More seems to be expected of converts from heathenism than from home converts, and even than from ordinary Christians, when there certainly ought to be much less. No time is allowed for growth in grace, which there certainly ought to be, as it is generally found, I think, that there is as much human nature in most of them as there is in other people--if not more. Heathen habits of a lifetime and heathen superstitions are deeply rooted in their natures, far too deeply to be very easily eradicated. ‘It is very strange indeed that it should not be taken for granted that many native Christians, even when truly converted, are, like so many Christians at home, cold-hearted, inconsistent and vulnerable to the shafts of temptation.’ We cannot expect the subjects of ‘the obscene empires of Mammon and Belial’ to take any interest in Christian missions, or do anything except scorn missionaries, their work, and their converts. Unless people have a heart interest in religious work, they are likely to make the most of the shortcomings of native Christians--as a sort of self-justification--and to disparage the work of the modern missionary accordingly. They would not dare to disparage the work of the Apostle Paul, because history has vindicated it; but they choose to forget what ‘unsatisfactory’ people many of Paul’s converts in Corinth and Galatia were. CHAPTER VI EARLY EXPERIENCES ‘Truth springeth out of the earth; and righteousness hath looked down from heaven.’--PSALM lxxxv. 11. Our enforced sojourn in the capital for the first four months of the year 1872, while in some respects a privation, afforded me more time to work at the language. I was also able, while there, to buy most of the wood for our future manse, to get brick-moulds, and agree with a master bricklayer for building it. Many other things were also arranged which it would have been difficult to negotiate from Fìhàonana. We started back for Vònizòngo in May, and as we thought it would be easier for my wife and the baby to go as far as possible--about halfway--by canoe (along with some friends who were travelling west for a holiday), we adopted this course; but with such results to both, from exposure on the water to the unclouded sun for six hours, that we never repeated the experiment. I had sent the wood for the manse down the river by canoe, and wished to see where it was stored.