“One evening, a day or two before Ash Wednesday, the manager heard many voices at the door of the teacher who had charge of the boarding department. There was an interested consultation, and then he heard the boys troop back to their rooms with many little shouts of gratulation and glee, and many a “_bagunnadi_” (it is good).
“The next morning the teacher came to the manager with a queer smile.
“What were the boys up to last night?’ queried the latter.
“‘They asked for permission to go without their supper once a week, on condition that the money saved be given them for the little church up in the hills,’ was the reply.
“‘Oh,” said the manager, ‘I think it will not hurt them. Let them try it; but we must keep a watch on them that they do not get sick.’
“‘Yes,’ replied the teacher, ‘but they were not satisfied with that. They worked out how much it would make, and this morning they came back to request that they be allowed to go without supper twice a week!’
“The manager, catching their enthusiasm, said, ‘Let them try it.’
“Growing boys have hearty appetites, and it was not easy for those lads to go to sleep supperless every Tuesday and Thursday evening during those weeks, but there was never a murmur.
“Palm Sunday came. No one ever saw brighter-eyed boys than those who walked to church that morning from our school. When the offerings were received, they put a solid lump of silver coins on the plate. It contained twenty-five _rupees_--eight dollars and thirty-three cents.
“The girls in their school had been securing an offering in a similar way, and they brought only thirty cents less.
“That day there was laid on the plate a total offering of ninety dollars!
“_This is the Telugu Lutheran definition of self-denial._”
If the devotion of the Church at home even distantly approached such devotion as this how quickly might the work be accomplished!
The world is still overshadowed by the apparently impenetrable cloud of a great war. The condition of hundreds of mission stations is a matter for serious anxiety. When the war closes it is likely that there will be new boundaries, British colonies now German colonies, or German colonies now British colonies. Each change of this kind will bring into existence new complications for missionary policy to meet. The Christian Church will need faith and courage to take up a task so sadly interrupted and marred.