South America, the Dark Continent by Emilio Olsson

Inscription inside The Dark Continent by Emilio Olsson This particular volume of Emilio Olsson’s book on the urgent need for increased missionary effort in South America appears to have proved inspirational to at least one person. The inscription on the title page reads: “Edward Barton, 29th February 1904” – presumably the date on which the book was purchased. It continues: “Just before I sailed by “Panama” from Liverpool for Rio de Janeiro”. The “Panama” here may refer to refer to the S.S. Aleutian, which was renamed S.S. Panama in 1905.

My thanks to Redcliffe College for providing a copy of this book for digitisation. This title is in the public domain.

Emilio Olsson, South America: The Dark Continent. New York: M.E. Munson, 1899. Hbk. pp.89. [Click to visit the download page]

Introduction
Carrying the Bible Into the Forest
In Wildest South America
A Marvelous Continent
Among the Gauchos
Sleeping on Scorpions
On the Great Pampas
Lost in the Forest
The Falls of the Madeira
Among the Savage Tribes
Curious Courtship
Marriage in Patagonia
Strange Burial Ceremonies
The Warlike Tobas
Burying Aged People Alive
South American Dialects
Indians of the Amazon
Descendants of the Incas
The Gospel and South America

Introduction

No field could be riper for the harvest than South America is to-day for the Gospel of Christ. A vast continent, extensive regions of which are unexplored, and the semi-civilized parts of which are but little known to Christendom, cries out, with the cry of Macedonia to Paul, to the heart and conscience of the Protestant world. \Vhile nearly every steamer crossing either ocean to Africa or the Orient bears some message of light to the heathen groping in the darkness of idolatry and superstition, millions of South American heathen at our threshold remain neglected, and plungej in barbarism and ignorance even to a greater degree than when Columbus first landed in the western hemisphere….