pens, slate pencils, writing-cases, work-bags, thimbles, needles, cottons, and a variety of little things that we had had sent from England, or had got together here.

The children were all delighted, and said they had been very happy; and, as it was afternoon, and the rain was threatening, we sang a hymn and dispersed.

whole of the lower part of this village, including the whole of the missionary buildings, would have been swept away, like the sad sight I witnessed at Mitiaro last year. But such was not to be our lot. The sea was enveloped in a thick mist: nothing could be seen a few yards beyond the reef. The entire surface of the ocean seemed to rise bodily as if to ingulf the island. The awful violence of the waves breaking on this rocky shore was grand in the extreme. As it was impossible to conjecture how it might end, the inhabitants of the part of the village where we live carried away to higher ground their children and their property; even to their pigs. My own family and the teachers were the only ones left. As every minute we expected the roof of our house to fall in, we were compelled to leave it about two o'clock. The chiefs and deacons came several times, begging to be allowed to take Mrs. Gill and our children on the hill, fearing that the sea would continue to rise. But we deemed it unnecessary to do so during daylight.

About three o'clock the large and beautiful church at this village, which was thoroughly repaired in 1862, was unroofed; but happily the stone-work was not injured. The school-house, being a smaller building, we managed to secure by ropes; so that it escaped with little damage. In our own dwelling part of the thatch came off, so that the drenching rain filled some rooms almost knee-deep with water. The drops of rain, and especially the heavy spray the sea, struck upon the face like pebbles. To stand in the wind seemed impossible. During the worst part of the hurricane no one durst stir, on account of falling trees and cocoa-nuts, any one of which, hurled by such a mighty force,

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