VIEW OF MISSIONS. In the following tables, we have compiled the most interesting facts, which were within our reach. Our authorities are the last Reports of the respective Societies in this country, several late numbers of the London Missionary Register, &c. AFRICAN ISLANDS.-MAURITIUS AND MADAGASCAR. Christian Knowledge Soc. 1828 London Miss. Society 12 1814 General Estimate. 1 170 1956 Number of Missionary Societies, which have sent Missionaries to Africa, Assistants, including wives of Missionaries, native Teachers, &c. about Scholars, of various descriptions, at least INLAND SEAS. 7 80 120 2,000 to 3,000 10,000 RED-MEDITERRANEAN-BLACK-CASPIAN-PERSIAN GULF. At Malta, the American Board, the Church Missionary, and the London Missionary Societies, have established presses. Of the press belonging to the American Board at Malta, the following particulars are given, including the number of copies, printed, remaining in the Depository, and issued, from August 1822, to November 1827. There were issued from the press of the Church Missionary Society, in 1825-6-7, 3,000,000 pages of different religious tracts and books. The press of the London Society has printed a modern Greek Lexicon in two volumes; a modern Greek Testament: an Albanian Testament, &c. In addition to the Missionary Societies enumerated, the Bible, Tract, several Education, Philanthropic Societies, as well as benevolent individuals, are engaged in establishing schools, in translating and circulating bibles, tracts, manuals of elementary instruction, &c. with great earnestness. To this quarter of the world all civilized nations are looking with intense interest. The day of glorious change, the day of redemption is drawing nigh. SIBERIA. Lond. Miss. Soc., 3 Missionaries at Selengisk. This Mission is near the centre of the Asiatic continent, among the Mongolians, the descendants of the tribes once ruled by the mighty Ghengis Khan. A translation of the scriptures is nearly completed into Mongolian. CHINA. Lond. Miss. Soc., 1807. 1 Missionary, 2 native assistants. Dr. Morrison has published the whole Bible in Chinese. It is impossible to ascertain the number of communicants, or scholars, in the schools. Most of the reports are very incomplete. Gratifying exceptions are those of the American Board, and the Wesleyan Missionary Society. At the Methodist stations there are 635 communicants. At the stations of the Am. Board in Ceylon and Bombay there are 100 communicants, and 6387 scholars, of whom 1349 are girls. The Mission Seminary at Batticotta contains 67 students, arranged into 5 classes. At all the Mission stations, in India, there are not far from 130 ordained Missionaries; probably 200 European assistants; a large number of native assistants; and more than 100,000 scholars. ISLANDS IN THE INDIAN AND PACIFIC OCEANS. London Missionary Society. At Batavia, Amboyna, Friendly Islands, Harvey Islands, Society, Georgian, Raivaivai, Paumotu, Marquesas, and Sandwich-24 stations; 17 missionaries; 42 native assistants. Wesleyan Missionary Society. 11 missionaries; 162 members; 298 scholars, at their stations in New South Wales, in Van Dieman's Land, in Tongataboo, and in New Zealand. Baptist Missionary Society. 2 stations; 2 missionaries at Java and Sumatra. Church Missionary Society. In New South Wales; in New Zealand; 4 stations; 7 missionaries; 7 catechists. American Board. Sandwich Islands. On the islands Hawaii, Oahu, Maui, and Tauai; 6 stations; 10 missionaries; 86 native members of the church; 26,000 scholars. An edition of the gospels is now in the press. The number of persons who sometimes assemble to hear the missionaries preach, is no less than 5,000. Total, in the islands in these seas, 40 stations; 47 ordained missionaries. SOUTH AMERICA. Very little is done in the way of missionary effort, in South America at the present time, with the exception of the missions in Guiana. Rev. Messrs. Torrey and Parvin are laboring in Buenos Ayres, and an agent of the Bible Society in distributing bibles and Creeks, Cherokees, Putawotamies, Ottawas, 5 stations; 3 missionaries. In Scott county, Ky. is an academy containing 101 students, Choctaws, Creeks, &c. Methodist Missions. Among 8 tribes; 14 stations; 18 missionaries; 1,600 members; 350 scholars. Cumberland Presbyterians. Chickasaws, 1 station; 1 missionary; 25 scholars. United Brethren. Labrador, Upper Canada, Cherokees, 6 stations, 19 miss., 287 comm., 323 scholars. Total in N. America 57 stations, 60 miss., 2220 comm., 1792 scholars. GENERAL SUMMARY. An approximation to the truth, more or less near, is all which can be expected in this summary. Number of missionary stations through the world 340 Number of ordained missionaries 500 Native assistants, chiefly school teachers, between 16 and 1700 Learners in mission schools, at least 200,000 AMERICAN BOARD OF MISSIONS. We subjoin a few additional particulars in regard to the history and home department of the Board, taken chiefly from the Missionary Herald. This Board was incorporated in 1812. It now consists of 68 elected members, residing in different parts of the Union. There are 446 honorary members, constituted by the payment of 50 dollars if clergymen, and 100 dollars if laymen. We regret that we are not able to furnish which at that time contained but 1400 inany account of the Home Missionary Socie-habitants. It now contains 8 counties, and ty of England, which has been in vigorous more than 100,000 inhabitants. The followoperation for several years. This deficien- ing table contains the result of the Sociecy we shall hope to supply in our August ty's labors. number for 1830. United States. Several local societies, of an efficient character, have for some time existed in the United States. One of the earliest and most useful of these is the Connecticut Missionary Society. In 1774, the General Association of Connecticut resolved that an attempt should be made to send missionaries to the settlements forming in the western and northern wilderness. In 1780, two missionaries were sent from the county of Hartford, to labor in Vermont. In 1798, the General Association again took up the subject of missions, and presented a petition to the General Assembly, that contributions might be made for this object. The petition was granted, and the first contribution amounted to $1,269. The General Association formed themselves into the Missionary Society of Connecticut in 1798. In 1800 a missionary was sent to the Western Reserve, Period since its establishment, in 1798, 31 years. Number of missionaries employed, 144. Bibles, Tracts, Pamphlets, Sermons, &c. Bible Societies formed by the missionacirculated, 63,316. ries, 6. Amount of labor performed, 14,000 weeks. Whole receipts of the Society, since its formation, $160,657 30. Maine Missionary Society. formed. It has been greatly instrumental It is about 22 years since this society was in building up the waste places of Maine. It employs from 40 to 50 missionaries. Massachusetts Missionary Society. It is 30 years since this society was formed. In 1827 it was connected with the Massachusetts Domestic Missionary Society. It employs from 60 to 70 laborers, principally in the destitute portions of Maine and Massachusetts. Board of Missions of the General Assembly. In 1789, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church was organized. From that period till 1802, the Assembly managed their missionary concerns by a committee annually appointed. In 1802, a standing committee of missions was appointed. This committee continued to conduct the missionary operations of the Assembly till 1818, when the Board of Missions was constituted. The principal efforts of the standing committee, and the Board of Missions, have been directed to supply the destitute places in our own country. The following statement will give a general view of what has been accomplished: Number of missionary appointments 924 Miss. who fulfilled their appointments 769 The time spent by them in service (yrs)167 Number of miles' travel 241,314 Number of sermons preached 24,733 Number of baptisms 2,394 Money collected by them $10,978 98 Money paid to them by the Board 77,941 75 During the last year 101 missionaries were employed in 21 states and territories, and 1 in South America. United Domestic Missionary Society. This society was formed in 1822. In 1826 it was merged in the American Home Missionary Society. During the last year of its existence it supplied 148 churches and congregations with the labors of 127 missionaries. Its sphere of operations was principally confined to New York. American Home Missionary Society. In regard to this society, we are happy to make use of some extracts from a communication obligingly furnished us by the Secretary of the Society. "A sketch of the origin and present state of the American Home Missionary Society. "The formation of the American Home Missionary Society may well be regarded as commencing a new era in the history of domestic missions in the United States. We would not speak lightly of the missionary efforts of former years. Something was done in the days of our fathers to supply the destitute of this great country with the ordinances of a preached gospel. The character of our population, from the beginning, was migratory. Planted upon the border of a newly discovered continent, a large proportion of which remained yet to be possessed, but few of the sons of the pilgrims allowed themselves to live and die upon the spot that gave them birth. The undiscovered extent, and inviting resources of the country that lay before them, inspired each generation with new degrees of enterprise to go in and possess it; and thus field was added to field, and state to | state, until, in a little while, we became a great nation, blessed with a government independent and free, offering an asylum for the oppressed of other countries, and af fording still greater facilities and encouragements for the dispersion of our own population. The result has been, what none were bold enough to predict, that, in a little more than two hundred years, we have a population of twelve millions scattered, with more or less denseness, over a territory of perhaps 1,500,000 square miles. "In the progress of this rapid enlargement, it was early perceived that the power of Christianity was losing its proportion to the numbers and extent of the popula tion. The majority of those who left the home of their fathers to plant themselves in a larger place in the wilderness, soon forgot the interests of their souls and the souls of their children, in the ardor of worldly enterprise and the deceitfulness of increasing wealth, while the few who still "remembered Zion" sent back their cry to the churches from which they had gone out, for help to sustain the ordinances of the gospel in the frontier settlements. These appeals were not made altogether in vain. The early records of several of the oldest churches in New England contain interesting memorials of what they were accustomed to do for their brethren, whose residence in new settlements had deprived them of privileges which they once enjoyed. Such was the beginning of the work of domestic missions in this country. Individual churches, as they became interested in the moral condition of particular neighborhoods of the destitute, were accustomed to grant them aid in the support of the gospel. But as the new settlements were multiplied, and their wants became more generally known, it was apparent that these separate efforts of individual churches were inadequate to their demands. The increasing desolations of the frontiers of our country now became a subject of just alarm. Christians and Christian ministers conferred together on the obligations of the churches to let their light shine, and prayers were offered up to God for wisdom to direct. Infidelity was becoming the fashion of the day, and it was seen that more vigorous measures must be adopted to sustain and propagate the institutions of religion, or there was danger that this nation of freemen would soon become the bond-slaves of that spirit which ever reigns in the children of disobedience. The interest of the churches was awakened, and the importance of more united efforts was discussed. The result was, the successive formation of several domestic missionary societies, the most important of which were those of Massachusetts and Connecticut, and the Board of Missions of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church. These gave a |