I enforced old Namakei’s appeal, telling them that, though they knew it not, it was the living and true and only God who had sent them every blessing which they possessed, and had at last sent us to teach them how to serve and love and please Him. In wonder and silence they listened, while I tried to explain to them that Jesus, the Son of this God, had lived and died and gone to the Father to save them, and that He was now willing to take them by the hand and lead them through this life to glory and immortality together with Himself. The old Chief led them in prayer—a strange, dark, groping prayer, with streaks of Heathenism colouring every thought and sentence; but still a heart-breaking prayer, as the cry of a soul once Cannibal, but now being thrilled through and through with the first conscious pulsations of the Christ-Spirit, throbbing into the words: “Father, Father; our Father.” When these poor creatures began to wear a bit of calico or a kilt, it was an outward sign of a change, though yet far from civilization. And when they began to look up and pray to One whom they called “Father, our Father,” though they might be far, very far, from the type of Christian that dubs itself “respectable,” my heart broke over them in tears of joy; and nothing will ever persuade me that there was not a Divine Heart in the heavens rejoicing too. CHAPTER VI. _FACE TO FACE WITH HEATHENISM._ Navalak and Nemeyan on Aniwa.—Taia the “Orator.”—The Two next Aneityumese Teachers.—In the Arms of Murderers.—Our First Aniwan Converts.—Litsi Soré.—Surrounded by Torches.—Traditions of Creation, Fall, and Deluge.— Infanticide and Wife-Murder.—Last Heathen Dance.—Nelwang’s Elopement.—Yakin’s Bridal Attire.—Christ-Spirit _versus_ War-Spirit.—Heathenism in Death-Grips.—A Great Aniwan Palaver.—The Sinking of the Well.—“Missi’s Head Gone Wrong.”—“Water! Living Water!”—Old Chief’s Sermon on “Rain from Below.”—The Idols Cast Away.—The New Social Order.—Back of Heathenism Broken. On landing in November, 1866, we found the Natives of Aniwa, some very shy and distrustful, and others forward and imperious. No clothing was worn; but the wives and elder women had grass aprons or girdles like our first Parents in Eden. The old Chief interested himself in us and our work; but the greater number showed a far deeper interest in the axes, knives, fish-hooks, stripes of red calico and blankets, received in payment for work or for bananas. Even for payment they would scarcely work at first, and they were most unreasonable, easily offended, and started off in a moment at any imaginable slight. For instance, a Chief once came for Medicine. I was so engaged that I could not attend to him for a few minutes. So off he went, in a great rage, threatening revenge, and muttering, “I must be attended to! I won’t wait on _him_.” Such are the exactions of a naked Savage!