While the bishop was with us eleven more boys were baptized and received into church fellowship. The first ten were all standing true, so that our number had now increased to twenty-one. There were as yet no girls or women ready for baptism, but some were beginning to accept Christ as their Savior. As the new church was nearly completed at the time of his visit, it was thought advisable to dedicate this also before his return. He gave a most excellent sermon on the occasion, and we were all strengthened by his visit among us. CHAPTER NINE The Native The most interesting thing in Africa is the native himself; the more I see him and study him the more I respect him.--Bishop J. C. Hartzell. I most heartily voice the sentiment expressed above. The study of the native is a most interesting one and worthy of the best minds of the age. The latent power and ability lying back of some of those crude exteriors is often marvelous, and the transformation often wrought by a few years of careful, sympathetic training far more than repays for all the labor expended. From what has already been given in the preceding pages, some idea of the native character may be gleaned, and yet it is impossible to give in such a book an adequate conception of the nature of the natives. In fact, the only way to know them is to live among them, and then one can not be sure that he has the correct idea. The subject is so many-sided, so elusive, and above all so changing that it is doubtful if any one can tell all there might be given. This twentieth century has produced three large volumes on the African native, which, in the estimation of the general public, seem to occupy a preeminent position among the many books continually written. I refer to "Thinking Black," by Daniel Crawford; "White and Black in South Africa," by M. S. Evans; and "The Essential Kaffir," by Dudley Kidd. The first is the work of a missionary who has spent twenty-two unbroken years in the heart of the African Continent. The second is the work of a politician who has studied the native problem deeply and sympathetically from a governmental standpoint and has given his opinions and conclusions in a clear and convincing manner. The third work might be said to have been written from an independent standpoint, and is by many Europeans in South Africa considered the best thing written on the native. One who has lived long in Africa might be inclined to differ with any one or all of these writers in some points, but they are all excellent and well worthy of careful study. I was once speaking with an official who had had long experience in dealing with native problems, and whose opinions along these lines were sought after by others. I asked him, "Wherein do you think lies the chief difficulty in dealing with the native?" He replied somewhat as follows: