[21] This is the Armenian whose history I gave a little account of before, as the son-in-law of the richest merchant in Baku, who has given up all the prospects of his connection with his father-in-law, which are very considerable, to endure afflictions with the people of God. This young Armenian is another proof of the immense importance of having those to bear testimony to the power of the Spirit's work in regenerating the soul in the image of him that created it, from among themselves. The people can see in him the contrast between the past and the present man. They have also a knowledge of the peculiar modes of thinking and feeling among those with whom they have been educated, and been in the closest terms of intimacy with from their infancy, that they cannot have with foreigners. The two dear and most interesting deacons, of whom one is mentioned as having died in the faith in his way to suffer for the truth, and the other has gone to witness alone before his enemies and persecutors at Etchmiazin, were both in the school at Shushee, and in the study of and translating the word of God, had been led step by step, to see through the errors of the system by which they were bound. Another proof of the progress of the same spirit manifested itself in our infant beginnings. The two little Armenian boys who live with us, eat and live as we do; on being asked by the boys without, why they did not fast as their nation did for fifty days? without any knowledge or direction from me, they set about selecting from the New Testament, in conjunction with my own little boys, those passages which bear on the question, and which shew that if we eat not we are none the better, and if we do eat, none the worse. Remarks of a similar kind have many times occurred in the course of our translations from the Testament. At all events, there is a growing tendency in the minds of the children, to feel that God's word is the one rule on which they must justify all they impose, and thence the necessity of understanding it; and these principles upset at once the whole system of ignorant mummery which is now called or thought to be the religion of Jesus here. If it be the Lord's pleasure to spare our lives, and grant us the ability and opportunity to publish his truth, results will follow to rejoice our hearts, I have no doubt: God has declared it shall not return to him void, nor shall it. And to the Mohammedans also these converts from among the fallen churches become invaluable preachers, from their vernacular facility in the language, and from their being continually exposed to the question, why they do not do so and so; they are called upon by the very necessity of their position to defend with meekness and wisdom their new position; whereas, with us, they are satisfied with just simply making up their