From Diarbekir the missionaries and six of the pastors went to Mardin, whence, after ordaining one pastor, they went a journey of five days to Sert. There they took part in another ordination, and the formation of a church. Elias, the new pastor, had labored long and faithfully in this place, and refused a most pressing call from Mardin, though in worldly things it was much more desirable. He believed he could be more useful where the poor and oppressed looked to him as their spiritual father. Out of seven persons who offered themselves as candidates for church-membership, six were organized into a church. The congregation was small and poor, but a long series of persecutions had wonderfully purged them of selfishness. They had paid largely for their house of worship, had provided the pastor elect with a new suit of clothes for the ordination, and, considering their deep poverty, had made extraordinary subscriptions towards the required half of his salary. They now adopted the system of tithes cheerfully, which had been so successfully advocated by John Concordance. From Sert Mr. Williams proceeded to Mosul, and the rest to Bitlis. There the congregation had long desired for their pastor Baron Simon, who received ordination as an evangelist years before at Constantinople. He has been repeatedly mentioned as Pastor Simon, and was a man of experience and sterling worth. There were no missionaries then at Bitlis. From hence they passed on to Moosh. The plain on which the town is situated, is sixty miles long and ten or twelve wide, and contains about seventy nominally Christian villages. The travellers were exposed to a snow-storm while crossing the plain. "It was genuine winter weather," writes Mr. Barnum, "yet I think I never saw anywhere else, not even in the warm sunshine of Egypt, so much nakedness, total or partial. Adults of course had the semblance of clothing, though it was often a mass of rags, sewed or tied together; but the poor children! It makes my heart ache to think of them. Some had a tolerably whole shirt and drawers, some had no drawers, and what was once a shirt was now a few shreds, hanging from the shoulders. Many had merely a rag, as a sort of jacket, with holes to put the arms through, and others had not a thread upon their bodies. The people seem to be almost bedless. Wherever we went, we found that the beds were a piece of carpet, or felt, or only a little straw, with a piece of carpet as a covering. In the six or seven villages visited by us, we did not notice a woman, or a child, who had either stockings or shoes. They walked about in the snow, and over the frozen ground, with bare feet. The soil is fertile, and the people own the land themselves,--not the Turkish Aghas, as is the case in many other parts of the country,--so that it must be mere thriftlessness, rather than any stern necessity, which makes them so destitute. They have not learned to raise cotton, and consequently do not have on hand the