“‘Like our contemporary, we have noticed the “extravagant estimates” to which it refers; but we never happened to notice their having been made by any Catholic authority whatever. They usually make their appearance in papers of the _Christian Advocate_ stamp, and are employed as a stimulus to rouse missionary zeal in people who are much more readily moved to give money by their hatred of Popery than by their love for what they believe to be the truth taught by our Divine Lord. The _Independent_ wants facts to substantiate these boastings. We suggest that it can always be accommodated with facts enough to substantiate the truth of whatever assertions are actually made by our missionaries. They can hardly be held responsible for any wild stories which other people may circulate at their expense.’ “Those who have been most troubled by reports of the gains of Catholicism among the negroes may give to the winds their fears.” We, too, have been for more than a year making special inquiries. We have read the large estimates, which have been through the newspapers, of money expended, and pupils taught. The statement that $600,000 in gold (nearly one million dollars in our currency) was given to this work by the Propaganda at Rome, in 1867, and that, in the same year, sixty-six priests landed in New Orleans to undertake missionary work among the blacks, we trace to the _Christian Intelligencer_ of that year. The fact is, that it is extremely difficult to get at accurate and authorized statements in regard to all Roman Catholic missions. Their funds are not raised by appeals, based on special needs or special encouragements, or addressed to the general public; and their policy is one of quiet foundation-laying, rather than of demonstrative up-building. It is not an easy task, even, to secure reliable information of what they are doing here at our doors, or behind their own. Recognizing this difficulty, we are not ready to agree with the _Independent_ that, if the Roman Catholics had facts to prove, they would not hesitate to publish them conspicuously. Nor are we ready yet to congratulate ourselves that we “have been able to capture and expose the spectre,” while we are obliged to confess that we have not had it in our grasp sufficiently to take the measure of its outlines, or tell its height and girth. A careful reading of the ‘virtual concession’ of the _Catholic Review_ makes it amount to virtually nothing, except an ingenious evasion of responsibility for any statements which may have been made. It does not even say that the estimates have been extravagant, but uses that expression as a quotation from the _Independent_. It only suggests that assertions actually made by missionaries (who are careful not to make assertions) can always be substantiated.