As a further result Mr. Trimblerigg brought about, more by accident than by design, an informal alliance in missionary effort between True Believers and Free Evangelicals. For out there in the mission fields True Belief was now having won for it the battle which at home it had lost; and by a strange irony the man most responsible for that turn in its fortunes was he who, once its rising hope, had been so uncompromisingly cast forth for a too-relative adherence to revealed Truth. One day word was brought to Mr. Trimblerigg that certain elders of True Belief had been of a mind to search the Scriptures concerning him: and the word had come, not inappositely--though open to different shades of interpretation: ‘Cast thy bread upon the waters, and after many days it shall return to thee.’ And it was reported that the said elders had been impressed and had made a note of it. Mr. Trimblerigg was pleased by the news, for it meant that a door still stood open; and though he had no intention of passing through it again, he liked it to be open. For he was now busy opening a door to them; and theirs being open in return, they might eventually pass through it to him. The idea of relegating the mission field definitely to True Belief under an agreed coalition of the Churches began to attract him, for it was becoming clear to him that among the mentally deficient True Belief was the quickest and most effective way to conversion, if only it could be made non-sectarian--a means rather than an end. He saw, with speculative instinct that looked like faith, how a place might be found for all on a plan of his own making. Thus the great fusion of the Free Churches toward which he was working came a step nearer to practical politics. His work being the organization of missions, it was often his duty to entertain missionaries. And as the best time of all, for establishing confidential relations, was to meet them in friendly intimacy immediately upon their arrival, it was beginning to be his practice to invite as guest to his house any prominent missionary who had come home on leave. Thus in the course of a few years the very cream of the Free Evangelical mission world, and a few others from connections that were friendly, passed through his hands. It was from one of these latter that Mr. Trimblerigg received news of the swift civilization that was taking place in parts scarcely heard of as yet, owing to the beneficent efforts of certain missionary centres not only to sow the seed of the faith but to develop the wealth and resources of the fields in which they laboured. This particular missioner was an optimist about his own districts. ‘In fifty years’ time,’ he said, ‘it will be for its size, the richest country outside Europe and the States.’ And as its size was nearly half that of France such a forecast suggested big possibilities.