actually bewildering.  They say the place seated 3,500; it appeared to be full.  It was a simple circle, with a ring set in the centre.  At one end was a little platform seating myself and my Staff, opposite me was the entrance for the horses, which was packed by the crowd, while the remaining space, on circle upon circle, tier upon tier, the audience was to be seen.  On the right hand we had row after row of Queen’s soldiers in their red jackets, lower down the Eurasian and middle-class Europeans, with a few natives.  In the centre we had a very fair proportion of the elite of Calcutta:  there was the Lieut.-Governor, the Chief Commissioner of Police, the Consuls of America and two or three other countries, some great native swells, ladies bespangled with jewellery and finery, while on the left was one mass of dark faces reaching right up to the canvas sky.  It was the most picturesque audience I ever addressed, to say the least of it.

     “Our singing of ‘Grace is flowing like a river,’ was very weak,
     still everybody listened, nobody more so than the swell Europeans.

“The solo, ‘On Calvary,’ was sung with good effect, and then I rose to do my best.  The opportunity put new life into me.  I was announced to speak on ‘The Religion of Humanity,’ but this did not seem to me to be the hour for argument of any description; there was no time for dissertation.  I felt I must have something that went straight to the point.  I had been talking to these Brahmo Samaj and other people upon Social Work, alluring them on afterwards by indirect arguments long enough.  Now I felt that I must go as straight to the point as it was possible to do.  So I took ‘What must I do with Jesus?’ and made it fit into ’The Religion of Humanity’ as best I could.

“I never hit out straighter in my life, and was never listened to with more breathless attention—­except for the few wretched natives in the top seats, who would go out, I guessed, because they did not know the language, and came perhaps expecting I should be translated, and after sitting an hour felt that was enough.  However, they soon cleared out, the audience taking no notice of the process.

     “Once done, however, a general movement took place; a Prayer
     Meeting was impossible.  We retired feeling that a victory had been
     gained so far.

     “I cannot stop here to speak of the Meeting at which the Brahmo
     Samaj presented me with an Address of Welcome the next day.

     “All I know is, that nothing surprised me more than to hear some of
     the priests and laymen declare that they had gone with me in every
     word I had said the night before.