The language is very hard, but when it is one's business to learn a
thing, it is done after a while as a matter of course.

'We have quite made up our mind that New Zealand itself is the right
place for the head-quarters of the Mission. True, the voyage is
long, and lads can only be kept there five or six months of the year,
but the advantages of a tolerably settled state of society are so
great, and the opportunities of showing the Melanesians the working
of an English system are so many, that I think now with the Bishop
that New Zealand should be the place for the summer school in
preference to any other. I did not think so at one time, and was
inclined to advocate the plan of never bringing the lads out of the
tropics, but I think now that there are so many good reasons for
bringing the lads to New Zealand that we must hope to keep them by
good food and clothing safe from colds and coughs. Norfolk Island
would have been in some ways a very good place, but there is no hope
now of our being settled there....

'I can hardly have quite the same control over lads brought to an
island itself wholly uncivilised as I can have over them in New
Zealand, but as a rule, Melanesians are very tractable. Certainly I
would sooner have my present school to manage, forty-five of all ages
from nine to perhaps twenty-seven or eight, from twelve or thirteen
islands, speaking at least eight languages, than half the number of
English boys, up to all sorts of mischief....

'Thank you, dear uncle, for the Xavier; a little portable book is
very nice for taking on board ship, and I dare say I may read some of
his letters in sight of many a heathen island....