any of Hagop's 
 relatives survived to accompany him and the 
 emigrating multitude who came to gather 
 about the rulers, and feed upon government 
 crumbs in and about the new capital. Suf- 
 fice it to sa}^, none remain ; nor have any 
 been seen since the days of missionary occu- 
 pation, beginning about twentj^ years ago. 
 Here Mr. Dunmore, the first missionary, 
 found him, a man of some threescore 3"ears, 
 and soon had the joy of welcoming him to 
 the circle of gospel believers, — a joy which, 
 to the day of his death, the convert in- 
 creased by a steadfast adhesion to the truth, 
 and an ever increasing clearness of Christian 
 experience. 
 
 And there was room for growth ; for 
 though a saint, he was not at first, even if 
 he subsequently became, a perfect one. One 
 sadly prominent stain, which was only 
 washed away by his being providentially
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 105 
 
 made to pass througli deep waters of afflic- 
 tion in the line of Lis sin, was that of nig- 
 gardhness. Ivever can the writer forget the 
 stingy positiveness with which, though then 
 in receipt of an ample salary from the mis- 
 sionary treasury, as bookseller, he protested 
 his utter inability to pay more than six cents 
 a month towards the salary of the pastor 
 they were about to settle. But we shall see, 
 in due time, how all this was changed, and 
 he made meet for that world into which 
 no sordid soul shall ever enter. Like most 
 men of his class, he was extremely narrow 
 minded ; and like too many, who, though 
 saved by grace, fail to secure a generous, 
 broad, intelligent Christian culture, he re- 
 mained to the last a man of somewhat narrow 
 views. Thank God, we shall all have plenty 
 of room, time, and means for the largest 
 growth up there, where years ago our old 
 pilgrim began effectively his work of large 
 development.
 
 106 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 It hardly need be said, that, like all the 
 rest of his people in those days, he was very 
 ignorant. But this lack of book-culture per- 
 haps aided, rather than hindered, the devel- 
 opment of a native shrewdness which often 
 stood him in good stead in time of need. 
 
 Of this he gave a good specimen when 
 once a government defaulter, who denied his 
 debt, was brought for trial before the court 
 of which he was a member. As, in the 
 absence of proof to fix the debt upon him, 
 the man was about to take the customary 
 oath, denying it, Hagop requested that the 
 case be left to him. Then — saying to the 
 man, " I am about to swear you on this Book 
 of God, and if, with your hand on this, you 
 tell a lie, neither can the priest pardon you 
 in this world, nor will God in the next ; for 
 you will be guilty of blasphemy against the 
 Holy Ghost, and will be for ever lost " — he 
 bade him place his hand on the volume, and
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 107 
 
 said, " Tell me, do you owe this money, or 
 not ? " — "I do," said tlie frightened debtor ; 
 and the government got its dues. Would 
 that some such new and effective form of 
 oath might be discovered for defaulters else- 
 where I Two Oriental notions were firmly 
 fixed in his mind, — one, that the wife should 
 implicitly obey her husband in all things ; 
 and, second, that, on the death of one wife, 
 the afflicted husband should make haste to 
 honor her memory, and console his grief, by 
 taking another. 
 
 Unfortunately, his first wife, who was a 
 model of obedience, died, and, to our surprise, 
 late one evening, a few days after her death, 
 he came in, and in a hasty, excited way, said 
 to Mr. Dunmore, " I have found a woman. 
 Come at once and marry me." 
 
 But alas ! " Marry in haste, and repent at 
 leisure," had an illustration in his case ; for 
 the woman so hastily chosen proved to be
 
 108 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 more of a means of grace than a saint, and 
 sorely tried the good old man's patience. 
 
 " Ah ! " said he sadly one day, " why is it 
 that all missionaries' wives are angels ? Mine 
 is very disobedient. Do come over, and 
 exhort her to obey me." But, fearing that 
 our Socrates was probably not a faultless 
 husband, we declined to exhort his Xantippe ; 
 and to the day of his death she helped him 
 to grow in the grace of patience. 
 
 Against his continuing in his business as 
 bookseller for the missionaries, there were 
 two valid objections, — one, his utter inability 
 to be convinced of the reasonableness of the 
 rule requiring payment in full for books at 
 time of sale. This inability was, however, 
 removed by another rule overpowering a 
 weaker part of his nature, according to which 
 he paid for all books sold. He lost about 
 two dollars in this way, and then learned, 
 that, by trying, he could say " No " to an 
 importunate, impecunious purchaser.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 109 
 
 A second and insurmountable objection 
 was the feeling of the new missionaries, that 
 bookselhng should not be confined to one or 
 any limited number of salaried men, nor to 
 such " spiritual loafing and smoking shops," 
 as observation showed the tendency of Ori- 
 ental bookshops to be, but that all who pro- 
 fessed to love the Cible should personally 
 and gratuitously aid in selling it. It is the 
 resolute carrying-out of this principle which 
 has resulted in scattering so many thousands 
 of good books in this mission-field,' and pro- 
 duced outside the very mistaken impression, 
 
 that, in Harpoot, people are so hungry for the 
 
 • 
 Word, that Bibles "sell themselves." Sore 
 
 * The following books have been sold from the Har- 
 poot book depository during the past seventeen years : — 
 Bibles in different lanj^nages . . . . 4,250 
 Portions of Scripture in different languages . 20,G00 
 
 Other religious volumes 39,233 
 
 School-books 23,816 
 
 Total 87,809
 
 110 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 was the affliction of the poor bookseller, as, 
 by the force of this new idea, he saw rivals 
 rising up to take away his trade ; and when, 
 at length, his monthly sales were reduced to 
 less than a dollar, and he got the courage to 
 protest against the " new notion," which 
 threatened to deprive him at once of both 
 his bread, and his joy in selling the Book, we, 
 too, took courage to say, " You see that the 
 work can be more cheaply and effectively 
 done in this way," and to propose to him to 
 give up his bookshop cushion, and go into 
 active service. 
 
 In this he was employed chiefly as a trav- 
 
 * 
 
 eling evangelist, proving himself earnest and 
 efficient, going on horseback from place to 
 place, till, in 1861, he with his horse fell 
 over an embankment, causing such injuries 
 as unfitted him for active service ; and as 
 failing eyesight prevented his return to his 
 early trade of repairing watches, and we
 
 GRACE ILLUSTKATED. Ill 
 
 could not again employ him in bookselling, 
 he was without visible means of support. 
 In vain did we secure a supply of " Yankee 
 notions " in Oriental demand, hoping, that, 
 by the profits on their sale, the good old man 
 might earn his bread. 
 
 "Yankee notions" are one thing in the 
 hands of a Yankee, and another and very 
 different thing in those of an unpractical Ori- 
 ental like Deacon Hagop. The result was, that 
 what " notions " he didn't eat were sold at 
 cost ; and selling his house, and removing to 
 a cheaper one, he decided to " wait upon the 
 Lord." This he did with the simple, clinging 
 faith of a little child. In vain did his old 
 friends gather about him, saying, " See how 
 these missionaries treat you in your old age ! 
 Come back to the Armenian Church, and we 
 will support you." 
 
 His uniform reply was, " I have put my 
 trust in the Lord ; and, though he slay me, I
 
 112 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 will continue to trust in liim. But I do not 
 believe lie ^Yill forsake me." We all com- 
 mended his case to Him who inspired the 
 utterance, " I have been young, and now am 
 old, yet have I not seen the righteous for- 
 saken, nor his seed begging bread." And 
 who can say that the result was not a direct 
 and striking answer to prayer ? 
 
 A letter by Mr. Barnum, giving some facts 
 of the case, found its way to an English 
 magazine, a copy of which, in like manner, 
 " found its way " into the hands of an Eng- 
 lish-speaking Dutchman on the continent of 
 Europe, whose sympathies were so moved, 
 that he at once collected quite a sum of 
 money, a bank-check for which he inclosed 
 to Mr. Barnum, addressing the letter to him 
 at Harpoot. On reaching Turkey, its English 
 direction was, of course, useless ; and the post- 
 masters sent it hither and thither in search 
 of a foreiorn claimant. The annual meeting
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 113 
 
 of the Mission to Eastern Turkey, with, 
 which Harpoot is connected, being in session 
 in Bitlis, distant from Harpoot about ten 
 days direct, but about a month by post (!) 
 Mr. Barnum had just presented the case of 
 Hagop for consultation, when the post 
 arrived -with the letter and money in search 
 of the long-sought claimant. One sentence 
 of its quaint English was, " If the Lord 
 Jesus thinks ivell of it, I desire thus to sup- 
 port Hagop as long as he shall live." "We 
 feared to tell the aged pilgrim this promise, 
 lest he should be overmuch tempted to put 
 his trust in man. He knew that He in whom 
 he trusted sent him some eight dollars month 
 b}^ month ; and he believed that he would do 
 it to the last. He loved his human bene- 
 factor, and wrote him letters, which we 
 translated and forwarded ; and the promise 
 to support him, if Jesus thought well of it, 
 was made good. Of the last remittance, only
 
 114 GKACE ILLT7STRATED. 
 
 enough was left to pay the expense of his 
 funeral, and place a plain granite stone to 
 mark his grave. Much to our disappoint- 
 ment, though we subsequently repeatedly 
 wrote to our Dutch fi'iend, no response has 
 come. 
 
 It was during these years of patient wait- 
 ing and trusting, that the fruits of grace 
 abounded, to the continually increasing ex- 
 clusion of nature's weeds. He who, in the 
 time of prosperity, had grudgingly pledged 
 six cents a month for Christ's cause, now, in 
 sickness and poverty, when living by faith, 
 gladly, and unsolicited, gave many times the 
 amount. 
 
 Then he seemed to feel what before he 
 had only said^ that he and all his belonged 
 to Christ ; and his niggardliness was all 
 gone. In his soul, expanded, illumined, 
 and purified by divine grace, it could find 
 no corner dark and foul enouQ'h to hide its
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 115 
 
 execrable shape. The nearer he felt the end 
 of his earthly labors to be, the dearer to him 
 were those for whom he had labored. 
 
 Not long before his last illness, feeling 
 that he had strength for such a journey, if 
 taken slowly, he said, " I must go again, and 
 visit my brethren in every city where I have 
 preached the word of the Lord, and see how 
 they do." Extending his tour beyond the 
 bounds of our own field, he visited Bitlis 
 and Erzroom, confirming the brethren, 
 being received by all with that respect and 
 affection which his venerable appearance, 
 and Saint-John-like Christian character and 
 exhortations, were fitted to secure. Return- 
 ing, he felt that his earthly service was 
 nearly ended, and not long afterwards 
 retired to his sick-room, to wait, a patient 
 sufferer, for the hour of his release. 
 
 " The chamber where the good man meets his fate 
 Is privileged above the common walks of life; " 
 
 and so pre-eminently was his.
 
 116 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 Among this people, all means, honest and 
 dishonest, are resorted to, to conceal from a 
 dying man the fact of death's approach, lest 
 his terror and distress hasten, the hour of his 
 departure. And such is the popular dread 
 of all of death's surroundings, that the body 
 of one who dies too late in the day for the 
 usual hurried burial must be at least hastily 
 wrapped in the customary shroud, and hur- 
 ried off to the church, to be ready for the 
 early morning burial. But here was one, 
 who, to all his old companions (who came in 
 numbers to see him), not only predicted his 
 speedy departure, but assured them that he 
 was joyful in the thought of going. In the 
 intervals between his asthmatic sufferings, 
 he tried to point them to Him whose grace 
 had thus removed the fear and dread of 
 death, and exhorted them to secure him as a 
 friend for their own coming time of need. 
 
 Besides himself, but one in that white-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 117 
 
 bearded company — "the aged auctioneer" 
 — had been united with the httle company 
 of gospel believers ; and those death-bed 
 exhortations, even, seemed to make but 
 little permanent impression. Some thought 
 him beside himself; others listened in incred- 
 ulous amazement ; while others felt and 
 wept, and went away, and forgot it all. 
 They came, indeed, as he had requested, and 
 sat around his coffin on his burial day, and 
 wept again, as we sung the hj'mn he had 
 selected, — 
 
 " Come sing to me of heaven 
 TMien I'm about to die: 
 Sing songs of holy ecstasy, 
 To waft my soul on high. 
 There'll be no sorrow there, 
 There'll be no sorrow there: 
 In heaven above, where all is love, 
 There'll be no sorrow there! " 
 
 But to this hour, those yet alive, whose tears
 
 118 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 then fell fastest, are apparently most stony- 
 hearted, and least likely to follo\y him up 
 the shining way. So true it is, that for the 
 Ethiopian to change his skin, and the leop- 
 ard his spots, is impossible with men, possi- 
 ble only to Him whose word can raise the 
 dead, and who saves from the company of 
 white-haired rebels only enough to illustrate 
 and verify the reality and power of his 
 almighty grace. 
 
 Such was the nature of his disease as to 
 compel him to spend day and night in a sit- 
 ting posture, and that often in the keenest 
 torture. After his paroxysms of distress, he 
 would point up, and say, " There is no 
 coughing up there ; no coughing up there ! " 
 " I am going to a wedding, to the marriage- 
 supper of the Lamb," were the last words 
 the writer heard him utter ; and soon he did 
 join the company of the redeemed, continu- 
 ing to the last patient, peaceful, full of joy.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 119 
 
 A weeping company bore Ms remains to 
 the grave which he had dug beside that of 
 his wife, and placed over it the gray granite 
 block he had prepared to mark the spot. 
 
 The Word was read, a hymn sung, and 
 prayer made, and we left him to wait the 
 resurrection morn, feeling, as we came away, 
 that the Master scatters such life and death 
 scenes here and there along our pathway, to 
 prevent our weak faith from failing in the 
 hard, ungrateful work we have to do. It 
 was said above, that the good man loved his 
 Dutch benefactor. To some, this statement 
 may seem so necessarily true as to be un- 
 necessary, and still more uncalled for the 
 statement, that, to the last, he was grateful 
 to those who had made him acquainted 
 with the gospel ; not merely to that always 
 admired benefactor, " the Board," around 
 which gathers the halo of ethereal, distant 
 beneficence, but also to its seen, human rep-
 
 120 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 resentatives, the missionaries, witli their 
 many real, and more imagined, imperfec- 
 tions. 
 
 AVe devoutly hope that the experience of 
 missionaries to real heathen may be different 
 from that of most who labor for " nominal 
 Christians ; " but that those who, if hungry, 
 would be grateful to any passer-by who 
 should give them a piece of bread, or a 
 bowl of soup, are frequently increasingly 
 ungrateful to those who have brought them 
 the bread and the water of life, is a fact 
 explainable by no philosophy but that of 
 the perverse inconsistency of poor human 
 nature. Are we to suppose that missiona- 
 ries, instead of remaining to labor for the 
 permanent planting of Christian institutions, 
 should simply proclaim the gospel, and pass 
 along, not waiting for the ingratitude and 
 abuse of those apparently most blessed (!) 
 by it ? It would sometimes seem that grati-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 121 
 
 tude, called by some one a "plant of slow 
 growth," seldom finds room and soil for 
 growing in the newly enlightened adult 
 soul in this world. Be that as it may, the 
 heart of the missionary in this land is oftener 
 saddened by reproachful demands for un- 
 received benefits than cheered by grateful 
 acknowledgment of those bestowed. And 
 those proposing to enter upon the work 
 may as well be forewarned. But let them, 
 also, be fore-armed by the assurance that here 
 and there some life or death scene will be 
 so radiant with the luster of divine grace 
 as to cause to be forgotten all the gloom 
 and sadness which follow even the most 
 trying exhibitions of human imperfection 
 and sin. 
 
 In the missionary scale, the enjoyment 
 of one growing, grateful saint, outweighs 
 the trial of a score of complaining ones; 
 and the Master, if we trust his promise,
 
 122 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 will take care, that, in addition to his own 
 blessed presence, the supply of visible, 
 tangible cheer, shall abound to those who 
 need it — as who of us does not at times ?
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 123 
 
 IX. 
 
 THE BROKEN VOW. 
 
 QOME twelve years ago, a copy of the 
 New Testament, in the modern tongue, 
 found its way into the hands of a tailor, a 
 " reader " in one of the Armenian churches 
 in Harpoot, and stirred within him new and 
 strange thoughts, — questionings concerning 
 his own religious experience and that of 
 those about him. These questions he used 
 to commit to writing for further thought 
 and examination ; and once, when a mission- 
 ary called at his home, the question-paper 
 was brought out to aid in seeking the light 
 he needed. Finding two other young men, 
 who, with him, felt an interest in studying 
 the new book, they three became especially
 
 124 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 earnest in the worship of their church, 
 being desirous even of having the people 
 leave, and close the church-doors upon them, 
 that they might have longer space for united 
 worship. 
 
 These companions both died ; one appar- 
 ently being prepared for death, leaving the 
 young tailor still feeling his way toward 
 full gospel light and liberty. 
 
 A Protestant meeting being opened in 
 his ward of the city, he, after many ques- 
 tionings, concluded to go for once. To his 
 surprise, he found that these innovators 
 talked well and truly, raising just the ques- 
 tions which had been troubling him, and 
 professing to answer them. He was so 
 troubled by this, and alarmed, lest they 
 should steal his affections from his own 
 church, that he went, and, kneeling before 
 the altar, made a solemn vow never to sepa- 
 rate from her communion. Having thus
 
 GEACE rLLUSTEATED. 125 
 
 fortified his resolutions, and made his posi- 
 tion safe from Protestant attack, he con- 
 tinued to attend their meetings, where, to 
 his dismay, he found that even his oath- 
 bound resolutions were like the vow of 
 darkness to withstand mid-day light, or of 
 a lump of ice to resist the noonday sun. He 
 saw, that, to hold to his purpose, he must 
 escape from the light and heat which ra- 
 diated from the open Bible on the Protes- 
 tant pulpit. 
 
 Again he knelt before the altar with the 
 feeling, " I must be on one side or the other. 
 Which shall it be? Did I do right in 
 making that vow ? and is it binding upon 
 me ? " There, alone with his God, he settled 
 the question in the negative. Not only was 
 the vow not binding upon his conscience, 
 but he had done wrong in making it. From 
 that hour, he was a recognized adherent of 
 the evangelical party, and, with his family, 
 was always present at the meetings.
 
 126 GEACE nXUSTRATED. 
 
 And not only so much, but saj-ing to him- 
 self, " These services cost something, and 
 I should pay my part towards them," he 
 sought out the treasurer, and entered his 
 name among the subscribers for the pastor's 
 salary. With such principles, and such 
 a beginning, it is not strange that he was 
 speedily known as a leading member of the 
 church, nor that, when a successor was 
 needed for " Deacon Hagop," hands were 
 laid upon the head of Kineose, and that he 
 has been, and still is, one of the chief pillars 
 of the church.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 127 
 
 X. 
 
 ONE OF GOD'S HmDEN ONES. 
 
 BY MISS HATTIE SEYMOUR. 
 
 T entered the female seminary, we 
 
 can not say definitely at what age ; 
 though, when asked how old she was, she 
 replied, " Sixty." Her teacher laughed, and 
 told her that was impossible. " Well," said 
 
 J , " perhaps I am fifty." As she only 
 
 guessed at her age, we may be allowed to 
 do the same ; and probably a more correct 
 estimate would be, that forty summers had 
 passed over her head. She is a woman of 
 gentle spirit, kind in feeling and manner. 
 
 She did not know her letters when she 
 entered school ; and to learn to read at her 
 age seemed a most formidable undertaking.
 
 128 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 She began aip, pen, Mm (a, b, c) with a 
 good will ; but as day after day passed, and, 
 notwithstanding her hard work over her 
 lessons, she did not make much progress, she 
 said to her teacher, " I can never learn to 
 read. My mind has never been worked, and 
 my brain is thick. I study away at the first 
 letter till I think I have learned it, and then 
 try the second; but, when I turn back to 
 the first, I have forgotten its name." 
 
 As day after day, sad and discouraged, 
 she repeated her conviction to her teacher, 
 that she should never learn to read, she was 
 advised to try this plan, — never to open her 
 book to study, without first silently lifting 
 her heart in prayer, that her mind might be 
 quickened, and that God would send down 
 special grace to help her remember. The 
 answer to her prayers seemed almost a 
 mkacle. 'Tis faith that 
 
 " Laughs at impossibilities, 
 And cries, ' It shall be done.' "
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 129 
 
 And simple faitli and prayer brouglit a 
 
 daily supply of strength to poor J , 
 
 which carried her triumphantly through 
 the primer her first year in school. It was 
 pleasant to see her happy face as she entered 
 the second year, bearing her New Testament 
 reverently in her hands. Her reading was 
 not now a mere lesson to her. She sat one 
 day in the class with several other women, 
 one of whom read Matthew's account of our 
 Lord's crucifixion. There was some familiar 
 talk about the " old, old story ;" and then 
 
 J was called, in her turn, to read. She 
 
 rose slowly, and, with averted face, took 
 her seat by her teacher, but, instead of read- 
 ing, bowed her face in her hands, and was 
 evidently trying to suppress her sobs. 
 " Why, J ," her teacher asked in sur- 
 prise, " what is the matter ? " — "I can 
 never hear that story of Christ's death," 
 she said, " without crying." Happy J ! 
 
 9
 
 130 GEACE ILLTTSTEATED. 
 
 Well might one, who, from a child, had 
 known the Holy Scriptures, envy you the 
 freshness and tenderness of your feelings, 
 and feel that the teacher should sit at the 
 pupil's feet, and learn of liim. 
 
 The day of fasting and prayer, just after 
 
 the opening of J 's second year in school, 
 
 was one of tender interest. Those present 
 in the morning prayer-meeting will not soon 
 forget J 's face, working with deep emo- 
 tion, as she said with tremulous voice, " I 
 want you all to pray for me. I am weak ; I 
 don't know any thing ; I am very bad ; but 
 I want to be a Christian." Later in the day, 
 her deep contrition had another element 
 mingled with it ; and the burden of her heart 
 and words seemed to be, — 
 
 *' I'm a poor sinner, and nothing at all; 
 But Jesus Christ is my all in all." 
 
 And afterwards, whenever inquiry was
 
 GEACE ILLFSTEATED. 101 
 
 made as to whether she still loved and 
 trusted Christ, she answered with the 
 simplicity of a child, that she was sure she 
 did, " And why are you so sure ? " she was 
 once asked. " Because," she said, laying her 
 hand upon her heart, " I feel such a warmth 
 here whenever I think of him." "Blessed 
 are the meek and single-hearted," says 
 Thomas A Kempis ; " for they shall possess 
 the abundance of peace."
 
 132 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 
 
 XI. 
 
 THE LITTLE HUMPBACK. 
 
 "IVTEAR the city of Arabkir, nestled among 
 the Anti-Taurus Mountains, is the 
 ■wretched little village of Sh^pik. Poverty- 
 seems written over every door ; but this is 
 the place where blind John Concordance 
 first preached his " Tithe Sermon," which so 
 aroused the poor, simple-minded Protestants 
 of the village, that each male with willing 
 heart consecrated the tenth of all his gains 
 to the Lord's service. The influence of this 
 sermon could not be shut up here ; but the 
 blind preacher was invited to preach it in 
 other places, and many were convinced by 
 his strong arguments that they had been 
 robbing the Master's treasury.
 
 GBACE ILLUSTRATED. 133* 
 
 More than twenty years before this revival 
 of giving the "Lord's tenth" in Shepik, a 
 little girl was born in one of these humble 
 homes. Her parents gave her the beautiful 
 name, Kohar (" Jewel "). I know not why 
 they gave her this name ; for when she grew 
 up she was neither handsome in features, nor 
 comely in form, for she was humpbacked. 
 This deformity may have been caused by 
 some injury in her childhood ; but the par- 
 ticulars we know not. We first hear of 
 Kohar as the " bright little humpback," 
 who had run away from her Shepik home to 
 Arabkir, to see the missionaries ; or, rather, 
 had tried to d?o so. 
 
 She heard in her village that some " In- 
 glese " had come to Arabkir, a city only six 
 miles away. 
 
 The neighbors came in to talk about 
 these men with a " new religion," who " kept 
 no fasts," and never " kissed the earth " in
 
 134 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 their worshiping. The priests shook their 
 heads, and warned their flocks to beware of 
 these " deceivers coming in these last days," 
 these " wolves in sheep's clothing." Each 
 new-comer from the city had some new 
 thing to tell about the Protestants. " These 
 people bring the Bible, and urge old and 
 young to read it, even the women. They 
 open schools, too, for both boys and girls. 
 They give much honor to their wives, 
 walking with them in the streets, and per- 
 mitting them to enter a house first." 
 
 Little Kohar was greatly delighted with 
 all these things ; and she believed that such 
 people could not be as wicked as her priest 
 thought them to be. She was greatly 
 troubled. Her priest was God's chosen ser- 
 vant. She had been baptized by him. He 
 could read the holy Bible, and the books of 
 the fathers ; and he said these Protes were 
 " bad, wicked men." But the others read
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 135 
 
 tlie Bible too ; and they have schools, and 
 try to teach people to read the Bible for 
 themselves. 
 
 The jewel covered up in the rubbish 
 began to shine a little. This little girl 
 longed for more knowledge. " Why should 
 not she read the Bible for herself, and see 
 what was written in that holy book sent 
 down from God? These foreign women 
 could read, and God had not struck them 
 dead for their impiety ; but they were 
 trying to teach other women to read also." 
 Her thirst for knowledge overcame all her 
 fears ; and she resolved to visit these stran- 
 gers, and see for herself what kind of people 
 they were. 
 
 Poor child ! What can she do ? She is 
 only a girl, and can not go so far alone. Her 
 parents would not consent to let her go, 
 even if some one would take her to these 
 people. She had never been taught to pray
 
 136 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 to Jesus to help her, and show her the right 
 way ; and would the " Blessed Virgin " 
 help, when she wished to go to the very 
 people who said it was wrong to pray to 
 Mary ? The desire filled her whole soul ; 
 and she forgot all her fears, forg-ot her weak 
 back, and started to go alone to Arabkir. 
 Her mother soon learned that she had run 
 away, and hastened to the priest's house, 
 and begged him to help her rescue her child. 
 They went in pursuit, and soon overtook 
 the poor girl, and led her back by her hair, 
 that hung in long braids upon her shoulders. 
 The missionary at Arabkir, hearing of this, 
 visited Shepik, and sought out Kohar. He 
 was pleased with her earnestness, and felt 
 that God was calling her to a higher service 
 than the work in her poor village ; but he 
 told her she must not disobey her parents, 
 and run away. " The Bible tells us to obey 
 our parents. You must pray to the God of
 
 KOHAR, (Little Humpback.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 137 
 
 this holy Bible, Kohar; and he will hear 
 you, and open a way for you to come to the 
 school at Arabkir, where you can learn to 
 read the Bible for yourself." 
 
 I have no doubt that she daily prayed for 
 this one great desire of her heart ; and God 
 in heaven heard the little humpback's 
 prayer ; for the work in Arabkir prospered. 
 Many were those who sought the new light, 
 and were themselves enlightened, and went 
 out to seek others, that they, too, might come 
 and see, and believe for themselves. This 
 light had entered the city ; and, even though 
 many had risen up against it, it eould not 
 be concealed under a bushel. The shining 
 reached even to the mountain village, and 
 was the topic of conversation in every house. 
 Some, even of the wiser ones, bought the 
 condemned Book, the "Prote Testament," 
 and began to read for themselves about 
 this "-new faith." Then they told their
 
 138 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 neighbors, and compared this new book with 
 the ancient one from which their priests 
 read. " Why, brethren, these are just the 
 same words; only one is in our ancient 
 tongue, and the other in the modern. 
 These people are right, and our priests are 
 wrong. They are ignorant, and have kept 
 us so." A desire for knowledge was awak- 
 ened; but many shuddered at these new 
 doctrines, and kept a more watchful lookout 
 for their beloved ones. 
 
 The women especially felt that the religion 
 that forbade them to call on the Holy Virgin 
 was not to be tolerated. The Turk was bad 
 enough ; but these New Rehgionists were 
 much more dangerous, especially to their 
 children. 
 
 " I would rather my child should be a 
 Turk than one of those Protes," was the 
 language often heard fi-om those calling 
 themselves Christians.
 
 GEACE n.LUSTEATED. 139 
 
 The priest himself began to think about 
 these strange doctrines, and read more care- 
 fully his smoky Bible, and to think less of 
 his book of church forms and rules. The 
 sabbath was discussed ; and many began to 
 say, " Surely the sabbath is holier than 
 saints' days ; but we profane God's da}", while 
 we carefully keep a great many saints' days." 
 
 Kohar's father and uncles began to talk 
 of these things in the long winter evenings, 
 when the neighbors would come in and tell 
 of some new development in the neighboring 
 city. The mother, too, listened, and seemed 
 to be more softened towards her little girl, 
 who would be drinking in all she heard, 
 believing that God would soon send the 
 answer to her earnest prayers, as the mis- 
 sionary had assui'ed her he would. 
 
 These discussions were the wedge that 
 God prepared to pry open the door to let his 
 jewel come forth to the light of perfect day.
 
 140 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 Kohar became a better cliild ; and God was 
 using her as a little preacher in her home, 
 and thus softening her parents' hearts. They 
 looked upon her crooked back, and pitied 
 her ; for she would never be married, and she 
 could not work in the field, and thus aid her 
 father. What can a village woman do, if 
 too weak to labor with her husband, father, 
 and brothers in the fields ? The father and 
 brothers would say, " Surely the housework 
 is of very little account." 
 
 "How would it do to -let those Inglese 
 have Kohar ? " was the thought that troubled 
 father and mother. " Perhaps they, too, are 
 Christians, and then our child will not be 
 lost. By and by she will be only a burden 
 to us ; but, if we let her go to school, she 
 may be able to help herself in some way. 
 At any rate, they will care for her." It was 
 a joyful day when she entered a Protes- 
 tant family in Arabkir, and began to attend
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 141 
 
 school. She made sucli progress, that, ere 
 long, she was able to help the missionary's 
 wife in the school, and finally became the 
 teacher of the girls' school. She loved to 
 study ; and, when she heard that a seminary 
 for girls was opened at Harpoot, she became 
 uneasy even in her beloved work of teaching. 
 She was unwilling to sadden those who 
 had done so much for her to fit her for this 
 position ; for she saw no one to take her place 
 in the school. The desire grew, and became 
 so strong, that she looked sad. The kind 
 missionaries said, " Kohar, you are very much 
 needed here ; but in the spring you may go to 
 Harpoot." The happy girl felt that God had 
 answered her prayer a second time ; and her 
 heart was filled with joy and thanksgiving, 
 and her face radiant with smiles. She was 
 an earnest student, and, after her graduation, 
 was selected as assistant in the seminary, 
 where, for several years, she gave great satis-
 
 142 GEACE ILLTTSTEATED. 
 
 faction to the missionary teachers, and was 
 beloved by all the girls, her Christian influ- 
 ence over whom filled the hearts of her 
 superiors with joy, and they felt that their 
 dear pupils were safe while they had such 
 a constant example of earnest piety and 
 patience to look up to. Kohar was at the 
 head of the school-family; and seldom did 
 her management need any interference, while 
 she was ready to listen to any advice given 
 her. During the long winter vacations, 
 when the seminary was closed, and the girls 
 sent home to teach, or aid their parents in the 
 family, Kohar made long tours among the 
 villages, sometimes spending several weeks 
 in one place, teaching the women, holding 
 prayer-meetings, and singing sweet songs, 
 which the women often speak of as one of 
 their pleasant recollections of her visits. 
 
 In this way she encouraged both the 
 preachers and their wives, besides winning 
 new sisters to the gospel.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 143 
 
 She did not forget lier native village nor 
 her father, mother, and brothers. When 
 visiting and talking, her fingers were busy 
 making collars or edging, which she sold, 
 and sent the avails to help support the pastor 
 of Sh^pik ; for the light had not only 
 entered her home, and enlightened her father 
 and mother, and other members of the family, 
 but now a church was formed ; and the priest 
 — who for years had burnt incense before the 
 pictures of saints, and preached fast days 
 and saints' days, — stood up to preach not the 
 intercession of Mary, but that of Jesus the 
 Son of man, as the only advocate between 
 God and fallen man. 
 
 She remembered her parents in their 
 poverty also, and often sent them something 
 from her own earnings. Nor did she forget 
 the foreign mission-work. Well do I re- 
 member the time when she gave five dollars 
 to this work, while she had not clothing suit-
 
 144 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 able for the cold winter before her. While 
 seeking others' comfort, she forgot her own ; 
 and often her own health would have suffered 
 from her unselfishness, had not some one 
 cared for her. But He who cares even for 
 the hungry ravens, and notes the sparrow's 
 fall, put it into kind hearts to supply the 
 warm garments needed for her frail body 
 when she went out among the villages in 
 midwinter. Her gratitude to the unseen 
 givers, often far off in a (to her) strange land, 
 was earnest and beautiful. It touched her 
 tender heart to think that strangers should 
 care for her, because they, too, loved the same 
 Jesus she did ; and she often spoke of the 
 joy she should have in seeing these dear 
 ones, and praising this same Jesus with them 
 in heaven. During one of her vacations, she 
 went to the city of Egin, where we had a 
 preacher and his wife, but where the people 
 looked with scorn upon Protestants. The
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 145 
 
 women were superior to those of any other 
 place in our mission-field, very neat and tidy 
 in their dress and houses, but proud, and far 
 away from the simple teachings of Jesus of 
 Nazareth. She conversed with those who 
 would lend a listening ear out of mere polite- 
 ness. But soon some were ready to welcome 
 her to their houses, though others hooted 
 after her in the streets, crying out " Prote," 
 even throwing stones at her. "When the 
 time came for her to return to Harpoot, she 
 had won several women, who not only came 
 to listen to her sweet words about Jesus, but 
 were busy over their primer, learning to read, 
 that they for themselves might study the 
 sweet words of the Saviour about whom they 
 had heard from Kohar. Among these pupils 
 were women with white heads, patiently 
 learning their a, 5, e's. " You must not 
 leave us," was the pleading cry of these 
 women. "Who will care for us, if you 
 10
 
 146 GRACE rLLTJSTEATED. 
 
 go ? " She urged that her presence was 
 needed in the school ; but they replied, " The 
 missionaries can find some one else. Do not 
 leave us now ! " 
 
 She staid with them ; but they were just 
 as unwilling that she should leave them 
 when the next spring came, and the next ; 
 and she has seen the work extend, till 
 quite a strong Protestant community has 
 grown up. Twenty-three persons, among 
 them nine women, have joined a neighboring 
 church, and are looking forward to the time 
 when they can ordain their preacher, and 
 become a separate church. Kohar has now a 
 school of sixty pupils, and calls earnestly for 
 an assistant ; so that she may devote her time 
 to those who are yet too proud to acknowl- 
 edge that they need any good thing. Who 
 of us could have foretold the success that 
 has followed this poor little deformed girl, 
 when we first saw her in her humble home 
 amono- the mountains?
 
 GEACE rLLUSTRATED. 147 
 
 God has his jewels scattered all over the 
 world ; and he will cause them to shine when 
 he has need of their light. He will call 
 upon us to help him polish and refine them, 
 if we are waiting to help him ; and surely 
 the reward will be glorious. 
 
 " Sow in the morn thy seed ; 
 At eve hold not thine hand ; 
 To doubt and fear give thou no heed ; 
 Broadcast it o'er the laud! 
 
 Thou canst not toil in vain : 
 
 Cold, heat, and moist and dry 
 Shall foster and mature the grain 
 
 For garners in the sky."
 
 148 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 XII. 
 
 KOORDISH AMY. 
 
 Q|OME fifty miles north from Harpoot, the 
 horizon is skirted by the towering range 
 of the Anti-Taurus Mountains, which, 
 stretching to the east, to Persia and the 
 homes of the mountain Nestorians, and 
 south-east, through Koordistan Proper, 
 toward the Persian Gulf, are the home of 
 untold numbers of Koordish tribes, whose 
 ancestry, the CarducM, held these same 
 fastnesses nearly twenty-three hundred years 
 ago, and near Redwan, one of the Koordish 
 mission-stations of our native churches, dis- 
 puted with Xenophon and his retreating 
 " ten thousand " the passage through their 
 land. Theories are various, curious, and
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 149 
 
 some of them wild, in regard to the origin 
 of this interesting people and their two 
 languages, — the Koormanji and the Zaza 
 Koordish. Suppose we "guess" that Nim- 
 rod, the " mighty hunter before the Lord," 
 had two sons, who, with their companions, 
 betook themselves to the mountains in search 
 of game, and concluded to stay there, and 
 replenish and hold their hunting-park. Tliis 
 supposition gives the old sportsman no mean 
 posterity, since among the Koords are found 
 some of the finest specimens of physical 
 manhood in all the Orient. 
 
 If, however, commentators insist on a 
 universal deluge, and the drowning out of 
 all the children of Adam except those 
 "eight souls," not even allowing Father 
 Noah a few servants in the ark, let them 
 provide progenitors for our Koords from 
 among those eight, while we turn to our 
 story.
 
 150 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 About a score of j^ears ago, in one of the 
 districts near the city of Chemishgezek, one 
 of this people, Murto by name, wedded a 
 beautiful maiden named Bayzie. And, what 
 was even more satisfactory than wedding a 
 beauty (a thing which can not happen among 
 the harem-owning Turks, with ugly black 
 veils concealing their women's faces when 
 abroad, nor even among the less exclusive 
 Armenians), he, and all about him, knew 
 that she was beautiful ; for the Koords, while 
 guarding with vindictive jealousy the virtue 
 of their women, allow them to go and come 
 with unveiled faces, a thing unknown among 
 those about them. 
 
 And so it came to pass, that, when Murto 
 and Bayzie had become the happy parents 
 of two little girls, — Amy and Hedjie, — a 
 wealthier and mightier Koord made a mid- 
 night raid upon their home, and carried off 
 the beautiful mother.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 151 
 
 Whether Bayzie was more or less happy 
 in her new home, or made any effort to 
 return to her husband, we learn not ; but he 
 soon fled to Chemishgezek, where, at his 
 death not long after, he left his two little 
 orphans, servants in a wealthy Armenian 
 family.^ 
 
 The gospel light, and with it the idea of 
 educating and elevating woman, which en- 
 tered this home of "the Seven Young Con- 
 fessors," so far penetrated this family, that 
 Amy, the elder of the two girls, learned to 
 read, and obtained a two-cent copy of the 
 Gospel of Matthew. Our first knowledge 
 of her was when (in 1869) a request came 
 from Chemishgezek, that we receive " a poor 
 girl " to the Harpoot Female Seminary. 
 
 Our reply was in the usual form : " If she 
 
 1 By a misapprehension, it was stated in the Harpoot 
 News, that " the father died, and the mother remarried;" 
 which is true in reversed order of time.
 
 152 GEACE rLLTTSTRATED. 
 
 is a suitable person, and any one is responsi- 
 ble for lier clothes, books, and traveling ex- 
 penses, we will receive her," adding, "but 
 our seminary is not an alms-house." The 
 reply soon came, " She is a poor Koordish 
 girl, for whom no one cares ; and those with 
 whom she lives are so far from wisliing to 
 send her, that, should she go to school, they 
 would even deprive her of all her best 
 clothes." 
 
 Our reply, " Such a girl will not do for us 
 to educate," put an end to the matter, till, 
 some months later, Mr. H. N. Barnum and 
 myself visited Chemishgezek ; and Amy 
 appeared before us to plead her own cause. 
 
 She seemed thoroughly possessed with the 
 idea, that come she must to the seminary, 
 — that paradise of girls in need of Christian 
 education. 
 
 No Armenian girl of her age, unless edu- 
 cated in a Protestant school, would have
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 153 
 
 ventured to say a word to us, or even to 
 reply to a question ; but this poor Koordish 
 girl, with her inborn nature energized by 
 earnestness of desire, stood and pleaded her 
 cause with a boldness and perseverance 
 which interested and surprised us. 
 
 But to all her pleadings we had a ready 
 reply, till she exclaimed, " Missionaries, if 
 Jesus were now on earth, and a poor girl 
 Hke me wished to come to liim, and learn 
 about his salvation, don't you think he 
 would receive her?" To this question, 
 enforced by her earnest tones, and pleading 
 face, we could not find it in our hearts to 
 give the cold, logical reply, " Oh ! you can 
 learn about Jesus here, without coming to 
 the seminary;" for she at least felt, that, 
 surrounded as she was by merely nominal 
 Christians, she could not learn his will. 
 But, earnest and sincere as she appeared, we 
 '■+ill had a hngering fear of being deceived
 
 154 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 in this our first experience with a Koordish 
 candidate : so we inquired of all the " Prot- 
 estant brethren," whether, so far as they 
 knew, she was truthful, industrious, and 
 faithful, and, in their opinion, sincere in her 
 request, or whether she might wish to go to 
 the seminary from mere curiosity, or in hope 
 of living an easier life. When all gave 
 decided testimony in her favor, we said, 
 " We will run the risk, and make this one 
 experiment. Let her come." Take her 
 ourselves we could not. 
 
 But, surrounded as she was by those 
 hostile to us and the evangelical faith, mere 
 letting would not bring her. And the diffi- 
 culty increased greatly, when word went 
 forth among the many Koords in the city, 
 " The ' hat-wearers ' are about to carry off one 
 of the tribe, and make her a Christian." So 
 the poor orphan suddenly had plenty of 
 friends, who, with loaded guns, let it be
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 155 
 
 known that any one would take lier away at 
 the peril of his life ; and, as Koordish guns 
 have laid many a poor Armenian low in 
 those wild regions, it was not surprising that 
 sudden fear and trembling took possession 
 of the Protestants who had secured her in- 
 terviews with the missionaries. But it was 
 surprising to see how suddenly the introduc- 
 tion of this new alkaline element of fear 
 turned all their beautiful coloring to a som- 
 ber blue. Accustomed as we are to the 
 timidity and fickleness of this land, we were 
 amazed to see, that, all at once, Amy, the 
 paragon of excellence, had become a " lazy 
 shirk, seeking to escape life's burdens by 
 hiding herself in a seminary, under pretense 
 of learning about Jesus." 
 
 When all these improvised arguments had 
 been rebutted by recalling words just before 
 uttered by the same men, one of them, a 
 very zealous Protestant, but rather poor
 
 156 GRACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 Cliristian, heedlessly let the truth out, in- 
 quiring in a distressful tone, " Is that Koord- 
 ish girl of so much importance, that, for her 
 sake, you are willing to send our souls into 
 eternity unprepared ? Shall we be lost, that 
 she may be saved ? " — " Not at all," we re- 
 plied ; " but, having once conscientiously 
 taken a position, no fear of Koordish guns 
 can turn us from it. And perhaps the Mas- 
 ter is taking this way to prepare you, sir, for 
 heaven. So long as you feel that the hour 
 of death is uncertain, there is little hope of 
 your being any thing more than a Protes- 
 tant. Perhaps a look down the muzzle of a 
 gun is just the thing needed to wake you up 
 to prepare to meet God. So, then, we still 
 say, ' Let her come.' " 
 
 It remained, then, to decide how the thing 
 should be done. To take her along our- 
 selves would raise a mob, and perhaps 
 hinder her leaving, besides lifting our pro-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 157 
 
 tegee up with pride and seK-conceit at the 
 thought of being of so much consequence. 
 During the sabbath services, we had been 
 struck by the earnest looks of a man some 
 fifty years okl, to whom the Word seemed 
 to be like cold water to a thirsty soul. 
 
 During all the discussion about Amy, he 
 had sat a quiet, interested listener ; but now, 
 when the time for words had passed, and 
 that for deeds had come, he rose and came 
 forward, saying, " Missionaries, do you intend 
 to let this girl come to the seminary ? " On 
 our replying in the affirmative, he, with a 
 resolute, martjT* look, added, " Brethren, I 
 can not conscientiously allow her to be pre- 
 vented from going. Tell all the Koords 
 that I did it. I will take her to Harpoot. 
 Let them kill me, if any one." 
 
 But we much preferred that nobody die, 
 and that one member of the little com- 
 munity should run away. He was a man
 
 158 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 equally famous for enduring persecution, and 
 notorious for lazy loafing, — one who made it 
 a matter of principle to sponge his living 
 out of Protestant preachers, and in various 
 vrays bring reproach on the Protestant 
 name. 
 
 Now, thought we, is the time to feed two 
 birds with one grain of wheat, by getting 
 Amy to Harpoot, and Garabed so out of this 
 city, that he will never dare to come back. 
 So we whispered in his ear, " You bring 
 her," and left. 
 
 But he was as shrewd as lazy, and at once 
 posted off to the chief of Amy's tribe, the 
 famous Ali Gako of Mr. Dunmore's day,^ 
 and obtained a paper authorizing him to 
 take her to Harpoot to be educated by the 
 missionaries. 
 
 "With this to insure his own safety, he 
 
 1 See Missionary Herald for 1855, pp. 55, 340 ; for 1857, 
 pp. 210, 346; and, for 1858, p. 113.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 159 
 
 mounted her on a mule, and fled from the 
 city by night, and appeared the next day 
 with his prize at the seminary door, which 
 she entered with curiosity, expectation, and 
 delight, little, if any, less than that with 
 which she and we shall at last cross the 
 threshold of the New Jerusalem. With her 
 tall, erect form, dark, flashing eyes, long, 
 rather coarse, unkempt hair, and (to a gen- 
 tleman) indescribable toilet, coarse, ragged, 
 and peculiar, our mountain maid was a sub- 
 ject for a painter. It hardly need be said, 
 that entering the seminary with feelings 
 such as hers, and brought daily, continually 
 under the religious influences of the place, 
 she, ere long, yielded her heart to the Sav- 
 iour about whom she had come to learn. 
 Some tliree years afterwards she was bap- 
 tized, and entered into covenant with the 
 church in Harpoot, of which she is still a 
 member.
 
 160 GEACE ILLTJSTRATED. 
 
 Her progress in study during llie four 
 years she was a pupU. iu the seminary was 
 laborious, very slow, and very sure. Any 
 thing once learned was learned for perma- 
 nence and use. Once having acquired it 
 herself, she was ready and able to teach 
 others also ; and when examining the girls' 
 school, which, during the year past, she 
 taught in Central Harj)Oot, we were both 
 amused and gratified at seeing what a female 
 seminary in miniature she had. 
 
 Each movement and method were after 
 the exact model. And, before a crowd 
 which would have abashed almost any other 
 pupil, she, with the self-possessed dignity 
 of an old, experienced teacher, went through 
 the exercises. 
 
 One quality, rare enough in this land, but 
 which she exhibited in Occidental measure, 
 is that of steadfast performance of duty to 
 be done, in s^^ite of the efforts of others to
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. ICl 
 
 turn her aside. It is a very, very difficult 
 thing here to induce teachers to adhere to 
 rules laid down for their government, and 
 especially in regard to time. But when a 
 person of some consequence once tried to 
 induce Amy to omit a lesson at its time, and 
 was angry with her for failing to comply 
 with his wishes, she replied, " The mission- 
 aries have put me here to teach these girls ; 
 and I shall do it^ 
 
 Amusing as it may seem, she still enter- 
 tains high ideas of her former condition, and 
 speaks in lofty terms of " the big house " in 
 which she had the honor of serving. A 
 more prohfic source of pride is in the atten- 
 tions paid by many to " the Koordish girl," 
 who is sure to be the first one sought out 
 by visitors to the seminary, in which, during 
 the present year, she has been made assistant 
 teacher. 
 
 She has any but true ideas in regard to our
 
 162 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 connection with her coming here. As she 
 recently stated in a letter, " When the Har- 
 poot missionaries learned of my desire to 
 come to the seminary, two of them came to 
 Chemishgezek to see me." (!) And were we 
 to give her all the flattering messages sent 
 by those in this land and at home, who feel 
 an interest in her, and especially were she 
 to hear all the noise that is made about her, 
 she and we could with difiSculty dwell in the 
 same house. 
 
 The earnest spirit of emulation which has 
 thus far characterized her leads her to 
 aspire even to " complete her education" in 
 some American South Hadley or Vassar. 
 
 Disappointed in her plans and efforts, or 
 especially wounded in her sensitive-plant 
 feelings, she sinks at times into what we call 
 " the depths of indigo," tinged, now and then, 
 with a hue of sanctimony, constraining the 
 writer once to call to her, " Why, Amy, I
 
 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 163 
 
 thought you were about to die ; and here you 
 are again wickedly taking the air with these 
 worldly-minded girls ! " 
 
 But, though not yet blooming in the 
 perfect beauty and symmetry of a flower of 
 paradise, she is one who adds much to 
 the attractions of our " missionary garden." 
 Her evidently conscientious desire to do 
 right, her patient, prayerful efforts to please 
 her teachers as pupil, and now, as assistant 
 teacher, to exert a Christian influence over 
 those whom she instructs, and her humbling 
 sense of her felt deficiencies, give ground to 
 hope much for her future usefulness. Would 
 that, with a suitable companion, she might 
 return to labor for her own people, among 
 whom the light of the gospel has hardly 
 begun to shine ! 
 
 Her one ungratified desire is to have her 
 sister Hedjie a pupil in the seminary. Over 
 this she anxiously meditates, and for it she
 
 164 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 prays. And if earnest, eloquent, gifted 
 prayer avail, her request will surely ere long 
 be granted ; for she knows how to plead with 
 God as few or none of her sex here do. 
 'Tis said that ah'eady Hedjie has learned to 
 read, and is watching her opportunity to 
 escape from her semi-servitude, and join her 
 sister here. But of this we know not. 
 Those, certainly, with whom she is living, 
 will take good care that she do not too easily 
 fall into missionary hands. 
 
 Not so happy the fate of Rose, — we forget 
 the Koordish of it, — a girl from a tribe 
 residing some seventy-five miles north-east 
 from Harpoot. Permitted by her parents to 
 reside for a time in a Protestant family in 
 the capital of the Geghi district, she formed 
 the purpose, which we did not encourage, to 
 come to the famous seminary. We advised, 
 rather, that, for a time, she study in the 
 school taught there by the pastor's wife.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 165 
 
 But, poor girl ! she was not allowed to do 
 it ; for her parents dragged her back to 
 their mountain-home, where, against her 
 wish, she was married to an untamed Koord. 
 Should any one ask why we did not at 
 once take this poor girl to Harpoot, we reply, 
 " Because we wished first to try her farther ; 
 and, secondly, because her tribe, being of the 
 wildest sort, would certainly have avenged 
 her coming by the blood of some one or 
 more members of the family with whom she 
 lived. Will not all who read this sketch 
 join us in praying for the speedy dawning, 
 on these mountain-fastnesses, of the day of 
 religious liberty ?
 
 166 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 A PILLAR REMOVED. 
 
 TTTHO shall tell us whether it is from the 
 innate force of gospel truth to develop 
 leadership, or by special providential ap- 
 pointment, that almost without fail, wher- 
 ever a little body of believers is collected, 
 an Aaron, with, perhaps, an added Hur, 
 comes to the front as leader in church-work, 
 whether of praying or practical working? 
 Were all these earnest workers to be gath- 
 ered in some one body, even a pretty large 
 one, the effect might not be the best even 
 there ; while many a little leaderless band 
 would lose heart and all aggressive force, 
 and the little light in many a dark place go 
 out.
 
 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 167 
 
 Such a leader early appeared for the little 
 Protestant band in the village of Hulakegh, 
 about six miles west from Harpoot. 
 
 At one of Mr, Dunmore's earliest visits 
 there, he was sought out by a man, Avak by 
 name, who timidly purchased a Bible, and 
 hurried away to hide it at a neighbor's 
 house, where he might secretly go and read 
 the forbidden book ; for, though about forty 
 years old, he was, according to Oriental 
 custom, still subject to his father, who 
 would not allow the " Prote Bible " to enter 
 his house. 
 
 Being a church "reader," Avak had not 
 to go through the usual tedious process of 
 learning to read, but was able, from the first, 
 to peruse his new-found treasure understand- 
 ingly. Being a sincere, conscientious man, 
 the result was, that he was soon known as 
 an adherent of the new faith, of which, in 
 spite of a somewhat phlegmatic, conserva-
 
 168 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 tive turn of mind, lie at once became an 
 eam(;st, practical apostle, going from man 
 to man, house to house, and village to 
 village, as an unpaid preacher. And the 
 character of these efforts was in marked 
 contrast to those of some of his fellow 
 Protestants, who were such merely. In- 
 quired one of these one day, "Plow happens 
 it that I have so much trouble, while you, 
 who talk so much, get along so easily?" 
 — "-Oh!" replied Avak, "because you seek 
 noise; and I, peace and success." — "I see," 
 retorted the other, touched by the home- 
 thrust, " you raise the plow at every stone, 
 while I let it remain." — "Rather," replied 
 Avak, "say that you use the ax on the 
 stone." A result of his wise, loving efforts 
 to win men, enforced by his consistent 
 Christian example, was, that one, and 
 another, and another were won to the new, 
 eld faith, who are now living members of
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 169 
 
 the little Hulakegh church. The death of 
 the father soon opened the way for bringing 
 home the proscribed book, and made Avak, 
 as oldest of three brothers, the head of a 
 family of fifteen, who were soon united in 
 studj^ing and obeying the new book. Burn- 
 ing with zeal to fit himself for more effective 
 preaching, he now entered the newly-opened 
 theological seminary in Harpoot. But a 
 month's trial convinced both him and us 
 that he was out of his place ; and he went 
 back to labor on in the old way. The ques- 
 tion of forming a church in Hulakegh was 
 hard to decide, perhaps I should rather say 
 easy ; for, though the people were not poorer 
 than the mass of those of other villages of 
 Harpoot plain, they did seem to be more 
 penurious, and to justify very little hope of 
 their ever supporting a pastor. The decision 
 turned, at last, upon the question, whether 
 Avak and hi& brothers could be induced to
 
 170 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 pay the unprecedented sum, for a village 
 family, of ten dollars a year. To our sur- 
 prise and gratification, the presentation of 
 the question to him in that form secured an 
 immediate affirmative. He could do any 
 thing necessary for such an object, and the 
 church was formed ; the village of which we 
 had said, "No self-supporting church can 
 ever be formed there," being among the 
 first to assert its independence of foreign 
 aid. 
 
 But the days of John Concordance and 
 tithe-paying were first to come, and multiply 
 this ten dollars by three and more. 
 
 One of John's converts, a student in the 
 theological seminary, went to tell the people 
 of Hulakegh of the new, easy, and equita- 
 ble method of providing for church ex- 
 penses. But for Avak to tithe the income 
 of himself and brothers, and thus increase 
 the ten to tliirty-foui- dollars for the current
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED^ 171 
 
 year, was harder than to make the original 
 contribution. So, in the meeting held to 
 consider the question of tithe-paying, his 
 natural conservatism came prominently out, 
 and he was forward and efficient in offering 
 objections to the new plan. " It would be 
 difficult to tell the amount of the tithes," 
 an objection, which, from a farmer, who 
 would pay in kind, evidently originated 
 more in the heart than the head. Then, 
 " there would be danger of withholding the 
 tithes, and, like the Jews, 'robbing God,' 
 and falling under his wrath and curse," &c. 
 
 This dialogue between pulpit and pews — 
 or, rather, seat on the floor, — went on till 
 the young theologue summoned courage to 
 say, "Brother Avak, it seems to me that 
 only those who fear that God will give them 
 a good deal are unwilling to return his 
 tithes." 
 
 The arrow had reached the mark. His
 
 172 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 better nature at once re-assumed the ascen- 
 dency ; and he exclaimed, " You are right ! " 
 and immediately rose, and began to pray, tell- 
 ing the Lord all about his past covetousness, 
 and promising to do better in the future. 
 And the vow then made he faithfully kept 
 till his dying-day, which came in September, 
 1869, when he was suddenly prostrated with 
 a disease which deprived him of the power 
 of speech, Avhich was restored to him only 
 for a very brief period before his death. 
 These moments he improved in expressing 
 gratitude to God for giving him the power 
 of speech once more, and telHng those about 
 him how much he should love once more to 
 make a preaching-tour among the villages. 
 
 This testimony given, he closed his eyes 
 and lips, to open them, we doubt not, amid 
 the glories and praises of the better world, 
 and leaving behind him a name which will 
 long have a saintly fragrance in all the region 
 around.
 
 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 173 
 
 XIV. 
 
 DEACON AVEDIS. 
 
 rpHE little Hulakegh church had yet one 
 more pillar; but of him, too, the Lord 
 had need, and, in the September following 
 the death of Avak, called him to higher 
 service. 
 
 His was a later and somewhat peculiar 
 conversion to the gospel faith. The work in 
 the village began, and for some time con- 
 tinued, among men exclusively ; and it was 
 a happy day, when, by the use of a little 
 w^orldly wisdom — taking a company of mis- 
 sionary ladies and Protestant "sisters" from 
 Harpoot to a dedication service in the vil- 
 lage, and so, by an appeal to innate curiosity, 
 luring some women to that dreaded place, a
 
 174 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 Protestant meeting — we succeeded in con- 
 vincing a very few that those who read the 
 Scriptures in the modern spoken tongue 
 were not worse than Turks. Of those whom 
 curiosity lured in, two or three, soon followed 
 by a crowd, came again and again ; and, ere 
 long, Hulakegh was noted for the extent of 
 the evangelical work among the women. 
 Among those who first learned to read the 
 gospel was the wife of Avedis, thereby so 
 putting him to shame, that, he too, purchased 
 a primer, and imitated her example. 
 
 The entrance of God's word gave not 
 only intellectual light, but spiritual under- 
 standing ; and he was soon so marked for his 
 consistent, earnest Christian character, that, 
 on the formation of the church in Hulakegh, 
 he was chosen as its first deacon. But 
 his was to be a very brief earthly service. 
 While he lived, he gave himself, with all his 
 heart, to the duties of his ofQce, and to gen-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 175 
 
 eral evangelistic effort among all classes ; so 
 that, at his death, " all the village wept," 
 Protestants and Armenians alike. His one 
 thought was, " What more can be done to 
 advance Christ's work among us? " But, in 
 the autumn of 1870, he was seized with 
 typhoid-fever, and felt from the first that his 
 end was near. He had no fear of death, but 
 calmly attended to all necessary business, as 
 if he were but going on a journey. His 
 greatest care was for the church ; and, when 
 reason was dethroned, the current of thought 
 was still the same. 
 
 Now he was on the point of leaving his 
 "dark, smoky, narrow dwelling, to go and 
 dwell in a royal palace, full of light and 
 glory," and was urging those about him to 
 be ready to accompany him. Again he had 
 " drunk to the fill of the living water which 
 Jesus promised to the woman of Samaria," 
 and invited othera to drink too, and see how
 
 176 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 sweet it was ; and yet again liis couch was 
 covered with every variety of beautiful and 
 sweet-scented flowers from paradise ; and he 
 expressed surprise that those about him could 
 not see and smell their beauty and sweetness 
 as he did. Apparently almost entirely un- 
 conscious of pain, and reveling amid such 
 delights, he was enjoying on earth rapturous 
 foretastes of heaven. To all the church- 
 members who visited him, his one charge 
 was, " Care well for the church, and labor in 
 hope. These clouds will soon all pass away, 
 and God will again bless his own cause." 
 When his wife inquired, " Why do you not 
 talk to us ? " he replied, " I do not need to 
 do so. I have already, when in health, said 
 enough to 3^ou ; and now I only add, ' Let 
 my death put the seal of truth to all my 
 counsels.' " 
 
 Once only did he allude to his sufferings, 
 saying, " My body is filled with pain, but
 
 GBACE ILLUSTRATED. 177 
 
 my soul with joy." Unlike Avak, lie de- 
 clined to call a physician, saying it would 
 do no good ; and, when near his end, he 
 set apart the sum he should have paid for 
 medical service, sajdng, "Pay this for the 
 missionary work in Koordistan." 
 
 At last, conscious that his end was near, 
 he uttered a few last words to those about 
 him, and adding, " I shall talk no more," 
 closed his eyes in death. The most blessed 
 memory which he left behind him was that 
 of his character as the peacemaker. And he 
 passed away at a time when a threatened 
 division in the church seemed to plead most 
 effectively for the longer tarrying of such as 
 he. This second pillar removed, it almost 
 seemed that the little church could not sur- 
 vive. But, though the two leaders were 
 gone, there remained too many of kindred 
 spirit, too many loving, praying Christian 
 souls, men and women, and they are led by a
 
 178 GRACE rLLUSTEATED. 
 
 pastor of too much Christian experience, to 
 allow the candlestick to be removed out of 
 its place.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 179 
 
 XV. 
 
 DER KEVORK. 
 
 TN our ramble in the missionary garden, 
 we shall light upon some specimens of 
 doubtful genus, requiring the Master's 
 analysis to decide whether they are plants 
 of his, or only weeds. Such an one we have 
 in Der Kevork (" Priest George "). 
 
 On reaching Harpoot in 1857, we found 
 in mission employ, and for the time being 
 occupying the Harpoot pulpit, a man of 
 about forty-five years, of a rather stout 
 build, and sluggish movement, whose face 
 wore a somewhat sinister look, together with 
 one of triumph and self-satisfaction, wliich 
 combined seemed to say, " I've won a 
 victory, and got a reward, and am ready to
 
 180 GRACE ILLTJSTEATED. 
 
 tell all how to do the same." When sabbath 
 came, and he rose to preach, his delight 
 seemed to be to pound the pulpit with his 
 clinched fist, and throw forth in a spiteful, 
 son-of-thunder tone, sentences, which, I sub- 
 sequently learned, were aimed against the 
 absent sinners from whom he had so recently- 
 separated, the adherents of the Armenian 
 Church, and particularly the priests and 
 vartabecls, for whom no terms of condemna- 
 tion seemed to him quite adequate. " This 
 man," said I, "is a very pugnacious 
 preacher. Pity he can't put a little more 
 love into his tones." He soon came to call 
 on the new missionary, and, sitting down by 
 his side, began to rattle off a string of unin- 
 telligible sentences, taking, it for granted, as 
 do all in this land, that, of course, all Ameri- 
 cans speak Armenian. Of one sentiment he 
 resolved to compel an understanding by a 
 Blow, measured utterance of "Eench — vore
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 181 
 
 — emus — ay — koogut — ay, — yev — eench 
 
 — vore — koogut — ay — emus — ay." Find- 
 ing that decrease of his speed did not in- 
 crease the force of my understanding, he 
 opened the Testament at Acts iv. 32, and 
 helped me to translate his utterance as 
 " That which mine is yours is, and that 
 which yours is mine is." There I had it. 
 The preacher, like most of his class, a son 
 of poverty and covetousness combined, not 
 satisfied with the rather fat salary paid 
 him from the missionary treasury, proposed 
 to divide possessions with the new-comer 
 from the golden-hilled land beyond the 
 waters. This impression was confirmed, 
 when, some days afterwards, he came to put 
 his text into practical use by helping him- 
 self from the missionary wood-pile. 
 
 Observation during the week impressed 
 me rather too forcibly Avith the idea that 
 the new convert was lazy. " Too forcibly,"
 
 182 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 I say ; for to one fresh from live, stirring 
 Yankee-land, all the Orient seems to be 
 peopled with a dead-and-alive race ; and, of 
 course, any individual sluggard is compara- 
 tively too harshly judged. But years of 
 observation have not only justified the 
 opinion then formed, that this particular 
 priest was covetous and lazy, but also that 
 he is but a representative of his class. It 
 would seem, that, by some mysterious pro- 
 cess, the holy oil of consecration inoculates 
 them all with these two incurable distempers. 
 Suffice it to say that Der Kevork's frailties 
 seemed day by day less hopeful of removal, 
 and all the more so, because he imagined 
 that the missionaries dare not offend a 
 person of his importance. The wood-pile 
 embargo weakened somewhat this confidence, 
 which received a more violent shock when 
 the missionaries took possession of the city 
 pulpit, and he was located in the neif^^"^ -
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 183 
 
 ing village of Husenik, with instructions to 
 open a school. 
 
 He must now make a demonstration 
 suited to alarm his misguided employers, 
 and bring them to terms, — more money, and 
 less work, and that in the place of his 
 choice, or let them tremble at the prospect 
 of losing so important a proselyte. 
 
 So one day a good Protestant brother, 
 with a face the image of despair and alarm, 
 rushed panting into our house, and ex- 
 claimed, " Der — Kevork — is — parleying — 
 with — the — Armenians ! " The response 
 of a hearty laugh and " Praise the Lord for 
 it," was to him inexplicable trifling with 
 a solemn matter ; for he had no doubt that 
 the breaking of such a pillar would bring a 
 Dagon-temple ruin on the Protestant cause. 
 But not so we. So when, shortly after, we 
 received from him a letter, inquiring, " If I 
 remain in your service hereafter, how much
 
 184 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 will my salary be?" we at once replied, 
 " See Matt. xxvi. 15. Your salary will here- 
 after be five paras " (half a cent) " per 
 month." 
 
 The result was his immediate employment 
 by the Armenians of Husenik as their 
 preacher, followed by a shout of triumph, to 
 tell all the people that the Protestant cause 
 was ruined. 
 
 So far there is nothing to show that our 
 plant is any thing more than a mere weed, 
 a tare of the enemy's sowing in the garden 
 of the Lord. But here begins a different 
 manifestation. While in missionary employ, 
 his scanty store of preaching-material, and 
 perhaps scantier supply of Christian charity, 
 had constrained him to resort to that most 
 abundant and accessible of all stores, — abuse 
 of those who differ from us. 
 
 But, once more inside their church, he be- 
 gan to surprise aU the Armenians, and offend
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 185 
 
 many, by preaching to them the fervid and 
 searching evangelical sermons which he had 
 heard from the apostolic Dunmore. And the 
 result was such a ferment m that town as 
 years of missionary preaching could not have 
 produced. Contrary to our expectation, he 
 did not abuse the missionaries, nor say that 
 we were in error. He only compromised 
 with his own conscience by conforming to 
 certain rites, and repeating certain petitions 
 to the saints, which their church-service re- 
 quires. The Armenians of Husenik had just 
 built them a large and fine stone church ; and 
 their new preacher made its arches resound 
 with truths new to the crowds who flocked 
 to hear him. 
 
 The result was loud and bitter complaint 
 by some, who exclaimed, " This Prote is lead- 
 ing us all astray from the faith of our 
 fathers ! " And when, one day, from some 
 imperfection in its construction, the noble
 
 186 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 pile fell flat, just after the priest had been 
 preaching, they declared that the bawling of 
 that son of thunder had thrown it down. 
 
 He must preach smoother things, or lose 
 his place. And preach them he did for a 
 little time, till one day he rose in his place, 
 and told a dream. During the preceding 
 night he had died, and gone to the judgment- 
 seat. With fear and dread, he heard the 
 Saviour call one and another and another, 
 and declare their eternal destiny for weal or 
 woe, and bid the angels execute his sen- 
 tence. Near the throne were seven 3"awning 
 mouths of as many different hells; the 
 seventh and deepest being reserved for un- 
 faithful ministers of the gospel. 
 
 At length his own turn came, and, fixing, 
 upon him a look of anger, the judge inquired, 
 " Why have you ceased to preach to the 
 people the truths which I bade you tell 
 them?" "I was speechless," said he ; "for
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 187 
 
 I had clone this only to please you, and not 
 to satisfy my conscience, and please my 
 Master. So he called two mighty angels, 
 and said to them, ' Take this unfaithful 
 priest, and cast him into the seventh hell.' 
 
 " They seized me, and were dragging me 
 towards the mouth, when, uttering a shriek 
 of despair, I awoke. And now I can keep 
 silence no longer. I must and shall tell you 
 all the truth." 
 
 The result was, that the place soon became 
 too hot for him ; and he accepted a call to an 
 Armenian church in Harpoot, where he re- 
 mained ten years or more, preaching with 
 more or less faithfulness, but with a con- 
 science ill at ease from conformity to the 
 customs of the church. On the approach of 
 Easter, when all are expected to confess, and 
 partake of the communion, his daughter once 
 found him weeping over his Bible, and asked, 
 " Father, why do you do these things, if 
 they are against your conscience ? "
 
 188 GRACE ILLUSTBATED. 
 
 "I would not," lie replied, "if I were 
 young, or had a grown-up son to care for 
 me/' While here, though his preaching had 
 some awakening power ujDon the masses, 
 who heard him gladly, and did many things, 
 few, if any, did the one thing needful ; for 
 his practice in conforming to church mum- 
 mery seemed to deprive the gospel word of 
 its ultimate divine force to convert the soul. 
 The result was the development of a phari- 
 saical spirit of reform in some directions, 
 while leaving the root of evil untouched. 
 
 Some, indeed, stirred by his preaching to 
 hunger for the bread of life, found their way 
 to the Protestant church ; but, for the con- 
 sciences of most awakened ones, he had some 
 ready salve which was effectual in soothing 
 
 « 
 
 them to rest. 
 
 If he ever himself felt the Spirit's power 
 in his heart, his sinful compliance has so 
 dulled his perceptions, and the teachings of
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 189 
 
 liis church (practically ignoring, if not deny- 
 ing, the work of the Spirit in days subsequent 
 to the apostles) have so obscured his mental 
 vision, that, instead of directing the troubled 
 sinner to the only Physician, he finds for him 
 in outward works an opiate for an awakened 
 conscience. 
 
 But in Harpoot, too, difficulties arose ; and, 
 some months since, he accepted a call to 
 Gaban Maden, where, doubtless, he will run 
 much the same course, and go, ere many 
 years, to that judgment-seat before which, in 
 vision, he trembled and shrieked. 
 
 Fortunately we are not called upon to do 
 Christ's work of judgment ; for, " if we 
 were," as a good old man once said, " we 
 should let many into heaven who don't 
 belong there, and keep out many who do."
 
 190 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 "THE LORD'S BEDROS." 
 
 ■yTR. DUNMORE had not been long in 
 Harpoot, before he was able to write, 
 that a " notorious tippler " had been won to 
 the truth. 
 
 Nor were these early hopes to be disap- 
 pointed. The tippler not only became and 
 continued a sober man, but, infinitely better, 
 a sincere Christian. 
 
 He at once began to devote a large part of 
 his time to efforts to lead others to the truth, 
 supporting himself and family by laboring a 
 part of the time at his trade as a gunsmith. 
 A man of much native tact and slirewdness, 
 though uneducated, he soon became a walk- 
 ing concordance of the Scriptures; being
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 191 
 
 always ready to give chapter and verse. He 
 was, besides, entirely fearless in prosecuting 
 his evangelistic labors; so that, ere long, Mr. 
 Dunmore wisely judged that he should be 
 employed as a permanent missionary helper ; 
 and from that day to tliis, eighteen years, he 
 has, with the exception of one year, been 
 thus employed, winning many souls to Christ, 
 for, from the first, he fixed his heart on 
 this single aim. His tact in so quoting 
 Scripture as to silence opposers enables him 
 to win his way where most would retire 
 abashed ; while his simplicity and earnestness 
 of Christian character give him great power 
 in convincing those who approach him. An 
 incident in liis early labors will illustrate 
 this. He started for the village of Haboosie, 
 distant some twelve miles from Harpoot, 
 and meeting successively three men on the 
 way, who inquired whither he was going, he 
 was, on informing them, met by the reply
 
 192 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 " There is a certain Torose there, by winning 
 whom to Protestantism, you will convince us, 
 also, of its truth. Bedros needed no other 
 challenge to find out and labor for this wicked 
 and apparently incorrigible 023poser ; and he 
 was soon won, not only to Protestantism, but, 
 better still, apparently to Christ ; and, though 
 his has been a hard fight against his old 
 nature, such is his reputation for saintliness, 
 that he has been called even by a sick priest 
 to read and pray with, in hope of healing 
 him. 
 
 If there be a stronghold of opposition, 
 Bedros is the man to enter it, either by direct 
 attack or by stratagem. 
 
 Such, for centuries, has been the haughty 
 insolence of the Turks to the Armenians here, 
 that, till the coming of missionaries, they did 
 not even allow them to bent a goachnag^ a 
 piece of board used in some places to sum- 
 mon the people to church. In Harpoot city,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 193 
 
 Mr. Dunmore first used such a board for his 
 own meetings ; and, in time, the Armenians 
 followed suit. 
 
 It was a more difficult thing to introduce 
 the custom in outlying places, and especially 
 in Palu, where Bedros was for a time labor- 
 ing, because the foolish Armenians, jealous of 
 the Protestants for enjoying a privilege which 
 they dared not claim, complained to the Turks 
 that that Protestant was breaking the law; 
 and the governor of the city forbade Bedros 
 to beat his goachnag again. But, hearing that 
 the pasha of the district was coming with a 
 retinue of soldiers, he resolved by one bold 
 stroke to stop the mouths of all opposers ; and 
 just as his Excellency, with all his retinue, 
 came down the hillside opposite the Pro- 
 testant church, Bedros went upon the roof, 
 and gave out a loud, emphatic rub-a-dub-dub, 
 rub-a-dub-dub, from his board, and then 
 hastily descending, and outrunning the 
 
 13
 
 194 GRACE ILLIJSTEATED. 
 
 Armenians who started to complain to the 
 pasha, he paid his respects to him, and at 
 once entered a complaint against them as 
 men tiying to restrain him in the enjoyment 
 of his religious right to call his people 
 together for worship. A stern rebuke to 
 them, with an order to let him alone, sent 
 them away unheard ; and henceforth they, 
 too, began to use a goachnag. 
 
 Calling once at a monastery, and upon a 
 vartabed, a relative of his, he was rudely 
 repulsed with, " You have apostatized : I don't 
 know you." — "Very well," replied Bedros, 
 " if I have strayed, yoft should have sought 
 me. But, instead of this, I have sought you ; 
 and you must now by this gospel convince 
 me of my errors." Ill prepared for a conflict 
 with such a weapon, the vartahed fled to 
 another room of the monastery, m which the 
 Turkish governor of Palu was a guest. But 
 Bedros was not to be shaken off so easily,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 195 
 
 and at once followed him. Being asked by 
 the governor who he was, he replied, " I 
 am a Protestant preacher of the gospel ; but 
 this Christian vartahed refuses me lodgings." 
 — • " Be my guest, then," he replied ; and, 
 turning to the vartahed^ asked, " Is not yoiu" 
 gospel the same ? " He failing to answ^er, 
 Bedi'os replied, " It is ; but he does not 
 receive it. To prove this, let him say whether 
 some things which I say are not true." At 
 this the governor laughed heartily, and said, 
 " Say on." — " First of all, then," said Bedros, 
 " the gospel says, ' If thine enemy hunger, 
 feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink : ' but 
 this vartahed does not receive us, though we 
 are his friends and relatives." At this the 
 governor said to the vartahed^ " You have 
 done wrong, and should repent," at which the 
 latter left in confusion, but soon returned, 
 and beckoned Bedros to follow him, who, 
 having taken supper with the governor, did
 
 196 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 SO. Seated in another room, the vartahed 
 told Bedros that he did not hate, but pity, 
 him for his errors. " Convince me of them, 
 then, by this book," was the instant reply of 
 Bedros, pulling out his Testament. " I will 
 try," replied the vartahed. " Tell me, then, 
 whence you have authority to preach the gos- 
 pel ? " — " Here in 1 Pet. ii. 9," was the ready 
 reply, "it is said to common Christians^ ' Ye 
 are a chosen generation, a royal priestJwod, 
 . . . that ye should show forth the praises 
 of him who hath called you out of darkness 
 into his marvelous light.' In Acts viii. 4, 
 w*e read that common Christians went every- 
 where preaching the word. And here in 
 1 Pet. iv. 10, 'tis said, ' As eve^y man hath 
 received the gift, even so minister the same 
 one to another.' " Unable to meet this array 
 of texts, the vartahed changed the subject. 
 Another vartahed coming in, and the servants 
 of the monastery gathering around them,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 197 
 
 Bedros then spent four hours in faithfully 
 preaching the gospel, and at the close was 
 followed to his room by a white-haired old 
 man, who, telling him of a pilgrimage made 
 by him to Jerusalem in the vain hope of 
 finding peace of conscience, added, " I am 
 ignorant. I do not know the way of salva- 
 tion. "Will you tell me what I must do to 
 be saved?" 
 
 The poor okl man listened as for his life, 
 while Bedros told the story of the cross, and, 
 at the close, exclaimed, " Alas ! I have lost 
 my days ! " and continued asking questions 
 till past midnight. 
 
 Warned by tlie people of Palu to desist 
 from a proposed journey into the mountain- 
 ous district to the north, as two men had 
 just been robbed and murdered there, he 
 assured them that he was ready not only to 
 be robbed, but to die if need be, for the sake 
 of XDreaching the gosx3el to his perishing
 
 198 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 countrymen in that district. So go he did, 
 and fell into the hands of the Koords, six 
 of whom, entering a house where he was a 
 guest, robbed him of his watch and aha, a 
 sort of cloak. 
 
 To the expostulations of the host, the 
 robber chief replied, " Were God to come 
 down from heaven, he could not prevent our 
 taking what this man has." 
 
 He then demanded the rest of Bedros' 
 clothes, and his money, which he refused to 
 give up, unless force were used ; and then he 
 so set the robber's sin before him, and so 
 excited his fears by appealing to the Moham- 
 medan belief, that, at the judgment, the 
 wicked must make good all the wrong in- 
 flicted on others, that he recovered back his 
 watch and aba. His argument, in short, 
 was this, " Do you believe there is a God ? " 
 _ u Yes." — " Will all men die ? " — " Yes." 
 — "And be judged?" —"Yes." — " They
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 199 
 
 will indeed," continued Bedros ; " and what 
 then can you do ? If a naked man were in 
 the water, and ten men, pointing their swords 
 at his breast, should say, ' Give us one para,' " 
 (a tenth of a cent), " ' or we will kill you,' 
 could he give it?" — "No," replied the 
 Koord. " So you," continued Bedros, " will 
 be naked before God in the judgment, when 
 he shall demand of you this watch and aha^ 
 and, on your failing to restore them, send 
 you to the place of everlasting torment." 
 
 The result was, that the Koord, having 
 returned what he had taken, begged a copy 
 of the Testament, from which Bedros went 
 on to preach to him till half-past three 
 o'clock in the morning, when the robber lay 
 down to rest. But Bedros, though a firm 
 behever in the perseverance of the saints, 
 fearing that this unclean spirit had only left 
 for a time, sat and watched his sleeping 
 convert till dawn, who, on waking, began
 
 200 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 with much delight to show his Testament to 
 his companions, and to tell them of the 
 wonderful truths which Bedros had told him 
 from it. At leaving, Bedros still feared that 
 the robbers would intercept and rob him on 
 his journey, as they had once before done to 
 a guest, when bribed by the host to let him 
 depart in peace ; but his fears were ground- 
 less. And thus summer and winter, during 
 most of these long years, sometimes through 
 the pathless snows of the mountains, and 
 often in perils of robbers, but never robbed, 
 he has come and gone with a burning apos- 
 tolic zeal which deservedly won for him the 
 name, "Apostle." A little missionary girl 
 five years old was so impressed by what she 
 heard of his Christian zeal, that hearing us 
 address him as Bedros, and curious to know 
 whether he was the one, inquired, " Are you 
 the Lord's Bedros?" He "hoped he was," 
 and so do we assuredly. Sure we are that
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 201 
 
 he bas been instrumental in leading many to 
 Christ. In these latter clays, with the weight 
 of 3'ears increasing upon him, his vigor and 
 efficiency, if not his zeal, have been less con- 
 spicuous ; but he seems to be the Lord's 
 Bedros still, aiming with singleness of pur- 
 pose to do the work which the Master gives 
 him.
 
 202 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XVII. 
 "THIEF MAGHAK." 
 
 A ND a slirewcl, sharp one he was, till the 
 gospel got hold of him, which it began 
 to do in one of his oil-peddling tours. 
 
 From that day he became so upright in his 
 dealings as even to redeem from reproach 
 the more contemptuous name of " Prote ^ 
 Maghak," which his adherence to the gospel 
 fixed upon him. Even discussions over rites 
 and ceremonies, usually worse than useless, 
 can be useful, as was seen in his case. Per- 
 haps we should rather say, that passages from 
 God's word are so gemlike in their luster as 
 to glitter even when cast among such rub- 
 
 1 An abreviatiou of "Protestant," but so pronounced 
 as to mean "porode," a "leper."
 
 THIEF MAGHAK.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 203 
 
 bish. Being present at such a discussion in 
 the village of Iclimeli, IMaghak's attention 
 was drawn to a passage quoted by one of 
 the disputants : " Now the Spirit speaketh 
 expressly, that, in the latter times, some shall 
 depart from the faith, . . . forbidding to 
 marry, and commanding to abstain from 
 meats." He came away, saying to himself, 
 " These false teachers can not be the so 
 much reviled Protestants ; for their mission- 
 aries are married, and they make no rules 
 about abstaining from meats ; while our 
 bishops and vartabeds never marry, and are 
 very scrupulous about meat-eating on certain 
 days." The result of these meditations was, 
 that he resolved to obtain a " Protestant 
 Bible," and examine for himself ; and, though 
 knowing not a letter of the alphabet, he at 
 once bought the book, adding its key, a 
 primer. Putting the latter in his bosom 
 while^on his peddling tours, and exacting a
 
 204 GKACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 lesson from every reader to whom he sold his 
 sesame oil, he was soon able, though stam- 
 meringly, to study the Bible for himself. 
 The change was immediate and complete. 
 From being notorious for dishonesty, he 
 became equally famous for integrity in his 
 dealings ; so that even the Turkish owner of 
 the soil which he and his brothers cultivated 
 ceased to measure his share of the crop, 
 taking Maghak's word for it. Soon his two 
 brothers, and all the members of their united 
 households, became adherents of the despised 
 faith, now no longer despised in this region ; 
 for such has been the power of the gospel in 
 externally saving people from the power of 
 wickedness, that, alike among Mohamme- 
 dans and nominal Christians, Prote no longer 
 means leper, but an adherent of a purer 
 faith than that of the mass. 
 
 Maghak still lives, though too feeble for 
 any service, except that of illustrating the
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 205 
 
 power of divine grace by a consistent Chris- 
 tian life. 
 
 He can not long survive; but while the 
 smoky light of his sesame oil is giving place 
 to the still more smoky emanations ^ of kero- 
 sene, and the oil-trade fast becoming a thing 
 of the past, many a year must go by ere the 
 light of the oil-peddler's life shall cease to 
 shine in his native village, and others which 
 have been reached by his story. 
 
 1 As the kerosene is burned iu common wick lamps, 
 and ixsually -with the wick pnlled high up, the already 
 blackened rafters of Oriental village homes are rapidly 
 enriching themselves with a more luxurious accumula- 
 tion of the essential soot.
 
 206 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 DIVERSE GIFTS. 
 
 rTlHE village of Sliukhaji, perched upon 
 the sides of a spur of the Taurus Moun- 
 tains, some twenty miles east of Harpoot, 
 early enjoyed the advantage of missionary 
 labor by the location there of a native helper 
 by Mr. Dunmore, the first missionary in 
 the Harpoot field. And while, for several 
 reasons, and among these the death of two 
 native laborers successively located there, 
 the gospel fruit has not been as abundant as 
 we desire, it has furnished rather striking 
 specimens of Christian life, two of which, 
 by their contrasted character, suggest the 
 heading given above. The first man to de- 
 clare himself an adherent of the gospel was
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 207 
 
 a liardy muleteer, Arakial (" Apostle ") 
 by name, whose nature and vocation had 
 combined to make a resolute, independent, 
 hard-headed, stout-handed man, with whom 
 few cared to come into conflict. And, when 
 the gospel took hold of his sturdy manhood, 
 it took strong hold, and kept it. Everybody 
 knew that that muleteer was an adherent of 
 the new doctrines. 
 
 A brother's wife, residing in the same 
 house, soon followed him, and suffered what 
 he could not, — persecution. This woman 
 was an especial object of hatred to Arakial's 
 wife, by whom, in the absence of the hus- 
 band, she was treated in a shamefully cruel 
 manner. Resolved to put an end to this, 
 Arakial, on his return, gave his wife a whip- 
 ping, which cured her of her propensity (or, 
 at least, the indulgence of it) to torment her 
 sister-in-law. When expostulated with by 
 Mr. Dunmore for this energetic method of
 
 208 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 administering family discipline, lie replied, 
 " Oh ! I was only giving her a needed curtain- 
 lecture." The native helper dying, the vil- 
 lagers rose in force to prevent his burial ; but 
 going himself, and digging a grave, he stood 
 by it, pickax in hand, requesting any one of 
 the mob who desired to be buried first to 
 come on at once. The young preacher was 
 buried in peace. 
 
 And our new convert was equally zealous 
 in effort to lead others to the truth, though, 
 in doing so, he showed himself somewhat of 
 a " son of thunder," presenting quite freely 
 the aggressive, vindictive side of the gospel, 
 and being a little too much inclined to blame 
 people for not coming to the light as readily 
 and quickly as had he. 
 
 He still hves, and, while enfeebled by age 
 and hard fare, is the same unflinching ad- 
 lierent of truth and right as he understands 
 it, and in his deep poverty makes sacrifices
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 209 
 
 for the gospel's sake, some of which would 
 not be appreciated in enlightened Christian 
 lands ; such, for instance, as giving a rich 
 young preacher a valuable daughter gratis^ 
 instead of taking from thirty to fifty dollars, 
 as those villagers not adhering to the gospel, 
 and perhaps even some professing to do 
 that, would have done. 
 
 Come we now to one whose nature and 
 gifts are diverse from these. Hazar was no 
 *' son of thunder," but a man of peace, of a 
 gentle, loving temper, ruled less by impulse 
 than by conscience. A younger brother in a 
 large, and, for that place, wealthy family, 
 he, by his quiet sincerity and energy, took 
 the place of leader, and had almost undis- 
 puted control of the family property. There 
 was one thing, however, which he could not 
 control, — a wife as little inclined to gospel 
 ways as was she whom Arakial ruled ; and 
 the result is, that, while the latter soon 
 
 14
 
 210 GEACE ILLTTSTEATED. 
 
 changed her naughty ways, the former holds 
 to hers still. 
 
 Hazar, having been a "reader" in the old 
 church, was at once ready for reading and 
 receiving the Scriptures in the modern 
 tongue. 
 
 A visit to his home would have given one 
 a vivid idea of the diminutive amount of 
 real comfort' which even wealth usually pur- 
 chases in this land. Wrote a missionary 
 lady who visited it, " "We went to Hazar's 
 house, or rather hovel. As we entered, six 
 men were taking breakfast at one table ; and 
 seven women, in another place, had their food 
 upon the floor ; while four dirty urchins 
 occupied another part of the room. It was 
 a scene. Poor man ! he does not get much 
 comfort at home. But his trials have been 
 sanctified to him ; for I never saw a more 
 exemplary Christian. Of course, my testi- 
 mony alone would not be sufficient to war-
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 211 
 
 rant the declaration; but all others give him 
 the same character." 
 
 The " trials " alluded to were from a long 
 and expensive conflict in the effort to erect a 
 parsonage and a church, in which he took the 
 lead, and which made sore drafts on both 
 patience and purse ; he having personally- 
 contributed three hundred and fifty dollars, 
 while all the property of the family would, 
 probably, not exceed fifteen hundred dollars. 
 And yet we, who were deeply interested in 
 the case, and doing what we could to help it 
 on, did not know till afterwards how much 
 it had cost pecuniarily and otherwise, so 
 equable and calm was his temper, and so un- 
 assuming his manner at all times. He had 
 consecrated himself and his all to Christ, and 
 took it for granted that the consecration was 
 accepted. 
 
 If there was any thing which we would 
 have changed, it was this perfect uniformity.
 
 212 GRACE rLLTJSTRATED. 
 
 Had he sometimes made his family piety a 
 little less patient, a little more forcible and 
 aggressive, he might have seen greater 
 changes for the better in his large family 
 circle. Said a quiet, patient saint to a rest- 
 less, aggressive " son of thunder," " You do a 
 great many things to harm Christ's work." 
 — "And you," was the not less truthful 
 reply, " neglect a great many things to harm 
 it." 
 
 This remark might have been made with 
 some justice of Hazar ; but, take him all in 
 all, he was a very good man, — one of whom 
 it was justly said, " I never saw a more ex- 
 emplary Christian," and " All give him the 
 same character." 
 
 His one great aim, prayer, and effort was, 
 that Christ's work might advance. 
 
 But just when he seemed indispensable to 
 this progress, just when the struggle over 
 the church and parsonage was over, and we
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 213 
 
 began to hope that an independent church 
 would soon be formed in Shukhaji, he was 
 laid upon a bed of sickness, and at once 
 said, " I shall not rise from it, but shall die." 
 Fearing lest members of the family might, 
 after his death, cause trouble to the little 
 Protestant community, by laying claim to 
 the property for which he had paid so heav- 
 ily, he took pains to make all legally safe. 
 
 Some years before, he had joined the Har- 
 poot church, but subsequently transferred 
 his membership to the church in Ichmeh, 
 nearer his home. But, upon his sick-bed, he 
 recalled his old love, and, on the fifteenth 
 day of his illness, sent to the Harpoot 
 church a special message of affection, add- 
 ing, " Tell them, that, though I am to die 
 to-night, I have never been so peaceful as 
 now." And so he did die that night, peace- 
 fully trusting in Christ to the last. In vain 
 the old priest came, and begged to aid in
 
 214 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 saving liis soul, saying, " Open your mouth, 
 that I may give you the communion, — a 
 piece of the body of Christ." He patiently 
 allowed him to read and go through the mum- 
 meries of his church, keeping his mouth 
 closed alike for communion and rebuke. He 
 knew in whom he had believed, and knew, 
 also, that the old priest could do him neither 
 good nor harm. To avoid an unseemly 
 quarrel, the priest was also allowed to com- 
 mit the body to the grave with the same 
 harmless forms ; for we knew that the soul 
 was safe in the hands of Him who had 
 bou2:ht and cleansed it with his own blood.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 215 
 
 XIX. 
 
 GRACE ABOUNDING. 
 
 BY JIES. O. P. ALLEN. 
 
 O EVENTEEN years have passed since tlie 
 first prayer-meeting was established at 
 Harpoot. In its early history, one chilly day 
 in December, when the spacious room was 
 crowded with eager listeners, the attention 
 of the missionary was arrested by one who 
 was present for the first time. Her fine in- 
 tellectual countenance, dress, and grace of 
 manner, were in striking contrast to most 
 of those around her. In conversation with 
 her after the meeting, she showed no signs 
 of interest in the truth which had been 
 uttered ; and there was little expectation 
 that she would come again. But in this
 
 216 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 case, as it too frequently happens, we failed to 
 recognize the power of Him who holds the 
 hearts of all in his hand, and is able to turn 
 them whithersoever he will. From that 
 time till her death (in 1871), she was in 
 constant attendance, with the exception of 
 the first three years, when she was occasion- 
 ally absent, and during which time the truth 
 seemed to make no impression on her heart. 
 She was devoted to the world. She listened 
 attentively to religious conversation and the 
 reading of the Scriptures, and became famil- 
 iar with the great truths of salvation, but 
 manifested a stern determination to resist 
 entreaties to seek Christ. 
 
 But the Holy Spirit came, and she was 
 led to see her sin and danger. She fled to 
 the cross, and there found the joy of for- 
 given sin. The change in her life was very 
 marked. From a proud, worldly woman, she 
 became a humble and self-denying Christian.
 
 GEACB ILLUSTEATED. 217 
 
 The things she counted gain before were 
 now loss. She remarked, one day, to a 
 friend, that her husband was urging her to 
 prepare a marriage-outfit for Hanum (her 
 daughter) ; but, said she, " I tell him it is 
 not well to lay up treasures upon earth, 
 where moth and rust doth corrupt." And 
 she could not be prevailed upon to make the 
 quantity of clothes the custom required, and 
 which she was amply able to do, for the sole 
 reason that she did not think it worthy an 
 immortal soul to spend so much time on that 
 which was to perish so soon. 
 
 One of the first lessons that the Spirit 
 taught her was, that not only she herself, 
 but all she called her own, belonged to 
 Christ. 
 
 To the poor she gave frequently and 
 freely, and with her own hands, but made 
 others almoners of her contributions for the 
 cause of Christ. Many a gold coin she
 
 218 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 brought to the pastor's wife, saying, "You 
 know better than I what part of the work 
 of the Lord is most needy." It was suffi- 
 cient for her to know that the money went 
 into the treasury of the Lord. Her chil- 
 dren, too, were consecrated to the Master. 
 Her eldest son fitted for the work of the 
 ministry ; but, health failing, he was not 
 able to preach, and yet was able to give 
 instruction in both seminaries for several 
 years. One daughter became the wife of 
 a preacher. Both she and her husband, this 
 year, have joined the mother in the better 
 land. 
 
 Mariam was the wife of a watchmaker, 
 Puroodian by name. She prayed with an 
 intense longing for the conversion of her 
 husband ; but the " convenient time " did 
 not come till years afterward. One day, 
 during a religious awakening, she came to 
 Ihe prayer-meeting, and, with a voice chok-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 219 
 
 ing with emotion, begged the sisters to fjray 
 for her husband. The request was heeded ; 
 many fervent prayers being offered in his 
 behalf. The next day he asked his son to 
 pray with him, saying that his family were 
 all going to heaven, but that he was doomed 
 to perdition. At the meeting the following 
 week, she came with a joyful heart, to 
 praise God for his mercy in bringing him to 
 Christ. 
 
 For years she was in feeble health, being a 
 victim to a lingering consumption. She was 
 often prostrated by disease, but, if she had 
 power to walk about, was sure to come to 
 the place of worship. She loved the prayer- 
 meeting; and neither storms nor cold kept 
 her at home. A year before her death, one 
 wintry day, she came into the meeting, so 
 exhausted from the effort to ascend a steep 
 hill, that she could not speak for some mo- 
 ments. One remarked to her, " You are
 
 220 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 not able to walk such a distance." She re- 
 plied, "What shall I do? I have a great 
 desire to come." Durinsf the following^ win- 
 ter, she became very sick, and her friends 
 gave up all hope of her recovery. But she 
 again rallied ; and once more hope revived. 
 
 One morning, shortly after, a request came 
 to the pastor and wife to visit her. As 
 they entered her room, she said to them, " I 
 am a pilgrim. I am going. I wish you to 
 forgive me, if in any way I have wronged 
 you, or injured your feelings." She had 
 always treated them with the greatest kind- 
 ness. They never visited her without re- 
 ceiving some token of her love, not given 
 on the impulse of the moment, but some- 
 tliing reserved especially for them. 
 
 She was sitting up in bed, and seemed as 
 well as usual; and her friends tried to 
 assure her that she was so. But she con- 
 fidently affirmed that it had been revealed
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 221 
 
 to her that night, that she was soon to leave 
 them. She wished that all her relatives and 
 acquaintances be called ; and from them she 
 sought forgiveness for every unkind word. 
 She distributed the gold coins of her neck- 
 lace among her friends, giving to her pastor's 
 family several pieces as memorials of her 
 love. The poor received from her own 
 hands her clothes, with the exception of one 
 suit. When the last garment had been dis- 
 posed of, she smilingly said, "I have nothing 
 left, except the clothes for my burial." 
 
 For a season, darkness came over her. 
 She — to use her own words — "lost her 
 Jesus." But the clouds soon dispersed ; and 
 He in whom her soul had taken great 
 delight stood forth more glorious than ever 
 before. She sent for her pastor, and, with a 
 countenance beaming with joy, said, as he 
 sat beside her, " I have all things now. I 
 have found my Jesus: I have found my
 
 222 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 
 
 Jesus! He left me for a little while; but 
 he has returned." From that time till her 
 death, a few days after, her mind was in 
 "perfect peace." Death had no terrors for 
 her. It was only the door through which 
 she would enter into the " many mansions." 
 It was her great desire that her pastor should 
 perform her burial service ; but it so hap- 
 pened, that there was to be a meeting at a 
 place some three days' distant from Harpoot. 
 The day for starting had been fixed. Should 
 the pastor go, and leave this dying saint? 
 He presented the case before her, and asked 
 what he should do. " Go," was her quick 
 reply. " Of course, you must go. Shall the 
 work of the Lord be hindered for me ? It 
 will make but little difference who buries my 
 poor body." So the pastor bade her a last 
 good-by. 
 
 The following morning she sweetly and 
 peacefully fell asleep.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 223 
 
 " Asleep in Jesus! oh, how sweet 
 To be for such a skimber meet ! 
 With holy confidence to sing 
 That death has lost its venomed sting."
 
 224 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XX. 
 
 PATIENT SARKIS. 
 
 npHE wind, bearing the thistledown away 
 over hill and dale, deposits its seed to 
 grow and multiply on the distant mountain- 
 side ; or, better still, the little bird places 
 beside it the seed of some fruit-bearing tree, 
 brought from far, for a slower growth and a 
 richer fruitage to bless men of coming time : 
 but more mysterious and blessed still is 
 God's providential work of scattering the 
 good seed of his word at times. Some sev- 
 enty-five miles north-east from Harpoot, 
 hemmed in among the Anti-Taurus Moun- 
 tains, and surrounded on all sides by Koords, 
 are some thousands of Armenians, scattered 
 over a district of some four hundred square
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 225 
 
 miles, mostly isolated from the mass of the 
 nation, and, till within a few years, sunk in 
 the deepest spiritual ignorance, and fanati- 
 cally attached to their national church. 
 About twenty-five years ago, Sarkis, an 
 inhabitant of the Kasahah, or chief town 
 of this district, visited Constantinople, and, 
 while there, received a present of a Testa- 
 ment, wliich, though unable to read, he took 
 home, and hid in his house ; for no ona there 
 might then with safety declare himself the 
 possessor of the hated Protestant book. 
 
 The mass of the people were in the same 
 condition of ignorance : but a few persons, 
 called deratsoos, specially trained for aiding 
 the priests in reading the church service, 
 were possessed of the wonderful power of 
 reading. To one of these he at length in- 
 trusted the secret of the strange book, and 
 begged him to read it to him. 
 
 Then the good seed of the Word, so provi- 
 
 15
 
 226 GBACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 dentiall}^ wafted hither from far away, began 
 to take root, and spring up. Others joined 
 the reader and listener ; and soon there was a 
 little company who held secret meetings for 
 reading. But secret they could not long 
 remain ; for the words they heard were as 
 fire shut up in their hones. 
 
 This was especially true of Sarins, whose 
 heart was touched, and with meekness and 
 courage he began to tell all abroad the con- 
 tents of the wonderful volume, which he 
 himself soon learned to read. As this must 
 be stopped, the priests and the chief man of 
 the town headed a mob, who went to the 
 house of Sarkis, beat him, cast him into 
 prison, and, making a fire in a public place, 
 threw his Testament into it. 
 
 The imprisoning and beating were repeated 
 again and again, but all to no purpose. Like 
 the apostles before the sanhedrim, he re- 
 plied, " Whether it be right in the sight of
 
 GEACE ILLIJSTRATED. 227 
 
 God to hearken unto you more than unto 
 God, judge ye. For I can not but speak the 
 things which I have heard." To supply the 
 place of the burned Testament, he went three 
 days' journey to Erzroom, and purchased 
 another, to which he afterwards added a 
 Bible, and was known by all as a Protestant. 
 Meanwhile, the son of the leader of the 
 mob, a young man, Hampartsoom (" Ascen- 
 sion ") by name, attached himself to the gos- 
 pel party, and was told by his father that he 
 must forsake the society of Sarkis, and leave 
 off reading the forbidden book, or leave his 
 house. But, when he took his wife's hand 
 to depart, the father's heart relented. The 
 father and an elder brother having died not 
 long after, Hampartsoom, without professing 
 to be a Protestant, began to hold meetings 
 at his house for Scripture-reading. As the 
 priests dare not touch a man of his wealth 
 and influence, one step was gained in the
 
 228 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 direction of religious liberty, — tlie right to 
 read the Bible. 
 
 But it would have been amusing, had it 
 not been painful, to see the timidity of these 
 Bible-readers. In 1858, accompanied by the 
 present pastor of the Harpoot church, I 
 started to visit the place ; but when in Tem- 
 ran, some nine miles distant, we were met by 
 Sarkis, who had come as their delegate, to 
 request, that unless proposing to remain in 
 the Kasahah, so as to protect them, we would 
 not visit the place, and thus stir up against 
 them the enmity of the people. 
 
 To this we, of course, replied, " We come 
 not for you alone, but for all the people ; and 
 if you are afraid of being called our friends, 
 and suffering persecution, you are at liberty 
 to stay away." At first, all except Sarlds 
 did stay away ; but sixteen of them speedily 
 repented of their cowardice, and, furnishing 
 us with a room of their own, treated us as
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 229 
 
 tlieir guests. Among these was not Ham- 
 partsoom, though apparently not from fear of 
 persecution, but, rather, fearing loss of influ- 
 ence for good, as he called it ; but during 
 our week's stay there, uniformly at nine, P.M., 
 he rapped at our doors, and remained till the 
 night was far spent, conversing on gospel 
 truth. " These sixteen," said he, " are now 
 able to stand ; and I commit them to you, and 
 go back to the church to win others," Poor 
 man ! In vain we tried to show him the sin 
 and danger of his course. Before we left 
 the place, he made us a great feast, to which 
 were invited some of the chief dignities of 
 the town, for Oriental courtesy required this 
 of him. And, at our subsequent visits to the 
 place, he was uniformly friendly, at times 
 even attending the Protestant meetings ; 
 but, to the time of his death, he retained his 
 connection with the Armenian Church, seem- 
 ing to have no deep heart-experience of the
 
 230 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 power of evangelical truth ; and, now that he 
 is gone, his sons seem to be still further 
 removed from its influence. 
 
 The contrast between him and Sarkis was 
 from the first marked. "With the latter, 
 there was no attempt to serve two masters. 
 While so patient as to bear for many years 
 persecution of the most violent kind, without 
 indulging any bitter feeling towards his per- 
 secutors, and so timid and self-distrusting, 
 that, even to this day, 'tis said that he reads 
 family prayers from a prayer-book, yet, in 
 all efforts to promote the gospel cause, he is 
 an earnest, efficient leader, his timidity and 
 self-distrust all disappearing when action is 
 called for. 
 
 Hard and long was the contest against 
 enemies who were resolved to prevent it, 
 before the little church-buildmg was erected, 
 and longer and more trying still the struggle 
 before a person suited to be pastor of the
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 231 
 
 prospective church was secured, and his 
 salary made up. But at length the end was 
 gained ; and, some months since, a fruit of 
 that one Testament appeared in the forma- 
 tion of a church of twenty-four members 
 from the Kasahah and neighboring towns, 
 with the prospect of, ere long, forming 
 anotlier in Temran, while the leaven has 
 spread extensively throughout the district, 
 two other towns in which are occupied by 
 evangelical laborers. 
 
 Meanwhile a rich blessing has come upon 
 the family of Sarins. His wife, an earnest 
 Christian, went once rejoicing down to 
 death's door, but was raised up to see one of 
 her two daughters graduate from Harpoot 
 Female Seminary, and return to marry their 
 young pastor, and the other now one of the 
 most promising pupils in the seminary, both 
 sincere Christians. But his richest blessing 
 is in seeing the moral reformation which has
 
 232 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 followed from that Testament so providen- 
 tially placed in his hands, and which, having 
 drawn in its train hundreds of Bibles and 
 Testaments, and thousands of other volumes, 
 — primers, copies of "Saints' Rest," Dod- 
 dridge's " Rise and Progress," " Pilgrim's 
 Progress," hymn-books, catechisms &c., — 
 has inaugurated a moral change in that hith- 
 erto benighted district, which is but faintly 
 indicated by the fact of the formation of the 
 little church. Years ago, when a sermon 
 was preached there on the sin of lying, and 
 applied by saying, " You know that all of 
 you except Sarkis are liars," no one took 
 offense ; but to make such an application 
 now would be both unjust and unsafe ; for a 
 moral sentiment has arisen in the commu- 
 nity, and a public opinion, which, while it 
 demands truthfulness, at least, from the pro- 
 fessed friends of the gospel, makes them 
 resent the imputation of falsehood.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 233 
 
 And by the side of the patient man, after 
 so many years of unwearied waiting and 
 working, stand at length some others whose 
 hearts are moved only less deeply than his 
 own, to see the entire district renovated by 
 the gospel. And we trust the number will 
 go on increasing, till even the surrounding 
 Koords shall feel the influence of that Testa- 
 ment in the hands of Sarkis, and of his 
 patient waiting, praying, and toiling. 
 
 "There shall be an handfid of corn in 
 the earth upon the top of the mountains ; 
 the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon."
 
 234 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 XXL 
 
 THE DESPAIRING SILVERSMITH. 
 
 fTlHE modern gospel-net, equally with that 
 of apostolic days, gathers some fish fit 
 only to be cast away. If, then, we are to 
 give a fair sample of our saints, or, rather, 
 if we are so to gather our bouquet as to 
 show honestly what is growing here in the 
 garden of the Lord, we must pluck this one 
 evident iveed ; for among the weeds we must 
 surely class this one, unless we suppose the 
 heavenly analysis to differ essentially from 
 ours. 
 
 In our earlier missionary days, most of 
 the native helpers were men of little or no 
 education ; some of them knowing little more 
 than to read the Scriptures. Among those
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 235 
 
 thus employed and sent forth, was a native 
 of Gaban Madeij, who, upon the decline of 
 that place, had removed to the vicinity of 
 Harpoot, and connected himself with the 
 church here. Being a man of considerable 
 personal presence and fluent speech, and, 
 withal, quite zealous for the new faith, he 
 was employed, and sent to labor in Ichmeh, 
 a town which had a visitation of at least 
 two worthless, if not harmful, laborers before 
 it was blessed by the coming of "Little 
 Gregory," its present pastor. Garabed the 
 silversmith went; but the work did not 
 open ; and, on visiting the place, we had not 
 far to look for the cause. 
 
 The zealous brother was a lazy, inefficient 
 laborer; and when he did, now and then, 
 wake up, it was only to discuss questions of 
 form and ceremony with the Armenians. In 
 vain we urged him to let alone the fasts, 
 " which even heathen Turks eat," and point 
 the people to Jesus.
 
 236 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 The poor man did not seem to know the 
 way. Ahis ! he had himself been con- 
 verted (?) under the labors of one whose 
 first sermon to the people of Maden had 
 been acted in a coffee-shop by cooking and 
 eating an egg on a fast day. So we called 
 him back to work at his trade as a silver- 
 smith, at which he was so much offended, 
 as, to his dying-day, to look upon us with 
 no kindly eye. It soon appeared that the 
 gospel had not made him a more honest man 
 than before, when he had weighted the silver 
 with excessive alloy. When expostulated 
 with, he made the usual apology of such 
 sinners, — that he must live in some way, 
 and could not do it honestly at that trade ; 
 for, were he to be honest, people would not 
 believe it. But at length he had a call to 
 what promised to be a more gainful pursuit. 
 
 The people of the neighboring town of 
 Yegheki, so roused by rumors of the new
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 237 
 
 gospel as to wish to hear it, and yet unwill- 
 ing to break away from their own church, 
 and bear the reproach of being Protestants, 
 invited the silversmith to become their 
 preacher on condition of his putting in the 
 usual alloy of crosses, fasts, and other super- 
 stitions. He accepted their call, and labored 
 among them a year, when he returned to his 
 old trade and old ways. But ere long he 
 was laid upon a sick-bed, from which he was 
 not to rise. For a time, he seemed uncon- 
 scious of his sickness alike of body and soul, 
 but at length awoke to feel them both. 
 
 Summoning a Protestant Christian physi- 
 cian, he piteously begged him to heal him. 
 The physician plainly told him the truth, 
 sa3-ing, " If you have any preparation to 
 make for death, now is the time to make it." 
 
 At length, mortification began in one of 
 his hands ; and as it slowly crept up along 
 his arm, and neared his vitals, he pointed
 
 238 GKACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 visitors to his decaying, loathsome body, 
 saying, " God is making me a spectacle for 
 all to behold and fear, that others may not 
 do as I have done." His groans were dole- 
 ful to hear. In vain did one and another 
 Christian visitor point him to Christ as still 
 willing to hear and save him, if he would 
 but look to him. " Christ," he replied, " has 
 turned his face away from me. My time of 
 repentance is past. It is too late, too late ! " 
 And in this state he closed his eyes in death, 
 and passed to the tribunal of Him against 
 whom he had so grievously sinned. 
 
 " If we sin willfully after that we have 
 received the knowledge of the truth, there 
 remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a 
 certain fearful looking-for of judgment and 
 fiery indignation which shall devour the 
 adversaries. He that despised Moses' law 
 died without mercy under two or three wit- 
 nesses: of how much sorer punishment,
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 239 
 
 suppose 3^e, shall he be thought worthy, who 
 hath trodden under foot the Son of God, 
 and hath counted the blood of the covenant, 
 wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy 
 thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit 
 of grace?" Of such a one Watts well 
 says, — 
 
 " "What scenes of horror and of dread 
 Await the sinner's dying bed ! 
 Death's terrors all appear in sight, 
 Presages of eternal night. 
 
 His sins in dreadful order rise, 
 And fill his soul with sad surprise; 
 Mount Sinai's thunders stun his ears, 
 And not one ray of hope appears. 
 
 Tormenting pangs distract his breast; 
 Where'er he turns he finds no rest. 
 Death strikes the blow — he groans and cries, 
 And in despair and horror — dies."
 
 240 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 THE KOORDISH MISSIONARY. 
 
 A MONG the Koordish-speaking students 
 gathered by the churches of Harpoot, 
 to be trained in the theological seminary 
 here for prosecuting their prospective mis- 
 sionar}^ work in Koordistan, was a young 
 man, Kavme Ablahadian, a native of Cuttur- 
 bul on the Tigris. 
 
 Like most residents in that Babel town, he 
 had the gift of tongues, readily speaking 
 Turkish, Arabic, and Koordish, to which he 
 soon added Armenian, and, subsequently, some 
 knowledge of English. Though a zealous, 
 warm-hearted adherent of evangelical truth, 
 and burning with desire to prosecute the 
 missionary work in the regions beyond his
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 241 
 
 native borderland of Koordistan, he soon 
 became convinced that he was not experi- 
 mentally a Christian, and, with deep anxiety, 
 asked, "What must I do to be saved?" 
 Under the faithful instructions of the Har- 
 poot pastor, himself a native of Hain^ in 
 Koordistan, and so acquainted with the Koord- 
 ish, he soon came out into the clear light 
 of gospel liberty. His was a deep, old-style 
 experience of something more than mere 
 sentiment. His intellect enlightened by the 
 teachings of the Bible, his sensibilities 
 deeply moved by gospel manifestations of 
 divine love, and his will completely subjected 
 to divine direction, and fixed in purpose of 
 service, he consecrated his whole being to 
 the service of Christ. No one will imagine 
 from this that he became at once, or has yet 
 become, a perfect character, any more than 
 do others here, and elsewhere, by a similar 
 experience. 
 
 16
 
 242 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 "Were it necessary to do so, I could point 
 out marked deficiences, showing especially 
 liow feeble even a partially sanctified and 
 confirmed Oriental will is, to stand firm in 
 defense of a purpose which is assaulted by 
 excited sensibilities ; but our present purpose 
 leads not that way. 
 
 During his course of study, he spent one 
 winter vacation in Shemshem, a polyglot 
 town in Koordistan, and succeeded in winr 
 ning his way to some hearts wliich were 
 hard to enter; and one in Sinamood, a ward 
 of Harpoot, being prevented by liis wife's 
 illness from going to the more distant place. 
 At his graduation, the people of Sinamood 
 pressed their claim so forcibly, that, seeing 
 the Koordish mission treasury poorly sup- 
 plied with funds, he consented to remain 
 with them a year, they assuming his entire 
 support. But, being permitted to make a 
 visit to his beloved Koordistan on condition
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 243 
 
 that lie should not remain there, he kept his 
 pledge in the letter, but broke it in spirit, 
 by making a like promise to the little Prot- 
 estant community in Redwan, one of the 
 Koordish missionary stations of the Ar- 
 menian churches. 
 
 Among the mingled population of Ar- 
 menians, Jacobites, Koords, Turks, and 
 Yezidees in that dark center of Koordistan 
 proper, the gospel had gained an entrance ; 
 and a congregation of eighteen men, thirteen 
 women, and twenty-two children, had sepa- 
 rated themselves from the superstitions of 
 their people, erected a little church, and, 
 deprived of their former preacher (Avho had 
 gone to another station), begged Kavme, to 
 stay, saying, " We will pay half of your 
 salary now, and all by and by, and will build 
 you a house. Do come ! Do not leave us 
 alone." The result was, that he hastened 
 back, said " Good-by " to his city parish,
 
 244 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 and hurried off for Redwan, — as great a 
 descent externally as for a New York pastor 
 to leave his fine mansion, and go to dwell in 
 one of the "sod houses" of Dakota, with 
 the added fact, that the contrast between the 
 people of Harpoot and those of Redwan is 
 little, if any, less than that between their 
 dwellings. 
 
 But not thus was he to remain at rest. 
 A " call " followed him from the city of 
 Diarbekir, which he at once laid before liis 
 people, who had meantime, self-moved, in- 
 creased their half of his salary to four- 
 sevenths. Their reply was, " The Diarbekir 
 people need you very much; and we will 
 lend you to them for a few months." He 
 came ; but some of the Diarbekir people, on 
 seeing him, almost repented the call. He 
 was very unassuming, at times seeming 
 almost to beg pardon of men for the offense 
 of being among them.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 245 
 
 But a few weeks' experience changed all 
 that feeling on the part of the people ; and, 
 at the expiration of the allotted time, 
 only a sense of honor and necessity made 
 the city parish willing to return the loan. 
 Said a hitherto somewhat phlegmatic 
 brother, " I have listened for years to the 
 learned, eloquent sermons of our pastor, 
 
 Mr. , and they only pleased, without 
 
 benefiting me ; but this man talks to me 
 about myself, and the salvation wliich I 
 need. He is doing my soul good.''^ And so 
 he was. All ! after all, the primary prepara- 
 tion for a useful gospel ministry is a deep 
 heart-experience of the power of the doc- 
 trines of grace. This can vivify and clarify 
 the sleepiest and muddiest brain, and ener- 
 gize the feeblest, almost supplying that 
 which is wanting, and setting it at work for 
 Christ ; while without it the most resplendent 
 talents can only please the ear, and inform
 
 246 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 the mind, leaving the heart unbenefited and 
 unreached. 
 
 But we found Kavme, ill at ease in his 
 city parish. He longed to return once more 
 to his humble Koordish congregation. And 
 the way was providentially opened for him 
 soon to do so. He goes fully purposed to be 
 an earnest, self-denying, Christian missionary 
 there. 
 
 May God give him health and long life, 
 and the needed wisdom and grace for carry- 
 ing out his purpose ! Will not all the 
 readers of this brief sketch unite with us 
 in this petition.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED, 247 
 
 D 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 THE LITTLE SYRIAN MAID. 
 
 BY MISS M. E. WABFIELD. 
 
 (From tlie Cliristian Mirror.) 
 
 EAR S. S. Childeex, — Would jou like 
 
 to enter an upper room, where I went, a 
 short time since, to the death-bed of one of 
 our loved pupils ? She was lying, according 
 to the custom of the people, upon the floor. 
 The father, also upon the floor, was sitting at 
 her head. The mother, assistant teacher, the 
 pastor and wife, and a few other friends, 
 were gathered around to watch the loved 
 daughter, whose life was fast passing away. 
 
 Her eyes were covered, and she lay per- 
 fectly quiet; while the difficult breathing 
 showed that she could not louo; remain. It
 
 248 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 was painful to witness the distortion of lier 
 bright face at every breath. We supposed 
 she was entirely unconscious to all earthly 
 things: but, after waiting a few moments, 
 we uncovered her eyes ; and I said, " Sadie, 
 do you know me ? Are you going to Jesus ? " 
 The clear child turned her eyes toward me, 
 but was unable to utter a sound. 
 
 No sign could she then give to show 
 whether or not she was happy ; and soon her 
 spirit took its flight, as we trust, to be with 
 the Lord ; for, although we could then have 
 no word from her lips, we mourn not for her. 
 We believe she had given herself to Jesus, 
 and is now happy with him. 
 
 Shall I tell you something of this dear 
 girl ? She came to us last year from Cuttur- 
 . bul, near Diarbekir. She was about fourteen 
 years of age, quite small and uncomely in 
 form, but with a bright face, and lustrous 
 black eyes. But we soon found that her
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 249 
 
 bright face was not always sunny ; for she 
 had a very bad temper, and would often be- 
 come angry at some word from her associates ; 
 and then her sunny face would be darkly 
 clouded. 
 
 Kohar, our assistant teacher, often told us 
 that Sadie was sometimes very troublesome, 
 and even hateful to her associates. Much 
 prayer was offered for this bright, wayward 
 girl ; and, after a time, she was awakened by 
 the Holy Spirit, and led to see her sinful- 
 ness, and one sabbath day came to our room 
 to talk about her soul. She felt that she 
 was a great sinner, and earnestly inquired 
 what she should do to be saved. 
 
 After we had explained to her the way of 
 salvation, she felt that she could give her- 
 self to Christ, beUeving that he would for- 
 give her sins, and give her a new heart. A 
 few days after this, she told us, with a beam- 
 ing face, that she had given herself to
 
 250 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 Christ, that she gave her heart to him that 
 sabbath day, and had since been very happy. 
 Several times after this, she spoke of her joy 
 and peace in Christ, and one day lingered 
 at the close of a recitation, and requested 
 me to give her some spiritual advice. I 
 talked to her a few moments, when she 
 looked up with a grateful smile, thanked me, 
 and said, " I wish you would talk to me every 
 day." 
 
 Miss Seymour spoke to her especially 
 about looking to Jesus for strength to con- 
 quer her violent temper, and refrain from 
 all angry words ; and we believe she did 
 indeed seek and find help from him ; for, 
 when she returned this year, she was much 
 improved, and we feel that it was grace 
 alone which had wrought such a change, that 
 Kohar said of her, " She is very sweet this 
 year." 
 
 Some weeks after her return, she came to
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 251 
 
 our room with a bright smile, to tell us of 
 her love to Jesus, and ask us to pray that 
 she might always live near to him, and be a 
 blessing to others. 
 
 Soon after this, she was taken violently 
 sick, and suffered much for nearly six weeks. 
 We visited her several times, and always 
 found her groaning with pain, but apparently 
 trusting in Jesus. She requested us to pray 
 for her, and wished to be remembered in the 
 prayers of her schoolmates also. 
 
 Once I found her suffering greatly, and 
 saying, " He will take me, he will take 
 me." And when I said, " Sadie, do you 
 wish to go ? " her face instantly brightened, 
 and she said, " Oh, yes ! " — " But," said I, 
 "you are a sinner. How can you go to 
 heaven ? " 
 
 She replied, " Yes : I am a great sinner, 
 but Jesus will save me. It is only by Jesus, 
 onlyhy Jesus T
 
 252 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 At times she talked much of the precious- 
 ness of Christ, the joy of heaven, and her 
 confidence in her Saviour ; and I have never 
 heard of any doubts of her acceptance, or 
 fears of death, during the whole of her long 
 sickness. At one time she said, " Since 
 Christ has died for me, why should I not 
 trust him ? why should I fear death? " 
 
 One night she called her parents, and 
 begged their forgiveness for all her unkind- 
 ness and disobedience ; and at another time, 
 when asked if she was not sad in view of 
 death, she said, " I am not sad when think- 
 ing of myself ; but I grieve for my parents. 
 I hnow it will be hard for them to bury me 
 here, and go home alone." 
 
 Once she exclaimed, " I see the angels ! 
 they are coming for me." The day of her 
 death, she was too weak to talk much ; but, 
 when asked if she would hke to have 
 prayers, she immediately said, " Yes."
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 253 
 
 Again, while suffering from intense pain, one 
 asked, " Are you glad that the Lord has 
 sent this upon you?" She said, "Oh, yes! 
 glory, glory to thee, O Lord ! " 
 
 These were her last words. 
 
 The next day we attended her funeral, 
 and sang the sweet hymns, which Sadie had 
 selected some days before, — "I want to be 
 an angel," " Forever with the Lord," " I'm a 
 pilgrim," " Come sing to me of heaven," 
 and " Joyfully, joyfully." I doubt not you 
 are all familiar with these same hymns, and 
 perhaps often sing them, but not as we do 
 here. Here they are sung in the Armenian 
 language, and we have learned to enjoy them 
 in this foreign tongue. 
 
 We felt that it was truly appropriate to 
 sing, " Joyfully, joyfully," and that we ought 
 not to iveep for her, but should rather rejoice 
 that Jesus had taken her from all the trials 
 of earth, and especially that he had per-
 
 254 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 mitted her to give such good evidence of a 
 change of heart, and fitness for the bright 
 mansions. 
 
 And now, my dear young friends, may 
 you all, like our dear Sadie, give your 
 hearts to Jesus, ask him to make you his 
 dear children, and give you strength to 
 overcome all your faults, and grace to live 
 for his glory. Give yourselves to Christ, ask 
 him to guide you, and believe that he will do 
 it. Do not be discouraged if you do not 
 become like Jesus at once. Sadie did not 
 immediately conquer, but was obliged to 
 watch and pray as long as she lived, in order 
 to keep down angry words and thoughts ; 
 but Jesus helped her, and has now taken 
 her to himself, and given her the crown prom- 
 ised to those who overcome. 
 
 And so, dear young friends, he will 
 surely help you, if you daily ask him to ; 
 and, if you cheerfully bear the cross here., he 
 will give you the crown of life in heaven.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 255 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 MISS M. E. WARFIELD. 
 
 r\N the 16th of February, 1870, but a few 
 weeks after penning the preceding let- 
 ter, Miss Warfield followed her dear pupil, 
 going up to wear " the crown of life in 
 heaven." 
 
 Hers was a brief, earnest, effective mis- 
 sionary life of a little less than three years, 
 spent in the Harpoot Female Seminary. 
 
 When the call came to engage in this 
 work, though shrinking from its responsibili- 
 ties, yet thinking the Master called, she 
 cheerfully responded, " Here am I," and 
 leaving the school which she was teaching in 
 Arlington, Mass., prepared to bid farewell 
 to her widowed mother and only sister, and
 
 256 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 go SO soon as an associate sliould be secured. 
 The proper person not being found so 
 speedily as she had hoped, she fixed a time, 
 delay beyond which in finding an associate 
 should be to her evidence that she was mis- 
 taken in supposing her own call to be from 
 the Master. 
 
 Telling her purpose to Him whom she 
 loved to call the dear Saviour, she calmly 
 waited that final tentJi day, the evening of 
 • which providentially ratified her call by the 
 news that Miss Hattie Seymour of Rochester, 
 N.Y., would soon be ready to join her in her 
 chosen work. Henceforth, whatever the 
 thorns which beset her path, or the darkness 
 which enshrouded it, in a work the peculiar 
 difficulties and trials of which none in the 
 home land, and few, if any, in the foreign 
 field, besides the young ladies themselves, 
 can fully appreciate, she never again gave 
 place to a doubt that she had been divinely
 
 MISS WARFIELD.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 257 
 
 called, nor lost, for a moment, her cheerful 
 zeal in doing her Master's bidding. She 
 felt sure that he was with her, and would 
 be to the end, though little suspecting how 
 soon that end of earthly service was to come. 
 Her quick mind and enthusiastic earnest- 
 ness secured for her a speedy and ready 
 command of the language ; and almost from 
 the first day in the field she was a practical, 
 efficient missionary. Her labor for her 
 pupils was a cheerful service of love to them 
 and her Saviour, — one in which no 3delding 
 to weariness or discouragement was allowed. 
 The result was the condensation of an 
 unusual amount of effective work into those 
 brief months. Not content with their sum- 
 mer labors in the seminary, she and her 
 associate devoted most of the winters to 
 visiting their pupils in their places of labor, 
 going for this purpose on horseback, through 
 rain and snow, from outstation to outstatiou, 
 17
 
 258 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 some of them several days' journey distant. 
 The return from these missionary tours 
 usually brought a generous supply of cheer 
 for the home-circle ; for hers was a hopeful, 
 buoyant spirit, not prone to look on the 
 cheerless side of missionary life, but eagerly 
 gathering up all which could energize her- 
 self or others for the work in hand. In 
 these journeys, for the sake of economy in 
 using sacred funds, she cheerfully bore some 
 privations, which some of us older — shall I 
 say wiser ? — tourists have felt constrained 
 to remand to the experiences of more youth- 
 ful days. Returning from the last of these 
 tours, made to several villages on Harpoot 
 plain, she was taken with measles, which 
 was prevailing in some of the places visited. 
 Having a skillful physician at hand, we had 
 no fear for the result, especially as the dis- 
 ease was in a mild form ; but when, on the 
 sixth day, typhoid-fever set in in a violent 
 form, we felt that there was little hope.
 
 GRACE ILLTJSTEATED. 259 
 
 . Happily she herself had felt, days before, 
 that her end was near, and, while yet in full 
 possession of her reason, had left her dying- 
 messages to her mother and other home- 
 friends. 
 
 During the dehrium of typhoid, she im- 
 agined herself called upon to suffer the 
 martyr's death at the stake. Yet not even, 
 then did faith or courage fail ; and it was 
 touching to hear her exclaim, " Dear Saviour, 
 thou knowest that I am weak, but do give 
 me strength. I am willing to bear even this 
 for thee." Recognizing her associate stand- 
 ing by her bedside, she exclaimed with all 
 the earnestness of reality, " Go back, Hattie, 
 go back ! It is enough for one of us to die. 
 You must stay, and bear witness for Christ." 
 
 The ruling thought was strong in death ; 
 and her whole anxiety was for the work 
 and the people whom she came to bless, to 
 imaginary companies of whom she was, from
 
 260 ' GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 time to time, making earnest appeals on tlie 
 one great subject. 
 
 And thus she went home to hear, no 
 doubt, the welcome plaudit, " Well done ! " 
 and receive from her dear Saviour's hand 
 the crown of that martyrdom she had con- 
 sciously endured for him. 
 
 Her grave made the sixteenth in our little 
 hillside cemetery ; the first adult to lie 
 there having been Mrs. Williams (Miss Bar- 
 bour), who, though nine years before too 
 modestly declining the post of first teacher in 
 the seminary, had been providentially led 
 hither to- find a resting-place. And that 
 burial-ground is not a sad place, — is really 
 a " God's acre." Of all who lie there, we 
 have the joyous assurance that they have 
 entered into the rest which remains for the 
 people of God. 
 
 What if their dust must, for a brief time, 
 sleep far from that of their kindred and
 
 GRACE ILLCrSTRATED. 261 
 
 jfriends, among a people of a strange speech ! 
 This seeming isolation and loneliness will 
 but make the angels watch all the more 
 tenderly over it, till that day when Re shall 
 come to re-animate, and gather home, his 
 chosen ones. 
 
 " Asleep in Jesus, blessed sleep! 
 
 From which none ever wake to weep, —' 
 A calm and undisturbed repose, 
 Unbroken by the last of foes. 
 
 Asleep in Jesus — oh, for me 
 
 May such a blissful refuge be ! 
 Securely shall my ashes lie, 
 
 And wait the summons from on high."
 
 262 GRACE ILLUSTKATED. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 THE MAN WHO MUST PREACH. 
 
 QOME time in the early days of our 
 missionary life, a guest brought with 
 him to our home, a young man, some twenty 
 years of age, a native of flie city of Egin, 
 in the north-west part of our field. His 
 large head, and somewhat larger self-assur- 
 ance, with a good measure of aggressive 
 force, and earnestly-avowed Protestantism, 
 attracted our attention. 
 
 It was quite evident that he aspired to 
 be a servant in the ministerial sense ; for, 
 complacently requesting the use of a small 
 prophet's chamber, he, after a few days of 
 seclusion, issued fi-om it, manuscript in hand, 
 with an invitation for himself to preach it
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 263 
 
 from our pulpit on the following sabbath. 
 This was our first acquaintance with Simon 
 Deradoorian. 
 
 Soon after, he presented himself as a can- 
 didate for the theological seminary, to 
 which he was received, and graduated with 
 honor four years later, being remarkable 
 chiefly for an excessive scrupulousness, and 
 a strong tendency to asceticism ; this last 
 manifesting itself in the eating of some 
 kinds of food which, though fitted, perhaps, 
 to "bring under the body," are not fitted to 
 develop a refined taste. 
 
 His earnestness and self-assurance did not 
 fail; but the latter was somewhat discour- 
 aged by occasional exposure to ridicule, in 
 his attempts to indulge it at the expense 
 of those about him ; as when a letter of pri- 
 vate rebuke and exhortation to one of his 
 teachers for a supposed fault was quietly 
 passed along to be read and laughed at by 
 the assembled students.
 
 264 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 Alas tliat in the forceful application of 
 tlie truthless as trite maxim, " Great men are 
 always modest," the great, arrogant world 
 so often blasts the blossoms of growing 
 greatness ! But the blossoming genius of 
 our theologue was proof against even the 
 withermg influence of the " dread laugh " of 
 the little world in which he moved, and 
 upon which he looked down with the calm 
 serenity of conscious superiority. 
 
 And the little world meanwhile repaid 
 him with a certain sincere respect for his 
 talents, and the ascetic rigor of his ad- 
 herence to what he supposed to be right. 
 
 Gifted with a somewhat commanding 
 presence, a good voice, and ready command 
 of language, and giving due attention to the 
 cultivation of the two latter, he was able, in 
 his senior year, to take pre-eminence among 
 his classmates as a preacher. 
 
 On graduating, he went to Temran, a
 
 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 265 
 
 town among tlie mountains, to the north-east 
 of Harpoot, in the then newly occupied 
 district of Geghi. Though he there had 
 no regular audience or place of worship, and 
 so no opportunity to cultivate his preaching- 
 talent, except occasionally in efforts to 
 control crowds of excited hostile men, yet, 
 in this primary evangelistic work, his natural 
 earnestness, and Ms warm-hearted piety, 
 found new nourishment, and opportunity to 
 grow, and he profited by them. Those were 
 the days of mobs in that wild district, in 
 the midst of which he developed a, to us, 
 new trait of character, — that of Christian 
 mildness and forbearance, such as to win 
 some of his bitterest enemies, and among 
 them poor old Sarah, a sketch of whom is 
 next given. She was one of a mob that 
 threw his books and other possessions into 
 the street, and beat him ; but, seeing how 
 patiently he bore it all, she exclaimed, " Poor
 
 266 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 young man, he don't deserve sucli treat- 
 ment," and from that hour began to seek 
 and love the truth for which he suffered. 
 His brief stay there laid the foundation of 
 a prosperous work, which is on the point of 
 resulting in the formation of the second 
 church in the district. 
 
 But here, as elsewhere, qualities and talents 
 such as his are sure to win reputation in 
 more important centers ; and he soon received 
 and accepted a call to Harpoot. 
 
 His course here was very brief; for he 
 came only to die, being seized with typhus- 
 fever ere he had preached a single sermon. 
 But this new summons was received with 
 the quiet confidence of one who knew in 
 whom he had trusted. When told what 
 would be the issue of his disease, and asked 
 whether he felt afraid of death, his quiet 
 reply was, " Why should the Christian fear 
 to die?" And thus, in the vigor of his
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 267 
 
 early manhood, and the beginning of his use- 
 fulness here, he passed away, to respond, Ave 
 doubt not, to a call to enter upon a higher, 
 wider sphere of usefulness in some other 
 world. 
 
 " Lift not thou the wailing voice, 
 "Weep not, 'tis a Christian dieth : 
 Up where blessed saints rejoice, 
 Ransomed now, the spirit flieth. 
 High in heaven's own light he dwelleth; 
 Full the song of triumph swelleth, 
 Freed from earth and earthly failing : 
 Lift for him no voice of wailing."
 
 268 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 OLD SARAH. 
 
 I HE lived for seventy years in spiritual 
 darkness in Temran, the town in which 
 labored Simon Deradoorian, and then re- 
 ceived her first ray of light from seeing the 
 patience with which he endured the abuse 
 of a mob, whom he blessed while they were 
 beating him, and destroying his property. 
 
 She had gone with the crowd to see the 
 " infidel preacher " beaten, — the man who 
 did not worshijD the saints and the Holy 
 Virgin, and who, of course, must be bad and 
 behave very badly. But when she saw a 
 meek, gentle Christian, who joyfully suffered 
 for the Master's sake, her natural sense of 
 justice was outraged by the violence of her
 
 GRACE ILLITSTRATED. 269 
 
 companions ; and she began to love the 
 "good young man." 
 
 When Simon came to Harpoot, and died 
 here, old Sarah attached herself to his suc- 
 cessor, who, fortunately, was a man of kin- 
 dred spirit. 
 
 A hard task had she before her in the 
 effort to be a Christian ; for, during all her 
 adult years, she had been known, even in 
 that wild, rough region, as a virago, — the 
 terror of all who came in contact with her, 
 men as well as women ; for, in her terrible 
 outbursts of passion, she hesitated not to 
 enforce hard words with harder blows, when 
 necessary for her purpose. 
 
 But, having made up her mind to serve 
 Christ, she went to work with characteristic 
 earnestness. Her little grand-daughter was 
 at once put into the Protestant school ; and 
 when the new preacher and his wife came, 
 taking the little girl upon her shoulders,
 
 270 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 she waded with them through the deep 
 snows of that mountain-region to introduce 
 them to the people at their homes. Happily, 
 they were both earnest, spiritually minded 
 people ; and it was old Sarah's delight thus 
 to go with them from house to house, and 
 hear the " old, old story " told over and 
 over again. The Bible was to her like a 
 gushing fountain of pure cold water to one 
 perishing with thirst. She never wearied 
 of drinking in its sweet words. 
 
 Once, hearing the preacher read Christ's 
 discourse with Nicodemus, she exclaimed, 
 " Saviour, I am unclean ! wash me with thy 
 blood. There is no other way to be saved." 
 
 She seemed literally to hunger and tliirst 
 for the bread and the water of life ; and, 
 when the preacher went to visit another 
 town, she was impatient for his return, 
 saying, " Why does he not come ? " and 
 requesting those about her to talk to her
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 271 • 
 
 of spiritual things. " Ah ! " she exclaimed, 
 "would that I had heard these things 
 sooner ! " 
 
 To the amazement of all about her, who 
 wondered at the change, and admired the 
 power of that gospel which was able to 
 produce it, she became as remarkable for 
 sweetness as she had before been for vio- 
 lence of temper. 
 
 Once only did the old nature get the 
 better of the new, and then in a praj^er- 
 meeting, to hold which, some members of 
 the Palu church had come three days' jour- 
 ney. A nephew of hers rising to leave in 
 prayer-time, with the exclamation, " I don't 
 accept your groanh''^ (religion), she gave 
 him a vigorous box on the ear, exclaiming, 
 " You call prayer a groanJc^ do you ? " 
 
 But not long had she to fight the good 
 fight of faith, only one winter's snows 
 through which to wade to guide the preacher
 
 272 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 in his household visits. With the opening 
 spring she sickened ; and it was soon appar- 
 ent that she was near her end. To the 
 last, she clung to the place of prayer, saying, 
 go she must. To some who once tried to 
 dissuade her from going, she replied, " I 
 must and will go to hear God's voice once 
 more." 
 
 But three days before her death, she 
 induced two men to take each an arm, and 
 lead her to the loved place once more, for 
 the last time. 
 
 The story of her death tells nothing of 
 rapturous exultation, nothing of transporting 
 visions of heavenly glory ; but we doubt not 
 she found an angel convoy in waiting to 
 convey her thither. When wearied, and at 
 times almost disheartened, by the worldli- 
 ness and ingratitude of many for whom we 
 labor, the memory of poor old Sarah wading 
 through those winter snows, and trying to
 
 GBACE ILLUSTRATED. 273 
 
 breathe her last breath in the atmosphere 
 of prayer, cheers us with new confidence 
 in the promise, "Lo, I am with you al- 
 way."
 
 274 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 b£go, the wife of doxo. 
 
 BY EEV. H. N. BAENUM, D.D. 
 
 N the year 1868 twelve Protestant women 
 ill Pain, along with their family cares, 
 seemed each a few Armenian women and 
 girls as pupils, hoping in this way to bring 
 them into contact with the Bible. They 
 rightly judged that this was one of the 
 surest ways of doing good ; for they them- 
 selves had recently learned to read, and, in 
 learning, their minds had become awakened, 
 and their hearts drawn to the truth. 
 
 Among these pupils was a bright married 
 woman, less than thirty years of age, whose 
 name was Bego. She was much interested 
 in reading, and made rapid progress. After
 
 GEACE ILLUSTKATED. 275 
 
 a little, she removed, with her husband, to 
 Temran, a village in the Geghi district, 
 among the Anti-Taurus Mountains. This 
 district is three days' journey from Palu, 
 and surrounded on all sides by wild Koords. 
 Soon after reaching Temran, following the 
 example of the Palu sisters, Bego opened 
 her own house for the gratuitous instruction 
 of such women and girls as were willing to 
 come. There were very few such at that 
 time, it is true ; for this was a new thing in 
 that region, and most persons regarded read- 
 ing by females as very unwomanly. But 
 it was the beginning of female education 
 in a place which has already sent three 
 girls to the female seminary in Harpoot. 
 We heard of this school, and rejoiced in 
 it as the sliining of the light in a very 
 dark j)lace. None of us, however, saw the 
 teacher ; for she and her husband were 
 faithful adherents of the old Armenian 
 Church, and kept aloof from us.
 
 276 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 Bdgo's love of reading led her to study 
 the Bible ; and, as she studied it, the truth 
 gradually dawned upon her mind, and she 
 and her husband became convinced of the 
 errors of the Armenian Church, and joined 
 the feeble band of Protestants in Temran. I 
 well remember the time when I first saw 
 her. It was on a visit to Temran, in 1870. 
 I was a guest of the preacher, when she 
 timidly came in, and was introduced to me 
 as the woman who was helping a few of her 
 sex to read. She was not then openly com- 
 mitted to the truth ; but, after a few months, 
 she came out clearly and decidedly on the 
 Lord's side. 
 
 Two years later (in 1872), in the midst 
 of endeavors to do good, she was prostrated 
 by a most painful attack of rheumatism, 
 from which there is no hope of her recovery. 
 On a recent visit to Temran, I called upon 
 her. I was not surprised that she had rheu-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTKATED. 277 
 
 matism. The wonder is, considering the 
 damp, cold houses the people live in, that 
 so many of them escape this disease. The 
 house which Bego occupies is the ordinary 
 one-story building, six or seven feet high, 
 with mud walls, flat, earthen roof, and the 
 bare ground for the floor. On one side, the 
 whole length of the room, both the wall and 
 the roof are so dilapidated, that they do not 
 join each other, but leave an open space 
 from three to eight inches wide. The room 
 is bare of furniture, — a cheerless, comfort- 
 less place. Somebody has been sufficiently 
 thoughtful, after she has lain for two years 
 with her poor, hard mattress on the ground, 
 to make a rude, wooden frame, and place 
 her bed on that. At the foot of the bed, 
 on the wall, hangs the recently issued roll 
 of daily Scripture promises in Armenian, 
 sent to her by one of the missionary ladies ; 
 and during the long, weary hours of the
 
 278 GEAOE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 day, she comforts herself with these precious 
 words. Her husband and little boy are kept 
 at home from their shoemaking with sore 
 eyes. As we enter, she appears a little 
 embarrassed ; for, with a woman's sensitive- 
 ness, she shrinks from the exhibition of pov- 
 erty which her house too clearly manifests. 
 "VVe have seen man}^ such dwellings before, 
 and at once put her at her ease. A mattress 
 is spread for us on the ground, with a soiled, 
 tattered cover, — a very uninviting seat ; 
 but it is probably the best bed in the house. 
 Before we left, we felt that we were sitting 
 in heavenly places. 
 
 Here lies a woman in the prime of life. 
 She is by nature unusually ambitious and 
 enterprising. For two years, she has been 
 the victim of a most distressing disease. 
 At times her pain is so severe, that the 
 approach of a person to her bedside brings 
 from her an involuntary shriek, through the
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 279 
 
 fear of being touched. Her muscles have 
 become contracted and rigid. She can not 
 move hand or foot. Her hands are so drawn 
 in, and bent, that the fingers nearly touch 
 the arm. She has not even the power to 
 drive away the flies that swarm upon her 
 face. She lies thus perfectly helpless, racked 
 with pain, and able to sleep but little, even 
 at night. Oh, how heavily the weary, weary 
 hours and days and weeks and months must 
 move along ! Is patience possible in the 
 midst of such suffering ? How many could 
 endure to lie helpless, and often for hours 
 alone, like this poor woman, even if there 
 were no suffering connected with it ? Sim- 
 ply the flies and the fleas would make many 
 people well-nigh frantic. But in the coun- 
 tenance before us is an expression which 
 implies something more than mere patience. 
 You do not need to ask whether she is 
 happy. Joy beams through all her features,
 
 280 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 — a heavenly peace, triumphant over suffer- 
 ing, such as is seldom seen in a huinan face. 
 Yet happiness is so incompatible with such 
 a wretched condition, without any allevia- 
 tion, and with no hope of release, except by 
 death, which may be many years in coming, 
 that one can scarcely avoid asking the ques- 
 tion which I did, " Can you be happy in 
 this state ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes ! " she replied, " I am very happy. 
 My soul is full of peace and joy. Jesus is 
 present with me, and, although I suffer 
 much pain, I want nothing more. Except 
 for Christ's presence and blessing, I never 
 could endure this. I am content to wait 
 upon him, and let him do as he pleases. 
 His will is the best." 
 
 This testimony was to me more assuring 
 than all the philosophical demonstrations 
 of the truth of Christianity. The Temran 
 preacher says that he often goes to the bed-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 281 
 
 side of this poor but blessed woman to have 
 his own spiritual nature refreshed, and his 
 faith strengthened. ~B6go was to have been 
 a Bible-reader in Temran ; but I left her, 
 feeling that she is doubtless doing vastly 
 more for her Master by illustrating the 
 power of the gospel to sustain one in trial, 
 than she possibly could have done by the 
 most active service, and possibly more than 
 many a preacher or missionary. Seldom 
 has a sermon impressed me so deeply, and I 
 trust profitably, as the quiet, heavenly joy 
 that beamed from the face of this humble 
 disciple.
 
 282 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 THE AGED AUCTIONEER. 
 
 TjlAMILY BIBLES are of modern mis- 
 sionary introduction into Turkey homes, 
 and so don't tell wlien tlie angels brought 
 the ancestors of the rising generation. 
 
 On the plain, flat tombstone, then, of our 
 patriarchal pilgrim is inscribed only, " Died 
 in 1869 ; " for he himself used to say, as do 
 most old people in this land, " God only 
 knows when I was born." But, by the aid 
 of certain historical landmarks located by 
 him in his boyhood, we were able to infer, 
 that some time during the reign of the fa- 
 mous but unfortunate sultan, Abdul Hamet, 
 probably about the year 1780, the comely 
 form of baby Garabed (" Forerunner ") first
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 283 
 
 gladdened the eyes of his father Harootune 
 (" Resurrection ") and his, to us, nameless 
 mother, in their home in Gaban Maden, then 
 the capital of the Harpoot pashalic. 
 
 His ancestral patronymic, Ockle Deryesian, 
 which is not Armenian, but Turkish, and 
 means " sea of wisdom," shows the estima- 
 tion in which the family had been held by 
 the Turks ; but, as this reputation may have 
 been the reward of paternal sharpness in 
 auctioneering, we can not, unhesitatingly, 
 adopt the old style, and assert that they 
 were " poor, but honest." Honest, accord- 
 ing to the Scripture, or even the Occidental 
 standard, they surely were not ; for no auc- 
 tioneers are so in this land. 
 
 Young Garabed had fallen upon troublous 
 times, even for troubled Turkey. His youth 
 was terrified by the terrible janizaries, more 
 pitiless in these then wild regions than in 
 Constantinople, where the head of a " Chris-
 
 284 GEACE ILLTJSTRATED. 
 
 tian dog " was cheaper than even that of the 
 real animal. 
 
 His manhood saw the revolt against the 
 attempt of Sultan Mahmoud to levy sol- 
 diers to supply the place of the exterminated 
 janizaries, when the terrible Reshid Pasha 
 made the streets of Maden run with the 
 blood of hundreds, and, to increase the 
 popular terror, impaled living revolters upon 
 the different highways leading from the 
 city, and pommeled the heads of others in 
 huge stone mortars. 
 
 Older inhabitants still tell how they saw 
 seventy heads cut off by a single yatagan, 
 and the trunks thrown into the Euphrates ; 
 and that, on the third day after his impale- 
 ment, one poor wretch transferred his girdle 
 to his head to protect it from the rain. 
 
 It is an interesting fact, that from such 
 scenes of horror, repeated in one form and 
 another through his entire youth and early
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 285 
 
 manhood, Garabed came out with his natural 
 sensibilities unblunted, his heart still tender 
 and sensitive as a httle child's to sights or 
 tales of suffering. It was this which made 
 him eager to visit at once any sick person 
 to whom he hoped to do any good, and 
 which made him ever a welcome, because 
 sympathizing visitor, to the sick and suffer- 
 ing Mohammedans, as well as to nominal 
 Christians. 
 
 When the suppression of the revolt, and 
 the transfer of the capital to Harpoot, began 
 for Maden that work of decay which has 
 reduced it from a flourishing city to a 
 comparatively insignificant village, Garabed 
 removed to this city, and continued the 
 busiuess which procured for him his sur- 
 name, Talal (" Auctioneer "). 
 
 When we read the inspired description 
 of all our rising race, that " they go astray 
 as soon as they be born, speaking lies," and
 
 286 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 remember that our Talal was not only 
 brought up in the Orient, and with no Bible 
 or religious teachings of any kind, and that 
 auctioneers in this land go from house to 
 house, and man to man, telling what pre- 
 ceding bids have been, and trying to get 
 bigger ones, and that often the amount of 
 their own commissions depends upon the 
 amount of successful lying, we can easily 
 imagine that our prospective saint had one 
 very steep and long hill, " Difficulty," to 
 ascend, before reaching the city whose gates 
 exclude all liars. 
 
 Those who have not breathed from in- 
 fancy an atmosphere of falsehood, whose 
 very bones have not been pervaded and 
 almost disintegrated by its poisonous efflu- 
 via, can never truly sympathize with the 
 feebleness of those who, born, and having 
 long dwelt, in this valley of the shadow 
 of death, awake, at length, to an effort to
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 287 
 
 escape from it, and rise to the pure air and 
 crystal light of truth. 
 
 Then, too, the position of nominal Chris- 
 tians in this land, crushed for centuries 
 heneath grinding Moslem oppression, is fitted 
 to excite and strengthen a spirit of greed 
 and parsimony, a "get-all-you-can, keep-all- 
 you-get " disposition, which is second only 
 to falsehood in its demoralizing influence on 
 the soul. "When it is remembered that our 
 hero lived under the full power of these 
 demoralizing influences, daily pursuing his 
 business of auctioneering, for more than 
 threescore years and ten, we may rely upon 
 our readers to believe and bear in mind, 
 without further repetition of the fact by us, 
 that when, on the verge of his second child- 
 hood, poor old Talal first read the gospel 
 terms, and learned, that, to be saved, he 
 must first undo his life's work, he felt, and 
 felt to the last day of his Christian pilgrim-
 
 288 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 age, that his was a hard task, — one which 
 only divine strength could enable him to 
 complete. It will easily be beheved that 
 we, who thought we saw the strugglings 
 of the new principle of Christian life within 
 him, felt called upon to watch over and 
 warm and nurse the poor old patient, much 
 as a tender nurse would a cholera or typhoid 
 patient just rising from the gates of death. 
 We fed him carefully with the sincere milk 
 of the Word, laid no very heavy burdens 
 upon him, put his Christian integrity to no 
 hard, rude tests, and hoped, to the last, that 
 he was slowly fitting for those mansions 
 which nothing unclean shall ever enter. 
 
 It was in 1855, on the arrival of Mr. 
 Dunmore in Harpoot, that old Talal gained 
 his first idea of simple, pure gospel truth, 
 separated from its muddy admixture in the 
 dead tongue and deader ritual of the Arme- 
 nian Church.
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 289 
 
 He at once bought a primer, and learned 
 to read, and, by his success, furnished a text 
 for many a profitable sermon to the old, on 
 their ability and duty to learn to read God's 
 word ; for the old man, who, for so many 
 years had cried his wares through the 
 streets of the capital, was known to almost 
 everybody throughout the pashalic. And, 
 having learned to read, he put his Testa- 
 ment and hymn-book, and, later still, a 
 little book of prayers, into his bosom, from 
 which he never removed them, except for 
 sleep or reading, till his dying-day. And 
 go past his little variety-shop when we 
 might, — for, beginning the Christian life, 
 he left off auctioneering as a business, — 
 we saw him, if not serving a customer, serv- 
 ing himself from his bosom stores. * 
 
 Unfortunately, his wife was too near a 
 relative to her of poor old Job's or Socrates' 
 home to encourage or help him at all in his 
 
 10
 
 290 GEACE ILLUSTEATED. 
 
 Christian pilgrimage : so he kept plodding 
 on alone. 
 
 There was one employment for which, by 
 his tall, erect, manly form, and his graceful 
 bearing, as well as the respect felt for him 
 by all, Armenians and Turks alike, he was 
 peculiarly fitted, and in which he took both 
 pride aijd delight, — that of being guide and 
 body-guard to escort the missionary ladies 
 going to hold female prayer-meetings in 
 different and distant parts of the city. The 
 delight came in, when, on arriving at the 
 place of meeting, and carefully tying the 
 donkey in a safe place, his age and known 
 simplicity of character secured him admit- 
 tance to the meetings themselves, no one 
 objecting. 
 
 He apparently loved the place of prayer 
 as well as did the good old deacon in War- 
 ren, Me., who, being asked how many were 
 present at a certain meeting, replied, " Two,
 
 GBACE ILLUSTRATED. 291 
 
 Jesus and I ; and we had a blessed time." 
 He was seldom absent, never, except from 
 illness ; and when the feebleness of age 
 bowed his tall form, and a local injury made 
 it painful for him to sit, it was affecting to 
 see him, in summer's heat and winter's cold, 
 slowly and painfully, but with radiant face, 
 making his way to the sanctuary, leaning 
 upon his staff. We miss him sadl}- from his 
 familiar place at the foot of the pulpit-stairs, 
 so nearly beneath the sanctuary droppings, 
 that no one else cares to fill the vacant 
 place. When he could no longer walk as 
 escort to the female prayer-meetings, we, at 
 his request, provided him with a donkey to 
 ride ; and thus, up nearly to the time of his 
 last brief illness, he enjoyed his coveted 
 privilege. Never but once did any one 
 venture, in his presence, to offer any dis- 
 respect to his protegees; and then he at 
 once put himself in the path of the drunken 
 Turkish soldier, and turned him aside.
 
 292 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 In spirit and manner, he was a born and 
 trained servant, sucli a one as our republi- 
 can soil can not produce, nor our equality- 
 loving citizens train, on any soil. The " 
 charge, that we missionaries spoil all our 
 servants — or must I be more Occidental, 
 and call them helj)? — by teaching them 
 such republican notions that we serve rather 
 than they, is, I fear, true in all cases except 
 this one of Garabed, who came to our hands 
 too old to be cured of any ways which were 
 not anti-gospel. "On my head," was his 
 uniform reply to every expressed wish, with 
 a final " Any thing more ? " at leaving, even 
 when, as at times, he meant to have his own 
 way, wliich was only in those very few cases 
 in which he was sure he knew better than 
 we how a thing ought to be done. 
 
 There are some vices — or must we call 
 them virtues in such cases? — which even 
 the gospel don't cure, but only renders them
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 293 
 
 more inveterate. A conscientious, Christian 
 bigot, one who means to compel all mankind 
 to believe and do just right, and get to 
 heaven in spite of themselves, is the most 
 intolerable of all nuisances, one which can 
 be expressed by but one word, — pope. 
 
 Now, happily, our Talal's bigotry, if such 
 it can be called, didn't touch at all the 
 domain of religion, and didn't reach the 
 area of other people's activities. He only 
 silently maintained sometimes his right to 
 do his employers' work in his own way. He 
 had, for instance, no respect for our fasti- 
 dious prejudice against drinking from the 
 same vessel with that " noblest of animals," 
 the horse ; and so, in spite of all our protes- 
 tations, he continued to water horses, mules, 
 and donkeys from our fountain bucket. 
 This he continued to do till despair quick- 
 ened our wits into curing one vice by 
 another; and, appealing to his yet uncured
 
 294 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 love of money, we said, " Yes, it is easier to 
 water the animals there : so we will forbid 
 you no more. Go on, then, only letting us 
 know how many bucketsfuU they drink, 
 and you shall have it for a piaster a bucket." 
 The horses and we never again di-ank from 
 the same vessel. 
 
 The old man was apparently inveterately 
 addicted to the Oriental habit of smoking; 
 and, while telling him it was harmful, we 
 could not find it in our hearts to insist that 
 he discard his pipe, except on our own 
 premises, and particularly in the stable, 
 which was then beneath our house. 
 
 But the good old man was sure he knew 
 better than we that smoking was good for 
 him, and, moreover, couldn't be harmful to 
 our stable ; and surely he who loved us so 
 well could never do so naughty a thing as 
 to set fire to our property. And so the 
 dangerous habit was slyly indulged in the
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 295 
 
 forbidden place, and no suspicious snuffings 
 of ours, and declarations that there was 
 the smell of tobacco-smoke, could convince 
 him of the fact, till one day I scented out 
 the yet burning pipe hid in a corner of the 
 building. The offending thing was, of 
 course, punished by being thrown into the 
 street, and its master bidden to reflect on his 
 part of the sin in thus deceiving us. This 
 brief sermon on his besetting sin did its 
 work; and he went home solemnly vowing to 
 cut off the offending right hand. And he 
 did it. Much to our surprise, he never 
 smoked again, but became, from that day, an 
 anti-tobacco apostle. Such was his zeal, that 
 be composed a poem, copies of which he had 
 written out, and put up in the two city 
 churches, where others might read, and 
 profit by his experience, when he should be 
 gone. We give a nearly word-for-word 
 translation of it, hoping that its wider pub-
 
 296 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 lication may do good where the old man 
 never expected it. 
 
 " For many years tobacco's slave, 
 To it I've service done : 
 Of money much I wasted have, 
 Advantage gaining none. 
 
 E'en to old age, from boyhood's days, 
 
 I tribulation bore, 
 Alas, for those my foolish ways I 
 
 But now my slavery's o'er. 
 
 O boys ! now fix your eyes on me, 
 
 And to my words give heed : 
 You yet from it are wholly free : 
 
 Don't touch, don't smell, the weed. 
 
 And brethren , you who love the stuff, 
 And it habitually do puff, 
 To your own selves you damage do ; 
 Try, gain the victory, I beg you. 
 
 Why will you squander money so? 
 
 Break up all those chibouques I 
 And cigarettes are worthless too : 
 
 Spend money for good works-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 297 
 
 This my brief life is nearly o'er, 
 Soon shall I leave this earthy shore ; 
 Thus, as I to my fathers go, 
 This my last counsel I leave you." 
 (Signed) Talal Garabed. 
 
 I have read somewhere a statement, that, 
 in 1867, one religious denomination in the 
 United States paid two million dollars for 
 tobacco used by them, and left their mis- 
 sionary treasury seventy-six thousand dol- 
 lars in debt. 
 
 Would that some one had given the sta- 
 tistics for other denominations ! But one 
 thing is sure. The Master keeps the ac- 
 count in his ledger ; and if some Christians 
 who spend more on tobacco in defiling God's 
 air with its smoke, and — oh, tell it not in 
 Gath ; for not even infidel Turks do that — 
 his earth with their nasty expectorations, 
 than they pay for supporting the gospel at 
 home and abroad, don't blush at meeting
 
 298 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 old Garabed in those pure mansions, it must 
 be because divine compassion takes away 
 there the power of shame for the follies and 
 sins of earth. 
 
 The poor old man had one lifelong grief 
 in the fact, that, in his home, he was alone in 
 trying to live the Christian life. His wife, 
 as before mtimated, scolded him for his 
 Protestant ways ; his daughters were mar- 
 ried to men (one of them a leading man 
 in the city) who were far from the truth; 
 and, of his two sons, the elder, in his tall 
 manly figure the image of his father, had 
 early gone to Constantinople as groom to 
 the British ambassador, where he led any 
 thing but a sober life ; while the youngest, 
 the Benjamin of the family, saddened his 
 father's heart for a time by his vicious 
 ways, and finally almost broke it by leav- 
 ing him in his old age, and running away 
 to the capital.
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 299 
 
 But these sorrows seemed only to make 
 the poor old pilgrim cling the more closel}'" 
 to his hymn-book, his Testament, and his 
 Saviour ; developing more fully his child- 
 like simplicity of Christian character. A 
 sort of shrinking diffidence seemed to grow 
 with his years and his Christian growth. 
 Though possessing naturally quite a fine, 
 sonorous voice, such was his apparent timid- 
 ity in public prayer, that, when he " took 
 part " in a meeting, the part became practi- 
 cally the whole to the rest of us, since, 
 hearing not a word, we could only say 
 amen in our hearts to the many good peti- 
 tions he was supposed to offer. This was, 
 in part, no doubt due to the sudden transi- 
 tion from the read, ritualistic church-service 
 of threescore years and ten, in which he had 
 been only a hearer and spectator, to the 
 voluntary simple forms of Protestant wor- 
 ship.
 
 800 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 As, however, he was elsewhere fearless 
 and outspoken, we at one time hoped to 
 make him useful as a traveling preacher, 
 crying gospel-wares all abroad in his old 
 auctioneer tones. But the attempt proved 
 a complete failure. On his return from his 
 first circuit, when asked what he had 
 preached to the people, he replied, " Bak 
 che gah, masoonk che gah, surpotes pare- 
 hosootune che gah" ("Tliere are no fasts, 
 there are no relics, and no intercession of 
 the saints"). And such had, in fact, been 
 the substance of his crying aloud. Rescued 
 in old age from the darkness of a system 
 which made fastings, relic-worship, and call- 
 ing on the saints the substance of Christian 
 duty, and entering again among those still 
 similarly benighted, his first impulse was to 
 cry out against the clouds which were ob- 
 scuring the Sun of righteousness, So we 
 concluded that the good old man could
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 801 
 
 preach Christ best by humbly living him at 
 home. And this he continued to do, feebly 
 and stammeringly at times, indeed, but still 
 preaching him alike to all, both Mohamme- 
 dans and nominal Christians, till at length, 
 bowed by the weight of almost fourscore 
 years and ten, he betook himself to his little 
 upper room, and lay down upon his humble 
 couch to witness for him once more by a 
 peaceful Christian death. Yes, peaceful, 
 full of peace : that's the word to tell all 
 the story. As in life, so in death, there 
 were no raptures, no exultings, but only a 
 trustful, tranquil waiting for the Master's 
 coming. 
 
 He loved to tliink and talk of the crystal 
 walls, the pearly gates, and the golden streets ; 
 but he did it in much the same way as a sick 
 child would talk of getting well, and going 
 home once more. 
 
 He craved the privilege of burial, not in
 
 302 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 Oriental style, but in a coffin, and begged us 
 to sing at the grave, — 
 
 "Joyfully, joyfully onward I move, 
 Bound to the land of bright spirits above: 
 Augehc choristers sing as I come, 
 Joyfully, joyfully haste to thy home! 
 Soon with my pilgrimage ended below, 
 Home to the land of bright spirits I'll go: 
 Pilgrim and stranger no more shall I roam. 
 Joyfully, joyfully resting at home." 
 
 His wish was gratified, and, on the day of 
 his burial, a larger crowd than at any funeral 
 here before or since gathered at the Protes- 
 tant church to do honor to the man whom 
 all had known, and, in spite of his weaknesses, 
 known only to respect and love. And, as we 
 gazed upon his peaceful face, we thought of 
 him as indeed joyfully resting at home. 
 
 At the head of the coffin sat his first-born, 
 Jacob, who had returned from the capital in 
 time to be welcomed by the old man's glad,
 
 GEACE ILLUSTRATED. 303 
 
 •warm embrace before he lay down to die. 
 Since his father's death, he has begun to 
 attend the Protestant service occasionally. 
 Will not all who read this simple story offer 
 at least one earnest petition, that both he and 
 the yet absent Benjamin may return to their 
 heavenly Father with the penitent prodi- 
 gal's confession and prayer, and follow their 
 father in the way to heaven?
 
 504 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 PILGRIM ANNA. 
 
 A BOUT four years after the coming of 
 Garabed, " the Aged Auctioneer," in 
 Maden, to gladden the hearts of his parents, 
 two other parental hearts, in a home some 
 hundred miles north-east of the capital, were 
 disappointed and saddened by the advent of 
 " nothing but a girl," a portraiture of whom 
 may make a good " companion picture " for 
 that of old Talal, since, like him, she in mature 
 life migrated to the new capital, where, in 
 old age, she learned and received the simple 
 gospel story, and, like him, went home, being 
 about ninety years of age. During this time 
 she had lived with a husband nearly half a 
 century, and remained a widow thirty-three
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 805 
 
 years. Her early life, like that of old Gara- 
 becl, was passed amid scenes of oppression 
 and violence, but among Koords rather than 
 Turks. Like him, she was a person of tall, 
 erect form, and graceful movements ; but here 
 the likeness ceases. While we could not 
 surely certify to her uniformly conscientious 
 truthfulness from the first, we can say, that 
 if, during her later years, she ever told lies, 
 it must have been some as the good old fa- 
 ther of the faitliful did, — when under very 
 strong temptation. Nor was she apparently 
 covetous. 
 
 The natural traits for which she was 
 most noted were fearless energy, gratitude 
 for favors received, and religiousness. The 
 last made her devoted in performance of the 
 rites and duties of the Armenian Church, and 
 equally conscientious in acting up to her new 
 found gospel light. Her fearlessness and 
 energy are best illustrated by the fact, that 
 
 20
 
 306 GRACE rLLUSTEATED. 
 
 when seventy years old, unattended by any 
 one to care for her, simply hiring an animal 
 in a caravan going thither, she set out upon 
 a six-months' pilgrimage to the holy city, 
 Jerusalem ; which visit gave her the surname 
 Haji ("Pilgrim "), the name which the Turks 
 apply also to those of their faith who have 
 paid their devotions at the sacred shrine in 
 Mecca. We suggest, for the investigation of 
 the curious, why it is that while Armenian 
 males who have seen the holy sepulcher are 
 called in their own tongue Mahdesee (" Seer 
 of the death") as well as Haji, females 
 receive only the Turkish appellation, one 
 which is practically more honorable, as being 
 in the ruling tongue. 
 
 We regret not having obtained the story 
 of her journey from the mouth of the old 
 pilgrim herself; but we can easily imagine 
 most of the scenes in Jerusalem itself and 
 the holy places abput it, — the eager, igno-
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 807 
 
 rant, fanatical, frenzied devotion at the sup- 
 posed sacred sites of the birth, the crucifixion, 
 and the burial of our Lord, and the process of 
 plundering in those dens of thieves hard by, 
 the homes of the ecclesiastics. Her daugh- 
 ter, with an apparent unconsciousness of its 
 wrongfulness, characteristic of those living 
 under such a government, tells us of the 
 tone of triumph with which the holy pilgrim, 
 on her return, presenting her child with 
 materials for a suit of clothes, exclaimed, "I 
 bought these in the holy city, and hid them 
 in my sJialvars (Turkish trousers), and thus 
 escaped paying duty at the gates, and have 
 brought them so all the way." And on the 
 way she alone of all the caravan escaped pay- 
 ing a tax in gross, levied near Damascus by 
 the Arabs, who carried off horses and all, 
 except the one on which she rode, which she 
 put to his highest speed, and thus saved him 
 to his owner, who, stripped of all his other
 
 308 GEACE ILLUSTBATED. 
 
 possessions, reached Harpoot some time after 
 her arrival here. 
 
 I At another time, hearing a cry from a 
 neighbor's house, she rushed in to find the 
 master crying out in helpless distress because 
 four gypsy women were robbing his house. 
 The courageous crusader gave them all a 
 sound beating, and sent them on their way. 
 
 She seems to have been of that rare class 
 whose physical force is increased by anger. 
 And, while giving her characteristics, we 
 may as well whisper a confession, that, like 
 the rest of us mortals, the good lady, both 
 before and after the beginning of her saintly 
 experience, did at times get angry, only, per- 
 haps, a little oftener than some of us, and a 
 little more so. 
 
 A characteristic story by a person at our 
 elbow, illustrating this impetuous weakness, 
 we refrain from telling, lest, to accidental 
 ears, it pass at a premiimi. Suffi.ee it to say,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTEATED. 309 
 
 that, even in her later and more saintly days, 
 our Haji had occasion often to recall the 
 divine declaration, " He that is slow to 
 anger is better than the mighty, and he 
 that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh 
 a city." 
 
 Almost immediately on the coming of Mr. 
 Dnnmore to Harpoot, she, with her daughter 
 (wife of " God's Bedros ") and family, at- 
 tached themselves to the gospel party. Unfor- 
 tunately, her perhaps waning courage and 
 spirit were not equal to the labor of learning 
 to read ; and thus the Bible was to her eyes 
 a sealed book. But it could not be such to 
 her ears ; for she was always glad when she 
 could go into the house of the Lord. Of 
 tliis privilege she seldom or never allowed 
 herself to be deprived. Only a week before 
 her death, when on a communion sabbath, 
 on account of her feebleness, she was urged 
 to remain at home, with the promise that the
 
 310 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 elements should be brought to her there, 
 she refused, saying, " No ! I will go on my 
 own feet." 
 
 She was constant and frequent in secret 
 prayer, so much so, that her daughter, who 
 has the reputation of being less heavenly- 
 minded, once said to her, " You go so often 
 to your little room, that you will bring Jesus 
 down into it." To which she replied, " He 
 is my all." 
 
 But, though she loved much, she knew 
 very little, if one can be said to do so who 
 has heart-knowledge of Christ crucified. So 
 little head and tongue knowledge had she, 
 that she made three attempts before getting 
 into the church, and then only got in because 
 we who knew her decided that come in she 
 must. Any questions about Christian doc- 
 trine soon bewildered her poor old head; 
 and she would exclaim, " I'm only a poor old 
 woman. I don't know any thing ; " adding,
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 311 
 
 one day, putting her hand upon her heart, 
 " But I know I love Jesus." 
 
 So all doctrinal questions were dropped 
 next time ; and all the examination con- 
 densed into this, " Haji Anna, what do you 
 hate most ?" — " Sin." — " And whom do 
 you love most ? " — " Jesus." So, on this tes- 
 timony of her tongue and life, she was wel- 
 come to the Lord's table ; and no one 
 repented of the step. 
 
 In the kindness of her heart, she prayed 
 that her death might not take place in the 
 winter, because then the sexton would suffer 
 so much from cold in digging her grave in 
 the rocky soil of the Harpoot cemetery. She 
 had her wish, dying on the 30th of July. 
 One more petition she asked of the Lord. 
 She very much dreaded the physical death- 
 struggle, and often said, " Lord, it will be 
 hard to die. Be thou with me then." The 
 dreaded struggle came not; for she died
 
 312 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 unexpectedly, as quietly as a child drops to 
 sleep. During the few days of her illness, 
 she frequently uttered brief ejaculatory 
 prayers, such as, " Jesus, I have trusted in 
 thee. Be with me." The day before her 
 death, she suddenly called her daughter, 
 who finding her much excited, and looking 
 upward, inquired, " Mother, what has hap- 
 pened ? " — " My brother Bedros came," she 
 replied, referring to a favorite brother, who 
 died about forty years ago. Shall we call 
 all such seeming appearances of the loved 
 and departed to the dying mere fancies ? or 
 are they sometimes but foretastes to the 
 departing soul of the blessed companionships 
 of the spirit-world? Do others than those 
 whom Jesus loves and calls see such messen- 
 gers from the yet unseen world to which 
 they are departing? 
 
 Her last words were in token of gratitude 
 to a little grandson, who brought her some
 
 GRACE ILLUSTRATED. 313 
 
 grapes. " God bless the boy ! " said she ; and, 
 without any sign of the near approach of 
 death, instantly passed away, and passed, as 
 we can not doubt, into the presence of him 
 in whom she had trusted.
 
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