One could not help being drawn, as by some magnetic influence, towards the good old man. I well remember our first meeting, a few weeks after our arrival at Antanànarìvo. We could not exchange a word, we could only grasp each other by the hand, and look in each other’s faces; but I felt, as I looked in that transparently honest face, that here was a true man; and my heart warmed towards him, as a man who had done, and said, and suffered much for the cause of Christ in Madagascar; and the longer I knew him the more I loved and respected him. We drew to each other from the first. We were fellow labourers in the vineyard of God for many years, and the fastest friends to the day of his death. He was ever a tower of strength to me. I hardly know how I could have got through one-half of the work I was privileged to do in Vònizòngo but for the help and encouragement I received from Razàka. ‘He was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.’ Napoleon Bonaparte said: ‘Conquest made me what I am, and conquest must sustain me.’ It was the grace of God, and the conquest it made of him heart and soul, that made Razàka what he was, and sustained him to the end. He had a deep and passionate love for his Bible: I have seldom met any one who knew it as he did, for he seemed to know it from Genesis to Revelation, and ‘the word of Christ dwelt richly’ in him, ‘in all wisdom and spiritual understanding,’ while he strove to live up to his light and to the testimonies of the Book he so dearly loved. Once in a Bible-class I said to him: ‘Supposing some one were to say to you, Razàka, that the Bible was not trustworthy--what answer would you give him?’ ‘No one would be so foolish as to say anything of the kind,’ he replied, ‘except some foolish Malagasy, who did not know what he was speaking about. I should tell him to hold his peace until he knew what he was talking about.’ ‘But,’ I said, ‘suppose some Vazàha (European) were to say such a thing to you--how would you answer him?’ It was difficult to get the good old man to imagine any European who could doubt or deny that the Bible was the Word of God. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘just let us suppose such a case for the sake of argument--I would like to hear how you would answer him.’