Micsocas? Enusdes | 
 
 Issued as Occasion may Require by the | 
 
 American Baptist Foreign Mission Society 
 Ford Building Boston, Massachusetts 
 
 Neulhao 
 
 cA Story of the Great War 
 
 By W. E. WITTER, D.D. 
 
 esp 
 
 ‘* Several thousand natives in France 
 from tribes in the Naga Hills and Garo 
 Hills of Assam ... two thousand Nagas 
 there . . . rendering an important service 
 behind the lines of our fighting men.”’ 
 
 O us who have lived among them 
 and seen them in their savagery 
 it seems incredible; while swift 
 
 on the heels of that humanistic thought 
 of incredibility there rushes in a whole 
 battalion of memories jubilant with the 
 shout, ‘‘ Certainly, just as we might 
 have ‘expected, and there are more to 
 follow and still more — men fearless of 
 death who will laugh at danger, endure 
 like heroes and die like saints, for into 
 their mountain fastness He came and 
 through the story told them of His 
 3 . 
 
might to save, they came to accept Him 
 as the Captain of their salvation. 
 
 I wish I knew all the story of that 
 brave Kuki from Manipur, the first of 
 his tribe to become a Christian. How 
 or where he first found Christ I do not 
 know. But never, as long as we live, 
 will: Mrs. Witter or I forget the moment 
 when first our eyes fell on that seem- 
 ingly most unpromising bit of humanity, 
 panting with double pneumonia as he 
 lay on the hard chang (bamboo bed) 
 in that cheerless quarter of the old 
 ‘student lines ’’ of the Jorhat Christian 
 Schools. It was our first Sabbath after- 
 noon after arriving at Jorhat in March, 
 1913. As the wind blew in upon the 
 sick lad through the walls through 
 which you could put your hands, what 
 could you do, no matter how filthy the 
 boy might be, and how alive with ver- 
 min or how near the great change, but 
 have him quickly removed to the bunga- 
 low and placed in the room next your 
 own sleeping room with an open door 
 between? What had dirt or vermin to 
 do with the question? Did not the 
 Master always without exception “ lay 
 His hand’’ on every leper whom He 
 healed! Is it not enough that “ the 
 disciple be as his Master! ”’ 
 
 A native physician was called, and a 
 house boy to watch the patient at night, 
 give him his medicine regularly and re- 
 port if necessary. We who could hear 
 the breathing in the adjoining room slept 
 with one eye open and ears alert as the 
 wrestling with the ‘last enemy ’’ pro- 
 
 2 
 
ceeded through weary days and nights. 
 
 “The prayer of faith’’ and joyful 
 ministry were rewarded. The boy was 
 at last able to return to the cheerless 
 ‘“‘ Boys’ lines’’ and in time to resume 
 his studies one by one. We learned 
 that he spent some time in the Boys’ 
 School at Kohima, and, being of a 
 specially religious nature, had been ad- 
 vised by Dr. Rivenburg to come to the 
 Jorhat Christian Schools and give him- 
 self especially to the studies best suited 
 to prepare him to preach to his own 
 tribesmen the Gospel which he had 
 come to know and love with a passion 
 rarely equaled in a convert so young. 
 To us was granted the privilege of giv- 
 ing special attention to the religious 
 training of this strange lad, strange in 
 looks and actions,, but with a light in his 
 face which one could not mistake. He 
 was a lad with a vision, yes with visions, 
 to be wonderfully realized. 
 
 Day after day as we sat together he 
 would say, ‘‘Sahib, I saw Jesus last 
 night and He said, ‘ Ngulhao, you must 
 go, go and tell the thousands of your 
 people that I can save them.’ Sahib, 
 when he would say that, I could see my 
 tribesmen, thousands of them all in the 
 dark about me, listening eagerly to me 
 as I told them of Jesus. O Sahib, I 
 must go, I must go.’’ Then I told the 
 boy, that while the Master was anxious 
 for him to go and tell his people of the 
 wonderful things He could do for them, 
 any call from Jesus for service involves 
 also a call to prepare for service, and that 
 
 3 
 
I felt sure Jesus would wish him to re- 
 main still longer at Jorhat so he could 
 give more intelligently the Gospel mes- 
 sage to his people. This comforted 
 him for the time being, but usually only 
 a few days would pass before he would 
 tell me that Jesus was again urging him 
 to hasten to his people in the far away 
 mountains. 
 
 At last he could endure the pressure 
 upon his spirit no longer, and off he 
 went. Several friends attached them- 
 selves to him, but at once their lives 
 were put in such peril that they had to 
 hide in the jungle for several days with- 
 out food, knowing that if they were 
 caught by those enraged at the thought 
 of the hated new religion being intro- 
 duced among them, their heads would 
 be displayed as trophies, while fiendish 
 shouts re-echoing through the moun- 
 tains would proclaim the bloody victory. 
 
 In due time Negulhao returned to 
 Jorhat, saddened at the attitude of his 
 fellow villagers, but with his zeal in- 
 creased. He implored the prayers of 
 his fellow students and the missionaries 
 for his people. We can never forget 
 the intensity of those pleadings. Soon 
 three Kuki men came to Jorhat, a dis- 
 tance of 150 miles to ask Negulhao to 
 return with them and preach. Having 
 been tried in the fire and found faithful 
 and fearless, at his next entry he found 
 savage ears anointed and savage hearts 
 open to receive the message. Converts 
 in large numbers were won, and in Mani- 
 pur and in Kohima, places far distant 
 
 4 
 
from their own mountain fastnesses, 
 they were gathered for baptism by the 
 missionaries and native pastors. 
 
 All the time Ngulhao was composing 
 hymns in Kuki. By the summer of 
 1916, he had two hundred hymns ready 
 for publication, besides having bands of 
 young Christian men and women trained 
 to go about from village to village sing- 
 ing the Gospel story and proclaiming 
 with their lips and shining faces the 
 power of that Gospel to transform the 
 savage heart and make men new and 
 gloriously happy. 
 
 Then came the War, and the Govern- 
 ment of India was asked to send thou- 
 sands of the Hill men of Assam to the 
 war fronts in France to work behind 
 the trenches. Missionary William Pet- 
 tigrew was asked to assist in recruiting 
 two thousand, and went to the hills, 
 glad to help in any way possible in 
 this war for the supremacy of righteous- 
 ness and world-brotherhood. He called 
 Ngulhao to his camp and explained to 
 him and another young Kuki evangelist 
 what is involved in this world war. No 
 sooner was the situation grasped by 
 these young men than. both offered 
 themselves for the trenches in France, 
 and told the missionary they would see 
 that Government had its full quota 
 from the Kuki tribe. They hastened 
 back to their fellow tribesmen, and soon 
 returned with sixty young Christians 
 who volunteered to go wherever the 
 Government wished. The evangelists 
 returned again to rally the full quota 
 
 5 
 
from among the still non-Christian men 
 of Kuki land. Soon these and other 
 tribes started on their long journey to 
 Calcutta, across India and on to France, 
 to their tasks on the battlefields where 
 they brave the perils of war and meet 
 death, if need be. Those who go over 
 the top trained to manipulate weapons 
 of warfare are no more essential to the 
 winning of the war than the weaponless 
 but sturdy arms and muscular limbs 
 and backs of those dark skinned brothers 
 from far away Assam. 
 
 Negulhao has left in the Kuki Hills a 
 wife and baby boy. May he be re- 
 turned in time to win thousands of his 
 tribesmen to Christ. . 
 
 Previous Numbers in This Series 
 
 . His Father’s Place. 
 
 . The Day’s Work. 
 
 . A Night in a Jungle Village. 
 . A Bean for Africa. 
 
 —& W NHN 
 
 OR additional literature or other infor- 
 mation regarding the work of the Ameri- 
 can Baptist Foreign Mission Society, write 
 to any of the following: 
 1. The District Secretary of your District. 
 
 2. Department of Missionary Education, 23 East 
 26th Street, New York City. 
 
 3. Literature Department, Box 41, Boston, Mass. 
 
 115-10M-4-10-1018.