GEORGENHOLTZ

[s. 272] : A settlement in the Transvaal Colony, S. Africa, situated in the Zoutpansberg region on the River Pafari. Station of the Berlin Mi ionary Society (1877), with 1 mi ionary and 5 native workers. 255 GEORGE TOWN: Capital of British Guiana, South America, situated on the right banic of the Demerara River, near its mouth and where it is It has a surprisingly large nearly one mile wide. number of deaths from consumption every year, The population due, it is said, to overcrowding. The city was formerly called is (1891) 53,200. was occupied It as a mi ion station Stabroch. in 1815 and since 1885 has been by the control of the Eastern Annual Conference under of the Wesley ans of the West Indies, with (1901) WMS 6 mi ionaries, men and women; 6 outstations, 8 preaching places, 6 day schools and about In 1903, by request 2,000 profe ing Christians. of the Conference of the West Indies, the decided to resume the charge of work in this field. Station also of the SPG (1855), of the Seventh Day Adventists (1887), of the PB, of the NBC (1892) and of the AME, the last named societies having together (1900) 18 mi ionaries, men and women; 28 native workers, men and women; and 880 communicants, WMS GEORGIAN LANGUAGE Belongs to the Urallanguages and the Caucasus It seems to stand aloof from other lan branch. guages, showing affinity for them solely by the words which it has borrowed. It is written with characters peculiar to itself and with the further peculiarity of having two alphabets, one of which is known to the priests only and is used for sacred purposes, while the alphabet known to the people is considered too profane for use in the best literaAltaic: family of ture. GERLACHSTHAL. See SPHmopoNTEix. GERMAN EAST AFRICA A German protect: and sphere of influence, lying between Portuguese E. Africa and British Central Africa on the south and British E. Africa and Lake It has a coast Victoria Nyanza on the north. line on the Indian Ocean of about 620 miles, and extends west to Lake Tanganyika and the Congo Free State. The area is 383,079 square miles, the population (estimated) 6,750,000, mostly orate The German E. of Bantu negroes. African Company in 1888 acquired a fifty years’ lease of the coast territ or}’, and in 1890 the German Government bought the rights of the Sultan of Zanzibar, by whom the lease had been made, thus acquiring a protectorate over a territory larger by one-half than the entire German empire in Europe. A convention with England has fixed the boundaries between the protectorate and the British E. African territories. The seaboard (the Swahili coast) is a swampy and alluvial The region, intersected by numerous streams. climate is malarious, the rainfall abundant, and vegetation luxuriant. All the tropical plants and several European species flourish. Mountain ranges, toward which the coast region gently rises, separate this region from the plateaus which form the water-shed between the sources of the seaward rivers and of those of the Congo region. The regions west of Usagara and Nguru, consisting of waterle plains, have a dry climate and are largely sterile. The first of these plains separates the Usagara from the populous district of Ugogo. Beyond that district a second arid plain is cro ed, and the water-shed, averaging from 4,000 to 5,000 feet above the level of the sea, is reached. Hence flows the Shimuyu River northward to the Victoria Nyanza. whence, emerging, it becomes the Nile. The Rufigi also rises here and flows eastward to the Indian Ocean, composed Geography German Evangelical and streams which empty into Lake Tanganyika, and thence find their way to the Congo, have their birth here. A railway is open from Tanga to Mombo (82 miles). There are well-kept roads between the principal towns. The principal inhabitants of the German Protectorate are: 1. The Swahili (or coast tribes), the people of They are of the coast and island of Zanzibar. Bantu stock, and, while intermingled with immigrants from all the neighboring regions, have a national unity supplied by their profe ion of the Mohammedan religion. The Arab element has extended their langu.age, modi their usages, and developed their trading enriched.and fied instincts. The Swahili language is the general medium of intercourse with the tribes of the interior, and is spoken of as one of the 12 most important languages of the world, with reference to the vast Besides the Bible area over which it is spoken. and many religious treatises, it po e es already collections of proverbs, legends, poems, etc., and its literature is receiving constant acce ions. The Arabic alphabet is being replaced by the Roman. 2. The Was agar a, inhabiting chiefly the Usagara highlands, which separate the coast regions from the interior plateaus, have, in some of their clans, become more or le civilized through intercourse with explorers, while other Their clans remain in unrelieved barbarism. language is widely extended. The pierced lower hangs down so lobe of the ear, which sometimes as to touch the shoulder, serves to hold tobacco pouches, instruments, etc., and is a mark of freedom. Slaves are forbidden to pierce or ornament the ears. 3. The Wazaramo are coterminous with the Contact with the Swahili tribes on the west. coast people has had a civilizing influence upon some of the tribes, who wear the Arab dre and have discontinued many of the ferocious practises which still prevail among their kin in the remoter districts. They do not practise circumcision, tho in many respects under Mohammedan influence. Their po e ion of firearms renders them formidable slave-hunters. There are 7 Protestant mi ionary societies operating in this region the German East Africa Mi ion, the Berlin, the Leipzig, and the Moravian societies and the Universities Mi ion and The whole number of stations occuthe CMS. pied is 36. The Roman Catholic Mi ions have their headquarters at Bagamoyo. GERMAN EVANGELICAL SYNOD of North America (1884) Previous to 1884, all the foreign mi ionary work of the Synod was done through European societies. Those interested in the work, however, felt that they should have work of their own, and a monthly periodical called The Mi ionary was i ued to stir up the people with this end in view. Another element in the denomina: tion, intimately connected with the Basel Society, the North German Society (of Barmen), etc., desiring that these societies should be supported, began the publication of the Evangelical Friend Mi ions, to advocate their cause. members of the Synod deprecated this of Many course, and a committee of nine was appointed to consider the advisability of the Synod’s undertaking an independent foreign work and to report to a general meeting of the Synod in 1883. German Inner Oerman SoathTreat Besides the above named mi ionary interests an independent, union mi ion society had been organized during the year 1865, in New Brunswick, N. J., by members of various churches and denominations, including Luther ans, German Presbyterians, Moravians, German and Dutch Reformed, and Evangelicals. The official name of the society was German Evangelical Mi ion It sent the Rev. Society in the United States. Oscar Lohr to India, in 1867, with instructions to choose his special field of labor according to God’s leading. Through the pleadings of the Rev. Mr. Cooper of Nagpur, on behalf of the Chamars of Central India, he was induced to begin work among these people, the first station being established at Bisrampur, near Raipur. The work was placed on a firm material basis, inasmuch as Mr. Lohr was able to buy a large tract of land (1,926 acres), upon which he colonized his first converts. This tract is the site of By 1883 two outstations Bisrampur station. had been established at Ganeshpore and Raipur. This union organization having found that it could not support the growing enterprise in India, proposed to the General Conference of the Synod that it undertake the care and support of this work. The offer was accepted and in 1884 the mi ion was transferred. At that date there were but two ordained mi ionaries in this field. The two mi ion publications were merged into the Deutscher Mi ionsfreund, published monthly in German. The mi ionary work of the Synod is controlled by a Board of seven members, elected every four years by the General Conference. The increase in the interest of the churches at home has kept pace with the gradual expansion of the work in India, the direct contributions increasing from $8,000 in 1891 to nearly $21,000 in 1902. The only field of the Synod is India. There are (1903) 4 stations and 44 outstations, 15 American mi ionaries, 119 native workers, and 2,263 communicants. There are also primary schools and orphanages, and an asylum for lepers at Chandkuri, with financial a istance from the Mi ion to Lepers in India and the East. 274