HUDSON TAYLOR The man who believed God by Marshall Broomhall

THE AUDACITY OF FAITH 129
small faith in the usefulness of those who expected to be
abroad what they were not at home. The two terrible
typhoons, which dismasted and almost sank the vessel
ere she reached her destination, though more spectacular,
were not as deadly a peril as that which had been
conquered within the cabins of 'that ship. Though the
Mission has stood in jeopardy every hour of its history,
this jeopardy stands out with a dramatic vividness as
we picture the newly born organization shut up for so
long within the limits of that little vessel, in the midst
of the perils of the mighty deep.
Shanghai was reached on Sunday morning, the last
day of September, 1866. That the vessel was in a badly
battered and dismantled state only served to remind
its passengers that even the winds and waves are subject
to their Master's word. They had learned that
Christ had been with them in the storm, and were
strengthened for trials ahead.
Terrible as the unfriendly forces of Nature are, the
opposition of man can be even more disconcerting. And
so Shanghai, though a weJcome refuge from the storms
at sea, was a somewhat inhospitable haven for such an
unconventional missionary party. Here the cutting
criticism of the unsympathetic had to be faced, and the
difficulty of securing accommodation for so large a party,
for Shanghai was small in those days. And then the
more serious problem of taking such a company of raw
recruits inland, and of finding for them some place of
residence in the heart of an anti-foreign city-when it
was frequently impossible to gain a footing for onehad
to be undertaken. This was enough to make most
men quail, but he who believed that the walls of Jericho
fell down by faith knew that to occupy China's fenced
cities also was not impossible with God. And he was not
K