CONTENTdm
British Columbia Historical Books Collection
Dawson, E. C. (Edwin Collas), 1849-1925
"Chapter 6: Mrs. Ridley among the redskins." -- Lowther, B. J., & Laing, M. (1968). A bibliography of British Columbia: Laying the foundations, 1849-1899. Victoria, BC: University of Victoria, p. 174.
xv, 168 pages : illustrations, advertisements ; 21 cm
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THE LIBRARY OF ROMANCE Lavishly Illustrated, Ex. Crown Svo. $s. each volume " Splendid volumes."— Th* Outlook " Gift B ooks whose value it would be difficult to over-estimate."— The Standard 44 This series has now won a considerable and well-deserved reputation." The Guardian THE ROMANCE OF MODERN MECHANISM BY ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A., F.R.G.S. With thirty illustrations 44 A genuinely fascinating book." Liverpool Courier THE ROMANCE OF 1 ANIMAL ARTS & CRAFTS I BY 1 H. COUPIK, D.Sc., 6* J. LEA, M.A. With twenty-seven illustration* j 4,A charming subjeot well set forth." J A thenaum j \ THE ROMANCE OF MODERN EXPLORATION BY ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A.. F.R.G.S. With twenty-six illustrations u A mine of Information and stirring Incident."—Scotsman THE ROMANCE OF EARLY EXPLORATION BY ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A.. F.R.G.S. i With sixteen illustrations f 44ViYid and rigorous." Glasgow Herald j \ THE ROMANCE OF MODERN ELECTRICITY BY CHARLES R. GIBSON, F.R.S.E. 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PHILIP, D.Sc, Ph.D. With thirty illustrations THE ROMANCE OF MODERN MANUFACTURE By C R. GIBSON, F.R.S.E. 1 With forty illustrations \ SEELEY, SERVICE & CO. LIMITED THE LIBRARY OF ROMANCE Each volume profusely illustrated. Ex. Crown Svo, $s. "The Library of Romance offers a splendid choice."—Globe. THE ROMANCE OF AERONAUTICS By CHARLES C. TURNER Holder of the Aeronautic Club's Certificate for Aviation Author of44 Aerial Navigation of To-Day " With forty illustrations THE ROMANCE OF MODERN ASTRONOMY BvHECTOR MACPHERSON, Jonr. " An excellent compendium told in popular language."—a thenaum With thirty-seven illustrations,, THE ROMANCE OF THE SHIP By E. KEBLE CHATTERTON, B.A. "An excellent specimen of the Romance Library.—Scotsman With thirty-four illustration* THE ROMANCE OF SAVAGE LIFE Describing the Habits, Customs, Everyday Life, Arts, Crafts, Games, Adventures and Sports of Primitive Man By Prof. G. F. SCOTT ELLIOT M.A., B.SCm F.R.G.S., F.L.S., &C With forty illustration* THE ROMANCE OF THE WORLD'S FISHERIES With descriptions of the Many and Curious Methods of Fishing in all parts of the world By SIDNEY WRIGHT With twenty-four illustration* THE ROMANCE OF MODERN SIEGES By thb Rev. EDWARD GILLIAT With sixteen illustrations THE ROMANCE OF MODERN PHOTOGRAPHY By CHARLES R. GIBSON, F.R.S.E. With sixty-three illustrations THE ROMANCE OF MODERN INVENTION By ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A., F.R.G.S. With twenty-five illustrations " There is no boy but will keenly enjoy this admirable volume." Standard THE ROMANCE OF MODERN ENGINEERING By ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A., F.R.G.S. With many illustrations "Graphic and absorbing descriptions of the wonderful inventions Of OUT fay."—Graphic THE ROMANCE OF MODERN LOCOMOTION By ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A., F.R.G.S. With twenty-five illustrations " Crisply written, brimful of incident. To intelligent lads should be as welcome as a Ballantyne Story."—Glasgow Herald THE ROMANCE OF MINING By ARCHIBALD WILLIAMS B.A., F.R.G.S. With twenty-four illustrations "We cannot praise this book tOO highly."—British Weekly THE ROMANCE OF POLAR EXPLORATION By G. FIRTH SCOTT With twentytfour illustrations Extra Crown Svo. 5s. " Thrillingly interesting." Liverpool Courier THE ROMANCE OF THE MIGHTY DEEP By AGNES GIBERNE With illustrations "Most fascinating; admirably adapted for the young." Daily Hews SEELEY, SERVICE 5r» CO. LIMITED MISSIONARY HEROINES IN MANY LANDS MISSIONARY HEROINES IN MANY LANDS TRUE STORIES OF THE INTREPID BRAVERY AND PATIENT ENDURANCE OF MISSIONARIES IN THEIR ENCOUNTERS WITH UNCIVILISED MAN, WILD BEASTS AND THE FORCES OF NATURE IN MANY PARTS OF THE WORLD BY E. C. DAWSON, M.A. (Oxon.) Canon of St. Mary's Cathedral and Rector of St. Peter s^ Edinburgh AUTHOR OF "THE LIFE OF BISHOP HANNINGTON " 44 LION-HEARTED" "iN THE DAYS OF THE DRAGONS " &»C. &*C. <5r»C WITH EIGHT ILLUSTRATIONS LONDON SEELEY, SERVICE & CO. LIMITED 38 GREAT RUSSELL STREET 1912 THE PINK LIBRARY BOOKS FOR BOYS & GIRLS With Illustrations. Extra Crown Svo. By the Rev. Canon E. C. DAWSON. LION-HEARTED. The Story of Bishop Hannington's Life told for Boys and Girls. MISSIONARY HEROINES IN MANY LANDS. By M. L. CHARLESWORTH. THE OLD AND THE BROKEN LOOKING-GLASS. MINISTERING CHILDREN. MINISTERING CHILDREN. A Sequel. By the Rev. A. J. CHURCH. TO THE LIONS. A Tale of the Early Christians. A GREEK GULLIVER. By Bishop WILBERFORCE. AGATHOS. The Rocky Island, and other Sunday Stories, By EMMA MARSHALL. BROTHERS AND SISTERS. BROOK SILVERTONE. By E. BERTHET. THE WILD MAN OF THE WOODS. By MARY SEELEY. THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. Stories from the Best Book. By the Rev. J. C. LAMBERT, M.A., D.D. MISSIONARY HEROES IN ASIA. MISSIONARY HEROES IN AFRICA. MISSIONARY HEROES IN OCEANIA. By L. M. ALCOTT. LITTLE WOMEN. GOOD WIVES. By HANS ANDERSEN. FAIRY TALES. By the GRIMM BROTHERS GRIMMS FAIRY TALES. By SUSAN COOLIDGE WHAT KATY DID AT HOME. By VARIOUS AUTHORS THE LIFE OF A BEAR. With Sixteen Illustrations. THE LIFE OF AN ELEPHANT. With Sixteen Illustrations. ONLY A DOG. By a Humble Friend. With Eight Illustrations SEELEY, SERVICE 6s CO., LIMITED PREFACE The Church of to-day is running a race for the possession of the world. Other forces than Christianity are hard at work, and make much the same promises as the Church. Civilisation is spreading so rapidly that in a very few years hence it will have altered the conditions of life of every race and nation upon earth. But it is a civilisation which does not trouble itself much about God, and has nothing to do with another wprld than this. If we believe in the revelation of eternal life which was made through Jesus Christ, and that the chief end of man is "to glorify God and enjoy Him for ever," we must make haste to proclaim this truth to all mankind before the secular teacher has occupied the ground. Much has already been done to show Christ as the Light of the World, but very much more remains to be accomplished. The object of this book is to give as vivid a picture as possible of some of the pioneer work which has laid the foundation of all present efforts. The examples here given are all women. The men have been undertaken by other writers. Preface My endeavour has been not so much to give complete lives of missionary workers, as to present an impression of the everyday doings of those who accept a missionary vocation. Some of the short histories contained in this volume are exceptionally adventurous, some are not. It may be taken perhaps for granted that the ordinary life of the ordinary missionary is not so. It is composed of a regular round of somewhat humdrum duties, and is as little romantic as teaching in a school at home. Yet adventures of the most tremendous sort may come suddenly and at any moment upon the quiet days of the evangelist and teacher, when his faith in the goodness of God will be put to the test. Such was the case in China so recently as 1895, 1900, and 1911, and such cases may again recur. The earlier missionaries to Africa, to North-West America, to Sarawak and to the South Seas had lives as full of adventure as the most adventurous could desire. Not a few of the women included in this volume went out as the wives of missionaries. But they were none the less missionaries themselves. Indeed, whatever may be said as to the expediency of sending young wives into certain dangerous or difficult stations, experience has abundantly proved that in very many instances the man who is married doubles his efficiency for good. Wise Mission Boards will, no doubt, make a very Preface careful study in future where single men and single women can be used most advantageously— whether alone or in communities—and where the man and wife can best display the beauty of Christian family life. The instances given are, as the reader will perceive, taken from "all sorts and conditions" and from various denominations of Christians. We have scarcely yet reached the stage in which ecclesiastical differences bulk largely in the mission field. Here and there there may have been some clashing between differing systems. But tbings are not generally enough advanced for that. All the teachers are mostly concerned with those elementary truths which lie at the basis of every kind of Christianity. Hence the feeling of tolerance and brotherly kindness with which missionary greets missionary among the heathen. So far as I have been able, I have tried to give some idea of what all are attempting to do. I desire to acknowledge, with many thanks, my indebtedness to Miss A. M. Stoddart and Eugene Stock, Esq., who have kindly provided me with -much valuable information concerning many ^ of the subjects of the chapters in this book, contained in private letters, pamphlets, and books. My best thanks are also due to the following Missionary Societies and firms of publishers who have given me permission to make use of the information contained in books issued by them, CONTENTS CHAPTER I MRS. BOWEN THOMPSON PAGE Her active nature—How she obtained a school-house—Marriage —Begins work at Antioch—Death of Dr. Thompson—The Lebanon massacres—The Druses—Massacre of Christians —At Beirut—The Syrian women—-Schools—An answer to prayer—Canon Tristram—Daoud Pasha and the schools— Superstition—Return home—Death 19 CHAPTER II FIDELIA FISKE Early life—Arrival at Trebizond—Oroomiah—Ignorance of the women—Popularity of the schools—Deacon Gewergis— Return home—Illness and death 47 CHAPTER III MRS. KRAPF German missionaries—Dr. Krapf—Fraiilein Dietrich—Her marriage—Birth of a child in the Shoho Desert—Refused entrance to Tigre"—Return to Aden—Mishaps by water— At Zanzibar—At Mombasa — Illness and death of Mrs. Krapf 57 CHAPTER IV MRS. BISHOP Isabella Bird, an observant traveller—Marries Dr. Bishop— . His death—She visits Kashmir—Little Tibet—Amritsar— Persia—Through Armenia to Trebizond—The Nestorians —Mr. W. E. Gladstone—Queen Victoria—China and Japan —Korea—To Newchang—Nagasaki—Injured—Tokyo— Western China—Tibet—Shanghai—Return to London— Morocco—Illness and death 65 Contents CHAPTER V HANSINA CHRISTINA HINZ Early life—Influence of the Moravians—Affianced to Johannes Hinz—Perilous journey to Greenland—A wreck—And rescue—Reaches her husband—Work among the (Greenlanders—Birth of daughter—Death 91 CHAPTER VI MRS. RIDLEY Metlakahtla—Wizards—William Duncan—Uphill work—Opposition of medicine men—A Christian colony—Bishop Ridley—Mrs. Ridley's work—Her great influence on the men—The white man—A saloon turned into a school—An Indian prayer-meeting—Goes up the Skeena in mid-winter —Stikine River—Illness—A moving scene—Death . . 107 CHAPTER VII MARTHA CROLL Hindus in Jamaica—A difficult class to reach—Martha Croll— In India—Invalided home—Off to Jamaica—Opposition of Brahmin priests—Work among the women—A brief life of hard work—Death—Private letters 135 CHAPTER VIII AMONG THE " BLACKFELLOWS" OF NORTH AUSTRALIA The aboriginal—His religion—"Black-birders"—Mrs. Ward —The mission arrives at Thursday Island—Then at the mouth of Batavia River—Native law—Drilling the natives —Difficulties—Mrs. Ward's school—A church—Mapoon— Mrs. Hey—Socialism among the natives—The protection of the mission—Co-operation with justice—A year of troubles—Death of Ward—Mrs. Ward continues the work —Native reserves and protectors—The f. G. Ward— Development of Mapoon 143 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Settling Disputes Frontispiece PAGE A Syrian Fisherman 25 Syrian Woman Making Bread 35 Syrian Homes 41 Travelling by River in China 79 Fearless Riding 83 An Ardent Convert 115 A Totem Pole 125 m PUBLISHER'S NOTE The contents oj this volume have been taken from Canon Dawson7s larger book entitled " Heroines of Missionary Adventure" published at live shillings. MRS. BOWEN THOMPSON THE REGENERATOR OF SYRIA CHAPTER I MRS. BOWEN THOMPSON THE REGENERATOR OF SYRIA Her active nature—How she obtained a school-house—Marriage— Begins work at Antioch—Death of Dr. Thompson—The Lebanon massacres—The Druses—Massacre of Christians—At Beirut— The Syrian women—Schools—An answer to prayer—Canon Tristram—Daoud Pasha and the schools—Superstition—Return home—Death. Elizabeth Marion Thompson was one of those women who are born to comfort and strengthen the weak and perplexed. She herself was gifted with superabundant energies, all of which she freely poured forth for others.\ Her homely face beaming with kindness and lighted up by eyes which looked direct through all difficulties, brought renewed courage to many a downcast heart. She was of Celtic extraction. Her great-grandmother was a Highlander, and a Jacobite, and it is said that she changed clothes with Prince Charlie and allowed herself to be taken in his stead, keeping up the illusion for several days, till he was well away. Her grandfather was a Welshman, General Lloyd, known in his day as a tactician. Her own character was prompt, decisive, and "managing." As a friendly Quaker observed of 19 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands her to a member of the family: " Thy sister is a great general"; and to herself: " My dear Elizabeth, thee dost need equanimity." This equanimity Mrs. Thompson learned in the school of adversity, which so sternly educates all— making or unmaking them, according to their teachableness. All through her life, however, she was noted for her brisk readiness to take the gift of the passing moment. A sedate Oriental, whose leisure had been encroached upon by her unconquerable Western persistence, said to her: "Madame, you are as quick in seizing opportunities as a Frenchman is in catching fleas." Daoud Pasha, observing this same practical readiness, became her admirer and friend. He had granted her a dirty and uncared-for house among the hills for a school, and told her that he would shortly return to inspect it. Whereupon Mrs. Thompson pinned up her skirts, took brush and whitewash, and spurred everybody to do the same, so that when the Pasha returned, three days later, he found a neat school- house, already furnished with desks and benches, at which a number of children were seated busy over their needlework. It looked like magic. " This is administration!" exclaimed the Pasha. " This is work!" From that moment he became her friend and supporter. Before her mission to Syria, Mrs. Thompson had given frequent proof of her powers. As, for example, when a soldier was condemned to death for a murder during a drunken fit at Aldershot, she I The Regenerator of Syria discovered that the man had been wounded in the head during the Crimean War, and that a doctor had cautioned him never to drink. This had not been brought out at the trial. She took up the matter, pressed it before the Home Secretary, and eventually obtained the unhappy man's reprieve. Whatever she undertook she carried to its conclusion with a resolution which would take no denial. Mrs. Thompson was very early brought under strong religious influences. She was consciously converted to Christ, and was a firm and childlike believer in the power of prayer. Without prayer she attempted nothing, but when she had laid a matter before God she was invincible. Her marriage to Dr. James Bowen Thompson united her with one who thoroughly sympathised with her in all these respects, and they were very happy together in their work. Dr. Thompson was at the head of the British Syrian Hospital at Damascus from 1843 to 1848. He had large plans for Syria, and hoped to open it out by providing direct railway communication to India along the valley of the Euphrates. In pursuance of this scheme the husband and wife went first to Constantinople, and then settled on some property which the doctor owned near Antioch. It was at Antioch, where Christians first got their name, that Mrs. Thompson began the work for which she afterwards became famous. She was sorry for the women and pitied their degraded Missionary Heroines in Many Lands state. She succeeded in forming several little schools in the neighbourhood, and established teaching centres. During the year and a half of their residence they gave the movement a good start. When they left, they committed the work to a native Christian teacher and some Armenians, with a good hope that it would be carried on successfully. When the Crimean War broke out Dr. Thompson at once offered his medical experience to the ^Government and hastened to the scene of action. Unhappily he was one of the earliest victims of the malignant fever which raged at Balaclava, and was also a victim of that ridiculous red-tapeism which played such a disastrous part in that distressful campaign. As a " civilian " he might not be taken into the military hospital, but was left to die on board ship. It was a horrible experience, and Mrs. Thompson, audacious in her grief, laid it before Queen Victoria in a notable letter, which moved the Queen's heart to such an extent, that she took measures that no such criminal mistake should again be made. In the meanwhile the deed was done. The fever- tossed man in his close berth was again sent out to sea, and died a few days later. Mrs. Thompson did not permit herself the luxury of nursing her grief, but, when the Indian Mutiny followed the Crimean War, she joined the Lady Mayoress' Committee at the Mansion House and threw herself into the work of providing UI The Regenerator of Syria necessaries for the sufferers. To this work she added the formation of an Association for the Wives of Soldiers under the patronage of the Queen. When the terrible news of the massacre of Christians in the Lebanon reached England in i860, she was ready to hear in the cry of the thousands of women and children who were cast destitute upon the charity of the world a direct call to herself to go to Syria and help them. The history of the Lebanon massacres is now an old story. But in i860 it startled Europe and America, and moved every generous heart to indignation. The Lebanon and anti-Lebanon ranges of mountains are famed for their beauty, Tacitus, the Roman historian, thus describes what he saw: " Libanus . . . rises to a great height, affording shade under its verdant groves, and even in the ardent heat of that sultry region is covered at the top with eternal snow" {Hist., Bk. v. 6). The mountains rise boldly and lie fold beyond fold till the foothills lose themselves in majestic Hermon, which rises like a white altar, and whose snows are seen from far over the hot plains of Palestine. The wooded slopes and deep sequestered valleys of this mountainous district are inhabited mainly by Christians and Druses. The Christians are Maronites. They are descendants of the ancient Syrians, and followers of the saintly ascetic Marou. He and his party were condemned as " Monothelites" by the General Council of Con- 23 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands stantinople and retired to the fastnesses of the Lebanon. They now have a concordat with Rome, and use Syriac as the religious language, celebrating mass in that tongue. They are said to number about 200,000. The Druses are a hybrid sect which combines Mohammedanism with certain Christian superstitions. They date from the Khalif Hakim, who ruled in Egypt at the close of the tenth century. He was a religious dreamer, and after his assassination was deified by certain disciples who prophesied his return to earth. A Persian named Hamza became a convert to this creed in 1030, and proclaimed himself Hakim's Prophet. One of his disciples, Derazy, fled to the Lebanon and obtained a following there. These Druses admit the more advanced worshippers to an initiation which constitute their "Okkals"; the rest are called Djahels, or uninitiated. In addition to the Maronites and Druses there are a certain number of Greek Christians not in communion with the Orthodox Church. The remainder of the population of the Lebanon consists of Mussulmans. For a long while there had been an increasing jealousy of the Druses against the Christians. The latter were industrious and prosperous, and were rapidly growing in power and independence, so much so that they had aroused the attention and fear of the Turks. A systematic persecution commenced, in which the Druses were backed up 24 Stereo Copyright, Underwood &• U, London &• New Y, A Syrian Fisherman ■ The pillars and stones are those of ancient Tyre. A remarkable fulfilment of prophecy (see Ezekiel xxvi. and xxvii.). JJ The Regenerator of Syria by the Turkish rulers. Outrages of all kinds began to be practised, and no Christian life was safe. In i860 the long-planned blow fell. A general attack was made on the Christian villages. The order went forth that all males should be killed from seven years to seventy. None were spared. The stories of slaughter are appalling. In May i860, a crowd of Christians escaping to the hills was overtaken near Beirut and not a soul was spared. Beirut itself became crowded with maimed and bleeding refugees. The village of Jezeen, among steep rocks, was surprised by a mob of some two thousand ruffians, who burned the place, thrust the startled people down the ravine, and cut twelve hundred of them to pieces as they fled. Some were pursued as far as Sidon and murdered on the seashore. Christian convents were attacked and plundered. Sometimes the miserable Christians would be offered shelter in some courtyard, and then the slaughterers would be admitted and all were butchered as they stood. At the Castle of Hasbeya the Turkish Governor invited the panic-stricken Christians to take refuge under his protection. He took away their arms, assembled them all in the quadrangle under colour of carrying on negotiations for their deliverance, and then sent his soldiers in among them with orders to spare none. " Many were terribly mutilated before the final blow was given. Shrieking mothers, in vain endeavouring to cover and 27 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands conceal their boys and screen them from the sword, shared their fate, perishing together in a grasp that the sword alone could dissever." These poor people met their fate bravely, and in that supreme moment of agony their religion came to their help. It is said by one of the women who survived the horror that each, as his turn came, " submitted his body to the stroke, and fervently murmured, I In Thy Name, Lord Jesus.'" All through the Lebanon the same deeds were being enacted. The villages were shambles. The ditches ran with blood. In one place the description is that: "The women being ordered to fall back . . . the blows given by hatchets and axes sounded like those of woodcutters felling" the trees of a forest. Six hours completed the work, and filled the gutters and the waterspouts with blood which rose above the ankles." The wretched women, after seeing their men cut down before their eyes, were compelled, all splashed with their blood, to say, " Long live our victorious lord! " Some of these poor women were driven mad by the terror and sorrow of it. Others could never forget their anguish, or cease to demand vengeance for their wrongs. A year later Mrs. Thompson met some of these women at Beirut to consult as to what could best be done for them. " We look," they said, "to England to do us justice for the blood of our husbands and sons." Then one drew from her bosom a cap stiff with the blood in which it had been soaked. "It was the cap 28 The Regenerator of Syria of her son. A shudder came over all and deep silence, followed by sighs and weeping. 'This is my son's cap/ said the lady, ' this is his blood ; and see his locks of hair,' opening the cap. . . . ' They cut my son in pieces before my eyes ; they have left me nothing but his blood/ . . . And she put the cap back into her bosom, and sat down on the ground without another word . . . while all around sobbed with grief." Another described how she stood up to her knees in blood, while the Turks stripped her of her ornaments, and one almost cut her finger off to get her ring, while another gashed her neck in slicing off her pearl necklace. When the news of these atrocities reached the outer world the Powers at once sent battleships to quiet the disturbance, and a strong Anglo- American committee was formed to relieve the immediate necessities of the homeless and destitute women. Lord Dufferin was prominent in the generous attempt to save life. He advanced ^5000 from his own purse to meet the emergency. All that could be done, however, seemed too little. Beirut was overwhelmed with crowds of miserable beings who had literally lost their all. Mrs. Thompson at once responded to this call from the East. Her own knowledge of Syria fitted her to help the Syrians. And as she said, u It was but natural that my heart should respond to the widow's cry"; she who herself had been made a widow so short a while 29 J Missionary Heroines in Many Lands before. " Therefore, as a widow caring for the widow, I felt specially called upon to try and alleviate their distress, and make known to them the only balm for a broken heart—the love of Jesus." She lost no time, but started in October i860, intending to spend the next half-year at Beirut. She did not at that time foresee the work which lay before her, and which was to fill the remainder of her life. It was heart-breaking at Beirut. " At first my heart," she says, " died within me at the squalor, noise, and misery of these people. Ignorance of the truth and deeply cherished revenge characterised the greater number of the women." But her gentleness and sympathy soon produced some effect, and as she read to them the words of Christ they began to listen, saying, | We never heard such words. Does it mean for us women?" She at once began to teach them to read in order that they might get to know the Scriptures, which were, to nearly all, sealed books. What was needed was education of body and mind for these poor creatures. They all cried for work, but few knew how to do it. They could not help themselves. "You scarcely see," Mrs. Thompson says, "any one here in anything but rags. Even if they had a length of calico or print given them, with needle and thread and hooks and eyes, not one in fifty knows how to cut it out and make it up. You see them 30 The Regenerator of Syria kneading a little flour and water on a stone by the wayside sometimes, but otherwise disheartened and idle." They would sit in rows besieging the doors of the Sisters of Charity, in hope of a dole of bread and flour. " Many," she says, "are like bears bereft of their cubs—so wild, so savage, so reckless; one's heart aches to see them, and I ask myself, Can these dry bones live ?" In the midst of all this abject misery and despair, the women did not lose hold upon their religion. But of that religion they understood almost nothing except the observance of its outward forms. Mrs. Thompson describes a deathbed. The Greek priest came in his robes. He turned everybody except herself out of the room. He then took from his pocket a green embroidered scarf or stole, and drawing it over his head he repeated the office appointed for such occasions. Though the woman could not speak, she tried to follow, and feebly made the Sign of the Cross. Then the priest laid the other end of the scarf over the woman's head, and pronounced the Absolution; which being said, he left the room. This woman had once been wealthy. She had seen her husband hacked to pieces, herself unable to save him. She apparently knew very little about what she had been taught to believe, or of the actual teachings of Christ. Mrs. Thompson got a Syrian boy to read to her from the Scriptures, and this boy ever and again would bid 31 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands her say, "Lord Jesus, save my soul." But the Greek nurse interrupted each time, exclaiming, "Say, Jesus, Mary, Joseph, save me!" Mrs. Thompson became more and more convinced, as she proceeded with the work, that what was primarily required was a sound system by which these women might get the elements of knowledge. The priests themselves were quite ready to welcome her attempt. All recognised the need. As the family of a certain priest confessed, " We are like the cows, we know nothing." To understand and to act were one and the same thing with Mrs. Thompson. She began at once. The plan of an association for the improvement of the condition of the Syrian women rapidly formed itself in her mind. She opened a class in her hotel. The landlord himself became the first pupil. She secured an Arabic teacher. The scheme began to run. Already she saw her future school at Beirut. It was to have a classroom for little children, an industrial department for women and girls, a dep6t for obtaining work for the unemployed, and a store-room for the supplies which she confidently expected would flow in from England. In fact, the beautiful and splendidly appointed school which now carries on her work at Beirut was plain even then to the eye of her mind. She was very fortunate in securing, at this stage, the co-operation of Mr. and Mrs. Mott, who devoted themselves to carry out the same ends. 32 The Regenerator of Syria By the end of 1861 a house was secured. It was at once occupied by some thirty Hasbeyan widows. The number increased so rapidly that within a month three schools were in active operation. Subscriptions began to come in, and interest in the work grew. Soon a fourth school was started in a stable. And still the number of applicants were greater than she could receive. Yet another school was filled with ninety little children, and a few days later a fifth school was formed for young women. Almost any one but Mrs. Thompson would have been overwhelmed. She writes: " I had not the slightest idea how large and how rapidly the work would grow; and when I look at the schools as they now stand, I own I marvel to see what the Lord has wrought in little more than two months and a half. Not a single woman or child has been asked to come here, but I have had to select. . . s^The care of this large flock completely exhausts my time and strength." Lord Shaftesbury was much interested in all that was being done, and gave the weight of his name and influence to procure Mrs. Thompson the financial help she required. But all on the spot were quite enthusiastic. The officers of the fleet anchored off Beirut used to send her all their washing to be done by her women in the laundry which she set up. One of the captains presented her with a mangle, and the ship's carpenters put up all the fittings. 33 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Sometimes she was reduced to straits. Once when money ran short and she could not pay her widows for their work, she called them and bid them all join in prayer with her to ask for help. That day a visit was paid by the harem of a Turkish Pasha. The ladies presented a purse of piastres on leaving the school, and when Mrs. Thompson came to count the coins she found that they totalled up to three Turkish liras, or exactly the sum which was needed to pay her widows. No wonder if they all regarded it as a gift from God, something like the sending flesh and bread to Elijah by the ravens! In the early summer of 1862 the schools were visited by the then Prince of Wales, His Majesty King Edward. This was a great event. The Prince was greeted by the children with the English National Anthem, and was much pleased with all he saw. After some practical questions which proved how thoroughly he comprehended what was being done, the Prince contributed twenty-five Napoleons to the school, and gave a large order for embroidery. A school was presently started at Hasbeya, I where one of the most terrible of the massacres had taken place. Mrs. Thompson went throughout the whole district planning where best her centres of education might be planted. Indeed from Hasbeya she ascended Mount Hermon, and from its towering summit looked down upon the whole land spread at her feet. Down upon the 34 Stereo Copyright, Underwood & U. London &■ New York Syrian Women Making Bread The Regenerator of Syria river Pharpar, and upon Damascus lying among its gardens, like a pearl among emeralds; upon Tyre and Sidon by the sea, and upon the blue Lake of Galilee and the southern plains. On the descent, as they crossed a gully full of snow, they saw the tracks of a brown bear, and soon the great beast itself appeared quite close to them. When the guides shouted and waved their poles it slowly retreated somewhere to its den amoner the rocks. Great eagles hovered and soared in the clear blue sky. All around were signs of an untamed world, in which savage nature claimed the weaker as her prey. But Mrs. Thompson was soon to soften some at least of the human hearts in that fierce place. When Canon Tristram visited the neighbourhood, some while after, he was surprised at the kindly welcome he received. The women, once so uncivilised, wanted to "do" for him, inquired if he had any things ^et be washed, or clothes to be mended. " We soon found," he says, "that the benefits of Mrs. Thompson's education descended to the very practical details of everyday life, and when I told them that Sitt (Mrs.) Thompson was a dear friend of mine, they clapped their hands for joy. . . . Soon a merry group was seated under the lee of our tent . . . needles in hand, to overhaul our tattered and travel-worn wardrobes. . . . Their Christian education spoke out of their bright, intelligent faces." In 1864 there were already eighteen schools in full swing, and still more places asked for them. 37 c f~ Missionary Heroines in Many Lands The seventh annual examination of scholars took place in 1867 at Beirut. The greatest possible interest was shown by everybody. During three days all classes of Beirut society, natives and Europeans, came out to see the children. On one occasion there were about a thousand people present. It was in this year, 1867, that Daoud Pasha was so much impressed by Mrs. Thompson's energy and business-like ways that he gave her his entire confidence and support. There had been some misunderstanding on his part, but the Pasha accompanied her to the village of Afn Zahalteh, where she wished permission to open a school. He offered his arm and went with her through the village to seek for a suitable house. But such filth and dilapidation and squalor met them everywhere that they returned to the tent. The Pasha then left, and Mrs. Thompson received the offer of part of a house. It was dirty beyond description, and nobody seemed to see the need of cleansing it. She therefore tied a handkerchief over her head, and set to work herself with broom and duster, till others followed her example. After a while the novel spectacle stimulated the men also to assist, and carpenters and masons gave their help to put up partitions and stop holes, besides putting up shelves and benches. When the Pasha returned in a few days, he found to his great surprise that a transformation had been effected. A neat room greeted him, with seats, desks, and blackboard. He then and there contributed 1000 38 The Regenerator of Syria francs toward the new school-house, which was presently to replace the temporary room. Later on, a school was started at Damascus by this never-flagging searcher-out of new ground. As usual, she did not stop to consider ways and means, but just commenced. Having found the right teacher, she arranged to pay her a monthly salary, and, she says: " I feel the sweetest confidence that God will provide the means." And, indeed, she had every reason to believe that He would do so, since she had never prayed to Him in vain. It was indeed a triumph when Mrs. Thompson found that her movement was affecting not the Christians only, but their hereditary enemies the Druses. To win this fierce people was a revenge worth taking upon them for their persecution of the people of the Cross. A school faas established at Zachleh with the full approval of the Turkish Governor of the Lebanon, and with the authority of an Imperial Firman from Constantinople. These schools became centres of Gospel teaching as well as of secular knowledge. The Bible was always taught in them and expounded. Some of the Maronite Christians needed this teaching very much. Mrs. Thompson gives an example of the sort of superstition which had to be combated. It was customary to buy a standing-place in heaven at so much a foot! " We had heard of this monstrous practice before; but, to feel quite sure, we made inquiries, and learned . . . that many had 39 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands bought two feet square, and others more, but none would own how much she had paid for her lot. This purchased possession in heaven is the absolute property of the purchaser; none can expel her from it, nor may she go into her neighbour's plot. Incredible as it may seem, it is not confined to Zachleh. In a neighbouring village a poor Maronite widow, who had with difficulty succeeded in raising sufficient money to buy the two feet square in Paradise for herself, begged the priest to allow her to have her little granddaughter with her, promising to keep the child close at her side, so as not to overstep the boundary line!" "To such a people," adds the writer, "the entrance of God's Word is as ! the dayspring from on high.'" The Maronite priests were naturally opposed to this school at Zachleh, but they protested in vain. The fine school-house, built in Moorish style, stands to-day on the steep side of the village hill as a monument to the untiring zeal of the beloved foundress. It was a happy day for her, their spiritual mother, when some of her young pupils went to Jerusalem with their teacher to receive confirmation at the hands of the Anglican bishop. At length, however, the inevitable day came when the long-taxed strength was no longer sufficient for the demands upon it. During the summer of 1869 Mrs. Thompson suffered much from weakness. In the early autumn she re- 40 Stereo Copyright, Underwood & U. Syrian Houses The large room up the steps is the guest chamber of one house. J The Regenerator of Syria turned to England, and took up her residence at the house of her sister at Blackheath. At first it was hoped that she might regain strength, but the decline recommenced and the end came rapidly. Toward the end she asked them to telegraph to Beirut and beg that the children might be gathered together to pray for her. " Say," she dictated, | Elizabeth is sinking ; pray without ceasing." Later still she received the Holy Communion for the last time. She was quite conscious, and content in the thought that she was "going home." On 14th November 1869, precisely at midnight, the soul of the friend of Syria passed away, and went to meet its God. Her last words were, " Glory be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Jesus, Jesus! Rest, rest! Arise! Amen ! " Much of the material for this chapter has been gathered from The Daughters of Syria, a narrative of efforts, by the late Mrs. Bowen Thompson, for the evangelisation of the Syrian females. Edited by Canon Tristram. (Seeley & Co.) 43 J FIDELIA FISKE AMONG THE NESTORIANS OF PERSIA CHAPTER II FIDELIA FISKE AMONG THE NESTORIANS OF PERSIA Early life—Arrival at Trebizond—Oroomiah—Ignorance of the women—Popularity of the schools—Deacon Gewergis—Return home—Illness and death. The Americans have had a Mission in Persia among the Nestorians since 1834. Though this cannot be placed on the same basis as a Mission to non-Christians, the work is not wholly dissimilar. It is sometimes more difficult to enlighten and teach those who have lost almost all but the name of Christianity than those who are wholly outside. The part which Miss Fiske took in dealing with the Nestorian Christians of Persia was mainly that of raising the degraded girls, and giving them a truer ideal of Christian womanhood. She was born in 1816, in an up-country farmhouse, among the hills of Massachusetts. It was a simple and religious life that the more devout among those American farmers lived during the early part of last century. Plain living and high spiritual thinking was the rule. The family lived in a one-storey wooden house, in which there was but one general room, with a few sleeping-places 47 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands off it. They rose early, lived hard, and retired to rest soon after nightfall. But when they gathered about the wood fire on winter evenings the children were all brought into real relationship with each other, a true family party, and, whatever might be the occupation, it was always wound up with devotions. The big Bible was taken from its shelf, a chapter was gravely read, a prayer was said, and immediately all were expected to seek their beds. This religious life had been a tradition among the Fiskes during several generations. The fathers of the family, two brothers Fiske, were among the original settlers who left England for conscience' sake in 1637. Fidelia was brought up in an intense spiritual atmosphere. She was brought under searchings of soul at the age of thirteen, and made a public confession before the congregation of faith in Christ when she was only fifteen. At the age of twenty-three, means were found to send her to Mount Holyoke Seminary. There she graduated in due course, and became a teacher. The lady who presided over the seminary was anxious to create a missionary spirit amongst the teachers and students, and did not find much difficulty in impressing Miss Fiske. When a missionary from Persia visited Mount Holyoke and appealed for helpers, she sent him the following words on a slip of paper: "If counted worthy, I should be willing to go." The family at the farm were 43 Among the Nestorians of Persia naturally reluctant to part with her, but a prayer- meeting was held at which they made up their minds, and finally dismissed her in the name of the Lord. She reached Trebizond, on the Black Sea, in 1842. Her station was to be Oroomiah, where there were about a thousand Nestorians, among about twenty-four thousand Mohammedans and Jews. The condition of these people, the fringe of the ancient Church of the East, was most unhappy and degraded. The condition of the women was as bad as could be. Miss Fiske saw at once, with the eye of the new-comer, that the only way to reach them would be to get them to school. The prospects were not encouraging. School had been tried before with poor success. The girls did not care to learn, and their parents were afraid that bookishness would spoil their daughters for the field labour in which most of them were employed. She, however, made a start with one or two little girls. The first two were brought by the Nestorian bishop, Mar Yohanan. "They are your daughters," said he, and left them in her charge. Miss Fiske had to begin from the very bottom. She had to wash her pupils as well as teach them. At first they had not the most elementary notions of truth or honesty. Everything was stolen and lied about. She thought something could be done by making a solemn occasion of the next theft, and so laid a little 49 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands scheme. When the children were on their way to bed, she stuck six black pins into a cushion past which they must go. Pins are valuable assets, and coveted accordingly. When she returned to the cushion the pins were gone. She went up to the girls and told them of her loss. In an instant all the hands were raised in proof of innocence, while all the children cried, "God knows that we have not got them." Miss Fiske replied that she was afraid that God knew just the reverse, and proceeded to search them, but to no purpose. Then she made them all kneel down, and prayed that God would show her where the lost pins were. Immediately she remembered that she had not searched the girls' caps. She told them that she was about to do so. Instantly a child put her hand to her head, and looking in her cap, Miss Fiske found all the pins stuck into the lining. This made a great impression. It seemed to the girls a direct reply to the prayer. They were very much more careful in future not to lay their hands upon what did not belong to them. But the real difficulty with the women was that they had, through generations of contempt, lost their self-respect. To questions as to their knowledge, they would reply, " What do we know? we are women"—which was the equivalent of saying, "We are geese." It took a long time to excite their interest, and then still longer patience to get them to think out any subject and learn. 5° Among the Nestorians of Persia When once the girls were shown what they were capable of, they made rapid progress. Miss Fiske had the delight of watching a wild crew of noisy, cackling, undisciplined hoydens grow up into quiet, responsible, and lovable Christian women. To have achieved such a change among even a few was a result worth labouring for. At first she could not even get their ear. They came together jabbering to see the foreign teachers. One could not hear oneself speak. So Miss Fiske told them that unless they, one and all, put their finger on their lips and kept them shut, she would not say a word to them. In this novel fashion she gained an audience, read them a story from the Gospels, and prayed with them. The school became so popular and so many girls wanted to attend, that Miss Fiske felt strong enough to announce that only those who were entirely happy in the school and meant to take full advantage of their opportunities, and keep all the rules, should remain with them. A real spirit of religious earnestness grew among the scholars. They learnt the meaning of effectual prayer. Speaking of some of them, Miss Fiske wrote: "If they do not pray several times a day, they feel that they are becoming very cold-hearted. To-day, as they were going out to walk, one of them, who, perhaps, had not prayed for three hours, felt that she could not go until she should have a few moments alone. I have the whole school divided into little circles of five or six 5i Missionary Heroines in Many Lands each, and have a prayer-meeting with one circle every day." The practical results of this consciousness of God seem to have been very marked. Stealing and lying became less frequent; gradually they became very rare. Consciences became active, and on all sides faults which were quite unsuspected would be confessed. "The intellect of the girls seemed greatly quickened by grace in the heart. They brought better lessons, wrote better compositions, and were in all respects better scholars." It often happens, both at home and in the mission-field, that hard cases among the parents are healed through the children. An example of this occurred about three years after Miss Fiske commenced work. A certain deacon named Gewergis was noted for his irreligion and inhumanity. He brought a daughter of twelve years to the school. Miss Fiske calls the man "one of the vilest of the Nestorians." His daughter was heard one day praying for him that God would save her father from "going down to destruction." When this man was interviewed and reasoned with he simply laughed. Then the following occurred, Miss Fiske writes :— " I was about turning from him, when I seemed to have a new view of the worth of his soul. I turned to him, took his hand, and said: t Deacon Gewergis, I see you do not wish me to speak with you of your soul. I promise you 52 Among the Nestorians of Persia that I will never do so again, if you do not wish me to; but I want you to make me one promise. When we stand at the bar of God, and you are found on the left hand, as you certainly will be if you go on in your present course, promise me that you will tell the assembled universe that, on this twenty-second day of February 1846, you were told of your danger. I leave you to pray for you! \ I could say no more: my heart was too full. I turned and was about leaving him, when he burst into tears, and said, (My sister, I need this salvation; I will go and pray for myself.'" That was a remarkable confession; and at the moment Miss Fiske could scarcely believe in it. It passed through her mind that the man would simply steal what came to his hand and go home. But while she and her friends were at prayer "the door opened very gently. Deacon Gewergis entered; his gun and dagger were gone; his turban had fallen over his face; his hands were raised to his eyes; and I could see the big teardrops falling." It was the beginning of a great change, which finally transformed a graceless man into a gentleman. He became after a while an evangelist, and worked with the Mission until his death ten years later. The last years of Fidelia Fiske's life were full of suffering. She was compelled by the progress of the disease which prostrated her to return to America, There, in spite of much weakness, she 53 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands did some good work, among other things writing Woman and ker Saviour in Persia. She also, in 1863, undertook work at her old seminary of Holyoke. But the end was then very near. She was taken in the summer of 1864, happy and strong in spirit to the last. Such lives are good to think of. Authorities: Fidelia Fiske, by Rev. W. Guest (Morgan and Scott); and Consecrated Women, by Claudia (Messrs. Hodder and Stoughton), 1880. 54 MRS. KRAPF IN EAST AFRICA CHAPTER III MRS. KRAPF IN EAST AFRICA German missionaries—Dr. Krapf—Fraiilein Dietrich—Her marriage —Birth of a child in the Shoho Desert—Refused entrance to Tigr6—Return to Aden—Mishaps by water—At Zanzibar—At Mombasa—Illness and death of Mrs. Krapf. In the early days of the Church Missionary Society's work it was, as everybody probably knows, very difficult to interest the English clergy in Foreign Missions. Almost none offered to go abroad. Their place was supplied from Germany. There was in the first half of the nineteenth century a profoundly serious spirit among the German Lutherans, coupled with an admirable zeal for the evangelisation of the world. The opening of Africa and India is largely associated with the names of these men. Weitbrecht, Pfander, Krapf, Rebmann, Hinderer, Leupolt, Hoernl£, Isenberg are household words, both in missionary and geographical circles. These men were set apart and ordained by the Archbishop of Canterbury for work in the Foreign Mission field, and took their place in the ranks of the Anglican clergy. Dr. Ludwig Krapf was born at Derendingen in Wurtemberg 57 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands in 1810. He was richly gifted with the German talent of acquisitiveness of information and knowledge of things foreign. When quite a boy he set his heart on becoming a traveller. He studied at Basle, was brought under deep religious convictions, and finally offered himself to the C.M.S., by which he was sent out in 1837 to Abyssinia. When the English missionaries were turned out of Abyssinia in the year following, Krapf journeyed south, hoping to gain an entrance into Shoa. Shoa was then in a very unsettled condition. It had suffered heavily at the hands of Mohammedans, Abyssinians, and Gallas. It was Christian in creed, but the people were ignorant and degraded. Krapf laboured among them in the midst of many discouragements until 1842. At first he had a companion, his friend Isenberg, but was for most of the time entirely alone and unsupported. In 1842 he felt his position so difficult, especially when boys were brought to him to educate and he had to maintain a school as well as continue his evangelistic journeys, that it occurred to him he would do better with a wife. It was characteristic of the man that he should have regarded this matter entirely from the point of view of his work. He was aware of the existence of Fraulein Dietrich, who had been betrothed to another missionary, KiAhnlein, who had died at Marseilles in 1837. He had never seen her, but had every reason to believe that she was courageous 58 In East Africa and devoted. Accordingly he wrote to her and proposed an alliance. Fraiilein Dietrich regarded the union in the same light as the Doctor, and agreed to meet him at Cairo. There accordingly they came together and were married in 1842 or 1843. The marriage proved a supremely happy one. They were both of one mind, and Mrs. Krapf displayed as brave and ardent a spirit as her husband. She was not in the least daunted by the prospect of a life to be spent among the rude people of Shoa, nor by the dangers of the way. It was, however, impossible to return to Shoa. When they approached the frontier from the Red Sea a message came from the King of Shoa forbidding entrance. They were compelled to return to Aden. It was at this time that the University of Tubingen conferred the degree of Doctor on Mr. Krapf, in recognition of the work which he had done in connection with many valuable Ethiopic manuscripts which he had collected and sent to Europe. Neither Dr. nor Mrs. Krapf could endure the idea of a retreat without first making some supreme effort to reach their work in Shoa. Early in 1843 or x^44 ^ey started for Tigre, where some other German missionaries had established themselves. Mrs. Krapf was not deterred from this journey by the knowledge that she was very soon to become a mother, though they were to pass through some rough and desolate country. The 59 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands track ran through a sandy plain with here and there spare trees—the great Shoho Desert. As they proceeded, the waste contracted into a rocky defile through which ran a river. There, overcome by the heat and fatigue of the way, the intrepid lady gave birth to a baby girl. The child lived long enough only to be baptized by its father, and was buried that same evening beneath a tree close to their travelling tent. They named it Eneba, which means, in Amharic, a Tear. The wild Shoho tribesmen, with whom they were travelling, would not allow Mrs. Krapf to rest more than three days, after which she was hurried along with the caravan. Only by giving the Shoho people a cow and a dollar a day could Dr. Krapf persuade them to remain even for that short while. And, after all, their journey was in vain, for the King of Tigre" adopted the same policy as the King of Shoa, and forbade the Europeans to enter his territory. The Krapfs returned to Aden and, without losing further time, made preparations for an expedition to the Galla country. It was as though the forces of nature were leagued against them. Their dhow sprang a leak in the rough seas, and they barely kept themselves afloat by baling with the saucepans and bowls which Mrs. Krapf had brought with her for a start in housekeeping. When they were in the utmost extremity, and the husband and wife had retired to the small cabin for a last prayer together, another vessel 60 In East Africa hove in sight, and with some difficulty took them all on board. They had no sooner been transferred than their own boat capsized, and lay along the water. Again they found themselves in Aden. A week later the wind became more favourable, and they sailed, without further adventure, to Zanzibar. The vSultan proved friendly, and gave letters of recommendation to "Dr. Krapf the German, a good man who desires to convert the world to God." This was the commencement of the East African Mission. The Doctor crossed to the mainland, and decided to make Mombasa the base of his operations. The mainland at that time bore a terrible repute. The natives were reported as lawless, cruel, and violent. But Krapf was not to be dissuaded. He took his wife to Mombasa, and fixed upon the spot on the great continent itself from which he would make his first attempt to penetrate into the interior. Unfortunately the season was an exceptionally bad one, and there was an unusual amount of fever about. Dr. Krapf was himself down with fever, and he had barely recovered when his wife was seized. It was while she was still weak from this attack that her second child, also a daughter, was born. She seems to have had another attack of fever shortly after the birth, and she failed rapidly. Dr. Krapfs account of her death is very touching. The devoted companion of his travels 61 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands and perils for a short while lost heart, and wondered whether her life had been regulated by mere personal desires or by the spirit of sacrifice for the glory of God. She, however, ended in great peace, and with perfect submission to the Divine Will. So brave was she and steadfast at the end, that her husband was strengthened and confirmed in his purpose to devote his entire life to the missionary cause. She desired him to bury her on the mainland, in order that the sight of her tomb might constantly remind the passers- by of the Object which had brought the servants of the Church of Christ to their country. "Thus," says her husband, "she wished to be preaching to them by the lonely spot which encloses her earthly remains." The child did not many hours survive its mother. The two were buried together, opposite Mombasa, by the side of the creek, on the coast of Africa. "Tell the Committee," wrote Dr. Krapf to the Church Missionary Society, "that there is, on the East African coast, a lonely grave of a member of the Mission cause, connected with your Society. This is a sign that you have commenced the struggle with this part of the world. . . . Never mind the victims who may fall. . . . Only carry it forward, till the East and West of Africa be united in the bonds of Christ." The material for this chapter has been gathered from The Finished Course, by permission of the C.M.S. 62 MRS. BISHOP THE FRIEND AND MOTHER OF MISSIONS- CHAPTER IV MRS. BISHOP THE FRIEND AND MOTHER OF MISSIONS Isabella Bird, an observant traveller—Marries Dr. Bishop—His death —She visits Kashmir—Little Tibet—Amritsar—Persia—Through Armenia to Trebizond—The Nestorians—Mr. W. E. Gladstone —Queen Victoria—China and Japan—Korea—To Newchang— Nagasaki—Injured—Tokyo—Western China—Tibet—Shanghai —Return to London—Morocco—Illness and death. If Mrs. Bishop was never a missionary herself, she was certainly a pioneer of missionary effort. She surveyed the ground and prepared the way for Missions; she founded and supported hospitals and orphanages in heathen lands ; and the information which she gained at first hand has proved of inestimable advantage to missionaries and to the directors of missionary societies. Mrs. Bishop was an intrepid traveller. She was also a keen and accurate observer. She penetrated into many obscure and almost unknown places. But whether she passed through regions known or unknown, she always added something to the knowledge of the world. She had a gift for statistics, and loved to compile them. She had an eye which nothing escaped. She set down all she saw and heard with the utmost impartiality. And she had a freshness of mind all her own, and 65 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands always saw things from the most interesting point of view. Therefore she could always tell a good story. When Miss Isabella Bird first began to write her wonderful books of travel and adventure, many persons refused to credit them. Some of her critics had been to the places themselves, and had not seen anything of the sort that she described. No doubt they had been there; but there are dull eyes, and eyes that are sharpened. Nothing escaped Miss Bird. She knew instinctively how to separate the humanly valuable from the commonplace. Her writings are full of life and colour. Hence their perpetual and extraordinary interest. In 1881 she married her old friend and suitor, Dr. Bishop. Dr. Bishop, whom we all knew as an eminent Edinburgh surgeon, was absolutely devoted to his talented wife, and made her very happy during the few years of their married life. He died in 1886. It was the privilege of the present writer to visit him frequently during his illness in Edinburgh and to minister to the husband and wife in the sick-room when Dr. Bishop was too weak to receive the Sacrament in church. It was very touching at that time to observe how completely Mrs. Bishop had forgotten the very existence of her own malady. She was entirely wrapped up in her tender duties as nurse to the cherished invalid, whom she strove to fan back to life with the breath of love. From the time of that tragic 66 The Friend and Mother of Missions illness of her husband she never again, till her own last sickness, permitted herself to be laid aside. With Mrs. Bishop's widowhood a new chapter of her life commenced. Dr. Bishop had interested himself in medical mission work, and had often spoken of Nazareth, where there seemed to be a good opening for a useful hospital. After his death his wife at once proceeded to carry out what she believed would have been his wish. She opened up negotiations for the erection of a hospital at Nazareth, and hoped to give herself the satisfaction of building and endowing it to her husband's memory. She was filled with a great pity for the_ sick and poor. She turned her London house into a Home, and filled it with those who needed skilled attendance and care. It was a crisis in her spiritual life, and she solemnly offered herself to God for service. It was while she was m this state of tense feeling that she felt herself again drawn to the East. She therefore prepared herself by careful study for a visit to India and Persia. This time she went with the fixed intention to observe the work of the Church and to take what part in it she could. Everywhere, therefore, on her way out, she visited the Mission stations and made mental notes, which resulted sometimes in prompt practical aid, sometimes in sharp criticism. In the spring of 1889 she found herself at Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir. There she made the 67 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands acquaintance of Dr. Neve and his brother, and was shown all that was to be seen. She now for the first time came into close contact with the work of the C.M.S. She was absolutely broad-minded, and held no party views on ecclesiastical matters, holding the frankest intercourse with Christians of every denomination, but her special sympathies were no doubt always with her own Church and its services. Of the work of the C.M.S. she often speaks with warm appreciation. So satisfied was she with what she saw at Srinagar that she resolved to erect in Kashmir the first hospital of the series of memorial hospitals which owe their origin to her liberality. The place selected was Islamabad, thirty-two miles from Srinagar. Behold her, therefore, riding thither in semi-Persian costume, "just like a Yarkandi woman," and so able to pass through the crowded streets with as little observation as though she had been an Eastern wife going veiled to the zenana. She was full of happiness in the thought of what she was about to do. "Her heart," says Dr. Neve, " went out to the people, ' as sheep without a shepherd,' given over to the tender mercies of mercenary mullahs and professional saints." This hospital was called the "John Bishop Memorial Hospital." And "thus," wrote his widow, "I hope the righteous will be had in everlasting remembrance." Dr. Neve tells a delightful anecdote of her pluck in a sudden emergency. A heavy squall The Friend and Mother of Missions swept the broad river and dashed the boats against the bank. The wind caught the hoods of matting and tore them in shreds, blowing everything movable—and Mrs. Bishop's MS. among other things —overboard. The doctor's boat was almost wrecked, and was whirled towards some half-sunken stumps, where it would have been quickly broken up by the blast. But, he says, "in presence of danger Mrs. Bishop became alert and gay, making light of her own losses." She leaped out into the shallows among the waves, and came wading along the marshy bank to see whether she could assist the other crew. She was then fifty-eight. From Srinagar Mrs. Bishop rode to Leh, the capital of Little Tibet. Her description of the view from the summit of the famous Zoji Pass is worth quoting. " Below, in shadow", lay the Baltal camping-ground, a lonely, deodar-belted, flowery meadow, noisy with the dash of icy torrents tumbling down from the snow-fields and glaciers. . . . Higher than the Zoji, a mass of grey and red mountains, snow-slashed and snow-capped, rose in the dewy, rose-flushed atmosphere in peaks, walls, pinnacles, and jagged ridges, above which towered yet loftier summits, bearing into the heavenly blue sky fields of unsullied snow." After a while her Arab horse was exchanged for a Tibetan ox, or yak, which, as Miss Stoddart says, is " a steed of exciting possibilities, half-savage still after centuries of attempted training, with an 69 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands alarming habit of knocking over its leader, bellowing defiance, and leaping down the slopes from boulder to boulder till it finds its herd, leaving its rider to accommodate herself to the circumstances." Leh was reached without any adventure, except such as roaring torrents, slippery snow slopes, and steep rocks, present to every traveller, and, after inspecting the Moravian Mission, Mrs. Bishop came back to the Punjab to organise an expedition through Persia. At Amritsar she purchased a disused hotel, and fitted it up as a hospital in memory of her sister Henrietta Bird. She then made up her party and started for Baghdad, travelling by Kurachi and Bushire, on the Persian Gulf. From Baghdad she penetrated inland to Kirmanshah. This proved to be a long and difficult journey. She says: " I never would have undertaken it had I known the hardships it would involve." She speaks of " the abominable accommodation, the filthy water, the brutal barbarism of the people." The roads were such only in name. The horses could only do from one to one and a half miles an hour, and at the end of each slow day there would come a "cold, filthy, and horrible caravanserai," crowded with hundreds of mules and their half-savage drivers, or perhaps the hospitality of a rude Kurdish house, "shared with mules, asses, cows, and sheep." But during this sordid journey Mrs. Bishop had her first good opportunity of studying unadul- 70 The Friend and Mother of Missions terated Mohammedan misrule. She was horrified at what she saw everywhere. " The people are most cruelly oppressed. Everything beyond the mere necessities of life is taken from them by the rulers; and if they hide anything they are taken to prison and burnt with hot irons, their finger-bones squeezed and broken, and the soles of their feet beaten to a jelly, till they tell where it is. . . . The land lies desolate." Then she adds: "When I see the awful darkness in which these people live, and remember how the news of salvation by Jesus Christ ... is brought into our very houses ... I often think of the words of our Lord, * It shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in that day than for that city.'" Mrs. Bishop was fortunate enough to get into the company of Major Sawyer, and with him passed through some of the worst places; over high, wind-swept passes, through waterless tracts, across the Great Salt Desert, she rode day after day. Six of the soldiers and muleteers died of cold and exhaustion. There is little wonder that this heroic invalid should have been almost brought to the end of her endurance. " I was done last night," she wrote, "and in such anguish in my side and spine, that, having been laid down beside a fire, I stayed there all night." When at last they reached Julfa she rapidly recovered strength, and immediately planned a further march of a thousand miles through the Bakhtiari country. "The dear old tent" was re- 7i e Missionary Heroines in Many Lands fitted with new ropes, mules were chartered and provisioned, and astride a strong horse herself, they started in the spring of 1890. This expedition proved very arduous, and occupied more than double the time she had expected. Part of the way she still had the advantage of Major Sawyer's companionship, but most of the while she was quite alone. Mrs. Bishop, however, never minded being alone; she was quite sufficient for herself. It never troubled her that she was only a woman. She faced thieves, curious and unfriendly crowds, or mutinous servants, with the same unruffled composure, and quietly mastered them all. Her route now led her through Kurdistan and Armenia to Trebizond on the Black Sea. The country traversed was the wildest imaginable. Robbers were an everyday experience. It was in Turkish Kurdistan that she met for the first time a community of Syrian Christians. So far her experience of Arminians had been in the cities, and she had not formed a favourable opinion of them. But for the Nestorian Christians of the country districts she found nothing but pity and admiration. Their fidelity in the face of the cruel and relentless persecution to which they were subjected filled her with wonder. These Nestorian Christians she saw living in constant alarm. Their poor little churches were fortified against sudden raids. In the darkness of these gloomy sanctuaries Mrs. Bishop heard them daily chant their pathetic prayer, "Give 72 The Friend and Mother of Missions us by Thy mercy a peaceful day." But few peaceful days were theirs. The very morning Mrs. Bishop arrived at Marbishu the Kurdish horsemen had raided twenty sheep, and that same afternoon they returned to drive the cattle. The Christians had neither protection nor redress. They were utterly at the mercy of their merciless Mohammedan neighbours. Mrs. Bishop marvelled at the steadfast courage which had enabled these poor, untaught creatures to cling to the faith of their fathers, when they had only to renounce it to live in comparative comfort and peace. She saw plainly that they were ready to suffer every extremity rather than deny Christ. Some of the clergy visited the English lady at her quarters in a subterranean stable. They entreated her to use her influence to send them teachers from England. " We are blind guides," they said. " We know nothing, and our people are as sheep lost upon the mountains." It was probably at this time, as her biographer thinks, that Mrs. Bishop finally made up her mind to devote her life to the propagation of the Gospel of Christ among the non-Christian peoples of the world. As she confessed, there had been a day when missions did not appeal to her. She would have made a detour of twenty miles rather than stop at a Mission station. She thought that interference with national creeds and customs was a mistake. But now the understanding was forced upon her that the only hope 73 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands for the world lay in a general acceptance of the Gospel. She saw that whoever really loved mankind must take part with those who were throwing the light of Christ's teaching upon the nations. As to Mohammedanism and Buddhism, she said, " There is nothing to arrest the further downward descent of systems so effete yet so powerful and interwoven with the whole social life of the nation. There is no resurrection power in any of them." Of the Nestorian Christians she wrote: " Their churches are like catacombs. Few things can be more pathetic than a congregation standing in the dark and dismal nave, kissing the common wooden cross, and passing from hand to hand the kiss of peace, while the priest leads the worshippers in prayers and chants which have come down from the earliest ages of Christianity—from the triumphant Church of the East to the persecuted remnant of to-day." All through her painful journey through Kurdistan, Mrs. Bishop witnessed the ruthless cruelties and abominable outrages practised upon these helpless people, whose only crime was that they were literally " faithful until death." It opened her eyes and enlarged her religious sympathies. She understood better than ever how the indestructible essence of Christianity may endure in many and divers forms. By the shores of Lake Van, and by Erzeroum, and so, accompanied most of the way by icy 74 The Friend and Mother of Missions blasts of wind and storm, by Trebizond in the Black Sea, Mrs. Bishop was once more within the pale of civilisation, and spent the Christmas Day of 1890 in Paris. Mrs. Bishop had now become a "great lady." She was widely known and much sought after, and she continually met many of the most interesting people in London. The Contemporary Review published a series of articles from her pen on the treatment of Christians in Turkish Kurdistan. Mr. William Ewart Gladstone had a conversation with her on the subject, and she gave evidence before a Parliamentary Committee. Her public addresses at this time were numerous. Among others were speeches at the meeting of the British Association at Cardiff in 1891, before the Church Congress of 1892, and before the British Association at Edinburgh in the same year. In 1893 she was presented with the Fellowship of the Royal Geographical Society. Her book on Journeys in Persia and Kurdistan was much read, and out of the profits she was able to rebuild her hospital at Islamabad,1 which had been swept away by a flood. In 1893 she was graciously received by Queen Victoria, who gave her a special welcome. They were not unlike each other, either in form or character, those two indomitable little Englishwomen. Mrs. Bishop's speech to the "Gleaners' Union" at Exeter Hall made a profound impression. Mr. Page 68. 75 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Eugene Stock said that it proclaimed her as "one of the greatest of missionary advocates." Her carefully chosen, weighty words impressed people as never before with the hopelessness of heathen life under systematised customs of cruelty and hateful superstition. Speaking of woman's life in Asia, she said : "These false faiths degrade women with an infinite degradation. The intellect is dwarfed, while all the worst passions are stimulated, jealousy, hate, and intrigue running to such an extent that in some countries I have hardly ever been in a woman's house without being asked for drugs with which to disfigure the favourite wife, to take away her life, or to take away the life of the favourite wife's eldest son. This request has been made to me nearly two hundred times." She concluded an address of immense and cumulative power with an appeal to the luxurious to give up some of "the un- necessaries of life" that they might take some personal part in the betterment of mankind. Such advocacy was of the greatest possible gain to the Church. Mrs. Bishop stood on a different platform to the partisan. No one could flout her, and at least she gained a general hearing for the cause of Missions. In the following year, 1894, a journey was undertaken to China and Japan. Mrs. Bishop was now so well known that steamship companies were prompt to do her honour. On this occasion the Allan Line invited her to be their guest on 76 The Friend and Mother of Missions board the Mongolia. Arrived at Halifax, she crossed at once to Vancouver, where she took ship by Yokohama to Korea. So far the Koreans had not left a favourable impression on her mind. She had thought them "the dregs of a race-^- indolent, cunning, limp, and unmanly." But now as she mixed with them, after her usual custom, and got to understand their conditions of life better, she began to modify her opinion. Bishop Corfe found for her a trustworthy servant, and she started to explore the beautiful river Han. She found the country-folk in some parts rude, cowardly, and troublesome. One insolent lad kicked her, and was knocked down by her companion. But she cared little for such demonstrations, and would often leave her boat aM. walk along the river-bank with her camera, leaving the men to pole the flat-bottomed house-boat up the rapid stream. When her sampan could take her no further in the right direction, she procured Korean ponies and rode across the Diamond Mountains to the sea. Every one in the mountains was in terror of tigers. Mrs. Bishop saw none, but they persuaded her to put up with the heat and sleep with closed windows lest she should be snatched from her bed by some man-eater during the night. She found the whole population in bondage to the fear of evil demons. Demons are supposed to infest every tree, ravine, spring, and hill, and to hide away in roofs, chimneys, jars, 77 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands and what not. The people are kept on the stretch of nervous tension by their credulity. Mrs. Bishop was much interested in all she saw, but was prevented from further exploration at that time by the " Tong-Hak Rising," an upheaval of Oriental conservatism against the innovations of the West. When she reached Chemulpo she found an excited mob there, and a detachment landing from Japanese battleships to check disorder. This was the commencement of that duel between Japan and China for supremacy in Korea, which culminated in the Chino-Japanese War. It was no place for a foreigner at that moment, and Mrs. Bishop was hurried on board a boat and taken to Cheefoo in China. She landed there without money or kit, and went to the Consulate to represent her destitute condition. The Consul at once did his best, vouched for her at the bank, and got for her all she needed, so that she was able to continue her journey to Newchang. The weather was abominable. All the country was under water. Her boat was poled across the flooded fields. She was soon in the throes of fever, aggravated by swarms of mosquitoes. The clumsy market-boat, which was her only means of conveyance, was swept helplessly along on a brown sea of muddy waves. When at last they reached something solid a cart was hired. But the going was so bad that before long both 78 Stereo Copyright, Underwood &• V. London <S* New York Travelling by River in China This house-boat is on a canal in the interior. The Friend and Mother of Missions horse and cart rolled over into a deep ditch and she was thrown violently out, breaking her arm and dangerously tearing the tendons. She was then sixty-three, yet in less than three weeks she was well enough to give an address at the Mission church of Mukden, and to proceed on her way. There was so much political disturbance throughout Manchuria that travelling became almost impossible. The country was full of insurgents and undisciplined bands of troops hurrying to the scene of the coming war. Hatred against the foreigner was at fever-heat. Mrs. Bishop accordingly sailed for Vladivostock. Soon afterwards she was back in Japan, at Nagasaki, where her indefatigable brain began to sketch out the plan of a great expedition to the northern and undisturbed parts of China. She wrote about this time: " I am utterly steeped in the East." On her way to China she stopped tor a while at Seoul, the capital of Korea, where the king received her very kindly, and gave her facilities which enabled her to take some interesting photographs. A guard of honour waited upon her, and she was admitted to several places difficult of access to Europeans. She had several interviews with the talented Queen of Korea, who was shortly afterwards murdered in her palace. This journey was destined to be a chain of personal accidents. Mrs. Bishop was tilted backwards out of her jinriksha by a clumsy 81 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands runner, and received a painful jar of the spine, which affected her for long afterwards. In fact, she had to retrace her steps from China to Japan to get medical attendance. Bishop Bickersteth, when he heard of her trouble, invited her to Tokyo as his guest. She says: "I arrived in rags, and most of my stockings have no feet. My boots were so absolutely done that I had to wear straw shoes over them." However, they quickly repaired both her and her wardrobe, and after a few weeks' rest and doctoring she started for Western China. The great river Yangtze flows through a course of nearly 3000 miles from the mountains of Tibet to the sea. It is the natural waterway into the interior of China. Up the river Mrs. Bishop was borne in her flat-bottomed houseboat, over the rapids, and on to Wan-Hsien, whence she took horse for the almost unknown. Perhaps she had scarcely estimated the strength of the dislike and fear which the people felt toward all "foreign devils." But several times she was in great danger. Once she had to barricade herself in her room while a crowd surged and shouted outside. On another occasion a stone struck the back of her head and almost stunned her. "China," she wrote, "is very interesting and terrifying." Dr. Cassels, Bishop of West China, met her at Paoning-fu, and she gave him ^100 toward a new hospital to be erected in memory of her sister . s a o it The Friend and Mother of Missions Henrietta. From here she turned direct north and set her face toward the mountains of Tibet, which she could now see bounding the northern horizon. The country grew wilder and wilder, and presently she entered the defiles. And here she made a most interesting discovery. Right amongst the mountains she found a company of Christians. At first she could not credit it. No European had ever visited these parts, certainly no Christian teacher had visited those valleys. But it appeared that a man from a mountain village had gone south to work as a carpenter at Sze-chuan, and had brought back with him, when he returned home, a copy of the Gospels. Reading with all the earnestness of a Chinaman who is once started on the way to truth, he became convinced, and then convinced others. Mrs. Bishop says : " There were only a few men in the whole village who were not in deed and truth Christians, and my servant, who was a very shrewd man, remarked how different that village was from others, that there was no attempt to cheat or take advantage." Mrs. Bishop believed that these people afterwards managed to save enough from their earnings to take them to the nearest Mission station, very far away, and that they were formally received into the Church. Unfortunately this mountain expedition was brought to an abrupt end by an overstrain of the heart, which compelled the traveller to return ; so she retraced her steps, flashed down the rapids 85 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands up which she had so laboriously ascended, and was again at Shanghai. Her travels in China gave her a high opinion of the Chinese people. She thought they were a " straight" people, with a great future before them. Apart from the tyranny under which they suffered, she regarded them as "practically one of the freest and most democratic people on earth." And possibly China, when it has shaken off the yoke, may show that she was right. Mrs. Bishop, during her sojourn in China, Korea, and Japan, founded three hospitals, containing altogether 160 beds, and also an orphanage at Tokyo. "These," she said, "are memorials of my husband, my parents, and my sister, and you can imagine the pleasure they give me." When Mrs. Bishop returned to London in 1897, she was more than ever in request as a speaker and writer. She had another bad accident at Tobermory, where she fell down the cliff, but nothing could lay her by for long. In 1901 she was at Tangier, a traveller in her seventieth year, yet with all a girl's desire to see new places, and as keen as ever to report upon them. As usual she bestrode the fieriest and best horse she could buy. "You would fail," she wrote home to a friend, " to recognise your infirm friend astride on a superb horse, in full blue trousers and a short full skirt, with great brass spurs belonging to the generalissimo of the Moorish army, and riding down places awful even to think 86 The Friend and Mother of Missions of, where a rolling stone or a slip would mean destruction." Again she saw the results of Moslem rule: " This is an awful country, the worst I have been in. The oppression and cruelty are hellish —no one is safe. The country is rotten to the core, eaten up by abominable vices, no one to be trusted. . . . Truly Satan's seat is here." She was full of desire to go as far as she could, and rode through the Atlas Mountains. The bridle paths were terrifically steep. She says: "We lamed two horses, and one mule went over a precipice, rolling over four times before he reached the bottom," but, " I am not shelved yet! " Her last ride in Morocco was very nearly the last in this world. A strong party of Arabs espied them and gave chase, pursuing them on horseback almost to the gates of the town. Only Mrs. Bishop's horsemanship and fearless riding saved her from capture, or possibly from death. So far was this intrepid woman from feeling shelved that she was actually planning another big expedition to China when warning of the fatal malady which ended her life came to her. This was in the spring of 1902. A tumour was then discovered close to the lungs and heart. She came to Edinburgh to consult some eminent specialists. There the present writer saw her often, and was on several occasions privileged to minister to her. The last stages of the disease were swift, but she retained her clearness of mind 87 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands to the very end. Nor had death any terrors for one who had long ago laid her life at the feet of her Master. When she lay dying, she thought she heard cathedral bells. Her last words, as she came within sight of the gates, invisible to all but her, were : " Oh! what shouting there will be ! " Much of the material for these chapters has been derived from The Life of Isabella Bird (Mrs. Bishop), by Anna M. Stoddart. (John Murray.) 88 HANSINA CHRISTINA HINZ AMONGST THE SNOWS OF GREENLAND CHAPTER V HANSINA CHRISTINA HINZ AMONGST THE SNOWS OF GREENLAND Early life—Influence of the Moravians—Affianced to Johannes Hinz—Perilous journey to Greenland—A wreck—And rescue— Reaches her husband—-Work among the Greenlanders—Birth of daughter—Death. The story of Hansina Hinz is given in a book published by the Religious Tract Society. It is supremely interesting to one who loves to study character in out-of-the-way places. It can scarcely be called the life of a missionary, since the woman described did not live long enough to do anything of any special note ; but it gives a picture of that right missionary stuff which overcomes the world, and which has, by sheer courage and " stick," won so many victories in what have seemed unhopeful fields. Moreover, this simple story shows, quite without design, how the religious life, sincerely lived, refines not merely the spirit but the thoughts and manners. The wild South Sea Islanders who kept company with Bishop Patteson, the worthless Kashmiri boys who came under the influence of Mr. Tyndale-Biscoe, and the savage dog-eating Indians who clustered about Mrs. Ridley's death- 91 F Missionary Heroines in Many Lands bed, all became gentlemen under the teaching of the Spirit of Christ. And many Christians born into the lower ranks, and who have never learned " manners," have been educated in the fullest sense of the word by the practice of the Gospel. Hansina Fogdal was the daughter of a small farmer who owned a thatched house and a few acres in Schleswig, that finger of land which stands up on the map between the Baltic and the North Sea, and which was added, after the war of 1864, to what is now the German Empire. A few cows and sheep formed the whole stock, and the one horse was hard-worked at plough and harrow and cart, besides carrying milk twice a day to a central depdt. The daughters, as soon as they grew up, had to go into service, and Hansina was domestic servant in various houses from the age of fifteen. Her lot might have been that of the faithful m'&dchen to the end of her days, had she not very early come into contact with the warm spirituality of the Moravians. These earnest people had a settlement at Christiansfeld, not far from the little farm. Hansina and a bosom friend together struggled into the light under the guidance of those simple- minded Christian people. After a while, when a place was vacant for a maid at the Sisters' House at Christiansfeld, she removed there, and was employed at first in the kitchen, and afterwards as principal servant. It was a unique education for 92 Amongst the Snows of Greenland a girl so minded. She learned how to value and preserve her self-respect, and to meet all Christians as sister meets sister, while at the same time she was taught never to presume upon that delightful relationship. Her biographer says that she was naturally " cautious and deliberate," but " you had only to look at her bright face . . . and you could not help loving her." She developed "a pleasant calmness of manner," which, it may be noticed, is one of the special products of an experimental Christianity. Circumstances which need not be related here took the young woman back to her home at the farm, and she was settling down to assist her mother in the ordinary duties of such a homestead, when she received the letter which drew her into the Foreign Mission field. It has been customary among Moravian missionaries to leave the selection of their wives to the controlling Board at home. Apparently this is not quite so often done as formerly, but this responsibility is still thrust upon the fathers in council not unfrequently. It does not sound romantic, and one can scarcely believe that all such unbiased selections have turned out happily. But the advocates of the system might with some point reply that neither have all the love-matches proved to be for the best. They claim that, at least, two like-minded people are thus brought together, and that when temperament has been studied, and age considered, and station in life 93 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands not wholly left out of the discussion, there is a very good chance that bride and groom will learn to like as well as esteem one another, and that out of this mutual friendship love will frequently arise. At the time of which we are speaking there was a young missionary working in Greenland who lacked a consort. He also came from a country farm, and had been educated at the Moravian Mission College for foreign work. When he was settled in the cold country of his adoption he wrote to the Board to ask for a wife. The result of their deliberations was a letter to Hansina offering her the hand and a share of the work of Johannes Hinz. Such a missive startled even one who had been so long accustomed to the ways of the Brethren. She had no desire for marriage in itself. But she had been long accustomed to obedience, and her own wishes were the last guide she was disposed to follow. She consulted her parents and all her more intimate spiritual friends; she went to Christiansfeld and asked the Sisters what they thought she ought to do. But, as is usual in all such personal matters, she got no direction from any one. The thing was clearly to be decided by herself and none other. At last she made up her mind. This was a call. It was not to be thrust aside. Her very shrinking was a sign to her that she should go. If she was 94 Amongst the Snows of Greenland to be a missionary it were better to come sooner than later. She wrote a reply in the affirmative. Even in such high matters human nature must be given its place, and Hansina paid a visit to the Hinz family and stayed with them awhile, that she might judge from his parents and surroundings what sort of a man her future husband was likely to be. They were very favourably impressed by each other, and parted on the happiest terms. Nothing now remained to be done but to gather together a few household necessaries for the Greenland home, and to start as soon as possible. The ship which conveyed this adventurous and noble-hearted woman to the north-west was aptly called the White Bear. It also bore provisions and specie for the Danish colony in Greenland. The voyage is always a difficult one and full of uncertainties. The course lies through an ice- strewn sea towards an ice-bound coast. The spring of 1895 was a late one, and the ice-pack still lay thick at the end of March about the northern shores. Ice was met on the first day, and the ship was obliged to cut her way through. Passing the Faroe Islands, in the lee of which she sheltered from a north-westerly gale, the ship came within sight of Cape Farewell on the 2nd of April. But between ship and land lay a far-stretching sheet of ice. Toward the open sea the ice was broken into slabs and bergs, which plunged and tossed madly on the waves, and threatened to cut 95 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands through the sides of the vessel. Toward the shore the ice was closer, but heaved and swayed with every motion of the sea. The captain tried to find an open waterway through which he might win his way to a landing. It was an alarming prospect upon which this country-bred girl looked out. Great masses of ice rose and fell around the ship like sea-monsters. They piled themselves one upon the other, only to fall back with immense splashing, and piled themselves again in new and fantastic shapes. Hansina was sent down to the cabin. Not that she showed any signs of fear, but that the crew might have perfect freedom to handle the ship. There she listened to the uproar, and commended her faithful and simple heart to God. Meanwhile a storm of sleet and icy rain enveloped the vessel, so that it was impossible to see the land. Hansina, concluding that she was safe in the hands of the Almighty, turned in and went to sleep. When she awoke on Good Friday morning she found herself tossed violently to and fro. All around was a hubbub of crashes, and the grinding shriek of ice as it scraped against the sides of the ship. Shock followed shock. A warning was sent down to her from deck to dress as quickly as she might, and be ready for anything that might happen. A mysterious ground-swell had arisen during the night, unaccompanied by wind, and the ship was tumbled back and forth and knocked among" 96 Amongst the Snows of Greenland the floes in a manner which threatened even her strongly built ribs. They were in a small bay under the lee of some rocks, to which they attached the barque by two steel hawsers. One of these presently broke. The men replaced it at great danger to themselves; but as the sea still became higher, and the tossing more violent, the cables were twisted and strained till they both parted. Sails were now set to relieve the strain upon the anchor chain, and full steam was given to the engines. But it was impossible to keep the ship steady. The anchor chain gave way, and the vessel was at the mercy of the ice. At this horrible moment a few of the hardy sailors, led by the mate, scrambled to the rocks, over the heaving ice masses, and made fast a rope. It was all in vain, nothing could stand the wrenching of the—distraught ship. Hansina quietly put on her warmest things, put into her pockets such valuables as she could, and gave no sign that she was afraid. She watched the lowering of the boat, in which the money and stores, and all that it seemed most important to save from the sea, were packed. It was hoped that perhaps this strong life-boat might endure the pressure of the ice-pack, and float until the danger was over. This, however, was not to be, and she was crushed before their eyes between the ice and the plunging ship. Hansina herself was placed in this boat for a short while, but, as its position became more dangerous, she was again, though with great 97 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands difficulty, lifted back to the deck. She kept repeating to herself, in silence, the words, " Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me even as Thou wilt." After many attempts, one of the seamen found a chance to leap upon the rocks as the ship swayed toward them, and a rope was passed between the heaving deck and the shore. Along this, by means of running tackle, the crew were conveyed to land. It was high time. The waves increased in violence. The ice and the ship were mingled together in one seething mass. The sharp edges of the plunging floes cut through the bows. The vessel quickly filled and foundered. Nothing was then seen but the raging of the water as it forced itself up in spouting columns between the immense ice-slabs which rode and dived and leapt into the air. Everything, of course, was lost. The whole cargo went down with the ship, and Hansina landed with the drenched clothes alone in which she had struggled ashore. There was a cave not far from the beach, and in its damp and draughty sides the crew found some sort of a shelter. Hansina and a Danish passenger named Hastrup were led along a rude path over the cliff to a hut, where they were taken in for the night. This Greenland hut was a new experience to the German girl, who had been brought up to regard cleanliness as very near to godliness, and to be tidy, whatever else she might be. It was 98 Amongst the Snows of Greenland entered by a low and windowless passage which led into a dark room, lighted only by a hole in the turf roof, which was covered with a piece of seal bladder. The air was never changed, and was almost insufferable. The place was saturated with nameless mephitic vapours. It was almost impossible to breathe. When the lamp was lighted and a fire kindled in the rude stove the air became, if possible, worse. Nor were things improved when their wet clathes were taken off and were hung before the stove to dry. However, they were so utterly exhausted that they fell into a dreamless sleep. It is test of character when poor services are gracefully received, and the intention is valued more than the gift; and judged by this test the young German maiden comes out true gold. She had nothing: but thanks for the dried fish andv cold, not too clean water, for the cast-off shirt on which she was supposed to dry her hands, and for the unscrubbed bench on which she lay during that unsavoury night. The people were kind, and for that she was grateful. Like a practical frau soon to be, she also gave her thoughts to replenishing her drowned wardrobe, and wrote home on some damp paper, saved in some one's pocket from the wreck, naming a friend about her own size and girth, from whom if the measure were taken, she might expect that a new dress would be a reasonable fit. After some days an umiak, or woman's boat, 99 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands was sent to fetch her. This roomy boat, light and of small draught, made of skins stretched across a wooden frame, found a passage where ships' boats would have failed. Kagssimiut was presently reached in safety, and the storm-tossed woman was received into the kindly arms of a fellow-countrywoman. It was delightful to see a real Danish homestead again, and Hansina had soon turned up her sleeves to help her hostess with the housework. As soon as the ice was sufficiently opened out she went on her way and reached Julianehaab at last, a tocherless bride indeed. When the affianced couple met it was without embarrassment. Were they not both servants of the Lord and His Church, and was it not right that He should dispose of them as He willed? "It is the Lord," writes Hansina, " who unites heart to heart, and we both belong to Him." A very short acquaintance convinced them that they could spend their lives together happily, and they were more than content with their lot. Hinz wrote home after a few hours' interview with her that his bride suited him in all respects, she was spiritually " a true handmaid of the Lord"; physically she was " fresh and blooming." Already he loved her, as Isaac, under not wholly dissimilar circumstances, had loved Rebekah. They began their journey together stormily, starting in a cruel blizzard, which beat them back to their starting-point ; but, not to be beaten by weather, they ioo A rst the Si )f Greenland mongst tne onows oi Lxreenianc left their boat, cached their goods, and made their way onward on foot. The wedding took place in May at Lichtenau, amid general rejoicings. It is strange how ill-luck will persist until its evil force is wholly spent. When the friends in Schleswig learned of the shipwreck they did their best to remedy matters, and to make up to Hansina for her loss. Some provided fresh linen, others a clock, others china, and others made up suitable clothes. The whole was safely packed and put on board the Ceres, which shortly sailed for Greenland. But there was a fate against the plenishing of the Mission house at Lichtenau. The Ceres was stranded on a rock off Julianehaab by an inexperienced pilot, and, when the tide ebbed, capsized and foundered in water deep enough to soak her entire cargo. Almost everything on board which was not utterly spoilt was stained with salt water. The clock would no longer go, the dresses were blotched and disfigured, the cloth garments were sodden, so that they would never afterwards properly dry. It is not to be supposed that the young haus- frau gave in without an effort. Weeks were spent washing and bleaching, scrubbing and ironing ; but nothing could make those sea-drenched things look fresh again. It is pleasant to learn that this second disaster did not discourage the friends at home, who set to work dauntlessly to prepare a third outfit. Missionary Heroines in Many Lands The Greenlanders are so dependent upon the unexpected that it is difficult to teach them to be provident. When one's best calculations may be upset by a sudden blizzard, and when no one knows whether he will be able to make a journey on a given day or not, people naturally leave much to chance. Mrs. Hinz complained that they were terribly thriftless. It pained her orderly soul to see them eating up recklessly what they happened to have in the house, and making no provision for the morrow. But things generally came right somehow. Now it would be an enormous shoal of the little herrings which form the staple of the Greenlanders' food, and which they eat dried, "like bread." Or in winter the men would make holes in the ice, like the Esquimaux, and wait patiently beside them till some fish came to their bait. Living much in the open air, they keep their health, in spite of the dirt in which they spend their nights. " Many of the houses are scarcely ever swept or the floor cleaned." It was not for want of example that the Greenlanders lived in this haphazard and sordid fashion. The Mission station at Lichtenau is a model of what a homestead should be. Standing in a gully between rocky cliffs, the windows, in a long row beneath the steep, high roof, look over the waters of a bay to a range of picturesque mountains beyond. Everything is neat, upstanding, and suggestive of order and well-being. An object-lesson in Christian settlement. When the Amongst the Snows of Greenland snow lies deep over all the land, the station looks full of light and kindliness in the midst of its bleak surroundings. Between September and May there is no communication with the outer world. The last letters are despatched to Europe at the end of September; the first mail comes in the middle of May. Up in Greenland there is almost no traffic during winter between post and post. Each station is self-contained—a small fortress holding its own unaided against the elements. It is a time when teaching is done at each little centre, and the people have plenty of time to attend to their teachers. One can only regret that so capable and practical a teacher of godliness as Hansina Hinz should have remained for so brief a time among the people who so much needed the example of her faith and common sense. Unhappily the birth of her baby daughter in that unfriendly climate brought her useful life to an end. Eight days after the birth she died, and was buried amid the snows. On 23rd October 1896, eight Greenlanders bore the coffin to its grave in the icy soil. The drift ice, which was gathered thick in the bay, barely permitted a friend and his wife, who took charge of the baby, to return after the funeral to the neighbouring station of Igdlorpait. A few months later the little child had followed her mother, and was buried in the same grave. Such are the ways of the iron North, but no 103 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands complaint comes from the devoted people who have consecrated their lives to the cause of the Northlanders. Much of the material for this chapter has been gathered from Hansina Hintz, by kind permission of the Religious Tract Society. 104 MRS. RIDLEY AMONG THE REDSKINS CHAPTER VI MRS. RIDLEY AMONG THE REDSKINS Metlakahtla—Wizards—William Duncan—Uphill work—Opposition of medicine men—A Christian colony—Bishop Ridley—Mrs. Ridley's work—Her great influence on the men—The white man —A saloon turned into a school—An Indian prayer-meeting— Goes up the Skeena in mid-winter—Stikine River—Illness—A moving scene—Death. Far up, almost at the northernmost point of the sea-coast of British Columbia lies Metlakahtla, a place celebrated in the annals of missionary history, yet which, but for the efforts of the missionaries, would probably never have been heard of at all. Metlakahtla is on that fiord-riven shore into which the waters of the Pacific Ocean have eaten so deeply in their age-long conflict with the land. It is just to the south of Alaska, and opposite the Queen Charlotte Islands. Fifty years ago the only inhabitants were wild Zimshian Indians, fierce Haidas, and other warlike tribes which ranged the fastnesses of the far North-West. A graphic account of these Indians and their customs will be found in Mr. Eugene Stock's 107 g Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Metlakahtla and the North Pacific Mission. Their religion consisted mainly of a demon-cult, which was carried on through the mediation of the Medicine-Men. These Medicine-Men were regularly initiated into their profession. They went through a process which produced in them the effects of mania. The young man destined for this career would retire into the forest and work himself into a frenzy by fasting and self-torture. When he reappeared among the tribe he would rush upon the first person he met and bite a piece out of his flesh. He would then chase and seize some passing dog, tear it limb from limb with his hands, and devour it piecemeal, running about dripping with blood, and rending the fragments as he ran. At last he would fall exhausted and be carried to his tent by his admiring friends, any one of whom, who might have chanced to be bitten by the maniac, considering himself specially in favour and in the way of luck. One might often see one of these aspirants for medical fame surrounded by his initiators. Stark naked, he would crouch and prowl like a wolf, making sudden rushes, while the whole party would join him in fiendish howls and screeches, bringing him now and again a dog to be torn into bits by his teeth. Some of these wizards were man-eaters. Mr. Duncan, who wrote in 1857, says that he saw the whole camp fling itself into canoes and paddle out from the shore, and learned later that the man- 108 Among the Redskins o eaters were searching for a victim. If they failed to find a dead body, they would take the nearest living one. Every one must look out for himself till the cannibals were satisfied. The Mission of the Church of England to this part of the world owes its origin to a visit paid to Tunbridge Wells, in 1856, by Captain Prevost,R.N. While cruising along the coast of Vancouver he had come into some contact with the Indians, and was impressed by their savagery and degradation. A missionary meeting in connection with the C.M.S. was being held at Tunbridge Wells, and Captain Prevost inquired what the Society intended to do for a people so promising and so neglected. Captain Prevost followed up this inquiry by a paper on the subject, which was published in the Church Missionary Intelligencer of July 1856. He appealed to all friends of Foreign Missions to send teachers to the North-West Pacific coast. For some while no one was found to volunteer, but the matter was expounded at missionary meetings in different parts of the country. At one such meeting in the Midlands a young man, William Duncan, was moved to offer his services. He sailed for Vancouver Island in December 1856. It took him nearly six months to reach Victoria, and still five hundred miles lay between that place and his destination. As quickly as possible he made his way to Fort Simpson, where he arrived on 1st October 1857. 109 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands The Fort was then a rude enclosure, formed of wooden palisades, some twenty feet high, within which were the stores of the Hudson's Bay Company, and some houses of their agents. Outside was a village of the Zimshian Indians. Duncan was soon to see of what these people were capable. A chief, whose daughter was sick, ordered that a female slave should be sacrificed and thrown into the water. No sooner was this done than two naked men pranced forward with wolf-like howlings, each at the head of a band of yelping men. These naked fellows advanced with a creeping stoop, stepping like horses, and shooting forward each arm alternately. They jerked their heads to and fro, flinging their long black tresses from side to side. All this was the usual show of seeking out the body. Presently they found it and fastened upon it like a pack of wild dogs. In a few minutes they had torn the body asunder between them, and each began to bury his face in the dripping fragments and devour them before the people. Murders were common. Duncan saw a man, who had been wounded, deliberately shot at and finished off just outside the stockade of the Fort. Nothing daunted, the young missionary visited all the native houses. He made a sort of census, and found that the township consisted of about 2000 souls. He was, on the whole, well received. He set to work to master the language, Among the Redskins and after some eight months was able to preach to them in their own tongue without the aid of an interpreter. The first baptisms took place in 1861. Mr. Duncan had to encounter great opposition from the Medicine-Men and from the older chiefs; but he stuck manfully to his post, commenced a popular school, got the interest and sympathy of the boys, and, though his life was often threatened, held his own fearlessly. Already, in 1859, there were signs of general improvement. There was less drunkenness. The missionary's arguments against the bestial customs which had been associated with religion were met by more and more approval. The people began to send their children freely to the school, and the chiefs sent a message to Mr. Duncan to "speak strong" against the " bad ways." Everything, indeed, looked very promising for the Mission. After a while it became clear to Mr. Duncan that if he wished to form a Christian community he must find a place at some distance from the temptations to which the natives were exposed, not only at the hands of their own countrymen, but from profligate and unchristian white men. The godless white man has always been the bane of the young native churches. Such a place was found at Metlakahtla, on the coast, seventeen miles from Fort Simpson. Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Here, in 1862, Mr. Duncan founded his Christian colony. He started on May 27th with fifty Indians. In less than a fortnight thirty canoes followed, bringing a hundred more people. In less than a year the new settlement was on a good working basis. Christian laws were framed for their guidance. On Sundays some six hundred Indians would attend the services of the Church. About one. hundred children came to school, and the same number of grown-up people availed themselves of the night-school. Medicine-Men were among the converts, and Mr. Duncan made a collection of their instruments of wizardry, sacrificed to Christ. Mr. Duncan's power and authority over the Indians rapidly increased. He became widely known throughout the tribes, and was often able to exert his influence to prevent wars, besides arranging difficulties between the natives and white men. The Mission was extended to the Queen Charlotte Islands, and a station was opened at Massett on the west coast of the northern island, Graham Island. Unhappily certain disputes between Mr. Duncan and the Anglican Church, which had sent him out, led to his removal, in 1881, to another spot in Alaska; and the Metlakahtla Mission came under the direct and personal influence of the Bishop of Caledonia. Under his fostering care it has continued to flourish, and has produced some very Among the Redskins excellent results. The type of Indian convert has been of a very high class indeed. The first Bishop of Caledonia was that stalwart soldier of Christ, the Right Rev. William Ridley, who had served as a C.M.S. Missionary in Peshawar and Afghanistan from 1866 to 1870, and who was consecrated in 1879 to this difficult diocese. He at once set to work with almost superhuman energy to bind together the scattered units of the Church on that ragged coast into a living and manageable whole. His first requirement was a steamer. As he wrote home, "Unless I get one, a new Bishop will soon be wanted." The storms were sudden and frequent. Wrecks were of common occurrence. To be thrown upon the rocks was almost certain death. After a narrow escape in an open canoe in a gale, the Bishop felt that he was justified in making a strong appeal for a Mission steamboat, in which he might be able to dare all weathers and visit his people among the fiords and islands. In 1880 the steamer was launched. It was named the Evangeline. The Bishop was not only captain, but engineer too. He presents a picture of himself as coming out of his engine-room, wiping his black hands on a piece of cotton-waste, and asks a respectable committee in London if that is the idea they have formed of Bishops in general and of himself in particular. Mrs. Ridley went almost everywhere with her 113 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands husband, until the work at the station became so continuous and exacting that she was Seldom able to be away for long from the spot. She had, among many other agencies, a home for Indian girls, where, the Bishop says, "they are as carefully watched, guarded, and taught, as in a good boarding-school in England." They had their schools for boys and girls separately, as well as a mixed school for girls and little boys. There were Sunday-schools for children and for grownup people. Classes and clubs of every kind were organised and kept in full swing. There was, in fact, the machinery 'of a large English parish, all of which depended largely upon Mrs. Ridley's energy and tact. She was from the first dearly loved by the people. The young men adored her. The Bishop tells of one who had been a noted wizard and dog-eater—"a splendid fellow, square built, of great muscular strength . . . whose attentions to Mrs. Ridley, then here alone, were almost comical. He hung about her all day long. The clock would not go fast enough to hasten school or service-time, that he might ring the bell and gather in the people." This was a passionate youth of a high spirit, who found it very hard to control himself when he was opposed, and would often break out into violences which were at discord with his newly-made Christian profession, but at Mrs. Ridley's feet he was as meek as a lamb. 114 An Ardent Convert A noted wizard and dog-eater became a Christian and the terror of whisky- drinkers, gamblers, and swearers. One day he found an old heathen dying, and at once ran off and dragged back a Christian friend, beseeching him to " Hurry up " and " make it very plain," remembering a recent sermon on the Penitent Thief. Among the Redskins He became an ardent reformer, this once tearer of dogs, and was the terror of all whisky-drinkers, gamblers, and profane swearers. It was touching to hear him sometimes make an apology (a most difficult thing for an Indian) when his temper had carried him too far in his tilting against abuses. The Bishop says: "This Hotspur is a tender-hearted being. He found an old heathen dying the day after he had heard me speak of the penitent thief. . . • He ran to fetch the only Christian then here. . . . Dragging his friend ... he urged him to tell the poor creature what I had told them the day before. ' Make it plain, very plain; hurry up. . . . Make it very plain.'" Mrs. Ridley was often left behind when her husband went on his long journeys, "and right well she carried on the Mission for months, single- handed." But, as we have said, she frequently made considerable journeys with him up the rivers. The Bishop refers to one of these in Contrasts in the Campaign. They were canoeing up the Skeena River, in 1880, and came to a village named KitaumSksh, where they disembarked in the bright moonlight. There was but one vacant house. 11 was window- less, and there were ragged gaps in the roof, through which the moonbeams cast silver splashes of light upon the broken floor. Worse still, this shanty was next to a drinking saloon frequented Missionary Heroines in Many Lands by white miners. The Bishop says: "Our noses decided us to postpone possession till morning." Then the rising sun proclaimed the malodorous fact. The wrecked hut had for long been a sort of free kennel for Indian dogs. The Bishop says: " They paid no rent, but / could not use it without." Some washing soon made the hut more habitable, and the Bishop himself knocked together some windows and a door, and built a chimney. This latter feat got the Bishop a great reputation. How he could take away his supporting barrel from beneath his arched fireplace without bringing all the stones down upon his head they could not imagine. The theory of the arch was one which had never occurred to them. It went abroad that the new white man was the greatest wizard ever seen, since he could make stones hover in the air, and keep them there as long as he willed. But Mrs. Ridley proved herself an even greater magician. She cast her spell so effectually over a party of riotous white miners that she weaned them from their drunken orgies. The saloon already mentioned was offered to the Bishop for sale. " I cannot run a saloon," said he. " Nor can I now," replied the tavern-keeper. The fact was that drinking had ceased to be the fashion in that locality. The Indians came and asked the Bishop what charms he had used 118 Among the Redskins to make bad white men good? But the only charm was the subtlest of all philtres, the charm of a woman's pure and simple heart. When the Bishop asked the miners to tell him what it was that had led them to make so desirable a reform, they confessed that his wife had done it. The result of this victory of Mrs. Ridley's was that the saloon was bought and turned into a school-church. The Indians were delighted at first, and gave their help gratis to fell trees and split them into planks, while the miners took their part in transforming the scene of their former debauches and put up benches for the coming scholars and congregations. It was not till later that the Indians discovered that in ridding themselves of the saloon they had also lost their own chance of a drink of "fire-water." Then il they were mad because they could get no other liquor than water drawn from the now frozen river, and therefore needing no more icing." One night, as the Bishop was striding up and down upon the frozen river, and thinking a little despondently of the difficulties which lay before him, he heard a prolonged sound which suggested prayer. Gently he followed where his ear led him, till he came to one of the larger houses on the river bank. Creeping up to the walls he peeped in through a slit in the rough logs and, to his astonishment, saw about seventy Indians on their knees, while one of them prayed. He 119 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands listened awhile, standing there in the snow, his heart, as he says, beating with excitement. It seemed to him that the Holy Spirit of God was at last descending upon that post on the Skeena River. The man who was praying was so evidently carried out of himself that the silent listener could not doubt but that he was under the influence of heaven. Quietly and quickly he retraced his steps and returned home, saying to his wife— " The Indians have a prayer-meeting." " Where ? " said she, as interested as he was. While he explained, she hurriedly flung on some wraps and went with her husband upon the ice. Together they crept to the log wall and listened. There could be no doubt about it. The Indians were at prayer, and prayer of the most earnest kind. Soon they were all immersed together in what they felt to be a flood-tide of heavenly light and joy. It was the beginning of a strong movement. To quote the Bishop's later words: " That Indian town is now wholly Christian. My rotten old log palace is razed, and a fine new church now stands on its site, with a battlemented tower whence issue from the great bell in sonorous notes the frequent summons to worship God. . . . The Christians have made fine roads in the forest and many clearings; planted pretty gardens; . . . and the whole scene is one of real beauty bespeaking order, industry, and godliness." Among the Redskins Once, when a young missionary and his wife returned unexpectedly and suddenly from the wild Skeena River, "recoiling from the horrors of a savage life," and unequipped in themselves to endure the hardships of it, the Bishop found himself in a great strait. It was too late in the season to supply the place of the runaways. Winter was already whitening the land. Yet to leave a newly founded station without a head was to lose all that had been gained. He did not know what to do. But before he was able to think the difficulty out, a volunteer had come forward. Mrs. Ridley said— " Let me go. I will hold the work together until you find somebody else." "Do you mean it?" said the Bishop, well knowing what was implied by such an offer. " Yes," was the firm reply. "Then," said he, "wait till the morning and we will discuss it." When they had slept upon this proposal and all its issues, and the Bishop was pressed for an answer, he at length gave his consent. Together they commenced the long journey. " It was difficult to get a crew to face a November 1 Skeena,' which freezes in hummocks from end to end," but, hastily packing provisions for a year, they started across*the snow. It took them more than a fortnight to reach the log hut on the Skeena River, and there, after unpacking and storing the things, they left her alone, the only white woman Missionary Heroines in Many Lands for 170 miles, among Indians and miners. It would be impossible to be more isolated. There was absolutely no one upon whom that solitary woman, sealed up in the immense waste by winter, could fall back. Yet such confidence had her husband in her powers, that he actually visited England on a sudden, imperative call, and was back again at Metlakahtla before his wife up there in the snows knew that he had left. " The miners said that she was the best parson they ever had, and the Indians call her 'mother' to this day." The Church Missionary Intelligencer publishes a letter written about sixteen years later than these early adventures. Bishop and Mrs. Ridley had seen and done many things during those sixteen years. Waste places had been made to bloom, and waste hearts had been reclaimed. The Bishop was again without his steamer. He had been compelled to sell her. As the work spread more rapidly than the diocesan fund increased, he found that he had to choose between maintaining a vessel which cost him from ^"200 to ^400 a year, and supplying the spiritual needs of his many Mission stations. Without hesitation he chose the latter course, and parted with the useful ship. But he was sadly hampered for lack of her, and was obliged to use such coasting craft as he could find to get about his diocese. He wrote in 1896 from the Stikine River, the Among the Redskins Mission which was afterwards developed as a memorial to Mrs. Ridley. The steamer on which he was a passenger cut her way through the countless islands, leaving a white track upon the blue waters. On shore great eagles stooped from the pines from which they had watched the ship's approach, and beat their way heavily in flight. Bears were seen gazing from rocky crags; the howl of wolves was heard in the forest; while the sea was often thrown into a foam by the rush and dive of whales and the resounding slap of their flukes. " Islands everywhere, with their tops snow-clad in May. . . . What a vista in mountain snow-land burst on us as we turned into the first long reach of the river! Range after range abutted on the water, so that the valleys opened to us as we steamed past, each with its glacier, giving the mountains the appearance of a serried line of gigantic sentinels guarding the avenue . . . with the treasures of the snow." When they reached their destination there was no one who had time to look after a newcomer. He had to be his own porter and tent- pitcher. The banks of the river were steep, and no level place for the tent could be found till he had clambered up about 150 feet. It was well that the Bishop was an all-round handy man and could do for himself. He set to work without demur, got all his things up, across a roaring creek by a shaky corduroy bridge, up a steep bank set with loose stones, and behind the shelter Missionary Heroines in Many Lands of some rocks. There he pitched his tiny tent, while the mosquitoes took full advantage of the fact that both his hands were occupied, and stung him almost to death. While the Bishop was cooking his dinner some children wandered up to the tent, and presently crept in. These he coaxed still nearer with some sweets. They were then allowed to feast on the scrapings, and to watch while plates and frying-pan were washed, a process unknown in a land where the only cleaning of utensils is by the tongues of the dogs. That was always the Bishop's plan, to get the confidence of the children, who would by and by fill his school, and in their turn act as a magnet to attract their parents. A week had scarcely passed before he had made many friends among the youths. One of these, a ten-year-old half-breed, attached himself to him like his shadow. "He had a. bright face and a pair of eyes sparkling with intelligence, mischief and fun under the shadow of a felt hat whose brim slouched nearly to his shoulders." This boy constituted himself general friend and herald of the new teacher. "On the second Sunday morning, before I was dressed, he wormed himself under the wall of my tent . . . and sat in silence watching me. Then he shared my breakfast, and finally ran off to the store with my Bible and Prayer Book. Back he scrambled, and we started down together, but not before he 124 1 A Totem Pole A family or tribal monument of the Hydab. India 1 Among the Redskins had startled me with a shrill cry that brought a number of red-and-blue things swiftly down the opposite bank from a height of quite six hundred feet above us. " What did you say ? " I asked. "I say," he proudly answered, "Come, come devils; come hear singing man." That was the name the Bishop had earned in the place through singing some hymns, solo, at the first service he held. The whole letter, from which we have not further space here to quote, is full of very touching and wonderful instances of the power of a man who is himself full of conviction and zeal to heal and help those who are without the knowledge of God, or who have lost the religion in which they were brought up. Heathen children, degraded Indian women, " Dandy Jim " the drunken white man, all owned the sway of Christ when He was presented to them by the fearless preacher who first won their hearts and then moved their consciences. It is a beautiful picture that of the manly Bishop with a four-year-old child, the son of a white man and an Indian half-breed woman, on his knee. "I used," writes Bishop Ridley, "to tell him of the Child-Jesus. ... His eyes, full of wonder, were fixed on mine, and he would say, * Mother never told me this. Why did not mother tell me?' When I told him God loved him, he would say, * Where is He? 127 H Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Who told Him about me? Is He older than you?'" Less than five months after the above letter was written, the blow fell upon the Mission which deprived it of its dear and honoured mother. The end came very suddenly, on 6th December 1896. When the Metlakahtla Indians knew that she was seriously ill they crowded about her house and hung round her bed. They spent their whole time in the chapel, praying for her recovery, night and day, without an instant's cessation. From her bed she could hear their voices, and was upheld and comforted. As the news of her illness spread, people came hurrying in from distant stations. All wanted to see her and hear her last words. Whispering into her husband's ear as he bent down to her pillow, she said— " The work of God shall not suffer through my departure. Shall it ? " Then her eyes fell on the Chinese cook who was standing near with bent head, and she said— " My Cha Li; my dear Cha Li." He fell down by her side and kissed her hand, " raining his tears on it, only to kiss them away." At the same instant one of the house-boys heard her say, "My own dear boy, my son, Herbert"; and the great fellow was overcome, and burst into tears as he pressed his face against her other hand. 128 Among the Redskins " Immediately behind her was a young Kitikshan maiden. To her she turned slightly, saying, 1 Mary is such a blessing to me,' which convulsed the dear creature, who owes her salvation from savagery to the saint whom she has often of late borne in her arms. Four races at the same moment held her in their hands, and mingled their tears as she blessed them all." The large room in which she lay was covered with the kneeling forms of Indians, all silently praying. In the meanwhile the prayer-meeting at the chapel never for one moment stayed its course. During three days and nights her spiritual children prayed for her in relays, one following the other, and the chapel and adjoining rooms being always full. Every ten minutes tidings of her state were passed from the sickroom to the chapel. When they learnt that it was the will of the Lord of life and death that she should not recover, they changed the tenor of their petitions, and prayed that she might pass happily and peacefully into the world of spirits. The Bishop says that " Many found the light during the death struggle. In her death she, by her beautiful and tender words and patient endurance . . . drew more souls" to the Saviour of the world than ever. When all was over her husband committed her body to the Indians, that they might honour it as seemed best to them. They gladly accepted 129 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands his confidence. Canoes were despatched to fetch other missionaries, and she was buried amidst weeping crowds. Over her grave has been erected a white marble cross, with her name simply inscribed upon the pedestal. It is a fitting emblem of a pure life, wholly devoted to the service of Him whose Cross was raised for the salvation of all the world. Bishop Ridley collected some of the more beautiful sayings of the people who had learned to think beautifully from so beloved a teacher. One said: " God has driven the nail in, blow after blow; quite in; it hurts, but it fastens." " She passed into the breakers from the shore, but has gone up on the further side, beyond the dark arch, into the peace of angels." Another said: " She saw us lying in the stones and dirt, and put her pure hands under us to lift us up." Yet another: "When in my sin all kicked me and trod me under their feet; she alone came to me, and took me in her loving arms, and told me to rise up again and walk with God." One of the Indians, to whom her body was entrusted, said: " Our mother gave her life for us; you now give her flesh to our keeping. Our hearts open wide at the thought of our rich charge. ... Her grave will be holy." Her life was summed up by an Indian thus: " Now we have seen pure feet walking in the 130 Among the Redskins Way. . . . She kept all the Commandments of God. We never saw it so before." Snapshots from the North Pacific (C.M.S.); Metlakahtla and the North Pacific Mission (Eugene Stock, C.M.S.); Church Missionary Intelligencer, 1897 ; Contrasts in the Campaign (C.M.S.). 131 MARTHA CROLL IN JAMAICA CHAPTER VII MARTHA CROLL IN JAMAICA Hindus in Jamaica—A difficult class to reach—Martha Croll—In India—Invalided home—Off to Jamaica—Opposition of Brahmin priests—Work among the women—A brief life of hard work— Death—Private letters. While enumerating those women who have given up their lives to the enthusiasm of missionary work, and have gladly died in the service, we must not omit Miss M. B. Croll, agent of the United Free Church of Scotland in Jamaica. Jamaica is now largely devoted to fruit growing, and is one of the principal producers of bananas for the American, Canadian, and British markets. In order to obtain a sufficient supply of labourers, the planters introduce a number of East Indians into the island. These people are Hindus, bringing with them their own priests and all the paraphernalia of their faith. They are perhaps all the more tenacious of their creed and customs because they are isolated among strangers. They also cling to their own tongue. In consequence they are a difficult class to reach, and offer a problem to the Christian teacher. It was among these East Indians labouring 135 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands among the fruit-gardens of this Isle of the West that Miss Croll found her sphere of work. She was peculiarly fitted for her task both by temperament and special education. Born in kindly Aberdeen among a clannish and conservative people, she thoroughly understood the folk to whom she came as a bearer of new tidings. If they were clannish and somewhat difficult to strangers, she thought none the worse of them for that. Moreover, if they were tenacious, did she not come of a race more tenacious still—of that sturdy Aberdonian stock which never makes up its mind to do a thing without accomplishing it ? Martha Croll was strong by inherited character, and was possessed of intensely strong convictions. She never had a doubt as to her grounds for faith, nor of her mission to proclaim it. As quite a girl she devoted herself and her life to the cause of Christ. In 1891 she was sent as a missionary to India in connection with the United Free Church. She gave her mind to those preliminary studies which are so harassing to the young missionary eager to begin at once and teach, and mastered the language in as short a time as possible. She remained in India long enough to acquire a deep interest in and sincere love for the people, and then to her great disappointment her health suddenly failed, and she was ordered home. She returned to Scotland and remained quiet for a time, but always with the determination to resume her work among 136 In Jamaica the Indians the moment she was permitted to do so. The doctors, however, were against her. India was pronounced impossible. She was in much distress and perplexity over this matter when, quite unexpectedly, her way was made plain to the West Indies. A missionary was wanted at Kingston, Jamaica, to deal with the Hindu settlement in that place. Toward the end of 1898 we find her established there, and quite at home among her beloved orientals, once again speaking the tongue of her adoption. The work was arduous in the extreme. The Brahmin priests were masters of the people's conscience, and bitterly resented any intrusion. They used every means short of actual violence to hinder the introduction of the Gospel among their flock. But Miss Croll was not to be denied. She went among the women as a sister and friend, and soon succeeded in winning the hearts of a few. The poor women welcomed her mingled strength and gentleness, and soon grew to regard her as principal adviser and guide. They found in her just the refuge they needed, and which their own religion utterly refuses to woman. She quickly became to these poor creatures the beloved " Miss Sahib," whom they could trust and who alone really cared for them. The result was as might be expected, and not a few were won to accept the Gospel which their friend and counsellor so earnestly preached. 137 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Husbands too were, in some cases, won through their wives. There was quite a movement throughout the Indian community towards the Church of Christ. Miss Croll did not, however, live long enough to see the full fruit of her work. She died in 1906. A sharp attack of heart-trouble carried her swiftly away. She was ever a hard worker and unsparing of herself. When her little Indian maid, who was admitted to her friendship and allowed to find fault with her, used to take her sharply to task for working too hard, she would reply with a smile, " The night cometh when no man can work." When at last the night came, she was not afraid of the darkness of the valley. Miss Croll's private letters are full of those thrills which move those who are passionately and intimately concerned with souls. There is the ring of a great sincerity about them. She literally existed for her work and lived in it. " I am very, very happy," she wrote to her friend Mrs. McLaren. And again: " I love my dear East Indians with a great love. What a delightful feeling I have when I visit \ Hope Barracks/ where our Christians mostly are. They are so different from those who have not yet confessed their faith. My dear women are now sisters in Christ Jesus, and it makes a world of difference. They cling to me, and I to them, and we have such sweet times together." On another occasion she writes: " Do you 138 In Jamaica know that I have wished that I had the power to baptize! One woman and her three boys from Papine, who had given me her name as one ready and longing for baptism, has been taken away to a distant part by her relatives. If I could have got Mr. Martin at once, all would have been well. This is not the first case of the kind." And yet again: " How our people listened! I do not think you could find better listeners anywhere." Miss Croll had many pathetic experiences in the prison which she systematically attended. Among others was the case of an Indian lying under sentence of death for murder. This man understood no English and apparently had no religion. By the invitation of the Inspector-General of Police Miss Croll visited the convict repeatedly, and remained with him at the last hour of his life. Her knowledge of his language and her gentle ministrations completely won the man's confidence and affectionate attention, so that he became apparently truly converted, and was admitted to baptism before his execution. When the moment of supreme trial came, his new-found faith in Christ stood the test. He went to his death truly repentant and with the courage of one who has found his Saviour. His last words were : " I cover myself with Him.'1 139 AMONG THE "BLACKFELLOWS" OF NORTH AUSTRALIA CHAPTER VIII AMONG THE "BLACKFELLOWS" OF NORTH AUSTRALIA The aboriginal—His religion—" Black-birders "—Mrs. Ward—The mission arrives at Thursday Island—Then at the mouth of Batavia River—Native law—Drilling the natives—Difficulties— Mrs. Ward's school—A church—Mapoon—Mrs. Hey—Socialism among the natives—The protection of the mission—Co-operation with justice—A year of troubles—Death of Ward—Mrs. Ward continues the work—Native reserves and protectors—They. G. Ward— Development of Mapoon. The natives of Australia have, on the whole, a bad reputation; and of a bad lot, those who inhabit the northern coasts of the great island appear to be the worst. Estimates differ however, and those who come closest to the native, and therefore should know most about him, are by no means convinced of the hopelessness of his case. Naturally one must discount to a certain extent what the resident white man, the lord of Australia, has to say on the subject. To him the native is an unmitigated nuisance. He steals his fowls, raids his vegetables, sometimes spears his cattle, and will even transfix himself if he can do it with safety. The master of the soil would fain turn the whole batch of natives out of the country, as the Tasmanians did, and locate them on some profitless 143 1 r Missionary Heroines in Many Lands island where they could only harm each other. That, of course, is out of the question; but no great regret is expressed that the blackfellow is dying out, and that the land may before long be rid of his presence through the action of " natural" causes. Mr. Pitcairn, writing in 1891,1 says: "The blacks of North Queensland are, without exception, the lowest type of humanity on the face of the earth. They are almost on a level with the brute creation. . . . They are treacherous in the extreme ; their principal occupation appears to consist in spearing the white man's cattle, and, when possible, the white man himself. " They are as dangerous as snakes in the grass, and, like them, should be trodden under foot." That is how a passing traveller, who has seen the bestial side of the native, and possibly experienced something of his thievish propensities, is apt to talk. On the other hand, travellers who have trusted the natives as guides and hunters, and have made long and difficult journeys with them, sometimes speak of them in quite other terms. The traveller Mitchell grows enthusiastic over the excellent qualities of his guide Yuranigh, whom he treated as a companion and friend; and says that his other black servants were "superior in penetration and judgment" to the white followers who accompanied him on his march. We shall probably find that the missionary is 1 Two Years among the Savages of New Guinea. 144 Of North Australia the man who is best qualified to give a fair estimate of these people, who by their age-long isolation from the rest of the world have had perhaps less chance than any other human beings of rising above the level of the beasts. The missionary starts with the idea of raising the people to their highest possible. And it is certain that he has not despaired of his spiritual children. They may be difficult, but he has not found them impossible. And with all their imperfections he has found that he can love them and win their love in return. It used to be thought that the Australian black was an instance of man without religion. But that is now known not to be so. He has no faith in a Supreme God, or possibly in anything with the name of god, and he makes no idols; but he firmly believes in demons and ghosts. He has an implicit faith in incantations and in the virtue of charms to avert their evil influence. The magician is a force. All good or evil comes through his instrumentality. He is a cannibal for the same reason. He devours his enemy, or at least such parts of his slain enemy as he considers to be the seats of life, as his kidney fat, or his eyes, partly to absorb his virtues and partly to prevent his spirit from returning to trouble the slayer. A dead friend or relative is eaten for much the same end, to show how much he was appreciated and to lay his restless ghost. MS 1 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands One can easily believe that these wandering children of the bush and desert, so lately brought into contact with masterful men of another race, should refuse to be readily tamed. But the white men have themselves to thank for much of the annoyance they suffer. Mr. Ward says : " There is a dreadful antipathy to these blacks. For the slightest provocation they are brutally treated, and even shot." His first impression of the natives was their evident distrust of him and his race. When a deputation of blacks came to assure him that he would be welcomed as a teacher, he observed that all the women and children had been hidden out of sight. The men were quite prepared for any treachery on the part of their visitors. He adds: "We earnestly hope and pray that God will give us easy access to the confidence of the blacks." Then the raids of "black-birders," who wanted pearl-divers and who stole "gins" (women) who belonged to the black men, filled the people with rage. They waited their chance for revenge. By their law somebody had to die for what had been done, and they speared the first whites at whom they got a chance. Then there would be a white " expedition," and indiscriminate shooting. At first these people seemed almost as difficult to deal with as intelligent monkeys might be, but patience had its fruit. In i860 "the first convert was speaking about his soul. He could not understand himself, he said. He had wept over his sins, 146 Of North Australia and he could not get rid of the picture of Christ agonising in the garden." The two ladies, whose work among these black people forms the theme of this chapter, were sisters, each married to a missionary, one to James Ward, and the other to Nicholas Hey. They were sent out by the Moravian Church, that community which of all Christian bodies has perhaps realised most thoroughly its duty to the heathen world. Their lives among the blacks are very delightful reading. They were so entirely given to their work. They so utterly refused to be daunted by any difficulties; and they so completely trusted in the grace of God and in His continual intervention and help. They went out—at least three of them did, for Mr. Hey was not then married—in 1890. Their destination was the extreme north of Queensland. They were to found a station somewhere at the northern end of the York Peninsula, which juts out like a horn in the map towards New Guinea. They were warned that the blacks were specially dangerous in that neighbourhood. A man who had himself been wounded by a spear bade them take care how they wandered in the bush. It was said that two miners had been recently murdered and devoured on their way from the gold-diggings. The Australian papers made game of their expedition, and told ghoulish stories of what they might expect. One native was supposed to say 147 1 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands to the Inspector, who scolded him for cannibalism, " We like man flesh; you like something else." But that sort ol talk, far from deterring them, made them the keener to try what conciliation and justice could do. The paper recommended them to take rifles. They thought they had a better weapon than that. When the Wards reached Australia they were disappointed to find that their proposed mission excited very little enthusiasm among the churches. Nor did the Government officials do much to help them. One of these, who informed Mr. Ward that it had been determined to make a grant of rations for the natives, added : "But mind! It is not for you missionaries ! " The unfortunate missionary had to keep his temper as he best could, and hope to prove his honesty by his deeds later on. Mr. and Mrs. Ward pressed on, and landed on Thursday Island, off the coast of the York Peninsula, in November 1890. Thursday Island is the centre of the pearl-shell fisheries in those waters, and a number of boats congregate there. It is a pleasant island, two miles long by three-quarters of a mile wide, and had become the Government Residence. When the Wards arrived it was being fortified. They did not propose to remain there a moment longer than necessary, and arranged with the Albatross, the patrol-boat which polices the pearl-fisheries, to take them to Cullen Point on the mainland, by the mouth of the Batavia River. In North Queens- 148 Of North Australia land the heat is very great. The climate, in fact, is tropical. The mouths of the tidal rivers are, like the rivers of Africa, fringed with mangrove swamps, and are almost equally infested by fever. M. Elise Reclus describes the Endeavour River (so named after Captain Cook's ship, which was there beached for repairs) as being very beautiful when ascended. It may be taken as a type of the other streams which flow from the precipitous mountains which encircle the plain. When the mangrove trees give way to bush, the banks are glorious with every kind of tropical plant. In clearings may be seen many a bright homestead with its orchards and gardens, where many tropic fruits are grown, such as mangots, grandillas, bananas, pineapples, lemons, oranges, pomegranates, and pawpaws. Behind the river trees the lonely bush stretches in long undulations up to the mountain walls beyond. In these sultry surroundings Mrs. Ward fell ill, and her husband and she were detained awhile on the island. At last, however, their boat, the Dicky, hove in sight, bringing four carpenters and materials for building from Brisbane. They lost no more time, but crossed to the site which had been selected. It was a place of "low, sandy ridges, sparsely timbered, with an open, sandy beach, and stretched about two and a half miles from Cullen Point to the south." Further south still were the mangrove swamps which lined that part of the Bay of Carpentaria. 149 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands They soon met the natives. Two men in shirts and trousers led a motley band clad only in loin cloths. They shook hands, but the captain of the Dicky did not trust them, and kept his revolver ready. So did the white policeman who went with the party. The blacks were a sufficiently savage- looking crew, most of them slashed about the body in the way that fashion demands, and all carrying spears, clubs, and boomerangs. But they were not the pure product of the soil. Smoke rose in the bush behind, and, pointing to it, they said that over there were " the wild fellows!' The wild fellows had not even the thin varnish of civilisation which prompted the others to put on white man's attire. The first night in the bush was made intolerable by mosquitoes. Ward got under a table, over which he draped a blanket, and spent the hours of darkness on the ground. At sunrise they began work. The first thing was to put up a hen-house for a few fowls they had brought with them; then they organised a party of porters and carried up the packing-cases out of the tidal mud into which the sailors had dumped them. When the sun set and darkness swooped down with tropic suddenness upon the bush, they had made a sort of fort for their encampment out of bales and furniture, roofed roughly over with slabs of corrugated iron. There they passed the night, with rifles close to the hand, not knowing whether they might not at any moment be attacked. The native 150 Of North Australia camp was not far off, and howling went on all through the night. Next morning all was safe ; so they pushed on with their building and got the carpenters and a white trooper and his wife temporarily housed. Some difficulty was caused by the white workmen, who openly showed their contempt for the missionary. It was difficult for such men to understand how anybody worthy of respect should choose to live among the blacks. They must be no-account people. All North Australia had recently gone crazy over the gold-diggings, and great fortunes had been made and lost. There was one well-known man who from being a common miner became an owner of property with a quarter of a million. He spent it all in about four years; became a Member of Parliament, sat in the House at Brisbane, made a flurry in society, and was rapidly reduced to beggary. Such men were counted wise in their generation. But the man who professed no interest in a gold-rush, and immersed himself among the swamps simply to do the native good and serve the Church of Christ, was next door to an idiot. The natives, too, were a constant anxiety during the first few weeks. It was impossible to trust their peaceful intentions. They had lately eaten two white men ; what security had these two, Ward and Hey, with a helpless woman, that they would not, as soon as they were left alone, share the same fate? But firmness and fearlessness gradu- 151 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands ally asserted their superiority. The blacks came to learn that they had found friends and masters. As riotous schoolboys yield to the strong will of the man in authority, so the savages let themselves be influenced by their white teachers. The missionaries often found themselves able to quell a fight, stepping in and taking away the spears already poised to throw. But it was excessively difficult to discover what was the native law in each case, and who had the right in any quarrel. Here is one example :— A man named Telford speared the dog of a man known as Toby. Thereupon Toby retaliated by spearing Telford's sister. The tribe instantly formed up into Toby and Telford factions, and there would have been a battle had not the missionaries managed somehow to soothe everybody and satisfy honour. Here is another case. A man named Dungeon suspected that, a neighbour called Cook intended to run off with one of his "gins," whereupon he promptly speared him. While Cook was being attended to at the Mission house the girl in question gave further colour to the rumour of her infidelity by running away from Dungeon. The trackers at once took up her spoor and pursued her into the bush. Presently she came racing back into camp, followed by her tormentors. She made for the Mission house as a haven of refuge, and reached the door in time to get shelter. After a while the missionaries, who did not know 152 Of North Australia what the native law was in such a case, had to send both the girl and Cook out to meet the tribe. The injured husband thereupon flung himself upon the girl and dragged her, screaming and clutching at the grass, towards his hut. When they began to beat the wretched woman on the ground, Mr. Ward ran in among them and made them desist. Immediately the camp formed sides for a battle. Part sided with Cook, part with Dungeon. Eventually, after a prolonged "row" and bitter railing on the part of everybody, Cook and his inamorata escaped to another camp. When they came back, the quarrel broke out afresh. The brother of the runaway girl was egged on by every one to kill his sister. He did not wish to do so, but was goaded to execute what somehow or another was considered the justice of the case. He therefore seized a moment when his sister's back was turned, and hurled his spear into the back of her neck. She ran off, the spear still sticking in the wound, and was chased by some men eager to finish what had been so well begun. The missionaries again intervened in time to save her, and cutting out the spear nursed the girl back to health. The end was that both Cook and the "gin" were sent to Thursday Island to be right out of the way of further quarrels. But the whole dispute left the Wards and Hey in greater perplexity than ever. There was evidently some law in the matter. But what was it f It was clear that a long residence among the i53 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands people would be necessary before they could be accepted as arbiters of disputes. A further case seemed to give some slight clue to the law of retaliation. "Boats'n" was speared in his sleep in revenge for a death he was supposed to have had some hand in. " Dan," who speared him, presently found that he was not the guilty person. He therefore made amends to Boats'n by allowing him to spear him in return. " Boats'n magnanimously used the small spear and wounded Dan in the leg, and then walked up to him and said, * Now we are friends!' So the feud was ended." It was not easy to accommodate oneself to native customs. Perhaps our own civilised tastes in matters of meat and drink are arbitrary. Anyhow, they do not fit in with those of Australian black men. Mrs. Ward had to use water so brown that she could not tell by the look of it whether she had made the tea or not. Going to the pool from which this water was drawn, she once found two blacks in it, cooling themselves. She did not like it, but they could not understand why. The people were almost naked. Mr. Ward thus describes their appearance : " The black man's skull is prognathous. His curly hair is usually matted with dirt. His cranium is abnormally hard and thick. The * bottle-nose' is a common feature. Ophthalmia is prevalent. . . . The lips are thick and the mouth wide. . . . The two front teeth are knocked out at the time of initiation into the 154 Of North Australia privileges of manhood. The chest is scarred with ornamental cuts. When some of the single men returned from a ' spell' in the bush, and were asked what these cuts meant, they replied: * If we no cut ourselves, the girls no like us.' . . . It is rare for any to attain the age of fifty. Colds, consumption, cancer, skin diseases, rheumatism . . . carry off most of them before they reach middle life." It was on such material as this that the missionary party began to work. They commenced teaching at once, and Mrs. Ward started a school ; but the first thing was to cultivate some ground, and get the blacks into some order as properly organised workers. There was a regular drill, so as to establish a *habit. First came prayers, which all the labourers were expected to attend. Then two and a half hours clearing and enclosing the field. They began upon two acres. The men were formed into gangs, some to hoe, others to make holes for posts and rails, others to cut and saw wood, and so on. Then a boat-house was built, and such sheds as were needed for the little "croft." The soil proved to be very discouraging. Nothing would grow in it. They carried earth from the swamp and tried to make good mould, and they were most diligent in watering their seeds, but nothing at first would prosper. " The first fruits of all their labours was a cucumber, which they pronounced delicious." 155 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Farming was carried on under difficulties that would have dismayed any but those dauntless settlers, who were planting crops only that they might reap men. Their fowls led a precarious life in the midst of countless enemies. Hawks and crows, snakes and dingoes alike turned to the fowl-house as to a convenient larder. The cock had a battle royal with a monster crow and defeated him, only to be himself seized and carried off by a prowling dingo. A snake was killed in the hen-house with nine chicks in its stomach. All sorts of unexpected diseases attacked the cows, and Mrs. Ward needed all her courage not to give up dairy work in despair. It was all educative to the natives, whom they made constant attempts to discipline. Hunting parties were organised to give them wholesome employment, and fishing excursions with the net were very popular. There was no sense of honour among the men. Mr. Ward enters in his diary: "After work went fishing. We divided as usual among the men, and then took remainder to the camp for the women. I ran short of twelve. Great matter dividing fish. Many tricks. One man picked up a fish with his foot and hid it behind his back. Another buried a big one in the sand." Again, " Great haul of fish. We counted 702. . . . There were the usual attempts at stealing and burying. * Broad Charlie' sitting on a big one, and help- 156 Of North Australia ing most devoutly to put the others into buckets." After a while Mrs. Ward started a regular school, and commenced with two boys. Another joined. All these spoke different dialects. Next week a class was formed for girls. They were as difficult as young goats, those bush maidens. After a month's schooling Mrs. Ward thought that she might begin to teach them some housework, so she asked one of the girls to commence by washing her hands and face. The girl did not understand that this could be necessary, and, when Mrs. Ward tried to show her how to wash herself, she was seized with sudden panic and fled at top speed to the natives' camp. This was repeated more than once. At last the lesson was learned, and the root idea of cleanliness was implanted. It was hard to get the boys and girls to count. They soon got tired of any mental effort. After a short while of puzzlement it would be, " Me no stick, me get tired," Numbers perplexed them. They do not count further than to three. After that they say "mriteka," much or plenty, for the remainder. One of the scholars, who had the mellifluous name of Treacle, would shed tears because he could not remember "two tens," or "three tens." But they were quite interested in the school, and liked to learn to write. It was customary to give a sweet as a prize to a diligent scholar. "Even young men i57 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands gladly received one sweet as a prize." At Christmas a prize knife was given to the best scholar. Mrs. Ward's class for the girls included such matters as baking, washing, ironing, and mending. Gradually she got some intelligence out of the poor women whom, at their first interview, the missionaries had pronounced "the picture of stupidity and degradation." The girls, in fact, bid fair to outstrip the boys. When first a mixed class was formed, and all the scholars were arranged in a semicircle, one of the girls got to the top, and two others stood above several of the boys. As the boys became domesticated they were trusted to do various things about the house and farm. Not always, however, with conspicuous success. "Johnny" was set to milk the cow, but when no milk appeared, Mr. Hey went to look for him, and found both boy and milk on the ground. "That cow he humbug along me," exclaimed the discomfited milker, rubbing his shin. g He send bucket longway." Of course, a church was commenced as soon as possible. It was a poor little building, but to the imagination of the blacks it was a great house, and appealed to them as a wonder of architecture. This church became the mother of several others, and Mission stations grew about Mapoon. Mapoon became the centre of industries. Fertile soil was stripped of the scrub which choked it. Cocoa-nut trees were planted on either side of a road which 158 Of North Australia stretched for two miles from an out-station to the beach. A small fleet of vessels was collected to trade and ply between the stations. Natives have proved themselves capable agriculturists, carpenters, builders, and stock-raisers. Many acres of sand and bush have been turned into fields and gardens, and a new and better church has taken the place of the primitive shed which was first put up. The black Christians have also proved efficient as teachers and preachers, while the women have, many of them, become emancipated from their slavish positions as mere family chattels, and have learnt self-respect. It is just possible that there may be still a future before the crossed and transformed remnant of aboriginal Australia. In any case, the black man has already proved that no human being is incapable of being raised when he is brought into real and vital contact with the Gospel of Christ. The settlement at Mapoon is regarded with much interest by those who care for the native. White Australia had become accustomed to treat them as noxious vermin. They can now watch them in their own reserve, and judge of what they are capable. They are still exposed to many temptations at the hands of unscrupulous whites. But their future is not without hope and brightness. It was a great comfort to Mrs. Ward when her sister married Mr. Hey and settled at Mapoon. The two sisters now stood side by side in all their work, and helped each other both in the school and 159 k Missionary Heroines in Many Lands in the general management of household affairs. It had been intensely lonely for the one white woman when her husband was away, sometimes for several days together. From this time the two women were able to encourage and support one another. To the blacks themselves the object-lesson of European family life, lived there in their very midst, was invaluable. The native women had no place in society. The men formed a socialistic community. There was no chief, no settled government of any kind, but merely a loose code of generally-accepted customs. All food was the property of the tribe. When a man kills any game —crocodile, wallaby, or emu—he just lights a fire and proceeds to cook a meal from the carcase. The rising smoke soon proclaims his occupation, and others flock to him like vultures. Some one miles away in the bush sees the smoke, and concludes, " Somebody catch something." He is off to share in it. Dozens of others do the same ; the news spreads, and there are plenty of guests for the feast. Each, as he arrives, "squats down in silence behind the original hunter, who tears off a piece of cooked flesh and hands it to him without turning his head. In this way a man may give away a whole animal and have nothing for himself." This Socialism does not extend to a man's property in his women. They are his own. They may not be taken except at the penalty of 160 Of North Australia death. These wretched "gins" do all the work, erect the primitive shelters for their lords, which do duty for huts, and provide food for the man. He has absolute power over her, and can put her to death at his whim. When a woman is married she erects a shelter with its open side towards the clearing occupied by her lord and his other wives. Opposite each shelter of this kind is a fire, whence the wife is called " Moatana " (having her own fireplace). Each has to work, much as a slave would do, through the day. At sunset she must report herself and give an account of her work to her husband, being beaten if she has not provided enough to please him. There is no proper family life. The blacks of both sexes had to learn the very existence of such a thing from their daily observations of life at the Mission stations. It was a mutual observation society at Mapoon. If the natives watched their white teachers, the missionaries took care to sympathetically watch the blacks. They did not ignore their customs as savage and negligible, but strove to ingratiate themselves by such respect as was possible. They soon discovered that there was a certain order in the midst of apparent disorder, and that an etiquette was observed by the natives in their intercourse with each other. By refraining from injuring susceptibilities, they won their pupils to regard them as friends and protectors. It was a very new experience to these aborigines of Northern Australia. Hitherto they had 161 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands met white men mainly as captains of pearling vessels anxious to make up their crew, and not too particular how they got their contingent. No respect was paid to the women. Mr. Ward says: " Let me take these men as examples. . . . One has a wife on Thursday Island, and a black concubine on another island. The others live openly in concubinage with blacks from neighbouring islands. . . . The blacks have never heard the name of Christ used in a good sense. They only know that in certain circumstances the white man says, ( By Christ!' * God damn you!'' Such men have a very vivid hatred of the missionary. He is a spoil-sport. And, in fact, he does spoil many of the tricks which have been played upon the helpless and ignorant. When one lugger anchored off the Cocu River and threatened the blacks with guns, trying to capture a woman, it was quite enough for the blacks to say, "We belong missionary, and missionary catch you by and by." The lugger made off. On another occasion the owners of a lugger who had inveigled several girls and dropped them on an island to avoid registration at Thursday Island, intending to pick them up on their return, were exposed by some Mission blacks and fined ^10 and costs, while the women were taken back to Mapoon. It is easy to understand that a Mission which protected the blacks, and gave them a sense of their own rights, would not be very popular with 162 Of North Australia a certain section of the whites. And every native trouble was likely to be magnified and reported as a consequence of the interference of the missionaries. This was what actually happened in 1893, when several killings occurred, and the papers recommended an expedition to hunt down the offenders. It was realised, however, that it would be dangerous to shoot at random among the natives while the missionaries looked on, and that there might be awkward prosecutions for murder if volunteers tried to execute justice on their own initiative. Accordingly a properly authorised body of police was sent. They were not successful, but the Mission was exonerated. Then occurred the affair of a certain Captain Nicholl, who was thrown overboard by his crew of nine blacks who had been shipped from Mapoon. These men were not Mapoon people, but lived some sixty miles south of the station. They thought to return home after their mutiny, and passed again through Mapoon. There they were surrounded by police from Thursday Island. Six of them were captured; one had been drowned in swimming ashore, and two escaped. These two returned to Mapoon after the police had left, and were persuaded by the missionaries to surrender themselves at Thursday Island. Four were acquitted, while two were sent to the Assizes at Cooktown. This co-operation of the missionaries with justice went far to restore the confidence of the people of Australia in them and in their work. 163 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands The missionaries were soon after fortunate enough to be able to render assistance to the wrecked crew of the Kanahooka, which had foundered in the bay, and the report of this completed their rehabilitation in the eyes of the public. Mrs. Ward's supreme sorrow fell upon her at the end of 1894. That was a year of troubles. The dingoes ravaged the farm stock and killed the first calf and the first kids. Vegetables were constantly stolen. Disturbances were again and again caused In the camp by the crews of vessels which put into the bay. All kinds of debaucheries accompanied such visits, and disorders remained long afterwards to tax the patience of the teachers to the utmost. It was at length resolved to make exploration in the neighbourhood to discover whether a safer and better site could not be found for the Mission. Ward made the first attempt, and went up the Batavia River without finding what he sought. Hey took the next turn, without much result. Ward then started again about the middle of December that he might reinspect some of the sites which he and his colleague had thought the most desirable. He was delayed longer than he expected, and so did not camp on Friday night, but rowed down the river all through the night, that he might get back to the Mission in time for the Sunday services. On Saturday morning they found themselves in the broad mouth of the river and tried to set sail; but the men were tired out, 164 Of North Australia and something was wrong with the rigging, so they drifted to the shore, where all fell asleep. When Ward woke he drank some water close by, and then started to walk home with one of the blacks. He did not feel well. A week later he felt decidedly ill. Pains in the limbs commenced, and fever developed. He spent Christmas Day in bed. On the Montlay following he became delirious. During his delirium he spoke constantly of the blacks, upbraiding himself that he had not lived even more closely with them than he had done. He thought that he ought to get up and go to them. So strong was this prepossession that Hey, aided by seven blacks, found it difficult to keep him in his bed. The strain upon Hey and the two ladies was terrible, since the blacks had so long been accustomed to obey the word of their master, that when he commanded them to let him rise and go forth, they could scarcely be persuaded to continue restraining him. His last thoughts were with the children of the people whom he loved. Suddenly, relaxing his efforts to rise, he said, "The piccaninnies are gone. I must follow." So his spirit went forth into rest. It is not surprising that everybody gave way for a while. Both Hey and his wife became seriously ill. Mrs. Ward braced herself to send word to Thursday Island. The Albatross was despatched to fetch them, and for a while Mapoon was left without its chiefs. 165 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands Then Mrs. Ward herself broke down. " While others, black and white, had wept around her, she had neither moved nor wept." But the strain once removed her prostration was correspondingly great. A rest became necessary to them all. All these three were far too much bound up in Mapoon and its destinies to think of leaving it. When therefore Hey was appointed to be head of the Mission, Mrs. Ward laid aside her own great sorrow and returned with her sister and brother-in-law. The Victorian Presbyterian Women's Missionary Union offered that she should go as their agent, and she accordingly took her place as teacher of the school. When Mrs. Ward reached the station with the Heys, they realised how much depended upon continual personal influence. Everything was slipping back into savagery. But the news of their return spread like an electric current. In less than a month damages were repaired and the deserted school was refilled. Mrs. Ward was everywhere welcomed with acclamations as " Mother," and Mrs. Hey was convinced by many protestations of love that she had not been forgotten. Mrs. Ward had followed the Heys two months after they returned to Mapoon, and when the confusion caused by their absence during the period of sickness had been set right. She was met at the beach by a crowd of bright-faced and cleanly-dressed people who were all eager to 166 Of North Australia take part in carrying their "Mother" in a chair from the boat, and to shake hands with her. It was a great day when, in 1897, the Queensland Parliament passed a Bill, authorising the appointment of Protectors of the Aborigines. By this Bill natives could be transferred from one reserve to another, where they could be better cared for. Thus orphans of mixed parentage came to be placed under the care of the ladies at Mapoon. Women and children were forbidden in the pearl and beche-de-mer boats, and mixed marriages were made unlawful without the permission of a Protector. In 1904 a Native Reserve was created on the Gulf of Carpentaria, comprising a piece of land seventy miles long by about twenty broad. White men and foreigners were forbidden to land there without permission of the Superintendent of the Mission. Recruiting by the luggers was also forbidden on the shores of the Reservation. Thus it seemed possible to preserve the natives from the demoralising influences brought to bear upon them by unprincipled people. Already in 1896 a village was rising at Mapoon. Regular huts began to replace the miserable shelters. These huts were placed according to a plan. Every afternoon at four they were personally inspected by Mrs. Ward and Mrs. Hey to see that the rules about the removal of rubbish were properly observed. Then gardens were planted behind the houses, enclosures 167 Missionary Heroines in Many Lands were added, and good soil introduced from the swamps. Cocoa-nut palms were planted, and all kinds of produce gradually introduced. Mr. Hey designed and built a windmill to pump water from the swamp. The village soon had a homely and a pleasant appearance. The Ward Memorial Church was put up in 1896-7. It was a source of both amazement and joy to the people. When they filled it on the opening day they were so excited that they had to be allowed to talk it all over before services could begin. The years following are full of references to conversions, baptisms, and confirmations. It was a great comfort to the ladies when a Mission Ship of their own was purchased. Hitherto they had had to travel by the trading luggers, which were far from desirable places for women, and on which they heard much that was painful to them. This Mission boat was named the J. G. Ward. After a while other ladies joined the two who had done such brave pioneering work, and Mapoon ceased to be an isolated outpost of the Church of Christ. It must, indeed, have seemed a wonderful transformation to those who had passed through the days of darkness, when in 1905 a native Christian wedding was celebrated with all the surroundings and dignity of a European marriage. The Christian form and ideal of marriage were finally crowned and enthroned at Mapoon. Of North Australia But those who are interested in the fuller history of this really wonderful triumph over the seeming impossible may find ample details in the series of admirable articles published by the Rev. Arthur Ward in Moravian Missions, to which, by the kind permission of the Editor, we are indebted for much that is contained in this chapter. THE END Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson <5r» Co. Edinburgh 6r London AN APOSTLE OF THE NORTH MEMOIRS OF THE RIGHT REV. W. C. BOMPAS LATE BISHOP OF ATHABASCA By the Rev. H. A. CODY With an Introduction by the Archbishop of RUPERT'S LAND With Forty-two Illustrations. Demy 8m. 7s. 6d. net. " It is a record to make the heart young."—Church Times. "No more amazing story of half-unconscious heroism has ever been told than the life of William Bompas."—Church Family Newspaper. "If ever missionary deserved the title of Apostle it was William voted himself, heart and America."—Record. Carpenter Bompas, who for fortv long years dev soul, mind and body, to the Indians of North An "Mr. Cody has a fine story to tell, and he sets it forth with skill. The book is further enriched by a number of excellent illustrations." Pall Mall Gazette. HEROINES OF MISSIONARY ADVENTURE TRUE STORIES OF THE INTREPID BRAVERY AND SELF-SACRIFICING LIVES OF MISSIONARIES By the Rev. E. C. DAWSON, M.A. CANON Or ST. MART'S OATHifDRAL, EDINBURGH WUh Twenty-fow Illustrations. Extra Crown 8tx>. 6>. "A book of thrilling interest. The volume makes vivid and fascinating reading."—Sheffield Telegraph. " A noble reoord, written in exactly the right vein, simply, straightforwardly, and with enthusiasm."-^The Lady. " Tells with much vividness of the everyday work of those who enter the foreign field as missionaries. It has many striking illustrations." Scotsman. "The most thrilling missionary book we have ever read. A view of the heroic side of the missionary's wife, showing intrepid bravery and patient enduranoc."—Methodist Times. SEELEY, SERVICE 6- CO. LIMITED THE ROMANCE OF MISSIONARY HEROISM By JOHN C. LAMBERT, M.A., D.D. WUh Thirty-six Illustrations. Extra Crown Svo. 5s. "A book of quite remarkable and sustained interest." Sheffield Telegraph. "We congratulate Dr. Lambert and his publishers. This book is as attractive a volume as we are likely to see this season. Dr. Lambert has proved that the missionary is the hero of our day, and has written the most entrancing volume of the whole romantic series " (i. e. Messrs. Seeley'a Library of Romance).—Tlu Expository Times. "The Romantic aspect of Missionary careers is treated without undue emphasis on the high prevailing motive. But its existence is the fact which unifies the eventful history."—Athenaeum. " A book of golden deeds, it stirs the breast and gives the wine of hope to the heart. The illustrations are excellent and complete the value ot the volume. The sufficiency, the picturesqueness, and the charm of these brief presentations is a marvel."—Scottish Review. V V V HEROES OF MISSIONARY ENTERPRISE By the Rev. CLAUD FIELD, M.A. SOMKTIMJC C.M.S. MISSIONARY IK TOE PUNJAUB With Twenty-four Illustrations. Extra Crown Svo. 6s. "Every chapter is an inspiration."—The Glasgow News. ** The book has not a dull page from first to last." The Northern Whig. " A splendid collection of stories of brave deeds, many worthy of the V.O."—The Life of Faith* "There is no book for boys like the right missionary book. To the average boy, of course, the average missionary book is a fraud. But the right book exists. Here it is, written in captivating English by the Rev. Claud Field, and embellished with stirring illustrations." The Expository Times. V V $ SEEJJEY, SERVICE & CO. LIMITED JAMES HANNINGTON FIEST BISHOP OF EASTERN EQUATORIAL AFRICA A HISTOEY OF HIS LIFE <5r* WORK By the Rev. E. C. DAWSON, M.A. CAM ON OF ST. MART'S CATHEDRAL, EDINBURGH With Portrait and Illustrations after the Bishop's Own Sketches Crown Svo, Cloth, Ss. Qd. Cheaper Edition, Papsr Boards, 2s. Gd. " We doubt whether a nobler or more pathetic story has ever been told in biography.''—Athenaeum. " To say that the book is one of deep interest is but feebly to express the wonderful charm that it has for the reader. For dignity and grace of diction the volume is far superior to the general run of memoirs." Record. "A tale of thriving interest—of trial, hardship, sickness, peril bravely borne: and ending in a cruel death. A story in the best sense of the words full of edification."—Saturday Review. V V ^ LION-HEARTED THE STORY OF BISHOP HANNINGTON's LIFE TOLD FOR BOYS 6* GIRL8 By the Rev. CANON DAWSON Large Crown Svo, with Fronti&piecs in Colours, and other Illustrations, Handsome Cloth, 2s. 6d. Cheaper Edition, with Illustrations, Cloth, Is. 6U " We heartily welcome the volume. The career of James Hannington is just one of those which strongly move young people, and Mr. Dawson has fulfilled a very useful task. Mr. Dawson has adapted the narrative very successfully to the capacities of young people, and some excellent illustrations are provided."—Record. $? V 9 SEELEY, SERVICE dr* CO. LIMITED ON TRAIL AND RAPID BY DOG-SLED AND CANOE THE STORY OF BISHOP BOMPAS'S LIFE AMONGST THE RED INDIANS 6- ESKIMOS TOLD FOR BOYS &* GIRLS By REV. H. A. CODY, M.A. AUTHOR Off "AN APOSTLE OP THE NORTH" With Coloured Frontispiece and Twenty-six other Illustration^, Crown Svo, 2s. 6d. " A book of golden deeds, full of inspiration."—Queen. "Has value and interest of a quite exceptional kind."—Yorkshire Observer. " An admirable picture of a great career. . . . From first to last there is a singular fascination in the Bishop's personality as it is revealed to us in his life-story."—Spectator. "A stirring story of the romance of exploration. . . . The story of Bishop Bompas's experiences and narrow escape from death when travelling as a missionary to the Arctic coast is one of the most thrilling in missionary annals."—Saturday Review. "Written with a true appreciation of what is suited to the taste of young readers. The scene is the Canadian North-West, where exciting adventures of many sorts befell the young Lincolnshire curate who volunteered as missionary in consequence of an appeal made by the Bishop of Rupertsland. It is a book to read and to remember." Throne and Country. " Should be in great demand, for it gives a vivid account of the life led among the Red Indians and Eskimos by Bishop Bompas, who must rank amongst the great Pathfinders of the West."—Westminster. "The late Bishop of Athabasca was described ... as 'one of the noblest and most heroic men whom the Church Missionary Society ever sent beyond the frontier of civilisation.' "—Standard. "The Rev. H. Cody contributes a story of Bompas's life . . . particularly suitable for boys and girls, for the scenes among which his strenuous course was run have always strongly appealed to the imagination of the young."—Daily Telegraph. " Mr. Cody is a most sympathetic biographer, and at the same time a most skilful and dramatic writer."—Eastern Morning News. SEELEY, SERVICE 6- CO. LIMITED PuRCHASED.-g^-!r.itVA»f»P,--. J From ^[mA^-.s!*^^ C j Place of Purchase hj)r<^JL^A^ Price... lkn.. Later Catalogued Prices
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Women missionaries
Missionary heroines in many lands : true stories of the intrepid bravery and patient endurance of missionaries in their encounters with uncivilized man, wild beasts and the forces of nature in many parts of the world. With right illustrations
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