1850.
Memoir of the Rev. Walter M. Lowrie.
405
In August 1843 he again left Macao for a short time, with the in- tention of visiting the newly opened ports in the north of China. Again his voyage was unsuccessful. When he had nearly reached the island of Chusan the vessel was driven back and compelled to put into Amoy. While here he visited Chang-chow-foo in company with Mr. Abeel, for which they were afterwards publicly censured in a government notification by Sir Henry Pottinger. The proclamation of his Excel- lency called forth a reply from Mr. Lowrie defending his own course and repelling this arrogant assumption of jurisdiction over citizens of another country with which Sir Henry had no connection. In this he carried with him the sympathies of the whole foreign coinmunity. He returned from Amoy to Hongkong in a Portuguese lorcha. Soon after leaving the, port the rudder was broken by the violence of a wave that struck it, and they were thus left quite helpless, drifting at the mercy of the wind and waves down the coast. For three days the ef forts made to repair the broken rudder were ineffectual, and they finally succeeded just in time to escape being driven out into the China sea, from whence they could not have got back at all in their disabled condition.
In the beginning of 1844 the China mission was reinforced by the arrival of D. B. McCartee M. D. and Mr. R. Cole, printer. Mr. Cole brought with him a printing press and matrixes for a font of divisible metallic type, Mr. Cole having no knowledge of the Chinese language the labor of arranging the characters in the cases, according to their respective radicals and the frequency of their occurrence, devolved on Mr. Lowrie. The difficulties incident to the commencement of such a work were happily overcome and the press was soon in operation. In January 1845 Mr. L. again left Macao for the north. During the previous year a mission had been established at Ningpo by Dr. McCartee and the Rev. R. Q. Way. Mr. Lowrie reached Ningpo on the 11th of April 1845. His letters and Journal give a full and in- teresting account of his residence at this place, of his views and feel- ings as he entered upon some direct missionary labors, and of the progress of the work in the early years of this mission. In August 1845 the printing press was removed from Macao to Ningpo, and again made large demands upon Mr. L.'s time and attention. In con- sequence of this, he felt it his duty to give more attention than he might otherwise have deemed necessary to the written language. He was deeply impressed with the importance of the oral preaching of the word, and did not for a moment think of neglecting it, but being at first unable to speak the local dialect, he was the more easily induced