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394 holding their services. People began to crowd in from other towns. Soon the Romish church-bell began to ring, and the crowd nocked thither. Two of the Protestants, suspecting mischief, went also. In the sermon the priest told the Romanists that, "at whatever cost, the Protestants must be prevented from holding their service; they were heretics, enemies of their country, abandoned in their moral character, and ought to be destroyed." Thus stimulated, the crowd rushed to the house where the brethren were waiting. The justice of the peace was there, but not the prefect or the police. Soon with wild shouts the surging mob came down on them with showers of stones. The Gomez brothers slipped out by a back door and went to bring the horses. The Rev. Mr. Diaz, assisted by his brethren, succeeded in getting on his saddle, and escaped with a few bruises from clubs after being chased two miles, but the elder Gomez, weakened by the blows he had received, was dragged to the ground in attempting to mount, and was so badly stoned that after lying unconscious for a short time he died.

"Twelve years ago," says a missionary writer, "this plain Mexican, Nicanor Gomez, while passing along the street was attracted to a book-stall, on which he found a copy of the Bible. Purchasing it, he began to study its contents, and, becoming more interested, he invited his wife to join him in reading it. After a while he called in his neighbors and opened his house to a meeting for the study of the Scriptures and for prayer. Thus a small congregation grew up, for whose accommodation he gave up the principal room in his humble abode, he and his family being content with less commodious quarters. Thus for several years he carried on religious