January 21st, 1873.
My Dear——, I have put by your note from——, received ere I left London, mid-November, in some safe-hold, I know; but as I cannot put hand on it, I shall begin a line to you.
C.—-and myself arrived here December 6th, and propose progressing to Barbados about the 26th, or whenever that mail may go.
The need of laborers is here, as elsewhere, a trial; but faith expects trial: 'tis given that it may be tried, and when tried, may be increased, and augmented, and great honor put upon it; for God wills to have down here some who avow and act upon, trust and hope in Him, who raised from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ, and gave Him glory, that our faith and hope might be in God. 'Tis a singular contrast: to trust and hope in God for more laborers in the work, on the one side; and on the other, to use there being next to none, as a girdle to brace up one's loins to walk over the course alone.
The Lord has manifestly been gracious to us, and through us, since here, and things are now in a state which would justify one's going a-head, out fishing for souls that know nothing. A few lectures on the kingdom and coming of the Lord in this town of Georgetown have awakened a stir outside among nominal professors. The Lord knows what He has wrought, and what He will work; but whether men will hear or forbear to hear-He gave a good and fresh testimony from Revelation and Daniel, and a simple one too, so that those who are of ours could feed. I had thought after Barbados and Jamaica of perhaps getting on to New Zealand; but——has taken up that work, and it is old ground to him, so that as I suppose there is no need of my being sent on by the wearisome way of California and the Sandwich Isles. But the Lord knows His own grace, and what to do with His aged, and with His young laborers too. There is a movement here in some minds to send out gospel tracts through the run of the West India Islands. If of the Lord, may it be blessed. Hindoos, Malays, Chinese, Africans, are in numbers in the colony, and the Creole population many.
My kind love to all my friends and brethren in the Lord-to your wife in particular... • Grace, mercy, and peace to you in the Lord. G. V. W.