The meaning of these figures is clear.  We rejoice in the enlarging beneficence of the living and of the dead, who live unto God.  The tremendous pressure of our providential work is nearer to being felt and met by the American people than ever before.  What the Association has done hitherto is no measure of what it has constantly been called to do and is now called to do.  It can now meet a few more of the immediate demands urged upon it from its vast and necessitous field.  As between faith and fear, we do not hesitate to take the way of faith.  We thank God and take courage.  Hitherto the Lord hath helped us; He will bless us.

To our living friends we must say:  Our work, like all living things, either grows or decays.  Those who have been called hence, within these six months, have left us, by their legacies, their bidding to go forward with a growing work.  Except by your support, this growth will mean swift, subsequent decay.  Our largest work is in a field teeming with great dangers and yet with great possibilities of success.  The success depends upon prompt, vigorous and permanent increase.  It is yours to empower us to meet in some good degree the call of the hour and of God.

* * * * *

OUR MISSION IN ALASKA.

We have undertaken to establish a mission school among the Arctic Eskimo Indians of Alaska.  The location is to be at Point Prince of Wales at Behrings Strait, the westernmost point of the mainland of America and nearest to Asia.  Its distance from the North Pole has not yet been ascertained.  The inhabitants are described by Capt.  Charles H. Stockton, of the United States Navy, as “the boldest and most aggressive people of all the Arctic coast.  They are such a turbulent crowd that the whalers are afraid to visit them and consequently give them a wide berth.  It is both the worst people and the most prosperous settlement in that region.  They ought to have a mission station.”

Dr. Sheldon Jackson, the Secretary of the Territorial Board of Education, says:  “On account of the character of the people, I think it would not be safe to send a woman there, at least the first year.  I favor the sending of two men at first.  If difficulties arise, they will be a mutual strength, and if the teacher gets sick, there will be some one to attend him.  From the time that the revenue cutter passes south in August and the whalers in September, these men will be shut up with the natives and thrown upon their own resources and God’s protection until the following June or July.  I would advise that the missionaries be large men physically, as size impresses the natives favorably, and there may be times when they will need to remove a turbulent man from their room by physical force.”

We have sent out our call for the missionaries.  It is obvious that none need nor will apply who are not Christian heroes, and who have not in themselves the stuff of which martyrs are made.  But this mission will not be alone.  In that region, but at vast distances apart, will soon be established Presbyterian, Episcopal, Swedish and Moravian missions.