SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK.
ErNa.r this heading we nota such Books of the week as have not been reserved for review in other forrns.1 The Christian Church and the Congo Question. By John M. Harris. (E. Hughes and Co. 3d.)—Mr. Harris tells again with fresh emphasis and from experience of his own—he is a missionary in the North-Eastern section of the Congo State—a tale which has been told before,—a tale of robbery, outrage, and murder. Irebu, the "Venice of the Congo," with its forty thousand people—a State so powerful that Stanley did his beat to pass it unobserved— is a desert ; city, mission station, chapel, and people have disappeared. A riverine population of eight hundred thousand in Stanley's time has dwindled to fifty thousand. But how did this come about? Every one knows the answer. And where does the Church come in ? In the fact that the Missionary Societies, notably the Church Missionary Society and the Baptist Society, allured by the magnificent promises of the great philanthropist King Leopold, helped onward the movement which ended in the establishment of the Congo Free State. Our Government had other views—it may be doubted whether Portugal would have been better than Belgium—but the Societies prevailed. This is the result, and this they have to undo. It is a work in which all must join. Surely they are all ready to join, the Roman Catholics, it is to be hoped, as well as the others. Mr. Harris pays a tribute to their "magnificent" work. There have been some doubtful utterances from them. Let them imitate Las Cases rather than Cortes.
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