The rapidity with which the natives can turn to any chapter, or verse, of any book in the Bible, is a surprise to all strangers not familiar with the custom among the Protestant Sunday schools, of devoting a portion of the exercises of each week to seeing which member of the higher class can turn quickest to any chapter and verse given out by the teacher. We doubt if another people can be found who are more careful than the native Samoans in observing the Sabbath day as a day of peace, and rest from temporal labors, and a day given up to the worship of God. It is true that they have not all come to a unity of the faith in Christ, but, in all our travels among them, we found but one skeptic, as an exception to the rule of general belief in the Bible, and the worship of God according to the rules and regulations of the three distinct bodies of religious worshipers known as the Protestants, the Catholics and the Latterday Saints.

THE PROTESTANT CHURCHES.

The Protestants were the first to commence proselyting on Samoa. About the year 1830 or 1833, native missionaries from Tahiti came to Samoa representing the London Missionary Society, and ever since they have been nicknamed the "Tahitian" Church, and among the natives are so called to this day. These, with a few Wesleyans from Tonga, comprise the Protestant churches. There seems to be an understanding between these two sects to the effect that the former shall enjoy all the privileges on Samoa, while the latter is allowed the same on Tonga, for purely economic reasons.

The London Missionary Society, through its missionaries during the last seventy years, has succeeded in reducing the native dialect into a written language. They have translated and printed what is generally considered a very good translation of the Bible, together with a treatise thereon, not so good, and quite a number of works on educational subjects.

The Tahites, or Protestants, are by far more numerous than all other sects on the islands at the present time, and they have what is probably one of their strongest organizations on SaIn almost every village there is a native Protestant teacher who is at once the spiritual teacher and the day school teacher of the village. Boys that are apt to learn are adopted by him, and

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receive special care and training, and if they still continue bright and quick in their studies, at sixteen years of age, they are sent to Molua, the Protestant training school for native missionaries on Upolu. Here they take a four years' course in theology, and the common branches of education, under white teachers, and at the expiration of that time, are considered ready to fill any vacancy as village pastors, or as missionaries to any other group of islands. In this way the Protestants get the cream of the brainy ones for their work, and the schooling makes them more intelligent than their fellows. There is also the respect shown the religious office, and a small salary attached that make it a very desirable position for the ordinary native. It is understood that in time of war these village pastors are free from military duty, and the natives have been taught to give a tithe of their food to the village teacher, and to those dependent upon him, so that, to a great extent, he is also free from the manual labor necessary to gain a livelihood. The Protestant work is looked after by some eight or ten missionaries who are salaried, and well taken care of, by the London Missionary Society, and they live in ease, dress well, and are accompanied by servants wherever they go.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.

Next to the Protestants, numerically, are the Catholics, represented by the Jesuit fathers from France. The very appearance of these men with their black beards, black gowns, and care-worn faces on which there is no trace of a smile, repels one from their presence. They commenced their work some years after the country had become Protestant. It is said that their entrance into the religious life of the natives was opposed most vigorously by the dominant church, which opposition has continued ever since. This feeling of enmity between Protestant and Catholic, has had much to do with the recent internecine wars on the islands over the kingship question, (Malieatoa being a protestant, and Mataafa a Catholic,) since each sect was fearful of its rights, privileges, and property if the other should have a representative on the throne.

The Catholics have a number of fine concrete churches, which, with their stained glass windows and interior decorations, far sur

pass any others on the islands. On account of the natives being fond of bright colors, pomp, show and ceremony, we often wondered why it was that the Catholics did not make greater headway and more converts. Hovever, as is usual with this sect, their converts are converted in very deed to Catholicism, and they pride themselves very much upon the fact that there are many more Catholics than members of any other Christian sect on the earth at the present time. To the native mind, that is one great proof of truth and right, and they take great pleasure in asking one the question, for personal gratification: "Which sect has the greatest number?"

While the Catholics are more exclusive than the Protestants, yet we have often been most hospitably treated by them, and we have many converts who were previously members of the Catholic church.

THE LATTER-DAY SAINTS. THEIR HISTORY IN SAMOA.

Last, but not least, except in numbers, among the religious bodies on the islands, are the Latter-day Saints. There is quite a romance attached to the begining of our work on the islands; briefly it is as follows:

In the year 1857, when Johnston's army came to Utah, the Elders on missions in foreign lands were called home. We believe this request was generally obeyed, but there was one Elder, Walter Gibson by name, on the Sandwich Islands who chose to ignore the request of President Young, in this matter, remaining on the islands. Seemingly he took it for granted, as did many of the enemies of the Saints, that their extermination was sure. On the islands and among the natives, this ambitious schemer saw opportunities for wealth, fame and personal aggrandizement enough to satisfy the most ambitious of men. He succeeded to a most remarkable extent. He became very wealthy and rose in political power until he became the king's prime minister. It seemed, for a long time, as though the Lord had forgotten this man who had thus usurped the authority of the prophet of God in establishing on Hawaii a church of his own after the pattern of The Church, except that he sold the offices of the Priesthood at varying prices ac.

cording to the importance of the office. Then he robbed the overconfident native Saints by inducing them to buy an island, as a gathering place, which was deeded to himself, thus furnishing him with the necessary wealth and prestige to begin his political career.

Some day when the history of Walter Gibson shall be written, it will furnish another most forcible proof of the folly in any man deserting the work of the Lord for the things of this world, and vainly imagining within his heart that he can make a counterfeit of the genuine church. He was cast out of The Church, and, in the end, was banished by his political opponents from the islands, and died an exile from what had almost been his own kingdom, in the streets and gutters of San Francisco, without home, without friends, and almost forgotten.

During this man's power he sent two native elders, Kimo Belio, and S. Manoa, to open a mission on the Samoan Islands. While these native elders were not properly sent by this usurper, yet they had previously been ordained to the priesthood, and labored with zeal and considerable success. The last mentioned, however, transgressed, leaving the former to prosecute the work alone. Much credit and honor is due to Elder Kimo Belio, for the good work he did on Samoa. Unaided and alone, after his companion sinned, he succeeded in establishing a strong branch of The Church on the island of Tutuila. Had he lived to continue his labors, who can tell what we would have found when we went there twenty-five years later to assist in reopening the mission, in the place of the scattered sheep, who, for the greater part, had wandered back into their former folds! But Lamafa, Ifopo, and many others, together with the long since repentant Manoa, held themselves aloof from all other sects, still hoping, praying and sending occasional letters to The Church on Hawaii beseeching in most earnest pleadings that a white shepherd might be sent to gather them together again, and lead them in the true way.

It was the reading of these letters, at the Sandwich Islands mission, by Elder Joseph H. Dean, that created in his heart a desire to reopen the work on Samoa. In 1888, he was set apart for that purpose, together with his wife Florence, and they landed on the ittle island of Aumm. This island is separated from the larger sland of Tutuila by a channel about a mile wide. Both of these

islands, if the proposed division takes place, will be given to the United States. It was here that they found a nucleus of The Church in a few of the remnants of Belio's flock, who received them with tears of joy and child-like rapture. Four months later, when our party arrived to assist President Dean in his labors, we found him with a nice little branch of the Saints on Aumm. He had become quite proficient in the language because of the similarity between the Hawaiian and the Samoan dialects. Neither language nor space will allow us to describe, in this article, the peculiar feelings of our hearts, and the strange sights that we beheld with our eyes as our boat rode over the breakers, and the anchor was dropped in the surf, in front of the only village on the little island of Aumm, our first home on Samoa. All the village turned out that day and we received a royal welcome. Big, brown-skinned, natives waded out to our boat, and, locking their hands behind their backs, invited us to kneel on their hands, put our arms around their necks, and ride ashore. We men folks gladly availed ourselves of this opportunity, but Sister L., demurred, until the thoughts of two long weeks on the ocean, with that dreadful longing to reach land once more, was too much for her, when she too took her first man-back ride from boat to shore. Then came that wonderful, joyous greeting with the natives. From a Mr. McFarland, a quarter-cast, on the same vessel returning to the islands, we had learned the native greeting, but the way we saluted the native women with a long drawn-out ta-lo-fa-ta-ma-i-ta-i was undoubtedly, as Brother Dean said afterward, one of the most laughable things that he had ever heard.

With Brother Dean as our teacher and critic, and the natives to practice on, with the aid of the native Bible and dictionary, we began our daily exercise in the native language. For physical exercise, we went out each day into the forest and cut sticks and logs for our first meeting house. After its completion, President Dean took the other brethren, crossed over the channel to the island of Tutuila, and they made a complete circuit of that island, holding meetings, in nearly every village, being well received by the majority of the natives, and baptizing some before they returned.

During the absence of the brethren on Tutuila, we felt the weight of a responsibility entirely different from anything else in