The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1933, Page 121

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THE LUTHERAN PIONEER

121

she pleaded for a station where she could do active
pioneer work. She was placed in charge of the work
at Old Town, where she began a life of lonely, self-
denying effort. Her energy and intense spiritual
life soon bore fruit, and peace and order began to
spread around the mission-house. The native prac-
tise of killing twin babies and driving the unfor-
tunate mother into the bush to die, stirred her heart
to immediate and active effort. She undertook to
save the babies by caring for them in the mission-
compound, and thus began the warfare against this
cruel custom which she was to wage for many a
weary year and which was ultimately crowned with
success.

The third period of Mary Slessor’s life covers
the conquest of Okoyong and lasted from 1888 to
1902. She was a born pioneer and made many
visits to the neighboring villages, in which she told
the Gospel-story in the most simple and direct way.
The history of some of these first visits to the “in-
terior” (which was only thirty miles from the
coast) shows what she was willing to endure for
Christ’s sake. The dirt, the foul odors, the venomous
snakes, and the continual presence of the natives
made life a burden; but with unfailing cheerful-
ness she bore the burden and carried the message of
love to the natives.

Her mother and sister died in 1886, and she
wrote, broken-heartedly, that but one solace re-
mained : “Heaven is now nearer to me than Britain,
and no one will be anxious about me if I go up-
country.” She longed to work among the degraded
people in the interior, and she rejoiced when she
could write home: “I am going to a new tribe up-
country, a fierce, cruel people, and every one tells
me that they will kill me. But I do not fear any
hurt; only-to combat their savage customs will re-
quire courage and firmness on my part.”

The story of the cruelty and savagery which
Miss Slessor had to witness in Okoyong and the de-
scription of the conditions under which she was
forced to live are quite without precedent in mis-
sionary annals. Witchcraft controlled the daily life
of the natives, and the sufferings of those who fell
under its power are indescribable. When a chief
died, many of his wives and slaves were murdered
~ in order that he might not go unattended into the
spirit world. Poison and boiling oil were used to
settle questions of guilt, and the murder of twin
babies was an absolute law. She built a simple
mud house at Ekenge, with two rooms and a’ ve-
randa. Here she lived for a year, quite alone in

the midst of a, people not only savage, but con-
stantly drunk. She soon gained an influence over
them and began simple services, for which some sort
of church-building was necessary. The arrival of
a Christian carpenter from Scotland made such a
building possible, and though it was of the roughest
construction, to her eyes it was a thing of beauty.

When Miss Slessor went to Scotland again in
1891, she took with her a little native girl, named
Janie, who aroused great interest in all who met
her. On her return to Africa she returned to her
inland station and took up again the long fight to
save the lives of twin babies, to stop the ordeal of
trial by poison, and to put an end to the killing of
slaves at the death of a chief. After long years this
fight ended so successfully that Sir. Claude Mac-
donald, then Consul-General of the Niger Coast
Protectorate, appointed her government agent, and
she actually conducted all the public affairs of the
tribe. She presided over a native court, hearing
both sides with undisturbed calm and steadily knit-
ting all the while, and she settled palavers with
shrewd verdicts. Government men who came to see
her were amazed at her political influence.

Fifteen years after Mary Slessor had settled in
Ekenge, the first Communion service was held there,
and a little church was organized with seven mem-
bers. The day was one of intense joy to the patient
missionary worker as she compared the orderly com-
munity around her with. the wild savages whom she
had found on her arrival.

When Mary Slessor was fifty-four years of age,
the fourth phase of her life began, which is called
“The Romance of the Enyong Creek.” It is a fas-
cinating story of the opening up of new work on
a creek which was full of natural beauty, but which
for years had been the highway of slave traffic. She
learned to ride a bicycle in order to reach distant
villages and continued to labor with the same energy
as in other stations. She established schools, ar-
ranged for Sunday services (sometimes eight or ten
on one day), and exercised her power of governing
with wonderful success. When, in 1907, failing
health obliged her to go back to Scotland again, she
took with her a little black boy, only six years of
age, as her sole companion. A ie

The last period of her life (1910—15), was
marked by the same failing health and untiring
energy which had been characteristic of the previous
years of her life. She went to start a new station
two days’ journey up the Enyong Creek and
plunged into work with all possible zeal. As she