"Ma, forgive! forgive! he does not know any better."
There was no more after that about twins, and when she left she felt
that progress had been made.
Striking while the iron was hot she sent to Ikpe for school books, and
going into the highways and byways, she began to coax the lads to come
and learn. They stood aloof, half-afraid and half-scornful, and would
not respond. Then she adopted a flank movement, and began to speak to
them about the rubber and cocoa which the Government were planting in
the district, and tried to awaken their interest and ambitions by
telling them how the world was moving outside their home circle.
Gradually the sullenness gave way, and they began to ask questions and
to chat. She took the alphabet card, but they shied at the strange-
looking thing, and would not speak. One little fellow who had been at
Ikpe, and knew more than the others, began tremblingly, "A--B--," and
she and Alice who was with her, joined in until one after another
surrendered, and before long all were shouting the letters. By the end
of the week the lads were coming every spare hour for lessons, and
would scarcely give her time to eat.
The Ikpe disciples had ruefully watched this development, and at last
went to her:
"Ma, we are glad you have got a footing out here, but are you forsaking
us?"
Her heart ached at the words, and although now reduced to coming and
going in her Cape cart, she determined to give them every alternate
week when she was not at Use. Thus from now onwards she was keeping
three centres going by her own efforts.
After a week at Ikpe in fulfilment of her promise, she returned to
Odoro Ikpe to hold the first Sabbath service. A play was being enacted
in the town, and scores of naked young men and women were dancing to
the compelling throb of the drum. But some Ikpe and Ndot lads came to
support the service, and their presence helped the local sympathisers
to come forward. It was very simple; she said it would have seemed
babyish to Europeans, but it was an epoch to the natives. Another
meeting was held in the afternoon; and at night in the dark square, lit
only by the light of the fires where the women were cooking their meal,
she stood, and again proclaimed, with passionate earnestness, the love
of God and the power of Christ to save and uplift. It was, no doubt, a
day of small things, but she knew from long experience that small
things were not to be despised.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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