The Black-Bearded Barbarian : The Life of George Leslie Mackay of Formosa — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The Black-Bearded Barbarian : The Life of George Leslie Mackay of Formosa
John Stuart Mill · en
There are two thousand, one hundred members now in the four organized
congregations, and over fifty mission stations and outstations. But
better still there are in addition twenty-two hundred who have forsaken
their idols and are being trained to become church-members. The Formosa
Church out of its poverty gives liberally too. In 1911 they contributed
more than thirty-five hundred dollars to Christian work. "Every year,"
writes Mr. Jack, "a special collection is taken by the Church for the
work among the Ami--the aborigines of the Ki-lai plain." This is the
foreign mission of the north Formosa Church.
A Hoa lately followed his pastor to the home above, but many others
remain. Mr. Gauld and his family are still there, in the front of the
battle, and with him is a fine corps of soldiers, comprising fifty-nine
native and several Canadian missionaries, including the Rev. Dr. J. Y.
Ferguson and his wife, the Rev. Milton Jack and Mrs. Jack, the Rev. and
Mrs. Duncan MacLeod, Miss J. M. Kinney, Miss Hannah Connell, Miss Mabel
G. Clazie, and Miss Lily Adair. Miss Isabelle J. Elliott, a graduate
nurse, and deaconess, will join the staff shortly, and a few others
will be sent when secured, in order that the force may be sufficient to
evangelize the million people in north Formosa.
Mrs. Mackay and her two daughters, Helen and Mary, the latter having
married native preachers, Koa Kau and Tan He, are keeping up the work
that husband and father left. A new hospital is being built under Dr.
Ferguson, and plans are on foot for new school and college buildings.
And the latest arrived missionary? What of him? Why his name is George
Mackay, and he has just sailed from Canada as the first Mackay sailed
forty-one years earlier. He has been nine years in Canada and the United
States, at school and college, and now with his Canadian wife, has gone
back to his native land. Yes, Kai Bok-su's son has gone out to carry on
his father's work, and Formosa has welcomed him as no other missionary
has been welcomed since Kai Bok-su's day.
But these are not all. From far across the sea, in the land where Kai
Bok-su lived his boyhood days, comes a voice. It is the echo from the
hearts of other boys, who have read his noble life. And their answer is,
"We too will go out, as he went, and fight and win!"