July 31. "To-day I closed my school for the month of August by the distribution of rewards to _thirty little girls_. The American and English Consuls and a few Arab friends were present, and expressed much pleasure at the sight of so many young natives in their clean dress. A few of the more educated scholars read a little in the New Testament." August 8. "On Saturday I closed my school for the month of August. It was increasing every day in numbers and I would gladly have continued it. Last Sabbath we had at the Sabbath School forty-six scholars, a _fourth of whom were Moslems_." September 29. "Yesterday I commenced my school again with twenty scholars; which, for the first day, was a good number. Mrs. Whiting has ten little Moslem girls in Jerusalem, and the promise of more." December 14. "On Saturday, our native female prayer-meeting consisted of twenty, besides two children. Fourteen were Arabs, more than were ever present before. We met in the girls' school room, where we intend in future to assemble. We sung part of a psalm, as we have begun to teach music in our school. We find the children quite as capable of forming musical sounds as those in our own country; but alas, _we have no psalms or hymns adapted to their capacities_. The Arabic cannot be simplified like the English, without doing violence to Arab taste; at least such is the opinion now. What changes may be wrought in the language, we cannot tell. Of this obstacle in the instruction of the young here, you have not perhaps thought. It is a painful thought to us, that _children's literature_, if I may so term it, is _incompatible with the genius of this language_: of course, infant school lessons must be bereft of many of their attractions." It may be interesting to know whether present missionary experience differs from that of Mrs. Smith and her husband in 1835, with regard to children's literature in the Arabic language. In 1858, Mr. Ford prepared, with the aid of Mr. Bistany, (the husband of "Raheel," Mrs. Smith's adopted child,) a series of children's Scripture Tracts in simple and yet perfectly correct Arabic, so that the youngest child can understand them. In 1862, we printed the first Children's Hymn-book, partly at the expense of the girls in Rufka's school. We have now in Arabic about eighty children's hymns, and a large number of tracts and story books designed for children. We also publish an Illustrated Children's Monthly, called the "Koukab es Subah," "The Morning Star," and the children read it with the greatest eagerness.