175082 7 3 17035 12 7

80127 5 6

272245 5 4 114401 11

1 34818

6 7

95916 1 7 7838 5 2 18298 3 2 272245 5 4 140692

A Friend from Sheffield says:

6

"We continue to read the MISSING LINK' with renewed interest and thankfulness, and with united prayers for continued pecuniary aid and success, and we have no fear for you. He who has so marvellously helped will help still. We wonder as we read how He has sent money, workers, fellow-helpers, friends, wisdom, counsel, physical strength, and mental power for all the departments of the machinery connected with these BIBLE MISSIONS and their extensive operations. To those outside it is very wonderful. To God shall be all the praise, for of Him and from Hiм all good things come."

THE SERVICE OF THE WORD.

WE still observe, for our own encouragement and as a proof that God is yet enabling our Bible-women practically to remember the main aim of our Mission, the increasing sales of Scriptures. We have an increase during the year, allowing for all changes and losses, of six Bible districts, the total number served in the year being 203. For the last seven years our sales of Bibles among the lowest poor have been gradually on an ascending scale:

In 1860 and 1861 they had amounted to 10,533 and 11,592 copies in the year, at a cost of £833 and £1,059. In 1869 they had dropped to In 1870 they rose to

4,910 copies at a cost of £719

6,025

785

We may, therefore, this year announce a greater sale of Bibles in the lowest quarters of London than in any former section of our nineteen years' history, and we have greater proof than ever that this sale has been accompanied by an increase of spiritual results. We think we owe this to the steady pressure on each of our women of the very moderate

requirement of one new subscriber a week, and something also perhaps to the circulation of a Christmas card of “loving approval" to those who have observed the rule.

Our twelve PIONEERS are still very important helpers in keeping the Mission perseveringly to this its first aim. Fortysix districts are necessarily under their care for which we have no Superintending Ladies. The attendances at the Mothers' Meetings they hold have, during the year, been over 37,525; the Bible money their women have collected has been £537 8s. 11d.. (once again a third of the total sum of the year) and the number of new Bible subscribers obtained by them has been 3,806. Their subscribers for clothing have brought in 7321. 11s. 1d. We notice gladly the districts in which have been sold the highest number of Bibles, divided as last year.

In 29 districts, as above, over 100 copies have been sold—

Some of the latter are new districts. In our summary of 1873 we retained besides these sales 5,899 subscribers; in 1874 we had 6,601 remaining, besides a sale of 11,129 copies, at a cost of 1,5037.; in 1875 we have 7,124 remaining, besides a sale of 12,269 copies, at a cost of 1,6597.

We were able in last year's Report to name seven districts superintended by ladies, in which the sales were over 100 copies, and five of the same districts still retain the superiority, while the number in which similar success has been obtained, is now not seven but eighteen.

.

We are disposed to think this increase of Bibles sold on Ladies' Districts, a very important feature in the year's work." If we had more ladies, i.e., voluntary agents, who gave themselves fully to the meaning and principles of our BIBLE Mission, we should have less need of the assistance of Pioneers. We feel less warranted to press this perpetual starting point of our good work in districts privately supported, but nevertheless are convinced that if, in many of these, a vigorous re-canvass were commenced for Bible subscribers, large numbers of Bibles might be still sold, and many fresh doors of entrance obtained for Christian teaching thereby.

Of course it is not the mere number of Bibles sold, that is of the greatest importance, but what has been their Mission to the lowest parts of London, and how far they have been caused to speak there to poor fathers and mothers in the last score of years.

We can truly state, and from continual evidence always before us, that a real Bible Mission always bears fruit of souls, because it is the Lord who speaks and it is HE who opens the ear.

LETTER TO A BIBLE-WOMAN FROM ONE OF HER SUBSCRIBERS.

"DEAR MRS. W.,

"The first time I had the pleasure of seeing you was at the Mothers' Meeting in Somer's-town, when dear Miss Mintroduced you to me, and you introduced me to your Bibles; and now to encourage you in your labour of love, I think I will give you a short outline of the blessings derived from the Bibles I purchased of you, in number altogether five. It will be five years since I finished paying for the first one on the 28th of October, 1870, and my eldest son was about to sail for America, so I packed it in his box, and when he looked it over he found it folded in his shirt, and tossed it out, saying he did not want that book along with him. I found it on the floor after he had sailed, as I thought, and the next day was sorrowfully conveying it to a neighbour's, who had, I knew, a son also about to sail in the same ship. To my amazement, I

found my son, whom I thought departed, sitting in her room, and it had such an effect upon me that I fainted.

"When I recovered I found that he was frightened about me, and as he saw I was so earnest that he should have the Bible, he said to me, 'Mother, I will take the book, and I will read it.' So I marked some favourite verses for him. One was, The Lord is my Shepherd.' My first letters from him were rather discouraging, but one day a letter came to say that he had turned Good Templar. He next told me he attended different meetings and chapels, and a few weeks ago I had one to say that he had settled down in a Church of England. Praise the Lord for all His mercies.

BIBLE No. 2.

"A gay, thoughtless young woman, living in my house, took a fancy to the appearance of Bible No. 1, and purchased one of you. A letter you wrote and placed inside it so impressed her mind that she asked her husband if he would read a chapter with her every night, and being a steady young man, though not religious, he consented; the consequence was, they thought they would go to chapel, being invited by another couple living on the same floor; and the end of it all was, that the fourthe two husbands and the two wives-were all baptized together, and are still living as consistent Christians. So the Lord answered your prayer and blessed

your letter.

BIBLE No. 3.

"This copy I purchased to present to a Good Templar lodge, whose members had not provided one. They called a public meeting, and the Bible was brought forward, and, much to my vexation, thanks were returned to me with cheers. However, a person who happened to be present was so struck with the warm reception the Holy Book had met with, that she thought these people are surely in the right, and joined the Society at once. She afterwards witnessed to the good that Bible had been the means of doing to her own soul, and I was lately present at a missionary service at which she, her husband, and another person, were admitted to the Sacrament. All the fruit of Bible No. 3.