+-------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+------+ |On Probation.|1st Year.|2nd Year.|3rd Year.|4th Year.|5th Year.|Total.| +-------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+------+ | 6 | 13 | 10 | 3 | 6 | 4 | 42 | +-------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+------+ VI.--NATIVE PASTORS AND MISSIONARIES. The increase of our Church Members, and the enlargement of their spiritual life, have from time to time placed at the disposal of the Society an increasing number of Christian helpers for the local service of our various Missions. No exact account of them was taken for several years. But from the complete returns recently gathered, it appears that at the present time they are more than twelve hundred in number. The Christian Assistants not engaged in schools are divided into several classes. Some are READERS, who go from house to house, and explain the Word to families or individuals. Others are preachers of greater or less education, and are more or less trusted, either to work alone, or in company with more experienced brethren. In India and China, these brethren are usually termed CATECHISTS, though in the South Seas the missionaries have retained the title of NATIVE TEACHERS. One class among them, of higher character and education, in whom great trust is reposed, are termed in India EVANGELISTS. These brethren frequently occupy stations by themselves, or are immediate and trusted assistants of the missionaries. Several of the excellent preachers in China belong to this rank; as also others in the South Sea Islands and in Madagascar. It has from the first been a settled rule with the Society's missionaries that catechists and preachers should be men of known and proved piety; and that all candidates for theological classes shall be members of the church. The Directors believe that it is largely owing to the observance of this sound rule that the Missions have received a great blessing from above, and have been built up on a solid basis. It is the effect of this blessing, and a result of the development of the churches, that a steady improvement has taken place in the general character and fitness of Native Agents. And not the least benefit is that at length it is giving rise to the long-desired class of NATIVE ORDAINED PASTORS.