========================================================================
  A LIFE FOR AFRICA
  by E.C. Parsons
========================================================================

Parsons's biographical account of missionary work in Africa, chronicling the
challenges and spiritual victories encountered from the earliest days of arrival
through years of grappling with the realities of the African context.

  Chapters: 15

------------------------------------------------------------------------
  TABLE OF CONTENTS
------------------------------------------------------------------------

    1. 01   Girded When He Knew It Not
    2. 02   Grappling With The Situation
    3. 03   Embarrassed by Government Restriction
    4. 04   Beginning in the Ogowe Country
    5. 05   A Rising Tide on the Ogowe 1886-1887
    6. 06   Love and Solitude on the Obowe
    7. 07   Events in Rapid Evolution
    8. 08   Another Stage at Kangwe
    9. 09   Visit of Inspection to Liberia
   10. 10   On to the Interrior
   11. 11   Pioneering in Bululand
   12. 12   Byways of an Industrious Life
   13. 13   Roughing it in the Bush 1893
   14. 14   The Crowning Year 1894
   15. 15   The Last Five Months

========================================================================
  CHAPTER 1: 01   GIRDED WHEN HE KNEW IT NOT
========================================================================

Chapter 1 GIRDED WHEN HE KNEW IT NOT

1856—1882

UP in a grassy apple-orchard on a western Pennsylvania farm, a curly-headed boy
stretched himself, one spring day, and looked off on the panorama of surrounding
hills. He knew that fair prospect well. With eyes shut he could see the uplands
broadly plaided with alternating fields of winter wheat and plowed land, could
point to the dip in the rounded hills where Pine Creek runs, or where the Little
Mahoning marks a gap between lines of forest-trees, and Glade Run itself,
scarcely beyond ear-shot, babbles across the road between the farm and yonder
little borough of Dayton. But this boy’s merry brown eyes were never shut in
daylight, and now they were dark with resolution, and his mouth wore an
expression of determined purpose. The orchard was his retreat. With the village
boys he went fishing; with his brothers he caught squirrels in the woods and set
the trap for fox and mink; but when he went to the top of the orchard he went
alone, and there he had thought through many a perplexity under the blue sky,
with the winds of heaven blowing round him. To-day he had come again with a
mighty question surging through his soul, and to-day it must be settled. "When
at length, his meditation ended, he sprang to his feet, a frank-faced lad
stouter than tall for his sixteen years, his conclusion was fully reached and
there was no hesitation in his bearing, as he strode down from under the trees
prepared to announce that he " must have an education " and he would " find a
way or make one.’’ The orchard sloped to the south, and on the farther side of
the road at its foot was his father’s comfortable homestead, with green yard in
front, a Dutch oven and other outbuildings cozily grouped at the rear, and a
roomy barn beyond.

Adolphus Clemens Good was born December 19, 1856, in a log house in West
Mahoning, and in a log house he had lived till thirteen years old. His father,
Abram Good, was of German descent, and had gone with his parents when they
pioneered up from Maryland into a remote pocket of the Indiana County hills,
Pennsylvania. Scant were Abram Good’s opportunities for schooling in that
primitive mountain district, and when thirty years old he seized his last chance
for a short winter term taught by Hannah Irwin. The spring following he
determined to " take the schoolmistress and all." Of five sons born to them,
Adolphus was the second; and his one little sister having died, the mother often
leaned on his cheerful assistance in milking, churning, and other household
tasks.

Abram Good was a Lutheran, like his godly forefathers, and his eldest sons were
baptized in a Lutheran church, the only one accessible from the farm. His wife
was of Scotch-Irish ancestry. The Irwins for generations had represented
undiluted Presbyterianism, as well as intelligence above the average. So when
the Good family removed from their romantic but oppressively quiet farm into
Armstrong County, they cast in their lot with Glade Run Church, of which Hannah
Irwin’s father, Benjamin, was an original member and an elder until his death at
a good old age. This was a typical homogeneous American community. Social
simplicity and hardworking thrift were the rule. No flagrant wickedness was
heard of, for temperance, order, and religion prevailed. To this day it is
unaltered, and fortunate is the city resident to whom it is permitted to fly
from the smoke of Pittsburgh up the Allegheny Valley in the month of May, and,
leaving the railway fifty miles beyond, mount a big wagon behind stout
farm-horses and drive twenty miles straight into the heart of the hills.
Platoons of violets and low saxifrage escort him, trilliums wave from banks
above, redbud and shad-tree brighten the woods, a joyous cascade here and there
tumbles down towards Pine Creek, robins and mocking-birds sing in the tree-tops,
and every farm-house is embowered in apple-blossoms, peach, and cherry.

One Lord’s day spent in that rural hamlet discloses to the visitor not only what
the people are, but what they have been for a hundred years since the first
settlers came, following a pack-saddle trail across the mountains. Somewhat
chary of speech they are, thinking more than talking, generous in their
hospitality, patriotic, inured to hard work, and stanch believers in the Word of
God. It is a goodly sight, after " second preaching," to mark the long line of
top-buggies and open wagons, gray heads and rosy children together, defiling
homeward in every direction up the long hill roads. Looking backward to the
plain little church standing on its own height, with evergreens and marbles over
three generations of sleepers on the right of it, and to the left the most
unpretentious hall of learning one ever saw, you have the material embodiment of
the most forceful agent in keeping that community wholesome, intelligent, and
Bible-loving. Pastor Mechlin was also for over thirty years principal of Glade
Run Academy, and he was wise in his generation. From its quaint belfry rang out
an enticing voice to girls and boys of the farms for miles around. In low, bare
recitation-rooms a hundred or more students at a time grappled with geometry and
Greek; and in a period of about thirty years, over sixty young men who passed
out from the academy preached the gospel in their several denominations, and
seven men and women became missionaries to the heathen. When from time to time
his "boys" came back from their niches in the wide world, Pastor Mechlin proudly
stood them up in pulpit or on platform, and then the village children learned
with awe what greatness and eloquence are. In this environment, in such an
atmosphere, Adolphus Good grew up, and, fond of a book in a home where books
were rare, always " a good bit like his mother," the schoolmistress, it was
inevitable that the hour should come when Learning would beckon to him with her
potent finger and become his master passion. There was no Christian motive in
his decision that spring day, but he was girded when he knew it not. The boy who
would " find a way or make one " from farm to college would one day cut a path
into unmitigated savagery in Equatorial Africa, and push the frontier of
civilization a step forward there. He more than half suspected that his
independent decision would not meet a warm response. His mother might ponder
these things in her heart; but for the father to part ways with his son, one
whose activity matched his own, who never had to be called twice in the morning,
who could hoe his long rows of corn and turn his straight furrows with the best
of them, who, though a boy, was intelligent upon the whole subject of farming —
no wonder if this would be a keen disappointment. In the neighborhood, too, were
those who viewed such a departure with suspicion. "’Dolphus had taken to books,
and a first-rate farmer had been spoiled." From this time on for nine years
young Good took straight aim for an education, and pursued it with all his
might. Hand over hand he climbed upward. Three years he studied at Glade Run
Academy, walking to and from home two miles, " always in classroom soon after
seven o’clock for first recitation," filling vacations and odd hours with
teaching school or helping his father in barn and hay-field; three years at
Washington and Jefferson College, Washington, Pa.; three years more at Western
Theological Seminary, Allegheny, Pa., where he threw himself ardently into Soho
Mission and for most of the last year preached at Freeport.

Recollections of him are rife. After thirty years, the picture that comes up to
one is of " a sturdy little boy, his dark eyes snapping with energy and fun and
his feet swinging back and forth twice as fast as any other boy’s" on the long
bench in Sunday-school. One of the assistants in the academy remembers the lad
who entered in the spring of 1873, " earnestness personified," who had " a way
of giving his whole thought to whatever engaged his attention for the time,
whether a problem in algebra or a game of ball. The boys often said, Good plays
fair.’ He did not seem ambitious for leadership, and yet because of his
qualifications was often given first place." To this teacher he came, when
directed to write an essay, saying that it was a new thing and he did not know
how. Having received general instructions, he went away and some days later came
before the society with an essay on " Wheat " " which made some of us think that
we had one with us who would some day be known by his pen." Years after, Dr.
Mechlin wrote with the trembling hand of age: " Adolphus was an industrious,
earnest, and obliging boy, ready to make the best of circumstances. He was
respectful to his teachers, a kind of natural leader among the boys and always
popular with them. It was often said of him, He will make a good man.’ "

There was special religious interest among the students the very summer that
Good entered the academy, and, exemplary as he was, always attendant upon public
worship, with the strict and early instruction of his home, it was expected that
he would be among the first to avow himself on the Lord’s side. But when his
teacher asked him if he did not wish to take that stand he was " surprised" to
be met by "a decided negative." When under appointment as missionary to Africa,
he told this friend that he "never got away from that conversation"; that he
delayed becoming a Christian because he thought it would bind him to the
ministry, while he then had "other plans." Those plans were for the profession
of law and in the direction of a worldly ambition, which he was gradually
enabled to put under his feet. He also passed through a period of questioning
the received doctrines, and came out, where he stood immovable all his life,
upon the solid rock of conviction. He made a " manly confession," and united
with Glade Run Church, June 6, 1876, being then in his twentieth year. The next
autumn he entered the sophomore class in Washington College, and, having had a
shorter " fitting " than most of the students, took first rank in nothing; but
he ranked well all around, and entered heartily into all the college life. He
found his place in the Society of Religious Inquiry the first Sunday, and was
always in athletics. No one enjoyed better a good foot-race or game of ball. A
member of another class recalls that his most intimate associates in college
were " men intellectually strong," and "Good was a dominating force among them.
He gave the impression that, other things being equal, it was better not to get
into an intellectual contest with him. No one ever doubted his religious
conviction. He went his way; he acted on his conviction; nothing else mattered."

One of his classmates through both college and seminary recalls the first time
he saw the "sun-browned athlete,... eager for work, but impatient of trifling.
He was quiet and diffident to a degree, but it soon came to be understood that
where muscle or courage or brain or conscience was needed, Good’s place was at
the front." At the end of his college course, as well as the beginning, " his
face was transparent; he had nothing to hide." His splendid physical life
precluded uncouthness at this or any other period; ’ but," says a friend, " he
was wanting in those graces of deportment which have to be courted, and his
rugged honesty and self-respect without them led him, all his life, to
underrate, perhaps, their value."

He was one of six men of the classes of 78 and ’79 who banded together, and
lived at the lowest terms of expense, cooking for themselves by turn, as no
other men in college did. If this drew down an occasional sharp grind on "
Poverty Row," he was thoroughly insensitive on the subject. He belonged to the
Grand Order of Log Cabin Men of America, where Lincoln belonged, and Grant and
Garfield. No snobbery can touch such men. All six of that lively and congenial
band became ministers in the Presbyterian Church, two of them foreign
missionaries.

"What was Good’s leading characteristic in college days? " was lately asked of
one of those chief friends. " Virtus — manliness," was the answer. When his own
earnings were exhausted, Mr. Good’s father came to his rescue, and during his
seminary course he received aid from the Board of Education to the amount of one
hundred and fifty dollars. Every cent of this was voluntarily paid back from his
salary in Africa, an act which astonished the secretary into issuing a call to
pastors over comfortable churches in America, asking if they could not also
refund some part of the aid which they had enjoyed.

Both in college and seminary, along with other students, Mr. Good led country
Sunday-schools and cottage prayer-meetings, " preached the gospel to the poor
and visited them in their homes." His services were offered at Soho Mission,
Pittsburgh, with the remark, " I do not know what I can do, but I want to do all
I can and in the best way." Again he was girded when he knew it not. The
poverty, shiftlessness, and vice with which he there came in contact were
surprising to one reared in his country ways, and long afterward, in Africa, he
was applying the lessons he learned in that experience. When this loyal,
exuberantly active young student made an unreserved surrender in favor of the
ministry of the gospel, it was as good as settled that it would carry him
farther — it would take him as far as the commission read. Accordingly, in
March, 1881, we find him writing to his pastor that he was about to offer
himself to the Board of Foreign Missions. " It has long been my purpose." What
field he shall enter must be determined in the future; now he only asks to know
whether he " will be sent anywhere or not." His reasons for this step are most
matter-of-fact — " just about those that would suggest themselves to any one.
The gospel is here within reach of all and many of its temporal benefits, at
least, are enjoyed by all. The heathen have neither." This, he thought, made it
the duty, " especially of every young minister," to inquire, not, "Why should I
go! but Why should I not go? To the latter question I can give no answer, and I
therefore consider it my duty to go if the church will send me." This
whole-souled decision next constrained him one step farther — to propose the
field at that time most unpopular in the range of Presbyterian missions. His was
a nature impatient of halfway measures. In a speech before the General Assembly,
June, 1882, the treasurer of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions
announced with satisfaction that " thirty young men, graduates of our
seminaries, have been accepted for the foreign field." Only one of them was sent
to Africa, and he only after a mild effort had failed to turn him towards
another country. When Adolphus Good took aim he was not one to turn aside
without convincing reasons, and he had taken aim for Africa. The following
letter to the secretary of the Board in New York explains the situation:

’’Allegheny City, Pa., December 6, 1881.

"... I had not known until I received your note how much I desired to go to
Africa. I had looked upon my going there as almost a certainty, especially after
seeing you this fall. The action of the Board came as a surprise and, I confess,
somewhat of a disappointment. I have thought over the subject a good deal since,
and tried to find out exactly why I prefer that field to others. Part of the
ground for my preference, I frankly confess, is not very sound.

" At first I chose that field without having any decided preference. I chose it
because it seemed to me, as it does yet, the field in which the church was most
shamefully coming short of her duty, and the one where she was least likely to
be able to find men to work. Since then, looking forward to it, the hopefulness
of youth and a somewhat adventure-loving disposition have clothed the enterprise
in a sort of romantic dress, which I well know is unreal and would be soon torn
off by the hard facts of missionary life. Of course the thought of not going
disappointed such hopes as these. I find that the great incentive to mission
work, the only lasting source of inspiration, — love for the Master and lost
souls, — is to be found in any field. So I will go, and try to go willingly,
wherever I am sent. Still, I think there are reasons why I should go to Africa,
if I am sent. I am unusually strong and healthy, and think I could stand the
climate. In my early days I learned what hard work and roughing it meant. I am
rather inclined to adventure than afraid of it. Doing without home and society
is not so much of a privation to me as to most persons. And, most important of
all, I have at present no prospect of being married."

Two months later his position is the same, and he hopes the Board is about ready
to reach a " final decision " as to where to send him.

" If there is good reason for further delay I can wait still longer, but if not
I would like to have the matter settled. I have no great objection to going to
Siam.... Still, for reasons given in my last letter, I prefer Africa. Hoping
that if such is the will of the Master you will prefer to have me go there, " I
remain, yours respectfully, "A.C. GOOD."

Whence came this young man’s first impulse which had resulted in dedication on
the foreign missionary altar! As Robert Moffat’s came, like Mackay’s of Uganda —
from his mother. She pored over the pages of the missionary magazine, and
searched out every missionary paragraph in the Banner; and the boy’s eyes
followed his mother’s. For the rest, the whole gospel was declared in Glade Run
Church; the last command of Jesus was preached, and Paul was preached.

Mr. Good was licensed by the presbytery of Kittanning, April 21, 1881.

" I remember his trial sermon," says one. " My heart was drawn out to that young
man with his smooth, frank face and clear eye." Pastor Mechlin considered that
"he underwent a remarkable examination in theology " at that time. The same
presbytery ordained him an evangelist the next year, and he sailed alone for
Gaboon three months after, September 28, 1882. So little did the West Africa
mission stand in the eye of the church in those days that, when the humiliating
quota of one new man a year was filled, even his name was overlooked in the list
of departures in the Foreign Missionary and for four years after only one brief
paragraph referring to him appeared in its pages. But in the old home, that
September day, his father was walking nervously from house to yard, from yard to
house, no one venturing to speak to him; and his mother sat silent and tearless
in her chair.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 2: 02   GRAPPLING WITH THE SITUATION
========================================================================

Chapter 2 GRAPPLING WITH THE SITUATION November 21, 1882 — December 1883

FIFTY-FOUR days after leaving the pier at Philadelphia our traveler landed nine
thousand miles away, at Gaboon, "West Coast, Africa, and opened his eyes on a
new world. He had caught glimpses of tropical life on the voyage from Liverpool
— off Sierra Leone, Lagos, the Gold Coast, Old Calabar, Fernando Po. Now he saw
the indescribably dense jungle at close range: endogenous stemmed trees,
gigantic vegetable forms with gayblooming parasites trailing over them, the
lantana grown to a bush seven feet high, the oleander become a tree. He was only
fifteen miles north of the equator. " Since I came I have not seen a tree,
plant, leaf, blade of grass, an insect, a bird, fish, scarcely an animal, that
was familiar to me in America, except the dog, cat, and rat." Centipedes and
cockroaches hid in his closet, white ants in the backs of his commentaries, the
python swung itself from branches overhanging the path of his boat. Back in the
forest big game were found — elephant, antelope, wild boar, and the very
ancestral seats of all the monkey family, from the gorilla and chimpanzee to "
the little kilinga, whose waist you may clasp with thumb and finger; and every
one has the same white spot on the end of his nose, and the tail is as long as
the body."

He was "agreeably surprised" with Gaboon, the pleasantest place he had yet seen
in Africa. It has a fine harbor, one of the few good ones on the whole Gulf of
Guinea coast. A modern French town faces it, Libreville, where are the
commandant’s house, customhouse, and other accessories of a colonial station.
The American mission premises, Baraka, lie back from the beach two miles. In the
name survives the memory of a Portuguese slave-barracoon which stood on its site
early in the century. The first missionaries having arrived shortly after the
foreign slave-trade had received its death-blow, they saw the last company of
blacks destined to the slave-ship. Within distance of a block from their mission
house they saw the ground, an acre in extent, white with the bones of slaves
whose bodies had been thrown to beast and vulture. The eighth day after joining
the mission Mr. Good was on his way up-country with one of his brethren. By open
sail-boat, and again by canoe, they followed the course of the salty arm which
the Atlantic Ocean here throws inland, and which goes by the name of "Gaboon
River," and explored its upper waters to where they emerge in a series of rapids
from the Sierra Del Crystal range. Most of the towns all the way up to Angom
Station were those of the real Fang, cannibals with their teeth filed to a
point, and a loaded gun at full cock nearly always in their hands — " on the
whole, in the rough, materials for a high manhood." Mr. Good preached at several
places through an interpreter, and through the week was taking a thorough
measurement of the region as a field for missionary operations. Both on the up
journey and returning he was all night in an open boat, drenched with rain, and
with a face formidably swollen from sand-fly bites presented himself again at
Baraka.

Five days after he was on a flying trip to the Ogowe, where he was at home among
the missionaries, "as if I had always known them." He was struck with the rapid
current of the river; its volume was " grand "; but he had no compliments for
the brown color of its waters. Kangwe Station was well located to command
hundreds of small towns by itineration. The Mpongwe-speaking inhabitants were
fast being ruined by drink, and the Fang seemed rather inferior to those on the
Upper Gaboon. A few weeks later he was away on the coast at Corisco Island,
serving as clerk of presbytery, and preaching an installation sermon for the
first African pastor in the field.

Having " a glorious day " on their hands, he and a brother delegate rowed over
to Banya Island and picked up shells on the beach, wading under a hot sun into
the water for the finest shells, just as they might have done at home. This was
defiance of African climate. It proved a costly lesson. With his fresh, sound
constitution, Mr. Good escaped with a light penalty; but his companion was
prostrated with the fever of the country in its most dangerous form. It had been
precipitated by standing in the water, although the cause lay far back; for he
was an ardent missionary who had been doing the work of two men. Mr. Good helped
to nurse his associate, and made a thorough study of African fever at this time.
He did not inform his secretary about that day at Banya Island, but he
appropriated the warning. Many. a time after, the path of stern duty required of
him the same and worse exposure, but he never again took such a risk for
amusement. In fact, a fine balance of fearlessness and prudence in enterprise
became one of his marked missionary characteristics. His introduction to the
most unfriendly element to human life on the West Coast was more personal still.
"A subtle poison fills the air," he wrote to his family. " Sometimes for a year
or more it does no serious mischief, but gradually it pulls down the strongest
men. This does not make life here unpleasant, as you might suppose. One is not
unwell, only feels a languor and disinclination to activity. But I have no
reason to complain, for I have had only a little fever twice within the first
three months.’

Another typical journey was taken to presbytery at Benito, one hundred miles
north of Gaboon, and an account of it was sent to one of his brothers:

" Gaboon, April 10, 1883.

"... The trip had to be made by sea in an open boat. I went because somebody
must go, and I was the only one able, Brother having been recently ill. My
outfit was a boat about thirty feet by six, carrying a sail twelve by eighteen,
with six men to pull when the wind was unfavorable. Started March 16th about 10
a.m., and did not reach Corisco Island until midnight. Just when we were passing
the rocky point near Elongo a tornado struck us, and as the night was very
threatening I was persuaded to try to land. Turning the point too close, we were
caught in a rather ugly breaker. Coming up to the landing-place, we found it one
mass of angry foam. The boys backed off and said we could not land. What then?’
said I. ’Lie at anchor here all night and take it,’ was the reply. No, not I; if
we can’t land, we strike at once across the bay for Cape St. John.’ As they were
too timid for this, they again tried the landing. We ran for a bank of sand
which lay above the rocks and, when the tide is full, may be safely run into. We
were carried ashore with a force that made the future of our boat doubtful. We
went over the rocks and into the sand safely; but the boat must be gotten out
again at once, or it would be broken. The boys went at this, and I had to get
ashore up to the middle in water, in my shirt-sleeves. The boat was pushed out
quickly into deep water, and over the roar of the breakers it was impossible to
call for my clothes, even if it would have been proper to bring the boat ashore
again. I was glad to get a bed with our native pastor. Next morning, everything
wet, my food spoiled; and so we started again, in our wet clothes. It was very
hot, with only a little wind till 2 p.m., when another tornado came up, and
pouring rain till between eight and nine o’clock. Reached Benito about midnight
almost starved, for I had retained no food for forty-eight hours. None of us
seems able to eat on such a journey; consequently a square meal is acceptable
when the chance comes.

" Now you will think such a trip is dangerous. Tornadoes, for instance. Not so;
I have been at sea in four or five. The wind is terrific for a time, and sail
must be taken down at once; then there is no danger. The worst thing is the
rocks all along the coast, and the surf. The boat will not strike if she is in
two feet of water, and the man who would drown in that case ought to; but let a
boat, even if not running very fast, strike a rock, and you have a wreck. As
such a boat costs from two hundred and fifty to three hundred dollars, it is not
wise to be reckless. On this trip my boat was in danger two or three times, and
yet my men knew the coast very well. Once we were running probably at the rate
of ten miles per hour when it was very dark, and suddenly, not more than thirty
yards ahead, a reef was seen above the surface. A moment more and we might have
rested there till morning. The return trip generally takes four or five days,
but we covered it in thirty-four hours, the best time ever made on the route, as
far as I can learn. But to do it we sailed all night, and made the crew work,
one of the hardest things to accomplish with Africans. I stood it splendidly,
but was so sunburnt when I got home that people did not know me at first sight."

Thus the battle was joined at once. For twelve years to come Mr. Good should
have his full share of the Africa missionary’s lot — of open boats under glaring
sun and tropical downpours, of stemming the ocean tide at river mouths and
contending with frantic surf; contending also with a far more formidable enemy,
one demanding courage equal to any foe on any field — the burning fever and the
languor of reaction after fever. Could this enemy be conquered on the "West
Coast, the white man’s life would be stripped of half its perils. The new
missionary was not to be dazed by the new world into which he was plunged. Like
William of Normandy on landing in England, he took hold of Africa " with both
hands." In all the places where he went he was assimilating facts, in a
level-headed way, on which to form conclusions for action. The Mpongwe people of
Gaboon quickly sized him up: " He has come to stay." And the venerable senior
missionary saw "a fair prospect of some evangelistic missionary work in this
vicinity. He will soon be preaching in the vernacular." The mission, in Annual
Meeting (January, 1883), located Mr. Good at Baraka. There the gospel had been
preached forty years, against great odds of heathenism on shore and
anti-christian trade at the river mouth. In 1845 a missionary found a whole town
beastly drunk one day. Six of their men had been sold as slaves to the great
Spanish " slave factory" on the south side of Gaboon River, and were paid for
with six hogsheads of rum which the people, young and old, were consuming as
common property. He saw a line of women, hand in hand, fall like a row of
ninepins, stupefied with rum. In 1860 an Old Calabar missionary wrote: " The
difficulties of our brethren there [at Gaboon] are like our own. The trade gets
all the advantage of their labors among the young men; the demon of polygamy
devours the fruit of their labors among the girls." In 1883 the conflict was
still on. The problem to be grappled with at Gaboon was complex: Heathenism —
not like virgin soil, but like the stubble twice burned over. Trade — not
educative, industrious and innocent, but demoralizing, always associated with
intoxicants. "Trade is our great enemy," wrote Mr. Good. "Men worth anything to
work can get unheard-of wages." He saw the white trader’s net spread for the
native woman, and the better educated the heavier the temptation. Liquor —
almost universal among white and black. Roman Catholicism, The French priests
were manufacturing brandy from the mango. By " treating " parents to rum they
swooped scores of children into their schools, baptized them, hung a cross about
the neck, and taught them never to listen to a Protestant.

How do you win victories for the gospel in the midst of such forces! "Do not
feel so much for our privations and discomforts," Mr. Good wrote to his old
pastor; " I have seen little of these; but we do need your sympathy and prayers
in these tremendous spiritual difficulties."

There were unaccustomed duties to be grappled. First, mission assigned a
training-class of candidates for the ministry. Concerning this he wrote to his
secretary in New York: "All seemed to agree that no other person could be spared
for it, so I have been appointed. It is a work I am utterly unfit to do, owing
to want of experience and my very imperfect knowledge of the language. The
difficulties and responsibilities are too great to be thought about. I can
scarcely hope you will approve the appointment; yet I do hope, now that it is
done, you will do all you can, by your advice and influence, to help me." This
class was but temporary.

Care of the church at Baraka was added to that of the class. Its membership had
become reduced to about forty, some of them aged, and some lifeless Christians.

Mr. Good was fast getting his bearings; improving the advantage of "Father
Walker’s" presence, enjoyed for a few months; studying the people out in their
towns on foot or by boat; especially studying the Mpongwe language with all his
might. He had found on his arrival a mission force of twenty-three Americans. By
one steamer after another, he saw ten missionaries depart for home within a
year. At the end of six months he was the only man left at his station. As
Baraka was general depot for the mission, the duties of treasurer were now laid
upon his shoulders. These involved bookkeeping for the mission, receiving and
shipping freight for all the stations, the complex, wearying business of African
barter, relations with custom-house and other French officials, and acquaintance
with French laws. To be competent for these last, he straightway began evening
lessons in the French language. He confides to his mother (to whom the regular
monthly letter never failed while she lived) that " the place is a tough one for
a mere boy to hold. A great deal of business experience is needed, and I have
none." His chief complaint, however, is that he cannot work as he used to at
home — "cannot do more than half as much."

One of his public duties, conducting the funeral service of a white trader who
had led a scandalous life, is referred to in his notebook: "My task was a
difficult and delicate one — to keep from giving offense either to his friends
or to my conscience. I took care to avoid the latter." A letter to the Board in
May refers, as to a trifle, to the fact that, though a vessel has arrived direct
from America, the furniture which was ordered before his own departure has not
yet put in an appearance. "Fortunately there will soon be some for sale in the
mission from which I can supply myself, so it does not matter much." He is
intending marriage, or we should never hear of the furniture at all. The next
month an American man-of-war was off Gaboon harbor; and as excessive red tape
was essential to legalize a marriage under colonial laws, the wedding-party went
out and boarded the Quinnebaug which was anchored in neutral water four miles
from shore. There, June 21, under the stars and stripes, Adolphus C. Good was
married to Miss Lydia B. Walker, who had been for several years a member of the
mission. The incident is on the records of the Naval Department at Washington,
D. C. All the circumstances suited Mr. Good, for he was a thorough American. The
first Mpongwe sermon came off after only ten months in Africa. Inquiry meetings
follow. " We expected two or three persons; ten came." Cases of religious
interest in the towns are reported, and, " from visits among the same people, I
know they are not overdrawn." In this summer of 1883 began to be operated those
decrees of the republic of France, through their commandant in Gaboon, of which
intimations had been heard before, and which would eventually cause the transfer
of a part of the mission to French hands. All schools in what had become French
territory were ordered closed unless they were taught in the French tongue. If
the authorities had simply discriminated against the English language, and left
to missionaries their instruction in the vernacular, Mr. Good would have been
well content. He was inclined to believe that teaching in English at Gaboon had
been " a curse." But American missionaries had not prepared themselves to teach
French schools; they could not approve of them. They knew that a generation
would have to pass away before Africans could be brought to Christ through the
medium of a foreign language. Accordingly the schools were closed, but, with
justifiable strategy, " we manage to keep with us all the boys of the inquiry
class, and all who gave promise of entering the ministry or Bible-reading work.
Were we to send them away to be lost — the boys to go into trade, the girls to
the bad? " They were retained on the terms of a French law which defined a "
school " as constituted of " four or more pupils." Each missionary was permitted
to have as many as three Africans at a time attached to his or her premises; and
thus a dozen girls and boys were employed in washing, cooking, weeding yards,
and were taught the Bible as before, only on mission-house verandas instead of
in a school-room. A Jesuit hand was inside the glove of authority. It was not
the zeal of Paris, but of the Roman Catholic mission at Gaboon, which had closed
the schools. Its force included a bishop, half a dozen priests, and as many
nuns. There was one Protestant missionary to face their machinations. He was
afraid of only one thing: that, in view of government threats, the Board at home
would " decline to send out the reinforcements we ask for."

What were these Africans upon whom missionaries were expending their lives? To
what stage had the problem of their elevation been worked out? Mr. Good was
fitted to pass an unexaggerated judgment upon Gaboon people. He saw them with
somewhat different eyes from what might be the first glance of a refined woman
who had never visited the slums of a metropolis, and had passed her happy
girlhood amid the proprieties and preponderating Christian influence of an
American town. His conclusions were based, not upon the degree of their
nakedness, but upon the inward qualities which they disclosed, and their
powerful race institutions of polygamy, dowry, and tribal slavery. To his
friends of Glade Run Church he wrote:

"If you were to come here and see the degradation, superstition, and wickedness
of the people, you would feel, as I cannot help feeling, that the work of
Christianizing them is just begun. But when I turn away from this picture, and
ask of those who have been longest here how they found this people when the
gospel was first brought, they paint a picture so much darker than we see now
that I find a great deal to be thankful for. There is a decided advance.

" What sort of beings are they?’ do you ask? Without industry and energy. Do
they not work? ’ Are they not great hunters and fishers? ’ Yes, when hungry and
driven by the evil of empty stomachs to the lesser evil of work. When rain pours
through the rotten roof, or the long-propped-up walls fall around them, then
they build. Many of them are strong, athletic men with wonderful powers of
endurance; but take away the necessity for work, and they sink into a normal
condition of sleepy inactivity. Even courage, a quality which is usually thought
to be part of the savage character, must be subtracted from it, at least in this
part of Africa. They delight in bloodshed; almost every town of the great Fang
race has a deadly feud with neighboring towns, and they are constantly killing
and eating each other; but I never heard of a battle here. It is always an
ambuscade — a stealing upon an unsuspecting enemy in the bush and murdering him.
You could not induce them to stand up face to face in open fight. It is not
cruelty and brutality that make a brave man, but culture, refinement, and the
inculcation of noble sentiments and principles.

"Theft, dishonesty, lying, are fearfully prevalent; fidelity to promises the
exception. How could it be otherwise! No God; only cruel, revengeful spirits,
who inhabit the forest and are to be feared. Love is almost unknown here, for
love is of God. The family? There is none, in our sense of the word. "Wives are
slaves; they are bought by giving dowry, as it is called, but just about the
price of a slave is given. A man’s rank is determined by what he owns, and his
wealth is accumulated in the form of wives. They are beaten and abused
unmercifully. They have only one escape; that is, to run away, back to their
tribe, or get some man to take them and pay to their first husband what they
cost him. In all Gaboon and vicinity there are not more than three or four
women, outside of our mission, who have lived all their life with the same
husband. These people see nothing immoral in such a course. There is some care
for the children, but it mainly proceeds from the same base motives. Is it a
son? He honors the parent and strengthens the family, an important consideration
in their tribal feuds. Is it a daughter! She will in a few years be worth from
fifty to two hundred dollars, enriching her family thereby. Most of the parental
affection rests on strictly business principles. If you doubt it, you would be
convinced by seeing how the father will sell his daughter to any man who will
pay his price, no matter how many wives he may have, nor how wretched she may be
with him. What a life! How dark it is! They do not realize the saddest features
of their condition. As a people they are noted for freedom from care. They
cannot be called unhappy, as a rule, but you will travel a long time among them
before you see a genuinely happy face; and when old age comes and strength
deserts the arm, leaving the man nothing to be proud of, and the woman useless
and therefore neglected, the picture is sad indeed.

" Perhaps you will say, They are not like us; they are a lower order of beings.’
Nay; but what has made us to differ is the gospel with you, and the want of it
here. You will find men in America who have practically no religion, and they
show as little honor and truthfulness as men here. It is want of religion that
has sunk this people. Climatic conditions have determined the direction of the
descent. Here nature is too good to her children. Fish always swarm in the
rivers, and you can have plantains and cassava every day in the year. A few
days’ work provides a bamboo house with thatched roof. A few yards of cloth
satisfy their very primitive ideas of propriety. Thank God for long, hard
winters for a great part of the globe! But this people are waking up, and this
sleeping giant must be constrained by the love of Christ, or he would better be
asleep than waking.

" The gospel has made some real men out of this awfully poor material. Of course
it is hard, slow work. At home, temptations like a great stream bear thousands
away; here they are a mighty flood hurling multitudes on to eternal doom. Africa
is opened. Those who have the gospel must determine whether it shall be her
destruction or her salvation." In the fourteen years which have passed since
this description was penned there have been hundreds more of " real men"
developed through knowledge of their heavenly Father; but outside of narrow
sections where Christianity has acquired a considerable foothold, this
indictment is as true to-day as then, not only in Equatorial Africa, but over
all the great Dark Continent.

During his first year our young missionary had grappled with a handful of
problems pertaining to African life, and had reached several conclusions to
which he held tenaciously through his whole career:

1. That Africans are to be won to Christ through the medium of their own
vernacular, not through a foreign tongue.

2. That the gospel is to be given to the people to prepare them for education
and civilization, not the reverse.

3. That Gaboon Mission was to grow and from time to time apply to the church at
home for reinforcements.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 3: 03   EMBARRASSED BY GOVERNMENT RESTRICTION
========================================================================

Chapter 3 EMBARRASSED BY GOVERNMENT RESTRICTIONS

1884

THERE was no foreign governmental establishment within one thousand miles on the
coast, and for two thousand miles eastward, all the way to the Indian Ocean, was
unexplored savage territory, when Gaboon Mission was founded in 1842. But the
very next year a French cannon-ball struck the mission school-house while a
religious service was in progress. A French Jesuit mission soon planted itself
within three miles of Baraka, and not long after a French administration was
formally extended over the district, in spite of the helpless remonstrance of
the more shrewd headmen in Gaboon villages. Relations between French officials
and the Americans were friendly in the early days, and as late as 1864 Walker
wrote: "Embarrassments from the French government are not to be apprehended. It
has shown as much regard for our mission as could be expected from any
government." In 1882 the situation was somewhat altered. The scramble for Africa
had begun among European powers, and the French were on the alert to legally
establish their claims in the Gaboon. The Spanish, who appeared on Corisco
Island as early as 1858, had disappeared and reappeared again, came now to stay.
In 1884 a German man-of-war took possession of the Benito River and various
points north; and the French, having with great promptitude discovered an old
treaty which gave the Benito to themselves, took possession of the south bank.
The political situation became, and all summer continued, " uncertain."

Mr. Good was drawn into several conferences with the French commandant. It was a
delicate position for a man so young, so new in the mission, unversed in social
etiquette, only beginning to speak in French, and wholly without experience in
diplomacy. One burst of temper, one social blunder, a hasty inference, a little
slowness in comprehending the commandant’s tactics, might jeopardize the future
of the mission. The responsibility weighed heavily. He longed for "Campbell to
be back to share the burden," as he was forced, the only man at headquarters,
step by step to take action alone. The course natural to him was the best
possible. His directness, his habit of taking straight aim, the sagacity which
had been cultivated in watching the wily ways of birds and rabbits in his
boyhood, added to a fund of good nature and self-control, carried him through.
He had bent before the storm at its first approach and closed his school. The
commandant still refused his opening it in the vernacular. If the Americans
could not meet the requirement of the law themselves, they must secure French
teachers. This was reasonable, and the missionary yielded again. The retired
veteran, looking out from his Wisconsin watch-tower, " did not think there was
any one at Gaboon who knew what to propose this year, except to work on,
preaching the gospel, confirming saints, and winning sinners. It seems to me a
time to stand still and wait the moving of God’s providence." But he had a
successor, yet too young and too energetic to be warranted in simply standing
still. He proposed to do some moving himself in connection with God’s
providence. Mr. Good more than met the situation: he formulated plans for
action.

Now began a gentle but firm bombardment of the doors of the home office. From
month to month he writes about the course of the commandant. In March he
observes that some property at Gaboon is held by "the Board," while French law
recognizes only such as is held in the name of an individual. He finds the
Jesuit mission prohibited from preaching in the vernacular because the colony
pays them twenty thousand francs a year for teaching exclusively in French. "
Still, I cannot help asking. How have we escaped this blow?" And his intention
is that this blow shall not fall. He points out that restrictions are not laid
on account of the Protestant religion, but because of the feeling in France that
"our schools are making the people of the colony English." The commandant
promised that the other schools should be taught in the vernacular if a French
school were opened at Gaboon.

Plan No. 1 has therefore developed. He asks the Board to grant a French teacher
to assist in the Gaboon school, " in order to satisfy the commandant."
Concerning this letter he tells an associate, " I wrote it to induce the Board
to make an advance of some sort. He wishes they had a light-draught steam or
naphtha-launch, for with it they could give the gospel with reasonable
regularity to one hundred thousand souls within easy reach on the Gaboon and its
tributaries. He has just seen five missionaries on their way to the Congo. "By
every steamship there is somebody going to that mission. We might well take a
lesson from them." In August, though not yet officially informed, he learns that
the commandant " has orders in his pocket to close our only vernacular schools
left at Benito."

September. He had been notified of fresh instructions from France. A school
might be opened at Talaguga Station but in French only. Much suspicion was
directed towards the Sabbath services.

Then follows cautious see-sawing between Baraka and the colonial office, the
main end never lost sight of. Nor does Baraka always lose. One official
concession grants "religious services in the native language"; so that nail was
driven.

There is another tap at the secretary’s door. Mr. Good recalls the experience of
English missionaries on Tahiti — how, after French occupation, they had been
constrained to turn their mission over to French Protestants. One of his
colleagues had already suggested to the Board a similar course in their mission.
For himself, he begins to think that " getting French teachers is a compromise
plan; I am afraid of it. It is the settled policy of France to make every one of
her colonies a new France in language and customs. I am sorry to believe it, but
I do believe we shall in the end be forced to transfer our work to French
missionaries; and this will be best for the kingdom of Christ in the colony. The
government is determined to make this a French people. If so, a French church
can best harmonize with that policy; we never can." But men were needed. " At
present, with just enough to guard each station, we are doing nothing. People we
taught have gone to their towns, and we cannot even follow them. If we keep on
thus a few years, there will be nothing either to hold or to transfer." He
corresponds with his associates in the mission concerning a possible transfer.
One of them having first broached the subject to the Board, he can "follow."
Otherwise he would have been "afraid they would take such a suggestion from the
youngest member of the mission as assumption. Let us discuss this among
ourselves. Nothing will make our Board act but something like unanimous opinion
boldly expressed by mission meeting. I want this mission to adopt some definite
policy."

November. He is " sorry to say I have had the so-called malignant fever, which
is becoming so fashionable in our mission." He credits the attack to a sedentary
life. After active exposure, " all night wet and cold, eating all kinds of food,
drinking all kinds of water, I have never been the worse for it. When I have
walked fifteen or twenty-five miles a day it put new life into me for weeks; but
when confined a month or two at Baraka I have become languid and bilious."

December. A parting shot to the home office: " The French are likely to get
Benito, and we may expect our schools to be closed there, just when the harvest
is being gathered in so fast."

All the year Mr. Good had been mission treasurer, and pastor of Gaboon Church,
and superintendent of the station. " Of course I do justice to neither." He
might have added that watching through the alarming illness of his wife, his own
recurring attacks of fever, and anxiety for the future of the mission had
drained his strength. But the year had its joys. He had welcomed a little son
with fatherly pride. There had been " a quiet work of grace in a few hearts " —
a few; he will not overrate it. He had succeeded in visiting " a few Fang
towns," and he " rejoiced while he sorrowed " for Bessie, the good Bible-woman.
She had "labored beyond her strength" among her country women, and led many of
them to the Saviour; and when painful illness kept her foot from the oft trodden
paths, she "gathered women of the towns around her death-bed and prayed with
them." This woman was a Kroo, who had been trained from a child at Gaboon. A few
other facts were outstanding. " We discipline church members; the Jesuits do
not, and are attracting great numbers. We shall have baptized heathenism instead
of confessed heathenism to deal with." More breakers ahead: " Three times as
many trading establishments in the Gaboon as eighteen months previous." The
Mpongwe race was "dying out" on account of its viciousness. From six thousand of
them at Gaboon in 1842, they were now reduced to between two and three thousand,
and were likely to become extinct in twenty years or less. " Is it wise to lay
foundations in a sinking beach that in twenty years will be submerged? I confess
I should like to see promise of more permanency for the work to which I devote
my life. I should like to see a move interior-ward most of all, but suppose that
in any case the coast must be held."

Several members of the mission had been obliged to flee for their lives during
1884. One had lain down in her last sleep at Talaguga, beside the great Ogowe.
All had borne hardship, some of them in desperate loneliness; but all were
united in resolve to stand by their banner in Africa. Not specially heartening
could have seemed to them the report of the Board presented to General Assembly
in the following spring:

"Frequently grave doubts have arisen whether it is best to continue the mission
in such a climate. These doubts are now intensified by the disturbing influence
of French regulations." The necessary frequency of furloughs is referred to: "
Perhaps the best remedy for these climatic evils is to remove the mission to
some other African field." Requests from the mission to employ French teachers,
or to consider a transfer of some of the stations to the care of French
Christians, are at first presented as " suggestions," but in the end, as it
were, laid on the table. " There seems but one course open, that of standing in
our lot."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 4: 04   BEGINNING IN THE OGOWE COUNTRY
========================================================================

Chapter 4 BEGINNINGS IN THE OGOWE COUNTRY

1885 THE Ogowe is one of the mighty rivers of Africa. It stretches for over
seven hundred miles along the equator, and connects with the Congo by its upper
branches. It is a grand waterway for two hundred miles from its mouth, but above
that are rapids for five hundred miles. Its current is swift, and through an
immense delta it pours into the Atlantic, according to the season, from 360,000
to 1,750,000 cubic feet of water per second. The largest island in the river
divides it into two channels opposite Kangwe.

Just there, at Kangwe, the mission stationed Mr. Good, and he arrived there with
his family February 1. The four months following he pronounced " the happiest
since I came to Africa. Nearly half my time was spent in my boat. I visited all
the Glalwa towns, some of them several times, and many towns of the Fang and the
Akele." The record of the first among his numberless itinerations in this region
is interesting as showing the system with which, at just twenty-eight years of
age, but two years in Africa, and with no superintending eye upon him, Mr. Good
went about his work. His care to be exact, at least to avoid exaggeration, is
illustrated in his frequent use of the word "about." His notes of this journey
were preserved solely for his own reference, especially as a geographical guide,
and are given verbatim.

1885, Feb. 9. Began my first boat journey in the Ogewe. Started about 8: 30 a.m.
down the small river.

Passed a Galwa and town called Atangino on our left, one mile below Kangwg. Also
a small Bakele town opposite.

Next Akama (Galwa) left side 1/2-1 mile below Atangino.

We entered Degele creek just opposite, which flows to the N. five miles to a
small lake of same name. No towns. From the lake, Degele creek turns W. and S.
W. ten miles (all distances are guessed) where it approaches very near to the
river it had left, so that just opposite the Adjumba towns two creeks break
through from the large river into it. By the upper of these, Osondo, we crossed
to Adjumba. Still no towns on the Degele which flows on under a new name to Lake
Azyingo. Reached Adjumba towns about 12 m.

Spent the afternoon and night here.

Preached in the lower end of the town on the Prodigal Son. Present about 30
people. A little above, on the New Birth to 40 people. At the town farthest up
the river on Matthew 5:1-10 to about 20 people.

Again below this to about 30 people on John 3:15-19, and in the evening at
Mbumba’s place on Romans 8:1-5 to 50 people. Mbumba with whom I stayed is a
middle-aged man who has a very boyish appearance partly for want of a beard,
which want he very much regrets. He is very friendly and did his best to make me
comfortable.

Feb. 10. Meeting at Adjumba before starting for Lake Azyingo. Spoke on Romans
5:1-10 to about 30 people. Started about 7: 30 a.m. Crossed from Adjumba to a
small creek a little below called Orembagogo. Leaving a branch of this,
Orembankala, to the left we keep to the right and re-enter the Degele under the
new name Orembazyingo. Course nearly due N. Five to seven miles from Adjumba, a
large Pangwe town on the right called Atanda, and five miles further a town on
our left of Syekani and Bakele, called Ateve. Stopped and talked to the people
at both the above places. Three miles further we enter a creek called Eganli
coming from the Lake. Two miles along this sluggish stream course N. and we
enter the Lake from the W. S. W. We passed, near the entrance on our right, to
another town of the Adjumba called Mandezimbanli. Head man Agambwi. Stayed with
Mangandi. Learned that there were no towns on the Lake, except one (Adjumba) on
the opposite side of the entrance and four Pangwe towns at the other end of the
Lake probably 10 to 12 miles distant.

Visited the town opposite called Azyngo, where I talked to 35 people on Romans
3:10-20. Town small and the people timid. Returned to Mandezimbanli and in the
evening preached to about 25 on Galatians 5:16-23. The people of both these
towns seem wild and act strangely and, especially those of Azyngo, have mixed
with the oldest Mpongwe a great many words which I take to be Syekani and
Bakele. The Lake, as nearly as I can make out, is made up of two nearly equal
ends (separated) connected by a strait. The country beyond is hilly, almost
mountainous, but had no time to explore more particularly.

Talked again in the evening to 25 people on Matthew 18:21-35.

Feb. 11. Had a rather poor night. Was tired but failed to sleep on account of
the bedbugs of which (if I am to estimate them by the sense of touch) there were
thousands in my bed.

Talked in the morning to a few people on Matthew 7:14.

Re-entered the river we had left the day before to come to the Lake. Its name
changed to Olowiguma. Course westerly. Beautiful hills on our right outside the
Lake. Densely wooded. After 7 or 8 miles, the river divides around a long island
(4-5 miles long) and the right hand stream widens into a shallow lake one mile
wide and 3 or 4 long called Nkove. Some Pangwe towns at the end farthest from
the entrance. In passing through this lake, keep close along the island to the
left or the outlet will be missed. Course here becomes S. W. to S. for 5 or 6
miles, when we pass a small but very picturesque lake on our left, opening full
breadth into the river and extending back one mile, called Ogondwe. Toward noon
we found a small lake on our right 1/2 by 1 mile. Very fine― called Igulwe― 4-6
miles from Ogondwe. Took dinner in this lake and bought meat. No towns, only
fishermen. From this the river runs deep, and with strong current, between
wooded hills 7-8 miles and then opens on our right another lake called Loge.
Seen from the river it seems very fine indeed. We see the lower end. It lies
parallel with the river and near to it, 1 mile by 3 miles. Hills around it are
very fine. A mile and one half further brings to the Adjumba River and we begin
to ascend. First Galwa town I 1/2 miles above the junction on our left, called
Longwg. Opposite, a little below, a small creek goes off to the big river coming
out between Egenja and Asyuka. Called Ntondi. Said to be 1/2 day’s pull from
Longwe to the main river. Preached in the afternoon to 60 people (many children)
on Luke 5:31-32. Evening, to a house full on Luke 12:39-40. Probably over 60
present. People left off dancing mbwiri for a young man who was lost, in order
to attend the meeting. Longwe a large town, perhaps 200 people or more and full
of children.

Feb. 12. Passed a very comfortable night at Longwe. In the morning talked on
Christ and the woman at the well to 40 people. Start up the river due E. We pass
to the right of a large island beginning a little above Longwe and continuing
2-3 miles. Soon above, another island 1-2 miles long on the upper end of which
is the small Galwa town of Nenge. We turned to the right in passing the above
island, but the main channel is on the other side. To Nenge took 2-3 hrs. and
the distance may be 8 miles.

Preached here to 20 people on Matthew 22:36 sq. Close above, we pass to the
right of a small island and, a little above, to the left of a long island
extending past the next town. About 5 miles above Nenge we reach Olamba on our
left, a small Galwa town like Nenge in size. Talked to 15-20 people on John
6:47-57. People came very reluctantly. Reached this place about noon and left
about 2 p.m.

After 4 miles further reach a town of Ivile people on our right, called
Ompoymanla. Talked to 20-30, on the Prodigal Son. People friendly and apparently
anxious to hear.

Close above this a Galwa town, Ngondo, of fair size, very friendly but situated
in an unhealthful place and poorly kept. Spoke on John 3:14-21 to about 50
people. Some of the chief men and women were the worse for drink. They had made
some sort of intoxicant from cane juice with the bark of some tree in it. This,
the last of the four Galwa towns on this part of the river. Met here
Afangananga, head man of the Adjumba towns.

Just above this town a creek a few hundred yds. long enters Lake Adole. A fine
body of water 2-3 miles wide and 4-5 long. End toward the river.

6 P.M. Spoke again in the Ivile town to about 25 people on Luke 6:42-49:8 P.M.
Talked again in Ngondo on the parable of the Sower, to 20-30 people.

Feb. 13. After a fairly good night talked again to 20 people on Matthew 18:1-9.

One half mile above, on the opposite side, a small new Ivile town called
Egolianli. Preached here to 20 people on Matthew 5:1-12. Just around a bend of
the river on the same side a Syekani town, Njongo. Spoke here to 15 people on
Matthew 6:6-13. People very timid.

Two miles above this, on the opposite side, a town of Syekani, a fairly good
sized and well built town, called Adaginlanjambie. Spoke to 15-20 people on
Matthew 13:47-50. No towns between this and Adjumba, from which, distance 4-4
hrs. pull, or 12-15 miles. Took dinner in the bush and reached Adjumba 2: 30
p.m. Met here Angom and his wife.

Evening, spoke to 40-45 people on 2 Peter 3:8-11.

Feb. 14. Left Adjumba at 5:30 a.m. 3/4 mile above, a small Adjumba town called
Anenga. Too early to stop.

Pull 2 hrs., then the river Omoni goes off to the main river; 3 or 4 mi.
further, we come to the two towns called Ompolavoma on our left. The lower one
Syekani, small; the one, a little above, Galwa and a very fair town.

Spoke in the lower town to 12 people on the Prodigal Son. In the Galwa town
talked to 25 people on the New Birth. A little below Degele creek, the river
Ekalegambe goes off to the main river joining Omoni further down.

Close below Degele creek (lower entrance) on same side, a small Pangwe town.
Talked here to 40 or 50 people.

Crossed to Akama and talked to 15 people on John 3:16-21.

Stopped at Atangino to call the people to church next day.

Reached home, noon.

Preached in all thirty times, to about 800 people. Traveled 100-110 miles.

Missionary efforts on the Ogowe had thus far been made through the Mpongwe
language and chiefly expended upon the Gralwa tribe, while they were far
outnumbered by the Fang. "Tens of thousands of Fang," wrote Mr. Good, " and not
a single convert among them, on this river. It would be my wish to allow my
associate to go on with his previous work, and devote myself to the Fang." But
after a few months of energetic initiative came one of those inevitable,
characteristic interruptions to every enterprise of white men on the West Coast.
His associate was dangerously low with fever and had to be sent to Gaboon, and
soon after Mr. Good himself succumbed. The physician ordered them both out to
sea. At every calling port a message was sent back to Mrs. Good.

"Up with R___ all night; temperature 103. Mrs. R___ sick too. ’Yours truly’ is
getting on very well." From Old Calabar: " R___’s fever down, but takes little
food. Place unfavorable to recovery. Going to Bonny. If he gets up, you may
expect me by next mail-steamer. If not, there is nothing for it but on to
Madeira. I am going to get awfully tired of it. Don’t like the idea of being
away from you and work so long, but I am in for it. Don’t worry; am feeling
first-rate." Accompanying this letter was a photograph for " the girl I left
behind me," taken in the yard of the Scotch mission.

Back at Kangwe: "Now I hope to stay here a long time without change. My health
seems completely restored" ― a seeming to be disproved by many a burning fever
yet. No time is lost in getting that boat again into motion. Within a month the
missionary has seen " nearly all our people " at communion, and taken reports of
Bible-readers. " What pleases me most is an inquiry class of seventeen, among
them some young men who have borne persecution well." There was a school of
thirty to forty started, but French authorities closed it. Men twenty to thirty
years old worked one half-day to go to school the other half. They gave up their
wages to buy books; nearly all lived ten to fifty miles down-river. " Now we
must turn them away. The children say, ’ Must we grow up in darkness?’ Parents
ask, Shall we send them to the Roman Catholic school!’ Hitherto I have said,
Wait; ’ but that answer is getting rather old. Some church members will send to
the Catholics if we do not soon supply this want. What shall we say to them?"
The question at Gaboon was the question at Kangwe.

" Faithful, earnest Nguva, the only elder of our little church, has gone to his
reward. I shall miss him very much, and his place will be hard to fill. The want
of schools bears heavily on Bible work. These men we have can hardly read.
People will not long listen to such instruction as they can give." A French
priest, an ignorant, intemperate man, frequently amused himself by breaking up
meetings which Protestants conducted in the towns. Mr. Good was ready for such
cases. He could summon his patience and stand still in answer to abusive
language, or, allowing his opponent to address the people as long as he would, "
then I took the floor, or rather the middle of the street, and replied, trying
to do what he had failed to do ― confine my remarks as much as possible to
presentation of the way of salvation, and contrasting our teachings on the
subject with theirs."

One day the Fang themselves undertook to settle a discussion of this kind in
their town by a characteristic method. Each white man should send for a canoe of
tobacco. " Let it be brought and given; then we will know who is best." The
priest fell into the plan at once. " I let him commit himself thoroughly; then I
told them plainly that the Word of God was what I came to give. If they heard
it, well; if not, it was their palaver. I would preach it to them, but would not
pay them to listen; it was worth being heard without their attention being
bought. And, to my surprise, the people said I was right." But it was a year of
strife with the Jesuit mission. It was their aim to bring Protestant
missionaries into disrepute with the French government. They snatched and burned
Protestant Scriptures in the hands of poor, pagan, black people, as if they were
living in Spain; and Mr. Good came back to the old conclusion, " We shall never
have any peace till we teach some French."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 5: 05   A RISING TIDE ON THE OGOWE 1886-1887
========================================================================

Chapter 5 A RISING TIDE ON THE OGOWE

1886—1887

NOTWITHSTANDING attacks upon it, the Word of God became precious in those days.
A spirit of inquiry arose in the Ogowe concerning things of the soul. In March,
1886, the class of inquirers was swelled to over thirty members. Swifter and
swifter flew the Montclair down the great river for a week at a time, in all
weathers, putting in to shore wherever a group of banana-leaved roofs showed
above the tall grass; and people listened to the "words of God" in direct,
well-mastered Mpongwe. In June twenty-three were added to the inquiry class. "I
was counting on from three to five."

Referring to this time, Mr. Good wrote to his secretary, several months after:
"I thought of announcing the good news then, but hesitated. I doubted the
motives of so many in coming. There is nothing I so much dislike as writing good
news and afterwards being compelled to take it back." A large caution in making
deductions and statements was one of Mr. Good’s missionary qualifications. His
conclusions were reached with deliberation and then held positively and it was
humiliating to retract them. A characteristic instance was the case of a Congo
woman who, he judged, could be of use in the mission. A trial of her proved
otherwise, and he acknowledged his "chagrin ": "I never was so deceived in a
person, and, thinking over the whole matter, cannot help feeling a little
ashamed that, after forming SO good an opinion of one, I should so soon be
seeking to get rid of her." He adds that her wages have not been taken out of
mission money, and here another characteristic is touched.

Strict uprightness in the use of money, economy of mission funds as a sacred
trust, marked Mr. Good’s course. Four years out of his first five in Africa, he
returned an annual balance to the mission. When about to take a voyage on
mission business, he would exert himself to investigate passage rates and choose
the route by which he could " save eight days’ time and five pounds sterling."
While on furlough in America, a gentleman, from whom he had expected assistance
for the mission, surprised him with a personal gift of two hundred dollars.
Instead of putting it into his pocket for a visit to his brothers in Nebraska,
he writes like an embarrassed school-boy to ask his secretary, " What shall I do
with it? " Finding a satisfactory answer was more trouble to him than to wade
through a mangrove swamp. Not because he was niggardly with his own money. " The
grand balance," he writes to his wife, enclosing an order for every cent left to
his account at the end of a year. And again; " You do not need to account to me
for your expenditures. If you spend all the money you can get, you will not be
extravagant." This was while Mrs. Good was in America, ill health having
compelled her return in the summer of 1886. They had determined upon the
sacrifice of separation; and, putting wife and boy on board ship at Gaboon, he
went back alone to the great, lonely Ogowe, his nearest missionary associate
being seventy-five miles above Kangwe.

Now again, day after day, rain or shine, Galwa, Nkami, Akele, Ivile, Syeki,
Orungu, and Fang, all, in their low brown towns, descry the tireless Montclair
headed for their landings, the well-known white helmet in its stern. At least
four towns in a day are visited, sometimes fourteen. Up the Ogowe and down flies
the Montclair and by the " small river," by Degele Creek, and in high water by
the big lakes to the south. More often yet it is seen tied to the clay bank, and
the missionary is tramping mile after mile in the bush, through its twilight,
among colossal forest trees with their endless festoonery of vines, lush swamps,
naked mangrove banks decorated with crocodiles; in the bush, dark with foliage
above, terrible below with giant wrecks of lightning-struck cottonwoods,
redwoods, or palms, slippery vines to trap the foot, entangled bush-rope as
strong as a cable, and, hiding under the leaves, vipers, lizards, snakes, for
each variety of which the African has a separate charm. Of what Mr. Good ever
ate on these innumerable bush journeys, or how he slept, no one at the mission
rooms ever saw a line from his pen; but once, when Mrs. Good accompanied him,
she wrote upon these points to a friend:

"Passed on into the large lake Onanga. Two small islands came in sight, and the
trees looked from the distance as if covered with white blossoms; but as we drew
near we discovered they were blossoming with hundreds of large white birds. Ate
our lunch on one of the islands, and went on to Ngewa, qnite a large town. Held
a meeting, and crossed to the other end of the lake to Okonjo. Arrived at dark,
wet and tired. Did not find royal accommodations. After some talk we were
allowed the use of a room in a house minus windows or doors, having a mud floor,
with a pile of leaves and ferns for a bed. A bed of ferns ’ may sound luxurious,
but my experience was otherwise. Spent the Sabbath in this place; thirty-five
present at morning service. Next day up and away for Lake Ogemwe, far eastward.
Visited three towns. Ate lunch in the forest, and then the boat-boys pulled hard
till dark. Slept at Aningwa-revo, in a native house as uncomfortable and dirty
as usual, but were tired enough to be thankful for even that."

Bible-readers, here, there. Every one who is capable of imparting an elementary
gospel message is set to teaching his people, but is not left to himself. The
man can never conjecture whether it will be on Tuesday or Saturday, but his
missionary’s visit of inspection is sure to take him by surprise; then, whatever
he has tried to do will not escape that keen eye, neither what he has neglected;
and laziness is the one thing that will never be spared. But these workers must
be paid; appropriations have been " reduced," and " the school will eat up all
the money left" — that is, the school which is to be, if only the Board allows
French teachers. There are always resources to him who can do without. Every
workman is dismissed at Kangwe who can possibly be spared, even the boat crew,
and what is saved on their wages is paid out from the missionary’s own vital
energy in annoyance and watchfulness with temporary paddlers who must be
summoned and coaxed an hour before each trip. In the summer of 1886 the
telegraph came to Gaboon and a sub-commandant to the Ogowe. For some months the
same fencing had to go on with this official as with the Jesuit mission. The
same tactics won the day. At first hostile and surly, he "soon backed down on
every charge." Then, yes, he would give permission for " a school," but
Bible-readers he would have to see for himself. " All a game to stop my work."
Where should that French teacher come from? No one sent from New York; no
promise of one. No French teacher, no school. It would be unendurable to lose
the advantage that had been wrenched from the commandant. It was not lost. A
young African was secured who had learned French at the Jesuit mission. " This I
do with the knowledge and approval of all my brethren." No fear of a traitor in
camp, because there was " not enough religion there of any sort " to have been
absorbed. A school was opened, the young man put in charge, and the event
justified the measure. No earthly commandant could stop the current which had
begun to move in men’s hearts on the Ogowe. The Spirit of God was in it.

Every year in October, in that equatorial region, the skies open and tropical
rains pour down. They last for weeks; and what began, like the tuning of an
orchestra, with an ominous drum, drumming, upon countless green leaves, swells
to a wild, pauseless symphony, reverberating through the whole vast, shadowy
forest. All the streams hear it — some of them mentionable rivers themselves —
and they forget their old banks, they spread out in lakes, and with accelerated
heart-beat rush forward to bury themselves in the bosom of the mighty Ogowe. She
hears them coming, and, always rapid, as broad at two hundred miles from sea as
the Delaware is at Philadelphia, she welcomes them with a quickened pulsation.
Her current strengthens to fully five miles an hour. Low sand-banks, patches of
papyrus, and small islands are drowned out of view. Vines wont to swing far up
on palm-stem and redwood branch now dip and trail in the water’s edge, and
floating islands glide down-stream. The bush is alive with vivified ants, and
lizards, and glistening snakes swinging from boughs overhead, while
hippopotamuses troop away to find shallow lagoons. And in the heart of the human
dweller along its banks, who, perhaps, distrusting his house foundations, has
climbed to a perch in a tree to sleep, the dread of the Ogowe grows night by
night as he harks to the roar of the forest wind, the crashing of some giant
tree or a boat-house swept away, or a startling shriek, warning him that another
canoe has been engulfed. Morning by morning he looks out on an awesome sight,
for the Ogowe covers a vast area. By the tenth day it has risen twenty feet in
front of his door. You cannot legislate the rise of the Ogowe in the rains. At
the beginning of 1886 thirty-eight souls, gathered out of paganism, constituted
the church of Jesus Christ on the Ogowe. But the tide was rising; ten years
after there were six hundred Christians there.

All 1886 each quarterly communion was a high-day and a holiday at Kangwe. One is
reminded of the old observance of sacraments in the Highlands of Scotland.
Canoes came flocking from every waterside for fifty miles around. They came on
Wednesday or Thursday before communion Sunday, and the people lived on the
mission premises five, six, seven days together. Every one brought the
inevitable mosquito net of strong cloth; and when they had been hung over stakes
driven into the ground, there was presented an encampment of multicolored tents,
which surrounded the church, overflowed the mission yard, and made points where
light played in the shade of the plantain grove, under the oil palm and mango
trees. In true African style, they all had brought cooking utensils and
provisions; and when the sudden tropical night fell, and the pale equatorial
moonlight spangled the Ogowe, only fifty yards from their feet, picturesque
cooking fires shone here and there, and the people sat around them in homelike
fashion, eating a supper of cassava, roasted plantains, and dried elephant meat.
The echo of tom-toms across the river easily located some heathen dance; but the
loudest sound on Kangwe Hill was the chorus of voices singing the beautiful new
Mpongwe hymns, and singing them well. But what was to the people a joyous Feast
of Tabernacles was a week of strain and care to the missionary in charge and any
associate who might come to his help for the occasion. There was the direction
of preaching services every afternoon and three times on Sunday, besides those
which the people held themselves every evening. There were the offerings of
consecration: a fowl or a basket of eggs, a few fish or a bunch of plantains.
These must all be examined and a proper due-bill given to each individual, which
he places in the collection in lieu of currency. Bible-readers must render
reports, receive their wages and instructions. Long hours were consumed in
examining applicants for inquiry class; longer, intense hours were spent with
church session at every available time of day, and far into the nights, in
careful examination of candidates for baptism. Mr. Good once compared Kangwe
communions to calling the roll of divisions of an army after battle. Christians
had come by twos and threes and tens from scattered villages in each district,
and calling the roll was sometimes glad, often sad, work. "From some villages
comes news of victory and new recruits; from others sad stories of defeat and
loss." The missionary had at once to discharge the duties of host, mission
agent, and bishop of souls. Such responsibility, dread of being deceived by
flattering appearances, contact with hundreds of human beings crowded about him,
even into his private apartments, all wore upon brain and spirit. "I do not
pretend to sleep more than a few hours each night during communion." In
September: " It was the busy season, and we expected to add only eight or ten to
the roll of inquirers. After a great deal of sifting we added forty-three,
making the whole number about ninety. Of course these figures must not be taken
for their full face value. Not all of these ninety persons will finally become
baptized members of the Ogowe Church, but a large part of them will. There is
enough to convince us that the Spirit of God is at work mightily here.

" We see a marked increase of spirituality within the church, a disposition to
call offenders to account instead of shielding them, as was too common formerly.
Christians are beginning to realize their duty to preach Christ; in some
quarters they begin to give to his cause. God was at work when we had least
reason, apparently, to expect it, and now, having seen his power, we realize
what we might accomplish by his power. Pray with us that his hand be not stayed
till he work a great change in this river region." From Longwe and Nenge they
brought over ten dollars in fish to the collection. " Nenge is a town I had
given up. The last time I passed, the people were so drunk that I passed without
preaching; now six or eight men at one time gathered their fetishes and threw
them into the Ogowe. Women are beginning to come." Of December communion he
reports to his wife: "More than two hundred stayed somewhere about the houses.
They put boards under the big house and stayed there. Unprotected women were
admitted to the dining-room, and twelve mosquito nets were put up there.
Boat-house crowded. The collection about twenty dollars. Baptized eight.
Received eighty-one new inquirers; total, one hundred and sixty-three, of whom
forty are women — the most encouraging feature, for at the beginning of the year
there were only three or four women in the church. The change is like a waking
from the dead.

" I wish I had a good man here on whom to roll a part of this responsibility."
As the year closes there is an urgent voice at the secretary’s door in New York:
" What we need now is help. Already I have had the most dangerous form of fever
twice. The doctor says I ought to go home now — not that I have any notion of
acting on this advice; but should I break down without another man here, it
would be disastrous. More now depends on constant, careful supervision than
anything else except the presence of the Holy Spirit."

He begs that an assistant be sent in time to learn the language and gain the
confidence of the people, especially to learn how to take care of his health in
the African climate, before he should be left alone. " To begin alone would be
almost certain death." In connection with his annual report, January, 1887, Mr.
Good repeats his earnest request:

" I beg to remind the Board of the necessity of at once sending us assistance.
We must acknowledge that God has been far more faithful in blessing the gospel
than we have been in preaching it. The work done by myself has been little
enough — nothing compared with what ought to be done. The main part was done by
five Bible-readers. My field is so extensive, all I could attempt was to inspect
their work occasionally. It is these men who have brought the gospel weekly to
scores of villages scattered up and down the Ogowe for a hundred miles. Each is
provided with a small canoe and two or three boys to help handle it; thus fitted
out, he is expected to visit as often as possible all the towns in his district.
It is to the efforts of these men, more than all other influences combined, that
we are to ascribe, under God, this awakening we have enjoyed. But it will not do
to overestimate their efficiency and neglect to provide anything better.

" If each of these men were educated, or being educated, so that, when in a few
years each of these Bible-reading stations has become a church, he could be
licensed to preach, and when his church had grown strong to support him could be
ordained its pastor, then the plan would be perfect. But I am sorry to say these
men are utterly unfit for such a work. They are only useful because the mass of
the people are so ignorant. Some of them can barely read their own language,
none read well; and they write a little in characters that are fearfully and
wonderfully made. When their modicum of knowledge becomes the property of the
many their usefulness will be past, unless they can be educated so as to keep in
advance of the people." This awakening was connected with no prospect of gaining
worldly advancement. Few converts could be employed by the mission, and
conversion would require many, by refusing to deal in rum and by honoring the
Sabbath, to lose positions in trade. All who had more than one wife were bound
to incur loss of dowries. Still, one hundred and sixty men and women this year
decided for Christ in the Ogowe. "If the Holy Ghost has not done it, what has? "
But the missionary’s ideal was not to be blurred by a measured success. The
converts and inquirers were from several different tribes, but so far there was
not one Fang. One Bible-reader spoke Fang fluently, and was so located as to
visit frequently fifteen or twenty Fang towns. " The only one for twenty or
thirty thousand Fang within easy reach of Kangwe! What is one among so many? "

Still the tide was rising on the Ogowe. There were more troubled consciences
than ever in 1887. At March communion extra benches filled every available space
on Sunday. Scarcely any were mere spectators; almost all were members or
inquirers. Only six were baptized, for inquirers were obliged to complete a year
in the class before baptism. There were now two hundred and forty-nine inquirers
from five different tribes, speaking languages as different as German and
English.

Spiritual earnestness was the token on every hand. Church members in general
held daily prayer and Sabbath services wherever they were, and inquirers went
long distances to be present.

Two problems now confront the missionary:

1. "How are all these inquirers to be instructed?" Answered, by increasing the
efficiency of Bible-readers. They and other picked young men, a normal class of
twelve, are brought to Kangwe for a month of hard study and again sent forth.

2. Books were required. "I could have sold a hundred primers communion week. At
the rate they are called for, a year will exhaust all the Mpongwe books we have
in print, except hymn-books." This problem is solved by two Mpongwe manuscripts,
which spring up like Jonah’s gourd, and are promptly mailed to America to be
printed while Mrs. Good is there to read proofs. As for money to pay the
printer, his butterfly net has provided for "the tract," and he " would rather
foot the bill " for five hundred primers also "than not to have them right
away." The church in America was poor, and the missionary paid for the primers!

Difficulty with the colonial government had never ceased. There were constant
opportunities for sub-officials, clothed with a brief authority and backed by a
Mohammedan soldiery and police from Senegal, to be exasperating towards
Americans. One fact only prevented rupture: a modus vivendi had been established
by opening the French school at Kangwe, and by the promise of the missionaries
to do all in their power to secure French teachers. In view of the situation,
the mission, in January, 1887, passed the following resolution:

" Whereas, In view of the settled educational policy of the French rulers of
this colony, it is, and in our opinion always will be, impossible for us to
carry on our work here, except under most crippling and vexatious restraints;
therefore,

" Be solved, That we strongly urge upon the Board the advisability of
transferring to a French Protestant society the whole of our Gaboon and Ogowe
work." A committee of the mission also reported that should the mission continue
to hold the Gaboon and Ogowe districts, "we have no hope of making further
advance therein," and requested the Board " as soon as possible to take steps
with the German government " in the north to extend efforts in that direction. "
We are under the impression that, Germany being a Protestant power, we would be
free from the seizure and burning of our people’s Bibles by Romish priests, at
present unchecked by our French rulers." A few months later, a new secretary
having been placed in charge of the Africa mission, Mr. Good sent him greeting:

" I cannot say that I congratulate you on the task you have undertaken.
Missionaries in Africa are apt to be bilious, and a bilious man is proverbially
hard to please. The climate is at times terribly depressing, and when everything
looks blue we are apt to blame the Board with it all, just as foolish people at
home blame the government for poor crops. That Dr. Lowrie has lived to his age
with this incubus on him is little less than a miracle.... You have taken up
this work at a trying time. Great changes must be made in the near future, and
only divine guidance can keep us short-sighted mortals from mistakes." On the
subject of the proposed transfer, this letter advocates the measure, largely on
the ground that arrest of educational work will in the end defeat the very
object of the mission.

"You will say, Why not go on as you have done, without schools, devoting all
your time to preaching?’ Because no mission can he permanently successful in
such a country as Africa without education. What can I do with three hundred and
fifty inquirers scattered over a breadth of fifty and a length of one hundred
miles? The one Ogowe church must soon become four. Who is to take charge of
them? If we go on organizing churches without a native ministry, what can it
ever amount to? In Africa, not only the vast multitudes to be reached, but the
deadly climate, forbid the thought that white men can ever be more than
beginners and leaders in giving the gospel to her people.... I would not under
rate God’s power or resources, but he uses means. Men who do not sow cannot
harvest. We have one licensed preacher in the Ogowe field, and after that
nothing. It will take years to prepare men who are needed here, and this
educational work cannot be done in either English or the vernacular."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 6: 06   LOVE AND SOLITUDE ON THE OBOWE
========================================================================

Chapter 6 LIFE AND SOLITUDE ON THE OGOWE September 1886— December 1887 ANOTHER
side to life on the Ogowe is suggested by Mr. Good’s letters to his absent wife.

" Kangwe, Sabbath evening, 8:30, September 5, 1886. For a long time it has been
a fixed rule with me never to write a letter on Sunday; but I do so many worse
things on Sabbath than writing to my wife that I will make her case an
exception. I am somewhat at a loss how to write. If I could know just how you
are feeling I could come nearer the mark. If, when this reaches you, you are
perfectly happy with your friends, I don’t want to come in with a clumsy effort
at soothing your loneliness, and tell you not to weep overmuch over our long
separation. On the other hand, if this letter finds you crying your eyes out
over your poor husband far away among cannibal mosquitoes, then my foolishness
might seem like trifling with your most sacred feelings.... Hope to start
upriver in two days, then down, preparing for communion.... If it were not for
making you homesick, I could tell you how lovely the Ogowe is now. The cloudy
weather is past, and it is clear, except a little while at noon. Fish is plenty;
I have all the grenadillas that I ought to eat, and it is so quiet. Don’t you
wish you were here?... When I get lonely you will hear nothing about it.

" October 8. If the sand-flies allow, I will write you a letter this morning, to
go by regular Portuguese mail.... I am anxious to know how B [his two-years-old
son] takes in civilization. I fancy he would like as well to be back among the
goats and butterflies of Africa. He will not find the natives of America as
obedient to his commands as those here, and he will probably be a good deal
disgusted when grown men and women refuse to come at his call. Tell him that
Folaba has one of the prettiest little kids I ever saw.....

" There is a rumor that duties are to be taken off imports and put on exports.
Unless they put a duty on sick missionaries going home, this would be a decided
gain to our mission; it would save much of this nuisance of receiving goods....
The rains have just begun; no tornadoes yet. Bats are bad. Hope to get
cartridges for shot-gun by the Angola; then the war will begin....

" Hope next week to go out to Lake Azyingo and down the small river.... The
worst is, I am becoming demoralized mentally, and especially spiritually. Trials
seem to make me worse and worse. I am ashamed to go on doing my work with so
little heart in it. I feel like running away; but to leave my work would only
make me worse, not better."

[Specimen experience on board a river steamer.]

" November. We were going around the islands at the entrance of the Ogowe, and
there we stuck in the mud. The captain had spent his life running
sailing-vessels and knew nothing of the management of a steamer. Twice we got
off and twice we ran on worse than before, till a part of the cargo had to be
removed to the island near by. In short, we stayed at that delectable place from
Thursday afternoon till Saturday morning. Once in the river, the captain had no
more to do with the ship and we got on better. I am glad you were not on board.
The captain was the queerest old stick, kind and goodhearted, but so wanting in
manners. The food was a caution. There was one course of meat, almost always the
same — roast beef. We were seven white men, and, if real hungry, I could eat the
whole business. Imagine how careful we had to be to make it go around! The
captain saw the danger, and so helped himself first. He would sing out, ’ Come
to chop,’ and, while we were taking seats, help himself to about one third of
all the meat, then pass it. You would have laughed to see him. We had no
vegetable but rice, and once string-beans. While we were aground fish were
plenty. There was, fortunately, bread and butter and cheese in sufficiency.

" Tell B I bought him a pet, a young bushcat. It has a very sharp nose, body the
color of a raccoon, tail very thick at the base and running to a point."

[Letters from his wife having been sent past Kangwe to a French trading-house
upriver.]

" December. They may be returned in ten days, may go on to Stanley Pool. It is
interesting, I tell you. However, I have not given up hearing from you
altogether. If I live to a ripe old age, I hope some of your letters will reach
me to be a comfort in my declining years.

" The usual number of people are going wrong, and an encouraging number are
trying to go right."

[Referring to obstacles raised by a French official.]

" He has found a law of 1781 (how is that for finding laws?) which gave the
commandant authority to examine the character of missionaries ’ before allowing
them to labor in the colony. I gave him an account of all the young men,
accepted all his terms, and await his decision. He is anxious to stop the
Bible-readers. It is not pleasant to have so much responsibility resting on me.
I have scored several points in the mission’s favor; but one cannot see ahead,
and if I blunder it will be bad for all. I have made up my mind, if he does not
allow the Bible-readers to go on, to refuse to submit to the law. If he brings
me up, I shall claim that the law does not apply."

[His claim would be that the law read "missionaries," which the black men were
not; their title was either " Bible-reader " or " catechist."]

"To-day I have tackled accounts, and Monday begin stock-taking. [Of mission
goods, which take the place of currency in Africa.] You know how I like that."

[Care, feverish days, isolation, were beginning to tell. No one in his house but
black boys.]

" I am getting irritable and cross, and find it impossible to deal with people
and things equably. Things look to me favorable or unfavorable just according to
the humor I happen to be in, and I am in a bad humor pretty much of the time.

" January, 1887. I came up (from mission meeting at Baraka) by Fernan Vaz; saw a
lot of new country and a lot of people needing the gospel. They wanted me to do
something for them, and I promised to take a trip through there. It means a
journey of three weeks; don’t see how I can leave for so long."

[Referring to the possibility of going to America to bring his wife.]

" In the present state of our mission there is no honorable course for me but to
stay on the old craft as long as I possibly can. The Board, the church, and you
would despise me if I were to leave the field now. If I ever go home, I want to
go with nothing to be ashamed of.

" But I will tell you what I have done, and you will vote it about the most
selfish thing I ever proposed. I laid a request before mission which opens the
way for you to come out again in the summer, if you are well enough and willing,
I to go to England for you. I should be absent from Africa nine or ten weeks. It
would be a change that would enable me to stay here two years longer. Until I
hear from you I shall not lift a finger. When I think of the comforts and
friends that surround you, inviting you out to this land of bush and mosquitoes
to relieve my loneliness seems unvarnished selfishness.

"January 26. Ogula is cook and very faithful, only he wants to cook twice as
many things and twice as much of each as I can eat. It is the time of green corn
and inkula nuts, and there are sour-sops; altogether, I fare sumptuously every
day. Evenings at Kangwe are the most lonely, when mosquitoes make it impossible
to read or write, and I can only walk the floor and think. But don’t worry; I am
not going to die of homesickness in a hurry.... To leave work here for personal
comfort would be little less than treason. My health is provokingly good.

" Holland sends me some beautiful plates and drawings; says he has an article in
the printer’s hands describing three new species and three hitherto undiscovered
females. I am still finding a few new things.

" February. One good sign is the number of books sold. I sell Scriptures almost
every day, often to strangers. Sometimes men from down-river bringing food will
buy two or three books at a time, evidently for other people. There must be from
one to two hundred people learning to read on this river now.

"April. Last month took a trip of eight days down-river to Lake Avanga, on the
south side of the Ogowe — a narrow lake running inland ten miles and containing
ten or twelve towns of Nkamis, Akeles, and Fang. I was the first missionary who
ever visited them. Came home by way of the small river. In all parts of our
field I found a fairly encouraging state of affairs.

" In one respect this was the worst trip I ever made. I thought I knew about
mosquitoes before, but all I have ever seen is nothing to that trip. At Asyuka,
where I slept two nights, after dark it was impossible to sit. I left my supper
half eaten and fled to the street, where I walked till bedtime. The thickest
clothes seemed no protection. If I sat down for a moment near a lamp, literally
hundreds would be biting me. When I stirred them up, it was not mosquitoes I
saw, but a swarm like bees. One night at Longw they got into my net. I fought
them till I was tired, then fell asleep and let them go ahead. If I did not find
two hundred mosquitoes full of blood in that net, then I cannot guess. Even by
day, if I walked in the bush and stopped a moment, my legs would be covered. The
people say the great quantity of obbos that have gone to waste in the bush this
year is the cause of their numerousness.

" The big question now is, what to do with these crowded communions. The strain
on the nerves of having all these people about is something fearful. They are
quiet and orderly, but there is danger of abuses growing out of such gatherings.
I must divide and hold communions in different districts. But there are no
buildings, and it would mean long absences from Kangwe, and here is a school
requiring constant oversight. I don’t know what to do with it all. I feel like
running away and getting from under the responsibility. The very success of the
work makes me feel utterly insufficient. But enough of whining.

" Am sorry B does not want to come back and live with black people.’ We could
catch butterflies, and shoot squirrels and big birds, and go in the boat. In
going about from place to place, you will need to be careful, not so much of his
health as of his manners. People often act as if spoiling children were a
virtue. I say this, not that you do not know it, but to show you that I realize
the difficulties of your position.

"May. We get, on an average, one mail a month. I have waited a week now for
American mail. I give it up, and start tomorrow for a trip to the lakes. I don’t
feel like writing. Things are just as they were when I wrote last. The water of
the Ogowe is still flowing. I suppose each day it is new water that passes, but
it looks much like the same old water; and so of everything else.

" Later. This morning was dull and heavy, the beginning of dry season, and I
felt in sympathy. This afternoon the sun has come out, I have bought a nice
piece of fresh hippopotamus meat, caught a new species of butterfly, and feel in
better humor.

" Should you decide to meet me in England, I will leave to you the business of
laying in a stock of provisions. You can choose better than I. Get the best
American provisions going. We are nearly out of everything. In a month or two I
shall have nothing but fresh herring two years old. My meals take from three to
five minutes."

[Having heard that Mrs. Good will come to England in August, he arranges for the
meeting.]

"May 24.... Now those are my plans, and (D. V.) I will carry them out to the
letter, so you may know what to depend upon.

"Another matter has been a subject of much meditation and anxiety, and I now
submit it to you for decision. I shall act on your advice if I get it in time.
After you left I was very careless of my personal appearance, and neglected to
shave. As the result, the hair has grown all over my face until I do not believe
my own wife would know me. What is to be done with that beard? It is a great
convenience in my bachelor life, as it completely conceals the fact that I have
on neither collar nor necktie; but of course when you come back such unworthy
subterfuges must be given up. What — shall I do — with — this — beard? Write —
telegraph!

"The music came all right, and will be enjoyed when you get back; but I feel too
much like the Jews beside the waters of Babylon to care for music now.

" June. Last week enrolled thirty-two inquirers in Wambalia alone. In far-off
Lake Ogemwe, where I have been only once, and that nearly two years ago and
found the people in blankest ignorance of everything spiritual I am told many
want to become Christians, through the influence only of Christians who have at
different times visited in the towns. I shall strain a point to visit them
before communion....

" You could never guess what I have gone through to-day and how exhausted I am
after it. Actually, I cleaned house! Let me tell you how I did it. I took my
writing-table into my bedroom, shut myself in, called the boys, and told them to
take everything out of the parlor, clean, and put back again. Twice during the
afternoon I looked in to see that they were working, and really, now it is over,
I am not as fatigued as I thought I should be, and the room looks well, too;
only it will take a week or so to find where anything is.... When at last (if I
am spared) I get aboard ship and her head sets north, I shall give myself up to
the anticipation of our meeting. Till then may God keep us, and may we meet to
part no more." By instructions from the Board, Mr. Good went to Paris in
September and held an interview with officers of the Protestant missionary
society. The result was a promise from them to send three teachers to the
mission as soon as possible, and also commissioners to look over the Ogowe field
with a view to possible acceptance of it in the future. In this interview the
question of wine-drinking was one of the most delicate to be introduced. "We
missionaries are all as a matter of course teetotalers. It was with fear and
trembling that I suggested the matter.... They admitted that the drink sold to
the natives would ruin them, and that, as Christians, we were right in
abstaining for the sake of weak brethren, and they promised that the teachers
employed should have the matter laid on their consciences."

After an absence of three months and twelve days, Mr. Good was again at his post
in the mission, and his report for the year begins with expression of
thankfulness for the health and safe return of his family, and, "above and
better than all else, the Holy Spirit has been with us and wrought a great work.
The church has doubled numerically, and, I think, has fully doubled its
strength."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 7: 07   EVENTS IN RAPID EVOLUTION
========================================================================

Chapter 7 EVENTS IN RAPID EVOLUTION 1888― October, 1890

SUCH relations were now established between the Board of Foreign Missions in New
York and the Societe des Missions Evangeliques that in the spring of 1888 four
men were sent from Paris to the Gaboon Mission in the capacity of teachers and
mechanics. These were intended as forerunners of ordained men who should
ultimately carry the gospel where French explorers had gone on the Upper Ogowe.
The colonial authorities were gratified by their arrival, and at Kangwe they
were joyfully received. One of these French teachers soon had a school of sixty
boys; another was able to take charge of the station in Mr. Good’s constant
absences among the towns. " So," he wrote, " if God gives me and my family
health to hold on till these men get the work in hand, and expected recruits be
sent from Paris and also get the language, that for which I have been working
nearly five years will have been accomplished. What I shall do after that, or
what will be done with me, does not trouble me, and I have given the matter
little thought. For the present my work is here, to guide this flock and
gradually accustom them to their new shepherds, so that they may follow them and
not be scattered when they hear their strange voice.

" A few weeks ago I received a call from Herr Kundt, who has lately been
exploring back of Kameruns. Five or six days from Batanga he passed the
mountains and found himself on a high, grass-covered table-land twenty to
twenty-five hundred feet above the sea, apparently healthy and densely peopled
by, as he thought, branches of the Fang nation. Here, it struck me, is our
field. We could make Batanga our base and reach this interior table-land. But
would Germany allow us to work there untrammeled? If we were to promise to teach
German at Batanga, is it possible that restrictions would be laid on what we
might undertake in the interior I If we are to be prevented from entering such
open doors, I shall feel that the Christian nations have be come the worst
enemies of Christianity."

Here, though he did not know it, was struck the key-note of a new departure
which was to cost him toil and sacrifice, yea, his own life also, while across
his grave an outpost of Christianity would be planted one step forward towards
the heart of Africa. Of the years of the Great Awakening in the Ogowe, 1888 was
signally reaping-time. Ninety-four persons were promoted from inquiry class into
the church, and about four hundred were under instruction for baptism. No one
knew so well as the missionary, who went himself in and out of their
forest-hidden villages, in what wicked surroundings these Christians lived. "My
wonder is that any stand." But even in his conservative judgment, they stood the
test. "A change has taken place in hearts, and is taking place m communities,
which is nothing less than a miracle. Where this work has been firmly rooted the
people are slowly and painfully struggling up to a better life. The field is
dead ripe." The last of Kangwe mass-communions was held in March. The
hundred-miles-long parish was then divided into three sections, and in June
there were three session meetings instead of one, three sets of inquirers
instructed instead of one, and the missionary held communion successively at
Kangwe, twenty miles below at Wambalia, and at Igenja, fifty miles down-river.
Now those who had never been to Kangwe saw the Lord’s Table, for the first time
in history, spread in their wilderness. The white cloth and silver were brought
in the boat, carefully wrapped; and from the decorum of that Table and the
reverence which surrounded the sacred emblems there went forth an influence
solemn and wholesome into the lawless bush. The people of Wambalia and Igenja
began building chapels with their own hands, and the next step would be
organization of churches in these towns. The three years’ revival was not
followed by sudden coldness. Steady accessions of believers continued through
the fourth year. At the end of 1889 there had been " almost no cases of
deliberately going back to the world "; while " a good many had fallen into
sin," repentance was hopeful of " all but one or two." Could more be reasonably
expected of Africans at this stage of recovery from wild heathenism?

Visitation of his flock required the missionary’s absence from home half the
time, yet six weeks of the summer (1889) were consumed in a tour on the sea
coast, acting on a visiting committee for the mission, to Batanga and to inspect
several fields in charge of African helpers. The report of this tour is
characteristically thorough and clear. At Bata: " As communion had been held, I
confined myself to an examination of the condition of the church. Called session
together and went over with them the roll of members." There follows in detail
the number in "good standing," men and women separately counted, those
"suspended," " awaiting discipline," " excommunicated," deaths, dismissals, and
inquirers. The chapel is reported on; its capacity, " boards of the floors hewed
from trees in the forest." The fact is noted that it was built by Bata people
themselves, who, now that it is too small, propose to rebuild. " All these
northern churches have shown a good deal of pluck in building for themselves,
but I find that material and work are given mostly by a few. Collections are
taken up only once in three months. I urged monthly collections, and tried to
show them that if all would help they could not only build a church of which
they might be proud, but afterwards could easily contribute ____ ’s salary, and
he could then be made their pastor." The Sabbath audience and Sunday-school pass
under analysis. The latter " left a great deal to be desired; singing all
through was poor." Lack of a Bible-reader is commented upon, as well as the
eldership, on both the spiritual and material sides. Of one, " He is the ablest
man I met on the coast," and his occupation and social standing are defined.
Exact location of the church, its environment and reach, are discussed and the
summing up is made: " Remember how little has been done. This half-educated man
and a [missionary’s] visit once, or at most twice, a year to hold communion.
When one considers the success, he cannot help asking, If there were a man here
to speak the language fluently, full of fire and activity, what hinders that
thousands might be converted in a year? " Reviewing the condition of other
churches, the same thought is uppermost. " I cannot help the feeling that only
faithful work is needed to win the whole country to Christ." But this is no
one-sided reporter who sees only what he has gone to see. A disorderly session
is faithfully described: " They would get into angry dispute about nothing;
would all talk at once; I had to reprove them sharply." The offenses of
suspended members are enumerated in no euphemistic terms: " Several for
adultery, two for keeping slaves, a few for trading in rum, whipping their
wives, or fighting, two for taking dowry for daughters. The fact that the last
is regarded an offense by the church indicates a tremendous advance."

Characteristics of people in different localities are discriminated. At one
place " they are proud and difficult to manage; on the other hand, they are
energetic and aggressive." At Batanga Mr. Good saw the explorer Kundt again, and
learned all he could of the interior table-land.

" If we were only ready to send some one in to look over that country and get
the language! But of course the first step is to occupy Batanga. By that time a
road doubtless will have been cut through the coast forest belt; then, at least,
we ought to follow and give the gospel to those multitudes.... Until I must
return to America, my work is cut out for me in the Ogowe. In all I have said I
have no wish to suggest myself for any part of that work; but this field has
kindled my enthusiasm, and I long to see it occupied by men who will make it a
success."

Among those whose names are associated by all the world with Africa, Bishop
Bannington is the man whom our missionary most resembled. Very unlike Hannington
in the circumstance of birth into a home of elegance and wealth; inferior to
Hannington in social training, in ardor and expression of spiritual life; his
superior in early intelligent dedication to God; ecclesiastically at opposite
poles ― there was between the two men a marked likeness of natural gifts and
traits. Had they met they must have been congenial friends. When the American
boy was on his second term at Glade Run Academy, the English curate, nine years
his senior, went to his first missionary meeting, and "was made to speak, much
against my will, as I know nothing about the subject and take little interest in
it." Both went to Africa in 1882.

Taking up a sketch of the bishop’s life, sentences here and there are accurately
appropriate to our young American. Of Hannington’s characteristics, so of
Adolphus Good: "Love for his mother, fondness for nature, great courage for
exploits."

" A born naturalist."

"Enjoyed nothing so much as telling a ludicrous story against himself." At
college: "There was an indefinable charm about this bright, queer, passionate,
fun-loving, unconquerable undergraduate,... a strong undercurrent of genuine
kindliness and genial love for mankind."

"Contempt for canting protestations of superior piety." Of going to Africa: "His
home church sought to dissuade him, saying that his success showed he could
serve God as well in an English [American] parish as in a heathen country." In
African travel: He might "suffer intolerably and yet be the life of the party,
never permitting his companions’ spirits to flag. They testify that he was full
of thoughtful acts and gave them the best and easiest places.... When food
failed and they could not buy and would have starved, his tact succeeded." In
estimate of Africans: "I agree with Livingstone that they are capable of high
culture and compare favorably with the early history of civilized nations."

James Hannington once traveling on a Rhine boat which took fire, his journey was
delayed, and the pilot advised him that he would not be able to keep his
appointment at Cologne. " I have undertaken to be there " was the answer, and
there he was on the day appointed. So sacredly regarded were Adolphus Good’s
appointments, so scrupulously kept, often in the face of extraordinary
obstacles. But there was one masterful element which even his indomitable will
and perseverance could not control. It was the force that conquers every white
man in Equatorial Africa. " Our society," said the agent of the Equitable Life
Assurance Society in New York, " does not wish to receive an application from a
missionary to the West Coast of Africa." From his inspecting tour Mr. Good
returned to the Ogowe with the expressed purpose not to take a furlough to
America before the end of 1890. Two ordained French missionaries had arrived in
his absence, and were at once invited to accompany him on his journeys. Into the
midst of these activities ― traveling, preaching, introducing the strangers to
African life, speaking constantly in Mpongwe, Fang, French (to which he had been
quietly applying himself) ― suddenly that subtle, unconquerable African force
laid its finger upon him. For the third time he was prostrated with hematuric
fever. The ninth day he was carried on a folding cot to a steam launch owned by
a trading-house and hurried downriver, and, as soon as harrowing delays
permitted, after hanging between life and death, out to sea, bound for America.
With the first breath of the Atlantic he opened his eyes; but even after
reaching Liverpool there was yet a sharp conflict before he came off victor over
his enemy.

Mr. Good landed with his family in New York, September 20, and having made his
salutations at the Mission House, his secretary well remembers the
characteristic gesture with which he exclaimed: " Now, the voyage has
straightened me out; give me something to do or I shall die." The ninth day
after, he was giving a missionary talk at Pittsburgh. In his native air the
sallow African color yielded at last, and he rapidly recovered the splendid
health which was natural to him. His finely knit figure, manly bearing, clear
eye, powerful voice, alert activity, simplicity of purpose, devotion to Africa,
made a powerful impression upon the audiences which he addressed from New York
to Nebraska. He was equally adaptable Sunday morning in the pulpit of a wealthy
city church, or in the little hamlet of his boyhood where he held 5 gospel
services ten days consecutively, the ’’ whole countryside turning out to hear
him. . His address before the students of Princeton Seminary was pronounced by
one who rose up, left all, and went with him to Africa, " the most powerful
missionary appeal I ever’ heard." A pastor says: " Older people who heard him
thought once more of the eloquent Duff." His speech from the platform of the
mass-meeting held in connection with General Assembly was referred to six years
after in the same hall at Saratoga. Said the Moderator of that year : " The
impression of that young man, his face bronzed by a tropical sun, his burning
words in behalf of Africa, the audience carried away by his enthusiasm, will
never be effaced from memory." The missionary himself would sometimes have
preferred his boat on the Ogowe to a public appearance. "Was urged to bring me
grip ’ and spend the Sabbath," he wrote his wife. " Hate to do it, for I fear it
is a stylish place.... Am getting awfully tired of this public speaking; long to
go home to wife and baby." At the same time, the society of his peers, in
exchange for a black crew with their poverty of thought, was a mighty
refreshment. He was absorbing information on every hand: examining modern boats
and asking "innumerable questions" with reference to their use on African
rivers; with the aid of a dictionary and a German friend reading two volumes of
travel by Kundt, whom he had met in Africa; and, most satisfactory of all to
himself, aiding the Board to secure three new men specially adapted to the
conditions of the mission. That year Washington and Jefferson College conferred
on him the degree of Ph.D. " I do not deserve it," was his comment.

Dr. Good’s mother died suddenly during his furlough. Thus it was, in the divine
ordering of events, that, of all her sons, the one she gave to Africa called the
physician for her in her last hours and stood by her dying pillow. " This is the
cutting off of one of the last ties," he wrote, " that bind me to native land."

After eleven months in America, Dr. Good sailed for Africa the second time.
Seven years before he had embarked solitary. In 1890 the largest force for
Africa, within the memory of the oldest Presbyterian, set forth together. It was
a glad day. Tried missionaries were returning to their posts reinforced by the
beautiful strength and promise of three young missionaries and their wives. "
But when we are all located, our stations will be only half manned. At least one
will have to be manned with women alone."

One of the new couples, of French-Swiss family, had been selected with special
reference to the Ogowe, and no time was lost in conducting them to Kangwe. A
common incident of steam travel in those parts, the captain’s drunken condition,
created unnecessary risks on the voyage between Gaboon and Kangwe. Dr. Good
stood guard.

" The tide drifted him towards the hospital ship, and he failed to see it; when
he did signal to the engineer, the latter was not in condition to notice it
(drink again), and the captain rushed below and got the engines started barely
in time to prevent a collision. Then we had to run close round a sandy cape; but
as it was bright moonlight, a child ought to have been able to do it. But our
captain was very full and could not see the sand bank. We were within three
ships’ length and running full speed into it, and the captain was standing at
the wheel airily talking about how he would round the point when he reached it.
I said, Captain, you are running ashore,’ and just then we struck, fortunately
in a bed of sand inside the point. Had we struck outside, the steamship Eloby
would have been pounded to pieces before morning by the heavy swells. I did not
retire till I saw the captain safely asleep and the ship in the hands of the
mate and pointing well out from land."

News of the missionaries’ return had run in advance, in the mysterious African
way, and as soon as the Eloby reached the first village where Christians were
living, groups were descried from her deck, standing on the beach and gazing
inquiringly towards the passengers. The ladies’ dresses, and especially the
small white boy, settled all doubts. Then began a pantomime on shore which
became more steadily continuous as villages thickened and progress was nearer
and nearer towards Kangwe. The noise of the steamer’s machinery drowned the
shouts along the river bank;. but plainly there was shouting as black forms:
moved and postured, pointing, beckoning,; dancing, running to call an absent
one, tossing hats and arms in the air. And so, with miles long of joyous,
childlike welcome, they reached Kangwe landing, past midnight of October 27.

" I wish," wrote Dr. Good, " that some of the croakers who do not believe the
African can appreciate what is done for him could have been with us on that
steamer and heard the chorus of voices shouting, as we landed, Akeva Anyamhie!
Akeva Anyamhie! {’ Thanks be to God! Thanks be to God! ’) I have not heard a
prayer since my return that was not full of thanksgiving to God for permitting
us to come back. When we left so suddenly, they confess they were cast down, and
their discouragement was increased by reports, circulated by the Roman
Catholics, that I had died, and, when that was disproved, that I would not
return. I believe we are on the eve of better days than ever before."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 8: 08   ANOTHER STAGE AT KANGWE
========================================================================

Chapter 8 ANOTHER STAGE AT KANGWE November 1890―1891 A VIGOROUS inspection of
his great parish was inaugurated at once after Dr. Good’s return to Africa, and
his unvarnished reports went home to America.

"The state of the work is a good deal mixed; some sad falls; inquirers grown
careless. No denying the fact that in general Christians have decidedly cooled
off, especially in out-of-the-way places. At Nganda: Talked to a small audience
who manifested small interest. At Olamba: A large company of Christians welcomed
us. The gospel has in fact prevailed; the town seems completely transformed. At
Ajumba: Found old Afangananga a mere skeleton, evidently near death. He and his
people have exhausted all their superstitions to work a cure, but have given it
up as hopeless. Now, Afangananga seems disposed to look to God in his extremity,
and who knows but he may be accepted even yet? At Longwe: Nearly all the women
who were enrolled as inquirers have been guilty of adultery. The falling away of
so many can only show that the work there was very superficial. Was glad to get
away from the place, even though it was to enter the blank heathenism of the
lower river.

" In two Syeki towns, people listened well; in a third, listened intently. At
Nenge, people saw my helmet and ran into the bush, having heard a rumor that M.
de Brazza was seizing men to serve as soldiers. Almost impossible to gain their
confidence; and this is where, on a former journey, I supposed I made so
favorable an impression. At Enyonga, hundreds of people believe in the gospel,
but they are depending upon some sinful course for their living and are not
ready to sacrifice all for Christ. Mbora was stationed here in 1889. It has been
trying for him, fighting heathenism single-handed. As a music teacher he is not
a success. I started a tune which they were said to know, but no two sung the
same tune. Result something fearful; but the audience seemed to enjoy it. Spent
the night at Ngumbi; intensely interesting service; people seemed impressed with
the folly of their superstition. On the whole, encouraging and discouraging
features are about equally divided."

Ten were baptized at the first communion. Given, mere babes in Christian
knowledge; added, the African temperament; leave them unshepherded for a
twelvemonth in their native villages, and who could look for better results?
However, the chief cause of declension was not mere neglect, but a revival in
the ivory and rubber trade. Prices trebled in Europe, wages ― to traders,
canoe-boys, house-boys ― went up on the Ogowe, and there was a rush to its upper
sources. The best Christian young men were first to go. Their families left
behind, with the prospect of a year’s separation, beyond reach of the Sabbath or
Christian influence, surrounded by drunkenness, many were swept away by
temptation. " I long for the day," wrote Dr. Good, "when this wretched trade
will be a thing of the past. Then these people will stay at home and till the
soil, and the greatest hindrance to Christianity be removed."

One incident of the autumn visitation must be given with somewhat of fullness.

" After having preached in five villages in the course of the day we came, about
sundown, November 20, to a large town called Nengawaga, sixty miles perhaps from
Kangwe. The people on this part of the river belong to the Orungu tribe, who
occupy the region about the mouth of the Ogowe and to the north. When I stopped
at this village in February, 1889, I was the first white man to come after the
Spanish and Portuguese, who had visited all this region in quest of slaves. I
preached here then, and Mbora has visited and preached at this village two or
three times since. This is all they had heard of the gospel of Christ.

" The old chief, Mbiti, received me cordially, and at once installed me in his
fine large house, which stood at the head of the main street of the village. I
noticed that he was staying in a much poorer house a little on one side, and I
said, ’ Why do you give me the whole of your fine large house! ’ He replied: ’ I
do not go into it any more.’ ’ Why not?’ said I. I dare not. My doctor, or
medicine man, has told me that I must not go into that house again or I will
die; a demon is lying in wait for me with a club, and will kill me if I enter
the door.’ A crowd was standing about, and I turned the laugh on him by
exclaiming in much indignation: ’ So a demon with a club haunts that house, and
you are afraid, but you put your guest there to be killed! ’ He hastened to
exclaim that for me it was safe; the spirit would only be dangerous to him. Then
I said, ’ Do you really believe that!’ He replied: ’It is so. If I even come
near to the door I begin to feel hot.’ ’ You begin to feel afraid,’ I said, and
I tried to explain to him how much fear has to do with sickness and health. For
example, a Fang woman will see her dead husband in a dream, and he will say, I
want you; come join me in the spirit land. Next morning she will say to her
friends, I am going to die; my husband has called me.’ Her people will try to
make her forget it and cheer up, but it is useless. She pines and in a few days
dies. Now,’ I said, ’ your case is similar. If you are afraid of what the
medicine man told you, I would not myself urge you to enter that house. You
might be so worried by your fears that you would lose your appetite and perhaps
sicken and die. But if you had faith in God, and courage to walk into that house
without fear, it would harm you no more than me.’ He admitted the force of all
that I said, but still the old fear remained.

" I tried another tack. ’ Did the medicine man who told you this live in your
town, or does he belong to another family? ’ I knew that these doctors always
come from a distance and have usually no honor among their own people. He came
from down-river,’ said the old chief, ’ Ah, I understand it now.

You are one of the first chiefs in your tribe. You have built a house that is an
honor to your town. This medicine man is jealous of your greatness, and so he
takes this way of making your fine house useless to you.’

" This no doubt true explanation, at least in part, set the old chief and others
to thinking. But when I called the people together for evening service, Mbiti
asked me to hold it, not in the large front room, as I thought of doing, but in
the street, where he could sit near by. He was still afraid to enter his house.
He seemed convinced, but still did not care to take any risk. I have repeatedly
noticed this. A man may be so thoroughly convinced of the folly of his
superstitions that he will neglect them, but he will never throw away his
fetishes or violate a command of a medicine man, until the converting power of
the Spirit has set him free from his bondage of fear.

" I wish you could have seen that meeting. A table was set in the middle of the
street and on it was my lantern. At this I sat, and around me was my audience ―
fifty or sixty people. Many living in the place were away; you almost never find
more than a third of the people of a town at home. It was a brilliant moonlight
night, about an hour after dark. The world seemed asleep and the time a fitting
one for drawing near to God.

" I spoke to them of their neglect of God, their Maker. I reminded them that
they knew God, and their fathers had known him and called him Anyamhie, before
they ever heard of white men. I said, I come not to introduce a new religion,
but to reestablish the religion of your fathers; for they must have once
worshiped God, whose name has come down to you. This high and noble worship you
have given up for foolish superstitions, which are an offense to God and a
disgrace to yourselves.’ I pointed them to the fact that they knew clearly right
and wrong; that they had a book which every one could read without going to
school, written in their hearts by the finger of God; but they had deliberately
violated its precepts.

"All this time the most intense interest ― not a dissenting murmur; only low
exclamations of approval. Tired as I was before I began, I talked an hour. When
that solemn meeting closed, and the last strains of ’ Delay not, delay not! ’
(in Mpongwe, of course) had died away, every one drew a long breath, which was
almost a sigh. For a moment no one spoke. Then the old chief said there could be
no further doubt; it was all clear at every point, and whoever would not believe
now had no head.’ To have seen that audience, you would have thought half at
least would avow themselves on the Lord’s side. To have heard the response of
the old chief, you would have said, He, at least, is certainly converted.’ But,
if you could have seen that same company next day, your heart would have sunk.
The old chief as worldly and superstitious as ever, and most of those who seemed
so impressed careless as before. I have no doubt that meeting will do much
towards breaking down superstition; but one does not work long in Africa till he
realizes that convincing a man is not converting him, and a profound impression
is not the new birth. Men are not converted from such darkness as that of Africa
by a single sermon. The wonder is that they sit by so tamely and allow us to
demolish what has always seemed to them sacred." The death of a young French
teacher, only two months after arriving at Kangwe, cast a dark shadow across the
spring of 1891. " He went to work so quietly, so sensibly, so earnestly, that it
is only to-day we realize what a helper he had already become. As a true
missionary M. Tissot came, and he stood ready to spend his life in the service
of Christ in Africa." A contrasting opinion of another was fully justified: " He
has not come out for life; not for the work of redeeming Africa, but to see how
he likes it." A fourth church was organized this year, at Olamba, with a
membership of forty-three. A class of young men was taught, for a month, at the
station; and uncounted hours were expended on fatiguing revision of the Mpongwe
New Testament and hymn-book.

These volumes were a necessity for the church of the Ogowe. " Our French
successors could not take it up for years.... Will be the most valuable legacy
we can leave them." So sincere was the purpose of the mission in parting with
the Ogowe stations; so true to the broad interests of the Church of God. The
Fang were hard to catch. They constituted perhaps four fifths of the population
on the Ogowe. They seemed impervious to the gospel. Their great tribe was looked
upon as terrible and cruel, even by their cruel neighbors, and they bore a
stigma above all tribes on the river ― cannibalism. Twice a school of six or
eight Fang boys was attempted at Kangwe; but as soon as their cheeks were plump
from plenty of food and their bodies arrayed in a clean cloth, they all with one
accord arose and fled. It was therefore a notable event when a regular, though
informal, Fang service was instituted in 1891. It followed the church service in
Mpongwe on Sunday mornings. "I have for some years spoken the language but all
the time was painfully conscious that what I said was hardly intelligible,
certainly could not be interesting. Now I have been working on their language
and feel that I can really talk to them." In October the first Fang convert on
the river was reported.

" We have several times had young men from that tribe express a desire to become
Christians, but it was always coupled with a request for employment. I knew they
looked upon godliness as a way of gain.’

"But some time ago a middle-aged man who had four wives, nothing in the world to
make and a great deal to lose by becoming a Christian, announced that he wanted
to be saved no matter if he lost all he had in the world. He gave up three of
his wives; that was like giving up half his fortune. Not only that, but he did
something else which took my breath away. Every Fang keeps the skull of his
father in a bark bucket and from time to time makes offerings, sometimes of
blood, at others meat of a goat or fowl, to this skull. This is supposed to
secure the favor of the ancestral spirit. If he goes to trade, or to marry
another wife, or to war, he cooks a feast for his father’s spirit and sprinkles
the skull with redwood powder. This is, in short, the great fetish of the Fang.
All I expected was that converts would cease to make offerings to the skulls;
one could hardly expect them to throw them away. Imagine my surprise when, one
day, Bie gave me the neat basket in which was this precious fetish. This was
something so unheard of among the Fang that it brought on Bie’s head a storm.
There is no danger of violence being done him, but the Fang vocabulary of
abusive epithets has been exhausted by his neighbors in expressing their opinion
of the man who will give up three women and his biety, his great fetish, and for
what? But his stand has had an effect, and quite a number are seriously
balancing the claims of this world and the next. Three young men are inquirers,
and promise well. But it takes some such sacrifice as Bie made to give me
confidence in a Fang."

Bie was genuine. After instruction a whole year, it was said: " Bie has taken up
his cross and follows." In 1893 twelve more Fang were added to the class from
Foula, Bie’s town. A proposition had been sent to the Board of Foreign Missions
from Trinity Church, in Montclair, N. J., while Dr. Good was in America, that
they be allowed to assume his entire salary and regard him as their special
representative in Africa. This arrangement resulted most happily. Dr. Good’s
relation to the Board was in no wise altered thereby, and a particular benefit
has accrued to the church at large; for never before had he allowed himself the
time to write such full, leisurely letters upon general subjects, as he
recognized it his duty to write to the mixed congregation of young and old in
Trinity Church.

He was intolerant of glamour or rose-color in representations of missionary
work, and his former ideas of the usefulness of missionary letters were somewhat
narrow. They were modified by his home visit, so that, while he always had stood
up squarely to the duty of fully informing the Board upon his work, he now went
further, and said to his secretary: " I am coming to realize that we on the
field must assume more of the burden. The church is not awake to the facts of
missions; and though I dislike writing above all things, I shall endeavor to do
my part if you point it out." But, to the end, the best he had to say he said to
the Board and to Trinity Church, and never wrote a line for a newspaper. The
pastor, Rev. Orville Reed, by wish of the session, sends the following testimony
: " The influence upon Trinity Church of these letters was at once apparent.
Foreign missions became real as never before. Hard-headed businessmen, looking
at things from a business point of view, now took a vital and increasing
interest in the work. They became warmly attached to Dr. Good, but also evinced
an increasing interest in all missionary work. Read at monthly concert and then
passed about among the families of the congregation, those letters kept alive
interest, called forth many a gift, and inspired to most hearty prayer for
Africa. "Attachment deepened as the months passed on. The ’ pastor in Africa ’
was included with the pastor at home in the hearty prayers of a devoted people,
and his labors were watched with the deepest interest."

One of the Montclair letters of this period introduces us to neighbors, whose
depredations were frequent.

" Now, I submit, it is hard to preach the gospel in anything like the right
spirit to people who you know have robbed you and are studying how they can do
it again. I find it most difficult to live the gospel of charity and forbearance
and not lay myself open to be cheated at every turn. These Fang like us and
respect us, but their greed is insatiable and their ideas of honesty so low they
cannot resist the temptation to help themselves from what seems our
superabundance.

" Here lies the difficulty in giving the Fang the gospel. Ten dollars in cash
would buy all the worldly possessions of the average Fang man, barring his
wives. Every Fang, on the average, owes for wives already married two or three
times as much as all he possesses. Besides this, he wants to marry some more, no
matter whether he has one or twenty. He never accumulates goods. Cloth is the
principal currency; but few men will be found to have more than ten or twenty
yards in their possession. It goes as soon as bought to pay for some woman.
Where do the hundreds of thousands of yards go? The Fang number perhaps three
millions. Of these only a few thousand get cloth directly from traders. The
others buy it with ivory, rubber, but especially with women. The poor interior
supplies wives to their more fortunate countrymen who have the white man. There
is little polygamy among the poorer interior tribes. While such a system
prevails, and every man keeps before him as his highest ambition the marrying of
at least five wives, the Fang will remain poor.

" Such a man brings his plantains to sell. He sees in the mission store perhaps
a thousand dollars’ worth of goods. Oh, what riches! He learns that when we need
more goods we write home for them. How easy that seems! What great men these
missionaries must be! And where do all their goods come from? They cannot
believe that people in America would of their own free will contribute such sums
to enable us to come out here and teach people who are not even of our own
color. It is, to their minds, pure nonsense. It must be that we have some way of
getting goods without earning them. Often I have been questioned on this point,
and as often as I tried to explain, they have set aside my explanation and
returned to the attack in some other form. Sometimes they try to catch me by
leading questions: ’ Who makes cloth and guns and powder?’ We white men do,’ I
reply. ’ No, you do not. Is it not Anyam [God] who makes these things?’ That
sounds very pious, but wait till you see what he is aiming at. Does not God give
you all these goods you white people sell to us? and they don’t cost you
anything; and why can’t you put the prices down, and why can’t you make us poor
people gifts of cloth, tobacco, etc.?’ Again I go over the whole ground and
explain how white people work for what they have, and goods are given by
Christians in America to enable us to live among them and give them the gospel,
and are not to be given away, else they would soon be finished and the work
stopped. But it is useless. Some shrewd old scoundrel will look up after I am
done and say with a provoking grin:

Now, Good, you know you are lying. You white people don’t make cloth. Only God
could do that. You white people are hard not to be willing to divide with us who
have nothing on our bodies but one small cloth.’

"... While I am preaching they are studying my clothes, and when I am through,
these are some of the exclamations I hear: How finely he is dressed! Look at
that coat; and he is not satisfied with that, but he wears something else under
it. See his shoes and hat, and look at us! Only two yards of cloth on our whole
body! ’ They are disposed to blame God. If he loves us, why has he given white
men so much and us nothing? ’

" Our whole manner of living is a snare to them. Our plain table has on it a
wealth of dishes to a people who eat out of a basket with their fingers, and dip
their soups out of the pot in which they were cooked, using leaves for spoons.
And a bed! What rolls of cloth! That one bed would buy a woman.

" Some will imagine that natives of this country would be impressed by the
sacrifice we make in spending our lives among them. This is the case with the
more intelligent. But to these Fang, fresh from the bush, our life seems one of
luxury and ease.

"Some will suggest that, like Paul, we might be everything to every man, and
live as the people do among whom we labor. But no half-way measure would be
appreciable to these ignorant savages. I presume no one would ask us to reduce
our wardrobe to the native standard, or to sleep on a bed of logs laid together
with the round side up.

" We can only pray God to impress upon these poor grown-up children the fact
that there is something more important than worldly wealth. Meanwhile we must
expect that, while they look upon us as they now do, they will steal. And we
must rejoice with trembling in our spiritual successes. When a man says he wants
to come to the mission and learn about God, we must act cautiously. From the way
we question him you would imagine that we did not want the Fang to become
Christians. We say, What is it you want? ’ I want to live in the mission,’ he
replies. ’What for?’ ’I want to do God’s work.’ You want employment in the
mission so you can get wages!’ ’Yes; but I want to learn about God too.’ Beware!
the man is probably not a convert.

" We have had most of our success among older tribes who have known us long and
well. But I believe the future of our work lies among these hardy and energetic
but fearfully ignorant Fang. There seems to be a beginning already." A packet of
questions was sent to Dr. Good from Trinity Church friends, some of his answers
to which fill the remainder of this chapter. To a general inquiry, he answered:

" The most intelligent Christians here cannot see why they should not have
everything we have. They have no national costume, and every one of them would
like to have clothes just like ours, from hat to shoes, regardless of the fact
that they would be miserable in such dress. One of our elders made me fairly
shudder, some months ago, by appearing at communion in a thick overcoat. He
sweltered in it through a long hot day with a look of supreme contentment. It
was a white man’s coat, and therefore must be right. I suppose I was the only
person in the audience who did not envy him. I saw a young man ready to pay four
months’ wages for a clock, for which he had no use whatever. These are
illustrations of a prevalent evil. An African wants everything he sees.

" A few Christians are in mission employ, and they are discontented and grumble
because their wages will not enable them to live as we live. If we keep their
wages down, they are bitter against us and say we want to keep them down. If we
increase their wages out of proportion to incomes of the people, we put off
indefinitely the day of self-supporting churches. They do not want to see that
day, for they know that any support the churches can give them will be meager
compared with what we furnish. Do not imagine these men are mercenary hirelings.
Most of them are earnest men. But it is hard for them to see why the means of
grace should not be provided without price to the end of the chapter. Great
firmness and wisdom will be needed in dealing with our churches."

Q. " After a self-sustaining church and an educated ministry have been secured,
do you think the church will live and grow without the missionary! "

A, " That is a hard question. Not all the churches established by the apostles
lived and grew. Doubtless this question means, Can the people of Africa maintain
and propagate Christianity, once it is established among them, or are they
essentially inferior to other races, so that they will never stand without
outside support? I believe that, given the same conditions and opportunities we
have, the African will stand morally and intellectually just where we do. But a
people who have been stunted and degraded by thousands of years of heathenism
cannot be transformed at once into such Christians as this question
contemplates. Growth is a gradual process. It will not be in ten or in fifty
years."

[To a question concerning his health.] " Once a month or so I bring myself
thoroughly under the influence of quinine, and so escape fevers."

Q, "Do you not often grow weary and homesick! "

A. " Of course one’s thoughts often turn to friends and scenes in the home land,
and one wishes he could, at least for a little time, annihilate space. But I
believe, since I came to Africa, there has never been a time when, after
balancing the pros and cons I would not rather remain than go home. I do not
mean to say that I like the country or people of Africa as such; that I enjoy
isolation, ill health, living on canned provisions, working where my best
efforts are little appreciated. I could probably have better health, more
amusement, a better time generally, in America, perhaps a more successful
career, regarded from some points of view; but I doubt whether, knowing the
needs of Africa as I do, I could have an easy conscience if I were to run away
from this work. I prefer to stay at my post till the Lord discharges me.
Meanwhile I manage to be fairly comfortable and happy in Africa.

" I have spoken only for myself; but I think nearly all who have come to Africa
as missionaries have felt much as I feel on this subject."

[At the close of 1891.] " Looking at the physical side, I think I can honestly
say that I have worked up to the full measure of my strength. But when I
remember that the success of efforts put forth in the service of Christ depends
absolutely on our spiritual attitude towards him and his work, I am conscious of
shortcomings that amount almost to failure."

Seventy-two persons were admitted to the church this year in the Ogowe.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 9: 09   VISIT OF INSPECTION TO LIBERIA
========================================================================

Chapter 9 VISIT OF INSPECTION TO LIBERIA January — April, 1892 AT the end of
1891 Dr. Good received instructions from the Board to proceed on a tour of
inspection to the Liberia Mission. This had been established in 1833, had been
left without superintendence for a long time, was at present controlled entirely
by colored men, and the Board was in doubt whether it should continue on the old
basis. This was an unattractive task. Dr. Good always suffered from seasickness
on board ship; he knew the Liberian coast was dangerously unhealthy; visitation
of the scattered stations would involve great exertion under a hot sun; there
was no prospect of finding material for a glowing report, but every chance to
antagonize people; and, most of all, it involved separation from his family and
interruption of his Ogowe work for three months. He replied to the Board that he
could not but be grateful for their confidence in him, but the responsibility
involved in the visit to Liberia would be a "load" to carry. " Of course I shall
go, and, if I am spared, endeavor to perform the task assigned me."

Without waiting for adjournment of mission meeting, he was off to Liberia by the
first opportunity in January. In order to make ship connections he was obliged
to go beyond Liberia to Sierra Leone and return; but at whatever port he stopped
there was always something to learn, to investigate, or some piece of business
to transact for the mission. At Kameruns it was the proposition for a sanitarium
to be established, by several missions combining, upon Kameruns Mountain.
Discussing the general subject. Dr. Good wrote to the Board that he thought
furloughs were apt to be wastefully managed. Missionaries in Africa usually took
no vacation until sickness compelled it, whereas if they were expected to spend
a month each year away from their cares, sickness might be saved.

" Seven days in the week and every week in the year is the rule with some of us,
and the only fact that makes it possible to keep it up is that our work is very
varied. Have a mission sanitarium? Yes, if we are required to use it a few weeks
each year; no, if it is only a resort when we are broken down. After malignant
fever, six months, not six weeks, are necessary for restoration, and I would
much prefer going to America, where I could recruit spiritually and mentally as
well as physically, instead of going into the wilderness for a six months’
exile." At Sierra Leone he interviewed persons well informed upon Liberian men
and affairs. He went to the English cathedral and a Mohammedan mosque, and took
a general measurement of moral forces in the country.

Landing at Monrovia, February 11, he spent one month in Liberia, traveling seven
hundred miles on foot or by canoe, and visited every station of the mission,
with one exception. He also visited the Lutheran mission at Muhlenberg.

Everything passes under observation: the condition of Liberia, political,
commercial, agricultural, especially the coffee plantations; the proportion of
Americo-Liberian population to the great majority of uncivilized aborigines;
methods of the Colonization Society; methods, rules, salaries of different
mission Boards. It was some of the time intensely hot; and starting at 6: 30
a.m., once before 3 a.m., in order to take advantage of the tide up June River,
he walked hours together over an uninteresting country. Sabbaths he preaches —
four times one Sabbath. He arrives entirely unannounced, before they have time
to confer or " fix up " accounts, at each minister’s or teacher’s door, now
before seven o’clock in the morning, again at eight in the evening. He makes a
memorandum regarding the extent and value of all mission property and by whom
deeds are held; visits all the schools and examines the scholars, recording the
discrepancy between numbers enrolled and present; notes those who are just
beginning arithmetic, those who drop final consonants in pronouncing, those who
scarcely understand simple English but glibly recite long answers from the
catechism. Acting as eyes for the Board, he reports a teacher who " beats the
scholars more than is warrantable. I told him that he must win the people or be
written down a failure." He marks those ministers who are political candidates,
thereby creating division in their flocks; those who increase their income by a
side business, or whose moral character is under public suspicion; and he notes
the man who " pleased me much by his plain, unaffected way of reading and
leading in prayer." He finds Schieffelin the only place where Presbyterians are
in the majority, and here "we ought to have a minister," but advises the Board
to withdraw from a hamlet of three hundred people, where he discovers three
churches, the Presbyterian weakest of all. His ear is open to requests on every
side, but he distinguishes between wishes and needs: " ___ wants me to recommend
windows and seats for the church. I cannot recommend the latter." At ___ they "
sadly need books." Having taken leave of a station, he found it convenient to
make a second, sudden reappearance, whereby his first impressions were confirmed
or revised. There was only one man who made any success of evading the keen-eyed
visitor. " Loafed about the place, learning but little; seemed busy all day and
into the night, but I could not make out what he was doing. Crowds of people
come and go, and it cannot all be church business. He was not communicative. I
have the impression that, though professing cordiality, he was glad to get me
off." This errand to Liberia was executed in a temper which made his visit
agreeable to the African brethren. His energy might give them a cyclone shock,
but they appreciated his fairness and friendliness. His report was temperate,
and more faithfully presented the situation to the Board than if they had seen
Liberia themselves. Liberians were compared with other Africans, not with
Englishmen. " Why should it be expected that freed slaves and their children
should make an unblemished success of this business of self-government, which
the first cities in the United States find so difficult?... On the whole,
Liberia seems to be getting on her feet. I could easily criticize, but knowing
Africa as I do, I feel more like praising." Emphatic praise was accorded to the
public sentiment against use of spirituous liquors. " Liberian churches
discipline for drunkenness, and only white men handle liquor in Monrovia." On
setting out for Liberia, Dr. Good had promised his little son to try to return
by his birthday, April 12; but it was already the 3d when Eloby was reached, and
there yet remained a boat journey of two hundred and forty miles. Here the news
met him that his wife was ill. Taking a canoe, he rowed all night up the Moonda
River and walked across country to Gaboon to save a few hours. All in vain. He
waited five days to catch a boat for Cape Lopez; thence took a trader’s launch
which dropped him at Kangwe at midnight of April 12, and he entered the
sick-room with the step and voice of a practised nurse.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 10: 10   ON TO THE INTERRIOR
========================================================================

Chapter 10 ON TO THE INTERIOR January— August, 1892 WITH each year the course of
the colonial government added something to the strength of conviction in the
mission that their only way out was by the transfer proposed. Dr. Good’s
position was clear. The transfer must take place:

1. To save Christians and the prosperous churches in the Ogowe from falling to
Roman Catholics. American missionaries were liable to be ultimately expelled
from the river; unless evangelical Frenchmen could take possession of their
stations, Jesuits would.

2. French Protestants had decided to come to Congo Franais; rival stations were
not to be thought of.

3. Economy of mission funds demanded it. French schools in the Ogowe could be
conducted at half the cost of American schools, because granted a much larger
subsidy; government also discriminated heavily in their favor in custom duties.
The Board of Foreign Missions in New York had for many months seriously weighed
the question of their duty when the transfer should be consummated. A section of
the mission force in Africa would then be set free for new undertakings. Where
did wisdom and the providence of God point as the proper location of this force!
As usual, Dr. Good’s views were constructive. He saw a great stretch of inland
savagery reaching up to the very door-stone of the mission. There was the place
to begin. " While we hold the coast we have the key to a great interior which we
ought to open or give somebody else the key." The work "grandly begun" on the
coast could not be abandoned, and it pointed to the next step, eastward from
Bata and Batanga. " In such a work we ought not to act as if we were trading
horses, but rather see what will, in the long run, most hasten the coming of the
kingdom." As to distance: " We cannot expect the interior to come closer to the
coast than one hundred miles. To reach Stanley Pool is a land journey of twenty
days over fearful country." At the opening of 1892, mission requested Dr. Good,
should the Board endorse and authorize the same, to select an associate and make
a trip of exploration into the country adjoining Batanga district on the east,
with reference to a future occupation in those parts. At this point the Africa
Mission takes up afresh the old cry which had been raised by voice after voice
from the beginning of its history:

" If the providence of God [Wilson, 1843] shall continue to smile on this
mission, we may hope that Christianity will have a favorable door of entrance in
the interior." " Before a mission can be established in the interior [Report,
’49] the acquaintance of intermediate people must be made. The line of
communication must be in the hearts of the people." " Ten years have passed
[Bushnell, ’54] since we first came in view of these Ethiopian mountains,...
with feeble ranks we have been detained upon these lowlands. Oh, when shall we
be permitted to unfurl the banner of Immanuel there? " Ogden’s dying words (’61)
had never been forgotten: " Who will go? — will you go? — who will go to preach
on the mainland? " " We looked up the lovely Benito [George Paull, ’64] to the
great blue mountains beyond, and thought of the plenty, plenty people’
waiting... to catch some tidings of salvation. We are encouraged to hope that
ere many years those dark hilltops shall shine with the glory of a brighter
dawn." " It is the country far back from the sea [Report, ’74] that our mission
must consider. There dwell the myriads of Africa. Every door that may be opened
by Providence inland should be at once entered."

Doors had been entered from time to time; some after opening had closed again;
now the mission was looking eastward and asking whether again they saw the door.
At Kangwe Dr. Good awaited marching orders from the Board; but the expected
instructions were mysteriously delayed. Mail succeeded mail, and no reference to
the all important subject. Had their plans collapsed? With each passing week the
rains approached so much the nearer, when exposure in travel must be
proportionally increased. With soldierly obedience, he would not stir from his
post to anticipate orders by a day. He plunged into work industriously. All
spare hours, early, late, while waiting for other people, now and again a steady
pull for a week, he bent over the Mpongwe New Testament which was begun two
years before. At length, as the last line of revision was complete, the
long-awaited letter came, June 16. It had been mailed three months before.

Arrangements were at once made for proceeding to Batanga, his family to be left
meanwhile at Gaboon. A substitute at Kangwe was obtained in the missionary from
Talaguga, which station was formally turned over to the French in the following
month.

Dr. Good preached as usual on the last Sunday, taking no formal farewell of his
people. The journey on which he was bound could at present be treated only as an
experiment, and he expected, for shorter or longer, to come again to Kangwe. In
truth, the books he left standing on their shelves he never touched again. The
road on which he was started now would never lead back to the scene of those
seven rounded years of manful toil; its goal lay far north, in a region
untrodden by white man’s foot. On the Fourth of July — auspicious day — the
little party, all unknowing, looked their last towards their home, buried among
feathery palms and orange trees, as the boat turned southward on the
oft-traversed river course. Ten years’ experience in Africa forbade this step
should be taken lightly; no one more sensible than Dr. Good himself what
hardship and risk were certain, how much might he involved. From this time forth
there appears in his letters, always marked by freedom from hackneyed pious
expressions, an unwonted note of gravity which repeats itself, with simple
urgency, again and again: " Praying that we may all be divinely guided in this
new enterprise." Yet it was with ample courage, and not without some
exhilaration, that the intrepid missionary turned down the Ogowe page to open
upon a new chapter.

Plans had not been deferred until the time to start. In looking for a mission
location, he proposed to avoid the German government road, with the chance of
becoming involved in government conflicts with natives. He determined to travel
with the fewest carriers possible, not only to save expense, but because every
additional man would increase the danger of a breakdown; the sickness of even
one carrier would delay the whole party. In response to a charge from the Board
to use caution: " I shall try to have a [missionary] companion, and shall
prepare as carefully against all emergencies and dangers as I know how; but the
emergency against which I shall most carefully provide is failure." He ventured
no prophecies. "It is difficult to speculate about fields one has never seen. A
road is hard or easy according to a man’s idea of what a hard road is. The
German gave a rather dark picture of the road for the first seven days; but, as
I looked at him, I decided in my mind that he was not a man of great physical
endurance, and his picture may be too dark."

West Coast men are not, like the Zanzibari, trained carriers; they are not equal
to a load as heavy by twenty pounds, and are afraid to enter the country of a
strange tribe. The greatest vexation which Dr. Good encountered this summer was
in securing his few necessary guides and carriers. Trade goods, which, instead
of money, would purchase food, must be transported; the weight of every article
had to be calculated, anything not absolutely essential being rigidly excluded;
and then, had it not been for four boys from the Ogowe who could be implicitly
depended on, men could scarcely have been found for even the seven loads. When,
on the sixteenth day after leaving Kangwe, all was ready at Batanga, and none of
his brethren, though willing, was thoroughly available for the journey, Dr. Good
started alone at the head of his modest caravan. In this preliminary
exploration, which lasted twenty-three days, he reached a point about one
hundred miles inland. No report of it was offered to the mission, because the
population found was not sufficient to justify opening stations on this route.
Trinity Church, however, received a letter which, besides details peculiar to
this instance, unfolds several features common to all exploration in Equatorial
Africa:

" Now a word as to this country into which I am about to lead you. The Batanga
people live on the sea shore. Just back of them are the people called here
Mabeya, Dibea, by some Osyeba, but who call themselves Kwasiwo. Their towns are
within ten or fifteen miles of the beach. Among Batanga people the gospel has
taken a strong hold. Among these Mabeya scarcely anything has been done; but the
devil has been busy among them, and many of them are slaves to drink.

" When we had passed the last Mabeya town we found ourselves in a virgin forest,
through which we had to travel from sixty to eighty miles before we reached the
inhabited interior. This meant that food must be carried for from five to eight
days, according to the rate of march. There are, of course, no roads, only
narrow winding paths; no bridges over streams, no swamps filled up, no hotels,
only low rude sheds under which travelers may sleep on beds of poles with a fire
on each side, but affording little protection from rain. The natives dislike
climbing hills, and so these roads are fairly level; but, unfortunately for
white men, they do not have the same dread of mud and water. We had hardly
gotten into the forest when the path dropped down into the bed of a stream,
which it followed for a hundred yards or more.

" We tried each day to start soon after six in the morning. By half -past ten or
eleven we stopped to eat, and by three or four in the afternoon everybody was
tired enough to stop for the night. Beyond this there is little to say of our
tramp through the forest. There were a few birds in the trees, usually too high
to be shot. We saw a few deer, or rather antelope; but I got only one chance for
a shot, and that time my gun missed fire. There were many traces of elephants
and occasionally of buffaloes, also wild hogs. We saw many monkeys, some of them
very large; but the trees were so enormously high that shot would not reach
them, and the forest was always so dark that it was impossible to shoot with a
rifle with any accuracy. Even where trees were neither very high nor very thick
it seemed unaccountably dark. Most of the time the sun was clouded, and the
effect was as if twilight had already fallen, even at noonday. Even when the sun
came out, it seemed to have no power. In fact, African sunlight is in some way
of an inferior quality. As Mr. Stanley has said, it is more like moonlight than
sunlight.

" On Tuesday, the sixth day, about 2 p.m., suddenly the forest grew light before
us, and a few moments later we came into a clearing close to a small Bulu town
called Bieti. Here for the first time in seventy-five miles we were able to see
out and look about us. We were well received by the people, according to their
ideas of hospitality. The old chief was very friendly, and gave me a fowl and my
people plantains, although food was scarce. After some time a house was
provided, and glad was I to be under a roof, even if I could hardly stand erect
under it. I had known that the Bulu people were closely allied to the Fang; but
I soon found that, while many words were the same in the two languages, the
differences were so great that little that I said was intelligible to them. How
was I to preach to them — for preach I must? Our guides had told them that we
are not traders but teach people the words of God, and the whole town was
anxious to hear what was our message. They all came together, and the palaver
house was packed with men, women, and dogs. Fires are always kept burning in
these houses, and the smoke was very affecting, often moving one to tears; but
it had to be borne. I talked in Fang, which my Mabeya people understand a little
better than the Bulu people, so they helped me to explain what I could not
express clearly. But they added a good deal to what I said, being anxious to
display their knowledge, and I was not quite sure that what they said was always
orthodox.

" Among the Bulu I was on new ground and had to begin by finding out what they
call God, and I got a new name for the Creator of all things — Nzambe. The
Mpongwe call God Anyambie; the Benga and Batanga people, Anyambe; the Mabeya,
Njanibe; the Fang, Nzam; and here the Bulu call him by a name evidently related
to the others and yet different enough to be confusing.

" A scene here was repeated daily for the next two weeks. I wished to impress
upon them the truth that God is not far from any of us and can hear us when we
pray. So I explained the meaning of prayer, and requested them all to keep quiet
while I rose and began. At first there was only a little noise, but three or
four shouted out, ’Keep quiet! ’ To make matters worse, the Mabeya shouted,
’Shut your eyes!’ So unusual a performance convulsed some with laughter. Some
mothers thought closing the eyes was an important matter, and so held their
hands over their children’s eyes. Of course the youngsters screamed. Some women
became frightened and bolted for the door, laughing and screaming; and the dozen
or more dogs that had been asleep around the fires, roused up by the unusual
excitement, began to bark. I need hardly add that by this time the prayer was
effectually interrupted.

" At Akok, the village of Ndum, we spent a most interesting Sabbath. The chief
killed a large sheep, and did his best to make us comfortable. People came in
from the surrounding country, and I preached, or tried to, rather, to a large
audience. I kept my notebook in hand constantly, and set down every deviation
from the Fang which I noticed. Sabbath morning I got on fairly well, and Sabbath
evening the people encouraged me by declaring that they understood everything I
said. Some of them stood around and questioned about what I had preached till
late at night. One thing especially pleased me. When I said I must go on the
morrow they seemed sorry, but made no effort to hinder me. On the whole, I liked
the Bulu. They resemble the Fang but are more civil and humane. I may be
mistaken, but it seemed to me they had the good qualities of the Fang and not
all of their faults. But I must add, they could lie almost as well as Fang."

Dr. Good tried to find out how far north of the Campo River he was, and as a
specimen of the difficulty in getting geographical information is the variety of
answers he received: " We don’t know." " It is very far. No people live between
here and the Campo. There are no roads." " It is one day’s journey." "It is ten
days’ journey." "It is three or four days’ journey." "The country between here
and the Campo is inhabited by Fang; some of their towns are quite near." " The
country between us and the Campo is inhabited by Bulu, but none of them live
within three or four days’ journey."

Sabbath, on the rapid march home, was spent in the edge of the forest. "What a
Sabbath! It rained most of the day. My hut was so low I could not stand in it.
The people were noisy and offensively curious, but withal meant well. I could
make myself understood, and many seemed interested. They begged me to come soon
again, and were sure, if I would stay and preach to them, they would all become
Christians. Poor people! How little they realize the strength of the chains with
which the devil has bound them! " In the interval between his first and second
exploring journeys, and while mustering carriers again, Dr. Good was copying his
Mpongwe manuscript with exceeding care for the diacritical marks, as it would be
put in type in America by printers of course ignorant of the language. The Board
having asked for suggestions from all missionaries regarding the " Manual,"
about to be reissued, he addressed to them some of his matured views on
practical points. They related largely to the subject of expense. In regard to
voting in mission meeting, he urged that lay missionaries, men and women alike,
should vote upon all questions; that employees of the mission should be
appointed missionaries " after long, approved service "; wives should be
"associate missionaries," without a vote but with a voice in mission affairs
whenever they chose. " To refuse the vote to laymen is to wrong men and women
who, in all but ordination, are the equal of their ministerial brethren."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 11: 11   PIONEERING IN BULULAND
========================================================================

Chapter 11 PIONEERING IN BULULAND August 1892― January 1893 ON setting out for
the Bulu country the second time, Dr. Good wrote: " My plan has never had in it
anything grand or romantic. If I can this year find a good site for our first
station, and assure myself of a large population beyond, I do not see the need
of doing more at present." This journey was begun August 30, and ended October
4. It had been thrown forward into all the disadvantages of the rainy season by
delay in transmission of the letter of instructions. No one would have regarded
Dr. Good as recreant to duty if, placing the responsibility upon that delay, he
had postponed his journey until the good weather of December. But in January
mission would convene to take action upon all its affairs for the ensuing year.
Unless his report were laid before that meeting, no recommendations could be
made, and the advance movement might be retarded a whole year. Such wastefulness
of time, especially in uncertain Africa, was not to be thought of; therefore,
into the bush without hesitation! The start was south from Batanga, avoiding the
forest belt, then east and southeast, passing through Mabeya villages and farms,
to the Lobi River. Twenty-five miles of tramping brought them to the most
westerly Bulu town; thence, by a forest path of twelve miles, they emerged upon
a line of towns called Kokwa, which suggested itself as an excellent location
for a Bible-reader. "He could reach thousands of souls within a day’s journey."
All the Bulu encountered the first week belonged to the same clan, and there are
over one hundred clans. The vicissitudes of travel were varied. Several nights
were spent in the forest, " sleeping with nothing but a mosquito net of
cheese-cloth between me and all out of doors, and I felt no ill effects." Two
blankets at night were occasionally necessary, and it was rarely hot except at
noon. But a twenty miles’ march in tropical rain, "sometimes pouring down till
the air seemed full of water," would be followed next day by pouring rain again,
and for days following by "rain pouring as usual." There were no roads, only
crooked African paths worn trough-shape by water, their center six inches deeper
than the sides. Bridgeless streams must be crossed, often every mile or two, or
bogs several hundred yards wide, through which our pioneer went barefoot. " I
have read what Stanley says against a white man’s letting natives see his bare
feet, and I consider it all nonsense. The African has a great deal more respect
for a white man who can take care of himself than for one who has to be carried
like a baby." Near the towns constant obstructions, such as fallen tree trunks,
which Africans always go around, ― never remove for the public benefit, ― made
fearful work for carriers. On either side, the narrow path was often lined with
a dense growth of weeds and grass, always wet with dew, if not rain, till ten
o’clock in the forenoon, and the white traveler, disadvantaged by his clothing,
was soon wet to the hips. Worst of all, the paths, habitually dropping along the
course of streams for a mile or more at a time, required constant walking in and
out of cold water, the misery increasing at every step from sand and quartz
pebbles which gathered in the shoes.

Occasionally a town banded together, refusing food unless at exorbitant prices.
Then the caravan fell back upon rice, which had been brought in their loads for
such emergencies. Now and then a churlish chief offered no welcome, or promised
them robbery and murder at the next town on the road. At one place the question
of plundering their loads was openly discussed, but abandoned at the suggestion
from their own elders that the white man must have a " powerful fetish " or he
would not venture so far from his people. " I could not help thinking how easily
they could take our all if they had the courage." But though at times surrounded
by hundreds of armed men, they generally met a friendly reception. The only arms
in the party were Dr. Good’s old single-barreled shot-gun, loaded with
bird-shot, and a revolver which he carried out of sight, and displayed, with
apparent indifference but a wholesome effect, on one occasion only. It was
enough. The fame of the " small gun " was thence forward their avant-coureur.
Scores of times he was asked to show it, but always sternly refused, thereby
heightening the mystery. This he called a "silly ruse" which might answer for
once, but would not do when the white man became a familiar object. It would be
safe to recognize the limitations to exploring among unknown savages. "
Establish one station; from this explore for the next, choosing the best seasons
and going only one hundred miles at a time."

Ten miles a day was a " hard " march, but nearing home a "tremendous" march of
twenty-five miles was once covered. As Dr. Good proceeded from town to town, a
crowd of several hundred followed at his heels, adding to his natural fatigue
and anxiety the loud jangle of their untamed voices. He laid a mental tax upon
himself by continually watching for new Bulu words and idioms, which were
straightway transferred to the little note-book in his side pocket. In searching
for an appropriate station site, some towns which had been recommended (by
Africans) proved disappointing. True, Minkale was more than two thousand feet
above sea-level, surrounded by mountains from three to four thousand feet
higher, with a bracing air; but it was too isolated. The group of seven towns on
the watershed between the Kribi and Campo rivers had friendly people, and an
elevation of two thousand feet, but was too far from the sea. The valley of the
Muile, " fertile and level as a Nebraska prairie," was densely populated, but
promised to be unhealthful. Biyemyem was a town a mile long and would be a fine
center as regarded population, but lacked wood and water. There was a right
place.

" I was especially attracted by a long line of almost continuous villages called
Nkonemekak, where the people seemed to swarm on all sides. This line partly
encircled the base of a, hill which struck me as an admirable site. The
elevation of the town was only sixteen hundred feet, but this hill is two
hundred feet higher. Here is, in my opinion, the site for our first interior
station. By the crooked path we must travel, the distance from Batanga is not
less than seventy miles; but this is the first large center of population we met
with on elevated ground, and the largest within one hundred miles of the sea.
This point can be reached from the west by two or three different roads, and we
can go eastward by two roads. This is an important consideration in a country
where any chief who imagines he has a grievance may close the road against us.
Food is reasonably abundant, though not very cheap. I found the people ready to
listen to the gospel wherever I stopped long enough to preach." The method by
which the minds of those wild Bulu listeners were brought into contact with the
divine message, which for the first time was conveyed to their race, is pictured
in one of the letters to Trinity Church.

" I never failed to announce that I was not a trader. I went out of my way to
prove this. Many times, when invited to go and see the house full of ivory of
some chief, I really wanted to go; for I had often heard there were houses full
of ivory in interior towns, and was curious to know whether this meant a room
with ten tusks in it or fifty or one hundred. But I was being so carefully
watched that if I even went to look at their ivory the news would follow me
wherever I went, and the impression produced would be that I was a trader in
disguise, spying out the riches of the land. So I always pretended utmost
indifference to questions of trade. At times I would go into a long explanation
of how only a few white men were traders, and these not the greatest men with
us. I would disgust them especially by telling them that my father was a farmer,
and before I learned the work of the Book’ I myself hoed corn and potatoes.
Among them such work is only performed by women, or men of no standing. They
wanted to almost worship me, but this confession shattered their idol. Many a
time I could have gotten on more comfortably by a time-serving policy. Often I
would have preferred to pay an exorbitant price for something rather than go
without it. But I expected to come back sometime, and preferred to have my
difficulties at the beginning, and to leave no precedents that might make
trouble for some one else. Sometimes they intimated quite plainly that they
wanted a white man who would make them rich buying their rubber and ivory, not
one who came with nothing but words.’

"In nearly every case the gospel seemed to make a profound impression, at least
for a time. The truth of what I said was rarely questioned. You will wonder at
this in a people who never before heard even a rumor of divine truth, until you
understand how wonderfully the truth we preach harmonizes with and supplements
what they already believe. They believe in an eternal Being who has made all
things, to whom all men return at death, but they do not think of this Being as
observing their actions, or that after death he may call them to account for
deeds done in the body.

" The fundamental truths which they hold seem like fragments of a broken chain,
which they are too thoughtless to connect; but when the missionary comes along
and connects these severed fragments, they cannot help seeing how they fit
together. I ask who made them and all things, and they reply at once, ’ Nzam?
Who gives you all the blessings you enjoy? ’ He does.’ Do you love and worship
him and thank him for his goodness?’ ’No.’ ’Why not?’ At once they see their
conduct must be displeasing to God. Are lying, stealing, and killing right or
wrong?’ ’ Wrong, of course.’ ’ How do you know?’ They cannot tell; they just
know it. To the suggestion that these things are written in their hearts, like
the words in a white man’s book, they assent at once as a satisfactory
explanation. ’ Who wrote those things in your hearts?’ ’We don’t know,’ they
say. ’Who made you?’ ’Nzam,’ or ’ Njamle. Both words are used. Then, ’ Did he
not write these laws in your hearts?’ Here was a break in their knowledge, but
the moment the missing link is supplied, the chain is made complete in their
minds. Yes,’ in a chorus; yes, he gave us these laws in our hearts.’ Then I am
ready to press home the great truth from which there is now no escape. If God
made this law, he must be angry when it is broken. He must see when it is
broken, for he made the eye; as he made the ear, he must himself hear what is
spoken contrary to this law.’ ’ Yes, that must be so.’ Then, when death calls
you into the presence of this Being whose laws you have broken, how will he
receive you!’ They attempt no evasion; they admit that God will be angry; and
when I tell them of heaven and hell the excitement sometimes becomes intense.
Then I lead them on to the blessed truth that God is a God of mercy; and often,
when the strange new story is finished, trade and greed, all else, seem
forgotten. But next morning or an hour afterwards, when they have talked
together a little and repeated to one another what they have heard of me, doubts
begin to arise. They call me and want to talk a little more. I sit down,
prepared to be questioned. The object of my visit has been fully explained. But
no matter; the first question generally was, Where are you going? ’ I do not
know exactly. I told you I was going as far as I could and to see as many
peoples as I could.’ But who are you going to? ’ I don’t know.’ An astounding
statement to them, as they never dare go anywhere unless where they have a
friend who can protect them. What are you going for?’ By this time I would be
losing patience, and reply something like this: I have told you already; why do
you keep on asking the same question?’ ’Yes, we know’ (coolly); ’but tell us now
what you are really seeking!’ Several times I thought they did believe me, but
was afterwards convinced that, with the exception of perhaps two towns, the
people took little stock in my explanations, and by most I was set down as an
impostor. Had I come to look for trade, had I killed and plundered, they would
have fully appreciated my motives; but that white men want to teach them about
God and heaven without money or price, that was incomprehensible. The first
great law of heathenism is selfishness, and, tried by this their only standard,
you can see how unbelievable must have seemed my statement."

Dr. Good returned to Batanga in health, having traveled over four hundred miles
on foot, penetrating the country about one hundred and seventy miles, and having
seen the dwellings of from thirty to forty thousand people. He had expended less
than half the money granted, had selected one station site and the approximate
location for a second. Incidentally, he had acquired considerable fluency in the
Bulu tongue and revised the geography of some towns and of the Campo Eiver. At
once he prepared a masterly report upon what he had learned, which was presented
to his brethren in mission meeting and forwarded to the Board. The contents were
arranged in three parts: (1) a general outline; (2) analysis of important
features; (3) recommendations for action.

He acknowledged his consciousness of assistance from above:

" Not only my brethren here, but friends in America, must have been helping me
at the throne of grace. Again and again my way seemed closed, but always opened
just in time. I was turned aside from the course marked out for myself by
scarcity of food, want of guides, native feuds; sometimes I was misled by false
statements; but although at the time I fumed and fretted, I can now see that I
could hardly have laid out a better course than that by which I was compelled to
go."

He explained the geographical relations of many tribes; how from interior forest
seats the coast trade had beckoned them, and, moved by greed, they had years
before begun a march which was gradually increasing in volume and momentum as
they advanced. He showed the bearings of this seaward migration upon missionary
opportunity. The Ntum people were real Fang from the Ogowe. " They will soon be
down to the sea just north of the mouth of the Campo." The Bulu and Upper Campo
Fang were practically one people ― " in a few years will fill the region back of
Batanga." The greater part of them were still in their old homes, but, as fast
as they pushed those in front of them out of the way, were pressing westward.
This scramble to reach the sea was demoralizing. Constantly on the move, old
industries, such as working in iron, were abandoned, their towns were carelessly
built, they planted too little and were therefore hungry some months every year.
The whole social fabric was shaken because towns belonging to the same clan
became separated in transitu and a central government was therefore impossible.
But this very movement would bring hundreds of thousands of souls, before nearly
inaccessible, within easy reach of the gospel. The forest back of Batanga would
in twenty years, perhaps less, be filled with a dense population; "that is, if
we meet these peoples with the gospel of peace and so tame their savage
instincts that they can be crowded together without exterminating each other."
The vast country from the Campo River north to the Soudan border might be worked
as one field, in the Bulu language.

"The bane of mission work in all West Equatorial Africa is the multitude of
tribes, each with a distinct language, into which the people are split up. How I
have longed for a field in which one language and literature would reach
everybody! As I studied the map, the prospect was not inspiring. There were the
Batanga people, the Mabeya, the Fang, the Bene, the Yengone, the Yewondo. I said
to myself, Which of these tribes shall we adopt?’ I dwell on this that you may
realize the thrill of pleasure with which I learned that all these people,
except the first two, speak closely related dialects.... When, in conversation
of a half -hour with a Yewondo man, I was able to detect only a few slight
variations from the Bulu, my last doubt vanished, and I thanked God that we had
found our field."

Climate indications were favorable, "if there is such a thing as good climate in
Africa; but the man who is willing to go only where the climate is good had
better stay in the United States." The Bulu were not cannibals, they held no
slaves, had no intoxicating drink, and, "as far as I could discover," there was
no true idolatry among them. Their superstition is the fetish. " They have not
come in contact with civilization enough to get even a veneer of good manners,
and simply acted out their true character ― not that they do not know better.
Their moral natures are tuned to the same pitch as ours. They praise the same
virtues and reprove (in others) the same vices. But in practice they are
shamelessly immoral, dishonest, cruel. They might be worse. I think they are
less vindictive than the Fang of the Ogowe. Bulu character is somewhat relieved
by frequent streaks of good humor.

" How often the thought came to me that if heaven is to be a happy home for
God’s people, it will not do to admit these Bulu! And yet they are material out
of which saints may be made. Out of these rough, unlovely blacks might be
wrought beautiful images of Christ." The first " recommendation " of Dr. Good’s
report was that "we definitely adopt this field. I believe God has assigned it
to us and calls us to enter.... I make this recommendation after much prayerful,
anxious thought. know that treasure must he expended and lives sacrificed if
this region is to be evangelized. But with the difficulties and perplexities in
full view, I urge that we. take up this work."

Promptness to act in establishing a first station seemed of the greatest
importance, because the German government had promised not to allow Roman
Catholics to enter a field preempted by Protestants, and vice versa, Americans
would probably have no chance unless they seized it soon. " If we let the
Catholics beat us in this race, we ought to go home and quit."

It was recommended that three new men, one of them a mechanic, be sent out to
man the first station, others to follow in due time. Were not the proposals
conservative? "I cannot bring myself to believe that our great, wealthy church
will turn back from this open door. At least, let the work be laid on her
conscience.... I have faith that men will be found ready to go, and others will
be glad to make an investment for eternity by sending them."

Pending action upon his report. Dr. Good was with his family at Baraka, his pen
flying night and day, from epistle to epistle, ― would it never get done? ―
copying the Mpongwe Testament.

Mission indorsed the report, and passed resolutions adopting the new field and
asking the church for eight men to work it. Dr. Good was appointed to Batanga,
from there to superintend opening the first station. On account of his family,
he regarded himself as ineligible for permanent location in the interior. He
strongly advocated having it opened up by unmarried men, not chiefly on account
of difficulty of access and the roughness of a pioneer station, but rather to
reduce expenses to a minimum. He considered that for the first years the people,
food supplies, climate, all, were on trial. The people might turn against white
men and refuse to sell them food. In such cases, if their houses were simply
built of bark in native style, nothing to tempt the covetousness of Africans,
the missionary would be in a position to control the chiefs by threatening to
move on to So-and-so’s town. But if their premises were too valuable to leave
behind they would be in the power of the Bulu, and the Bulu would know it. " I
opposed taking ladies to the new field chiefly because doing so means building
better houses and furnishing them more expensively than I think the unsettled
condition of the country warrants. While our plant has little value, the
temptation to plunder will be small." For himself, he hoped to perfect his
knowledge of the Bulu language, and, living at Batanga, alternate preparation of
Bulu books with itineration among the Mabeya and near Bulu towns, thus
strengthening the work of the interior at the rear. When the report was received
in America, utmost pains was taken to have its contents thoroughly digested by
members of the Board of Foreign Missions. The vote of adoption was unanimous,
and it is probable that the Board never took a forward step with more perfect
comprehension of what was involved. In respect of distance from the sea, the
proposed first station did not compare with some which had been opened prior to
this time, but there was this difference: all others had been planted upon
waterways, where the missionary’s boat made him independent; but from Bululand
there could be no way out except on foot, through the bush, across bridgeless
streams, or, at best, in a hammock swung upon men’s shoulders.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 12: 12   BYWAYS OF AN INDUSTRIOUS LIFE
========================================================================

Chapter 12 BYWAYS OF AN INDUSTRIOUS LIFE NO one was well acquainted with Dr.
Good who did not know of his fondness for pet animals and his keen delight in
the outdoor world. He would chase a monkey with the zest of a boy. He had not
been in Gaboon two weeks before a night-ape was sharing his chamber. Later there
was an owl named " the Judge." A goat, gazelle, civet-cat, and nine monkeys at
one time were among the domesticated pets in the Kangwe home. He once shot a
leopard that was robbing the Baraka chicken-house, and he hunted elephants now
and again as they crossed the track of his itineration; but although the true
gorilla country was just behind his Ogowe field, and it would have been his joy
and pride to shoot a gorilla, he never left his post to try it. His chief
diversion in Africa was collecting moths and butterflies, of which he sent
thousands of specimens to America. When weaker men would have been snatching a
nap on the lounge, he was out in the air with his butterfly net, a recreation
which contributed not a little towards keeping his mind healthy and his judgment
sound. But the very Lepidoptera were made to fold their gauzy wings for the
redemption of Africa; every dollar of remuneration for his specimens was
conscientiously devoted to mission purposes.

Dr. Good’s ability was so versatile and his tastes ran in so many channels that
the old phrase " an all-around man " was often applied to him. Had his life been
prolonged to old age he would have been able to make valuable additions to the
world’s knowledge of the natural history, geology, ethnology, and philology of
Equatorial West Africa. This chapter is devoted to extracts upon miscellaneous
subjects, taken verbatim, or slightly condensed, from his note-books and
letters.

EARTHWORMS AND DRIVER-ANTS

" I saw to-day a curious sight. An army of drivers had spread themselves out to
forage, and part of the path was black with them. They swarmed not only on the
ground, but on bushes to a height of five or six feet, and there was the usual
commotion in the insect world. When thus scattered about driver-ants make a
noise on the leaves exactly like raindrops, and, misled by the noise, earthworms
come out as they are wont to do when it rains. It is a mistake, however, which
they usually atone for with their lives. To-day, in advance of the advancing
swarm of ants, I saw two immense earthworms scurrying across the path. They had
come out to enjoy a shower, but, happening near the edge of the ants, were
making good their escape. One of them especially was of immense size, fully a
foot long and a quarter of an inch thick. The extremities had a bluish cast. and
about an inch and a half from the head was a raised ring nearly half an inch
wide. When interfered with it squirmed violently. Happening to touch it with my
finger, I noticed a spray striking my hand. Trying again and again, I found that
from any part of its body it could send out, to a distance of six inches or
more, a jet of spray thick enough to be distinctly visible and to make the hand
quite wet. The jet seemed to come out just where the creature was touched and
along a half -inch perhaps of its length ― a little difficult to determine
exactly, for the spray did not become distinctly visible till it had left the
body an inch or two. It came out apparently from a center or point, and spread
like an inverted cone. I noticed no contraction of the skin or effort of any
sort on the part of the worm when it sent out the jet, and it followed so
quickly the touch that I should say it was involuntary. The ejection was not
irritating to the skin, and had no odor except an earthy smell such as one
notices when an earthworm is put on a fishhook." (April 21, 1891.)

"In New Nganda saw a young specimen of what I take to be an albino monkey. It
was distinctly white, but that yellowing or reddish white peculiar to albinos."
(1891.) VISIT TO THE CAVE BUDIA (SYEKI NAME)

"While spending a night at the Orungu town Nengawaga, about sixty miles below
Kangwe, I learned of the existence of a remarkable cave a mile or two above. I
at once asked the chief to give me some one to show me the way, and he promptly
offered to go himself, and so did, accompanied by quite a large party of his
people. We pulled up first about one and a half miles to Anyamhicawango, landed,
and got a slave to agree to guide us for a small consideration. A number of boys
and young men having joined us, we set out on foot for the cave. I found it a
real curiosity. About a mile brought us to the orove mi tako (tobacco prairie),
much of which is bare rock and of an unusual character for this country. All
rocks in the region seem to be sedimentary, but vary greatly in hardness. This
one, when wet, is covered with a slime as slippery as soap, which, where it was
dried, formed a black, wrinkled scum not unlike tobacco in appearance, though
utterly unlike in flavor. The people are said to use it as a substitute,
however, when they are hard up for the weed.

" At last we reach one of the entrances to the cave. It is at the foot of a
steep declivity, and looks like a big hole formed by a cave-in of surface rocks.
Lighting our lamps, we are soon on the floor of the cavern, upon which still lay
the rocks whose falling in made this entrance. To the north and south start
galleries which soon come to an end; but a low one, leading in a westerly
direction, intersects the main gallery at right angles. From there we start into
the darkness nearly due north. The first thing that strikes me is a dull,
peculiar roar like the noise of a powerful wind rushing through a rocky mountain
gorge. You can hardly believe it is only bats, but soon you will; for as you go
on you start them from their resting-place on the roof by thousands, and the
air, as you look towards a light, appears full of their dark forms. The floor of
the cave, where water has not cleared it away, is covered to a depth of four to
six inches with a black mass which feels under the bare feet like accumulated
soot. It is the excrement of myriads of bats. Through and over this crawl the
larvae of two species of beetles, and everywhere may be seen hopping about a
long-legged and rather feeble-looking cricket. These, with countless small
flies, gnats, and mosquito-like insects, which did not appear to bite, make up
the life of the cave. The bats were of two species. One was a little larger than
the common American bat. This filled the whole interior of the cavern. A few of
a larger species, their wings having a spread of more than a foot, were seen
near the entrance.

"On one side usually ran the stream of water. The floor of the cave is a talcose
clay or slate, so soft that it is difficult to say whether it is clay or rock;
but it is sedimentary and in distinct strata. Above this are strata of rocks of
a peculiar porous character. Much of it, I feel sure, would serve for dripstone.
It seemed as light as chalk, and some of it looked as if formed of a mass of
minute shells. It was certainly sedimentary, for it was full of water-worn
pebbles of various colors, and in some pieces I brought away there are distinct
fossils. The roof was of course a border rock, and the cave is simply the course
of an underground stream which has hollowed out for itself a channel in this
soft rock. The main gallery varies from ten feet in height and width to twenty
or even thirty feet. A gallery about midway of the main one comes in from the
east and, judging from the stream of water issuing from it, is quite long. Its
entrance is only about two and a half feet high, and, owing to our company
getting divided and frightened, I could not explore it far.

" In the north end of the main gallery our guide pointed to an entrance beyond
which, he said, were leopards. He hurried away, pretending to be afraid. I
called my boys to follow me on a tour of investigation. An examination of this
supposed leopards’ den showed no tracks except of dogs and men, who had been
there killing bats. The slaves eat these bats, which they knock down with clubs.
Some one had found that in this particular cavern, which gradually became lower
and narrower as we proceeded, the bats were driven before him until the air was
thick with them and the bat-catcher could bag all the game he wanted. The
leopard ’ was an invention to keep others from sharing his discovery. I went
until I could see the end, and I saw nothing more dangerous than bats. How they
did swarm! I had to hold my hand before my face as I advanced. Dozens of them
struck me all over the body every moment, and a score or more were clinging to
different parts of my person. A rough measurement of the cave gave a length of
three hundred and fifty yards.

" Here I saw an amusing illustration of the African’s ignorance of arithmetic
beyond addition and subtraction. A vine was taken into the cave to measure its
length. The main gallery from north to south entrance was thirty-two lengths of
our vine. After we came out, a native measured it by stretching his arms
horizontally, thus giving the length of his two arms plus the width of his body.
This gives one fathom, or six feet, with a fair degree of accuracy. I laid the
vine on the ground and paced its length, making it eleven yards, agreeing with
the natives measurement. Now,’ said I, our rope is five and a half fathoms long,
and the cave was thirty-two times its length; how many fathoms long is the cave?
’ They could not see how it could be made out. When I told them at once three
hundred and fifty-two yards, they thought I must be guessing. I said, Count it
up and see if I am not right.’ They studied over it awhile, then one said he
could do it. He picked up the vine and started to measure it off again in
fathoms. When I found that he intended to pass that vine through his hands
thirty-two times, counting up as he went along, I told him that his arithmetic
was too slow for me, as I wanted to get back to my dinner before night."
(November, 1890.) A HIDEOUS INCIDENT FROM THE OGOWE

" At Arevoma I was shown the evidence of a fiendish act of cruelty. A man
belonging to a village just above Arevoma had married a woman of Afangananga’s
tribe, so far as giving the dowry. The woman disliked him, however, and wanted
the marriage broken. This gave the prospective husband an excuse for claiming
several times as much back as he had paid. This was refused, and the woman was
compelled to marry him. She went and, as far as I could learn, did nothing out
of the way; but he caught her one morning, compelling a slave by threats of
death to help him, and cut off her ears, nose, and lips clear around the mouth,
leaving her horribly disfigured. Thus he sent her home. Her mother he struck a
blow across the eyes that put her blind. And this human fiend was allowed to
settle for all his cruelty by payment of a fine of five times the price of a
slave. There would be some comfort in even this if the payment went to the
injured women; but it all goes to the men of the family." (November, 1890.)
AFRICAN IDEAS OF JUSTICE―TWO GABOON STORIES

" One night, some years ago, a leopard killed a very fine calf for Rev. William
Walker, of the mission, but was discovered and driven off before it had time to
eat or carry it away. The same night the chief man of one of the little towns
that make up Gaboon had a very fine pig taken by a leopard, presumably the same
one. Next morning the man came to Mr. W. and wanted him to pay him for his hog.
Why? Because, as he argued, if the leopard had been allowed to eat the calf it
would not have taken the hog. Mr. W. by driving it away from the calf became
directly responsible for its taking the pig, and so ought to pay for it.

"When the explorer Cameron was either in Gaboon or somewhere on this part of the
coast, a native of means was attracted by some of his goods and began to take
measures to get them. He paid a man two hundred dollars to steal them for him.
The man went and tried, but Mr. C. had perversely locked them up where it was
impossible to get them; but he did not want to lose his two hundred dollars, so
he ran off. The man who was two hundred dollars short by the transaction then
came to Cameron and told him the whole story, and demanded of him, first, the
two hundred dollars which he had caused the complainant to lose by locking up
his goods, and, second, the price of the goods he had put out of the thief’s
reach and which our cheeky native friend had thereby been made to lose."

VISIT TO THE DWARFS

[The publication of the following account fell under the eye of a Scotch lady,
who was moved to provide the means for founding a mission to these " little
people," and two men have undertaken the difficult experiment of giving them the
gospel.]

" The second day from Batanga I struck a village of the famous dwarfs. As
everybody knows, it is only by a rare chance that one ever gets a sight of these
little people. They are found all over this part of Africa, but live much as the
Gypsies do with us ― scattered among many tribes, belonging to none. Other
peoples live by agriculture. Though much engaged in hunting and fishing, what
they kill is a small part of their living; it is on their gardens that they
mainly depend. "The dwarfs are not so. They live by the chase and on such wild
fruits and edible leaves as are found in the forest; but they are as fond of
cassava, plantains, etc., as other Africans. They want vegetable food, but do
not wish to work for it. How are they to get it? I am happy to say they are not
charged with stealing from their neighbors’ gardens. It is admitted on all hands
that they are remarkably honest. Here is their mode of life: They attach
themselves to some town of Fang, or Mabeya, or whatever tribe occupies the
country. They are skillful hunters, and if there is game to be had they will get
it. When hungry for vegetable food, they take their game to the town and
exchange it for what they want. This arrangement seems so satisfactory to both
parties that often a family of dwarfs will maintain such an alliance with a town
of their stronger neighbors for generations. The dwarfs are themselves a timid,
harmless people ― at least, those found in this part of Africa. I am assured
they never pretend to fight for their rights. When people to whom they have
attached themselves do them a wrong which they are disposed to resent, they
simply move away and seek alliance with some other town. It is considered an
advantage to have them as neighbors. Their towns are not permanent, merely rude
sheds, which they occupy only while game lasts in the neighborhood, and so
constantly move from place to place that even their friends hardly know
sometimes where to find them.

" But if the stronger tribes do not rob or kill them, they certainly take
advantage of their ignorance of the world. They supply them with cloth, guns,
powder, spears, at such prices as they choose to ask, and they take good care
that their dwarfs’ come in contact with no one who will tell them how they are
being cheated. Here comes in the difficulty of seeing them. You ask to be shown
a town of the dwarfs. The people pretend to be most willing, but they explain
that the dwarfs have never seen a white man and will be afraid; they must go in
advance and prepare them. Their real object is to see that they run away. If one
comes upon a dwarf village in the forest himself, ― a most unlikely thing, ― the
stories the dwarfs have been told about the dreadful white man will send them
flying in all directions. Had I asked the Mabeya to show me their dwarfs,’ I
would have asked in vain; they would have hit upon some scheme for keeping me
away; but I happened to have a young guide who was very impetuous. As we were
trudging through the forest, I noticed a newly beaten track leading off from the
main path, and at the same moment heard voices at no great distance. I asked in
surprise, Who made that path?’ Without taking time to think, he replied, There
is a town of dwarfs there.’ Then I had him fast.... I found the dwarfs at home
to the number of fifty or sixty, and not so badly frightened, after all, which I
attribute to the fact that they had not been ’prepared ’ for my visit. The
village was evidently newly built; the thatch was still comparatively fresh. The
spot selected for their village was well chosen; the ground was high and well
drained, and a fair-sized stream of beautifully clear water flowed close by. I
could have enjoyed spending a few days in such a camp myself; but to spend one’s
life in such encampments, ― no clearing, no open country, no sunlight, no
outlook beyond the shadowy forest glades, ― the thought was enough for me. I
have pictured only the reality. How can these people ever see clear sunlight?
They can, of course, wade out into the middle of some stream wide enough not to
be overshadowed by trees, or find a place where a large tree has fallen and
carried down with it a number of its lesser neighbors, thus letting the
’sunlight through to earth; but practically these people only see the sun as
they get dim glimpses of it through the trees. Their houses are simply sheds.
Poles are placed with one end on the ground, the other resting on a horizontal
pole supported on posts four or five feet from the ground. Across these poles
small sticks are laid, like lath on a roof, and on these the large leaves that
serve as shingles. You would imagine that such a roof would leak; but when well
made it is really wonderful how it will turn water. These houses are ten to
twelve feet from front to back, and anywhere from ten to twenty-five feet long.
Sometimes the ends are partly closed by setting up branches of trees against the
roof. The front is always open.

" I found a number of Mabeya in their encampment, exchanging cassava for game.
They seemed rather put out at seeing me there, but the dwarfs appeared rather
pleased. They gathered around and gazed in speechless wonder; but I doubt
whether their curiosity was greater than mine. Could I talk to them? I tried
Bulu on them; they replied modestly that they did not know Bulu, but as they
spoke in a language very like the Fang of the Ogowe, I felt at home at once. A
big and very consequential Mabeya came up and offered to interpret my Bulu into
Mabeya; but I promptly declined his services, and I had no difficulty in making
myself understood. They answered questions about themselves without hesitation.
One little old man seemed especially intelligent and fearless. I put the
question to him plainly, Why do you live here in the bush like this, and never
come to see the white man I ’ He replied, with a side wink towards the Mabeya, ’
These people will not allow us to see the white man.’ I spent most of my time
trying to solve a question, the answer to which I have been seeking for years,
viz.: Do the dwarfs have a language of their own, or do they speak the language
of the tribe with which they associate themselves? Other tribes answer the
question both ways; but while I was among them I heard nothing but Mabeya and
Fang.

’ These dwarfs did not fit any description I have ever read of African pygmies.
Some of them must have been five feet or more in height; still, they were
distinctly dwarfed in stature. They were a lighter tint than the surrounding
tribes, but I could see no sign of the yellowish or reddish growth of hair on
the body, of which some travelers have spoken. Certainly these dwarfs were the
lowest specimens of the human race I have yet encountered. Their jaws were much
too large; their foreheads and tops of their heads seemed irregular and rough,
instead of smooth and rounded. The lowness of their foreheads was emphasized by
the size of their eyes; the children especially seemed to have eyes like
saucers. The eyebrows, which were heavy, seemed farther above the eye than in
other races. You can imagine the result. The eyebrows seemed to be in the middle
of the forehead, and, worst of all, the brows did not in cases appear to be set
on straight; the two eyebrows on the same person did not, in some cases, seem to
have the same slant. This must have been a mistake on my part, but it certainly
seemed to me so. The upper part of their bodies was strong enough, but the
abdomen was far too large for symmetry, and their legs were crooked and weak.

" On the whole, my visit to the dwarfs left on my mind a feeling of sadness. I
tried to learn something of their religious ideas, but could not find that they
differed from those of the Mabeya.

" I am told that far back of the Bulu there is a country occupied by dwarfs
alone. Certainly there are in Africa a vast number of these weak, harmless
people, and the Christian cannot but ask. How long will it take the slowly
dawning light to reach these children of nature skulking with the beasts in the
shades of these mighty forests?

" One more curious fact. It is freely admitted by other tribes that the sea was
first discovered by the dwarfs, while the people now on the coast were still far
back in the forest and did not know there was such a thing as the sea."
(Batanga, July, 1893.) MISCELLANEOUS SAYINGS AMONG THE BULU

Proverbs. ― You set an ngomho (a basket for catching fish), you think of ghosts
(because such baskets are set at night in lonely places). The dead trunk of the
otunga (a species of tree) has broken down the trunk of the odu (a larger and
stronger tree); (i.e., a man of small importance has caused the death of an
important man). As you despise a stick (or log), it hurts or strikes your leg.
The buffalo that catches you in the street of your fathers, is it not goats that
are in the street of your fathers’ town? An Oath, ― Destruction! (A call to all
the dead.) I swear by the dead. I swear by (my) father. I swear by (my) mother.
Another form of oath is: I swear by the people who have perished (equivalent to,
the dead).

Ideas of God. ― Bisi Zam ele ― The seats of God are there. (Said when calling
attention to brilliant cloud effects.) Endi Zam ele ― The roof of God is there.
(Used in the same way.) If Zam speaks, there is no longer any medicine that will
avail. If Zam wishes to heal people, medicine is useless.

O Zam, thou hast made us; why, then, do you take away an only wife? (Such
complaints common, but no one openly abuses Zam.) Had it not been for Zam, this
would not have been accomplished (lit., arranged).

Zam ate nye ni, ane mone Zam ― God has saved him, he is a son of God. ( Said of
one who has experienced some remarkable deliverance.)

I will not occupy the place of a king; I will occupy the place of Zam (i.e., the
place Zam assigns me), because Zam, who has made us all, he says. Be so.
(Language of one who has been disappointed in not being chosen chief.)

One who is hopelessly afflicted is called Ndenden. Of such an one it is said:
God himself has afflicted him. (Said especially of a cripple.) A prayer: Zam, do
not take me (i.e., by death) till I have first eaten that food. (Such a prayer
is likely to be uttered by one who sees that his garden is going to give a good
crop.) Other examples of petition: Zam, do not take me till I first see how my
son will turn out (lit., how he will hunt). Zam, let me first marry, let me
first have a child. When a boy curses an old man, or steals, or any man does
wrong, he is often reproved by saying to him: Zam ayi yene wo ahe ― God will not
like you, or, will be displeased with you. One who is wronged often says: God
will revenge me on high. Not all will ’’ see " good in the world to come; some
will live in " God’s town," which is regarded as a great good; but bad people
will not be allowed to stop in God’s town, but will be compelled to pass to a
place called Etotolen, a place of exile; as, when one is carried away over the
sea to unknown countries from which he can never return, nor see his people
again, he is said to have gone to Etotolen. Another version is that all must
pass over a high, narrow bridge across a deep, wide stream. Over this the good
successfully pass, but the bad fall into Etotolen. I heard this version only
once. A bad man is told: You cannot live in the place where God lives. Of a
cripple it is said: There remains for him only to go and meet Zam; he has become
a person of " on high "; he no longer amounts to anything as a man. The rainbow
at first lived in this world. When he went to Zam above, he went because he had
caught people. Men cut him in two. The tail turned into the python. Black spots
on the python’s skin are said to be skins of people he ate while still the
rainbow. The rainbow, called the snake of Zam, is said to come to earth
occasionally at waterfalls. When seen in such places, children are warned not to
go near lest he eat them.

Fabulous Stories about Peoples in the Interior. ― Back somewhere east of the
Bulu are said to be the Biyamos, a people who sleep by day and work and travel
at night.

There are Ye-Mefap, a people said to have wings. There are Bemfamelede, called
also Bilatata, a Siamese-twins sort of people, always in couples, joined
together back to back. In Minjem, people spend most of the time by day scattered
in the tree-tops. They come down to build, make gardens, etc., but as a rule
only come to town at night. A full-sized, warlike people, who fight from their
tree-tops. Said to be very black. The Bifaifai are a people whose heads are
flattened both behind and before, hence called also Bibambam. As a specimen of
the original ancestral tales from which the " Uncle Remus " stories have
unquestionably descended, the following has a special literary value. A BULU
FABLE―THE LEOPARD AND THE PYTHON

[Among the Bulu there is a custom that whoever has a palaver with one whom he
fears may go to a third party and say, "Song’," which is equivalent to saying,
"I put my palaver in your hands." This third party then presses his claim, not
only collecting the debt or damages claimed by the aggrieved party, but enough
more to pay himself.] The leopard said to the turtle, "All the animals of the
forest I have caught, save only the python. Song ― catch him for me." " All
right," said the turtle; "go to your town." When the leopard had gone, the
python came and said to the turtle, " All the animals of the forest I have
caught, save only one, the leopard. Song ― catch him for me." "All right," said
the turtle; "go to your town." When the python was gone, the turtle thought the
matter over, and dug a deep pit in the bushes near his house. This he covered
over carefully and awaited the coming of his clients. The python came wriggling
up and said, "Where is the leopard I asked you to catch for me? " The turtle
whispered, " Don’t speak again. There is the leopard coming. Run and hide there
" (pointing the way of the trap). Hurrying to hide himself in the bushes, crash!
went the python into the pit. The turtle came and said, "Don’t dare to speak,
lest the leopard hear you; you are in a safe place," and carefully covered the
pit over again. Then the leopard came, to whom the turtle said, " Run! hide
there quick! I see the python coming over there." He, too, running to hide
himself, crashed through the treacherous cover into the pit. The python cried,
"What’s that?" The leopard cried, "What’s that?" The python coiled for a spring;
the leopard stood with opened jaws and paws uplifted, ready to meet the dreaded
enemy. Then from the mouth of the pit came the mocking voice of the turtle: "
Leopard, you asked me to catch the python for you. You, python, asked me to
catch for you the leopard. I have caught you both. You are in the pit, both of
you. Make the best of it." And at it they both went, and fought till they fell
apart, both dead. Of course this is not a literal translation of the original;
indeed, to translate the wonderfully concise and graphic style of these fables
is impossible. But this is a sample of the stories which these people have told
over, generation after generation, for who knows how many centuries? These
childish tales, when well told, have a charm and fascination that no written
story can ever have. The leopard does not simply come up ― his stately tread is
imitated; so, too, the wriggling of the serpent, the crash as they fall into the
pit; and when they fight, the story-teller’s teeth seem to become fangs, his
fingers claws, his arms are the python’s deadly coils, and his voice growls and
groans until one can almost fancy the creatures engaged in a death-struggle
before his eyes. (Efulen, 1894.)


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 13: 13   ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH 1893
========================================================================

Chapter 13 ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH

1893 IN anticipation of introducing the coming recruits to the interior, there
was much to be done: studying Bulu when nothing else; casually picking up Banaka
speech, useful with carriers; especially making more trips inland by which to
win the confidence not only of Bulu, but also Mabeya, who were afraid this
passing beyond through their towns meant losing their trade. On each
reappearance among them, the white man was greeted with diminishing suspicion.
Few now asked the question, "What are you seeking for? " But as he came closer
to the people, notwithstanding all his previous knowledge of Africans, Dr. Good
was profoundly impressed with their unspeakable immorality. " I cannot lift the
veil." That the gospel is the power of God was his only confidence. " Of one
thing I am certain. There is no remedy but God’s great remedy for sin. And that
that will avail I have already been permitted to see. The Galwa of the Ogowe,
while less savage, were once much more superstitious and hardly less immoral
than these Bulu. I did not see them until they had been greatly changed by the
influence of the gospel, but I had abundant testimony as to what they had been.
And I have seen hundreds of those Galwa come to Christ and become, if not
saints, at least as different from what they were as darkness is from light. The
degradation of the Bulu has shocked me, because I have seen it in all its
shameless nakedness. Pray that I may be permitted to see even these brought to
the feet of Jesus and clothed in his likeness." The first bush for the new
station was cut June 5, on the hill afterwards named, at the suggestion of a
Bulu woman, "Efulen" ― a mingling. The missionaries had come to settle all
palavers and bring together (mingle) all kinds of people. Within a few weeks
after it was occupied, Batanga, Mabeya, Banaka, Galwa from the Ogowe, and Bulu
were all working together on Efulen Hill.

Batanga men were first set to making a small clearing, and then left to put up a
bark house, native style, for a first temporary shelter. The Bulu promised, on
their part, to build the indispensable palaver house, which serves all the
purposes of restaurant, club-house, court, and city hall; in this case it was to
be also the house of prayer. The expected three men for the interior having
arrived. Dr. Good wrote to his strong backers in Montclair: "They all seem well
adapted for the work to which they have come. Pray for them, as you have prayed
for me, that they may be long spared to work for the Master, a blessing to
Africa and her perishing millions." And, about to march up-country, he wrote to
the Board: "You cannot move too fast for me. I see no obstacle to our
establishing three or four stations as fast as the men can be gotten out." In
Africa there are always obstacles. The new doctor was at once detained at the
coast, and within two years both the professional members of the party were in
America, on the resignation list. But that event was for the present hid from
their eyes.

Mr. Matthew Henry Kerr and Rev. R. H. Milligan went up with Dr. Good and reached
the mission clearing July 22. The one-roomed little house with earth floor was
ready for three educated white men, and a tent for dry weather; after that, they
had nothing but their hands and tools and the rich primeval forest surrounding
them, from which huge tree-trunks lay felled in the clearing. The station
possessed neither table, desk, nor chair, and was equally destitute of furniture
for preaching the gospel. There was not a page of the Bible in Bulu, nor one
hymn. Only one of the trio could even imperfectly convey the message of God’s
Word. He was struggling with gaps in the savage language. How to express the
idea of the Holy Spirit to a people whose only notion of " spirit " is the
shadow of a living man or the ghost of one dead! There were two words in Bulu
for " town," but only one and the same verb for "to believe," " to trust," and "
to have faith." Mr. Kerr began at once getting out planks with a pit-saw, and
whenever it was in motion he was the center of a curious and smiling circle of
Bulu. After six weeks the Station were able to elevate themselves off from their
earth floor, so dangerous in malarial Africa, and to move, though still in one
cramped room, into a new residence built on posts three to four feet high, with
bark walls and roof of bamboo thatch. It was completed by the middle of October,
affording a private room for each missionary, a store-room, and one general
living-room, which occupied the center of the house and opened on a porch at
each end. The floors were plank. There was neither sash nor glass, but open
window-places, protected by shutters. Their dining table was a true antique ― a
circular slice of a virgin forest tree, with the bark left on, supported on
stakes for legs. A clay fireplace was constructed in the "parlor," where the
weather permitted of a fire burning most of the time. Fuel bills were at zero,
and no taxes to pay. Dr. Good, by dint of perseverance, built himself a bedstead
and stuffed his mattress with native corn-husks. The poor hard soil was worked,
a variety of vegetables planted, and banana and other fruit trees were started.

Efulen commanded a crystal stream of water, and, on those sides not walled in by
forest, a distant view of grand mountains. Workmen were paid wages of sixteen or
eighteen cents a day, and the house, sixteen by twenty-eight feet, cost $52.80.
In this way Dr. Good’s purpose to give an object-lesson to the people was
realized.

" On the coast we import everything, and the natives conclude that to be
civilized they must have foreign food, foreign furniture, etc, and thus native
industry is discouraged. The Bulu think God has given us our wealth, and scoff
at the idea that white men make cloth and furniture. If we build and furnish our
houses and spread our tables from the resources of their own country, we are
pointing them in the only direction in which there is hope of bettering their
condition. If we set out to have foreign supplies, the report will go through
the land that white men have come with inexhaustible wealth; but if we make the
least possible display of foreign goods, raise our own food and make our
furniture, the story will be rehearsed far and wide that the white men work with
their hands, even make gardens. This will do more to correct their absurd ideas
of white men than years of preaching." The population around Efulen was not
stagnant. Native traders were coming and going. Strangers appeared from distant
places, so that preaching at Efulen was like preaching to the inhabitants for a
hundred miles east and northeast.

Development of the station was going on smoothly when news from his wife
compelled Dr. Good to hasten to the beach. He had been there but a week when a
pursuing messenger brought tidings that Mr. Milligan was very ill. This was one
of the times of dilemma when the missionary discussed within himself " whether
my duty lies there or with my invalid wife." He left Mrs. Good in bed, under the
doctor’s care, and, with the roads at their worst, made a forced march ― a "
terrible " journey even for him. The only way he could cross some of the
swollen, rushing torrents was by climbing trees and swinging himself from
interlacing branches of one tree to those of another on the opposite bank. But
difficulties of the journey were naught compared with the anxiety in his breast.
His patient was five weeks in bed with typhoid fever.

Itineration being thus prevented, Bulu manuscript multiplied. A dictionary was
growing fast. By October two hymns would " go " and the first consecutive
passage from the Word of God was read to the Sunday audience (October 1). It was
a portion of the Sermon on the Mount. What conception did those bloody men
receive from the novel proclamation, " Blessed are the poor in spirit," "
Blessed are the peacemakers "? At this stage in mastering the language. Dr.
Good’s method was to set a Bulu man to talking and stop him with questions
whenever he used a new word. That would result in gaining a general idea, spread
over three or four terms. The hinge of the task was then to extricate the exact
meaning in each of these terms. What should be done for a word to express thanks
and thanksgiving? The Bulu had no word. Christian ideas had no expression,
because they had no place in the heart. " Give them the ideas, and they will
soon find expression for them." It was therefore his purpose to translate the
gospels as soon as possible, and stop there. Some development of religious
language might be counted upon within two or three years, when translation of
the whole New Testament would be in order, to be rounded out with a revision of
the gospels. The Bulu tongue, however, was well equipped with terms for
sense-perceptions. A race standing guard, through suspicious generations,
against human foes and lurking beast and viper in the twilight of the forest had
developed five or six synonyms for the phrase " to see." " For all forms of evil
they have a wealth of names that completely discounts the English.... It is
intensely interesting to stand by and watch the regeneration of a language." His
young brethren looked on admiringly as from the lips of a wild Bulu, however
repulsive his personal presence, his enunciation changing and indistinct, his
intellect however dull, word by word, idiom by idiom, was captured. Ask the
expression for "my gun," and the answer is given; then ask for " my guns," and
the man declares, "I have only one." It is no use to press him further. He is
ready to call all his wives and brothers to testify that he has " only one gun."
Half a dozen Bulu would be successively played out in a morning under his fire
of questions, while " Dr. Good would toil on till night, never once losing
patience, to my knowledge.... His understanding of the African people and his
discretion in dealing with them commanded my continual respect and
admiration.... He could learn the truth from them when they told him nothing but
lies. He might ask the road to some particular town, and they would tell him the
boldest lies; but without betraying suspicion he would continue to question,
keeping his attention apparently fixed upon the chief speakers, but hearing
every word spoken by others aside. At last, when they had finished, he would
start off in the right direction, leaving them amazed and saying among
themselves, This white man has very powerful charms.’

" One day a Bulu chief called Ngombair, a powerful man, came to our station
storming furiously against the white man. He had been sending many persons for
medical treatment without paying anything for medicine. Other natives paid
something, but he presumed upon his importance until, at last, we had sent his
patients back to town without treatment. He cursed us to the workmen upon our
own premises and roused them against us, using very abusive language. Dr. Good
heard it without any show of indignation. Then, with a quiet smile, turning to
another native, he asked: Is this Ngombair who talks in this way? Is this the
wise chief of Nkonemekak? ’ Already the chief began to feel ashamed. Dr. Good
talked to him a few minutes in a friendly way, and soon sent him home cheerful
and praising the white man. So skilful was he in controlling and quieting their
savage passions." The illness of his wife detained Dr. Good at the coast for
some weeks towards the end of 1893. " All goes well at Efulen," he wrote; " but
so long as I alone have the language, the evangelistic side, the most important
side, of our work must depend mostly on myself. And yet I sometimes suspect that
if I should never he able to go back, the Master could find others to carry on
this work! " From the Ogowe Dr. Good had written to his wife in 1888: " This
separation is to be the last, or I can’t help it." And to the secretary: "As a
rule, I am utterly opposed to such separations; only the weakness of our force
could have induced me to consent." Yet, ever since, temporary separations from
his family had been constant, and, at the opening of 1894, he was again face to
face with the alternative. Mission meeting was at hand; their trunks were packed
to take the invalid to America; the steamer would soon arrive. Some of the
brethren conferred together, and begged him to stay behind. Affairs in the
interior were not in a condition to be left without him. It was true. With
prayer and searching of heart he consulted his wife. When she gave her full
consent for him to remain, he said, "You are really helping the work more than
any one else." He sent her and their son, in company with a missionary lady, to
Grand Canary, whence, as the season advanced towards spring, she might safely go
on to America. He watched the disappearing steamer, and plunged into the bush.

Already, only six months after the station was opened, its influence had begun
to tell. There were certainly no converts yet; there was not even one of whom
the missionaries could hope that he would soon take hold on Christ; but there
were good signs.

Every Lord’s day brought a company of people to Efulen Hill; and instead of
staying away after their curiosity was gratified, the most attentive hearers
were those who had heard most. The part of the gospel message which the Bulu
seemed to grasp first was what they eminently needed ― " peace among men."
Walking through a town where a palaver was being talked, Dr. Good asked in jest
if the palavers were not all finished yet. " Can palavers ever finish? " one of
them replied; but added, " Were we ever before so long without killing people as
since you came? " " And, thinking over the matter, it is true. In towns about
Efulen there has been no attempt at bloodshed since the station was opened.
Women have eloped or been carried off under circumstances that in the old days
would have led to bloodshed; but, in every case so far, it has been avoided out
of deference, so they say, to our teachings." A man from the Ntum tribe, three
days south on the Campo, said that the "Word" had gone all through the Ntum
country, and people were " settling their palavers." The comparatively subdued
behavior of Efulen audiences was realized only by the contrast in towns outside,
where usually two or three young fellows would keep up running comments on the
preaching, not intending to be disrespectful but frequently giving to it a
ludicrous turn. Or, one would notice something about the missionary’s person
that struck him as odd and nudge his neighbor. Eyes in all directions would
quickly take the hint, till suddenly the whole audience, who a moment before
were listening intently, would be lost in gazing at the speaker’s hair or shoes.
And they would laugh at everything, especially when the eternal punishment of
the wicked was mentioned, no matter how carefully and seriously. A babel of
voices would remind one another that that was for them. If stealing or other
immorality were mentioned, side-glances and ringing laughter not only played
havoc with the thread of discourse, but indicated how prevalent such sins were.
It was usually impossible to hold attention in new places for more than ten
minutes. The missionary could never explain the reason why towns differed in
their reception of his message; for in some places he could talk without
interruption for half an hour. Of the draft there is upon one in presenting
divine truth to such people, Dr. Good had ample experience this year. In
February he tramped twelve days, back and forth, on a preaching tour southeast
from Efulen, in the region where it was hoped to locate a second station. Every
day he preached in from five to eight towns. A specimen experience must be given
in his own words:

" Frequently after I have ceased speaking, the chief or some other man of
influence will harangue the people and urge them to receive and obey the words
God has sent the white man to teach them. How he will tax his people with lying,
stealing, robbery, immorality! To hear him remind his neighbors of what they may
expect in the world to come, one would think he himself must be an angel of
light, with nothing to fear from the events of the last great day. And yet that
man is passionate, cruel, always ready for a fight or a foray, probably a robber
and murderer many times over; his avarice is insatiable, he is a beastly
glutton. But as he stands forth, dilating on the shortcomings of his forty or
fifty wives and on the faults of his neighbors in general, he seems utterly
unconscious of the fact that he is probably the greatest sinner of them all. How
exceedingly human all this is! and how I long for the day when the Spirit of
truth will give them such a view of their own sins that they will forget those
of their neighbors! " The responsibility resting upon Dr. Good for the health of
his younger associates and of the whole great enterprise was keenly appreciated.
" You will not be surprised when I tell you that I sometimes tremble. I
understand now Paul’s anxiety, so often spoken of in his epistles, lest he
should be ’put to shame.’ I can only pray that God will glorify his great name."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 14: 14   THE CROWNING YEAR 1894
========================================================================

Chapter 14 THE CROWNING YEAR

1894 AT Efulen all was animation and action in the spring of 1894. Dr. Good and
Mr. Kerr were out with native workmen, making a road around swamps, the worst
place on the route to the beach, and bridging the Kribi River at a point twenty
miles from the station, by felling an immense tree across it. He doubts whether
there is a pastor in New York City who could have done four such days’ work
"without feeling inconvenience." A school-house is finished in May, the first in
all Buludom; and now that they have promise of recruits from America, Mr. Kerr’s
saw is in motion again, and great bales of bark and other materials are
gradually gathering and seasoning on the premises for a second missionary
dwelling. In late April Dr. Good is up and away on the march, most of the time
with two carriers only, all comforts necessarily reduced to the lowest notch. At
the same time his order is on the way home to the Board for one hundred dollars,
earned with his indefatigable butterfly net, " to aid in opening the second
station." The object of this trip is to find a site for that station and to
study the field in general. His course, directed as usual by his pocket compass,
was south by east as far as the Nlobo River, two hundred and ten to two hundred
and twenty miles from the coast. There he was within three days of the Ja, into
which it flows, and the Ja is an indirect tributary of the Congo. This journey
determined in general the scope of the field which had been entered. Its eastern
limit must be the Ja, for across that live the savage Ntem, a people wholly
different from the Bulu. To the south one would soon drift into French
territory; but to the north Bulu towns stretched for a hundred miles, and, for
no one knows how much farther, those of other tribes having a cognate speech.
Dr. Good tramped on this journey four hundred miles, a great part of the way
where the foot of white man never trod before. The weather was cool, generally
fine. Sometimes from a hilltop he would catch a view of wooded hills rolling
away as far as the eye could see; and when he reached plateaus twenty-six
hundred feet and more above sea-level, the air was as pure and the sky as blue
as among the well-remembered Pennsylvania hills.

It was plain that " a vast population looks to us for the gospel." But the Bulu
manner of life forbade denseness of population, and their method of building was
such as to give the appearance, from a distance, of unbroken forest even in
thickly settled parts. Bulu towns, composed of three to thirty villages strung
along a path at intervals of fifty to several hundred yards, might extend for
miles. Each village has its one straight street, lined on either side with low
bark houses, and a palaver house across both ends. Between these lines of
villages are intervals of bush or forest, or oftener clearings called gardens,
where corn, cassava, groundnuts, and plantains grow. Cultivation of these is
entirely the women’s work, but is done so inefficiently that they get only two
or three crops in ten years. Dr. Good pitied the poor drudges, who lose their
good looks and are old women when they ought to be coming to their best years.
He marked them carrying the daily food of the family on their backs from garden
to house, and the basket of firewood, besides, with which to cook it. He watched
the wife on the road, staggering behind her husband under a load of food, goods
and rubber, perhaps fifty pounds’ weight, while her liege lord burdened himself
with a single gun. "One of the saddest sights I ever saw was women toiling
through deep forest under their heavy loads, perhaps in pouring rain, with a
crying baby slung in a strap under one arm." Even maternity receives but little
consideration. Among some African tribes, the Galwa, for example, the mother
goes, before the birth of her child, to her own people and remains till it is
one or two years old. Here there is no such relief. As soon as her child is a
month or two old the Bulu mother must go to work as before.

He saw the men, after their desultory hunting and barter, loafing in the palaver
houses, eating, smoking, talking palavers and politics, or taking care of the
baby at home. " One of the most amusing sights I recall was an old chief trying
to pacify three or four hungry babies whose mothers were away in the gardens."
The men wear themselves out by their viciousness at middle age, and Dr. Good saw
scarcely any old people on this trip. As usual, he makes light of habitual
hardships. It has come to be almost a matter of indifference whether his feet
are wet or dry. Swamp of all depths and degrees, bad food, icy-cold streams to
be waded, a smoky hut at night with a bed of poles on which to spread his
blankets ― all this he can bear, like a born pioneer, with equanimity; but there
was one trial almost beyond endurance.

"I wish I could somehow make you eye and ear-witnesses of what I experienced.
Imagine me emerging from the bush, unannounced, upon the first village of a Bulu
town. Some child first catches sight of the apparition, and takes to the bush.
Grown people often looked indifferently at first, only remarking, ’ It’s an
albino.’ But soon somebody would divine the truth, or some one who had followed
from the last town would make the harmless remark, ’It’s a white man.’ The
result I can compare to nothing but the bursting of a dam. Out of the palaver
house come the men, as if they were being fired from some sort of repeating
weapon. Women rush to the doors of their houses, take one look, disappear again
for a moment while they set a pot off the fire or catch up the baby, and then
pour into the street, often with a remark to the effect that nobody is going to
get anything to eat to-day while this wonderful thing is to be seen. The
children, who ran screaming at first, soon regain courage enough to come back
and join the procession. People from near gardens, hearing the racket, rush
home, and men of the next village snatch up their ever-ready weapons and come
running to see if it may be an attack. As I go on from village to village the
crowd increases, until they swarm behind and on both sides, forming a half
-circle, of which I am the center.

" As all are talking at the highest pitch of their voices, the noise is simply
distracting. Out of the babel I catch such exclamations as my mother! ’ Is it
really myself? ’ And am I dead! ’ Isn’t he a beauty? ’ and others that will not
bear repetition. These from the ladies. The men are more dignified, but more
disagreeable. They would crowd into the places next me, and as we went on
through the towns would act as if they had me in charge, telling me when to
stop, and giving all sorts of directions. To the crowds of new-comers they would
shout information about me and the object of my journey, so absurdly false that
I often felt bound to stop and try to correct the impression they were giving.
This was not easy. If I said, ’ I have come to tell you about God, and not to
buy rubber or ivory,’ some one who had heard rumors of what we teach would begin
shouting an outline of our teachings, but such a caricature of the truth as made
me shudder.

" Disgusted at last beyond endurance, I would attempt to silence the worst
offender, usually the man who was following close at my heels, who for the last
half-hour had been shouting information into my ears. I would turn and tell him
that he knew nothing about me and that I should myself stop in a little while
and talk to the people. At this he would laugh as much as to say, I have gotten
the " thing " started to talk,’ and then shout to the crowd behind what I had
said, as if it had been the performance of a parrot. By this time I was getting
out of humor, and would request him in plain terms to keep quiet. At this he
would laugh again, and shout to the people behind, He says, keep quiet.’ Then I
would explain, ’ It is not the people behind whose noise is troubling me; it is
you who are walking close to me and shouting in my ears.’ But it was useless; he
would turn to the crowd and abuse them for making such a noise, shouting, if
possible, louder than ever.

" Then, if I was wise, I gave it up and’ went on, allowing him to say what he
pleased. But sometimes I was too angry to be wise, and I would get after the
fellow and make him think, at least, that I was going to chastise him. Then he
would at last realize that I meant him and would not speak above a whisper and
would try by gestures to keep others from doing so. Dead silence followed, save
the noise we made in walking. Meanwhile we had arrived at another village, and
you can imagine the result of the whole crowd walking in silence and by frantic
gestures giving the village the impression that I was some sort of a monster
that might be rendered dangerous by the least noise. This was worse than noise,
so I would explain that I had no objection to talking, if they would not yell.
Then they would start again, softly at first, but little by little the volume
increasing till there was the same babel as before.

"Then the crowd clamor for me to stop, that they may take a good look at me. As
I have reached the center of the village, I accede to their request. Standing in
the middle of the street, they form a circle around me, men in front, women for
the most part behind and trying to steal up close to examine something without
being observed. I turn my head, and at once there is a scream and stampede; but
only for a moment; they soon return, but more cautiously. Silence, or something
approaching it, follows, while all indulge in one long, intense stare, during
which only a camera could depict the various expressions in their faces. Then we
have a dog-fight. Every man’s cur from all the villages we had passed followed
his master, and the dogs of the village in which we are stopping object to their
presence.

" Meanwhile the chief is not being noticed, and must make himself known.
Stepping into the middle of the circle and raising his staff as if to chastise
the crowd, he begins, in what seems a fearful passion, to abuse everybody for
treating the white man in such outrageous fashion. As he is only talking for the
white man’s benefit, I silence him.

" Then comes a request to remove my hat, that they may see my hair. This
reasonable request I always grant, and am rewarded by a chorus of complimentary
exclamations. Next, no matter how much I had been talking, some one would ask,
Can he talk?’ This question I would answer by some trivial remark, which would
be received with a volley of laughter. Then they ask questions just to get me to
speak. Then follow requests to take off my shoes or other parts of my clothing,
that they might see whether I was really like one of themselves; attempts to
induce me to buy ivory or rubber, offers of marriage, requests for gifts, to
show my trade goods, compass, note-book, etc.

" When I thought their curiosity had been sufficiently sated, I would attempt to
tell them why I had come among them, and to give them some idea of the gospel
and their need of it.

" These scenes, with numberless variations, are repeated as we pass through town
after town, till at last we must stop for the night. If only one could escape
the noisy crowds then, that would nerve him to endure the babel of the day. But
the worst is to come. I get a house, put my goods and carriers inside, and in
order to give them a chance to unpack and prepare supper I stay in the street,
talking to the people. At last I am tired, and tell them they must go home and
let me rest. Needless to say they do not go. As soon as I am inside the house
they crowd around the door. If I shut it (the only opening in the walls of a
Bulu house) it is quite dark; besides, the cooking is being done over an open
fire, and the smoke is suffocating. But it may as well be shut as blocked by
heads and shoulders of the crowd.

" Sometimes I try reasoning with them. ’ I want to be quiet and rest.’ But we
want to see you,’ they reply. ’ Is this a proper way to treat a visitor? ’ No,’
they all agree. Then why don’t you go away and leave me? ’ We want to see you.’
So I shut the door, preferring smoke to the crowd. Sometimes I go out into the
street and call to the people whether I am to have a house, or whether I must go
on to the next town.’ By this means I gain my point. At last I am in my smoky
den, and the crowd shut out. But I am not hidden yet. When I light my tallow
candle every crack and crevice becomes a peep-hole; and I eat my supper knowing
that eyes are watching every movement.

" Gradually the noise subsides, and apparently they have become tired and gone
away; but only apparently. A few are waiting to see the white man go to bed, and
they do not attempt to conceal their disgust when he blows out his candle before
undressing.

" Now I can stand this sort of thing for three or four days quite
philosophically, but after about a week of it I become nervous and irritable.
Certainly, if I should ever visit a menagerie again, and see a monkey with a
crowd around its cage, exclaiming, as it scratches its head or takes a bite of
food, How funny! How very human! ’ I shall profoundly sympathize with the
monkey.

" But I cannot stop here, or I shall give a false impression. All this is
curiosity, not hostility or dislike. Impertinent and selfish it undoubtedly was,
but everywhere the intention was to treat me well. And when I have been able to
walk, with only two carriers, more than two hundred miles going and coming,
through a part of Africa where a white man was never before seen, without
meeting the first symptom of hostility, certainly I ought not to complain if the
people were unpleasantly curious. This trip has convinced me that any prudent
man can go as far as the Bulu language extends and preach the gospel without
hindrance."

Dr. Good alternated his journeys with translating at his desk ― the " same
humdrum work " of which he had more than enough on the Ogowe. But it cannot be
done too soon. By the end of March a considerable Bulu dictionary was finished
and John’s gospel begun. This was resumed after his journey of a month, and
again interrupted by an arrival from the coast. A committee of the mission came
up to decide jointly with him upon the site for a second station. They made a
twelve days’ trip together, retracing a part of his previous journey; and, as in
the case of Efulen, one place offered such superior advantages that the brethren
had no hesitation in their choice. They bought land for a station in the
district of Ebolowo’e, sixty-eight miles east by south from Efulen. The site was
on a low hill, at an elevation of twenty-four hundred feet above the sea. The
town proper had only about eight hundred inhabitants, but six roads led out in
as many directions to other towns, from a twenty minutes’ walk distant to an
hour, and one might continue on for a whole day, or days together, through a
succession of villages and a large aggregate population. To a novice in Africa
the people would seem wild enough: powerfully built, almost naked, smearing the
whole body with red powder, their hair decorated with buttons, beads, shells,
and feathers; they were always at war; they held human life at a discount;
nearly every girl was sold for a wife before five years old. Fifty or a hundred
of them at a time, each armed with gun, knife, or spear, they surrounded the
missionary group, prying curiously into all their few possessions. This was
heathenism. But the tiger tooth around the neck, the charmed antelope horn over
the shoulder, their " medicine " for guns, their grotesque ngee and organized
robber band, especially their speech, to those who understood it, were a
revelation of deeper darkness. The whole Bulu world lay under the paralyzing
power of the fetish. Our missionaries longed to give this land to Jesus Christ
for his possession; and, as they traveled back towards Efulen, they talked of
what the mail from America might bring. How soon would the new men be coming?
When could they begin to build upon the new-bought property? How long before
they might proclaim liberty to the captive there? At present not a Bulu from
Efulen dared to carry up their loads. One year from that time the people of
Ebolowo’e entrusted five boys to the mission school at Efulen. The name
eventually given to the second station, Elat, intimates a compact of friendship.
The mail came from America and brought ― delay. So far only one man had offered
for the service. "Our mission," wrote Dr. Good, " has been forty years seeking a
door by which to enter the interior of Africa. Now when this one has opened so
widely, is it thus we propose to enter?" Letters complimentary to himself in no
wise abate his disappointment. He tells his wife that " the soft soap is coming
in " till he might be tempted to think himself a hero, only he knows better; "
if any heroism is being displayed, it is by you." His accounts of the new field,
of which Efulen is " only the outer edge," go home by every irregular
opportunity. " We need many things, but none more than the prayers of God’s
people." In countries which, like China or India, possess an old civilization
and sacred books, missionaries have sometimes preached the gospel for years
before a soul would admit its power. Not so on Efulen Hill. The forest people,
gathering there with an increasingly respectful demeanor from one Lord’s day to
another, had been all their lifetime in bondage of fear from merciless and
ubiquitous spirits, and there was, to some ears, a welcome sound of deliverance
in the Word. Nor had they the scholar’s pride in concealing their interest. By
March one village was " stirred up" on the subject of religion, one middle-aged
man was coming for special instruction, an inquiry class would soon be "in plain
sight"; and when a palaver broke out, in which three men were killed, the people
were " ashamed " because they " prided themselves on having given up war since
we came." In July a number were expressing the wish to be Christians ― "too soon
to begin to count them." As time went on: " Of some we have good hopes"; but
many would-be inquirers were warily held off. The missionary had "no confidence"
in them. He had seen a great many Africans. Not every one who came with a pair
of white mans shoes on his feet or a cast-off overcoat, in which he appeared
equally ridiculous and uncomfortable, was bound for the kingdom of heaven.
Motives had to be probed. Some of them lay on the surface. The honor of
receiving special instruction, alone, from the white man was enough to raise up
some followers. And when, desiring to grapple with a thoughtful hearer, Dr.
Good, in order to avoid the hangers-on who would devour wayside seed by
provoking a laugh or a quarrel, took the man into his own bedroom, alas for his
theories of an object-lesson in simple living! There were a table, a typewriter,
shelves containing medicine bottles, and less than twenty indispensable books.
But this was a World’s Fair to a Bulu, when seen for the first time. His mind
wandered; his gaze was fixed now on the machine, now on what seemed a giant
volume, the United States Dispensary"; and "I might as well try to preach to
people while an earthquake is going on as to my inquirer in such surroundings."
And there was Zanga. It proved that he was absent from Sabbath service because
he was hunting for an animal that he had wounded the evening before. When told
that Christians do not work on Sunday, he replied, " Why, hunting is not work."
Then the matter is made plain to him. But a Sabbath or two later, as the
missionary is holding afternoon meetings out in the towns, he comes across Zanga
busy hewing out pieces of wood to make a sheath for one of the large sword-like
knives which the Bulu carry. When his attention is called to the way he is
keeping the Sabbath, he replies in amazement, " Surely you don’t call this work?
" Then Zanga is instructed in the doctrine of the Sabbath once for all. That day
week, passing again, there was Zanga, a smile of self-approval on his face,
sitting on a piece of wood, which he was holding in place while another man with
an adz was hewing it into a board, evidently for the door of Zanga’s unfinished
house. " I simply made a remark to the effect that I saw he was busy on his new
house. ’It is not I,’ he replied cheerfully; this man is doing the work, and he
is not a Christian.’ "

There was nothing surprising in the childishness of such ideas among people born
in the heathenism of Africa, to whom the gospel story was wholly a novelty. The
missionary was encouraged by their hearing ear; but he longed for the Holy
Spirit " to make clear what we can make them only dimly understand. What would
we not give for a little group of earnest Christians among them to set the
example for the rest of what Christianity is! "

Dr. Good was rapidly identifying himself with the people of the district. There
were chiefs and witch-doctors, but he was the influential citizen of all
Nkonemekak. In cases he was umpire. All the time he sat as if Judge on the
Supreme Bench against every form of prevalent and condoned wickedness. He
protested to the black traders against bringing up rum and gin. He used
arguments which they could appreciate ― that it would be no financial advantage
to them, and would work physical wreck. He was out in the midst of the people,
mixing in the everyday life of the towns, and a bystander at their palavers.
Once he looks so shocked at the conclusion they have reached that the men
apologize. At times they try to cover up facts which they are ashamed to have
him know. In most out-of-the-way places people were quoting, " Mr. Good says "
don’t do this or that. He took up the cause of the needy and them that have no
helper ― the poor women, lazy, impudent, vile though they were. "What toil,
patience, discipline will be necessary before Bulu women can stand where the
gospel aims to place them! " But he believed the old gospel which redeemed
womanhood in Europe and America would be a sufficient remedy for them. Again and
again he reproved men for cruel treatment of their wives, and for giving young
girls as readily as a sheep for pledges in palavers.

One Sunday afternoon in August, the strident sound of beating drum and incessant
firing of guns fretting the air warned him that mischief was brewing. So he
strolled down to the nearest town, where he was met by a typical Equatorial
Africa scene. The corpse of a leading Bulu lay under the burning sun, and his
seven wives huddled about it. They had been stripped of even their usual scanty
dress of grass and beads, while the body was decently wrapped in new calicoes.
Through the long afternoon they lay there with eyes closed, pretending to be
asleep, and other women, encircling the centerpiece, kept up a low moaning.
Right in the middle of the street, where men only are allowed burial, was the
open grave; and, getting a hint that one of the wives had been charged with
causing her husband’s death by witchcraft, and was destined to go with him into
that grave, the white citizen determined to stand by and if possible prevent the
deed. Late in the evening the post-mortem examination came on, and they found,
true enough, ― what they were looking for ― a witch. " The only unbeliever
present pronounced it a small, oval, fleshy tumor, about an inch long, lying
just inside the spinal column. I felt somewhat elated, for I thought the woman
was safe now; but I soon found they wanted to kill her, and the witch business
was only an excuse." Dr. Good persisted. He " buttonholed " the leading men,
expressing his "strong disapproval " of their cruel custom; and at last he had
the satisfaction of seeing the dead safely buried alone. Thus an efficient blow
was struck at witchcraft in Bululand. At this time burial of women, alive or
dead, in the grave of their husbands was a common event. Within two years after,
three witch-doctors in the district abandoned their calling, and went to work
building bark houses like other men; and for miles around Efulen belief in
witches had received, not its death-blow, but an incurable wound. His advances
towards the people were reciprocated. " You are one of us," they said. After Dr.
Good’s death, out from Efnlen perhaps twenty miles, Bulu men stopped the
missionary, as he was passing, to express not only their sorrow, but ― high
proof of savage friendship ― a wish to go to Ebolowo’e and kill those men of
another clan whose witchcraft had shortened their white man’s life. In order to
acquire colloquial expressions and a limber vocabulary. Dr. Good engaged the
more intelligent of the men in relating to him their folk-lore stories. In
August he writes to his little son about his evening school of a dozen or more
boys from the town: " Very good boys for this country, and anxious to learn." In
lieu of books, Mr. Kerr has fastened strips across the face of a board, and the
teacher inserts between them small blocks of white wood upon which letters and
figures have been stenciled, so by a sort of word game teaching the class to
read and count.

While this various, active contact with the people was unremitting, Dr. Good’s
industrious pen was accumulating for them a durable treasure. His systematic
habit was to rise at six o’clock, get to his desk at seven, translate till noon,
again two hours in the afternoon, and, after that, daily go into the near towns
and preach. In June four hymns were written. By the end of July the gospel of
John was translated, and seven chapters of Matthew. September 19 the gospels by
Matthew and Mark entire are added to that by John, and the same day manuscript
of the first Bulu book, a primer, is mailed to America to be printed. One month
later the dictionary has passed under careful revision, and the pen is laid down
at the last line of Luke’s gospel. The first Bulu proverb which Dr. Good thought
worthy of transference to his notebook is the following: "E mous me yen, osui
ndim ― Behind I see, before [is] unknown." Each week marked off, each day, was
swiftly narrowing the margin between him and that " unknown."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 15: 15   THE LAST FIVE MONTHS
========================================================================

Chapter 15

If this journey shall open a road for the light to enter this dark region into
which I have penetrated a little way, I shall never regret the toil. I do hope
God’s people in America will see to it that I have not run in vain, neither
labored in vain.—A. C. G., 1892. THE LAST FIVE MONTHS July― December 13, 1894
FROM the day of his boyhood’s resolve in the apple-orchard, it had been Adolphus
Good’s characteristic to aim straight for the mark. As the summer of 1894 waned,
his goal was as definite as ever, and his plans, as usual, embraced a full year
to come. First of all, a start must be made at the second station. Good news had
come of two new men appointed and soon to arrive at the coast.

They should come up straightway and hold Efulen, while he and Kerr would take
the ax and move on to Ebolowo’e. There November and December should be spent,
vibrating between the building going on under Mr. Kerr’s direction and
itineration in the district. He would move among the people, taking off the edge
of curiosity and running a furrow through the fallow ground. Especially he
resolved to see the Bene branch of Bulu speaking tribes and get sufficient data
for locating two more stations. The opening of 1895 would carry them up to
mission meeting, and then the husband and father-heart should be allowed to
speak. He would ask permission to revise his Bulu gospels and take them home to
be printed. Allowing himself six or eight months in America, he would hope his
wife could return with him, and then ― more service for the Bulu, more toil and
hardship for the redemption of Africa. So man proposed. And he had such
resources of health at command. It had been his refrain all the year. In April:
"Almost perfect health; " never stronger. After four hundred miles on foot:
"Strong as ever in my life.’ In June: "Do not think I ever had better health;
"do not need to go home on account of my health"; "no signs of fever or malaria
at Efulen’’; " dismiss anxiety for my health.’

July: "We are busy, and that is all. I have been so occupied with translating,
and Mr. Kerr with building and teaching, that our premises are rather out of
repair; but now we shall get time to put them in better order. We are having
fine tomatoes, cress, string-beans, and some potatoes are growing; not many,
however, as we failed to get seed. Cabbage and cauliflower look well, but cannot
tell yet whether they will head or not. Corn is abundant just now, but other
food still scarce, plantains especially, and we miss them very much. We are
trying to lay in a large stock of provisions from the beach before the arrival
of the new-comers.

October rains were heavy, and when they had ceased at Efulen would be at their
worst in the interior; " so I am likely to have a bad time of it; but I cannot
put off this trip, for I want to visit the Bene country before I revise my
translations.’’

Plans were defeated. The new missionaries were coming too late to permit of
building at Ebolowo’e, and Mr. Kerr would be obliged to remain at Efulen.
Therefore, instead of itinerating from the second station as his base, Dr. Good
must take the more difficult alternative and make his journey of a month or six
weeks from Efulen. Rumors of threatenings in various towns reached their ears
and frightened the carriers. They defaulted; others were engaged and were
exasperating. Certainly this was destined to be a laborious march; but " in all
the years that are past of my life, the path has never failed to open before me
clearly in good time." It opened in perfect day.

Already there was light in one direction. He would soon divide his " load.’’ " I
shall probably be away when the new brethren arrive, and I am glad of it; for I
am anxious to draw out of the position of adviser. By the time I am back they
will be well started in. If they do not see things as I do, I shall give them
large liberty to do what they like.’’

Before leaving he wrote with customary candor and caution to the Board about
progress at Efulen: " There is a great deal of interest among the people here,
and we hope there have been, or soon will be, several conversions; but I fear to
write of these people as converts, lest my words should come out six months
hence and find them gone back to the world.’’ At last it was November 12.
Carriers were keyed up to marching pitch, and Dr. Good took a cheerful leave of
his solitary comrade. But scarcely half a day out he was overtaken by Mr. Kerr’s
messenger: the new men were coming. Back he turned and went forward at a rapid
pace, welcoming them several miles the other side of Efulen, and escorting them
in to the station. They were three young brethren fresh from America. All the
afternoon and into the night they talked earnestly together, and next morning
Dr. Good was off to catch up with his loads.

Now brace your back again, good soldier, to its burden of anxiety and care.
March on once more, dauntless, through flood and forest and noisy towns bare of
a single token of civilization. Open your lips again, brave soldier, warning the
people lest they die in their sins, and give the message of life, eternal life;
for this is the last journey, and your guerdon waits at the end. From the meager
lines in his note-book the thread of events is followed. Dr. Good went eastward,
spending the first Sunday at Olem of the Yevo clan, people " rough and careless,
but meaning to be kind.’’ A whole week he preached among the towns of Ebolowo’e
district. The chief, a mighty man of eighty wives, confessed to him that at the
time of his father’s death he had cut the throats of ten people, and had killed
twenty when his brother died, all for witchcraft. Dr. Good secured a pledge from
him, made in public, that he would never repeat these deeds of blood. The first
Bene town was struck the 25th, eight miles north of Ebolowo’e, at an elevation
of three thousand feet, " November 27. I find the Bene country less populous
than the Bulu. The course was thence westward, in touch with several tribes ―
Yewondo, Yengone, Tando― and a line of towns belonging to the Yeno’e clan. With
all of them Dr. Good made himself understood, and comparisons between their
speech and the Bulu were recorded. The second week a severe cold had forced him
to stay inside his hut one day. His carriers proved as inefficient as they had
given promise. From stage to stage food was disastrously unsuitable and eaten
with an anxious heart; and now, in one of these Yeno’e towns, his insidious
enemy met him, like Joab in the gate.

" November 30. In the evening I felt fever coming on. I was quite chilly for a
couple of hours, then went into a profuse perspiration. Took a heavy dose of
quinine. Next morning the fever was broken."

Welcome would rest have been, but his quarters were " so mean and dirty " that
the road seemed preferable.

Yeno’e towns ― course same as yesterday, nearly west. Distance for day, eleven
miles.’ He might have added, "through mud and water. The third Sunday was spent
in a small town whose chief was " anxious for a teacher. Next day he was
cordially received at Lolodorf, the German government station in the Ngumba
country, whence he sends a reassuring line, " Safe and well, to his dear ones
far away. With the Ngumba he was " disgusted, and the roads out from their towns
balked him, for they all ran east and west. But on the 6th he struck a southward
line of Bulu towns, in one of which he spent the 9th. It was the fourth
consecutive Lords day passed amid savage sights and sounds, separated as by an
eternity from Christian sympathy and hallowed worship. The town was Bieti, the
last name in the note-book.

Monday, at noon, he appeared at the door of the mission house in Efulen, and
watchful eyes noted that his face was haggard and ominously yellow. He
acknowledged to having suffered from unsuitable food, from sleeplessness, a
feverish attack, and that a return of fever had hurried him home. But he
dismissed it lightly; he would take quinine and be " all right in the morning."
There was no loss of spirit and enthusiasm regarding the interior. They had
never seen him more anxious to open the second station. In all his journey of
two hundred and thirty miles he had found no place to compare with their chosen
site. At midnight he was wakeful, and, calling to Mr. Ford, who had come up from
the coast in his absence, they had two hours’ conference on mission affairs.
Next day, worse. His five brethren surrounded him with every possible ministry
of love and care. Wednesday, hematuria was manifest, and remedies were pushed as
fast as he could bear them. Loyal hearts and true wrestled in prayer for his
life; but the patient’s temperature rose steadily. " I felt,’’ wrote the
physician, " that the noble man was to be called to his reward."

Delirium came on. Attempts at prayer in English: " God, help in this supreme
hour," distinctly repeated at intervals. In conscious moments he charged his
brethren to be firm; not to be afraid, but to push on. Turning to one of his
watchers: " It has come to be the fashion to regard me as the representative of
this interior work,’’ (with an expressive gesture,) "I never liked it." Now he
was preaching in Bulu: "Listen carefully, and we will tell you about Christ."
Then, " praying much" for the work of the interior: " May good men never be
wanting to carry it forward." Again, he is on the road, calling to his carriers
in Mpongwe and battling with the obstacles of travel. And the fever did not
yield.

Thursday, near noon, in a few moments of mental clearness, he sent his last
messages. " In semi-forgetful prayer " he commended his brethren to God, and
asked for more laborers to the interior, and for himself preparation for death.
All the afternoon, wild delirium ― the last struggle of a strong vitality and
abounding energy; but at evening a hush fell. The little sixteen by twenty-eight
dwelling at Efulen was shaken with a tread more stately than cathedral
processional; for a messenger from the King of kings was at the door. As
peacefully as a child falls asleep in his mother’s arms, the Spirit returned to
God.

’’ ’A hut to die in! ’ Let me rest;

God bids me fall asleep;

Here lay my pillow down. This earth My wearied bones shall keep.

’’It is well that I died upon the field Where I have lived and worked and
fought;

I die upon my shield." The Galwa, boys from the Ogowe were first to find out the
truth, and, heathen fashion, were disposed to wail, but quieted at a word of
warning. The tidings flew down the line of Bulu villages, and in the darkness a
motley company of men and boys came straying up Efulen Hill and seated
themselves on the ground, each on his piece of bark, within the radius of
flickering light from a fire which was burning behind the house. They sent in a
request to the missionaries to address them, and, overwrought though they were
with nursing, excitement, and grief, they came out and spoke to an audience at
the moment strangely solemn and receptive. A funeral service was conducted next
day in Bulu, Mpongwe, and English; and, significant of the scope of Dr. Good’s
labors in Africa, his last " carriers were two Galwa, two Mpongwe, and two Bulu
men. The spectacle of people who, a year before, would have cared nothing for a
white man’s death now coming by hundreds to express their sympathy, many of them
with tears of sincerity in their eyes, was sufficient evidence of the
faithfulness of their missionary among them, and that his efforts had not been
thrown away.

Dr. Good died, like Hannington, at only thirty-eight years of age. The one
penetrating the continent from the west side, the other from the east, both
moved forward towards the heart of Africa, and, valorously carrying the standard
of the cross something nearer to its center, held it with their solitary graves.
Let the army come up to the colors! The last halting-ground of the pioneer in
Bululand is on Efulen hilltop, overlooking towns to the south. It is encircled
with a hedge of pineapple, and marked by a low bronze monument adapted to endure
the climate. This was sent out by Montclair friends, and on it they caused to be
engraved these words: "FAITHFUL UNTO DEATH.’’

" Lo, I am with you alway " has been coming down the ages, and it came to the
support of those five young servants of Jesus Christ left at Efulen. They were
Ford, to whose ear the last messages were entrusted; Kerr, on whom it fell to
make the coffin for his friend and counselor; Johnson, the good physician;
Roberts, at the moment blind from African fever; and Fraser, just recovered from
his first attack. There was no flinching down that picket-line; a tightening on
of the armor, rather.

" Those of us who stood at his bedside have promised not only Brother Good, but
Him who gave us life and has the right to take it, that while strength and life
last we will be faithful to our trust.’’ Their brief message, cabled to America,
though weighted with sorrow was winged by courage: "Send more workers.’’ A few
young men, like-spirited with them, raised an answering signal and stepped out
from the ranks of the church militant to join their brothers. More will follow.
The second station is manned. Echoes from Dr. Good’s instruction float back from
all the forest paths.

One day in November, 1896, Dr. Johnson led two Bulu young men into the same
little room where Dr. Good breathed his last, and, after a farewell prayer and
words of counsel, "with emotion not to be described," he watched them march down
the hill towards somewhat remote towns. These were the first witnesses, in their
great tribe, to catch up the evangel which had reached their own hearts and
attempt to pass it on. They were sent to give their testimony by the wish and at
the charges of their own Bulu school-fellows. This was, therefore, the
initiative of independent proclamation of the gospel by Bulu lips. And so a new
chord has been struck in the new song, and a voice dumb for nineteen Christian
centuries begins to blend with the sound of many waters before the Throne. It is
the prelude of the victory, when the glory of the King shall illuminate the
farthest river town and darkest forest tribe, and, remembering all the travail
of his soul, he shall be satisfied in the redemption of Africa.


========================================================================
Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/parsons-e-c-a-life-for-africa/
========================================================================