The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1894-09-07
THE SOUTHERN CROSS
the EMBLEM GOD MADE WITH FOUR
WORLDS IN THE HEAVENS.

DR.. Talmagc's Beautiful Description Of the
Celestial CruciHx-Crand Work Done by
Missionaries In the South Sea Islands.
Heroes and Heroines.
copyright, Louis Klopsch, ls9i.l
STEAMSHIP ALAMEDA, Midocean, July
10.-There are some things in the mind
year after year remaining underlined.
The time for explanation does not seem
to come We had for years seen allu-
sions to the southern cross. We knew
mot what it meant We supposed it to
DO an appearance in the heavens at GER
tain latitude and longitude, yet we
knew not exactly what that appearance
was. But, seated few nights ago ON
the deck of this ship in our voyage
around the world, gentleman bent
over me and said: 1.-The southern cross
is visible. Let us go and see it," Going
to the opposite side of the ship, looked
up and beheld it in all its suggestive
ness looking down upon us and looking
down upon the sea. The southern cross !!
1t is made up of four bright stars. One
star standing at the top Of the perpen-
dicular piece of the cross, and another
star standing for the foot of it. One
star standing for the right hand end Of
the horizontal piece Of the cross and
another star for the left hand end Of it.
So clear, SO resplendent, 80 charged with
significance, so sublimely marking off
the heavens that neither man nor wom-
All nor child nor angel nor devil can
doubt it. The southern cross! To make
it God put those four worlds in their
places. The tender and tremendous en-
blem of our religion nailed against the
heavens with silver nails of star. Four
are enough.
God wastes no worlds. He will not
encourage stupidity. If you cannot
see the southern cross in the four
stars, 40 stars will not make you see
it. Up yonder they stand, the four
stellar evangelists upholding the cross,
What a gospel of the armament! The
cross that Constantine saw in the sky
with the words, "By this conquer, !"
was an evanescent cross and for one
night, but this southern cross is for all
nights, and to last while creation lasts.
So every night of this voyage among the
islands of the Pacific l am reminded by
this celestial crucifx Of the only influ-
ence that has turned the islands from
their cruelty and shamelessness and hor-
ror-the influence of the cross.
Excepting the throne of the Deity, /
think there will be no higher thrones
in heaven than those occupied by the
missionaries. Others have lived and died
for their own country These lived and
died for the natives of other countries.
Many of the missionaries were the grad
yates of Yale or Princeton or New
Brunswick or Oxford or Cambridge or
Edinburgh and were qualified for pull
pits, for editorial chairs, for medical
achievement, for great words and deeds
in courtrooms, for commercial successes
that would have brought all honors and
all luxuries to their feet. Many of the
women of this foreign mission cause
We're brought up in refined associations,
could play well ON musical instruments,
were the charm of best society, had at
Effectiveness that fitted them for any cir
Gle Of ease or opulence. Such men and
women took whaleships for foreign
lands, lived ON fare that only coarsest
digestive organs could manage, were
tossed for months ON rough seas, landed
amid naked savages, abode in grass
huts, spent their life amid the squalor,
and the stencil, and the vermin, and
the epidemics and the low vices of those
whom they had come to rescue. Of a
roll of $50 names of such men and wom-
en- not more than four or five Of them
were ever heard of outside of their own
kindred of the circles of barbarians
among whom they lived.
The story of the Christian heroes and
heroines who came to these islands of
the Pacific in the brig Thaddeus, the
Leland, the Benjamin Bush, the Ave-
rich and the Mary Frazier under Cap
tain Charles Sumner can never be fully
told. All the talents, all the scholar
brain, all the spiritual energies of these
Christly men and women put forth on
behalf Of people whom they had never
seen and whose names they had never
heard pronounced until the day of the
arrival on these islands! Some of these
messengers of light were cut to pieces
and devoured by cannibals. Some Of
them toiled to save the besotted saw
age, while profligates of Christian coun-
tries landed from merchantmen or war
vessel or whaling ship were trying to
destroy them. The daughter of one of
the missionary families describes her
mother as toiling until the skin was
blistered off her arms and says that
while her father was about to preach a
group Of drunken sailors broke the win
dows and one brandished a knife about
his face, saying: Here he is. / have
got him. Come onI' These missionaries
sent their little children to America and
Europe because they could not be prop
erly brought up amid heathenism, and
what heartrending partings took place
as fathers and mothers surrendered their
children for the voyage across the seas,
in many cases those parents never see
ing their children again! No regular
postal Observation-Disclosures were often
not received until IS months or two
years old. The ship captain, Charles
Sumner, for the first part of the voyage to
the Pacific with his group of missiona-
ries scoffed at Christianity, but he was
converted under the influence Of their
example and became their champion.
He said about one of these Pacific is
lands: II have been here before, and
I see the difference. Formerly as soon
as my anchor was down my ship was
surrounded by dissolute men and wom
en- skimming out from shore and try
ing to come aboard. How different now!
Christianity has made the change"
And when some one traduced the mis-
sionaries he said: "Oh, you need not
tell me these storiesl have lived four
months with these dreadful people and
know them WE'LL l knew the natives,
too, as they were many years go, and l
am. fnlly convinced that the change
see Is from the influence of the religion