If anything of a really difficult nature cropped up they usually sent on to Fìhàonana to ask my advice; and before our settlement there they sought guidance from the capital. Repeatedly I had to crush the idea that I was the head of the churches, and that what I said must be regarded as law. I always tried to impress upon them that I was in no sense a supreme authority, but only one of their teachers, and that the assembled pastors of the district should settle the questions which arose, e.g. whether a church was needed or not, and what was the best site on which to build. For they knew the district and people and their needs better than I could, and were quite capable of deciding such matters. Then again, I thought it wise to leave everything the Malagasy could do for themselves in their own hands, that they might learn self-reliance. Missionaries for the most part should merely stand behind the scenes and prompt their people in the right direction, and then, as far as possible, allow them to act for themselves. It is essential to the best interests of Christianity that the assembled pastors of the churches in any district should decide how many churches should be formed in that district; otherwise every tiny village might set up a church, although it had only six huts, and whenever one petty chief fell out with another each would cause his people to build a church in his own village, of which he would probably be appointed pastor, even if there were but twenty people, and half of these twenty children. This sort of thing was done repeatedly in certain districts. I must content myself with sketching the broadest outlines of my work, giving glimpses of certain parts merely, the general facts connected with the whole; for there were many matters that occupied my time and attention during those earlier years which cannot be embodied in a short account like this. The people were most grateful for all I could do for them medically, although they entertained most absurd notions, and had absolute faith in my power to cure all little ills that flesh is heir to. I was often at my wits’ end, and did not know what means to use--a state of mind which generally ended in making an experiment upon them, and giving what I _hoped_ would do them good. When they returned to tell me that they were cured, and thank me for it, I often wondered whether it was the medicine, or their faith, or old dame Nature herself that had cured them--and if she would not have done it, even if they had taken no medicine at all.