CRITICS vociferously assert that the missionaries were chiefly responsible for the Boxer uprising and for most of the prejudice of the Chinese against foreigners. As to the general accuracy of this charge, the reader has doubtless formed some impression from what has been said in the preceding chapters regarding the objects and methods of foreign trade and foreign politics. Still, it is but fair to remember that there are 3,854 missionaries in China, representing almost every European and American nationality and no less than nine Roman Catholic and sixty-seven Protestant boards.[72] As might be expected, the standard of appointment varies. A few boards, while insisting upon high spiritual qualifications, do not insist upon equal qualifications of some other kinds, while in all societies an occasional missionary proves to be visionary and ill-balanced. But in the great majority of the boards, the standard of appointment is very high, and while occasional mistakes are made, yet as a rule the missionaries represent the best type of Protestant Christianity. They are, as a class, men and women of education, refinement and ability--in every respect the equals and as a rule the superiors of the best class of non-missionary Europeans and Americans in China. [72] The Chinese Recorder. Now it is manifest that criticisms which may be true of some missionaries may not be true of the missionary body as a whole. As a matter of fact, the average critic has in mind either the Roman Catholic priests or the members of some independent society. This is notably true of Michie. Many of the charges are not true even of them, but of the charges that I have seen that have any foundation at all, nine-tenths do not apply to the missionaries of church boards. It is always fair, therefore, to ask a critic, ``To which class of missionaries do you refer?''