Welsh Journals

®k Mm A RECORD OF CHRISTIAN WORK AMONG THE CaMnistic Methodists or Presbyterians of Wales. Vol. II. No. 3.] MARCH, 1886. [Price One Penny. LYDIA MAMREOFF VON FINKELSTEIN Miss Von Finkelstein, whose portrait we have much pleasure in being able to present to our readers with this issue, is of Russian parentage, but was born in Jerusalem, Palestine, and was brought up in the very presence of the most sacred scenes, and in familiarity with both "the Land" and "the Book;" and thus possesses unusual advan¬ tages as a lecturess on "The home and haunts of Jesus." She is able to give repre¬ sentations of Oriental life in a remarkably realistic manner, literally bringing all the Bible manners, customs, and costumes before her audience, and bringing home many clear illustrations in Scripture which appear incompre¬ hensible to those not per¬ fectly familiar with the details of life in the East. Miss Von Finkelstein has only been in this country a few months. Yet she has created quite a .^^^;; sensation in London and Hl^" some of the chief centres :^|llllil in the provinces ; for this is what the Editor of the Sunday School Chronicle said at a crowded meeting in the North of England the other day: "I have never known a stranger from a foreign land make such an impression in London as Miss Von Finkelstein has done in the short time she has been amongst us." Again, m reporting one of her lectures at the City Temple (Dr. Parker's), one of the London dailies says, " She attracted an immense congregation, and long before the doors were opened, a considerable crowd had collected, and extended out into the roadway. The large accommodation which the Temple affords was taxed to the utmost, and the aisles were thronged with people. The lecture throughout was \\V\\\\\\\\wwv From Photograph by Mr. W. Goodfellow, Regent Street, London. Taken from " The Christian," Feb. 18th, by special permission of Messrs. Morgan & Scott. listened to very attentively, and was in¬ tensely interesting." With regard to her special qualifications as a lecturess on oriental subjects, we may quote some striking words from The Christian, written by one who knows something of Miss Von Finkelstein's early experiences: Having been born in the Land, having passed her childhood, her girlhood, and years of young womanhood there, she herself necessarily lived the life she describes, in many of its modes and aspects. In the suscep¬ tible years of early youth, when there is space for those " hours of idleness " without which the child- life will ever be meagre and arid; in the easy freedom of Eastern life the child could see much that has remained engraven on the tablets of memory. Though she knew it not, then it was she acquired much of that material which she is now able to draw upon and formulate, and give forth for the in¬ struction of the dwellers in distant lands. Miss Finkelstein's ob¬ ject is to convince the people, the nations at large, of the reality and the truth of the Bible Stor¬ ies, and to make the scenes familiar and lifelike to them. She is now on a short tour through South Wales, and has undertaken to give one of her popular lectures at the Temperance Hall, Aberdare, on Mon¬ day, March 1st; Rhos Chapel, Mountain Ash, Tuesday, March 2nd; Wood-St., Cardiff, Wednesday, March 3rd; and Albert Hall, Swansea, Thursday, March 4th, and all. who attend may expect a rich treat.