spangled with stars of various brightness, and covered with a profusion of ribbons - things exceedingly attractive to the eye of an Indian. At midnight I celebrated a solemn mass and the Indians sang several canticles suitable to the occasion. That peace announced in the first verse of the angelic hymn - the Gloria - " Peace on earth to men of good will," was, I venture to say, literally fulfilled to the Indians of the forest. A grand banquet, according to In dian custom, followed the first mass. Some choice pieces of the animals slain in the chase had been set apart for the occasion. I ordered half a sack of flour and a large boiler of sweetened coffee to be added. The union, the contentment, the joy and charity, which pervaded the whole assembly, might well be compared to the agape of the primitive Christians.
After the second high mass, all the adults, with the chiefs at their head, presented themselves in the church to receive baptism, the fulfilment of their longing desires. The old man and woman whom I baptized two years before were sponsors for all. The men were placed on the one side, according to the custom of Paraguay, and the women on the other. I was assisted during the ceremony by Father Hoeken, their worthy and zealous missionary. Everything was done in order and with propriety. Permit me to repeat here that I should be delighted could I but communicate to the zealous and fervent those pleasurable feelings - that overflowing of the heart, which one experiences on such occasions. Here, indeed, the Indian missionary enjoys his greatest consolations: here he obtains his strength, his courage, his zeal to labor to bring men to the knowledge of the true God, in spite of the poverty, the privations of every description, and the dangers with which he has to contend. Yes, surely, even in this life is the promise of the Savior fulfilled with regard to him, " Ye shall receive a hundredfold." The trifling things of the world he abandons are nothing to be compared with the blessings he finds in the wilderness. The priest does not address in vain to the In-