It was a few days before we got our baggage, and Makukani had possessed himself of some valuables that had been sent out for the Mission. We had come out with a very high opinion of the brave native kings, but incidents of this kind were fitted to destroy the enchantment. Before leaving home I had asked very anxiously what we were to do if a native caught a white man and put him in a dungeon. I was told that the rest of the staff would know how to manage all that. This was quite correct for their years of experience in the country gave them the practical tact necessary in dealing with the strange people about them. On this occasion they imprisoned several of Makukani’s men and took their guns from them. In order to get back his guns, the chief sent up all the missing articles, which would have been entirely lost but for this prompt measure. The belief at the Mission was that these chiefs would take everything if they thought that they had more power than the Missionaries. CHAPTER VII. THE MISSION STATION. Fortunately we had seen too much of Africa to expect a carpeted room and a cushioned chair at Blantyre. We had slept so often in “shielins” incomparably worse than a Scotch hen-house, that we did not care what kind of roof covered us. “If you want to make a man happy,” it is said, “strive not to increase his comforts but to lessen his desires.” An experience like ours recommended the proverb; and as we stood for a minute (we would have sat if there had been a spare chair) “glowrin frae’s” in what we might call our own “fowl-house,” we saw that we should have many opportunities for exercising self-denial. When our friends in Scotland had tried to dissuade us from going to Africa, they had pointed out how prudent the men were who go no farther in mission work than to address drawing-room meetings. Still, we were quite contented. We had been promised the prayerful sympathy of the Church at home, and now we knew most of our difficulties. At least we thought so, and were happy, but “Dici beatus ante obitum nemo supremaque funera debet”. Blantyre, although highly praised at home, did not possess many attractions for the newcomer. On our first introduction to the manse we perceived that it contained two rooms. In the larger of these there was nothing but a huge table, which was noteworthy in many respects. It was the only one we had seen for a month, and with the exception of a board used by the artisans, it was the only table within a hundred miles. It had to serve too in surgical cases: when any poor native had to undergo an operation, it was on this that the doctors had to place him. The smaller room we may describe as a bedroom, though when we were first ushered into it, it contained neither bedstead nor bed, and boasted only of one small chair of the rudest description. In our hut there were two doors, but neither of them had a lock, and one had no fastening at all. When we learned that