{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_33214/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_33214","id":"gutenberg_33214","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/33214","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Adventure","Category: Biographies","Category: History - Other","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Missionaries -- Nigeria -- Biography","Slessor, Mary Mitchell, 1848-1915","Women missionaries -- Biography"],"text":"Produced by Bryan Ness, Rose Mawhorter and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n  Transcription notes:\n  p 170. Period added at the end of the first sentence.\n  p xi.  Period added after 1892 entry.\n  Both bare-footed and barefooted were in text. This has been retained.\n  Both bread-winner and breadwinner were in text. This has been retained.\n  Both egg-shells and eggshell were in text. This has been retained.\n  Both God-men and god-men were in text. This has been retained.\n\n  Subtitution scheme for non-ascii characters:\n  [:o] was used to indicate o with an umlaut diacritical mark\n  ['E] was used to indicate E with an acute diacritical mark\n  ['e] was used to indicate e with an acute diacritical mark\n  [~n] was used to indicate n with a tilde diacritical mark\n  [L] was used to indicated the British pound sign\n\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n  The Story of Mary Slessor\n\n  THE WHITE QUEEN\n  of\n  OKOYONG\n\n  [Illustration: THE CANOE WAS ATTACKED BY A HUGE HIPPOPOTAMUS]\n\n  THE STORY OF MARY SLESSOR\n  FOR YOUNG PEOPLE\n\n  THE WHITE QUEEN\n  OF OKOYONG\n\n  A TRUE STORY OF ADVENTURE\n  HEROISM AND FAITH\n\n  BY\n  W. P. LIVINGSTONE\n\n  AUTHOR OF \"MARY SLESSOR OF CALABAR\"\n\n  ILLUSTRATED\n\n  NEW YORK\n  GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY\n\n  COPYRIGHT, 1917,\n  BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY\n\n  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA\n\n\n             TO\n      ALL GIRLS AND BOYS\n           WHO ARE\n        LOOKING FORWARD\n             AND\n        DREAMING DREAMS\n\n\n\n\n  \"She left all and followed Him.\"\n\n\n\n\n  CONTENTS\n\n\n                                                               PAGE\n  CHIEF DATES IN MISS SLESSOR'S LIFE                            xi\n\n\n  CHAPTER I\n\n  Tells how a little girl lived in a lowly home, and played,\n  and dreamed dreams, and how a dark shadow came into her\n  life and made her unhappy; how when she grew older she\n  went into a factory and learned to weave, and how in her\n  spare minutes she taught herself many things, and worked\n  amongst wild boys; and how she was sent to Africa              1\n\n\n  CHAPTER II\n\n  How our heroine sailed away to a golden land of sunshine\n  across the sea; how she found that under all the beauty there\n  were terrible things which made life a misery to the\n  dark-skinned natives; how she began to fight their evil ideas\n  and ways and to rescue little children from death; how,\n  after losing all her loved ones, she took a little twin-girl\n  to her heart, and how she grew strong and calm and brave      22\n\n\n  CHAPTER III\n\n  Ma's great adventure: how she went up-river by herself in a\n  canoe and lived in a forest amongst a savage tribe; how\n  she fought their terrible customs and saved many lives;\n  how she built a hut for herself and then a church, and how\n  she took a band of the wild warriors down to the coast\n  and got them to be friends with the people who had\n  always been their sworn enemies                               45\n\n\n  CHAPTER IV\n\n  Stories of how Ma kept an armed mob at bay and saved the\n  lives of a number of men and women; how in answer to a\n  secret warning she tramped a long distance in the dark to\n  stop a war; how she slept by a camp-fire in the heart of\n  the forest, and how she became a British Consul and\n  ruled Okoyong like a Queen                                    69\n\n\n  CHAPTER V\n\n  Ma's great love for children; her rescue of outcast twins\n  from death; the story of little Susie, the pet of the\n  household; and something about a new kind of birthday that\n  came oftener than once a year                                 90\n\n\n  CHAPTER VI\n\n  How the Queen of Okoyong brought a high British official to\n  talk to the people; how she left her nice home and went\n  to live in a little shed; how she buried a chief at midnight;\n  how she took four black girls to Scotland, and afterwards\n  spent three very lonely years in the forest                  105\n\n\n  CHAPTER VII\n\n  Tells of a country of mystery and a clever tribe who were\n  slave-hunters and cannibals, and how they were fought\n  and defeated by Government soldiers; how Ma went\n  amongst them, sailing through fairyland, and how she\n  began to bring them to the feet of Jesus                     120\n\n\n  CHAPTER VIII\n\n  Ma learns to ride a bicycle and goes pioneering; the Government\n  makes her a Judge again and she rules the people;\n  stories of the Court, and of her last visit to Scotland with\n  a black boy as maid-of-all-work; and something about a\n  beautiful dream which she dreamed when she returned,\n  and a cow and a yellow cat                                   140\n\n\n  CHAPTER IX\n\n  Ma goes farther up the Creek and settles in a heathen town in\n  the wilds; she enters into happy friendships with young\n  people in Scotland; has a holiday in a beautiful island,\n  where she makes a secret compact with a lame boy; and\n  is given a Royal Cross for the heroic work she has done      163\n\n\n  CHAPTER X\n\n  This chapter tells how Ma became a gypsy again and lived on\n  a hill-top, and how after a hard fight she won a new region\n  for Jesus; gives some notes from her diary and letters to\n  little friends at home, and pictures her amongst her\n  treasures                                                    183\n\n\n  CHAPTER XI\n\n  What happened when the Great War broke out. Ma's last\n  voyage down the Creek; how her life-long dream came\n  true                                                         198\n\n\n  INDEX                                                        207\n\n\n\n\n    My life, my all, Lord, I entreat,\n      Take, and use, and make replete\n    With the love and patience sweet\n      That made _Thy_ life so complete.\n                           MARY SLESSOR.\n\n\n\n\n  CHIEF DATES IN MISS SLESSOR'S LIFE\n\n  YEAR                                                         AGE\n\n  1848. Born at Gilcomston, Aberdeen, December 2.\n\n  1856. Family went to Dundee.                                   8\n\n  1859. Began work in a factory.                                11\n\n  1876. Appointed by United Presbyterian Church to Calabar\n          as missionary teacher, and sailed.                    28\n\n  1879. Paid her first visit home.                              31\n\n  1880. In charge at Old Town.                                  32\n\n  1883. Second visit home with Janie.                           35\n\n  1885. In Creek Town.                                          37\n\n  1886. Death of her mother and sister (Janie).                 38\n\n  1888. Entered Okoyong alone.                                  40\n\n  1881. Third visit home with Janie.                            43\n\n  1892. Made Government Agent in Okoyong.                       44\n\n  1898. Fourth visit home, with Janie, Alice, Maggie, and Mary. 50\n\n  1900. Union of United Presbyterian and Free Churches as\n          United Free Church.                                   52\n\n  1902. Pioneering in Enyong Creek.                             54\n\n  1903. Started a Mission at Itu. Reached Arochuku.             55\n\n  1904. Settled at Itu.                                         56\n\n  1905. Settled at Ikotobong.                                   57\n        Appointed Vice-President of Native Court.\n\n  1907. Fifth visit home with Dan.                              59\n        Settled at Use.\n\n  1908. Began a home for women and girls.                       60\n\n  1909. Gave up Court work.                                     61\n\n  1910. Began work at Ikpe.                                     62\n\n  1912. Holiday at Grand Canary.                                64\n\n  1913. Visit to Okoyong.                                       65\n        Received Royal Medal.\n        Began work at Odoro Ikpe.\n\n  1914. Last illness, August.                                   65\n\n  1915. Died at Use, January 13.                                66\n          Mary Slessor Memorial Home decided on by Women's\n          Foreign Mission Committee.\n\n  1916. Issue of Appeal for L5000 for upkeep of Memorial\n          Home and Missionary.\n\n\n\n\nTHE WHITE QUEEN OF OKOYONG\n\n[Illustration: WISHART CHURCH, DUNDEE.]\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n    Tells how a little girl lived in a lowly home, and played, and\n    dreamed dreams, and how a dark shadow came into her life and\n    made her unhappy; how when she grew older she went into a\n    factory and learned to weave, and how in her spare minutes she\n    taught herself many things, and worked amongst wild boys; and\n    how she was sent to Africa.\n\n\nOne cold day in December, in the city of Aberdeen, a baby girl was\ncarried by her mother into a church to be enrolled in the Kingdom of\nJesus and given a name. As the minister went through the tender and\nbeautiful ceremony the people in the pews looked at the tiny form in her\nrobes of white, and thought of the long years that lay before her and\nwondered what she would become, because every girl and boy is like a\nshut casket full of mystery and promise and hope. No one knows what\ngifts may lie hidden within them, and what great and surprising things\nthey may do when they grow up and go out into the world.\n\nThe baby was christened \"Mary Slessor,\" and then she was wrapped up\ncarefully again and taken home. Surely no one present ever dreamed how\nmuch good little Mary would one day do for Africa.\n\nIt was not a very fine house into which Mary had been born, for her\nfather, who was a shoemaker, did not earn much money; but her mother, a\nsweet and gentle woman, worked hard to keep it clean and tidy, and love\nmakes even the poorest place sunshiny and warm. When Mary was able to\nrun about she played a great deal with her brother Robert, who was older\nthan she, but she liked to help her mother too: indeed she seemed to be\nfonder of doing things for others than for herself. She did not need\ndolls, for more babies came into the home, and she used to nurse them\nand dress them and hush them to sleep.\n\nShe was very good at make-believe, and one of her games was to sit in a\ncorner and pretend that she was keeping school. If you had listened to\nher you would have found that the pupils she was busy teaching and\nkeeping in order were children with skins as black as coal. The reason\nwas this: Her mother took a great interest in all she heard on Sundays\nabout the dark lands beyond the seas where millions of people had never\nheard of Jesus. The church to which she belonged, the United\nPresbyterian Church, had sent out many brave men and women to various\nparts of the world to fight the evils of heathenism, and a new Mission\nhad just begun amongst a savage race in a wild country called Calabar in\nWest Africa, and every one in Scotland was talking about it and the\nperils and hardships of the missionaries. Mrs. Slessor used to come home\nwith all the news about the work, and the children would gather about\nher knees and listen to stories of the strange cruel customs of the\nnatives, and how they killed the twin-babies, until their eyes grew big\nand round, and their hearts raced with fear, and they snuggled close to\nher side.\n\nMary was very sorry for these helpless bush-children, and often thought\nabout them, and that was why she made them her play-scholars. She\ndreamed, too, of going out some day to that terrible land and saving the\nlives of the twinnies, and sometimes she would look up and say:\n\n\"Mother, I want to be a missionary and go out and teach the black boys\nand girls--real ways.\"\n\nThen Robert would retort in the tone that boys often use to their\nsisters:\n\n\"But you're only a girl, and girls can't be missionaries. _I'm_ going to\nbe one and you can come out with me, and if you're good I may let you up\ninto my pulpit beside me.\"\n\nMrs. Slessor was amused at their talk, and well pleased too, for she\nhad a longing that her boy should work abroad in the service of Jesus\nwhen he became a man. But that was not to be, for soon afterwards Robert\nfell ill and died, so Mary became the eldest.\n\nA dark shadow, darker than death, gathered over the home. Mr. Slessor\nlearned the habit of taking strong drink and became a slave to it, and\nhe began to spend a large part of his money in the public-house, and his\nwife and children had not the comfort they ought to have had. Matters\nbecame so bad that something had to be done. It was thought that if Mr.\nSlessor could be got away from the bad companions who led him astray, he\nmight do better. So the home was broken up, and the family journeyed to\nDundee, the busy smoky town on the River Tay, where there were many\nlarge mills and factories, and here, for a time, they lived in a little\nhouse with a bit of garden in front. That garden was at first a delight\nto Mary, but afterwards she lost her pleasure in it, for her father used\nto dig in it on Sunday, and make people think he did not love God's Day.\n\nShe was now old enough to look after the younger children, and very well\nshe did it. Often she took them long walks, climbing the steep streets\nto see the green fields, or going down to feel the fresh smell of the\nsea. Sometimes her mother gave her a sixpence, and they went and had a\nride on the merry-go-round. It was the custom then for girls and boys\nto go bare-footed in the summer, and Mary liked it so much that she\nnever afterwards cared to wear shoes and stockings.\n\nOn Sundays they all trotted away to church, clean and sweet, each with a\npeppermint to suck during the sermon, and afterwards they went to Sunday\nSchool. As a rule Mary was good and obedient, though, like most girls,\nshe sometimes got into trouble. Her hair was reddish then, and her\nbrothers would tease her and call her \"Carrots,\" and she did not like\nthat. She loved a prank too, and was sometimes naughty. Once or twice\nshe played truant from the Sunday School. She was always very vexed\nafterwards, for she could not bear to see her mother's face when she\nheard of her wrong-doing--it was so white and sad. The quiet little\nmother did not punish her: she would draw her instead into a room and\nkneel down and pray for her. \"Oh, mother!\" Mary would say, \"I would\nrather you whip me!\"\n\nBut all that soon passed away, for she had been dreaming another dream,\na very sweet one, which always set her heart a-longing and a-thrilling,\nand it now came true and changed her life. It was the biggest thing and\nthe happiest that ever happened to her. She gave her heart to Jesus.\nVery shyly one night she crept up to her mother, nestled close to her,\nand laid her head on her knee, and then whispered the wonderful news.\n\"I'll try, mother,\" she said, \"to be a good girl and a comfort to you.\"\nHer mother was filled with joy, and both went about for long afterwards\nsinging in their hearts. If only the shadow would lift!\n\n[Illustration: THE LITTLE HOUSE-MOTHER.]\n\nBut it settled down more darkly than ever. We can change the place where\nwe stay and wander far, but it is not so easy to change our habits. Mr.\nSlessor was now bringing in so little money that his wife was forced to\ngo and work in one of the mills in order to buy food and clothes for the\nchildren. Mary became the little house-mother, and how busy her hands\nand feet were, how early she was up, and how late she tumbled into bed,\nand how bravely she met all her troubles! Tears might steal into her\neyes when she felt faint and hungry, but it was always a bright and\nsmiling face that welcomed the tired mother home at night.\n\nGloomier grew the shadow. More money was needed to keep the home, and\nMary, a slim girl of eleven, was the next to go out and become a\nbread-winner. One morning she went into a big factory and stood in the\nmidst of machines and wheels and whirling belts, and at first was\nbewildered and a little afraid. But she was only allowed to stay for\nhalf a day: the other half she had to go to a school in the works where\nthe girls were taught to read and write and count. She was fond of the\nreading, but did not like doing the sums: the figures on the board\ndanced before her eyes, and she could not follow the working out of the\nproblems, and sometimes the teacher punished her by making her stand\nuntil the lesson was finished.\n\nBut she was clever with her fingers, and soon knew all about weaving.\nHow proud she was when she ran home with her first week's earnings! She\nlaid them in the lap of her mother, who cried over them and wrapped them\nup and put them away: she could not, just then, find it in her heart to\nspend such precious money.\n\nBy the time she was fourteen Mary was working a large machine and being\npaid a good wage. But she had to toil very hard for it. She rose at five\no'clock in the morning, when the factory whistle blew, and was in the\nworks by six, and, except for two hours off for meals, she was busy at\nher task until six in the evening. In the warm summer days she did not\ngo home, but carried her dinner with her and ate it sitting beside the\nloom; and sometimes she went away by herself and walked in the park.\nSaturday afternoons and Sundays were her own, but they were usually\nspent in helping her mother. Her dress was coarse and plain, and she\nwore no pretty ornaments, though she liked them as much as her\ncompanions did, for she was learning to put aside all the things she did\nnot really need, and by and by she came not to miss them, and found\npleasure instead in making others happy. She would have been quite\ncontent if only her father had been different.\n\nBut there was no hope now of a better time. The shadow became so black\nthat it was like night when there are no stars in the sky. Mrs. Slessor\nand Mary had a big burden to bear and a grim battle to fight. In their\ndistress they clung to one another, and prayed to Jesus for help and\nstrength, for they, of themselves, could do little. On Saturday nights\nMr. Slessor came home late, and treated them unkindly, so that Mary was\noften forced to go out into the cold streets and wait until he had gone\nto sleep. As she wandered about she felt very lonely and very miserable,\nand sometimes sobbed as if her heart would break. When she passed the\nbright windows of the places where drink was sold, she wondered why\npeople were allowed to ruin men and women in such a way, and she\nclenched her hands and resolved that when she grew up she would war\nagainst this terrible thing which destroyed the peace and happiness of\nhomes.\n\nBut at last the trouble came to an end. One tragic day Mary stood and\nlooked down with a great awe upon the face of her father lying white and\nstill in death.\n\nWhat she went through in these days made her often sad and downcast, for\nshe had a loving heart, and suffered sorely when any one was rough to\nher or ill-treated her. But good came out of it too. She was like a\nwhite starry flower which grows on the walls and verandahs of houses in\nthe tropics. The hot sunshine is not able to draw perfume from it, but\nas soon as darkness falls its fragrance scents the air and comes\nstealing through the open windows and doors. So it was with Mary. She\ngrew sweeter in the darkness of trouble; it was in the shadows of life\nthat she learned to be patient and brave and unselfish.\n\nWe must not think less, but more, of her for coming out of such a home.\nIt is not always the girls and boys who are highly favoured that grow up\nto do the best and biggest things in life. Some of the men and women to\nwhom the world owes most had a hard time when they were young. The home\nlife of President Lincoln, who freed millions of slaves in America, was\nlike Mary's, yet his name has become one of the most famous in history.\nNo girl or boy should despair because they are poor or lonely or crushed\ndown in any way; let them fight on, quietly and patiently, and in the\nend better things and happier times will come.\n\nMrs. Slessor now left the factory, and for a time kept a little shop, in\nwhich Mary used to help, especially on Saturday afternoons and nights,\nwhen trade was busiest. The girl was still dreaming dreams about the\nwonderful days that lay before her, but, unlike many others who do the\nsame, she did her best to make hers come true. She wanted to learn\nthings, and she found that books would tell her, and so she was led into\nthe great world of knowledge. The more she read the more she wanted to\nknow. So eager was she that when she left home for her work, she slipped\na book into her pocket and glanced at it in the streets. She did not\nknow then about Dr. Livingstone, the African missionary and traveller,\nbut she did exactly what he had done when he was a boy: she propped a\nbook on a corner of the loom in the factory, and read whenever she had a\nmoment to spare. Her companions tell how they used to see her take out a\nlittle note-book, put it on the weaver's beam, and jot down her\nthoughts--she was always writing, they say; sometimes it was poetry,\nsometimes an essay, sometimes a letter to a friend. But she never\nneglected her work.\n\nHow different her lot was from that of most girls of to-day! They have\nleisure for their lessons, and they learn music and do fancy work and\nkeep house and bake--and how many hate it all! Mary had only a few\nprecious minutes, but she made the most of them. The books she read\nwere not stories, but ones like Milton's _Paradise Lost_ and Carlyle's\n_Sartor Resartus_, and so deep did she become in them at night that\nsometimes she forgot everything, and read on and on through the quiet\nhours, and only came to herself with a start when she heard the warning\nwhistle of the factory in the early morning.\n\nShe was fond of all good books, but the one she liked most and knew\nbetter than any was the Bible. She pored over it so often that she\nremembered much of it by heart. In the Bible Class she was so quick and\nso ready to answer questions that Mr. Baxter, her minister, used to say,\n\"Now, Mary Slessor, don't answer any more questions till I bid you.\"\nWhen every one else failed he would turn to her with \"Now, Mary,\" and\nshe always had her reply ready. She was never tired of the story of\nJesus, especially as it is told in the Gospel of St. John, for there He\nappeared to her so kind and winsome and lovable. When she thought of all\nHe did, how He came from His own beautiful heaven to save the world from\nwhat is sinful and sad, and how He was made to suffer and at last was\nput to death, and how His teaching has brought peace and safety and\nsunshine into the lives of millions of women and girls, she felt she\nmust do something for Him to show her love and thankfulness and\ndevotion.\n\n\"He says we must do as He did and try to make people better and\nhappier, and so I, too, must do my best and join in the war against all\nthat is evil and unlovely and unrestful in the world.\" So she thought to\nherself.\n\nShe did not say, \"I am only a girl, what can I do?\" She knew that when a\nGeneral wanted an army to fight a strong enemy he did not call for\nofficers only, but for soldiers--hosts of them, and especially for those\nwho were young. \"I can be a soldier,\" Mary said humbly. \"Dear Lord, I\nwill do what I can--here are my heart and head and hands and feet--use\nme for anything that I can do.\"\n\nThe first thing that she did was to take a class of little girls in the\nSunday School, and thus she began to teach others before she was\neducated herself, but it is not always those who are best trained who\ncan teach best. The heart of Mary was so full of deep true love for\nJesus that it caused her face to shine and her eyes to smile and her\nlips to speak kind words, and that is the sort of learning that wins\nothers to Him.\n\nWishart Church, to which she went, was built over shops, and looked down\nupon the old Port Gate and upon streets and lanes which were filled at\nnight with big boys and girls who seemed to have no other place to go\nto, and nothing to do but lounge and swear and fight. Mary felt she\nwould like to do something for them. By and by when a Mission was begun\nin a little house in Queen Street--there is a brass inscription upon\nthe wall, now, telling about Mary--she went to the superintendent and\nsaid, \"Will you take me as a teacher?\" \"Gladly,\" he said, but she looked\nso small and frail that he was afraid the work would be too rough for\nher.\n\nWhat a time she had at first! The boys and girls did not want anybody to\nbother about them: those who came to the meeting were wild and noisy;\nthose who remained outside threw stones and mud and tried to stop the\nwork. Mary faced them, smiling and unafraid, and dared them to touch\nher. Some grew ashamed of worrying the brave little teacher, and these\nshe won over to her side. But there were others with sullen eyes and\nclenched fists who would not give in, and they did their best to make\nher life a misery.\n\nOne night a band of the most violent lay in wait for her, and she found\nherself suddenly in their midst. They hustled and threatened her.\n\n\"We'll do for you if you don't leave us alone,\" they cried.\n\nShe was quaking with fear, but she did not show it. She just breathed a\nprayer for help, and looked at them with her quiet eyes.\n\n\"I will not give up,\" she replied. \"You can do what you like.\"\n\n\"All right,\" shouted the leader, a big hulking lad. \"Here goes.\"\n\nOut of his pocket he took a lump of lead to which was tied a bit of\ncord, and began to swing it round her head. The rest of the gang looked\non breathless, wondering at the courage of the girl. The lead came\nnearer and swished past her brow. Pale, calm, unflinching, she stood\nwaiting for the blow that would fell her to the ground. Suddenly the lad\njerked away the weapon and let it fall with a crash.\n\n\"We can't force her, boys,\" he cried, \"she's game.\"\n\nAnd, like beaten foes, they followed her, and went to the meeting and\ninto her class, and after that there was no more trouble. The boys fell\nunder her spell, grew fond of her, and in their shy way did all they\ncould to help her. On Saturday afternoons she would take them into the\ncountry away from the temptations of the streets, and sought to make\nthem gentle and kind and generous. Some of the most wayward amongst them\ngave their hearts to Jesus, and afterwards grew to be good and useful\nmen.\n\nWhat was it that gave her such an influence over these rude and unruly\nboys? They did not know. She was not what is called a pretty girl. She\nwas plain and quiet and simple, and she was poorly clad. But she was\nsomehow different from most teachers. Perhaps it was because she loved\nthem so much, for the love that is real and pure and unselfish is the\ngreatest power in the world.\n\n[Illustration: ONE OF THE \"PENDS\" OR \"CLOSES\" WHERE MARY VISITED THE\nBOYS IN HER CLASS.]\n\nThrough the hearts of the boys Mary found her way to their homes in the\nslums, and paid visits to their mothers and sisters, and saw that life\nto them was often very hard and wretched. The other Mission workers used\nto go two and two, but she often went alone. Once she was a long time\naway, and when she came back she said laughingly:\n\n\"I've been dining with the Macdonalds in Quarry Pend.\"\n\n\"Indeed,\" said some one, \"and did you get a clean plate and spoon?\"\n\n\"Oh, never mind that,\" replied Mary. \"I've got into their house and been\nasked to come back, and that's all I care about.\"\n\nShe always went in the same spirit in which Jesus would have gone.\nSometimes she would sit by the fire with the baby on her knees;\nsometimes she would take tea with the family, drinking out of a broken\ncup; sometimes she would help the mother to finish a bit of work. And\nalways she cheered up tired and anxious hearts, and left sunshine and\npeace where there had been only the blackness of despair.\n\nNo one could be long in her company without feeling better, and not a\nfew of her friends came, through her, to know and love and work for\nJesus. \"Three weeks after I knew her,\" says one of her old factory\nmates, \"I became a different girl.\" How eager and earnest she was! \"Oh!\"\nshe said to a companion, \"I wonder what we would do or dare for Jesus?\nWould we be burned at the stake? Would we give our lives for His sake?\"\n\"She _did_ work hard,\" says another, \"and whatever she did, she did with\nheart and soul.\"\n\nWhen the Mission was removed to the rooms under the church, the\nsuperintendent said: \"We shall need a charwoman to give the place a\nthorough cleaning.\"\n\n\"Nonsense,\" said Mary; \"we will clean it ourselves.\"\n\n\"You ladies clean such a dirty hall!\"\n\n\"Ladies!\" cried Mary; \"we are no ladies, we are just ordinary working\nfolk.\"\n\nNext night Mary and another teacher were found, with sleeves turned up\nand aprons on, busy with pails of water and brushes scrubbing out the\nrooms. Like other young people, she had her troubles, big and little,\nand these she met bravely. Evil-minded persons, jealous of her goodness,\nsometimes said unkind things about her, but she never paid any heed to\nthem. She always did what she thought was right, and went her own way.\nOn Saturdays she used to put her hair in curlpapers, and her companions\nteased her a lot about it, and tried to laugh her out of the habit, but\nshe just laughed back. When she and two or three friends met during the\nmeal hour and held a little prayer meeting opposite the factory, the\nother girls would come and peep in, and one of her companions would be\nvexed and scold them. \"Dinna bother, Janet,\" she would say quietly, \"we\nneedna mind what they do.\"\n\nShe was not always serious, but could enjoy fun and frolic with the\nwildest. Once while walking in the country with a girl she knocked\nplayfully at some cottage doors and ran away. \"Oh, Mary,\" said her\nfriend, \"I'm shocked at you!\"\n\nMary only laughed, and said, \"A little nonsense now and then is relished\nby the wisest men.\"\n\nFrom one old friend we get a picture of her at this time. \"Her face was\nalways shining and happy. With her fresh skin, her short ringlets, and\nher firm mouth she somehow always made me think of a farmer's daughter\ncoming to market with butter and eggs!\"\n\nHer life during these years was a training for what she had to do in the\nfuture. She must have had an inkling of it, for her dreams now were all\nof service in the far lands beyond the seas. Through the gloom of the\nsmoky streets she was always seeing visions of tropical rivers and\ntangled jungle and heathen huts amongst palm trees, and above the noise\nof the factory she was hearing the cries of the little bush-children;\nand she longed to leave busy Dundee with its churches and Sunday Schools\nand go out and help where help was most needed. She did not say\nanything, for she knew it was her brother John that her mother was\nanxious to make a missionary. He was a big lad, but very delicate, and\nthere came a time when the doctor said he must leave the cold climate of\nScotland or die. He sailed to New Zealand, but it was too late, and he\npassed away there. His mother grieved again over her lost hopes, and\nMary, who was very fond of him, wept bitterly. As she went about her\nwork she repeated the hymn, \"Lead, kindly Light,\" to herself, finding\ncomfort in the last two lines:\n\n    And with the morn those angel faces smile\n    Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.\n\nAnd then she came back to her dazzling day-dream. Could she not, after\nall, be the missionary? But she was not educated, and she was the chief\nbreadwinner of the family, and her mother leant upon her so much. How\ncould she manage it? She thought it all out, and at last said, \"I _can_\ndo it. I _will_ do it.\" She was one of the cleverest weavers in the\nfactory, and she began to do extra work, thus earning a bigger wage and\nsaving more money. She studied very hard. She practised speaking at\nmeetings until she learned how to put her thoughts into clear and simple\nwords.\n\nBut it was a weary, weary time, for she spent fourteen years within the\nwalls of the factory. Thousands of other girls, of course, were doing\nthe same, and sometimes they got very tired, but had just to go bravely\non. In one of her poems Mrs. Browning tells us what it was like: how the\nrevolving wheels seemed to make everything turn too--the heads and\nhearts of the girls, the walls, the sky seen out of the high windows,\neven the black flies on the ceiling--\n\n    All day, the iron wheels are droning,\n        And sometimes we could pray,\n    \"O ye wheels,\" (breaking out in a mad moaning)\n        \"Stop! be silent for to-day!\"\n\nBut they never did stop, and the girls had only their hopes and dreams\nto make them patient and brave.\n\nOne day there flashed through the land a telegram which caused much\nexcitement and sorrow. Africa was then an unknown country, vast and\nmysterious, and haunted by all the horrors of slavery and heathenism.\nFor a long time there had been tramping through it a white man, a\nScotsman, David Livingstone, hero of heroes, who had been gradually\nfinding out the secrets of its lakes and rivers and peoples. Sometimes\nhe was lost for years. The telegram which came told of his lonely death\nin a hut in the heart of the continent. Every one asked, What is to be\ndone now? who is to take up the work of the great pioneer and help to\nsave the natives from misery and death? Amongst those whose hearts leapt\nat the call was Mary Slessor. She went to her mother.\n\n\"Mother,\" she said, \"I am going to offer myself as a missionary. But do\nnot fret. I will be able to give you part of my salary, and that, with\nthe earnings of Susan and Janie, will keep the home in comfort.\"\n\n\"My lassie,\" was the reply, \"I'll willingly let you go. You'll make a\nfine missionary, and I'm sure God will be with you.\"\n\nSome of her friends wondered at her. They knew she was not specially\nbrave; indeed, was not her timidity a joke amongst them? \"Why,\" they\nsaid, \"she is even afraid of dogs. When she sees one coming down the\nstreet she goes into a passage until it is past!\" This was true, but\nthey forgot that love can cast out all fear.\n\nTremblingly she waited for the answer to her letter to the Mission Board\nof the United Presbyterian Church in Edinburgh. When it arrived she\nrushed to her mother.\n\n\"I'm accepted! I'm going to Calabar as a teacher.\" And then, strange to\nsay, she burst into tears.\n\n[Illustration: THE HOUSE IN QUEEN STREET, DUNDEE, WHERE MARY SLESSOR\nFIRST TAUGHT AS A MISSION TEACHER.]\n\nSo she who had waited so long and so patiently, working within the walls\nof a factory, weaving the warp and woof in the loom, was now going to\none of the wildest parts of Africa to weave there the lives of the\npeople into new and beautiful patterns.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: DUKE TOWN, WEST AFRICA.]\n\nCHAPTER II\n\n    How our heroine sailed away to a golden land of sunshine across\n    the sea; how she found that under all the beauty there were\n    terrible things which made life a misery to the dark-skinned\n    natives; how she began to fight their evil ideas and ways and to\n    rescue little children from death; how, after losing all her\n    loved ones, she took a little twin-girl to her heart, and how\n    she grew strong and calm and brave.\n\n\nOn an autumn morning in 1876 Miss Slessor stood on the deck of the\nsteamer _Ethiopia_ in Liverpool docks and waved good-bye to two\ncompanions from Dundee who had gone to see her off. As the vessel\ncleared the land and moved out into the wide spaces of the waters she,\nwho had always lived in narrow streets, felt as if she were on holiday,\nand was in as high spirits as any schoolgirl. She could not help being\nkind and helpful to others, and soon made friends with many of the\npassengers and crew.\n\nOne man drew her like a magnet, for he also was a dreamer of dreams.\nThis was Mr. Thomson, an architect from Glasgow, who was filled with the\nidea that the missionaries in West Africa would do better work and\nremain out longer if there were some cool place near at hand to which\nthey could go for a rest and change. He had been all over the Coast, and\nexplored the rivers and hills, and had at last found a healthy spot five\nthousand feet up on the Cameroon Mountains, where he decided to build a\nhome. He had given up his business, and was now on his way out, with his\nwife and two workmen, to put his dream into shape. Mary's eyes shone as\nshe listened to his tale of love and sacrifice; but, alas! the plan, so\nbeautiful, so full of hope for the missionaries, came to nothing, for he\ndied not long after landing.\n\nIt was from Mr. Thomson that she learned most about the strange country\nto which she was going. He told her how it was covered with thick bush\nand forest; how swift, mud-coloured rivers came out of mysterious lands\nwhich had never been seen by white men; how the sun shone like a\nfurnace-fire, and how sudden hurricanes of rain and wind came and swept\naway huts and uprooted trees. He described the wild animals he had\nseen--huge hippopotami and crocodiles in the creeks; elephants,\nleopards, and snakes in the forests; and lovely hued birds that flashed\nin the sunlight--until her eyes sparkled and her cheeks flushed as they\nhad done in the old days when she listened to the stories told by her\nmother.\n\n[Illustration: FROM DUNDEE TO CALABAR.]\n\nWithin a week the steamer had passed out of the grey north, and was\ngliding through a calm sea beneath a blue and sunny sky. By and by Mary\nwas seeking cool corners under the awning, and listening lazily to the\nswish of the waves from the bows and watching golden sunsets and big\nbright stars. Sometimes she saw scores of flying-fish hurry-scurrying\nover the shining surface, and at night the prow of the vessel went\nflashing through water that sparkled like diamonds.\n\nBy and by came the hot smell of Africa, long lines of surf rolling on\nlonely shores, white fortresses that spoke of the old slave days, and\nlittle port towns, half-hidden amongst trees, where she got her first\nglimpses of the natives, and was amused at the din they made as they\ncame off to the steamer, fearless of the sharks that swarmed in the\nwater. It was all strange and unreal to the Scottish weaver-girl.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nAnd when, after a month, the vessel came to the Calabar River and\nsteamed through waters crowded with white cranes and pelicans, and past\ndark mangrove swamps and sand-banks where the crocodiles lay sunning\nthemselves, and islands gay with parrots and monkeys, up to Duke Town,\nthe queer huddle of mud huts amongst the palm trees that was to be her\nhome, she was excited beyond telling. For at last that wonderful dream\nof hers, which she had cherished through so many long years, had come\ntrue, and so wonderful was it that it seemed to be still only a dream\nand nothing more.\n\nClear above the river and the town, like a lighthouse on a cliff, stood\nthe Mission where \"Daddy\" and \"Mammy\" Anderson, two of its famous\npioneers, lived, and with them Mary stayed until she knew something\nabout the natives and her work. She felt very happy; she loved the\nglowing sunshine, the gorgeous sunsets, the white moonlight, the shining\nriver, the flaming blossoms amongst which the humming-birds and\nbutterflies flitted, and all the sights and sounds that were so\ndifferent from those in Scotland. She was so glad that she used to write\npoems, and in one of these she sings of the beauty of the land:\n\n    ... the shimmering, dancing wavelets\n    And the stately, solemn palms,\n    The wild, weird chant of the boatmen\n    And the natives' evening psalms,\n    The noise of myriad insects\n    And the firefly's soft bright sheen,\n    The bush with its thousand terrors\n    And its never-fading green.\n\nHer spirits, so long bottled up in Dundee, overflowed, and she did\nthings which amused and sometimes vexed the older and more serious\nmissionaries. She climbed trees and ran races with the black girls and\nboys, and was so often late at meals that Mrs. Anderson, by way of\npunishment, left her out nothing to eat. But \"Daddy\" was fond of the\nbright-eyed, warm-hearted lassie, and he always hid some bananas and\nother fruit and passed them to her in secret. There was no factory\nwhistle to warn her in the morning, and sometimes she would start up in\nthe middle of the night and, seeing her room almost as light as midday,\nwould hastily put on her clothes, thinking she had slept in, and run\nout to ring the first bell, only to find a very quiet world and the\ngreat round moon shining in the sky.\n\nIt was not long before all the light and colour and beauty of the land\nseemed to fade away, and only the horror of a great darkness remain. She\nwas taken to the homes and yards of the natives in the town and out into\nthe bush, and saw a savage heathenism that astonished and shocked her.\nShe did not think that people could be so wretched and degraded and\nignorant. At some of the places the naked children were so afraid of her\nthat they ran away screaming. She herself shrank from the fierce men who\nthronged round her, but her winning way captured their hearts, and she\nwas soon quite at home with them.\n\nWhen she came back she was very thoughtful, and talked to Mrs. Anderson\nof the things she had seen.\n\n\"My lassie,\" said \"Mammy,\" \"you've seen nothing.\" And she began to tell\nher of the terrible evils that filled the land with misery and sorrow.\n\n\"All around us, in the bush and far away into the interior, there are\nmillions of these black people. In every little village there is a Chief\nor Master, and a few free men and women, but the rest are slaves, and\ncan be sold or flogged or killed at their owner's pleasure. It is all\nright when they are treated kindly, but think of the kind of men the\nmasters are. All the tribes are wild and cruel and cunning, and pass\ntheir days and nights in fighting each other and in dancing and\ndrinking, and there are some that are cannibals and feast on the bodies\nof those they have slain. Their religion is the fear of spirits, one of\nblood and sacrifice, in which there is no _love_. When a chief dies, do\nyou know what happens to his wives and slaves? Their heads are cut off\nand they are buried with him to be his companions in the spirit-land.\"\n\n[Illustration: A POT INTO WHICH TWINS WERE PUT.]\n\nMary shivered. \"It must be awful for the children,\" she said.\n\n\"Ah, yes, nearly all are slaves, and their masters look upon them as if\nthey were sheep or pigs. They are his wealth. As soon as they are able\nto walk they begin to carry loads on their heads, and paddle canoes and\nsweep and clean out the yards. Often they are beaten or branded with a\nhot iron, or get their ears cut off. They sleep on the ground without\nany covering. When the girls grow up they are hidden away in the _uf[:o]k\nnkukh[:o]_, or 'house of seclusion,' and made very fat, and then become the\nslave-wives of the masters or freemen. And the twins! Poor mites. For\nsome reason the people fear them worse than death, and they are not\nallowed to live; they are killed and crushed into pots and thrown away\nfor leopards to eat. The mother is hounded into the bush, where she must\nlive alone. She, too, is afraid of the twin-babies, and she would murder\nthem if others did not.\"\n\nMary cried out in hot rage against so cruel a system.\n\n\"Oh,\" she said, \"I want to fight it; I want to save those innocent\nbabes.\"\n\n\"Right, lassie,\" replied \"Mammy,\" \"and we need a hundred more like you\nto help.\"\n\nMary jumped to her feet. \"The first thing I have to do,\" she said, \"is\nto learn the language. I can do nothing until I know it well.\"\n\nEfik is the chief tongue spoken in this part of Africa, and so quickly\ndid she pick it up and master it that the people said she was \"blessed\nwith an Efik mouth\"; and then her old dream came true, and she began to\nteach the black boys and girls in the day school. There were not many,\nfor the chiefs did not believe in educating them. The bigger ones wore\nonly a red or white shirt, while the wee ones had nothing on at all, and\nthey carried their slates on their heads and their pencils in their\nwoolly hair. In spite of everything they were a happy lot, with bright\neyes and nimble feet, and Mary loved them, and those that were\nmischievous most of all. She also went down to the yards out of which\nthey came, and spoke to their fathers and mothers about Jesus, and\nbegged them to come to the Mission church.\n\nWhen she had been out three years she fell ill, and was home-sick for\nher mother and friends. Calabar then was like some of the flowers\ngrowing in the bush, very pretty but very poisonous. Mary had fever so\nbadly and was so weak that she was glad to be put on board the steamer\nand taken away.\n\nIn Scotland the cool winds and the loving care of her mother soon made\nher strong again.\n\nSometimes she was asked to speak at meetings, but was very shy to face\npeople. One Sunday morning in Edinburgh she went to a children's church.\nThe superintendent asked her to come to the platform, but she would not\ngo. Then he explained to the children who she was, and begged her to\ntell them something about Calabar. She blushed and refused. A hymn was\ngiven out, during which the superintendent pled with her to say a few\nwords. \"No, no, I cannot,\" she replied timidly. He was not to be beaten.\n\"Let us pray,\" he said. He prayed that Miss Slessor might be able to\ngive them a message. When he finished he appealed to her again. After a\npause she rose, and, turning her head half-away, spoke, not about\nCalabar, but about the free and glad life which children in a Christian\nland enjoyed, and how grateful they ought to be to Jesus, to whom they\nowed it all.\n\nWhen she reached Calabar again she was made very happy, for her dream\nwas to be a real missionary, and she found that she was to be in charge\nof the women's work at Old Town, a place two miles higher up the river,\nnoted for its wickedness. She could now do as she liked, and save more\nmoney to send home to her mother and sisters, for they were always first\nin her thoughts. She lived in a hut built of mud and slips of bamboo,\nwith a roof of palm leaves, wore old clothes, and ate the cheap food of\nthe natives, yam and plantain and fish. Many white persons wondered why\nshe did this, and made remarks, but she did not tell them the reason:\nshe cared less than ever for the laughter and scorn of others.\n\n[Illustration: TOWNS IN CALABAR.\n\nThere are so many winding creeks that the district looks like a jigsaw\npuzzle.]\n\nShe soon became a power in the district. The men in the town were\nselfish and greedy, and would not let the inland natives come with\ntheir palm oil and trade with the factories, and fights often took\nplace, and blood was shed. \"This will never do,\" Mary said, and she\nbegan to help the country people, allowing them to steal down at night\nthrough the Mission ground, and guiding them past the sentries to the\nbeach. The townsmen were angry, but they could not browbeat the brave\nwhite woman, and at last they gave in, and so the trading became free.\n\nThen she began to oppose the custom of killing twins, and by and by she\ncame to be known as \"the Ma who loves babies.\" \"Ma\" in the Efik tongue\nis a title of respect given to women, and ever after she was known to\nall, white and black, as \"Ma Slessor,\" or \"Ma Akamba,\" the great Ma, or\njust simply \"Ma,\" and we, too, may use the same name for her.\n\nOne day a young Scottish trader named Owen came to her with a black baby\nin his arms.\n\n\"Ma,\" he said, \"I have found this baby thing lying away in the bush.\nIt's a twin. The other has been killed. It would soon have died if I\nhadn't picked it up. I knew you'd like it, and so here it is.\"\n\nMa thanked the young man for his kindly act, and took the child, a\nbright and attractive girl, to her heart of hearts. \"I'll call it\nJanie,\" she said, \"after my sister.\"\n\nShe was delighted one day to hear that the British Consul and the\nmissionaries had at last coaxed the chiefs in the river towns to make a\nlaw after their own fashion against twin-murder. This was done through a\nsecret society called Egbo, which was very powerful and ruled the land.\nThose who belonged to it sent out men with whips and drums, called\nrunners, who were disguised in masks and strange dresses. When they\nappeared all women and children had to fly indoors. If caught they were\nflogged. It was these men who came to proclaim the new rules. Ma thus\ntells about the scene in a letter to Sunday School children in Dundee:\n\n    Just as it became dark one evening I was sitting in my verandah\n    talking to the children, when we heard the beating of drums and\n    the singing of men coming near. This was strange, because we are\n    on a piece of ground which no one in the town has a right to\n    enter. Taking the wee twin boys in my hands I rushed out, and\n    what do you think I saw? A crowd of men standing outside the\n    fence chanting and swaying their bodies. They were proclaiming\n    that all twins and twin-mothers could now live in the town, and\n    that if any one murdered the twins or harmed the mothers he\n    would be hanged by the neck. If you could have heard the\n    twin-mothers who were there, how they laughed and clapped their\n    hands and shouted, \"Soso[~n]o! Soso[~n]o!\" (\"Thank you! Thank you!\").\n    You will not wonder that amidst all the noise I turned aside and\n    wept tears of joy and thankfulness, for it was a glorious day\n    for Calabar.\n\n    A few days later the treaties were signed, and at the same time\n    a new King was crowned. Twin-mothers were actually sitting with\n    us on a platform in front of all the people. Such a thing had\n    never been known before. What a scene it was! How can I describe\n    it? There were thousands of Africans, each with a voice equal to\n    ten men at home, and all speaking as loudly as they could. The\n    women were the worst. I asked a chief to stop the noise. \"Ma,\"\n    he said, \"how I fit stop them woman mouth?\" The Consul told the\n    King that he _must_ have quiet during the reading of the\n    treaties, but the King said helplessly, \"How can I do? They be\n    women--best put them away,\" and many _were_ put away.\n\n    And the dresses! As some one said of a hat I trimmed, they were\n    \"overpowering.\" The women had crimson silks and satins covered\n    with earrings and brooches and all kinds of finery. The men were\n    in all sorts of uniform with gold and silver lace and jewelled\n    hats and caps. Many naked bodies were covered with beadwork,\n    silks, damask, and even red and green table-cloths trimmed with\n    gold and silver. Their legs were circled with brass and\n    beadwork, and unseen bells that tinkled all the time. The hats\n    were immense affairs with huge feathers of all colours and\n    brooches.\n\n    The Egbo men were the most gorgeous. Some had large\n    three-cornered hats with long plumes hanging down. Some had\n    crowns, others wore masks of animals with horns, and all were\n    looped round with ever so many skirts and trailed tails a yard\n    or two long with a tuft of feathers at the end. Such splendour\n    is barbaric, but it is imposing in its own place.\n\n    Well, the people have agreed to do away with many of the bad\n    customs they have that hinder the spread of the Gospel. You must\n    remember that it is the long and faithful teaching of God's\n    word that is bringing the people to a state of mind fit for\n    better things.\n\n    Now I am sleepy. Good-bye. May God make us all worthy of what He\n    has done for us.\n\nThe people were good for a time, but soon fell back into the habit of\ncenturies, and did in secret what they used to do openly. Ma saw that\nthe struggle was only just beginning, and she threw herself into it with\nall her courage and strength.\n\nShe was always studying her Bible, and learning more of the love and\npower of Jesus, and so much did she lean on Him that she was growing\nquite fearless, and would go by herself into the vilest haunts in the\ntown or far out into lonesome villages. Often she took a canoe and went\nup the river and into the creeks and visited places where no white woman\nhad been before, healing the sick, sitting by the wayside listening to\nthe tales of the people, and talking to them about the Saviour of the\nworld. Sometimes there was so much to say and do that she could not get\nback the same day, and she slept on straw or leaves in the open air, or\non a bundle of rags in an evil-smelling hut.\n\nOnce she took the house-children and went a long river journey to visit\nan exiled chief who lived in a district haunted by elephants. They were\nto start in the morning, but things are done very leisurely in Africa,\nand it was night before they set off by torchlight. Eyo Honesty VII.,\nthe negro king of Creek Town, who was a Christian and always very kind\nto Ma, had sent a State canoe, brightly painted, with the message:\n\n\"Ma must not go as a nameless stranger to a strange people, but as a\nlady and our Mother, and she can use the canoe as long as she pleases.\"\n\nThere was a crew of thirty-three men dressed only in loin-cloths.\n\nAs they dipped the paddles and sped onwards over the quiet water, a\ndrummer drummed his drum, and the crew chanted a song in her praise:\n\n    Ma, our beautiful beloved mother is on board,\n                      Ho, ho, ho!\n\nThe motion of the canoe was like a cradle, and the song like a mother's\ncrooning, and she fell asleep; and all through the night, amongst these\nwild black men, she lay in God's keeping like a little child.\n\nAt dawn they came to a beach and a village, where she was given a mud\nroom in the chief's yard, and here for a whole fortnight she lived in\nthe company of dogs, fowls, rats, lizards, and mosquitoes. Many of the\npeople had never seen a white person, and were afraid to touch her. She\nwas very sorry for them, they were so poor and naked and dirty, and she\nbusied herself making clothes and healing the sick. So many were ill\nthat a canoe had to be sent to the nearest Mission House for another\nsupply of medicines.\n\nOne day the chief said to her, \"Ma, two of my wives have been doing\nwrong, and they are to get one hundred stripes each on their bare backs.\nIt is the custom.\"\n\nShe was horrified. \"Why, what have they done?\"\n\n\"They went into a yard that is not their own. Of course,\" he added,\n\"they are young and thoughtless, they are only sixteen years old, but\nthey must learn.\"\n\n\"Oh, but that is a very cruel punishment for young girls.\"\n\n\"Ma, it is nothing; we shall also rub salt into the wounds and perhaps\ncut off their ears. That is the only way to make the women obey us.\"\n\n\"No, no, you must not do that,\" cried Ma. \"Bring all the people together\nfor a palaver.\"\n\nThe crowd gathered, and the two girls stood in front with sullen faces.\nMa spoke to them.\n\n\"You have done wrong according to your law, and you will have to be\npunished.\"\n\nAt this, smiles broke over the faces of the men; but Ma turned to them\nswiftly and cried, \"You are in the wrong too. Shame on you for making a\nlaw that marries girls so early! Why, these are still children who love\nfun and mischief. Their fault is a small one, and you must not punish\nthem so cruelly.\"\n\nThe smiles fled, and the faces grew angry and defiant, and there were\nmutterings and threats.\n\n\"Who are you to come and spoil our laws,\" said some of the big men; \"the\ngirls are ours, let us have them.\"\n\nBut Ma was firm, and as she was the guest of the village, and worthy of\nhonour, they at length agreed to give a lighter punishment. The girls\nwere handed over to two strong fellows, who flogged them with a whip. Ma\nheard their screams amidst the shouts and laughter of those who looked\non, and was ready to attend to their bleeding bodies when they ran into\nher room. Then she gave them something which made them sleep and forget\ntheir pain and misery.\n\n\"What can you expect?\" said she to herself; \"they have never heard of\nGod, they worship human skulls, and they don't know about love and\ncompassion and mercy\"--and she did her best to teach them.\n\nIn the quiet nights, when their work in the fields was over, they came\nand squatted on the ground, the big men in front, the slaves outside,\nand she stood beside a little table on which were a Bible and hymn-book\nand a lamp, and in her sweet and earnest voice told them the story of\nthe gentle Jesus. She could not see anything but the dark mass of their\nbodies and the gleaming of their eyes, and they sat so still that when\nshe stopped she could only hear the sighing of the wind among the palm\ntops. It was all very wonderful to them. Sometimes they would ask\nquestions, chiefly about the life after death, which was such a mystery\nto them, and, when they rose, they slipped away softly to their homes to\ntalk about this strange new religion that was so different from their\nown.\n\nIt was the time of storms, and one day when Ma was sitting sewing the\nsky grew dark, lightning flashed, thunder crashed, and floods fell. The\nroof of the hut was blown away, and she was drenched to the skin, and\nfor a time was ill with fever and nigh to death.\n\n[Illustration: MRS. SLESSOR AND JANIE.]\n\nOn the way back at night to Old Town another tornado burst, flooding the\ncanoe, and tossing it about like a match-box on the raging waves. The\ncrew lost their wits, and Ma thought they would be upset. But putting\naside her own fear for the sake of others, she made the men paddle into\nthe mangrove, where they jumped into the branches like monkeys and held\non to the canoe until the danger was passed. All were sitting in water,\nand Ma was wet through and shaking with ague. She became so ill that\nwhen Old Town was reached she had to be carried up to the Mission House.\nYet she did not go to bed until she had made hot tea for the children,\nand tucked them snugly away for the night.\n\nSoon afterwards another tornado destroyed her house, and she and the\nchildren escaped through the wind and rain to the home of some white\ntraders who were very kind to her. But she was so ill after all she had\ngone through that she was ordered to Scotland, and had again to be\ncarried on board the steamer. She would not leave Janie behind her, as\nshe was afraid the people would murder her, and so the girl-twin also\nsailed with her across the sea.\n\nMa soon grew strong in her native air, and one Sunday she went to her\nold church in Dundee with Janie, and there that morning the little black\nchild was given the name that had been chosen for her. With her black\nskin and her solemn eyes she was a curious sight to the boys and girls,\nand they came crowding round and begged to be allowed to hold her for a\nlittle. She appeared at many of the meetings to which Ma went, and\nduring the address would sit on the platform munching biscuits, which\nshe was always ready to share with every one near her.\n\nOne night Ma travelled to Falkirk to speak to a large class of girls\ntaught by Miss Bessie Wilson, a well-known lady in the Church. She had a\nmessage that night, and her face shone and her words fell like stirring\nmusic on the young hearts before her. Janie was passed round from one\nto another, and helped to make her story more real. So delighted were\nthe girls with the black baby that they begged to be allowed to give\nsomething every month for her support.\n\nPerhaps all this had nothing to do with what happened afterwards, but\nwas it not strange that out of that class by and by no fewer than six\nmembers gave themselves to the work in Calabar, including Miss Wright\nand Miss Peacock, two of Ma's dearest friends and best helpers?\n\nMa had a wonderful power of drawing other people to her and of\ninfluencing them for good. On this visit one girl, Miss Hogg, was no\nsooner in her company than she decided to go to Calabar, and she went,\nand was for many years a much-loved missionary, whose name was familiar\nto the children of the Church at home.\n\nMa was anxious to be back at her work, but her sister Janie, who was\ndelicate like her brothers, needed all her care, and was at last ordered\nby the doctor to live in a warmer climate. This set Ma dreaming again.\n\"If only I could take her out to Calabar with me,\" she mused, \"we could\nlive cheaply in a native hut, and it might save her life.\" But the\nMission Board did not think this would be right, and Mary, who had a\nquick brain as well as a warm heart, at once carried Janie off to\nDevonshire, that lovely county in the south of England, where she\nrented a house with a garden and nursed and cared for the invalid. Very\nsorrowfully she gave up the work in Calabar she loved so much, but she\nfelt that her sister needed her most. Then she brought down her mother,\nand they lived happily together, and Janie grew strong in the sunshine\nand fresh air. After a time Ma thought they could be left, and, after\ngetting an old companion down from Dundee to look after them, she went\nout again to Africa.\n\nHer new station was Creek Town, a little farther away, where the\nmissionary was her dear friend Mr. Goldie, the _etubom akamba_, the \"big\nmaster.\" Here she lived more plainly than ever, for she needed now to\nsend a larger sum of money in order to keep the home in Devonshire. But\nshe had not long to do this loving service, for first her mother, and\nthen her sister, died. All the rest of the family of seven had now\npassed away, and Ma was alone in the world. She never quite got over her\ngrief and her longing for them all, and to the end of her life was\ndreaming a sweet dream of the time when she would meet them again in\nheaven.\n\nWith no home-hearts to love she began to lavish her affection on the\nblack children, and was specially fond of Janie, who trotted at her side\nall day and slept in her bed at night. She was a lively thing, full of\nfun and tricks, and it was curious that the people should be so afraid\nof her. They would not touch her even if Ma was there.\n\nOne day a man came to the Mission House who said he was her father.\n\n\"Then,\" said Ma, \"you will come and see her.\"\n\n\"Oh, no,\" he replied, with fear in his eyes, \"I could not.\"\n\nMa looked at him with scorn. \"What harm can a wee girlie do you?\" she\nasked. \"Come along.\"\n\n\"Well, I'll look from a distance.\"\n\n\"Hoots,\" she cried, and seizing him by the arm dragged him close to the\nchild, who was alarmed and clung to Ma.\n\n\"My lassie, this is your father, give him a hug.\"\n\nThe child put her arms round the man's neck and he did not mind, and\nindeed his fierce face grew soft, and he sat down and took her gently on\nhis knee and petted her, and was so delighted with her pretty ways that\nhe would hardly give her up. After that he came often and brought her\ngifts of food. Thus Ma tried to show the people that there was nothing\nwrong with twins, and that it was a cruel and senseless thing to kill\nthem.\n\nThere were other children, both boys and girls, in the home, whom Ma had\nsaved from sickness or death, and these she trained to do housework and\nbake and go to market, and when their work was done she taught them from\ntheir Efik lesson books, and by and by they were able to help her in\nschool and church by looking after all the little things that needed to\nbe done. The oldest was a girl of thirteen, a kind of Cinderella, who\nwas always in the kitchen, but who was very honest and truthful and\nloved her Ma.\n\nBesides these there were always a number of refugees in the yard-rooms\noutside, a woman, perhaps, who had been ill-used by her masters and had\nrun away, or girls broken in body and mind, who had been brought down\nfrom the country to be sold as slaves and whom Ma had rescued, or sick\npeople who came from far distances to get the white woman's medicine to\nbe healed.\n\nIt was a busy life which Ma lived in and out amongst the huts and\nvillages of the Creek; but she was happy, like all busy people who love\ntheir work and are doing good.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: THE LANDING BEACH AT EKENGE.]\n\nCHAPTER III\n\n    Ma's great adventure: how she went up-river by herself in a\n    canoe and lived in a forest amongst a savage tribe; how she\n    fought their terrible customs and saved many lives; how she\n    built a hut for herself and then a church, and how she took a\n    band of the wild warriors down to the coast and got them to be\n    friends with the people who had always been their sworn enemies.\n\n\nMa felt that she was not getting to the heart of things.\n\nBehind that wall of bush, for hundreds of miles inland, lay a vast\nregion of forest and river into which white men had not yet ventured. It\nwas there that the natives lived almost like wild beasts, and where the\nmost terrible crimes against women and children were done without any\none lifting a finger to stop them. It was there that the biggest work\nfor Jesus was to be carried on. \"If only I could get amongst these\npeople,\" she said, \"and attack their customs at the root; that is where\nthey must be destroyed.\"\n\nShe dreamed of it night and day, and laid her plans.\n\nOne district lying between two rivers behind Creek Town, called Okoyong,\nwas specially noted for its lawless heathenism. The tribe who lived\nthere was strong, proud, warlike, and had become the terror of the whole\ncountry. Every man, woman, and child of them went about armed, and even\nate and slept with their guns and swords by their side; they roamed\nabout in bands watching the forest paths, and attacked and captured all\nwhom they met, and sold them as slaves or sent them away to be food for\nthe cannibals. They and the people of the coast were sworn enemies.\n\nMa knew all about them, and was eager to go into their midst to teach\nthem better ways. She pled with the Mission leaders at Duke Town. \"I am\nnot afraid,\" she said; \"I am alone now and have nobody to be anxious\nabout me.\"\n\nBut the missionaries shook their heads. \"No, no, it is too dangerous,\"\nthey told her.\n\nAnd her friends the traders said, \"It is a gun-boat they want, Ma, not a\nmissionary.\"\n\nIt was hard for her eager spirit to wait. For fourteen years she had\nworked in the factory at Dundee, for ten more she had toiled in the\ntowns on the Calabar River, and she was now a grown woman. But God often\nkeeps us at a task far longer than we ourselves think is good for us,\nfor He knows best, and if we are patient to the end He lets us do even\nmore than we had hoped for. So it was with Mary Slessor. She was at last\nallowed to go.\n\n[Illustration: THE OKOYONG DISTRICT.]\n\nThe Okoyong people, however, would not have her.\n\n\"We want no missionary, man or woman,\" they said sullenly.\n\nFor a whole year messengers went up and down the river, but the tribe\nremained firm. Then Ma said:\n\n\"I'll go myself and see them.\"\n\nOne hot June day she got the loan of King Eyo's canoe, a hollow\ntree-trunk twenty feet long, on which there was a little arch of palm\nleaves to shade her from the sun, and set out up the Calabar River. As\nshe lay back on a pillow she thought how pretty and peaceful the scene\nwas--the calm water gleaming in the light of the sky, the cotton trees\nand bananas and palms along the banks, the brilliant birds and\nbutterflies flitting about. The only sound was the dip of the paddles\nand the soft voices of the men singing about their Ma. And then she\nthought of what might lie before her, of the perils of the forest, and\nthe anger of the blood-thirsty Okoyong, and wondered if she had done\nright.\n\n\"We'll have a cup of tea, anyhow,\" she said to herself, and got out an\nold paraffin stove, but found that matches had been forgotten. Coming to\na farm the canoe swung into a mud-beach, and Ma went ashore, and was\nhappy to find that the owner was a \"big\" man whom she knew. He gave her\nsome matches, and on they went again. When the tea was ready Ma opened a\ntin of stewed steak and cut up a loaf of home-made bread.\n\n\"Boy,\" she said, \"where is the cup?\"\n\n\"No cup, Ma--forgotten.\"\n\n\"Bother! now what shall I do?\"\n\n\"I wash out that steak tin, Ma.\"\n\n\"Right; if you use what you have you will never want.\"\n\nBut alas! the tin slipped out of his hand and sank.\n\nMa was a philosopher. \"Ah, well,\" she said, \"it cannot be helped. I'll\ndrink out of the saucer.\"\n\nMa was really very timid. Just before leaving Devonshire she would not\ngo out on Guy Fawkes' Day, because she shrank from the crowds who were\nparading the streets; and yet, here she was going alone into an unknown\nregion in Africa to face untamed savages. What made her so courageous\nwas her faith in God. She believed that He wanted her to do this bit of\nwork, and that therefore He would take care of her. She would not carry\na weapon of any kind. Even David, when he went out to fight Goliath, had\na sling and a stone as well as his faith. Ma was going to fight a much\nbigger giant, and she took nothing with her but a bright face and a\nheart full of love and sympathy. She was more like Jesus, who faced His\nenemies with nothing but the power of His spirit.\n\n[Illustration: CANOE BEING MADE OUT OF A TREE-TRUNK.]\n\nThe paddlers landed her at a strip of beach on the river, and with a\nfast-beating heart she trudged along the forest path for about four\nmiles until she reached a village called Ekenge.\n\nShouts arose: \"Ma has come! Ma has come!\" and a crowd rushed forward. To\nher surprise they seemed pleased to see her. \"You are brave to come\nalone,\" they said; \"that is good.\"\n\nThe chief, who was called Edem, was sober, and he would not allow her to\ngo on farther, because the people at the next village were drunk and\nmight harm her. So she stayed the night at Ekenge.\n\n\"I am not very particular about my bed nowadays,\" she told a friend,\n\"but as I lay on a few dirty sticks laid across and across and covered\nwith a litter of dirty corn-shells, with plenty of rats and insects,\nthree women and an infant three days old alongside, and over a dozen\ngoats and sheep and cows and countless dogs outside, you don't wonder\nthat I slept little! But I had such a comfortable quiet night in my own\nheart.\"\n\nNext day all the big men of the district came to see her, and her\nwinsome ways won them over, and they agreed to give her ground for a\nchurch and school, and promised that when these were built they would be\nplaces of refuge into which hunted people could fly and be safe.\n\nShe was so happy that she did not mind the rain, which came on and\nwetted her to the skin as she walked back through the forest to the\nriver. The tide, too, was against the paddlers, so they had to put the\ncanoe into a cove and tie it to a tree for two hours. Ma was cold and\nshivery, and lay watching the brown crabs fighting in the mud, but she\ndared not sleep in case a crocodile or snake might make an attack. The\nmen kept very quiet, and sometimes she heard them whisper, \"Speak softly\nand let Ma sleep,\" or \"Don't shake the canoe and wake Ma.\" When they\nstarted again she gradually passed into sleep, and only wakened to see\nthe friendly lamps of Creek Town gleaming like stars through the night.\n\nA month or two later she was ready to go and make her home among the\nOkoyong. The people of Creek Town were alarmed, and tried to make her\ngive up the idea.\n\n\"Do you think any one will listen to you?\"\n\n\"Do you think they will lay aside their weapons of war for you?\"\n\n\"We shall never see you again.\"\n\n\"You are sure to be murdered.\"\n\nSuch were some of the things said to her. But she just smiled, and\nthought how little there was to fear when Jesus was with her.\n\n\"I am going,\" she wrote home, \"to a new tribe up-country, a fierce,\ncruel people, and every one tells me they will kill me. But I don't fear\nany hurt. Only--to combat their savage customs will require courage and\nfirmness on my part.\"\n\nThe night before she left she could not sleep for thinking and wondering\nabout all that was before her, and lay listening to the dripping of the\nrain until daylight. When she heard the negro carriers coming for the\npackages she rose. It was still wet, and the men were miserable and\ngrumbled and quarrelled amongst themselves until good King Eyo arrived\nand took them in hand. Seeing how nervous she was he sat down beside her\nand cheered her up, saying that he would send secret messengers from\ntime to time to find out how she was getting on, and that she was to let\nhim know if ever she needed help. Her courage and smiles came back, and\nshe jumped up, gathered her children together, and walked down to the\nbeach. Amidst the sighs and sobs and farewells of the people she stepped\ninto the canoe.\n\n\"Good-bye, good-bye,\" she cried to every one, and the canoe sped into\nthe middle of the stream and was lost in the mist and the rain.\n\n[Illustration: \"PLUNGED INTO THE DEPTHS OF THE FOREST.\"]\n\nIt was night when the landing-beach was reached, and the stars were\nhidden by rain-clouds. As Ma stepped ashore on the mud-bank and looked\ninto the dark forest and thought of the long journey before her, and the\nend of it, her heart failed. She might lose her way in that unlit tangle\nof wood. She would meet wild beasts, the natives might be feasting and\ndrinking and unwilling to receive her. A score of shadowy terrors arose\nin her imagination. For a moment she wished she could turn back to the\nsafe shelter of her home, but when she thought of Jesus and what He had\ndone for her sake, how He was never afraid, but went forward calm and\nfearless even to His death on the Cross, she felt ashamed of her\nweakness, and, calling the children, she plunged stoutly into the black\ndepths of the forest.\n\nWhat a queer procession it was! The biggest boy, eleven years old, went\nfirst with a box of bread and tea and sugar on his head, next a laddie\nof eight with a kettle and pots, then a wee fellow of three sturdily\ndoing his best, but crying as if his heart would break. Janie followed,\nalso sobbing, and lastly the white mother herself carrying Annie, a baby\nslave-girl, on her shoulder, and singing gaily to cheer the others, but\nthere was often a funny little break in her voice as she heard the\nscream of the vampire-bat or the stealthy tread and growling of wild\nanimals close at hand.\n\nBrushing against dripping branches, stumbling in the black and slippery\nmud, tired and hungry and wretched, they made their way to Ekenge. When\nthey arrived all was quiet, and no one greeted them.\n\n\"Strange,\" said Ma to herself, for a village welcome is always a noisy\none. She shouted, and two slaves appeared.\n\n\"Where is the chief? Where are the people?\" she asked.\n\n\"Gone to the death-feast at Ifako, the next village, Ma.\"\n\n\"Then bring me some fire and water.\"\n\nShe made tea for the children, undressed them, huddled them naked in a\ncorner to sleep, and sat down in her wet things to wait for the\ncarriers, who were bringing the boxes with food and dry clothes. A\nmessenger arrived, but it was to tell her that the men were too worn out\nto carry anything that night. She jumped to her feet, and, bareheaded\nand barefooted, dived into the forest to return to the river. She had\nnot gone far when she heard the pitter-patter of feet. She stopped.\n\n\"Ma! Ma!\" a voice cried. It was the messenger. He loved Ma, and, unhappy\nat the thought of her tramping along that lonesome trail, he had\nfollowed her to keep her company. Together they ran, now tripping and\nfalling, now dashing into a tree, now standing still trembling, as they\nheard some rushing sound or weird cry.\n\nWhen she came to the beach she waded out to the canoe, lifted the\ncovering, and roused the sleeping natives. They grumbled a good deal,\nbut even these big rough men could not withstand Ma's coaxing, masterful\nways, and they had soon the boxes on their heads and were marching\nmerrily in single file along the wet and dark path to Ekenge. She made\nthem put the packages into the hut which Edem, the chief, had allotted\nto her, a small, dirty place with mud walls, no window, and only an open\nspace for a door. When everything was piled up inside there was hardly\nroom for herself and the children, but she lay down on the boxes, and as\nit was after midnight, and she was weary and foot-sore, she soon fell\ninto a deep sleep.\n\n[Illustration: MA EME ETE.]\n\nWhen the chief and his followers came back from the revels at Ifako they\nwelcomed Ma, for it was an honour for a white woman to live in their\nmidst. But they had no idea of changing their ways of life for her, and\nwent on day and night drinking rum and gin, dancing, and making\nsacrifices to their jujus or gods. Sometimes the din was so great that\nMa never got a wink of sleep. The yard was full of half-naked\nslave-women, who were always scolding and quarrelling. Some were wicked\nand hateful, and did not want such a good white Ma to be with them, and\ntried to force her to leave. But there was one who was kind to her, Eme\nEte, a sister of the chief, who had a sad story. One day she told it to\nMa. She had been married to a chief who had not treated her well. When\nhe died his followers put the blame on his wives, and they were seized\nand brought to trial. It was an odd way they had of testing guilt or\ninnocence. As each wife stepped forward the head of a fowl was cut off,\nand the people watched to see how the body fell. If it lay in a certain\nway she was innocent; if in another way, she was guilty! How Eme Ete\ntrembled when her turn came! When she knew she was safe she fainted.\n\nEme Ete was big in body and big in heart. To Ma she showed herself\ngentle and refined, and acted towards her as a white lady would, caring\nfor her comfort, watching over her safety, going to her meetings, and\nhelping her in her work. They grew to be like sisters. Yet Eme Ete was\nalways a little bit of a mystery to Ma. She wanted the people to change\ntheir old ways, but she herself would not, and went on with her\nbush-worship and sacrifices, and never became a Christian. But of all\nthe native women Ma ever met, there was none she loved so well as this\nmotherly heathen soul.\n\nIn the yard there were also many boys and girls. Ma was fond of\nchildren, but these ones were not nice: they stole and lied and made\nthemselves a trouble to everybody. \"Oh, dear,\" she sighed, \"what can I\ndo with such bairns?\" But she remembered what her Master said, \"Suffer\nlittle children to come unto Me and forbid them not\"; and she gathered\nthem about her, took the wee ones in her arms and nursed them, made\nclothes for their bodies, and taught them what it was to be clean and\nsweet and good. When the sick babies died she would not let the people\nthrow them away into the bush, as they usually did, but put them into\nlittle boxes on which she laid some flowers, and buried them in a piece\nof ground that she chose for a cemetery. \"Why, Ma,\" said the natives in\nwonder, \"what is a dead child? You can have hundreds of them.\"\n\nNone of the children could read or write, nor, indeed, could any of the\nolder people, and so Ma started schools, which she held in the open air\nin the shade of the forest trees. At first everybody came, even the\ngrey-headed men and women, and learned A B C in Efik and sang the hymns\nthat Ma taught them. The beautiful birds which flew above their heads\nmust have wondered, for they had only been accustomed to the wild chant\nof war-songs. And at night the twinkling stars must have twinkled harder\nwhen they looked down and saw, not a crowd of people drinking and\nfighting, but a quiet company, and a white woman standing talking to\nthem in grave sweet tones about holy things.\n\nBut when Ma spoke about their bad customs they would not listen. \"Ma,\"\nthey would say, \"we like you and we want to learn book and wear clothes,\nbut we don't want to put away our old fashions.\"\n\n\"Well,\" replied Ma patiently, \"we shall see.\"\n\nAnd so the battle began.\n\nThe first time she failed, because she did not know what was happening.\nA lad had been accused of some fault, and she saw him standing, girt\nwith chains, holding out his arms before a pot of boiling oil. A man\ntook a ladle and dipped it into the burning stuff, which he began to\npour over the boy's hands. Ma sprang forward, but was too late; the boy\nscreamed and rolled on the ground in agony. She was very angry,\nespecially when they told her the meaning of the thing. It was a test to\nshow whether the boy was innocent or guilty of the charge brought\nagainst him. If he had not been guilty, they said, he would not have\nsuffered.\n\n\"Oh, you stupid creatures,\" cried Ma. \"Everybody will suffer if you do\nthat to them. Let me try it on you,\" she said to the man with the ladle,\nbut he rushed off amidst the laughter of the crowd.\n\nNext time she did better. A slave was blamed for using witchcraft, and\ncondemned to die. Ma knew he was innocent, and went and stood beside him\nin front of the armed warriors of the chief, and said:\n\n\"This man has done no wrong. You must not put him to death.\"\n\n\"Ho, ho,\" they cried, \"that is not good speaking. We have said he shall\ndie, and he must die.\"\n\n\"No, no; listen,\" and she tried to reason with them, but they came round\nher waving their swords and guns, and shouting at the pitch of their\nvoices. She stood in the midst of them as she had stood in the midst of\nthe Dundee roughs, pale, but calm and unafraid. The more angry and\nexcited and threatening they grew the cooler she became. Perhaps it was\nher wonderful courage which did not fail her even when the swords were\nflashing about her head, perhaps it was the strange light that shone in\nher face that awed and quietened them, but the confusion died down and\nceased. Then the chiefs agreed for her sake not to kill the man, but\nthey put heavy chains upon his arms and legs, and starved and flogged\nhim until he was a mass of bleeding flesh. Ma felt she had not done\nmuch, but it was a beginning.\n\nPeople at a distance heard of her, and one day messengers came from a\ntownship many miles away to ask her to visit their chief, who was\nbelieved to be dying.\n\n\"And what will happen if he dies?\" asked Ma.\n\n\"All his wives and slaves will be killed,\" was the prompt reply.\n\n\"Then I will come at once,\" she said.\n\n\"Ma,\" put in Chief Edem, \"you must not go. They are cruel people and may\ndo you hurt. Then see the rain; all the rivers will be flowing and you\ncannot cross.\"\n\nBut Ma thought of the women who might be murdered, and she went. The\nrain poured down, and as she fought her way for eight hours through the\nforest her clothes became soaked and torn, and she threw most of them\noff and left them. As she trudged with bare head and bare feet through\nthe villages on the way, she looked very ragged and forlorn, and the\npeople gazed at her in wonder. When she reached the township she found\nthe men armed and ready to begin the slaughter, and the women sad and\nafraid. Although she was wet and cold and feverish she went straight to\nthe hut of the sick chief and nursed him, and gradually brought him back\nto health, so that there was no more thought of sacrifice and blood.\n\n[Illustration: CHIEF EDEM.]\n\nHer next trouble was in her own yard. Edem, her chief, was kind to her,\nbut he was also under the power of the old bad ideas and believed in the\nwitch-doctors, cunning fellows who pretended to know the cause of\nsickness and how to cure it. Falling ill he called in one of these\nmedicine-men, who declared that an enemy had placed a number of things\nin his body, and made believe to take them out. When Ma came Edem held\nthem up--cartridges, powder, teeth, bones, eggshells, and seeds--and\nsaid, \"Ma, a dreadful battle has been going on during the night. See\nwhat wicked persons have done to me.\" Her heart sank: she knew what\nwould follow.\n\nSure enough, a number of men and women were seized and chained to posts\nand condemned to die. Ma set herself to save them. She begged and coaxed\nthe sick man so much on their behalf that at last she wearied him, and\nhe got his followers to carry him secretly away to one of his farms. Ma\ncould only pray, and she prayed that he might get better. By and by\nstrength did return, and the prisoners were released, only one woman\nbeing put to death.\n\nNo sooner was this trial ended than a worse came. A chief whom Ma\nfeared, a very cruel and blood-thirsty man, paid a visit to Edem. He and\nhis followers did nothing but drink, and soon they were mad with the\nfiery liquor, and the whole village was in a violent uproar. Ma bravely\nwent into the midst of the mob and sought to calm them. She saw that the\nbest thing to do was to get the visitors away, and she hurried them off\nas quickly as possible, going with them herself in order to prevent\nbloodshed on the way, for they wanted to fight every one they met. In\nthe forest path they saw some withered plants and leaves on the ground.\n\"Sorcery,\" they yelled, and fled back in a panic--they thought these\nthings had magic in them and were meant to do them harm.\n\n\"Let us go to the last village and kill every one in it,\" they shouted;\n\"they have tried to bewitch us.\"\n\nAnd they rushed pell-mell along the path flourishing their swords and\nshouting their terrible war-cries. Ma prayed for swiftness, and ran\nuntil she came in front of them, and then, turning, she threw out her\narms and breathlessly dared them to pass. It seemed a mad thing to do,\nbut again that something in her face made them stop. They argued with\nher and then they obeyed her, and went forward by another path. But they\nbegan to dance and caper and fight each other, until Ma, with the help\nof some of the soberer ones, tied the worst to the trees. The others\nwent on, and she did not leave them until they were safe in their own\ndistrict. On the way back she unloosed the drunken prisoners, who were\nnow in a raging temper, and sent them home with their hands fastened\nbehind their backs.\n\nBut that was not the end. Next day the cruel chief went to the village\nthat was blamed for laying the things on the path, and although it did\nnot belong to him, but to Edem, he made the people take ordeals, and\ncarried away a young man in handcuffs to put him to death. Ma hastened\nto the chief. He was rude and rough, and laughed at her, but she tried\nnot to mind, and begged hard for the lad's life. When she returned she\nfound that Edem was getting ready to fight, and she prayed earnestly\nthat the heart of the cruel chief might be softened. It was softened,\nfor news came that the prisoner had been sent home, and so there was\npeace and not war.\n\nMa began to wonder how long she would be able to live in the midst of\nsuch sin and dirt. She had hung a door at the opening of her mud-room,\nand made a hole in the wall for a window and curtained it with pieces of\ncloth, but the place was so small that at night she had to lift her\nboxes outside in order to give herself and the children room to sleep.\nIt was overrun with rats and lizards and beetles and all sorts of biting\ninsects. She could not get away from the squabbling and bad language and\nrioting of the wives and slaves, and was often tired and ill. It was the\nthought of Jesus that gave her patience and courage. She remembered how\nHe had left His home above the stars and dwelt on earth amongst men who\nwere unlovely and wicked and cruel, and how He never grumbled or gave\nin, though life to Him was often bitter and hard. \"Shall I not follow my\nMaster,\" she said, \"because my way is not easy and not nice? Yes, I will\nbe His true disciple and be strong and brave.\"\n\nShe was longing to be alone sometimes to read her Bible and think and\npray in quiet, and one day she started to build a little hut of her own\nsome distance away from the others. First she fixed stout tree-trunks in\nthe ground, and on the tops of these, cross-wise, she laid other pieces.\nSticks were then placed between the uprights, and strips of bamboo,\nbeaten until soft, were fastened in and out, just as the threads had\nbeen woven in the loom of the Dundee factory. This was the skeleton of\nthe hut, and when Ma looked at it she clapped her hands with delight.\n\n\"It's like playing a game,\" she said to the children.\n\nThe walls were next made by throwing in large lumps of red clay between\nthe sticks. When the clay was dry the surface was rubbed smooth, and\nthen mats of palm leaves were laid on the top and tied down to form the\nroof.\n\n\"Now for the furniture,\" she said. With kneaded lumps of clay she built\nup a fireplace, and moulded a seat beside it where the cook could sit,\nthen made a sideboard, in which holes were scooped out for cups and\nbowls and plates, and a long couch, which she meant for herself. All\nthese were beaten hard and polished and darkened with a native dye.\n\nThe flitting was great fun to the children. So many of the pots and pans\nand jars were hung on bits of wood on the posts outside that Ma declared\nthe house was like one of the travelling caravans she used to see in\nScotland; and so she called it \"The Caravan.\" When everything was\nfinished she stood and looked at it with a twinkle in her eye. \"Be it\never so humble,\" she said gaily, \"there's no place like home!\" Then they\nsat down to a merry meal. What did it matter if there was only one dish\nand no spoons or forks? There was no happier family in all the land that\nnight.\n\nMa was now able to read her Bible in peace and pray to God in quietness\nand comfort. But outside she had still the goats and fowls and rats and\nthe insects and even the wild things of the forest, and sometimes they\ncame in. One morning when she awoke, she saw on her bed a curious thing,\nand found that it was the skin of a snake that had stolen in during the\nnight and shed its old clothes as these reptiles sometimes do. So she\nbegan to dream of a bigger house with an upstairs, where she could be\nsafer.\n\nBut first there must be a church. The chief and free men and women\nhelped, and by and by there rose a long roomy shed, complete, except for\na door and windows. What a day it was when it was set apart and used for\nthe worship of God--the first church in wild Okoyong!\n\nMa told the people that they could not come to God's house except with\nclean bodies and clean hearts. Few of them had clean clothes, or clothes\nat all, and the children never wore any. But Ma had been receiving boxes\nfrom Sunday Schools and work-parties in Scotland, and out of these she\ndressed the women and little ones in pinafores of all colours. How proud\nand happy they were! But the excitement died into quietness and\nreverence when they went inside the building, and an awe fell upon them\nas Ma explained what a church meant, and that God was in their midst.\n\nThe chiefs rose and said that they would respect the building, that no\nweapon of war would ever be brought into it, and that all their quarrels\nwould be left outside; and they promised to send their followers to the\nservices and their children to the schools.\n\nBut like some better people at home these wayward savages could not be\ngood for long. They went back to their evil doings, and were soon away\nraiding and fighting, leaving only a few women and the children in the\nvillage. It was the rum and gin that caused most of the mischief. Every\none drank, and often Ma went to bed knowing that there was not one sober\nperson for miles around. The horrible stuff came up from the coast,\nhaving been shipped overseas from Christian countries. Ma never ceased\nto wonder how white men could seek to ruin native people for the sake of\nmoney. It made her very angry, and she fought the trade with all her\npower.\n\n\"Do you know,\" she said one day to her chief, \"you drink because you\nhave not enough work? We have a rhyme in our country which says,\n\n    Satan finds some mischief still\n      For idle hands to do.\n\nWhy don't you trade with Calabar?\"\n\nHe grinned. \"We do trade with Calabar,\" he said; \"we trade in heads.\"\n\n\"Well, you must trade in palm oil and food instead. And first you must\nmake peace.\"\n\n\"We can't do that, Ma, because Calabar won't come to Okoyong.\"\n\n\"Of course not, because they are afraid, and rightly too. Well, if they\nwon't come to you, you must go to them.\"\n\n\"But, Ma, we would never come back.\"\n\n\"Tuts! I will go with you.\"\n\nShe made them go to the river and get a large canoe and fill it with\nyams and plantains (these were gifts for the Calabar people), and with\nbags of palm nuts and a barrel of oil (these were to begin trading\nwith). But they knew little about boats, and they loaded it so high that\nit sank. Another was got, and all was ready, when some of the chiefs\ndrew back and said they would only go if Ma allowed them to take their\nguns and swords.\n\n\"No, no,\" she said, \"that would be foolish. We are going in peace and\nnot in war.\"\n\n\"Ma, you make women of us! No man goes to a strange place without arms.\"\n\nBut she would not yield, and they started. Suddenly she caught sight of\nsome swords hidden under the bags of nuts, and, stooping, she seized\nthem and pitched them out on the bank. \"Go on,\" she cried, and the canoe\nswept down the river.\n\nKing Eyo received the trembling chiefs like a Christian gentleman, spoke\nto them kindly, and showed them over his large house. There was a\npalaver, and all quarrels between the two peoples were made up, and all\nevil thoughts of one another vanished, and the men from Okoyong went\nback astonished and joyful. They began to trade with the coast, and so\nbusy did they become in their fields growing food and making palm oil\nthat they had less time for drinking and fighting, and grew more sober\nand prosperous.\n\nThey were very grateful to Ma.\n\n\"We are not treating her well,\" they said to one another. \"We must build\nher a better house.\"\n\n[Illustration: MA'S TINY COMPASS.]\n\nAnd they began to erect a large one with upstairs rooms and a verandah,\nbut they could not manage the woodwork. Ma begged the Mission\nauthorities to send up a carpenter to put in the doors and windows, and\nby and by one came from Scotland, named Mr. Ovens, and appeared at\nEkenge with his tools and Tom, a native apprentice, and set to work. Mr.\nOvens was bright and cheery, and had a laugh that made everybody else\nwant to laugh; and he made so light of the hard life he had to live that\nMa praised God for sending him. Like herself, he spoke the dear Scots\ntongue, and at night he sang the plaintive songs of their native land\nuntil she was ready to echo the words of Tom, \"Master, I don't like\nthese songs, they make my heart big and my eyes water.\"\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: JUDGE SLESSOR IN COURT.]\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\n    Stories of how Ma kept an armed mob at bay and saved the lives\n    of a number of men and women; how in answer to a secret warning\n    she tramped a long distance in the dark to stop a war; how she\n    slept by a camp-fire in the heart of the forest, and how she\n    became a British Consul and ruled Okoyong like a Queen.\n\n\nA low wailing cry, with a note of terror in it, drifted out of the\nforest into the sunshine of the clearing where Ma was sitting watching\nthe work on the new house. She leapt to her feet, and listened with a\nfar-away look on her face. Next moment she sprang in amongst the trees\nand disappeared.\n\nMr. Ovens saw that the natives about him were uneasy, and when a\nmessenger came running up and said, \"You have to go to Ma and take\nmedicine for an accident,\" they burst into loud lamentations. On\nreaching the spot he found that Etim, the son of the chief, a lad about\ntwenty years of age, had been caught by a log which he had been\nhandling, and struck senseless to the ground.\n\n\"This is not good for us,\" Ma said, shaking her head. \"The people\nbelieve that accidents are caused by witchcraft, the witch-doctor will\nbe called in to smell out the guilty ones, and many will suffer.\"\n\nThey carried the lad home, and she nursed him day and night, but life\nebbed away; and one Sunday morning when all was quiet and beautiful, she\nheard again that strange wailing sound which told of peril and death.\nShe rushed to the scene. The men were blowing smoke from a lighted palm\nleaf into the lad's nose, rubbing pepper into his eyes, and shouting\ninto his ears to keep back the spirit.\n\n\"Silly babies,\" she could not help saying to herself.\n\n\"He is dead,\" cried the chief, and giving the body to Ma he shouted in a\nterrible voice:\n\n\"He has been killed by sorcerers, and they must die! Where is the\nwitch-doctor?\"\n\nThe witch-doctor came, an evil-looking man with cunning eyes, and after\nhumming and hawing he blamed the people in a village near the spot where\nthe accident happened.\n\n\"Off! seize them!\" called the chief to his freemen.\n\nBut a swift foot had secretly carried a warning to the village, and\nChief Akpo and his followers had fled. Only a dozen men, and some women\nand babies who could not run, were captured, and they were loaded with\nchains and brought to Ekenge and imprisoned in a yard.\n\nMa felt that this was a big affair, and perhaps the turning-point in her\nlife amongst the Okoyong.\n\n\"If these people are killed,\" she said, \"all my work will be undone. I\nmust prevent it at any cost.\"\n\nAnd first she went away by herself and knelt down and prayed, and then\ncame back calm and strong.\n\nShe knew what the natives liked, and hoping to please and soften Edem,\nshe said to him, \"I am going to honour your son.\" From her boxes she\nbrought out fine silk cloth of many colours, shirts and vests and other\nclothes, and put them on the dead body. The head was shaved and painted\nyellow, and upon it was wound a turban, and above that a black and\nscarlet hat with plumes of feathers, and an umbrella. To one hand was\ntied a stick, and to the other a whip. Last of all a mirror was placed\nin front of the dead eyes, because the people believed the spirit would\nsee what had been done and be glad. There he sat, the lifeless boy,\nwith all his finery, a sad queer sight. When the people came in they\nyelled with delight, and danced and called for rum to make merry. Barrel\nafter barrel was brought and emptied, and they began to grow wild,\nleaping about with swords and guns, and singing their weird tribal\nsongs.\n\n\"Humph!\" said Ma, \"my cure seems to be as bad as the disease. Still,\nthey have forgotten the prisoners.\"\n\nThese were chained to posts, and expected every minute to have their\nheads chopped off. They were all very miserable. The babies were crying,\nand there was a girl of fifteen who clung weeping to her mother, and ran\nup to any one who came, saying piteously, \"Oh, I'll be a slave for life\nif only you will spare my mother.\"\n\nMa turned to Mr. Ovens. \"We must not leave these poor creatures. You\nwill watch by day, and I will watch by night, and we may save them yet.\"\n\nSo time and time about these two sat on guard. They had no weapons, they\nwere alone in the midst of a drunken mob, and yet they had no fear, for\nthey trusted God and believed that He would take care of them.\n\nBecause they were there, Edem and his brother chiefs did not touch the\nprisoners. Some days passed. Then one afternoon Ma saw little brown\nobjects lying on a stone. \"Eser['e] beans!\" she exclaimed in alarm. These\nbeans grow on a wild vine, and are very poisonous. She knew they were\nto be crushed and put in water, and given to the prisoners with the idea\nof finding out who was guilty of the death of Etim. Of course all who\ndrank the water would die, and the people would believe that justice had\nbeen done. That was the only kind of justice they knew.\n\n[Illustration: THE ESER['E] BEAN.]\n\nMa sought out the chiefs and told them they must not do this wicked\nthing, and when they put her aside she followed them about and begged\nand worried them until they became angry.\n\n\"Let us alone,\" they cried. \"What does it matter? Your God will not let\nthe innocent die.\"\n\nTheir followers grew excited, and some of them lost control of\nthemselves and hustled Ma and threatened her.\n\n\"Make the dead live,\" they snarled, \"and we shall give you the\nprisoners.\"\n\nMa's reply was to sit down and look at them with stern eyes.\n\n\"I will not move from here,\" she said firmly, \"until you set all these\npoor people free.\"\n\nIt was night. Stealthy steps came into the yard. In the darkness Ma saw\ntwo men take away one of the mothers. She looked at the woman going to\nher death, and at the others, who pled with her to remain, for they\nfeared this was a trick to get her away. What should she do? Praying and\nhoping that she was right, she ran after the mother, and was just in\ntime, for the woman was raising the poisoned water to her lips.\n\n\"Don't,\" cried Ma, and giving her a push she said, \"Run.\" In an instant\nboth jumped into the bush and made for Ma's hut.\n\n\"Quick,\" Ma cried to Mr. Ovens, \"hide this woman.\"\n\nHe drew her in and piled up boxes against the door, and Ma ran swiftly\nback to the yard, where, to her joy, she found the other prisoners still\nsafe. The warriors had been so astonished at what she had done that they\nhad forgotten all about them.\n\nThrough more weary and exciting days the struggle went on. The chiefs at\nlast said gloomily, \"We will set some of the prisoners free and see if\nMa will be satisfied.\" After giving a number a terrible native oath, and\nmaking them swear they were not guilty, they handed them over to Ma.\n\n\"Now,\" said the freeman, \"we will kill the others.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Ma, and dared them to do such a dreadful thing.\n\nThey stormed and raged at her.\n\n\"We shall burn down the house and yard.\"\n\n\"All right,\" she retorted. \"They are not mine.\"\n\nMore prisoners were released, and only three were left. Eme Ete came and\nknelt before her brother and begged him to set free one of them, a weak\nand timid creature, and this was done. A man and woman now remained, and\nMa was resolved to save both. After a bitter struggle they let the man\ngo, but nothing would make them give up the woman. She was doomed to\ndeath.\n\nOne afternoon Ma was secretly told that the funeral and the murder were\nto take place that night, and she was sick at heart. But when darkness\nfell, unknown hands--were they the hands of Eme Ete?--cut the chains\nthat bound the victim to the post, and with her leg irons on she crawled\nover the roof and found a refuge in Ma's room, from which, later, she\nfled to the freedom of the bush.\n\nSo the funeral of the young chief took place, but only a cow was killed\nand put into the coffin. No human blood was shed. It was the first time\nin the history of the tribe that such a wonderful thing had happened,\nand it was due to Ma's heroism and faith.\n\nTwo of the parties who went to the funeral met in the forest and\nquarrelled, and a man's head was cut off. War was declared, and there\nwas much fighting before Ma got them to stop and settle the matter by\npalaver. \"Blood for blood,\" was the verdict; \"the murderer must die.\" It\nwas a custom of the natives that another could suffer in the place of\none who was condemned. This man's friends offered his youngest brother,\na little child, but the judge would not have him. Then a bigger brother\nwas sent, and accepted. Before he could be killed, however, he escaped.\nOne day Ma heard the sound of singing and joy-guns, and was told that he\nhad been found and put to a cruel death before the eyes of his mother\nand sister.\n\nA day or two afterwards loud screams filled the air. Ma rushed out and\nsaw the women and children fleeing towards her yard.\n\n\"Egbo! Egbo!\" they cried.\n\nShe listened, and heard the throb-throbbing of a drum. Egbo was a more\ndreadful thing in Okoyong than in Calabar, for there was no law against\nit. The men were dressed in leopards' skins and wore hideous masks, and\ncarried long whips with which they flogged all whom they caught, and\noften killed them. Soon the village was filled with the queer figures,\nand shots were being fired. The women in the yard trembled in terror,\nand Ma prayed. By and by the noise died away, and on looking out she\nfound that all had gone. Only one village had been destroyed. In revenge\nEdem armed his men, and they went after them, and shot down every\nstraggler they came across.\n\nThen arose another trouble. The brother of Edem, called Ekpenyong, was\naccused of slaying the dead lad Etim, and after drinking heavily he\nsaid he would take the poison ordeal to prove his innocence. When Ma\narrived at his yard the women were clinging to him and trying to seize a\nbag which he held, and he was striking them fiercely.\n\n\"He has the beans in the bag, Ma,\" they cried.\n\nShe walked through the line of armed men who stood by.\n\n\"Give me the bag,\" she said quietly to the chief.\n\n\"No, Ma, there are only palm nuts and cartridges in it,\" he mumbled.\n\n\"Give it to me.\"\n\nHe threw it at her feet. She looked in and saw palm nuts and cartridges.\nHad he spoken the truth? But deep at the bottom she came upon two-score\nof the poison beans.\n\n\"I'll keep these,\" she told him.\n\n\"You will not! They are mine.\"\n\n\"Give them back,\" shouted the warriors.\n\nMa's heart beat wildly, but she walked down the ranks of the men,\nsaying, \"Here they are, take them.\"\n\nThey were so amazed at her courage that they let her pass, and she went\nand hid the beans in her house.\n\nDuring the night Ekpenyong stole off to find more beans. Eme Ete sent Ma\na secret message, and she rose and followed him, and coaxed him to take\nthe native oath instead of the ordeal.\n\nAfter all these wild doings the people came back to a better mind, and\nbegan to realise how brave and good Ma was; and at night, when she was\nalone with her bairns, they slipped in, one by one, and called her their\ngreat white mother, and thanked her with tears for all her love and\ndevotion.\n\n[Illustration: A CHIEF AND HIS CHILDREN.]\n\nEdem, too, was softened, and the thought of vengeance left his heart. Ma\nprevailed upon him to allow the chief who had run away to return. Poor\nAkpo! His village had been burnt to the ground, and all his goats and\nfowls and goods were lost. But Edem gave him a new piece of land, and\nseed for food plants.\n\n\"Ah, Chief,\" said Ma, \"that is the right way; that is the Jesus way.\"\n\n\"Thank you, Ma.\" And he, too, came and knelt before her, and held her\nfeet and poured out his gratitude for all she had done.\n\n\"Go on, Ma,\" he said, \"and teach us to do away with the bad old bush\nfashions. We are weary of them, they bind us like chains, and we need\nyou to help us.\"\n\nThese words thrilled Ma with happiness, and were a reward for all she\nhad come through; but they made her humble too, for she knew that unless\nGod had been with her she would not have borne up so long.\n\nNow that she was surer of herself and of that wondrous Power behind her,\nshe grew bolder still, and went wherever trouble threatened. No place\nwas too far for her to reach. Natives in distant parts were often\nsurprised to see her walking into their midst when they were starting to\nfight. Once a secret message came, saying that two tribes, many miles\naway, were on the warpath. Ma was ill and weak and in bed, but she rose\nat once. Edem said, \"Ma, you are going into a wild beast's den, and will\nnot come out alive.\"\n\nNight fell as she was tramping along, and she was always nervous of the\ndarkness and the mystery of the forest. The animals frightened her. \"I\nprayed,\" she said, \"that God would shut their mouths, and He did.\" At\nmidnight she reached a village where she hoped to borrow a drum and a\nfreeman to beat it before her as she marched, a sign that one under the\nprotection of Egbo was coming. But the chief, a surly despot, would not\nsee her, and would not give her the drum.\n\n\"If there is a war,\" his message said, \"a woman is not likely to stop\nit.\"\n\nBack went her reply. \"You think only of the woman. You have forgotten\nthe woman's God. I go without a drum.\"\n\nOn she went, and came at last to one of the villages where the trouble\nwas brewing. All was silent and still. Suddenly, out of the darkness\nswarmed armed men and closed around her and demanded her business.\n\n\"I have come to stop the war.\"\n\nThey jeered at her, such a small, feeble woman, and smiled grimly.\n\n\"You won't do that,\" they said.\n\n\"We shall see. I want to have a palaver and hear the story.\"\n\n\"All right, Ma,\" they replied, humouring her. \"Go to sleep until second\ncock-crow and we shall wake you up and take you with us.\" But when she\nwas awakened the band were already away on their errand of death.\n\n\"Run, Ma, run and stop them!\" cried the women, who feared what would\nhappen; and she rushed breathlessly up and down steep tracks and through\nstreams until she caught up with the warriors, who were making ready to\nattack and uttering their wild war whoops.\n\nShe walked into their midst.\n\n\"Don't go on like beardless boys,\" she said in scorn. \"Be quiet.\"\n\nThen she went on until she came upon the enemy drawn up in line across\nthe path.\n\n\"I salute you,\" said she.\n\nThere was no reply. Why was this white woman interfering with them at\nsuch a moment?\n\n\"Oho! I see you are gentlemen and have nice manners.\"\n\nThey frowned. Things were looking dangerous, but Ma was never at a loss,\nand she began to smile and joke. Then stepped forward an old man and\ncame and knelt at her feet.\n\n\"Ma, you know me? You remember you nursed and healed me?\"\n\nIt was the sick chief she had gone to see after she arrived at Ekenge.\n\n\"Ma,\" he went on, \"we confess that this quarrel is the fault of one of\nour foolish men, and it is a shame to bring evil on the whole town for\none. We beg you to make peace.\"\n\nMa's heart thrilled with joy, and soon she had a number of men from each\nside talking over the matter. Often it seemed as if war must come after\nall, and it needed all her patience to make them agree, but at last it\nwas decided that a fine should be imposed. To her horror this was paid\nat once in gin, and every one began to drink. She knew they would soon\nget violent and fight after all, and was almost in despair.\n\nBut taking off nearly all her clothes, she spread them over the boxes\nand bottles and dared any one to touch them. Only one glass would she\ngive to each of the head men. So disappointed were the others that they\nsurged round her in anger, but some of the older and wiser men obtained\nwhips and made themselves into a bodyguard to protect her.\n\n\"If all of you go to your homes and don't fight,\" she said, \"I'll\npromise to send the stuff after you.\"\n\nThey believed her, and trooped away like children.\n\nIt was night again when, worn out in body and mind, she tramped back\nthrough the dark and lonely forest, with crickets whistling and frogs\ncroaking around her, and the little lamps of the fireflies pulsing in\nand out like the flashes of a lighthouse. But there was a light in her\nown face that even the fireflies could not outshine.\n\nTwo years passed, two years of toil and hardship and strain. In the heat\nand rain, by day and night, Ma was never idle. If she was not tramping\nthrough the forest and putting down the customs of the people, she was\nbusy with work about her own door, helping the women to sew and cook,\nteaching the children in school, preaching on week-days and Sundays, and\ndoctoring all who were ill. It was a marvel she kept at it so long.\nPerhaps it was because she had such a happy spirit, saw the funny side\nof things, and laughed at her troubles. She was always ready with a\njoke, even when lying ill in bed, and missionaries who went to see her\nusually found her as lively as a girl.\n\nAt this time she lived in a way that would have killed any other white\nperson. She did not wear a hat or boots or stockings; she went about\nthinly clad; she ate the coarse food of the natives; and although she\nwas careful about the water she drank she did not filter or boil it, as\nall white people have to do in the Tropics. It made life simpler and\neasier, she said, not to bother about such things. How she did it no one\nknew; the secret lay between her and God.\n\nEven she, however, gave in at last. She became so ill that she was taken\nto Duke Town a wreck and carried on board the steamer and sent home.\nJanie again went with her, a woolly-headed lassie with velvet skin, and\neyes that were always ready to laugh. She was beginning now to think\nthat it would be a fine thing to be a white girl. One night, in a house\nin Glasgow when she was being bathed, she took the sponge and began to\nscrub the soles of her feet, which were whiter than the rest of her\nbody. \"Why are you doing that, Janie?\" she was asked. \"Oh, because the\nwhite place is getting bigger, and if I scrub perhaps I'll be all white\nsome day!\"\n\nAt this time Ma was dreaming another of her dreams. She wanted to see a\nplace in Calabar where black boys could learn to use their hands as\nwell as their heads, and so be able to become good workmen and teachers,\nand help to build up their country and make it rich and prosperous. She\nwrote a long letter to the Church magazine telling about her idea, and\nit was thought to be so good that the Church did what she asked it to\ndo, and started a school which has grown into the great Hope-Waddell\nTraining Institution, where boys are being taught all sorts of things.\n\nMade strong by the home air and the love of new and kind friends, Ma\nfared forth again to her lonely outpost in the African backwoods.\n\nThe people of Ekenge were glad to see their white mother back, and\nconfessed that they did not seem able to do without her. They came to\nher like children with all their troubles and sorrows, and she listened\nto their stories and advised and comforted them. When they quarrelled\nthey said, \"Let us go to Ma,\" and she heard both sides and told them who\nwas wrong and who was right, and they always went away content.\n\nShe needed no longer to go to any of the villages round about when a\nchief died. She just sent a message that there must be no killing. There\nwas a great uproar, but back always came the reply, \"We have heard. Our\nmother has made up her mind. We will obey.\" They did not know that Ma\nall the time was in her room kneeling and praying to God.\n\nSome mourned over the old ways. \"Ah, Ma,\" they sighed, \"you have spoilt\nall our good fashions. We used to take our people with us when we went\nto the spirit land; now we must go alone.\"\n\nBut she had still to be on the alert, for many of the tribes at a\ndistance from Ekenge had not yet given up their dark practices, and\nwhenever they were bent on anything wicked they plunged deep into the\nheart of the forest to escape her eyes.\n\nOne day she heard that a chief had died, and was guided to one of these\nhidden spots, where she found his free men giving the poison ordeal to a\nnumber of prisoners. They thought she would grow tired and go away if\nthey simply sat and waited, but days and nights passed and she remained\nwith them, sleeping on the ground beside a fire. Of the armed men lying\naround her she was not afraid, but only of the wild beasts that might\ncome creeping up through the darkness and leap upon her. It was not she\nwho became wearied and hungry, but the men themselves, and by and by the\nprisoners were set free.\n\nEme Ete helped her most. It was she who told her when wrong-doing was\nbeing plotted. In the swift way that only natives know about, Eme Ete\nreceived news of it. Calling a trusty messenger she gave him a special\nkind of bottle.\n\n\"Take that to Ma and ask her to fill it with ibok (medicine)--go\nquick!\"\n\nWhen the messenger arrived at the Mission House and Ma saw the bottle,\nshe knew what it meant. It said to her, \"Be ready!\" and she would not\nundress until she heard the cry, \"Run, Ma, run!\" Once she lay down to\nrest in her clothes for a whole month before word came, and then she\nsaved the life of a man.\n\nSometimes a quarrel arose so quickly, and the call was so sudden, that\nshe was not ready to go, and so she took a large sheet of paper and\nwrote anything on it that came to her mind, and after splashing some\nsealing-wax on it to make it look important, she sent it off by a swift\nrunner. None of the fighting men could read, and by the time they had\nfingered it and talked over it Ma appeared.\n\nShe liked best, however, to appeal to the good side of the chiefs, and\nget them to meet and reason and settle their affairs themselves. She\ncalled it the Jesus way; they called it the God-woman way; learned men\nwould call it \"the art of self-government.\"\n\nOn page 89 a picture is given of one of these palavers. It was in a\ngreen glade in the forest four miles away. The chiefs of the two tribes,\nwho sat opposite each other under coloured umbrellas, were dressed in\ngorgeous clothes and ringed round by armed men. Ma took her place\nbetween them and began to knit, for the natives love to talk, and she\nknew the palaver would be a long one. Besides, she never felt quite so\nnervous when she knitted. First one spoke and then another, and the long\nhours passed, and Ma's back began to ache, but still the talking went\non, and the excitement rose to fever-heat. Darkness fell with a rush,\nand torches were lit and threw a weird light on the scene.\n\n\"Enough!\" cried Ma. \"Come, let us end.\"\n\nAn old chief went over all that had been said, and Ma gave the verdict,\nwhich pleased both sides.\n\nThen, as was the custom, a warrior from each party stood forward, blood\nwas drawn from their hands and mixed with salt and pepper and corn; and\nhalf being given to one man and half to the other, they swallowed their\nportions at the same moment. This was the terrible blood covenant\nsealing the peace between tribes, and none ever dared to break it.\n\nThe sitting had lasted ten hours, and Ma was tired and hungry, but she\nwalked back in the moonlight feeling very happy.\n\nSo with a love that never wearied, with a patience that never gave in,\nwith a humour that never failed, Ma gradually put down the evil order of\nthings far and near. Year by year she grew in power, and from her house\nruled over thousands of people. She was really the Queen of Okoyong.\nThis was a marvellous thing, for at that time all the country belonged\nto chiefs, and they could do as they liked.\n\nBy and by a change came, and Britain took charge of the land and placed\nConsuls in the various districts. When Ma heard of it, she said: \"You\nmustn't send one here. If you do there will be trouble, for my people\nare proud and fierce, and will fight.\"\n\n\"Well, Miss Slessor,\" the Government replied, \"you know them best. Why\nnot do the work yourself?\"\n\nAnd she did. She became what Dr. Livingstone had been. He always wore a\nblue cap with a gold band to show that he was a British Consul. Ma did\nnot wear a hat, but she acted as a Consul, started a native court, and,\nlike Deborah of old, judged the people and guided them about the new\nlaws that were put into force. It was the first time in the history of\nour Empire that a woman had done such things. The result was all for\ngood. Wild and lawless as the people were, they obeyed Ma, and so the\nrule of Britain over them began in peace.\n\nMa always bore herself with queenly dignity, but she was really very\nhumble. She only did the work because she thought it was what Jesus\nwanted her to do. \"I am only a poor weak woman,\" she said, \"and not a\nQueen at all.\" The officials of the Government knew better; when they\nwent to visit her they were amazed at the power she held over the\npeople, and the deep respect and admiration they felt for her.\n\n\"She is a miracle,\" they exclaimed, \"this white Queen of Okoyong.\"\n\n[Illustration: AT A PALAVER.]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: SOME OKOYONG BAIRNS.]\n\nCHAPTER V\n\n    Ma's great love for children; her rescue of outcast twins from\n    death; the story of little Susie, the pet of the household; and\n    something about a new kind of birthday that came oftener than\n    once a year.\n\n\nMa's house at Ekenge was always like a big nursery.\n\nMothers are much the same all over the world, but in Africa they are\nvery ignorant and thoughtless, and do not know how to care for their\nchildren, while they believe so much in the strange customs of the\ncountry that things are done to the little ones which seem to us\nhard-hearted and cruel. It was worse in Ma's days, when most of the\npeople were still slaves.\n\nShe was always sorriest for the babies, they were so helpless, and the\nonly times she was really angry were when she saw them neglected or\nstarved or made drunk. Then she was like a tigress, and the people fled\nbefore her. \"Poor wee helpless things,\" she would say as she picked them\nup and thought of the way the white babies at home were cared for. She\nsaw in the tiniest babe one for whom Jesus died; and she loved them all,\nand washed them and nursed them, and sang to them day and night.\n\nThere was no cradle in the Mission House, but something better. Ma's bed\nwas in the middle of the room, and around it were hammocks slung to the\nroof, from each of which a cord was hung. In these were placed the\nbabies, and if any one became wakeful during the night and cried, she\nwould pull the string and set its hammock swinging, and soon the little\none was slumbering again. Sometimes she had to look after half a dozen\nor more at once, and two or three hammocks would be going at the same\ntime.\n\nWith many she had a hard struggle, but never grudged any trouble to make\nthem well. She would come home late after a long day's tramp in the\nforest, tired and hungry and sleepy, and send Janie to bed and stay up\nherself and tend the sick and suffering ones. You can fancy her there\nalone in the mud-house in the forest in the quiet hours of the night,\nbending over a wasted form, watching the pain in its eyes with tears in\nher own, giving it medicine, soothing it, and seeking to make it comfy,\nand beside her the pale dark shape of Death, with its grim smile,\nwaiting for another victim.\n\nMa sometimes won the child from the grave; sometimes she failed, and\nthen she was very sad. But she could not help it. The people believed\nthat sickness was caused by evil spirits, and most of the children that\ncame to her were already dying and beyond her love and skill. When they\nclosed their eyes she dressed them in a pinafore and put them in a box\ncovered with white flowers, and buried them in her children's cemetery.\n\nSome women who called at Ma's yard were gossiping about the day's\nmarketing, when one said it was funny that a baby should live after\nbeing five days and six nights in the bush.\n\n\"What's that?\" demanded Ma. \"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"Nothing, Ma. The girl baby that was thrown away because the mother is\ndead is still alive, for we heard her crying as we came along this\nmorning.\"\n\nMa jumped up and went flying to the spot. She found the waif on some\nwaste ground, terribly thin and eaten by insects and crying feebly.\nTaking her home Ma laid her in a big calabash and brooded over her with\ntender care, and by and by she recovered, and became healthy and pretty.\n\"The child of wonder,\" the people called her; but Ma named her Mary,\nafter herself, and she became one of her house-children, and stayed\nwith her until she married.\n\nTwins gave Ma the sorest time. The people believed that all sorts of\ntroubles would come to them if these were allowed to live. Ma laughed at\nthem.\n\n\"Twins are just like other children,\" she said; \"and if only you let\nthem grow up you will see for yourselves that there is no difference.\nLook at my bonnie Janie--she is a twin.\"\n\nBut it was no use. So the only thing for her to do was to save the\nlittle mites before they could be murdered. It was Eme Ete who told her\nwhen twins came, and when she got the secret message she dropped the\nwork she was doing and made swiftly for the spot. Sometimes they were\nalready dead and thrown away in pots, and the mother driven into the\nbackwoods. If she were in time she took the infants home and nursed them\nand guarded them from the father and relatives, who usually tried to\nsteal and destroy them.\n\nOne day she saved twins in her own village, and took them into the\nMission House and put them in her bed. The people were alarmed, and said\nthat dreadful things would happen. Chief Edem kept away. \"I cannot go\nany more to my Mother's house,\" he groaned; \"no, never any more.\" No one\nspoke to her. Mothers kept their children out of her way. She was sad\nand sorrowful, but she would not give in, for she knew she was doing\nright.\n\nOne of the twins died, but the other grew and waxed strong. The people\nliked their Ma so much that they, too, were unhappy at the cloud that\nhad fallen between, and at last they began to make friends.\n\n\"Ma, forgive us,\" they said humbly. \"We have not been taught right. Let\nyour heart warm to us again.\"\n\nSo the shadow passed away. What cheered Ma most of all was that the\nfather of the twin carried it home, and took back the mother, which\nshowed that the old stupid notion was beginning to die.\n\n[Illustration: IYE.]\n\nAnother day there was a great uproar. Twins had come to a slave woman,\ncalled Iye, about five miles off. Ma met her in the forest carrying the\ninfants in a box on her head, a howling mob of men and women hounding\nher on. They had destroyed all her property and torn up her clothes. Ma\ntook the box, because no one would touch it, and helped the poor mother\nalong to the Mission House. They could not go by the usual path, as the\nvillagers would not have used it afterwards, so they had to wait in the\nhot sun until another lane was cut.\n\nThe boy twin was dead, but the girl was alive, and with care became\nplump and strong. She was a bonnie child with a fair skin and sweet\nways, and she became the pet of the household. Ma called her Susie,\nafter her elder sister, and loved her as much as if she had been her\nown. Even the mother, after she got well and went away, sometimes came\nback to see her, and was proud of her good looks.\n\nFourteen months passed. One day Janie went upstairs to put a child to\nsleep, and asked Mana, one of the girls, to look after Susie, as she was\nfull of play and mischief. Mana took her, and while getting the tea\nready, placed a jug of boiling water on the floor for a moment. Susie,\nbabylike, seized it and spilt the water over her bare body. She was\ndreadfully scalded. Ma was frantic, and for a fortnight scarcely let her\nout of her arms. Often the child smiled up in her face and held up her\nwee hand to be kissed. Ma at last carried her down to Creek Town, and\nwoke up the doctor there at midnight in the hope that something more\ncould be done. But the shock and wounds had been too severe, and when Ma\ngot back the bright life of the queen of the household flickered and\nwent out.\n\nMa's grief was pitiful, and made even the people wonder. \"See how she\nloved her,\" they said one to another. They came and mourned with her,\nand stood by at the burial. Susie was robed in white, with her own\nstring of beads round her neck, and a white flower in her hand.\n\nIt was very lonesome for Ma afterwards. \"My heart aches for my darling,\"\nshe wrote. \"Oh, the empty place and the silence and the vain longing for\nthe sweet voice and the soft caress and the funny ways. Oh, Susie!\nSusie!\"\n\nHer heart went out towards Iye, the slave mother, and by and by she\nbought her for L10 and made her free, and she remained in the Mission\nHouse, a faithful worker, and a great help to Ma and those who came\nafter her.\n\nAll the stories of Ma's adventures with twins cannot be told, because\nshe had to do with hundreds of them, but this is one which shows what\nshe had often to go through.\n\nOne afternoon when she was busy teaching in the school, a message was\nthrown suddenly at her from the door.\n\n\"Ma! come, twins.\"\n\n\"Where?\" she asked.\n\n\"Twelve miles away in the bush, and the mother is very ill.\"\n\nMa went to the door and looked up. \"There is going to be a storm,\" she\nsaid, \"and I have a sickly baby to look after and night will soon be\nhere, but--come along, Janie, we'll go.\"\n\nDarkness fell ere they reached the spot, and the stars were hidden\nbehind clouds, and they could hardly see a yard in front.\n\nThey found the woman lying unconscious on the ground. One of the\ninfants was dead, and Janie dug a hole and buried it. Ma ordered the\nhusband and his slave to make a stretcher, which they did very\nunwillingly. Then she placed the woman on it and bade them carry her.\nStill more unwillingly, and grumbling all the time--for they dreaded\nto touch a twin-mother--they obeyed. Janie lifted the living twin, and\nall set forth by the light of a piece of fire-stick glowing at the\nend. This went out, and they stumbled along in the dense darkness. At\nlast they stopped. They had lost themselves. The men laid down their\nburden and went off to grope for a trail, and Ma and Janie were alone\nin the eerie forest with the moaning form at their feet.\n\n\"Oh, Ma, they may not come back,\" cried Janie.\n\n\"Well, my lassie, we'll just bide where we are until morning.\"\n\nA shining ghostly thing leapt about in the darkness. Janie's heart went\nto her mouth. But it was only the men back with a torch made of palm\ntassel and oil which they had got from a hut. They went on again.\n\nWhen the Mission yard was reached the men were so tired that they fell\ndown and went to sleep at once. Ma, too, was tired, but her work was\nnot done. She got a hammer and nails and some sheets of iron and\nknocked up a little lean-to, in which she put the woman and nursed her\nback to consciousness, and fed and comforted her. Then, utterly worn\nout, she just lay down where she was in her soiled and damp clothes, and\nfell sound asleep.\n\nThe baby died next day, and the mother grew worse, and there was no\nhope. She was sore in spirit as well as in body, and sorrowed for her\nfate and the loss of her husband's love. Ma soothed her, and told her\nshe was going to a better world, where no one would be angry with her\nfor being a twin-mother.\n\nWhen she passed away the people would not touch or come near her, and so\nMa did all that was needful herself, and placed her in a coffin, and\nthen the husband and his slave bore her away and buried her in a lonely\nspot in the bush.\n\nPoor twin-mothers of Africa!\n\nThough Ma did not save very many of the twin-children that passed\nthrough her hands, she did a great work by making the people realise how\nfoolish and sinful a thing it was to be afraid of them and kill them.\n\nThe household had grown and grown. We know about Janie and Mary, both\ntrickified and bright little maidens. Then there was Mana, a faithful\nand affectionate lassie. One day, in her own country, she had gone to\nthe spring for water, and was seized by two men and brought to Okoyong\nand sold to Eme Ete, who gave her to Ma. Wee Annie was there also, very\nshy and timid, but a good nurse. Her parents had stolen and eaten a dog\nin the bush, and there was much trouble, and the mother died, and Annie\nwould have been buried in the grave had not Ma taken her. Six other boys\nand girls with sad stories also lived in the Mission House, so that Ma\noften felt she was like the old woman who lived in a shoe, and who had\nso many children she didn't know what to do.\n\nIt was not easy for her to keep in stock the food and medicine and\nclothes that were needed for the family, and sometimes she would run out\nof things. Once, when she was short of tins of milk, she strapped a baby\non her back and tramped down the forest trail to Creek Town, got what\nshe wanted, and patiently tramped back again.\n\nAnother time she was watching some women who were imprisoned within a\nstockade and were going to be killed, and as she could not leave the\nplace Janie handed her cups of tea through the fence. Suddenly a tornado\ncame on and flooded the Mission House and soaked all the clothes. Ma\nherself was wet to the skin. To add to her trouble Janie came and said,\n\"Ma, we have no milk, and the baby is crying for some.\"\n\n\"Well, Janie, I'll just have to trot to Creek Town for it. I'll get\nsome dry clothes too. Put the baby in a basket.\"\n\nSlipping out in the darkness, and taking a woman to help to carry the\nbaby, she set forth. They lost their way in the rain, and wandered\nhither and thither, and only reached the town at the dawning of the day.\nMa roused one of the ladies of the Mission, obtained the milk and a\nchange of clothes, and lay down for a little sleep. Hearing that she had\ncome, King Eyo got his canoe ready, and sent her back by the river. Her\nabsence from the stockade had not been noticed, and she was able later\nto settle the trouble without bloodshed.\n\nThere were plenty of merry days in the home-life of Ekenge. Wherever\ngirls are gathered together there is sure to be fun and laughter, and Ma\nhad always the heart and will of a girl for jokes and mischief. She\ncould not take her bairns into lighted streets or gay shops, or to\nplaces of amusement, for there was none of these things in the bush, but\nsometimes she gave them a holiday, and a special tea, and gifts.\nPerhaps, however, the most delightful treat they had was when a box\narrived from across the sea.\n\nAll over Scotland loving hearts were thinking of Ma, and loving hands\nwere working for her; and clothing, books, pictures, and knick-knacks\nwere being collected and packed in boxes and sent out addressed to her\nin Okoyong. The Sunday School children also had their thoughts on the\nMission, and gave their pennies and halfpennies to it just as Ma herself\nhad done when a little girl. About this time they gathered up enough\nmoney to build a steel steamer for use on the inland rivers and creeks,\nand it was now plying up and down, carrying mails and parcels and\nmissionaries. It was called the _David Williamson_, after a minister of\nthe Church who visited Calabar, but the natives named it the _Smoking\nCanoe_.\n\n[Illustration: THE _DAVID WILLIAMSON_.]\n\nYou can imagine the excitement at the Mission House at Ekenge when a\nhalf-naked messenger, his dark body perspiring and glistening in the\nsun, appeared, and cried:\n\n\"Ma, the _Smoking Canoe_ is at the beach.\"\n\n\"Ho-ho! gifts from Makara land,\" sang half a dozen throats. \"Oh, Ma,\nwhen can we go? Let us go now.\"\n\nMa was as excited as the rest, so off went men, women, and children,\nstreaming along the path to the river, where the _David Williamson_ lay.\n\nAs the boxes were usually too heavy to be carried, they were opened up\non the beach and the contents made into parcels. These the natives\nbalanced on their heads and went off, a long file of them, through the\nforest to Ekenge.\n\nSometimes it needed a second and a third journey before all the goods\nwere together again.\n\nWhat a delight it was to Ma to open the packages! What cries of rapture\ncame from the children and the people looking on as they saw all the\nthings that were to them so wonderful and beautiful.\n\nThere were print garments by the dozens, woollen articles, caps,\nscarves, handkerchiefs, towels, ribbons and braids, thimbles, needles\nand pins, beads, buttons, reels, spoons, knives, scrap-books,\npicture-books and cards, texts, pens, and a host of other things. It was\nalmost with awe that the women touched the pretty baby-clothes, and the\nmen clapped their hands as Ma held up a blue or scarlet gown or jacket.\n\nThe dolls were looked upon as gods, and Ma would not give them away in\ncase they were worshipped: she kept the prettily dressed ones to teach\nthe women and girls how clothes were made and how they were worn. Some\ncommon things, which children at home would not value, they treasured.\nWhen Janie was handed a penwiper, \"Oh, Ma,\" she said reproachfully,\n\"wipe a dirty pen with that? No, no.\" And she put it up on the wall as\nan ornament!\n\nOne old woman was given a copy of the picture \"The Light of the World.\"\n\"Oh,\" she cried in joy, \"I shall never be lonely any more!\"\n\nIf you had watched Ma closely when she was opening the packages, you\nwould have seen that she was seeking for something with a quick and\nimpatient eye. When at last she found what she wanted she gave a shout\nof triumph. Tins of home-made toffee and chocolate! They were always\nthere, for every one knew she liked sweets. When at home she used to ask\nthat these might be sent out, because the bush bairns were fond of them,\nbut her friends just laughed in her face. \"Miss Slessor,\" they would\nsay, \"you can eat as many as the bairns!\" \"Of course I can,\" she\nconfessed.\n\nAfter the children had looked at all the gifts Ma would tell them where\nthey came from, and would kneel down and thank Jesus for putting it into\nthe hearts of the givers in Scotland to care for His forlorn black folk\nin Africa.\n\nThen Ma said, \"Away to bed, bairns. But oh, hasn't it been grand? It's\njust been like a birthday. Many happy returns!\"\n\nMa did not give all the things away. A brilliant gown might go to the\nchief as a gift--and he would sit proudly in Court with it and be\nadmired and envied by all,--or a flannelette garment to some poor and\naged woman to keep her warm during the shivery fog season; but as a rule\nMa liked the people to work for what they got, or to pay something for\nthem. Thus she taught them to want clothes and other things, and showed\nthem how to get them, and in this way she was a real Empire builder. She\nused to say that there was no truer or more successful Empire maker than\nthe missionary.\n\n[Illustration: OPENING ONE OF THE BOXES FROM SCOTLAND.]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: MA'S HOUSE AT AKPAP.]\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\n    How the Queen of Okoyong brought a high British official to talk\n    to the people; how she left her nice home and went to live in a\n    little shed; how she buried a chief at midnight; how she took\n    four black girls to Scotland, and afterwards spent three very\n    lonely years in the forest.\n\n\nThe tribes in some of the out-of-the-way places were apt to forget that\nBritish law was now the law of the land, and go back to the old habits\nthat were so deep-rooted in their nature. Ma often threatened that she\nwould have to make them feel the power that stood behind her. Once, when\nthe land of a widow was stolen, she asked the people whether they would\nhave the case judged by God's law or by the Consul and a gun? After a\nwhile they said, \"Iko Abasi--God's word.\"\n\nMa opened her Bible and read: \"Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour's\nlandmark--that is God's law\"; and the land was returned to the woman.\n\nThen a chief died, and the blame was laid on one who was innocent. As a\ntornado was blowing, Ma could not visit the district, but she sent a\nmessage:\n\n\"I'll come and see about it when the rain goes off.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes,\" the people grumbled, \"and when she comes she won't allow us\nto give the prisoners the bean. Let us take away the man and hide him.\"\n\nAnd they hurried him to a spot deep in the forest beyond her reach.\n\nMa was vexed, and she was ill and tired. \"I am not going to hunt for\nthem this time,\" she said quietly. \"They must learn to obey the law, and\nI will give them a lesson.\"\n\nSo she wrote to the Government at Duke Town, asking them to send up some\none to deal with the matter, and she took the letter herself to the\nbeach, and dispatched it by a special canoe.\n\nNothing can be hidden in negroland, and the news of what she had done\nsoon reached the disobedient people. They came out of the forest in as\ngreat a hurry as they went in, and rushed to the Mission House.\n\n\"Where is Ma? We want Ma.\"\n\n\"Ma,\" said Janie crossly, \"is away for the Consul. I hope he will bring\na big gun with him. It's time. You are killing her with your silly\nways.\"\n\nThey went back sorrowful and alarmed, for a big gun meant ruined homes\nand crops, and many arrests, and imprisonment down at the coast. When\nthey saw Ma later, they begged her to ask the Consul to come with\nthoughts of peace and not of war.\n\n\"Good,\" she replied, \"and we shall have a proper big palaver about all\nyour bad customs.\"\n\nWhen the Government official with his guard of soldiers arrived, he was\namused to find the Queen of Okoyong sitting bareheaded on the roof of\nher house repairing a leak. She came down, and they had a palaver with\nthe chiefs and people, who promised not to do any more killing at\nfunerals, and not to murder twins.\n\nMa shrugged her shoulders. \"They will promise anything,\" she told the\nofficials. \"I'll have to keep a close eye on them all the same.\"\n\nShe did; and as they broke their word she brought up the Consul-General\nhimself, Sir Claude Macdonald. He spoke kindly, but firmly, to the\nchiefs.\n\n\"The laws are made for your good and safety and peace, and if you do not\nobey them you will be punished.\"\n\nThey agreed to all he said. \"Sir, when words are spoken once, we don't\nmind them; but when they are spoken twice, we obey.\"\n\nMa also addressed them, telling of the blessings that would follow\nobedience, and of the quiet and happy days they would enjoy long after\nshe had gone.\n\n\"Ma! Ma!\" they cried in alarm, \"you must not leave us! You are our\nMother, and we are your children. God must not take you from us until we\nare able to walk by ourselves.\"\n\nAfter that things were better, though Ma's life did not grow less hard.\nIndeed, it was more stirring than ever. For various reasons her people\nwere leaving their huts and building new ones at a place called Akpap,\nand Ma had to shut up the Mission and go with them.\n\nThe only house she could find to live in was a little shed like a\ntwo-stalled stable, or one of the sheep-houses you see on the Scottish\nhills, with a mud floor and no windows. But she did not mind. She always\nthought of her Master, who had not a place to lay His head. So she put\nher boxes in one end, and in the other she lived and slept with the\nchildren.\n\nIt was a grand play-ground for rats, lizards, ants, beetles, and other\njumping and creeping things. At night the rats ran over Ma, and played\nhide-and-seek in the roof. Once, when Mr. Ovens arrived to do some\ncarpentry work, he went to wash himself in the shed. In the dimness he\nfelt what he thought was a sponge floating in the basin, and saying Ma\nwas surely getting dainty, he used it for his face, only to find that it\nwas a drowned rat!\n\nFrom this lowly hut, as from a palace, Ma continued to rule Okoyong.\n\nSoon a strange disease seized her new lot of babies, and four died from\nit. Then smallpox, that dreadful scourge, swept through the land, and so\nmany of her people were carried off that they lay unburied in their\nhuts. Ma was busy from dawn till dark, and often from dark again till\ndawn, vaccinating the well ones, and nursing the ill and the dying.\n\nTo her great grief her old friend, Chief Edem, caught the disease. In\nspite of his faults, which, after all, were the faults of his African\nupbringing, he had been very good to her, and she was grateful for all\nhe had done. When she reached his hut at Ekenge there was no one with\nhim, for as soon as a man or a woman was stricken all others fled. She\nfought the disease through long weary hours, but was not able to save\nhim, and he died in the middle of the night. Tired as she was, and weak\nfrom lack of sleep, and alone, she felt that she could not let him lie\nlike that. Going out she got some wood and made a coffin. Then in the\ndarkness she dug a grave and buried him. There was no dancing and\ndrinking and killing as this chief of Okoyong entered the spirit-land,\nonly the faint noises of the forest, and the stillness of the starry\nsky, and a woman's mute prayer. When all was done she dragged her\nwearied body back in the cool of the dewy dawn to Akpap.\n\nWas it a wonder that she began to lose her strength? Fevers laid her\nlow, and illnesses, due to lack of good food, weakened her. She could\nscarcely crawl about. Yet she would not give in, and bravely drudged\naway at her work. At last the other missionaries said, \"Ma, if you don't\ngo home, you will die.\" She did not want to die: she wanted to live, and\ndo much more for Jesus. \"If,\" she said, \"a holiday will help me, I will\ngo. But what shall I do with my girls? I cannot leave Janie, Mary,\nAlice, and Maggie here. If I go I must take them with me.\"\n\nHer friends were astonished.\n\n\"How can you take four black girls to Scotland, and you so ill, Ma? It\nis impossible.\"\n\n\"God can do impossible things,\" she replied in simple faith. \"He will\nkeep me and take care of them.\"\n\n\"What about your clothes?\" they asked.\n\n\"We have none but the old things we have on: the ants have eaten up the\nrest. But God will provide what we need.\"\n\nSure enough, when they went to Duke Town a box arrived from a Glasgow\nchurch, and in it was all the nice warm clothing they required.\n\nIt was the same everywhere. Kindness fell on her like sunshine. At\nLiverpool she handed her purse to a railway porter, and he bought the\ntickets and fixed them up in a carriage. And at Edinburgh there was a\nfaithful friend, Mrs. M'Crindle, on the platform, waiting to take the\nwhole family to her home in Joppa.\n\n\"Isn't God good to me?\" she often said, with a happy smile.\n\n[Illustration: ALICE, MARY, MAGGIE, JANIE.]\n\nThe four African foundlings were stared at by the rosy-cheeked boys and\ngirls, who, however, were kind to them when they heard their sad\nstories. None except Janie knew a word of English, but they were all\nclever, and soon picked it up, and Mary even went to school in\nPortobello.\n\nAfter a happy time Ma took a house of her own at Seton Mill, where she\ngot a glimpse of the sea, and here they all lived as in Africa, Janie\nbeing cook, and Ma going about often bare of foot and bare of head. But\nlife in Scotland is not like what it is in the wilds of the Tropics, and\nMa was sometimes found shivering over the fire. So a fairy godmother, in\nthe shape of Miss Adam, a lady of the Church who loved her, carried them\noff to a lovely village in the south called Bowden, where they stayed\nall July and August.\n\nA little girl named Happy Gray, who was staying with Miss Adam, grew\nvery friendly with the children, and together they wandered through the\nfields and woods, gathering flowers and raspberries, or climbed the\nEildon Hills. They taught Happy how to burst \"cape gooseberries\" on the\nback of her hand, and showed her that when they gathered nettles they\ndid not feel any sting. With her they drove to Stitchel Manse, where\nthey ate apple tarts in the summer-house, and also went to St. Mary's\nLoch, the four black faces being a wonder to all the people in the\ncountryside.\n\nAfter a time Ma left this haunt of peace to go and speak at meetings,\nfor she was a famous person now, and every one was eager to see and hear\nthe wonderful pioneer who lived alone amongst savages. She was very shy,\nand would not open her mouth if men were listening, and if any one began\nto praise her she would run away. It was always the work she spoke\nabout, and the need for more women and girls to go out and help.\n\nOnce in Edinburgh she was coaxed to address a meeting in the Synod Hall.\n\"I dinna ken how I'm to do it,\" she said to a friend. \"You'll pray for\nme? Where will you sit?\" Her friend said, \"In the gallery.\" \"I'll look\nfor you, and ken you are praying, and that will help.\"\n\nAnd, as usual, she spoke well. By and by many students of the Church\nCollege came creeping in under the gallery and listened, and she did not\nseem to mind, but appealed to them too, saying, \"There are many\nstudents who are ready, and making ready, to serve Jesus, and to tell\nabout Him, and they will be running after fine churches and good manses,\nbut there are multitudes who have never heard of Jesus out yonder. And\nfor His sake will they not come out and work for Him there?\"\n\nSometimes she spoke of the good of prayer. \"If you are ever inclined to\npray for a missionary, do it at once, wherever you are,\" she said;\n\"perhaps she may be in great peril at the moment. Once I had to deal\nwith a crowd of warlike men in the compound, and I got strength to face\nthem because I felt that some one was praying for me just then.\"\n\nAt another meeting, when Mary with her bright happy face was with her,\nshe told the young people how to be real ladies and gentlemen. \"It is\nnot,\" she said, \"the wearing of fine clothes, or the possession of great\nwealth, but having gentle manners and kind consideration for the\nfeelings and happiness of others--not the giving of our money or the\ndenying of ourselves of small luxuries to help the coming of the\nKingdom, but the cheerful daily giving of ourselves for the good of\nothers at home and abroad.\"\n\nShe was most at home with children, and at her best at the tea-table, or\nwhen she curled herself up on the rug in front of the fire. Then came\nfearsome stories that made them tremble--true stories of what she had\nseen and done in dark Okoyong.\n\n\"Oh, mother,\" the children would say when being tucked in bed, \"how can\nMiss Slessor live alone like that with wild men and wild beasts and\neverything?\"\n\n\"Ah,\" was the soft reply, \"she does it because she loves Jesus, and\nwants to help Him. I wonder, now, if you could love Him as much as\nthat?\"\n\nAnd the little minds in the little heads that were snuggling down\namongst the comfy pillows also wondered.\n\nMa was a puzzle to the grown-ups, too, for they saw that she was not\nonly very shy but very timid. Some small girls had more courage than\nshe. She would not cross a field that had a cow in it: she was nervous\nin the streets, and usually got some one to take her across from side to\nside. She had not even the nerve to put up her hand to stop a car: she\nwould take one only if it were standing. She shook when in a boat or\nsitting behind a fast horse.\n\nWhy was she afraid in this way? Just because these things happened to\nherself. In big things, where the cause of Jesus was in danger, or\nothers were to be protected and saved from hurt, she forgot her own\nfeelings, and thought only what was to be done, and was braver and\nstronger even than men. Her heart was so loving that she was willing to\ndie in the service of Jesus. You remember what He said, \"Greater love\nhath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.\"\nThat was her kind of love--the kind which Jesus Himself had for the\nworld, which made Him do so much for us, and which led Him at last to\nHis awful agony on the Cross.\n\nShe should have stayed a year, but when the winter came on with grey,\ncold, weeping skies, she and the bairns missed the sunshine and heat.\nAh! and she was always thinking of the work to be done in Africa. To her\nfriends who pressed her to stay, she said, \"If ye dinna send me back,\nI'll swim back. Do you no ken that away out there they're dying without\nJesus?\" So they set sail and spent Christmas Day at sea.\n\nWhat a reception they got at Akpap! \"Everything will be right now,\" the\npeople said, \"Ma is back.\" And once more she became the sovereign lady\nof Okoyong.\n\nThe next three years were the loneliest and worst she ever spent in the\nforest. She was never once down in Calabar, few white persons came to\nsee her, and she had a big battle to fight with ill-health. There was\nnot a day that she did not suffer weakness and pain: for whole nights\nshe never slept, for months she was low with fever, and at times she\nbelieved she was going to die. Think what it must have been for her to\nlie there alone, tended only by her black girls. But she was never in\nthe dumps. Somehow her spirit always managed to conquer her body, and\nshe would struggle up and with a droll smile and a stout heart go on\nwith her work. Nobody knew all she did in those years, for the story is\nhidden behind a veil of silence; only now and again we get a glimpse of\nher, lit up for a moment, as by a flash of lightning, and she is always\nbravely fighting for Jesus and the right, now hurrying to rescue twins\nand orphans, now sallying out to some village to put down the drinking,\nnow travelling far to save life.\n\n[Illustration: MA MENDING THE ROOF ON SUNDAY.]\n\nWhen she was not doing these things she was busy about her own doors.\nShe had now a new house with a room underneath, and here she taught the\nday-school and held services and Bible classes and preached on Sundays.\nAnd there were always the Court and the palavers and the dispensary and\nthe building and repairing and cooking and digging and a hundred and one\nother duties. So absorbed, indeed, did she get in what she was doing\nthat often, as in the early days at home, she lost count of time.\nSometimes she did not know what day of the week it was. Sundays had a\nhabit of getting mixed up with other days. Once she was found holding\nher services on a Monday thinking it was Sunday, and again on a Sunday\nshe was discovered on the roof hammering away in the belief that it was\nMonday.\n\nShe ruled with a firm but kindly hand. The hard and terrible times she\nhad come through had changed her a little. She had still the old\nsweetness, but she could be stern, and even rough, with the people, and\nshe often spoke to them in a way which a white man would not have dared\nto do. Those who were brought up to Court for harming women she punished\nseverely. If any chief challenged what she said, she would take off the\nslipper she had put on as part of her simple Court dress, and slap him\nover the bare shoulder with it.\n\nYet she was never afraid. She went about alone by day and night, and\nnever carried a weapon. She had no locks on her doors. Once a murderer\nwas caught and nearly torn to pieces by the mob before he was chained\nand brought to Ma to be judged. She heard the evidence, and ordered him\nto be sent down to Duke Town for trial. Then she took off his irons, and\nsent away the guard, and bade him come into the house, where she sat\ndown and talked to him earnestly for a long time. He was a big man,\nviolent and sullen, and he could easily have knocked her down and\nescaped into the woods. But he listened quietly, and allowed her to lead\nhim to the room below, where she fastened him in for the night.\n\nOnly once in all the years she spent in Okoyong was she struck, and that\nwas by accident. There was a quarrel and a fight, and she went into the\npress of excited men to stop them. One of the sticks hit her. A cry of\nhorror arose:\n\n\"Ma is hurt! Our Ma is hurt!\"\n\nBoth sides at once fell on the wretched man who held the stick, and\nbegan to beat him to death.\n\n\"Stop, stop!\" Ma cried. \"He did not mean to do it.\"\n\nAnd it was only by using all her strength and forcing them back that she\nsaved his life.\n\nAnd so the years wore on, and the new century came. \"A new century,\"\nsaid Ma, sitting dreaming in her lonely little house. \"What will it\nhold? It will at least hold His loving kindness and care all the way\nthrough, and that is enough.\"\n\nFor fifteen long patient years Ma gave her life to Okoyong, and she had\nher reward, for it became a land of peace and order and good will, the\nbad old customs died away, and the people were slowly but surely\nbecoming the disciples of Jesus.\n\nIt was a wonderful thing for a white woman to have done alone, but Ma\nwould not take any credit for it; she said it was no power of her own\nthat had won her such a place in the heart of the wild people: it was\nthe power of Jesus working in her and through her. _He_ was the King of\nOkoyong, and she was only His humble servant-maid.\n\n[Illustration: JANIE.]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: THE LILY-COVERED ENYONG CREEK.]\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n    Tells of a country of mystery and a clever tribe who were\n    slave-hunters and cannibals, and how they were fought and\n    defeated by Government soldiers; how Ma went amongst them,\n    sailing through fairyland, and how she began to bring them to\n    the feet of Jesus.\n\n\nOn some quiet summer day you may have been wandering through a country\nlane when you suddenly felt a whiff of perfume, fresh and sweet, and\nwondered where it could have come from. You looked about, but there was\nnothing save a tangle of green wood. You searched the hedges, and went\ndown to the brown stream below the bridge and along its banks. The\nfragrance was still scenting the air, now strong, now faint, but you\ncould not find its source. Then suddenly you came upon it--a sweetbriar\nbush, hidden away in a lonely and lowly spot.\n\nMa Slessor was like this modest briar bush. The influence of her\ngoodness spread far and near, and the fame of her doings reached peoples\nwho lived hundreds of miles away. They said to one another, \"Let us go\nand see this wonderful White Mother\"; and they left their villages and\ntravelled through forests and across wide rivers and creeks, risking\ncapture and death at the hands of hostile tribes, to seek her advice and\nhelp. Some of these visitors spoke languages Ma did not understand, and\nthey had to talk to one another in signs. Chiefs in districts she had\nnever heard of sent her messages: \"Oh, Great White Mother, come and\ndwell with us, and we will be God-men.\" Escaped slaves from cannibal\nregions, who had been doomed to be eaten, fled to her for refuge. All\nreceived from her a kind welcome and food, and, best of all, had a talk\nabout the Divine Chief who was to be the real Saviour of Africa.\n\nThere were other visitors to Okoyong she liked less, slave-dealers from\nbeyond the Cross River, who brought women and girls to sell. A slow fire\nof rage had long been burning in Ma's heart against this cruel system,\nand sometimes it burst into fierce flame. She would hear a sound of\nbitter sobbing, and go out to see a string of naked little girls being\ndriven forwards by a man carrying brass rods on his head--the money\nwhich the natives use. She would be so angry that she would shake her\nfist at the trader and storm at him, but he would only grin and ask her\nwhich girl she wanted, and would then describe their good points just as\nif they had been so many fowls or goats. Sometimes there would be sick\nones, or ones suffering from ill-treatment, and these the dealers would\nleave, and she would nurse them back to health, though she was always\nvery unwilling to let them go again into the awful whirlpool of\nslave-life.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nShe knew many of the dealers quite well, and often had long talks with\nthem about the mysterious country from which they came. Whitemen had not\nyet entered into the heart of it, but Ma learnt enough to be sure that\nit was a far more wicked place even than Okoyong had been. It was called\nIboland, and one of the tribes, the Aros, were so cunning and clever\nthat they had become a power over a vast region. It was they who were\nthe slave-stealers, seeking their victims everywhere, and selling them\nin markets to the traders. One of their best hunting-grounds was Ibibio,\nthe country to the south, where the natives were poor and naked and\nmiserable, and lived in little settlements deep in the forest, because\nof their fear of the slave raiders.\n\n[Illustration: THE WAY INTO THE JUJU GLEN.]\n\nThe Aros believed that they had a wonderful _chuku_ or juju--which means\nthe god of the Aros--in a rocky gorge down which a stream flowed. At one\nspot there was a dark ravine and a pool overhung by trees and creepers.\nHere, amongst the white lilies, swam ugly cat-fish, with fierce-looking\neyes, that were held to be sacred, and which it was death to catch. On a\nlittle island was a hut, guarded by priests, in which the juju was\nsupposed to live. The people thought it could aid them in time of\ntrouble, and came in great numbers to the shrine to ask advice and get\ntheir quarrels made up. Though the priests helped many in this way, they\nwere cunning and greedy, and often acted very cruelly. They took the\nfood and money which the visitors brought, and then said the juju\nwanted a living offering. So some poor man or woman was taken into the\nglen blindfolded, and the friends of the victim knew that the sacrifice\nwas made by seeing the blood flowing past lower down.\n\nOthers who entered never came out again. The priests said they had been\nseized by the juju, and the blood-red river seemed to show this, but a\ndye had been thrown in to colour the water. These persons were taken far\naway in secret, and sold into slavery. Any that were not of much value\nwere slain and eaten in the cannibal feasts.\n\nNow that Ma's dream of conquering Okoyong had come true, she was\ndreaming other dreams, and the most fascinating of these was to go to\nthis terrible cannibal country and put down the evil doings of the\nnatives. She told the slave-dealers about it.\n\n\"All right, Ma,\" they said, for they liked her, and admired her courage.\n\"We, who know you, will be glad to welcome you; but we are not sure\nabout the priests--they may kill you.\"\n\n\"I will risk that,\" she said; \"as soon as I can get away from here you\nwill see me.\"\n\nIn order to find out more about the tribes, she sometimes went far up\nthe Cross River in a canoe, stopping wherever she could get shelter. On\none of her journeys, when she had some of the house-children with her,\nthe canoe was attacked by a huge hippopotamus. It rushed at the canoe,\nand tried to overthrow it. The men thrust their paddles down its throat\nand beat it, but it kept savagely nosing and gripping the frail vessel.\nGreat was the excitement. Its jaws were snapping, the water was in a\nwhirl of foam, the men were shouting and laying about them with their\npaddles, the girls were screaming, Ma was sometimes praying and\nsometimes giving orders. At last the canoe was swung clear, and paddled\nswiftly away.\n\nThe story of this adventure is still told in Calabar, and if you ask\nDan, one of Ma's children, about it, he will say, \"Once, when Ma was\ntravelling in a canoe, she was attacked by hippopotamuses, but when they\nlooked inside the canoe and saw her, they all ran away!\"\n\nWhat Ma saw and heard made her all a-quiver to go into these strange\nlands, but she would not leave the Okoyong people until some one came to\ntake her place. The Mission had no other lady to send, and so she could\nonly watch and pray and wait.\n\nMatters became worse. The Aros hated the white rule, and would not\nsubmit to it. They tried to prevent the Government opening up their\ncountry to order and justice and peace, and would not allow the\nofficials to enter it; they blocked the river so that no white vessel,\nor native one either, could pass; they went on with their slave-hunting\nand cannibalism. At last the Government lost patience. \"We must teach\nthem a lesson,\" they said. So a warning went to all the missionaries\nalong the banks of the river to come down to Calabar at once. Ma Slessor\ndid not like the order. \"Everything is peaceful in Okoyong,\" she said.\n\"My people won't fight.\" The Government said they knew that, but her\nlife was too precious to risk, and they sent a special steamer for her\nand the children.\n\nWhen she came she found several companies of soldiers, with many\nquick-firing guns, already moving up the river. They landed in the Aro\ncountry, and marched through swamps and attacked the hosts of natives\nwho had gathered to bar their way, and defeated them. Still, the bushmen\nwould not give in, and the soldiers had many a weary time in the\ntrackless forests. At Arochuku they went down the gorge to the juju\nhouse, at the door of which they found a white goat starving to death.\nMany human skulls and cooking-pots lying about told a gruesome tale. The\nplace continued to be the scene of wicked ceremonies, and was at last\nblown up with dynamite.\n\nMa was sorry she had not gone to Iboland before the soldiers, because\nshe felt that if she had done so she might have saved all the fighting\nand bloodshed. Now that a way had been blazed into the country, she was\nmore than ever eager and impatient to go.\n\n\"The Gospel should have been the first to enter,\" she said; \"but since\nthe sword and gun are before us, we must follow at once.\"\n\n[Illustration]\n\nSo while carrying on the work at Akpap, she began to explore and look\nout for some place that would do for an outpost. One day she left Akpap,\ntaking with her the slave-girl Mana, who now knew English and her Bible\nwell, and a bright boy called Esien, and tramped to the Cross River,\nwhere she boarded a canoe and paddled slowly upstream. By and by she\ncame to another smaller river on the west, which seemed to run far into\nthe interior between Ibo and Ibibio, and there she landed on a beach at\nthe foot of a hill. This was Itu, a famous place, for it was here that\none of the greatest slave-markets in West Africa used to be held, and it\nwas down this side river, the Enyong Creek, that the slaves were brought\nin canoes, to be sold and sent over the country, or shipped abroad to\nthe West Indies or America.\n\n\"A good place to begin,\" Ma said; and she landed and climbed up the\nsteep bank to the top, where she had a beautiful view over the shining\nriver and the green land. \"Oh, yes,\" she repeated, \"a bonnie place to\nbegin.\"\n\nOnce more she lived the gipsy life. She opened a school, made Mana and\nEsien the teachers, and started to build a church. The people, who had\nso long trembled in the shadow of slavery, were so pleased that they did\nall they could to help her, and the children of the village tumbled over\none another in their eagerness to \"learn book.\"\n\nWhen she left for Akpap again the chiefs gave her the gift of a black\ngoat, and she tied a piece of string to it and led it to the beach,\nwhere the Mission boat picked her up and took her down to the\nlanding-place for Okoyong. She was bareheaded and barefooted, but in\nhigh spirits at the success of her trip, and she went away gaily into\nthe forest, leading her goat and singing:\n\n    Mary had a little lamb,\n    Its fleece was white as snow!\n\nMana did a wonderful work at Itu: she taught the women and girls to read\nand sew, held prayers in the chief's yard every night, and preached on\nSunday; and just because she loved Jesus, and tried to be like Ma, she\nsoon had hundreds falling under the spell of the new way of life. This\nhumble slave-girl did not fall away like others. She and Esien remained\nalways true disciples of their Lord.\n\n\"If only some one would come and help me at Akpap,\" Ma prayed, and her\nwish was answered, for another brave woman, Miss Wright, one of the\nMission agents in Calabar, offered to go up and stay with her, and after\nthat everything was easy, for Ma Slessor loved Ma Wright, and Ma Wright\nloved Ma Slessor, and both loved the bairns, and the bairns loved both,\nso that it was a happy company which lived in this African forest\nclearing.\n\nBy this time Ma's own special family was complete, and no more members\nwere added, so we can look in upon them and see who they were and what\nthey did.\n\nFirst, of course, came Janie, who was now a big lassie, very kind, and\nfull of sympathy for everybody. She spoke English fluently, and, like\nMa, was a constant reader of the Bible; few white boys or girls, indeed,\nknow it so thoroughly as she did. She was Ma's right hand, and could do\nalmost anything, indoor or outdoor, clean, cook, carry a load, build a\nhouse, or work in the fields. But she liked working outside best, and,\nalthough a twin, had many friends amongst the people.\n\nMary was another good girl, though not so fond of hard work as Janie.\nShe waited upon Ma, and did all her little ploys. Alice was a quiet,\nsolid, plodding little soul, not as bright as Janie or Mary, but\nfaithful in whatever duty she was given to do, and always willing and\nobedient. Annie had no head at all for her lessons, but was very\ndiligent, and always smiling. Maggie the restless--Ma's name for her was\nFlibberty-gibbet--was the one who was fond of the babies, always busying\nherself about them, except when she was in the kitchen cooking a tit-bit\nfor her own little mouth. The baby of the family was Whitie, a twin with\ndancing eyes, and giving promise of being clever by and by.\n\nThen there were the two boys, Dan, a lively little fellow, not clever,\nbut good, who had been brought up by Janie and was a favourite with Ma,\nand, as is often the case with a boy amongst a lot of sisters, was a\nlittle spoiled; and toddling Asoqu[:o], who was so very fond of food that\nhe sometimes stole the cat's milk!\n\nIn the house at this time was another boy named Impie. Poor Impie! He\nwas deformed and could not use his legs, and the natives had some queer\nnotion about it. He lay all day, so patient, with a smile for everybody;\nand when, in the evening, Ma Wright took him on her knee until bedtime,\nhis face was a picture of perfect content. He died soon afterwards.\n\nAll the children were astir before six in the morning. Annie made up the\nwood fire and boiled water in the kettle for Ma's tea, and Janie or Mary\nprepared it and brought it in. Then they swept up the yard, and went\ninto the bush to gather firewood or look for herbs to make _efere_ or\nnative soup. At prayers the children squatted on the verandah. They sang\na hymn in English, and the bigger ones read verse about, Ma explaining\nas they went along--for she never hurried through worship no matter how\nbusy she might be. Then she prayed in Efik, and all repeated the Lord's\nPrayer in English.\n\nPrayers were not always at the same time, and sometimes when everybody\nwas out of doors sweeping up or cutting down bush, Ma summoned them to\nthe shade of a palm or cotton or orange tree, and had them there just to\nteach them that people could worship God anywhere--at their work, as\nwell as in church.\n\n\"Boys and girls,\" she used to tell her young friends in Scotland,\n\"should pray at their play or lessons as well as when reading or saying\ntheir prayers night and morning. Make a habit of it by looking up and\nsaying a word or two in thought at any time. God is interested in our\nplay and work and everything.\"\n\nThen came lessons for a couple of hours, Ma doctoring patients or\nholding palavers the while. After breakfast the big lads or children\nfrom the village came, and school was held out in the open air under the\nverandah. This went on until six o'clock, when the evening meal was\ntaken.\n\nPrayers were again held on the verandah, and as the refugees in the yard\nand many of the neighbours came and sat below, the native tongue only\nwas used. There was a hymn, and Ma would tell a simple gospel story, and\nall would say: \"This night I lay me down to sleep.\" By that time one or\ntwo of the little ones were already in slumber-land, and were carried\noff to bed.\n\nOn Sunday nights the hymns that children all over the world know were\nsung, sometimes with choruses which Ma made up herself; and instead of\nreading, the girls told what they remembered of the sermon. Janie was\nbest at this. Mary and Alice could, at least, say the text, and when it\ncame to Annie's turn she always said: \"Nkokop nte Jesus edi eyen\nAbasi\"--\"I heard that Jesus is the Son of God.\"\n\nMarket-day was an exciting time for the children. The people came\ncrowding in from the villages with all sorts of food and things to sell,\nsuch as yams--these are something like large potatoes,--shrimps from the\nriver, oil from the palm-nut, sugar-cane, ground nuts, Indian corn, and\nfowls. Most of them came to see Ma, many simply to \"k[:o]m\" her, that is,\nto give her compliments, others to get advice or medicine. They brought\nlittle gifts for the children, sugar-cane, oranges and bananas and other\nfruit, or seed-plants, which they put in their own plots of ground, for\nthey all liked to grow things.\n\nIt was Ma who taught them to love flowers. She knew a great deal about\nthe wild plants of the forest. One day, when walking with a visitor\nalong the path, he complained of toothache, and by and by she picked a\nflower and told him to chew it. He did so, and the pain vanished. He\nplucked another which he thought was the same, and she said, \"If you eat\nthat you will be dead in five minutes.\"\n\nMa taught them many other things--indeed all they knew--and needed to be\nvery patient, for think of the ages of darkness and ignorance that lay\nbehind them! She tried, above all, to get them to hate lying, which is\nso common in Africa. Her one great and constant bit of advice and\nwarning to them was--\"Speak the truth.\"\n\nThese pleasant days in the Mission House were soon to end. Ma was now\nready to go forward, and only waited to be sure that God was leading\nher, for she never wanted to go any way but His. One day she trudged the\nsix miles to the Cross River in the hope of catching the Government\nlaunch for Itu. It passed when she was resting in a hut, and she had to\ntrudge back the weary miles to Akpap again.\n\n\"Oh, Ma,\" said Miss Wright, \"I am sorry you missed it.\"\n\nMa was tired, but only smiled and said, \"Never mind, lassie, God did\nnot mean me to go to-day, and He knows best.\"\n\nA week later the launch saw her and picked her up, and on board she\nfound the Military Commander.\n\n\"Ma,\" he said, \"I'm going as far as Arochuku. Why not come up with me?\"\n\n\"Oh,\" she thought, \"is this what God meant when He turned me back last\nweek?\" And although she meant only to go to Itu and had no change of\nclothing or food, she said, \"Yes, I will go.\"\n\nAnd so she passed Itu and sailed up the Enyong Creek, one of the\nloveliest little waterways in the world. She had seen many beautiful\nbits of tropical scenery, but never one so beautiful as this. At first\nit is broad and open, and here and there she saw a tiny canoe with a man\nfishing for shrimps, and she was told that electric fish, which gave one\na shock, lived in the water. Then it ran through the forest, where it\nwas as still as a lake in the heart of the hills, and dark and green\nbecause the branches drooped over it. Through the little arches of\nfoliage she got glimpses of what looked like fairyland beyond. The\nsurface was covered with lilies of dazzling whiteness. Scarcely a sound\nbroke the deep and fragrant silence. Sometimes a kingfisher would rise\nand fly lazily away, sometimes a troop of monkeys would look down from\nthe branches overhead and chatter, sometimes grey parrots with red\ntails would scream angrily for a moment at being disturbed.\n\nBut as Ma lay and enjoyed all the peace and the beauty, she seemed to\nsee other things--she saw canoe-loads of sad-eyed slaves passing down,\nweek after week, year after year, century after century--what terrible\nmisery and despair that lovely creek must have known!\n\nAnd when she landed and walked through the forest trails, the same\nthought was in her mind--how these paths had been beaten hard by endless\nfiles of hopeless slaves--men, women, and little children.\n\n\"At last,\" she said thankfully, \"the cruel reign of heathendom is over,\nand peace and kindness and happiness are now coming to this dark land!\"\n\nShe found the villages and towns almost touching one another, and full\nof people.\n\n\"Welcome, Ma! we looked for your coming,\" shouted her old friends, the\nslave-traders, although they knew well that she would try and stop their\nevil doings.\n\nShe found that some native traders from the coast had been telling the\npeople about Jesus, and she called the chiefs and held a palaver and set\nabout starting a school and building a church. It was curious to see not\nonly children but grave men and women squatting on the ground learning\nA B C! And some of the men were old slave-hunters.\n\n\"Come back soon, Ma! You are the only one who cares for us,\" they cried\nas she left.\n\nOne day, when coming down the Creek, she was idly watching a snake\ntrying to swim across the quiet water, when bump, bump, her canoe was\nrun into and nearly overturned by another, which shot out from the side.\n\n\"Sorry, Ma,\" said the man in it. \"I have been waiting for you many days.\nMy master at Akani Obi wants to speak with you.\"\n\nThe canoe was turned, and followed by the other into a creek that was\nfairylike in its tender beauty, and came to a beach where stood a\nnice-looking, well-dressed native and his wife. They took her into their\nhome, which was furnished like a European one.\n\n\"I am Onoyom,\" said the man. \"When I was a little slave-boy, one of your\nwhite missionaries explored as far as this. All the people fled. I was\nnot afraid, and I took him to the chief. I was punished afterwards. When\nI grew up I went to the cannibal feasts at Arochuku. My master died, and\nten little girls were killed and placed in his grave. I became steward\nof the House, and ruled as chief. My house was burned down, and my child\ndied. I thought some enemy had done it, and I wanted to murder people. I\nmet a man who had been a teacher, and he said, 'Perhaps God is angry\nwith you.' I said, 'I want to find this God.' He said, 'Go to the White\nMa and she will help you.' I took a canoe to find you. I missed you. I\nleft a man to wait, and he has brought you. Now, will you tell me what\nto do?\"\n\nAs she listened Ma's eyes grew bright with joy. She talked with him and\nhis household, telling them of Jesus and His Gospel, and praying with\nthem, and promised to come and begin a school and church. Then they made\nher a cup of tea, and went with her to the beach.\n\nAs her canoe skimmed over the quiet water again, darkness fell, and a\nrain-storm came on and Ma was drenched, but she did not care; she sang\naloud in her blitheness of heart, for after ages of darkness and\nwickedness the sunlight of God was beginning to shine in the Creek.\n\nAfter that what a life she led! She was always moving up and down the\nCreek, visiting strange places and camping anywhere. Sometimes she had\nto sleep in the open air, or in huts on the floor, or in the canoe;\nsometimes she was caught in tornadoes and soaked to the skin; sometimes\nshe was not able to wash for many days; sometimes she ran out of stores\nand lived on native plant-food and tea made in old milk tins. She was\noften ill, full of aches and pains and burning with fever; but even\nwhen she was suffering she never lost her happy spirit and her bright\nlaugh. She was like a white spirit fluttering hither and thither, a\nsymbol of the new life that was stirring in the land. The people were\nrising out of the sleep of centuries, everywhere they were eager to\nlearn, everywhere they cried for teachers and missionaries.\n\n\"Oh,\" cried Ma, \"if only I could do more, if only I were young again! If\nonly the Church at home would send out scores of men and women. If ...\"\n\nShe did too much, and her frail weak body could not stand it. Sleep\nforsook her, and that meant loss of nerve. When she thought of the\nimmense work opening up before her, with only herself to do it, she\nquailed and shrank from the task. In the night she rose and went\nwandering over the house, and looked down upon the children slumbering\nin perfect trust and peace.\n\n\"Surely, surely,\" she said, \"God who takes care of the little ones will\ntake care of me.\"\n\nIt was time for her holiday to Scotland, but she could not leave because\nshe was very near death. A long rest revived her, and she rose--to go\nhome? No. The flame that burned in that worn little body leapt up and\nglowed best in the African forest. Instead of going to Scotland she made\nup her mind to spend six months wandering about the Creek in her own\ncanoe, visiting the people and opening new Mission stations.\n\n\"Oh, Ma!\" said the other missionaries, \"are you wise to do this after\nall you have gone through? You have worked so hard, and you need a\nholiday. Go home and rest, and then you will be better able to do what\nyou wish.\"\n\nBut no, she would carry out her plan; and so giving up the Court work to\nbe freer to serve her own Master, she set out joyfully on her quest for\nnew toils and triumphs.\n\n[Illustration: \"MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB!\"]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: MA'S HOUSE AT USE.]\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\n    Ma learns to ride a bicycle and goes pioneering; the Government\n    makes her a Judge again and she rules the people; stories of the\n    Court, and of her last visit to Scotland with a black boy as\n    maid-of-all-work; and something about a beautiful dream which\n    she dreamed when she returned, and a cow and a yellow cat.\n\n\nMa settled at Itu in a little mud hut, with a table and chair and a few\npots and pans. The girls worked and slept anywhere; the babies, new and\nold, crawled all over the place like caterpillars, and at night lay on\nbits of newspaper on the floor. Ma helped in the building of the Mission\nHouse and Church, and when they were finished sent for some one to fix\nup doors and windows. Mr. Chapman, from the Institution, arrived, and\nwas treated as the guest of the people, so that when he made his bed in\nthe middle of the church the young men of the village came, as was their\ncustom, and slept on the floor round him as a guard of honour, and got\nwater and food for him in the morning.\n\nMa was as busy as a bee. She carried on a day-school, preached to four\nhundred people, taught a Bible Class and a Sunday School, received\nvisitors from dawn till dusk, and explored the forest and made friends\nwith the shy natives. Every now and then she canoed up the Creek as far\nas Arochuku, and stayed in the villages along the banks. Mud-and-thatch\nchurches began to spring up. Onoyom, however, said he was not going to\nbe satisfied with anything less than the very best House of God, and\ntaking three hundred pounds that he had saved up, he spent it all on a\nfine building. When the time came to make the pulpit and seats, he said:\n\"We want wood, cut down the juju tree.\" Now the juju tree is where the\ngod of a village is supposed to live, and his men were horror-struck.\n\n\"The juju will be angry; he will not let us, he will kill us.\"\n\n\"Ma's God is stronger than our juju,\" was his reply. \"Cut it down.\"\n\nThey went out and began the work, but the trunk was thick, and after a\ntime they stopped.\n\n\"See, we cannot cut it.\"\n\nThe heathen crowd, standing in a ring watching them, were overjoyed.\n\"Ah, ha!\" they cried, \"our juju is stronger than Ma's God.\"\n\nNext morning Onoyom took out a party of men who wanted to be disciples\nof the new faith, and before beginning to hack at the tree they knelt\ndown and prayed that the White Mother's God would prove more powerful\nthan the juju. Then, rising, they attacked it with lusty strokes, and\nsoon it tottered and fell with a mighty crash. It was the turn of Onoyom\nto rejoice.\n\n[Illustration: THE JUJU TREE.]\n\nWhen the Creek churches were ready, missionaries travelled up from\nCalabar to open them, and were astonished to see the happy, well-clothed\npeople, and the big sums of money they brought. At one place there was a\nhuge pile of brass rods, the value of which was L20. You must remember\nthat these were still heathen people, but they were longing to love and\nserve the true God. So eager, indeed, were they that they worried Ma\nuntil she was almost distracted. Messages came every day like this: \"We\nwant to know God: send us even a boy.\" \"We want a White Ma like you to\nteach us book and washing and sewing.\" \"We have money to pay a teacher,\nsend one.\" Sometimes she laughed, and sometimes she cried.\n\n\"What can I do? I am only one poor old woman!\"\n\nThen she prayed that more missionaries might hear these calls, and come\nout from Scotland to help. Sometimes another kind of cry came down the\nCreek. A messenger from Arochuku arrived.\n\n\"Ma, the bad chiefs are going to thrust the teachers out of the land.\"\n\nMa was startled.\n\n\"And what did the teachers say?\" she asked.\n\n\"That the chiefs could put them out of the land, but they could not put\nthem away from God.\"\n\n\"Good, and what do the people say?\"\n\n\"That they will die for Jesus.\"\n\n\"Why, that is good news!\" Ma exclaimed with delight. \"Go and tell them\nto be patient and strong, and all will be well.\"\n\nAs there were no missionaries to come up and help her, she went on\nalone, this time into the great dark forest-land that stretched far to\nthe west of Itu. It was the home of the Ibibios, that naked down-trodden\nrace who had been so long the victims of slave-hunters, \"untamed,\nunwashed, unlovely savages,\" Ma called them; but it was just because\nthey were so wretched that she pitied them and longed to uplift them.\nLike Jesus, she wanted to go amongst the worst people rather than\namongst the best.\n\nThe Government were now making a road through the forest, and as she\nlooked at it stretching away so straight and level and broad, she began\nto dream again. \"I will go with the road,\" she said, \"and build a row of\nschools and churches right across the land.\" She had troops of friends\namongst the white officers, who all admired and liked her, and they,\nalso, urged her to come, and one said she should get a bicycle.\n\n\"Me on a bicycle!\" she said. \"An old woman like me!\"\n\nShe had watched their bicycles going up and down the road, and was\nafraid of them. She said she would not go near them in case they should\nexplode; but one of the officers brought her out a beautiful machine\nfrom England, and that cured her. She soon learned to ride, and it\nbecame a great help in her work.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nOne day she took Etim, another of her bright scholars, who was only\ntwelve, and set out for a village called Ikotobong, six miles beyond\nItu, in a beautiful spot amongst the hills, and started a school and\ncongregation. Etim was the schoolmaster! And right bravely the little\nfellow wrought; very soon he had a hundred children deep in the first\nbook.\n\nThe head-teacher at Ikotobong, one of those who learned to love Jesus\nthrough her, thus tells the story of her coming:\n\n    When she walked through the town she saw many idols which we all\n    worshipped, and she pitied us very much. Seeing that the people\n    were sitting in darkness she asked for a dwelling-place. The\n    town's chiefs gave her a very nice little hill in the middle of\n    the town. And from the first day all the people were astonished\n    very much at her wisdom, gentleness, and love, because they had\n    never seen a white person like her before. And amazement fell\n    upon every one in the town concerning all that she told them\n    about God, and pleasure filled their hearts because she lived\n    amongst them. Before she came the people hated one another, and\n    did not sit in love and peace, but when she came to us her good\n    influence and love becalmed us. Though she was an old woman she\n    had to work like a very powerful big man. The Ibibio people\n    wondered and wondered about her in gladness, she was so full of\n    love to every one, and working hard every day for their good. So\n    by all her kind and compassionate work she came to be called\n    _Adiaha Makara_, meaning the eldest daughter of all Europeans,\n    and _Ma Akamba_, meaning great madam.\n\nAt last God answered Ma's prayers. Three things happened.\n\nFirst, the Church in Scotland, which was now called the United Free\nChurch, resolved to follow her into the wilderness and made Itu into a\nregular station with a doctor in charge. A hospital, called the Mary\nSlessor Mission Hospital, was added, and a launch was sent out for the\nCreek work. \"It is just like a fairy-tale,\" said Ma. \"I am so glad for\nthe people.\"\n\nNext a man missionary was sent to Arochuku, and came back with such a\nglowing story of the numbers of people living there, and their longing\nfor the right way, that he was sent up at once to open a station.\n\nThen the Church told Ma that they would place two ladies at Akpap, and\nshe need not return, but remain in the wilds and be a pioneer.\n\nThe sky of her life, which had been so dark before, now became clear and\nblue and filled with sunshine.\n\nOne afternoon a Government officer visited her and said:\n\n\"Ma, what are we going to do?\"\n\nThe same question was always being put to her. Everybody, from the\nBritish officials down to runaway slaves, came to her for counsel and\nhelp; few did anything in that part of the country without first talking\nto her about it.\n\n\"What is it now?\" she asked.\n\n\"We want a magistrate for this big and important district, and we want a\nvery clever and strong person who will be able to rule the people and\nsee justice done.\"\n\n\"Well?\" she asked again.\n\n\"Oh, Ma, don't you see what I'm driving at?\"\n\n\"Fine that,\" she answered with a twinkle. \"You want a very clever and\nstrong man to rule this people, and see justice done, a very worthy\naim.\"\n\n\"Quite so, and you are the man we want, Ma.\"\n\n\"Me? hoots, laddie, the tea must have gone to your head!\"\n\n\"No, Ma, I'm serious. We officers can't do the work; we haven't the\nlanguage for one thing, and you know it better than the natives\nthemselves; also you know all their ways and tricks; they worship you;\nyou have great power over them; and what a chance to protect the women\nand punish the men as you like! Think of the twins, Ma!\"\n\n\"Ay,\" mused Ma, \"it might help God's work. I don't like it, but I would\ndo it for His sake.\"\n\n\"Thank you, Ma. Your official title will be Vice-President of the Native\nCourt, but of course you will be the real President and do as you like.\nThe salary will be----\"\n\n\"I'll take no salary,\" she snapped. \"I'm not doing it for the\nGovernment. I'm doing it for God.\"\n\nBy and by the letter from the Government came appointing her, and saying\nthat her salary would be given to the Mission to help on her work.\n\nSo Ma became again the only woman judge in the Empire. The Court was\nheld in a thatched building at Ikotobong. Ma sat at a small table, and\naround her were the chiefs getting their first lessons in acting justly\nand mercifully towards wrongdoers. Often she had to keep them in order.\nThey were very fond of talking, and if they did not hold their tongues\nshe just rose and boxed their ears.\n\nShe sat long days trying the cases, her only food a cup of tea and a\nbiscuit and a tin of sweets. She needed all her courage to get through,\nfor the stories of sin and cruelty and shame poured into her ears were\nterrible for a white woman to hear. \"We do not know how she does it,\"\nthe other missionaries said. She could not have done it had it not been\nthat she wanted to save her black sisters and the little children from\nthe misery they suffered.\n\nShe was like no other judge in the world, because she had no books to\nguide her in dealing with the cases, nothing but her knowledge of the\nlaws and customs of the people and her own good sense. She knew every\nnook and cranny of the native mind, and although many lies are told in\nAfrican Courts, no one ever deceived her. They often tried, but she\nalways found them out, and then they would cower and slink away before\nher flashing eye.\n\nVery difficult questions which puzzled the Government officials had\nsometimes to be decided, but Ma was never at a loss. Once two tribes\nlaid claim to a piece of land, and a British Commissioner tried for\ndays to find out to whom it belonged, and failed. He was in despair. Ma\ncame, and as usual appealed to the people themselves.\n\n\"Isn't it the custom for the tribes to whom land belongs to sacrifice to\nit?\"\n\n\"Yes, Ma.\"\n\n\"Can you tell the tribe that has been in the habit of sacrificing to\nthis bit of land?\"\n\n\"Yes, Ma. Our tribe,\" said one of the big men.\n\n\"Then it belongs to you.\"\n\n\"Quite right, Ma,\" cried every one, and they went away laughing.\n\nThe people who came to Court were so ignorant and foolish that Ma\nsometimes did what no other judge would do; she treated them like\nnaughty children, and gave them a slap or a rap over the knuckles, and\nlectured them and sent them away. After sullen, fierce-looking men had\nbeen fined for some offence, she would take them to the Mission House\nand feed them and give them work. Then, in the evening, she would gather\nthem together and talk to them about Jesus.\n\n[Illustration: THE MBIAM POT.]\n\nThe oath given to the witnesses was not the British one, but the native\none or _mbiam_. A pot or bottle was brought in filled with a secret\nliquid which had a horrible smell. One of the chiefs dipped a stick\ninto it and put some of the stuff on the tongue, head, arm, and foot of\nthe witnesses, who believed that if they told a lie it would kill them.\nThey often trembled with fear when taking it. Once one died suddenly\nafter giving false evidence, and the people thought it was a judgment\nupon him.\n\n[Illustration: GIVING THE OATH.]\n\nJudge Slessor had to look sharply after the native policemen, for they\nwere important men in their own eyes, and often did things they ought\nnot to have done. One went to summon villagers to clean the roads. The\nchildren in the Mission school were singing their morning hymn, and he\nrushed in among them lashing with his whip and shouting, \"Come out and\nclean the roads.\" The teachers complained, and the policeman was tried\nbefore Ma.\n\n\"You need to be punished,\" she said, \"for you have grown so big that you\nwill soon be knocking your head against the roof.\" This pleased the\npeople even more than the punishment he got from the jury.\n\nThe Court became famous in the land, for the people knew that Ma\nunderstood them and gave them justice. So much, indeed, did they trust\nher that they got into the habit of taking their quarrels and troubles\nfirst to the Mission House, and there Ma made peace and saved them going\nto law. Even when she was ill they came and squatted down outside her\nbedroom window, and the girls took in their stories to her, and she\ncalled out to the people and told them what to do.\n\nA young man, a slave, wanted to be free, and came to Ma. \"I am sorry,\"\nshe said, \"the Court cannot do anything, but--the country lies before\nyou.\"\n\nHe took the hint, and bolted out of the district.\n\nA huntsman, in search of game, saw a movement amongst the bushes, and\ncried out, \"Any one there?\" There was no answer, and he fired. A scream\nmade him rush to the spot, and to his horror he found that he had shot a\ngirl. He carried her to the nearest house, where she died. He was\nbrought up and tried, and acquitted, as he had not meant to harm her.\nBut native law is \"life for life,\" and the people demanded a life for\nthe life that had been taken. The man, in his despair, ran to Ma.\nCutting off a lock of his hair, he gave it to her. This meant that all\nhe had was hers, and that the tribe would have to deal with her too. But\nshe knew that if he stayed he would be killed, and told him to fly,\nwhich he did.\n\nMa was also going on with her real work, preaching and teaching,\ntraining boys and girls to become little missionaries, and carrying the\nlight of the Gospel further and further into the heathen forest. And, as\nusual, she was dreaming dreams. She now remembered the dream of Mr.\nThomson to build a holiday home for the missionaries. She said to\nherself, \"Can I not build a little one for the ladies in Calabar?\" Some\nmoney came to her, and she sought out a spot on the wooded hills nearer\nthe Creek called Use, and began to put up several mud cottages that\nmight be used for rest-homes. She did most of the work herself, with the\naid of Janie and the other girls, sleeping the while on the floor in a\nhut.\n\nOne night a lady missionary stayed with her who was anxious to get away\nearly next morning.\n\n\"All right,\" said Ma, \"I'll set the alarum clock.\"\n\nThe visitor looked puzzled, for there were no watches or clocks to be\nseen. Ma went out to the yard where the fowls were kept and brought in a\nrooster and tied it near the foot of her bed. At dawn the \"alarum\" went\noff; the cock crew, and the sleepers were roused.\n\n\"Ma,\" said a Government doctor at last, \"you will die if you do not take\na rest.\" And very sorrowfully she replied that it was likely, and so\nshe went home to Scotland, taking Dan and leaving Janie to take care of\nthe other children.\n\nDan, who was only six years old, proved a very handy little\nman-of-all-work. He soon learned to speak English, and ran her messages,\ncarried her parcels, and even cooked her tit-bits of food. He had a\nroyal time, being loaded with toys and books and sweets, and Ma was\nanxious that he should not be spoiled. She would often ask those with\nwhom she stayed to allow him to sit on the floor, that he might not\nforget who he was.\n\nHe had quick eyes, and saw everything. When he went out in a town with\nMa he begged to have the money for the street cars, for, he said,\n\"Gentlemen always pay for the ladies!\" But he did not always understand\nwhat he saw. At table he thought the sharpening of the carving-knife on\nthe steel was part of the grace before meals!\n\nHer friends found Ma much changed. \"Oh, Mary,\" said one, \"I didn't know\nyou.\"\n\n\"Nae wonder,\" she said, laughing, \"look at my face!\" It was dark and\nwithered and wrinkled, though her eyes were as bright and merry as ever\nand full of changing lights.\n\nOne day she went to pay a visit to Mrs. Scott, the lady of the manse at\nBonkle, in Lanarkshire. They had written to one another for years, but\nhad never met. There were young people there, and all were greatly\nexcited, for the black boy was also expected. Everything that love\ncould think of was done for the comfort of the guest. At last the cab\nappeared at the bend of the road, and all hurried to the gate. Down\njumped Dan smiling, sure of his welcome. Then was helped out a frail and\ndelicate lady, who looked round shyly and brightly answered all the\ngreetings. She walked slowly up the garden path, gazing at the green\nlawns and the flower-beds and the borders of shady trees, and drinking\nin the goodness of it all.\n\n\"All this,\" she said, \"and for me!\"\n\nShe was so weak and ill that she was glad to sink into a cushiony chair\nplaced for her in the sunniest corner of the sunny room. The young girls\nfollowed her in. Stretching out her hands towards them, she cried:\n\n\"Oh! how many of you lassies am I to get?\"\n\nAnd, glad to tell, she did get one, Miss Young, who went out to Calabar\nand became to her like a daughter, and was afterwards picked out by the\nChurch as the one best fitted to carry on the work that lay closest to\nher heart after she herself was done with it all.\n\nIt was times like these that made Ma young again. She just wandered\nquietly about in the woods and meadows, or went and listened to the\nmusic practices in the church. She was delighted with the singing, and\nbefore leaving thanked the precentor for the pleasure she had got, and\nhe gave her his tuning-fork, which he valued, and she kept it as one of\nher treasures to the end.\n\nComing out one night after the service, she looked up to the starry sky,\nand said, \"These stars are shining upon my bairns--I wonder how they\nare\"; and once, when \"_Peace, perfect peace? with loved ones far away!_\"\nwas sung, she said: \"I was thinking all the time of my children out\nthere.\"\n\nShe missed them more and more as the months went on. One afternoon, when\nshe was sitting down to tea in a house in Perthshire, she begged to be\nallowed to hold a red-cheeked baby-boy on her knee. \"It is more homely,\"\nshe said, \"and I have been so used to them all these years.\"\n\nThen she made up her mind. \"I cannot stay longer, I am growing anxious\nabout my children. I am sure they need me.\" Her friends tried to keep\nher, but no, she must go. They bade her farewell at one or two large\nmeetings, where her figure, little and fragile, and worn by long toil in\nthe African sun, brought tears to many eyes. The meetings were very\nsolemn ones. As she spoke of the needs of Africa, one who listened said:\n\"It is not Mary Slessor who is speaking, but God.\"\n\nOne night before she sailed she was found crying quietly in bed, not\nbecause she had no friends, for she had many, but because all her own\nloved ones were dead, and she was homeless and lonesome. She just\nwanted her mother to take her into her arms, pat her cheek, and murmur,\nas she had done long ago, \"Good-bye, lassie, and God be with you.\"\n\nDan did not wish to leave all the delights of his life in Scotland, and\nalthough he had mechanical toys and books and sweets to cheer him, he\nsobbed himself to sleep in the train.\n\nSo Ma looked her last upon the dear red and grey roofs and green hills\nof Scotland, for she never saw them again.\n\nShe went to Use, which now became her home. It was a lonely place\namongst trees, near the great new highway. A wonderful road that was.\nBordered by giant cotton trees and palms, it ran up and down, over the\nhills, without touching a village or town. These were all cleverly\nhidden away in the forest, for the people had not got over their terror\nof the slave-hunters. Except on market-days the road was very silent,\nand you met no children on it, for they were afraid of being seized and\nmade slaves. Leopards and wild cats roamed over it at night.\n\nAt one part a number of rough concrete steps led to the top of the steep\nbank, from which a narrow path wound up the hillside and ended in a\nclearing in the bush. Here stood Ma's queer patchwork mud-house, just a\nshapeless huddle of odd rooms, with a closed-in verandah, the whole\ncovered with sheets of trade-iron, tin from mission-boxes, and lead from\ntea-chests. It was hard to find the door, the steps of which were of\nunhewn stones.\n\nShe began to work harder than ever. What a wonder she was! She did all\nthe tiresome Court business, sometimes sitting eight hours patiently\nlistening to the evidence; she held palavers with chiefs; she went long\njourneys on foot into the wilderness, going where no white man went. On\nSundays she visited and preached at ten or twelve villages, and between\ntimes she was toiling about the house, making and mending, nailing up\nroofs, sawing boards, cutting bush, mudding walls, laying cement. Was it\nsurprising that her hands were rough and hard, and often sore and\nbleeding?\n\nShe was seldom well, and always tired, so tired that at night she was\nnot able to take off her clothes, and lay down with them on until she\nslept a little and was rested, and then she rose and undressed. At times\nshe was on the point of fainting from pain, and only got relief from\nsleeping-draughts. It was true of her what one of the missionaries said:\n\"God does most of His work here by bodies half-dead, but alive in\nChrist.\"\n\nShe had now, however, hosts of friends, all willing to look after her.\nNearly every one, officials, missionaries, traders, and natives, were\nkind to her. Sir Walter Egerton, the British Governor, and Lady Egerton\nwould send her cases of milk for the children, and the officials pressed\nupon her the use of their steamers and motor-cars and messengers and\nworkmen. At Ikotobong was Miss Peacock, that girl with the great\nthoughtful eyes who had listened so eagerly to Ma when she had addressed\nthe class in Falkirk years before. She became one of the many white\ndaughters who hovered about her in the last years and ministered to her.\nTwo missionary homes were open to her in Calabar, those of Mr. and Mrs.\nWilkie and Mr. and Mrs. Macgregor, and there she was always made\ncomfortable and happy.\n\nOnce Government officials found her so ill that they lifted her into the\nmotor-car and took her down to the Mission House at Itu. Something rare\nand precious was there, a bonnie white child, the daughter of the doctor\nmissionary. During the first few days when Ma was fighting for her life,\nlittle Mamie often went to her side and just stood and stroked her hand\nfor a while, and then stole quietly away.\n\nWhen the turn for the better came, she charmed Ma back to health by her\nwinning ways. For hours they swung together in the hammock on the\nverandah, and laughed and talked and read, their two heads bent over the\npages of _Chatterbox_ and _The Adviser_, and over the _Hippopotamus\nBook_ and _Puddleduck_, and other entrancing stories. Some times they\ngot so absorbed in these that time was forgotten, and \"Oh, bother!\" they\nsaid when the sound of the gong called them to meals. Ma was still a\nlittle child at heart.\n\nAfter she returned to Use a new church was opened at Itu, and as she was\nnot able to go down she wrote this letter to Mamie:\n\n    I may not get to the big function, which will make me rather\n    cross, as I have looked forward to it. Anyhow if I am not there\n    will you pop my collection into the plate for me, like a bonnie\n    lassie? I wish it were multiplied by ten.\n\n    I wanted you and me to have a loan of that pretty picture-book\n    of your mother's. It has all the blouses and hats and togs that\n    they keep in the store in Edinburgh, and I was just set on our\n    sitting together and picking out a nice coat and hat and\n    pinafore, all of our own choosing, for you to wear in Scotland.\n    Oh! but you may be going to England? Oh well, they are much the\n    same. But here we can't do it, for it will be too late to get\n    them for you to land in. Anyhow ask that dear Mummy of yours to\n    help you to choose, and you will buy them with these \"filthy\n    lucre\" pennies. Mind, the Bible calls them \"filthy lucre,\" so I\n    am not saying bad words!\n\n    Now, dear wee blue eyes, my bonnie birdie, are we never to have\n    a play again or a snuggly snug? We shall see, but I shall never\n    forget those days with old Brown and Mittens and the Puddleduck\n    relations, and all your gentle ways and winsome plays. Be Mama's\n    good lassie and help her with all the opening day's work, and\n    you yourself will be the bonniest there. If I am there you will\n    sit beside me!\n\nMa's mind was as restless as her body. She was for ever planning what\nmore she could do for Jesus. Her new dream was a beautiful one, perhaps\nthe best of all. To understand it you must know that the women and girls\nin West Africa all belonged to households, and were bound, by native\nlaw, to obey the heads of these--their masters. The compounds were their\nonly homes. If they became Christians they still had to do what their\nheathen masters told them. When they were given orders which as true\nservants of Jesus they could not obey without doing wrong, they were in\na fix, for if they left the compounds it was not easy for them to live,\nas they had no houses in which to stay and no farms where they could\nwork and grow food. Ma had often thought of the problem, and now she\nmade up her mind that the women and girls must be taught simple trades,\nso that if they had to leave the compounds they would be able to support\nthemselves.\n\nAnd this was her dream. She would start a home for women and girls where\nshe would take in waifs and refugees and other helpless ones, and train\nthem to do things, such as the weaving of baskets, the making of bamboo\nfurniture, shoe-making, and so on. They could also rear fowls and goats\nand cows, and dig, and grow food-plants and fruit-trees. And best of\nall, they would learn to be clean and tidy and womanly.\n\nMa was never long in making her dreams begin to take form. She went out\none morning to look round the land at Use. Why, Use was the very place\nfor the settlement! She would begin in a small way with just a few\ncottages and a garden, and gradually make it bigger. She started at\nonce, and soon had many useful trees and plants in the ground, and fowls\nand goats and a cow in the yard.\n\nThat cow was a wild one, and a great bother, as it was always breaking\nout and wandering into the forest. Ma had no tinkling bell, but she tied\na tin pail to the beast so that the rattling noise might tell where it\nwas.\n\nThe stock had to be watched, for wild animals roamed about after dark,\nand leopards often sprang into the yard in search of prey.\n\nOne or two rooms at Use were kept for visitors. The doors of these were\nsealed up with strips of bamboo and mud until they were wanted. Once two\nlady missionaries arrived, and had to sleep a night before the doors\nwere hung. Not long before a leopard had carried off the cow's calf, and\nthe ladies thought it wise to barricade the hole. Ma looked on smiling,\nand said:\n\n\"There will be rats and lizards and centipedes, and maybe a snake, but a\nleopard would never come in ... even though it did it would just look at\nyou and go away again.\"\n\n\"We'll not give it the chance, Ma,\" said the ladies.\n\n\"Well, I'll give you the cat: it will scare the rats at any rate.\"\n\nThis cat, a big yellow one, had been found, when a kitten, meowing\npiteously by the side of a bush track, and was taken to the Mission\nHouse, where it became a favourite with Ma. It always travelled with\nher, lying in a canvas bag at the bottom of the canoe, or motor-car, and\nsometimes she carried it on her shoulder.\n\nThe night did turn out to be a lively one, for although no leopard came,\nevery other kind of creeping and jumping and flying thing paid the\nladies a visit, and there was not much rest for them, nor for the yellow\ncat, which hunted the rats until the dawn.\n\n[Illustration: A WEST AFRICAN LEOPARD.]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: A STYLE OF HAIRDRESSING.]\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\n    Ma goes farther up the Creek and settles in a heathen town in\n    the wilds; she enters into happy friendships with young people\n    in Scotland; has a holiday in a beautiful island, where she\n    makes a secret compact with a lame boy; and is given a Royal\n    Cross for the heroic work she has done.\n\n\nOne day there came out of the unknown a black boy with a number of\nstrange-looking men.\n\n\"M[:o]k[:o]m[:o] Ma,\" he said, \"I salute you. We come to see you. We are from\nIkpe. The soldiers and the people fought there and the people fled. I\nknow about you and I told them and they want your help.\"\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\"Ikpe?\" echoed Ma. \"Where is that? I never heard of it.\"\n\n\"Far up the Creek,\" he replied vaguely; \"two days by canoe. A big town.\"\n\n\"But I never knew of trading canoes going there.\"\n\n\"No, Ma, they don't allow Calabar men at Ikpe.\"\n\n\"Oh, I see, a closed market. Well, what do they wish?\"\n\n\"They want to be god-men and learn book.\"\n\nShe talked long with the men, whose cry was \"Come yourself, Ma, come\nback with us.\"\n\nIt was known that she was always ready to go anywhere at a moment's\nnotice.\n\n\"No, not now, I cannot, but I'll come soon\"; and having her promise they\nwent away with light hearts.\n\nShe was growing very, very feeble, and she shrank from entering a new\nplace, where she would have no friends amongst the natives and could see\nno white faces, but the spirit of adventure still tugged at her heart,\nand one morning she boarded a canoe and went up the river.\n\nIt was a wonderful thing, even for her, to lie in the canoe and watch\nthe changing beauty of the Creek. They passed the places she knew, and\nthen came to a region that was strange to her. Hour after hour they\nsped, pushing through the tangle of water-lilies, watching the fishermen\nplunging their spears into the mud after fish, passing farms where the\ngreen corn was sprouting, and bare landing-beaches where long canoes lay\nside by side, coasting along stretches of thick jungle where the water\nwas green and the air cool; where lovely flowers and ferns grew on the\nbranches, and monkeys gambolled and swung by their tails; where\nbutterflies and dragon-flies glinted in the sunlight, and snakes slid\ndown old trunks and stole rustling away.\n\nNow and again she saw the snout of a hippopotamus, with its beadlike\neyes, watching them, and noted that the banks were scored by their\nmassive feet. After they had done eight hours' paddling one of these\nmonsters rose angrily in front and opened its enormous jaws as if it\nwould swallow the canoe and the paddlers and Ma and all. The stream was\nnarrow and darkness was falling, and Ma said, \"Well, well, old hippo, we\nwon't dispute your right to turn us aside.\" The canoe made for the bank,\nand Ma stayed all night in a dirty little hut swarming with mosquitoes.\nThe chief here had heard of her and the Jesus religion, and was already\npraying to what was to him the unknown God. \"And my people just laugh at\nme,\" he said. Ma prayed with him and cheered him and left him happier.\n\nIn the lovely morning light the canoe went on, until the Creek became\nlike one of these little streams which feed the mills in Scotland. Ma\nhad at last to get out and walk through the bush. She came to Ikpe, a\nlarge mud town, very dirty and smelly, where all sorts of tribes\nmingled, and found that the people wore little or no clothes, that the\ngirls and boys ran about naked, and that all, old and young, seemed more\nwicked and shameless than any natives she had seen.\n\nOnly a few welcomed her, and these, having heard of her promise, and\nknowing that she always kept her word, had begun to build a church, with\ntwo rooms at the end for her to live in. It was situated in a circle of\ntall palm trees among which monkeys romped and chattered.\n\nShe remained some days, living on native food, and when she left told\nthe people she would come back.\n\nSeveral times she returned, and always the people asked:\n\n\"Ma, have you come to stay?\"\n\n\"No, not yet.\"\n\n\"Oh, Ma, when are you coming?\"\n\nWhat could she reply? How could she leave the work at Use? She begged\nthe Church to send up other ladies, but the months passed, and meanwhile\ntwo churches were ready in the district, and the people were beseeching\nher to come.\n\n\"It's another call,\" she said, \"and I must obey. I'm an old woman and\nnot very fit, but I'll do my best, and I'll carry on the work at Use\ntoo. No more idleness for me!\"\n\nSo up and down the Creek she went. The journey always took the best part\nof two days. A canoe, with ten paddlers, was sent down from Ikpe to the\nbeach near Itu. What a bustle there was at Use before everything was\nready! Then the house had to be shut up. This was done by nailing the\nwindows, and building in the doorways with strips of wood and clay.\n\nIn the afternoon the household set off, Ma sitting in the centre of the\ncanoe on a chair, and the children and babies round her, and the yellow\ncat in its bag at her feet. When it grew dark they landed at some\nvillage and spent the night, and before daybreak at four o'clock they\nwere off again. Ma did not like the bit which was haunted by hippos.\n\"But,\" she would say, \"they haven't touched me yet; they just push up\ntheir ugly heads and stare at me.\"\n\nWhen the sun became strong and they were all hot and tired they went\nashore at a clearing, and the paddlers lit a fire and cooked some food,\nMa joking all the time to keep everybody happy. Ikpe beach was reached\nabout four in the afternoon, and there was still a long walk before\nthem, and it was a very weary company that lay down to rest.\n\nThe paddlers were just the wild boys of Ikpe, very good-hearted under\nall their badness, as Ma told the Sunday School children of Wellington\nChurch, Glasgow:\n\n    They are ungrudging hard workers too. They paddle the whole day,\n    singing as merrily as if the sun were not beating on them like a\n    blazing fire. When we came up a month ago we had such a heavy\n    load of timber for building purposes that they could hardly get\n    a seat. One chief on the road asked me to put a part of it at\n    his beach as they would never be able to take it up, but the\n    boys sturdily answered, \"The canoe is good, let us go on.\"\n\n    They pulled eight hours on end without stopping to eat a bite.\n    About seven o'clock we all lay down, after holding worship in\n    the canoe, and didn't they sing! And then the moon began to show\n    through the mist about 3 A. M., and they jumped and pushed off,\n    and then for eight hours pulled and sang and laughed and shouted\n    in their high spirits, wakening the echoes of dreadful-looking\n    places, where mud and ooze hold the crocodile and other\n    creatures.\n\nIt was the same coming back, and when they all arrived at Use they broke\na little hole in the doorway and crept in and threw themselves down on\nbed and floor until morning. They were often soaked, and Ma sometimes\nwas so tired and ill and racked with pain that she could not leave the\ncanoe, but slept in it all night. \"However can you do it?\" she was\nasked. \"Oh,\" she replied cheerily, \"I just take a big dose of medicine\nand wrap myself in a blanket and manage fine.\"\n\nOnce when she got back to Use she found that a tornado had damaged the\nhouse, and she began to repair it with her own hands. The hard work was\ntoo much for her, and she took to her bed and became delirious. Yet she\nstruggled up and went over to the church and sat in a chair and\npreached.\n\nA young missionary, Dr. Hitchcock, had come out to take charge of the\nmedical station at Itu for a time. He had heard of Ma and of her\nmasterful ways, but he was strong too, and not afraid of her, and when\nhe saw her so ill he took her in charge and ordered her firmly to do\nwhat he bade her, just as if she had been a child. Poor Ma! She was a\nchild in strength then, and she obeyed him meekly, and he treated her\nlike a mother and she loved him as a son, and under his kind and\nwatchful care she gradually got better. \"But you mustn't cycle any\nmore,\" he said, \"you are past that now.\" So some friends in Scotland\nsent her out a basket-chair on wheels which the boys and girls pushed,\nand in this she continued to make her journeys into the forest.\n\n[Illustration: THE CHURCH AT IKPE.]\n\nA special joy in these lonely days was the love of many girls and boys\nat home. She told one that she had always a few choice packets of\nletters lying beside her chair and bed, and took them up as one would\ntake up a book, and read them over and over again. Many were from her\nlittle friends. They told her about their schools, their games, their\nholidays, their pets, and their books--the letters of one boy, she said,\nwere always like a sardine tin, they were so packed full of news--and\nshe sent long replies back, wonderful replies, full of fun and stories\nand nonsense and good sense.\n\nOne of the mothers said she was very kind to take such bother.\n\n    \"Why,\" she wrote, \"look at their kindness to me! The darlings,\n    with their perfectly natural stories and their ways of looking\n    at everything out of a child's clear innocent eyes, and the\n    bubbling over of the joys of a healthy life. It is a splendid\n    tonic, and just a holiday to me too, taking me with them to the\n    fields and the picnics and the sails on the lochs. Oh, one can\n    almost feel the cool breeze and hear their shouts. Don't you\n    think for a moment that though I am like a piece of wrinkled\n    parchment my heart is not as young as ever it was, and that I\n    don't prefer children to grown-up folks a thousand times over. I\n    would need to, for they have been my almost sole companions for\n    twenty-five years back. Oh, the girls at home are so bonnie with\n    their colour and their hair and their winsome ways. I just loved\n    to look at and to talk with them when I could. In church and\n    Sunday School they were a thing of beauty and a joy to me all\n    the time. I don't say that I don't love black bairns better and\n    know them better than white ones, for I do. But one must confess\n    to the loveliness of Scottish girls.\"\n\nOne of her most loving and diligent little correspondents was Christine\nGrant Millar Orr, who stayed in Edinburgh, and was, at this time, just\nthirteen, a clever girl, fond of writing stories and poems, and as good\nas she was clever.\n\nHer fresh young heart went out to the weary and lonely old lady in the\nAfrican bush who chatted to her so charmingly. \"You have a genius for\nletter-writing,\" she told Ma. \"Your letters are so full of news and yet\nso full of love and tenderness and your own dear self.\"\n\nHere is a bit from one of Ma's letters to her:\n\n    What a bonnie morning this is! It will be dark and cold with\n    you. It is half-past six, and I am in the little verandah which\n    is my sanctum. We have had breakfast, but I am not yet able to\n    do any work, as I need an hour or so to get the steam up. So I\n    shall bid you a good-morning, and just wish you could be here to\n    enjoy our bush, and cocoa-nut and oil and wine palms which\n    surround us, all wrapped in a bewitching lovely blue haze from\n    the smoke of the wood fire. Yes, you would even enjoy the\n    pungent smell of the bush smoke, and would think there were few\n    places like Calabar.... But an hour later! Oh, it _will_ be hot!\n\nMa thus tells Christine about the \"smokes\" season, which lasts from\nNovember to February:\n\n    It is a funny season when the air is so thick with what seems\n    fine sand that you can't see ten yards away, and the throat and\n    back of the nose and the whole head is dry and disagreeable,\n    just like influenza at home. Between these \"smokes,\" which are\n    supposed to come from the Great Sahara Desert, the hot season\n    blazes forth in all its fury, and one feels so languid and\n    feeble, and wonders where one can go for a breath of air or a\n    mouthful of cold water. Then the snow on the moors and the\n    biting winds and the sea waves of your cold land sing their\n    siren songs.\n\nNo wonder Christine wrote back:\n\n    How I should love to take you bodily out of African heat and\n    work and give you a long sweet holiday at The Croft, with your\n    face to the greenest field in Scotland, and the great hills and\n    the fresh caller air everywhere. The blossom, white and pink,\n    the laburnum, the heavy masses of hawthorn, the sweet odours of\n    wallflower, the calling of the blackbirds, the mossy lawn, the\n    shady glade with birch trees and wild hyacinths and baby birdies\n    in the hedges, and the glorious warm spring sunshine gliding\n    through the leaves--how you would love them all!\n\nKind hearts at home knew of the longing for a change that sometimes came\nto Ma, and one of the ladies of the Church, Miss Cook, like a fairy\ngodmother, quietly arranged that she should take a trip to the Canary\nIslands, and paid all the cost. Ma felt it was a very selfish thing for\nher to accept when there were others who also needed a rest, but the\ndoctors said:\n\n\"Ma, if you go you will be able for a lot of work yet.\"\n\n\"In that case,\" she replied, \"I'll go.\" She took Janie with her.\n\nIt was her first real holiday, for she had nothing to do but bask in the\nsunshine among the flowers and be petted by everybody, especially by\nMr. and Mrs. Edisbury, who managed the hotel at which she stayed. What a\ntime of joy it was! \"From the first hour we arrived in fear and\ntrembling,\" she said, \"to the hour we left with a heart full to\noverflowing, our visit was a delicious vision of every kind of\nloveliness.\"\n\n[Illustration]\n\nShe was not long in the hotel before she heard that Mrs. Edisbury had a\nlittle lame son, nine years old, named Ratcliffe, who could only walk\nabout on crutches. She could hardly walk herself then, and her tender\nheart was filled with love and pity and sympathy for the boy. \"Oh,\" she\nsaid, \"I must see him.\" She found him in the nursery, a very bright and\neager child, and at once they became fast friends. For hours he would\nsit by her side, his great grey-blue eyes fixed on her face, while she\ntold him thrilling stories of her adventures in wild Africa.\n\nBefore they parted they had a quiet talk and made a secret bargain. Each\nwas to do something every day only known to themselves; nobody was to\nbe told--not even Ratcliffe's own mother. His face was glowing when they\nwere planning it, and he felt it was splendid to have a secret which one\nwould think about from day to day, but which no other person would know\nof. His mother and aunt heard that it had been made, and sometimes they\nteased him to tell, but he just smiled, and nothing ever made him open\nhis lips and speak of it. We shall learn by and by what it was.\n\nOn board the steamer going back Ma wrote a long letter to Ratcliffe:\n\n    You were in the land of Nod long before our boat came in, so\n    neither Janie nor myself could go to say good-bye to you. But\n    what do you think your dear daddy did? Just came away with us in\n    the middle of the night, in the dark and the cold, and took us\n    to the boat with all our luggage and stuff, and in the dark\n    found our way for us to the big steamer, and then up the long\n    stair at the ship's side, and brought us into the cabin where I\n    am now sitting, and which has to be our home for the next ten\n    days or so. And your dear mother waited up to say good-bye, and\n    so did your dear aunty, and they sent us off laden with apples\n    and flowers, and, better still, with warm loving wishes and\n    hopes that we should meet again. My heart was glad and thankful,\n    but it was very sore and sorry, and I am afraid I cried a wee\n    bit when Mr. Edisbury went away out into the dark and left us.\n    How happy your dear parents and your auntie made us! and how\n    good it was to meet you. It will ever live as a picture in my\n    heart and memory the times we spent with you, and it was very\n    good for Janie to know you....\n\n    We have a crowd on board, and to-day we had a birthday cake to\n    tea, because it is a lady's birthday. As no one ever asks a lady\n    how old she is--you remember us talking about that--well, they\n    put 21 on the icing of the cake, but she is an old lady, and\n    they made her funny presents, a little dolly, and a china pug\n    dog with a tail that keeps wagging after you have touched it,\n    and some beads. It was such fun. There is so little to do on\n    board that every one gets wearied, and wants a bit of fun to\n    pass the hours away....\n\n    And now, dear little friend, good-bye. Be good and brave, and\n    hurry putting your pennies in the bank so that you can come to\n    see us and stay a long time. Janie sends her compliments to you\n    and to all, and says, \"Do not forget us.\" So say I.\n\nJoyful days in Ratcliffe's life were these when letters arrived from Ma,\n\"bang, bang from the wilds,\" as she said. In all she spoke of the\nmysterious secret. \"Now, sonny,\" she would say, \"do you remember our\nlittle secret treaty? I do, and keep it. There is a telephone and a\ntelegraph, secret, wireless, swift, which never fails, and it carries to\nCanary _via_ the Kingdom of God.\" Or this, \"Are you remembering our old\nsecret? Dear old sweet-heart, so am I, and I get surer and surer than\never for the BEST. Keep on!\"\n\nSometimes Ratcliffe wrote in reply, sometimes his mother or auntie, but\nalways there was a message to say that \"the secret was being kept.\"\n\nRatcliffe liked to hear about the children and their doings and about\nthe teeming life of the forest, \"cunning things among insects and\nbeautiful flies and butterflies and small creatures among the bushes\nglistening like fine stones or flowers,\" but best of all he loved the\nsnake stories like this:\n\n    One night in the dark there came up to my ears small screams\n    from below. Janie was jumping about and Annie and she were\n    throwing things, and by the light of the fire it looked awful.\n    Janie laughed back to my screams, \"It is a snake, don't come,\"\n    and she was lashing all she was able with a stick. Annie was\n    making noise, and not much more. I got round in my slow way to\n    the outside. Janie had forced it back till she and Annie and\n    Maggie were all on the outside and could run, but Janie held on,\n    and I threw her a machete and she hacked the things into bits.\n    In the morning the bits were all gone, some other beast had\n    eaten it, and there were only marks. Another day Janie was\n    chasing with the others a horrid thing we call Asawuri. I don't\n    know what it is in scientific English. It makes a long oo-o-oo-o\n    of a note and lives in the bush in a hole. It is bigger than a\n    lizard and marked handsomely like a snake, and has a deadly\n    poison; that's why God has given it the note of warning, I\n    suppose. Janie killed it.... I am always keeping my secret. Are\n    you? Don't slacken! Don't tell.\n\nMa always tried to cheer and help him:\n\n    I expect you will be at school by this time. Are you? How do you\n    like it? Do the masters give any punishments? I am sure they\n    won't need to do that with you, for you will be doing your best.\n    But it will sometimes be hard to do lessons when it is hot, and\n    you will want to do other things; and let me whisper a secret to\n    you. I, too, am an awful duffer at arithmetic! I simply can't do\n    it. Never mind, I've got on fairly well, and so will you; and\n    now I have only the sums of the boys in the school to bother me,\n    and I never give them harder ones than I can do quickly and\n    explain well myself. You will come out on top some day. All the\n    same, try for all you are worth and catch up. Auntie and mother\n    will help you--that's what aunties and mothers are for, you\n    know. Just you put your arms round auntie's neck and look at her\n    with your bonnie speaking eyes, and you'll see what will happen.\n    Janie can't count at all, she never could, and I had a great\n    pity always for her, and yet what could I do without Janie? She\n    is worth a thousand mathematicians to me and to our people.\n\nMa rejoiced that she was able to do a little more for her beloved\nMaster, and she began to take more care of her health. She did not want\nto be great or famous, only to walk very quietly from day to day, and do\nsimple things, looking after the needs of her people and fighting the\nsin and ignorance that marred their lives. So we find her again at Use\nand Ikpe spending the long hours preaching, teaching, doctoring,\nbuilding, cementing, painting, varnishing--a very humble and happy\nwoman.\n\nShe paid a visit to Okoyong, the first since she had left eight years\nbefore. The wild old station had become so quiet and peaceful that it\nwas almost like a bit of Scotland, and there was a fine new church.\nEverybody came to \"k[:o]m\" her, and she could scarcely get her meals for\ntalking about the long ago. She saw Eme Ete and Mana, and Iye the mother\nof Susie, and Esien, now a leading Christian, and many others; and when\nshe went over to the church she found four hundred people gathered to\nhear her, the men and boys in the centre, and the women in coloured\nfrocks and head-dresses at the side, while the children sat in rows on\nthe floor. All were clean and tidy, and she thought what a big change it\nwas from the terrible days when the naked villagers were only fond of\ndrink and bloodshed.\n\n\"Yes,\" said a church member later to one of the lady missionaries, \"even\nthe leopards became less bold and dangerous when Ma came!\"\n\nShe was glad to have a talk with Eme Ete, but sorry to know that she was\nstill a heathen, and sacrificed every day in her yard to a mud\nwhite-washed figure of a woman that had egg-shells for eyes. There was\nalso a mud altar on which she laid her offerings of palm-wine, gin, and\nfood, and sometimes she put a fowl or eggs in the lap of the image. Her\nrooms were full of charms, such as bunches of grass and feathers and\nbottles. It made Ma very sad. Eme Ete died soon after, and from the roof\nof her house was hung a great fold of white satin, which is a sign of\ndeath in a heathen home, and the doors were shut and the place left to\nrot and fall to pieces.\n\nThough Ma was hidden away in the African forest and thought she was a\nnobody, there were others who, knowing what she had done, and having\nbeen helped by her example, made up their minds that her story should\nnot be left untold. They wrote it out, and by and by it came into the\nhands of Sir Frederick Lugard, the Governor-General of Nigeria, as the\nwhole country was now called, and he, marvelling at the tale, sent it\nhome so that it might be brought to Royal notice.\n\nOne day a native runner appeared in the yard at Use with a bundle of\nletters, amongst which was a large one that looked important. Ma turned\nit over and wondered what it could be. It was from a very famous and\nancient society, the Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem,\nwhich has the King at its head and other Royal persons amongst its\nofficials, begging that she would agree to become one of its Honorary\nAssociates and accept the Silver Cross which it gave to those who were\nnoted for goodness and good work.\n\nShe looked at her torn dress and her rough hands and her bare feet, and\naround at the poor little shanty of a house, and chuckled.\n\n\"Fancy me with a Royal medal!\" she said. \"What have I done? I dinna\ndeserve anything for doing my duty. I couldna' even have done that\nunless God had been with me all the time. To Him be all the honour.\"\n\n\"But,\" she added, \"it's nice too, for it will let the folk here ken that\nthe King is interested in the work that we are doing.\" And so, being a\nloyal subject, she wrote back, saying \"Yes.\"\n\n[Illustration: MA'S SILVER CROSS.\n\nNow in the Museum of the United Free Church.]\n\nAnother letter arrived telling her that her election had been approved\nby King George V., and then came the beautiful diploma. But she had to\ngo down to Duke Town to be given the Cross at a public meeting, and this\nwas a great trial. Everybody, however, was kind and treated her like a\nprincess. While they were praising her she sat with her face buried in\nher hands, and when she spoke she made it seem as if the honour were\ndone to the Mission and not to herself. A bouquet of roses was handed to\nher, and when she got home to Use she planted a stem beside the\nrough-hewn steps, and to her delight it grew and flourished. When she\ndied a cutting from it was planted on her grave.\n\nOf course she had to tell Ratcliffe all about the affair. \"The Silver\nCross,\" she said, \"is a nice thing called a decoration, which one wears\non special occasions, and is just like a prize given at school to a boy.\nYou wonder what I got a prize for? So do I! I can't make it out at all.\nBut you see our King is so good and kind, he is always doing nice\nthings, and this is one of them.\"\n\nAshamed of all that people were saying and writing about her, she\nhastened up to Use, where she pinned the cross on her breast to show the\ngirls how it looked.\n\nBy this time Mary and Annie were married and had homes of their own, and\nAlice and Maggie were at Duke Town learning to wash and iron and cut out\nand make clothes, and Dan was also at school. Once Dan had a splendid\nholiday, and Ma tells Ratcliffe about it:\n\n    Dan has gone up the Cross River with his master to a new country\n    where coal has been found and where tin has been found, and\n    where our wonderful fellow-countrymen are to build a railway\n    which will enter and open up new lands and peoples and\n    treasures, and add to the wealth and greatness of our Empire.\n    The coal will make the biggest changes you can think of. It is\n    like a fairy tale. Just think, if we have coal, we can start to\n    manufacture everything out here, for we have material for almost\n    everything, and all the timber in these endless forests can then\n    be sent over the world. And what crowds of people from Britain\n    and here will be getting employment at the railways and the\n    mines! It is a wonderful old world this, isn't it? We are always\n    hearing that it is played out.\n\nAmong the men who were opening up the wild country, officials,\nengineers, and traders, Ma had many dear friends, and she was always\npraising them up for the work they were doing.\n\n\"We come of a wonderful race, Ratcliffe,\" she said. \"How proud I am of\nour countrymen many a time. How brave they are! What knowledge and grit\nthey possess! How doggedly they hold on! How they persevere and win! No\nwonder a handful of them rule the horde of natives and leave their mark.\nThe native, clever in his own way, just stares and obeys.\"\n\n[Illustration: MEMORIAL TO A DEAD CHIEF.]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: MA'S HUMBLE HOUSE ON THE HILL: THE LAST SHE BUILT.]\n\nCHAPTER X\n\n    This chapter tells how Ma became a gipsy again and lived on a\n    hill-top, and how after a hard fight she won a new region for\n    Jesus; gives some notes from her diary and letters to little\n    friends at home, and pictures her amongst her treasures.\n\n\nSome distance from Ikpe there is a high hill called Odoro Ikpe, on which\nthe Government has a rest-house.\n\nMa climbed up there one Saturday night.\n\n\"What a grand view!\" she cried, as she looked over the wide plain and\nbreathed in the cool fresh wind with a great content, \"I've never been\nso high before.\"\n\nAnd then her eyes grew sad. For all that green country was the home of\nheathenism. The chiefs had shut and bolted the door of their hearts\nagainst Jesus, and would not let any teachers or missionaries come in\nand disturb their ways.\n\nMa had often gone to them in her wheeled chair, fording rivers, crossing\nswamps, pushing through wet forests, and stood and knocked at their\nhearts in His name, but in vain. They were afraid that if she came all\ntheir old fashions would tumble down about their ears.\n\nShe was not the one to lose courage. As she sat there on the hill-top,\nshe dreamed that she saw the whole region being won for Jesus, and the\npeople coming to His house clothed and in their right mind.\n\n\"O God!\" she prayed, \"old and feeble and unworthy as I am, help me to\nwin them.\"\n\nAnd there and then she put on her armour and braced herself for battle.\n\n\"Janie,\" she said, \"we'll stay here until we overcome these chiefs.\"\n\nJanie looked round and grunted. The rest-house had only holes for\nwindows; there was a doorway, but no door; the floor was of dried mud,\nand there was not even a table or a chair. But Ma could be happy with\nnothing, she would have been content with bare ground for a bed, and the\nstarry sky for a covering. She did, indeed, find that it was better to\nsleep in the open air than in the stuffy rest-house, and she lay down\nevery night in the verandah with the cool wind fanning her cheeks.\n\nDay after day she called the chiefs and talked with them; she coaxed the\nlittle boys and girls, who were timid and sullen, to come and learn A B\nC; she stood at night in the villages when the women were cooking at\ntheir fires and the young people were dancing to the sound of the drum,\nand spoke to all who would listen of the love of Jesus and His power to\nfree them from sin.\n\nAnd at last, after a weary struggle, her patience and goodness and\nhumour melted the hard hearts, and one by one the chiefs came and said\nthey would allow her to do anything she liked, and they would try to\nworship her God and learn the new ways.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nHer heart was full. She went out in the cool of the night and stood\ngazing over the dim plain. All was silent and still, and the stars were\nshining more gloriously than she had ever seen them before. Her eyes\nswept over them, as they often did, and rested on the Southern Cross,\nthe group she loved most of all, because it was the symbol of her dear\nLord watching over the dark and sinful world, and her thin worn face was\nbeautiful, for her dream had come true.\n\nShe went in and sat on the floor, and leant her weary back against the\nwall of the room, and wrote by the light of a candle stuck in its own\ngrease, telling her friends how happy she was--the happiest woman in all\nthe world.\n\n\"I can't think,\" she said, \"why God has so highly honoured and trusted\nme.\"\n\nShe was a wreck, her body was a mass of pain, she was growing deaf and\nblind, she was tired and weak, and oh, so lonely! Yet her heart was\nbursting with love and gratitude and joy. O wonderful Ma!\n\nAll this time she was working three stations--Use, Ikpe, and Odoro Ikpe,\nand going constantly between them. She kept a diary, and every\nnight--often in the middle of the night--she wrote in it the story of\nthe day. And what a story of toil and heroism it is! Here are several\nsentences from it:\n\n    Left the beach for Ikpe in the evening, sail in moonlight;\n    reached Ikpe 4 P. M. next day; ran on to a tree; boys thrown\n    into the water.\n\n    Egbo out all night, screaming and drumming like mad-men till\n    daylight. All drunk.\n\n    First night in new house. Sorry to leave the wee hut I have\n    enjoyed so much comfort and blessing in.\n\n    Patients from early morning; man bitten by rat; another by\n    snake. School begun, nearly a hundred scholars.\n\n    First Christian funeral at Ikpe.\n\n    Chiefs here by daybreak for palavers.\n\n    Splendid congregation. People changing for the better.\n\n    Terrific thunderstorm. School-boys drenched. Got a big fire on\n    in hall, and all sat round the blaze and I gave them a reading\n    lesson.\n\n    A great reception at Use--thank God for the girls and home.\n    Thank God for sleep!\n\n    On roof all day, head and neck aching, hands broken and\n    bleeding.\n\n    Carrying sand, cleaning corn patch, mudding and rubbing walls.\n\n    Cut my first two roses from the rose bush--lovely, a tender gift\n    from God.\n\n    After sleepless night found white ants in millions in the\n    drawers.\n\n    Washed a big washing.\n\n    Terrific rain storm, no school.\n\n    Very feeble, scarcely able to stand upright in church.\n\n    Horrid night with cross child.\n\n    Lovely letters from dear ones. God is very good to me.\n\n    Every boy in school clothed to-day for first time.\n\n    Heaps of sick babies.\n\n    Full up with work till late at night. Dead tired.\n\n    Two women murdered on the way from market and their heads taken\n    away.\n\n    Fever; trying to make a meat safe.\n\n    Sleepless night, baby screaming every few minutes.\n\n    Splendid fever-sleep full of dreams. Thank God for daily\n    strength to go on however feeble. Thank God for the girls who\n    got up and got me tea without any bother.\n\n    Reached Rest House at darkening. A fearful night of misery with\n    mosquitoes and hard filthy ground on which we lay. Rose at\n    first streak of dawn and never was so glad to leave a place.\n    Baby yelled all night.\n\n    Nothing done, low fever, but a very happy day.\n\n    Fever, stupor sleep. Lost count of days.\n\n    Useless after utterly sleepless night. Made such sermons and\n    delivered them all night long.\n\nHer friends in Scotland began to call her home, tempting her with\nvisions of rest and peace and lazy days in gardens amongst flowers and\nall sorts of good and loving things, but though she thought of it with\nlonging and tears, she said she must first build a house on the hill-top\nof Odoro Ikpe to be ready for a missionary when the Church sent one.\nAfter that perhaps....\n\nSo she started to put up her last house, and because she was so feeble\nand her gang of labourers were such idlers and drones, she found it the\nhardest task she had ever tried to do. \"The African works well,\" she\nsaid, \"if you are at hand to guide and spur him on, but just leave him\nand he sits down and talks or sleeps till you come back.\" So vexed\nsometimes was she with the men dawdling over their trifling bit of work\nthat she would rise and box their ears, but they just laughed and\nthought it a fine joke. Ma did not like to do such things: she wrote to\none of her little correspondents: \"You would have thought your\nmissionary friend was rather hard-hearted, but hard things have to be\ndone and said when one's heart aches to say and do most melting\nthings.\"\n\nMa had more hope of the children than of the grown-ups, and she tried to\nget hold of them and teach them. \"Though they are black,\" she told a boy\nin the Highlands, \"they are just as bonnie and nice as if they were\nwhite. Indeed the colour does not matter. We are all the same inside our\nheads and hearts, and the little lads who know about Jesus are trying as\nhard to be good and brave Christians as you boys who are white.\"\n\nShe was specially hopeful about the boys. Once a missionary spoke to her\nabout one who seemed to have no wish to be a Christian, and she replied,\n\"Dinna gie up hope. You dinna ken what is behind him and what he has to\nfight against. His mother has maybe made him promise not to do\nit--perhaps made him chop _mbiam_ (take the solemn oath) over it.\" And\nafter she talked with the boy she said, \"He's a fine laddie, and ye'll\nhave him yet.\"\n\nMany boys came to her for help in their troubles, and how patiently she\nlistened to what they had to say, and how wisely and tenderly she spoke\nto them! She loved them all, and thought about them just as a kind\nmother would have done. To those who were going to be taught and trained\nshe said, \"You must be the leaders of your race and help them to rise,\nbut you can only lead others to Jesus if you follow Him closely\nyourself.\"\n\nThat was always what she was telling her own children: \"Keep close to\nJesus.\" \"Bairns,\" she would say, \"it's the wee lassie that sits beside\nher mother at meal-times that gets all the nice bittocks. The one who\nsits far away and sulks disna ken what she misses. Even the pussy gets\nmore than she does. Keep close to Jesus the Good Shepherd all the way.\"\n\nWhen the Government took a number of the Ikpe lads to work on the new\nrailway being built to the coal-fields they came to Ma and said they\nwere afraid to go so far.\n\n\"God will go with you and keep you,\" she said. \"Try and find out some\none who preaches the Gospel and keep near him.\"\n\nOn the fly-leaf of a Bible she gave one of them, she wrote:\n\n    _Ud[:o] Ekpenyo[~n] Edikpo._\n\n    _Trusting he will hold by the truths of this Holy Book when in\n    the midst of strangers he may be exposed to temptation. Never\n    forget prayer when reading.--Your friend_,\n\n                                                    M. SLESSOR.\n\n\"This book,\" she told Ud[:o], \"will be a lamp to you and guide you.\"\n\nThese young men returned none the worse for their exile.\n\nThe boys who wanted to be good had more to put up with than those at\nhome. At Ikpe there was an _mbre_, or play, called _ekang_, and all\nyoung men had to join it and pay a fee of L10. Those who would not were\nfined ten rods, some fish, some leaves called _akan_, and two jars of\npalm wine, and had to appear in the street and dance backwards to the\nbeat of the drum, and then were flogged and hounded to their homes. This\ncustom Ma put down.\n\nOnce the chiefs gave orders that all men were to hunt in the bush, and\nthe animals caught were to be sacrificed and eaten in honour of the\n_Ndems_ in the town. The lads of the Church refused to go to the hunt or\nto eat of the sacrifice. \"Then,\" said the chiefs, \"you will be\nbanished.\" Word was sent to Ma, who was at Use, and when she came she\ntold the chiefs that no lad must be forced to do anything against his\nconscience, and from that day to this there has been neither hunt nor\nsacrifice.\n\n[Illustration: A TOWN _NDEM_.]\n\nThe people sacrificed and ate animals before the _Ndems_, because they\nbelieved that it would make the yams on their farms grow big. Ma said\nGod alone gave them such a blessing, and that the children of the Church\ncould no longer follow the custom. It was not long before the custom was\nstopped.\n\nShe was very far out of the world, and seldom saw a white face. How\nglad she was when Mr. Bowes from Calabar appeared. They walked together\nfrom Ikpe to Odoro Ikpe. On the road she stopped and helped a woman to\nlift a very heavy load of palm nuts to her head. Then she went into the\ncompound of an old chief who was ill, found out what was the matter, and\narranged to send him medicine. At the entrance were three white chickens\nwith their heads cut off. \"It is a sacrifice,\" she said. \"Oh, the pity\nof it.\" On going up the steep hill Mr. Bowes wanted to carry a bag she\nhad slung over her shoulder. \"Na, na, laddie,\" she said, \"it's my cat\nand it helps to balance me.\"\n\nWriting to Ratcliffe at this time, she says:\n\n    I have been without money for nearly a month! What do you think\n    of that? Sometimes, but not very often, we have been hungry\n    because we had not enough money to send to the market to buy\n    food. The workmen make such a hole in my pocket. It is very\n    difficult to get money brought from Calabar, and then the people\n    won't take English money when it does come. They use copper\n    wires, which we buy from the next station. Don't we live a very\n    funny life? Pure gipsies, only we don't steal.\n\n\"It is sometimes a rather wearying kind of living, the gipsying sort of\nlife,\" she told Christine; \"but while there are no workers to go round\nwe must do this as the second best way of holding on.\" And then she\nwonders what her little friend is doing and asks, \"Are you going to do\nsomething fine in the new year? I trust so. At least you will be good,\nand To Be is a better verb than To Do in my estimation.\"\n\nShe began to remember that Christine was growing up, and did not like\nthe idea. So she says to her: \"I shall try and keep you in my heart with\nall the sweet mystery of girlhood. I should like, for many things, just\nto keep you among the simple loves and pleasures of home, and not to let\nyou slip over into the womanhood which has such heights and depths that\nalternately beckon and frighten one. But God's order is the only right\none, and you have a claim on Him.\"\n\n\"I shall be fifteen this August,\" Christine replied. \"I am rather sorry\nwe are all getting so big. However, there is one comfort, when we grow\nbigger we will be able to go out into the world and do good things, and\nperhaps splendid things, and help to make people better and\nhappier--though, of course, we can do that always.\"\n\nThat was what Ma liked to hear, and when any of her young friends grew\nup and married and went out into that world of which Christine spoke,\nshe would send them lovely messages. Here is one to a grand-niece of Mr.\nand Mrs. Goldie (the pioneer missionaries of Calabar who had been so\ngood to her) when she was about to sail to America:\n\n    MY DEAR LASSIE--You do not know me, but your parents and all\n    belonging to you are very dear to me, and I have always, from\n    before you were born, loved you all and tried to follow you all.\n\n    And now God is calling you to live your life and to witness for\n    Him in a strange land; and doubtless you will have fits of\n    home-sickness, and times when you will want those who have\n    hitherto made your world for you, and sometimes your husband\n    will feel the same, for marriage does not--if it be a wholesome\n    and sane one--destroy the old loves, but as one who knows what\n    the leaving home means, I know that you will find your Saviour\n    _near_, and _all-sufficient_ for all times and things.\n\n    Do you know a good old practice of ours in a strange land has\n    been to sing the 2nd Paraphrase every Saturday night. You tell\n    your husband to try it. At worship every Saturday night you sing\n    that, and though your voices break, you will find it a tonic.\n\n    You will have all your things packed up and ready and your\n    purchases all made, but as there are always a few small odds and\n    ends, as hairpins and button-hooks, etc., left at the end when\n    you are ready to embark and your boxes not at hand, I enclose a\n    few shillings to have in your pocket for that emergency.\n\n    I remember Mrs. Goldie having forgotten gloves and safety-pins\n    in Liverpool, and we rushed out of the cab to get them on our\n    way to the steamer!\n\n    May every blessing go with you, and may your married life be a\n    long and useful and happy one. He who hath hitherto led you will\n    still compass your path.--Yours affectionately,\n\n                                                    MARY SLESSOR.\n\nMa loved to hear how the girls at home were working for Jesus. How\ninterested she was in all the new things that were being started--the\nGirls' Auxiliaries, the Study Circles, and Guilds! \"The Church,\" she\nsaid, \"is wise in winning the young, for they are going to be the\nmothers of the future and shape the destiny of the nation, and they will\nbe all the wiser and the better mothers and Church members and citizens\nfor what they are doing.\"\n\nSome of her little friends were quite young. There was Dorothy, for\ninstance, who was only five. She sent out Ma a picture-book which she\nhad made herself, and Ma wrote back saying, \"I wish I could give you a\nkiss and say 'Thank you' to your very real self by my very real self,\ninstead of sending you a mere message on paper. But you see I cannot fly\nover the sea, and you can't come here, so what better can we do?\"\n\nThe letters from home Ma kept, along with other treasures, in an old\nchest of drawers that she loved because it had been her mother's. If the\nbairns had been extra good she would gather them about her there after\nthe lamp was lit, and show them everything. The letters were read over\nand over, and the children knew all about Dorothy's doll that could\nspeak and sleep, and Jim's rocking-horse which Santa Claus had brought,\nand the new little brother that had come to Mary's home. Then the\nphotographs of Dorothy, and Fay and her brother, and Christine and\nHappy, and others would be spread out and talked about and admired\nagain. There were also the little gifts sent to her, just trifles, but\nvery precious to her, because some bairn at home had worked at them.\n\"To think of the trouble they took,\" she would say.\n\nAnd the heather! How Ma loved it! These dry bits of plants brought tears\nto her eyes and sent her thoughts away across the wide sea to the\nhomeland, and she saw in vision the glint of the sun, and the shadow of\nthe cloud on the purple moors, and felt the scent of the heather and the\ntang of the salt sea breeze, and heard again the cry of the whaup.\n\n\"That's the Bonkle heather,\" she would say; \"oh, the kind hearts there.\"\n\"And that's the Blairgowrie heather and bog myrtle; never a year but it\ncomes, and it is like a call across the sea.\"\n\nOne package she opened very tenderly, for it held the wee toys and\nwell-worn books of a little boy who had died. They had been sent out to\nher from the heart-broken mother. Ma could never look at this beautiful\ngift without her eyes growing misty with tears.\n\nIn another corner was a cupboard filled with china and coloured glass,\nvery common, but very rare in Ma's eyes, because they were gifts bought\nby the bairns at market or factory with their odd pennies and shyly\noffered to her. She often scolded them well for wasting their money in\nsuch a way, but all the same she was proud of these tokens of their\nlove.\n\nThen, softened by sweet memories and kind feelings, the family went to\nevening prayers. The children, squatting on the floor, read verses\nround, and Ma talked to them simply about higher things, sometimes in\nScots, sometimes in Efik, after which they would sing old psalms or\nhymns, like \"Now Israel may say,\" which was one of Ma's favourites. No\nbooks were used, and woe betide the bairn or visitor who did not know\nthe beginning of the next verse! Ma, however, liked the children to\nlearn new hymns, and sometimes they could be heard singing the tuneful\nones in the yard or away in the bush or on the road.\n\n[Illustration: MASK USED IN NATIVE PLAYS.]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: MA'S LAST VOYAGE.]\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\n    What happened when the Great War broke out. Ma's last voyage\n    down the Creek; how her life-long dream came true. Now she lies\n    at rest, and dreams no more, but her work goes on.\n\n\nThe house at Odoro Ikpe was nearly finished. It was August 1914, and\nstrange stories were being whispered among the natives of a great war in\nthe world of white men beyond the seas. Ma knew how swiftly news travels\nin Africa, and became anxious but did not show it, and went calmly about\nher duties. The people grew more and more restless and excited, food\nbecame dearer, and no lamp oil could be had. She had to read at night by\nthe light of a wood fire.\n\nOne day she was sitting in the new house when the mail boy came running\nup with letters. She took the packet and read of the invasion of Belgium\nby the Germans, with all the horrors of that terrible time, the coming\nof Britain into the struggle on the side of right and justice and\nfreedom. \"Thank God,\" she cried, \"we are not to blame.\"\n\nBut the dreadful news shocked and hurt her so much that she became ill\nand could not rise. The girls carried her over to the rest-house and put\nher into her camp-bed, and for many days she was in a raging fever. At\nlast, worn out, she lay in a stupor. Round her stood the house girls and\nsome of the lads of the Mission weeping bitterly. What should they do?\nThey felt they must not let their beloved Ma die alone so far away from\nher own people. They must take her to Use.\n\nSo they lifted her in the camp-bed and set out for Ikpe, carrying her\ngently over the streams and up and down the hills. Next morning they put\nthe bed into the canoe and covered up the shrunken form and the thin\nwithered face. The yellow cat was also put beside her, but the bag\nslipped open, and it was so frightened that it rushed into the bush and\ndisappeared. It could not be found, and there was not time to wait, for\na long journey lay ahead, and so it was lost and never seen again.\n\nAll day the lads paddled down the beautiful Creek among the\nwater-lilies, and at night they took her ashore at the landing-beach,\nand she lay in the white moonlight until medicine was got and given to\nher, and then they carried her over the three miles to Use. Thus she\ncame to the only home she had, never to leave it again.\n\nShe became a little better, and was able to get up and move about, but\nall the old fighting spirit had gone, and she was very tender and gentle\nand sweet. The War troubled her, and she was always thinking of our\nbrave soldiers in the trenches and praying for them. But she felt she\ncould do nothing, and was content to leave everything with God. To a\nlittle boy and girl at home she said, \"God will work out big things from\nthe War, for there is no waste with Him.\" And to Christine she wrote,\n\"Every blessing be yours in the year that comes. Though it opens in\ngloom there is Light on ahead.\"\n\nYes, for her, too, there was Light ahead. One night she lay dying in her\nmud-room with its cement floor and iron roof. Miss Peacock was with her\nand the girls, Janie, Annie, Maggie, Alice, and Whitie. Alice never left\nher, and slept on a mat beside her bed. Through the long hours they kept\nwatch. Ma was restless and very, very tired, and sometimes begged God to\ngive her rest. Just before dawn death came. God had heard Ma's prayer\nand given her rest. She had worked hard and faithfully for Africa, and\nnow was to rest until Jesus comes again and on the glorious resurrection\nmorning calls her forth to receive her eternal reward. But her place in\nAfrica would be hard to fill, and the people wept, saying, \"Adiaha\nMakara is dead. What shall we do? How shall we live? Our Mother is\ndead!\"\n\nOnce more she voyaged down the Cross River to Duke Town, and there she\nwas buried on the Mission hill, all Calabar, young and old, turning out\nto line the streets and show their deep sorrow. At the head of the grave\nsat old Mammy Fuller, a coloured woman from Jamaica, a faithful servant\nof the Mission, who had welcomed Ma when she first arrived, a\nbright-eyed happy girl, thirty-nine years before, and had loved her ever\nsince. Ma had been fond of her too, and said it was she who ought to\nhave had the Royal Cross.\n\n\"Do not cry,\" said Mammy to the women who began to wail. \"Praise God\nfrom whom all blessings flow.\"\n\nThere was sadness in many a little heart when the news went across the\nocean that Ma was no more. Ratcliffe missed the letters that used to\nflash like rays of sunshine into his quiet life. What of that wonderful\nsecret which he had kept so closely locked up in his heart? He was told\nthat it was all right now, and that there would be no harm in telling\nwhat it was. It turned out to be very simple, like many bigger mysteries\nand secrets. Ma and he had agreed to pray every day that he might get\nbetter and be able to walk, and he was to be good and always do his\nbest.\n\nRatcliffe has never forgotten that compact he made with Ma. He remembers\nwell how she loved him and prayed for him, and he believes that her\nprayers will be answered. He is now in Liverpool attending a school, and\ncan go about on crutches with greater ease--sometimes for two and three\nhours at a time. He can also use his tricycle better, and enjoys a three\nor four-mile ride.\n\nChristine, too, mourned for the loving friend she had never seen, and as\nshe remembered the black children left motherless and alone she felt\ntheir sorrow and cried their cry, and put it all into the music of a\nhaunting lament, a beautiful poem, which begins:\n\n    She who loved us, she who sought us\n    Through the wild untrodden bushlands,\n    Brought us healing, brought us comfort,\n    Brought the sunlight to our darkness,\n    She has gone--the dear white Mother--\n    Gone into the great Hereafter.\n\nMa's death made her famous. She, who was always hiding herself in life,\nwas written and talked about and praised everywhere. The story of her\nheroism, devotion, and faith made her known and admired in many homes\nthroughout the world, and so, although she lies in a far-off tropical\nland with her hands folded in rest and her lips quiet for ever, she is\nstill helping and inspiring boys and girls and older people as she did\nof old.\n\nShe was a puzzling person in many ways. Perhaps her dear friend, Mr.\nMacgregor, describes her best when he says, \"She was a whirlwind and an\nearthquake and a fire and a still small voice, all in one.\" But what\ngirls and boys should remember is that she was, from her childhood, a\ndreamer of dreams. Not day-dreams which fade away into nothing. Not\ndreams of the night which are soon forgotten. But the kind of dreams\nwhich grown-up people sometimes call ideals, dreams that have in them\nthe purpose of doing away with all that is evil and ugly, and making the\nworld happier.\n\nMany boys and girls dream dreams, but they do nothing more. Their dreams\nare like the clouds that drift across the summer sky and disappear. Miss\nSlessor would never have done anything if she had _only_ imagined all\nher dreams. If a boy only longs to be a good cricketer or swimmer, he\nwill never become one. If a girl only thinks about a prize at school,\nshe will not gain it. If a sculptor or artist only dreams about a\nbeautiful statue or painting, the world will never have the joy of\nseeing them. We have to set to work and make what we dream about a real\nand solid thing.\n\nThat is what the White Queen always did. Her dreams came true because\nshe prayed hard and toiled hard and waited hard and loved hard, yes, and\nlaughed hard, for faith and toil and patience and sympathy and humour\nare all needed to win success.\n\nThere was only one of her ideas which did not come to pass--her home for\nwomen and girls; and that would have come true also if she had lived a\nlittle longer, for it was taking hold of the Church, and money was\ncoming in for it. It was like a bit of weaving which she had not time to\ncomplete. Now, young and old, who loved and admired her inside her own\nChurch and elsewhere, have taken up the threads and are finishing it and\nmaking it a lasting memorial of her. A number of native buildings and a\nMission House are being built, and there, under the clever guidance of\nher old comrade Miss Young (now Mrs. Arnot), young lives will be trained\nin all the things that make girlhood and womanhood useful and pure and\nhappy. And there, too, will be a beautiful gateway where tired men and\nwoman and children travelling along the hot roadway may take shelter\nfrom the sun, and rest, and find water to quench their thirst, and\nthink, perhaps, of the Great White Mother who spent her life for their\ngood.\n\nThe church at Ikpe built by Ma was destroyed by a falling palm tree; the\nhouse on the hill-top at Odoro Ikpe was blown down by a tornado, and\npart of the roof carried away into the valley; but her work goes on.\nMany of the young men she taught are now members of the Church; the\nservices in all the towns are crowded; the schools are full of scholars,\nand others are being built. \"All around,\" says the Rev. John Rankin, of\nArochuku, who looks after them, \"there is a desire for schools, but the\nwant of workers hinders more being done. We need a white missionary in\nthe district.\"\n\nWho is going to follow in Ma's footsteps, here and elsewhere?\n\nShe herself believed that it would be the young people of to-day. \"I am\nglad to know,\" she said, \"that the girls and boys are thinking of us and\npraying for us, and denying themselves and planning perhaps to come to\nour help.\"\n\nYes, the future of Africa, and, indeed, of the whole world of\nheathenism, lies with the young hearts who are now dreaming dreams of\nwhat they are going to do in the days to come. They will, by and by, be\nthe pioneers and workers in the dark lands across the seas. It is to\nthem that Jesus is looking to bring about the time when the whole earth\nwill be filled with His light and love and peace.\n\nEvery one, of course, cannot work in the Mission field, and you do not\nrequire to go there to be a missionary. Wherever you may be, whatever\nyou may do, you can always be a missionary and fight as valiantly as\nMiss Slessor did against sin and wrong-doing. You may not find your task\neasy. Our heroine did not find hers easy. You may meet as many\ndifficulties as Christian did on his pilgrim way, and your dreams may be\nlaughed at and scorned, but if you trust Jesus and persevere, you will\ncome out all right in the end.\n\nDream your dreams then, boys and girls, brave ones, lovely ones, but as\nyou grow up be sure and do your best to turn them into realities, for it\nis only those that come true that are making life better and sweeter and\nshaping the world into beauty.\n\n[Illustration: DAN.]\n\n\n\n\n  INDEX\n\n\n  Adam, Miss, 111\n\n  Akpap, 108\n\n  Alice, 110, 129, 181, 200\n\n  Anderson, Mr. and Mrs., 25, 26, 27\n\n  Annie, 53, 99, 130, 176, 181, 200\n\n  Arnot, Mrs. (Miss Young), 154, 204\n\n  Arochuku, 123, 126, 135, 146\n\n  Aros, 122\n\n\n  Bowes, Mr., 192\n\n  Box from home, 102\n\n\n  Chapman, Mr., 140\n\n  Cook, Miss, 172\n\n  Court at Ekenge, 88;\n    at Akpap, 117, 139;\n    at Ikotobong, 148\n\n  Creek Town, 42, 95\n\n\n  Dan, 130, 153, 181, 206\n\n  _David Williamson_, the, 101\n\n  Diary, extracts from, 186\n\n  Duke Town, 25\n\n\n  Edem, chief of Ekenge, 54, 59, 60, 71, 76, 79, 93, (death) 109\n\n  Edisbury, Mr. and Mrs., 173\n\n  Egbo, 33, 34, 76\n\n  Egerton, Sir W., 157\n\n  Ekenge, 49, 84\n\n  Eme Ete, 55, 75, 77, 85, 93, 99, (death) 178\n\n  Enyong Creek, 120, 127, 134, 164\n\n  Eser['e] bean, 73, 77\n\n  Esien, 127\n\n\n  Fuller, Mammy, 201\n\n\n  Goldie, Mr. and Mrs., letter to grand-niece, 193\n\n  Gray, Happy, 111, 195\n\n\n  Hippos, 23, 125, 165, 167\n\n  Hogg, Miss, 40\n\n  Home for women and children, 160, 204\n\n  Hope-Waddell Institution, 84\n\n\n  Ibibio, 122\n\n  Ikotobong, 144\n\n  Ikpe, 162, 165, 204\n\n  Itu, 127\n\n  Iye, 94, 96\n\n\n  Janie, 32, 39, 40, 42, 53, 83, 96, 98, 102, 106, 111, (portrait) 119,\n  129, 153, 176, 177, 200\n\n  Janie (sister), 41, 42\n\n\n  King Eyo, 35, 45, 47, 51, 67, 100\n\n\n  Leopards, 156, 161, (picture) 162, 178\n\n  Livingstone, Dr., 10, 19, 88\n\n  Long juju, 123, 126\n\n  Lugard, Sir F., 179\n\n\n  M'Crindle, Mrs., 111\n\n  Macdonald, Sir C., 107\n\n  Macgregor, Mr. and Mrs., 158, 202\n\n  Mamie (Robertson), 158\n\n  Mana, 98, 127, 128\n\n  Mary, 92, 98, 111, 113, 129, 181\n\n\n  Odoro Ikpe, 183, 204\n\n  Oil ordeal, 58\n\n  Okoyong, 46, 89, 118, 177\n\n  Old Town, 31\n\n  Onoyom, chief, 136, 141\n\n  Orr, Christine G. M., 170, 192, 193, 195, 202\n\n  Ovens, Mr., 68, 69, 108\n\n\n  Peacock, Miss, 41, 158, 200\n\n\n  Ratcliffe (Edisbury), 173-181, 192, 201\n\n\n  Scott, Mrs., Bonkle, 153\n\n  Silver Cross, award of, 180\n\n  Slessor, Mary, baptism, 1;\n    as a child, 5;\n    conversion, 5;\n    enters factory, 6;\n    father's death, 9;\n    study, 11;\n    teacher in Sunday School, 12;\n    offers for Calabar, 20;\n    leaves for Calabar, 22;\n    poem, 26;\n    first furlough, 29;\n    at Old Town, 31;\n    river journey, 35;\n    second furlough, 40;\n    in Devonshire, 41;\n    at Creek Town, 42;\n    goes to Okoyong, 47;\n    settles at Ekenge, 53;\n    builds a hut, 63;\n    and church, 65;\n    third furlough, 83;\n    Agent for the Government, 88;\n    care of children, 90;\n    removes to Akpap, 108;\n    fourth furlough, 110;\n    adventure with hippo, 125;\n    visits Itu, 127;\n    at Arochuku, 134;\n    settles at Itu, 140;\n    rides a bicycle, 144;\n    at Ikotobong, 144;\n    made Vice-President of Native Court, 147;\n    fifth furlough, 153;\n    goes to Ikpe, 164;\n    visit to Canary Islands, 172;\n    revisits Okoyong, 177;\n    awarded Royal Medal, 180;\n    at Odoro Ikpe, 183;\n    illness and death, 199\n\n  Slessor, Mr., 2, 4, 6, 8\n\n  Slessor, Mrs., 2, 3, 6, 8, 10, 18, 20, 39, 42\n\n  Smallpox, 109\n\n  Susie, 95\n\n\n  Thomson, Mr., his scheme, 23, 152\n\n  Twins, 28, 32, 43, 93, 94, 96, 98\n\n\n  Use, 140, 152, 156, 161, 167, 199\n\n\n  War, the, 198\n\n  Whitie, 130, 200\n\n  Wilkie, Mr. and Mrs., 158\n\n  Wilson, Miss Bessie, 41\n\n  Wishart Church, (picture) 2, 12\n\n  Wright, Miss, 41, 129, 133\n\n\n  Young, Miss (Mrs. Arnot), 154, 204\n\n\nTHE END","title":"The White Queen of Okoyong: A True Story of Adventure, Heroism and Faith","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":49707}