They have done all they could and dare do, in the circumstances, to oppose the progress of truth among their people, by slanders and snares, gibes and abuse, and violence, and even murder. But in spite of their vigilance and efforts to oppose, truth advanced with slow but steady step, and worked like “leaven in the meal.” Old men and young men, old women and young women, boys and girls, left them, and by open profession of regard for truth, stood boldly up in the face of their lies. The symbols of the gods, which the priests, war prophets and doctors had painted, wreathed and paraded “on every hill,” were defiantly spurned from their places by the feet of those who had been used to obey their caprices and crouch to their authority. The feasts and dances were less fully attended, the medicine-sack cast away, while hundreds of their former dupes, emancipated, read daily in their Bibles, sung the song of Zion, and prayed, in their houses, to their “Father in heaven;” and on the Sabbath assembled in the Christian church, erected by their own hands, and seriously, reverently, joined in the holy worship of the God of heaven. At sight of this, the rage of these demons in human form boiled over. The effervescence was mighty. Threats were fulminated and nothing but opportunity was wanting for them to rise, and re-establish by violence, the waning power of the TAKU-WAKAN, and to return, wading through the blood of Christians, if need be, to the homes of their pagan fathers. They hoped to be able to roll back the providential wheels of the Almighty God.