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LAOS.

CHAPTER XXII.

LAOS LAND AND LIFE.

You will read in the following pages of a people about whom little is known and less published—a people possessing many qualities of remarkable attractiveness, and yet having not a few strange and semi-barbarous customs and beliefs; a people who seem in some respects to be peculiarly open to the influence of Christian teaching, and upon whose soil the Christian Church is rooted and growing; a people among whom the Lord assuredly has "chosen ones" who are hearing his voice one by one and answering to his call.

You will read of their land, their homes, their temples, their worship, their lives and occupations. And of all these you will be told by those who have lived among them, who have learned to know—yes, and to love them, seeing the precious souls within as the sculptor sees the