Mission Methods in Manchuria Author:John Ross Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III Street Preaching INSTEAD of affecting the dignity of the unapproachable mandarin, like the Roman Catholic priest, the Protestant missionary cou... more »rts every opportunity of coming in contact with the people. In the open street, at marketplaces, walking along the highways, or staying at an inn, he falls into conversation with an individual or addresses a crowd on the message he has come to proclaim. But perhaps the most influential method of imparting Christian truth to the general public in Manchuria has been by the use of the " public chapel." In Newchwang, in the early part of 1873, steps were taken to secure some place on a main street suitable for a public chapel. But no landlord would let, on any terms, a respectable house to the foreigner. Finally, a shop was secured which was standing vacant. It afterwards transpired that this shop had been the scene of a murder several years before, and no Chinaman would accept as a gift the ghosthaunted place. A few benches transformed this place into a chapel. As it was a typical chapel, a description of this one will suffice for all. It stood on one of the most public thoroughfares. It was twenty- two feet square. Its floor was of mud. Smooth mud covered three of its walls. Its roof, shaped exactly like that of a railway carriage, was covered with mud. Its fourth wall was towards the street, and was of movable upright boards. The ordinary shop is opened at sunrise by taking down these boards. At sundown the boards are run into their groove with a bang; a long, strong bar of wood is fixed across behind them, and the shop is closed against all ingress. In the mud wall farthest from the street there was a small door leading into a much smaller room behind, which was both bedroom and kitchen. The bed was a brick pla...« less