‘She determined to introduce important changes in the government of the kingdom. She gave notice to the British Agent, and all Europeans, of her withdrawal from the treaty which Radàma I had made with the British government for the abolition of the foreign slave trade. She picked a quarrel with the British Agent because he had ridden on horseback into the village where a celebrated idol was kept, drove him from the capital, and ultimately from the island[3].’ Things had seemingly reached a crisis, and the missionaries felt that they might soon have to follow the British Agent; but this was for a time prevented by a rather singular incident. There was no soap of any kind in Madagascar in those days. The queen had come into possession of some English soap, and thought it desirable to get the white teachers to make soap from the materials found in her own island, and instruct some of her young noblemen to make it. This is not exactly noblemen’s work, as we should think; but in those days, and in that land, every one had to do as the queen commanded, or have their heads cut off. To attain her object she resolved to keep the gods and the royal idol-keepers quiet for a time, until some of her young noblemen had learned the mystery of soap-making. She had already proposed to the missionaries that they should confine their efforts to mere secular education, which, however, they had politely but firmly declined to do. The influence of the artisan missionaries had been of immense service to the Madagascar Mission in those early days of its existence; and mainly to their teaching must be attributed much of the skill of the Malagasy workmen to this day. There can be no doubt that the manifest utility of their work did much to win for the mission a large measure of tolerance, as this incident of the soap-making shows. ‘Having driven the British Agent from the capital and the island, and wishing next to get rid of the missionaries, the queen sent and asked them all to meet at the house of the senior missionary, as she had a communication to make to them. The queen’s messengers met them, and in her name thanked them for all they had done and all they had taught the people. The queen wished to know, they said, if there was anything they could still teach her people. The missionaries replied that they had only taught the very simplest elements of knowledge, and that there was still many things of which the Malagasy were quite ignorant, and they mentioned sundry branches of education, among which were the Greek and Hebrew languages, which had been partially taught to some. The messengers carried this answer to the queen, and when they came back they said that the queen did not care for the teaching of languages that nobody spoke; but she would like to know, they said, whether they could not teach her people something more useful, such as the making of soap from materials to be found in the country[1].’