The Word spread up the country first amongst Mr. Vidal’s relatives and friends.  At Santa Barbara the station master, Carlos Mendonca, was converted, who is now pastor of our church at Cantagallo.  He first moved to Rio Bonito and founded a church there, the truth spread, in other directions also and so the light which the unknown colporteur left with this farmer has shed its rays of blessings upon a whole county.  Twenty-one years ago, a Bible which belonged to a Catholic priest, or rather a part of a Catholic Bible, fell into the hands of the old man, Joaquim Borges.  Through the reading of this Bible, he abandoned idolatry and other practices of Rome and put his trust solely in the Lord Jesus for his salvation.  For sixteen years he resisted all attempts of priests and others to turn him back to Rome, always giving a clear and firm testimony to the truth of the gospel.  During all this time he never met with another believer.  Hearing of him, E. A. Jackson wrote him to meet him in Pilao Arcado.  He came 120 miles and waited twelve days for the arrival of the missionary.  As Jackson had through passage to Santa Rita, he asked the captain to hold the steamer while he baptized Mr. Borges.  Before administering baptism Jackson preached to the great crowd on the river bank and on the decks of the steamer.  It was a solemn and beautiful sight to behold this man, seventy-seven years of age, following his Lord in baptism at his first meeting with a minister of the gospel and before a multitude which had never witnessed such a scene.  Dripping from the river, Jackson welcomed him into the ranks of God’s children.  The missionary embarked on the steamer and Mr. Borges went back to work among his neighbors.  Up till the present time not even a native minister has visited him, for the lack of workers and funds to send them.  Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart to conceive the glorious things God has prepared for the man who will go to work for Him among the neglected people of the interior of Brazil.

In the State of Sao Paulo is a boy, Ramiro by name, now about thirteen years of age, the only son of parents who do not know a letter of the alphabet.  Indeed, he is the only one in a large connection that has been taught to read.

The family lives about twenty miles from their market town, Mogy das Cruzes, to which they go to sell the meager fruits of their labors on the little farm.  In this town they have some acquaintances, among whom is a believer whose faith had come through reading the Bible.  This believer one day came into possession of a Bible which he didn’t need, and so he gave it to Ramiro, who was then about nine or ten years of age and was beginning to learn to read.  The little fellow trudged home, twenty miles away, carrying his priceless present, and showed it joyously to his parents.  This was the first book that ever entered their humble home, excepting, of course, Ramiro’s little school book.  Curious to know what the