| 328 "I. L. Rogers, Dear Brother:--The inclosed [enclosed], addressed to Bro. Joseph, is intended for you and Bro. Sheen; also, in addition, I would say that the prospects are good. Last Sunday a brother from near Swansea, forty miles distant, having heard of us by the Merthyr papers, came up and was baptized, and returned to baptize ten more who sent him up. Also another from Sweeney, twenty miles the other way, came to inquire, and is coming again; was well pleased with what he learned. The Brighamite elders go from house to house to warn the saints of us. They say that we are apostates, and cut off from the church; that Joseph never belonged to the church, and is a lawyer, a gambler, and a drunkard; next I expect to hear he is a cannibal. If there were a couple more elders here I would be glad, but those that take hold are willing, generally, to help what they can; but in this country almost every man of family depends upon his day's work to support his family, and a day out of work curtails their daily bread. Times are hard on them now; in some parts there is much suffering for bread, and a great amount of property of all kinds has gone to the pawn shops this season to procure bread.
"The work is being planted in many localities, distant from each other. I think we are getting the work firmly rooted, if its progress is not so rapid as we could wish; there are open doors for us as fast as we can improve them. We are arranging for a public discussion in Birmingham with a clergyman of that place, and an ex-Brighamite, jointly, against our doctrines. They have challenged us, and we accept, of course. We are now arranging the question. I want it to cover the whole ground of our faith. I have sent one up for them to consider.
"J. W. BRIGGS."
-True Latter Day Saints' Herald, vol. 4, p. 74.
Elder Charles Derry wrote from West Bromwich, July 7, giving about the same items.
The following show how the work was being introduced in the West and elsewhere:-
"By a letter from a brother in Salt Lake City, dated August 11, we are informed that Elders E. C. Briggs and
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