In 1844 the _Norwegian Missionary Society_ sent Hans Schreuder as a missionary to Zululand. Here at Umpumulo he and thirty companions started a mission. After twenty-five years’ constant and faithful work, the number of Christians was two hundred and forty-five. To-day there are five thousand seven hundred church members divided among thirteen stations. The training school carries its students carefully through a nine months’ course in the Gospels, the Catechism and Church history, besides providing exercise in preaching and instruction concerning the care of souls. The pupils go out two by two on Sundays to preach in heathen kraals. Their instructor says of them, “For diligence, attention and Christian walk, I can give them the highest praise. It has been a delight to work among them, for they seem to grasp more and more the central teaching of Christianity.”
In 1873 Hans Schreuder, the pioneer, left the service of the society to establish the _Norwegian Church Mission_, which now has four stations and two thousand Christians. Schreuder was the father of Norwegian missions. His appeal, “A Few Words to the Church of Norway,” in 1842, aroused the country to a sense of its missionary obligation.
[Sidenote: Co-operation.] The _Swedish State Church_ established in 1876 a mission in South Africa among the Zulus, selecting this spot because of its nearness to the Norwegian mission from which the Swedes expected advice and co-operation. In this expectation they were not disappointed. In sympathy and collaboration with them are also the neighboring Berlin missionaries. A common hymn book, prayer book and catechism are used. The native pastors of the three missions are trained by the Swedes, the teachers by the Norwegian and the evangelists by the Germans.
Oscarberg is the oldest station. The Zulu war and the Boer war both caused great loss and suffering to the mission. The work was extended in 1902 to South Rhodesia. In all its stations the mission has about six thousand native Christians.
In Abyssinia and extending into British East Africa is the mission of the _Swedish National Society_. To this field the society was directed by Louis Harms in 1865. Its people, whom the missionary-explorer Krapf longed to reach, are Gallas, a vigorous and superior African race, one of the few who have not been influenced by Mohammedanism. Like Krapf, the Swedes hoped to have access to these people through the Abyssinian Church. To their hopes was put a cruel period by the murder of one of their missionaries. In 1881 a second effort was made to reach them. Prince Menelik of Shoa promised free passage and also Negus of Abyssinia, but both broke their word. Finally slaves who were carried from the Galla country were trained by the persistent missionaries and sent back. Among them, Onesimus Nesib, who was baptized in 1872, has translated the whole Bible into the Galla language and has written various Christian books and a large dictionary.