J.W.'s holiday brought several young people together who had not met for a long time. Marty came up again, and spent the day with J.W., all over town, from the store to the house and back again. In the evening Mrs. Farwell made a feast, to which, besides Marty, Jeannette and Alma and Pastor Drury were bidden. Mrs. Farwell was much more to Delafield than the best cook and the most remarkable housekeeper in the place, but her son insisted that she was these to begin with. Certainly, she had not been experimenting on the two J.W.'s all these years for nothing. After dinner--talk. No need of any other game in that company at such a time. There was plenty to talk about, and all had their reasons for enjoying it. Naturally, J.W. must tell about himself. Letters are all very well, but they are no more than makeshifts, after all. He was modest enough about it, not having any special exploits to parade before their wondering eyes, but quite willing. His Western experiences being called for, he was soon telling, not of desert and cactus and irrigation, but of the people who had so taken his attention, the Mexicans. "I believe," said he, "that we can do something really big down there. And it's our business. Nobody except American Christians will do it; nobody else can. Besides, the Mexicans are Christians in name, now. What they need is the reality. They are not impossible--just uncertain. All I heard and what little I saw made me believe they are suffering from bad leadership and ignorance more than from anything hopelessly wrong. They seem easy to get along with. The women are the most patient workers I ever heard of. And the poor Mexicans, the 'peons,' do want an end to fighting and banditry." "Well, J.W.," Marty asked, "what's the first thing we ought to think about for Mexico?" "I told you I don't know anything about Mexico, except at second-hand. But, I should say, schools. Schools are good for any land, don't you think, Mr. Drury? And in Mexico they are such great disturbers of the old slouching indifference. They will make the right kind of discontent. Schools bring other things; new ideas of health and sanitation, home improvement, social outlook, and all that. Then, with the schools, I guess, the straight gospel. The Mexicans won't get converted all at once, and they won't become like us, ever. But I'm about ready to say that whether missions are needed anywhere else or not, they surely are needed in Mexico. And Mexico is the first stepping-stone to South America; which is next on my list of the places that ought to have the whole scheme of Christian teaching and life." "Yes," said Alma, "and you know, I suppose, that the beginning of our Panama Mission was an Epworth League Institute enterprise? Well, it was. California young people assumed the support of the first missionary sent there, and later he went on down to South America, with the same young people determined to take him on as their representative, just as they did in Panama."