Rostagno, Francisco Gurico

Rostagno, Francisco Gurico, a minister of the Waldensian Church, was born in the year 1838 in the village of Prali, in the mountains of The Valleys. Delicate health prevented his going to school till he was about fifteen years of age; but, being a diligent student, he soon acquired the necessary requirements to make him a useful minister of the Gospel. Being thoroughly acquainted with the Italian language and literature, he wrote many articles for the Revista Cristiana, his last being on the "Religion of Alessandro Manzoni." In the year 1866 he was ordained for the Waldensian ministry, and a year afterwards he was put in charge of the small congregations of Verona and Mantua, where he labored until 1872. He was then called to Leghorn; and at this important and difficult post he not only supplied the spiritual wants of his own coreligionists, but also arranged to give a course of addresses especially to Jews upon the subject of the need of the Messiah — "What say the Scriptures about His Coming?" "Jesus of Nazareth Borne Testimony to in the Old Testament, in the Prophecies, and the Types." But soon he was removed from his earthly post, and died in January, 1874. See Jewish Intelligencer, 1874, p. 85 sq. (B.P.)