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The people in Bang-kah learned of the new church building, and one day, when the brick walls were about three feet high, there arose a tramp of feet, beating of drums, and loud shouts, and up marched a detachment of soldiers sent with orders from the prefect of Bang-kah to stop the building of the chapel. Their officers went straight to the house of the headman with his commands. Mr.
They did everything in their power to prevent him, but one day, many months after, right on the site where they had literally torn the roof from above him, arose a pretty little stone church, and that was the beginning of great things in Bang-kah.
But Tamsui was waiting; Sin-tiam, Bang-kah, Kelung, Go-ko-khi, they must all be visited; and finally he tore himself away, leaving some of his students to care for these people of Kap-tsu-lan. But he came back many times, until at last nineteen chapels dotted the plain, and in them nineteen native preachers told the story of Jesus and his love.
Rain dripped from the low ceiling on the mud floor, and the meager furniture was dirty and sticky. But the two young men who had found it were delighted. They felt like the advance guard of an army that has taken the enemy's first outpost. They were established in Bang-kah! They set to work at once to draw out a rental paper.
Some collected stones, others prepared sun-dried bricks, others dug the foundation, and the first church in north Formosa was commenced. Now Go-ko-khi was, unfortunately, near the great city of Bang-kah. This was the most hostile and wicked place in all that country, and A Hoa and Mackay had been stoned out of it on their visit there.
But Bang-kah still stood frowning and unyielding. It had always been very bitter against outsiders of all kinds. No foreign merchant was allowed to do business in Bang-kah, so no wonder the foreign missionary was driven out. Mackay had dared to enter the place, being of the sort that would dare anything. It was soon after he had settled in Formosa and A Hoa had accompanied him.
Here they all knelt and the young missionary laid their trouble before the great Captain who had said, "All power is given unto me." "Give us an entrance to Bang-kah," was the burden of the missionary 's prayer. They arose from their knees, and he turned to A Hoa with that quick challenging movement his students had learned to know so well. "Come," he said, "we are going back to Bang-kah."
But there was one place Mackay had so far scarcely dared to enter. Even the robber-infested Sa-kak-eng would yield, but Bang-kah defied all efforts. To the missionary it was the Gibraltar of heathen Formosa, and he longed to storm it. North, south, east, and west of this great wicked city churches had been planted, some only within a few miles of its walls.
A Hoa sat at the table and wrote it out so that they might be within the law which said that no foreigner must hold property in Bang-kah. When the paper was signed and the money paid, the old man crept stealthily away. He had his money, but he was too wary to let his fellow citizens find how he had earned it.
Should they go up again and storm the citadel of heathenism? And A Hoa answered promptly and bravely, "Let us go." So one day early in December, when the winter rains had commenced to pour down, these two marched across the plain and into Bang-kah. By keeping quiet and avoiding the main thoroughfare, they managed to rent a house.
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