It is, however, certain that the tribes of Africa are beginning to value the generous and devoted medical work of the Protestant missionaries. Journeying up the Congo one day we had on board a chieftain who three months before had left his village for an operation at a mission station hundreds of miles below his home. The senior missionary in this man’s district had persuaded him to take the journey and run the risk. The man had been bedridden for years with an elephantiasis growth; his wives had forsaken him and most of his friends had abandoned him. He had long given an obstinate refusal to the missionary’s proposal, but ultimately he was prevailed upon to make the journey to the distant mission post. The day for departure came, and with it funeral-loving friends, and weeping women who made the track echo with a monotonous death wail as the man was carried on board the steamer,—never, as they believed, to return alive. Two months later the man had come through the operation and seemed to be in perfect health. He boarded the steamer in full vigour, carrying his own box and sundry goods which the travelling native collects from the long-lost brothers and cousins whom they have a habit of discovering in every town. After three weeks’ steam, we were nearing the chieftain’s home; what a dressing of the hair and anointing of the body took place during several hours before the village itself was sighted! Within hail, lusty voices shouted to the villagers that their chief was aboard and was well and strong. The cry passed from lip to lip until the beach was lined with incredulous natives, the most hopeful amongst them anticipating nothing better than that the man would be carried ashore. Fifteen minutes later the ship was at anchor, the “gangway” run ashore and lo! the first man to stride off the ship was the erstwhile bedridden chief! It was too much for the majority who promptly took to their heels and bolted to a safe distance! In a few minutes, however, they realized that it was not a spirit, but the real man returned alive and well. Gradually they surrounded him, questioned him, gesticulated excitedly, rang the drums to inform the countryside that so great a miracle had taken place, and generally made such a din and noise that it was only with difficulty conversation became at all possible. That sort of sermon is far more eloquent to the native than many discourses on Christian ethics preached with the inevitable limitations of a foreign tongue and at the best often misunderstood; moreover, it renders him very receptive to Christian teaching. [Sidenote: MISSIONARIES AND OPPRESSION]