As arrangements for the preparation of a special history of the work of the Missionary Union, by Dr. J. N. Murdock, long the corresponding secre tary, came to naught, these ten pamphlets were bound together in 1897, in a volume entitled The American Baptist Missionary Union and its Mis sions, to serve for historical reference and reading regarding the work of the Union pending the com pletion of that full and elaborate history which the importance and absorbing interest of the subject suggests and demands.