Having made half the journey, I came to a dangerous path, almost

perpendicular, up a great rock round the base of which the sea roared

deep. With my heart lifted up to Jesus, I succeeded in climbing it,

cautiously grasping roots, and resting by bushes, till I reached safely

to the top. There, to avoid a village, I had to keep crawling slowly

along the bush near the sea, on the top of that great ledge of rock; a

feat I could never have accomplished even in daylight without the

excitement, but I felt that I was supported and guided in all that life

or death journey by my dear Lord Jesus. I had to leave the shore, and

follow up the bank of a very deep ravine to a place shallow enough for

one to cross, and then through the bush away for the shore again. By

holding too much to the right, I missed the point where I intended to

reach it. Small fires were now visible through the bush; I heard the

voices of the people talking in one of our most heathen villages.

Quietly drawing back, I now knew where I was, and easily found my way

towards the shore; but on reaching the Great Rock, I could not in the

darkness find the path down again. I groped about till I was tired. I

feared that I might stumble over and be killed; or, if I delayed till

daylight, that the savages would kill me. I knew that one part of the

rock was steep-sloping, with little growth or none thereon, and I

searched about to find it, resolved to commend myself to Jesus and slide

down thereby that I might again reach the shore and escape for my life.

Thinking I had found this spot, I hurled down several stones and

listened for their splash that I might judge whether it would be safe.

But the distance was too far for me to hear or judge. At high tide the

sea there was deep; but at low tide I could wade out of it and be safe.

The darkness made it impossible for me to see anything. I let go my

umbrella, shoving it down with considerable force, but neither did it

send me back any news.

Feeling sure, however, that this was the place I sought, and knowing

that to await the daylight would be certain death, I prayed to my Lord

Jesus for help and protection, and resolved to let myself go. First, I

fastened all my clothes as tightly as I could, so as not to catch on

anything; then I lay down at the top on my back, feet foremost, holding

my head downwards on my breast to keep it from striking on the rock;

then, after one cry to my Saviour, having let myself down as far as

possible by a branch, I at last let go, throwing my arms forward and

trying to keep my feet well up. A giddy swirl, as if flying through the

air, took possession of me; a few moments seemed an age; I rushed

quickly down, and felt no obstruction till my feet struck into the sea

below. Adoring and praising my dear Lord Jesus, who had ordered it so, I

regained my feet; it was low tide, I had received no injury, I found my

umbrella, and, wading through, I found the shore path easier and lighter

than the bush had been. The very darkness was my safety, preventing the

Natives from rambling about. I saw no person to speak to, till I reached

a village quite near to my own house, fifteen or twenty miles from where

I had started; here I left the sea path and promised young men some

fish-hooks to guide me the nearest way through the bush to my Mission

Station, which they gladly and heartily did. I ran a narrow risk in

approaching them; they thought me an enemy, and I arrested their muskets

only by a loud cry,—

“I am Missi! Don’t shoot; my love to you, my friends!”

Praising God for His preserving care, I reached home, and had a long

refreshing sleep. The Natives, on hearing next day how I had come all

the way in the dark, exclaimed,—

“Surely any of us would have been killed! Your Jehovah God alone thus

protects you and brings you safely home.”

With all my heart, I said, “Yes! and He will be your protector and

helper too, if only you will obey and trust in Him.”

Certainly that night put my faith to the test. Had it not been the

assurance that I was engaged in His service, and that in every path of

duty He would carry me through or dispose of me therein for His glory, I

could never have undertaken either journey. St. Paul’s words are true

to-day and for ever,—“I can do all things through Christ which

strengtheneth me.”

CHAPTER IX.

_DEEPENING SHADOWS._

Welcome Guests.—A Fiendish Deed.—The Plague of Measles.—A Heroic

Soul.—Horrors of Epidemic.—A Memorable New Year.—A Missionary

Attacked.—In the Valley of the Shadow.—Blow from an Adze.—A

Missionary’s Death.—Mrs. Johnston’s Letter.—A Heavy Loss.—The

Story of Kowia.—Kowia’s Soliloquy.—The Passing of Kowia.—Mortality

of Measles.—Fuel to the Fire.—Hurricanes.—A Spate of Blood and

Terror.—Nowar Vacillates.—The Anger of the Gods.—Not Afraid to

Die.—Martyrs of Erromanga.—Visit to the Gordons.—Their

Martyrdom.—Vindication of the Gordons.—Gordon’s Last Letter.—Plots

of Murder.—Death by Nahak.—Nowar Halting Again.—Old Abraham’s

Prayer.—Miaki at the Mission House.—Satanic Influences.—Perplexity

Deepening.—Selwyn’s Testimony.—Rotten Tracts.—Captain and Mate of

_Blue Bell_.—My Precious Dog.—Fishing Nets and Kawases.—The Taro

Plant.—The Kava Drink.—Katasian and the Club Scene.—The

Yams.—Sunshine and Shadow.—The Teachers Demoralized.—The Chief’s

Alphabet.—Our Evil Genius.—Ships of Fire Again.—Commodore

Seymour’s Visit.—Nouka and Queen ’Toria.—The Dog to his Vomit

Again.

In September, 1860, I had the very great pleasure of welcoming, as

fellow-labourers to Tanna, the Rev. S. F. Johnston and his wife, two

able and pious young Missionaries from Nova Scotia. Having visited the

whole group of the New Hebrides, they preferred to cast their lot on

Tanna. During the Rainy Season, and till they had acquired a little of

the language, and some preparation had been made of a Station for

themselves, I gladly received them as my guests. The company was very

sweet to me! I gave them about fourteen Tannese words to be committed to

memory every day, and conversed with them, using the words already

acquired; so that they made very rapid progress, and almost immediately

were of some service in the Mission work. No man could have desired

better companions in the ministry of the Gospel.

About this time I had a never-to-be-forgotten illustration of the

infernal spirit that possessed some of the Traders towards these poor

Natives. One morning, three or four vessels entered our Harbour and cast

anchor off Port Resolution. The Captains called on me; and one of them,

with manifest delight, exclaimed,—

“We know how to bring down your proud Tannese now! We’ll humble them

before you!”

I answered, “Surely you don’t mean to attack and destroy these poor

people?”

He answered, not abashed but rejoicing, “We have sent the measles to

humble them! That kills them by the score! Four young men have been

landed at different ports, ill with measles, and these will soon thin

their ranks.”

Shocked above measure, I protested solemnly and denounced their conduct

and spirit, but my remonstrances only called forth the shameless

declaration,—

“Our watchword is,—Sweep these creatures away and let white men occupy

the soil!”

Their malice was further illustrated thus: they induced Kepuku, a young

Chief, to go off to one of their vessels, promising him a present. He

was the friend and chief supporter of Mr. Mathieson and of his work.

Having got him on board, they confined him in the hold amongst Natives

lying ill with measles. They gave him no food for about four-and-twenty

hours; and then, without the promised present, they put him ashore far

from his own home. Though weak and excited, he scrambled back to his

Tribe in great exhaustion and terror. He informed the Missionary that

they had put him down amongst sick people, red and hot with fever, and

that he feared their sickness was upon him. I am ashamed to say that

these Sandal-wood and other Traders were our own degraded countrymen;

and that they deliberately gloried in thus destroying the poor Heathen.

A more fiendish spirit could scarcely be imagined, but most of them were

horrible drunkards, and their traffic of every kind amongst these

Islands was, generally speaking, steeped in human blood.

The measles, thus introduced, became amongst our islanders the most

deadly plague. It spread fearfully, and was accompanied by sore throat

and diarrhœa In some villages, man, woman, and child were stricken, and

none could give food or water to the rest. The misery, suffering, and

terror were unexampled, the living being afraid sometimes even to bury

the dead. Thirteen of my own Mission party died of this disease; and, so

terror-stricken were the few who survived, that when the little Mission

schooner _John Knox_ returned to Tanna, they all packed up and returned

to their own Aneityum, except my own dear old Abraham.

At first, thinking that all were on the wing, he also had packed his

things, and was standing beside the others ready to leave with them. I

drew near to him, and said,—

“Abraham, they are all going; are you also going to leave me here alone

on Tanna, to fight the battles of the Lord?”

He asked, “Missi, will you remain?”

I replied, “Yes; but, Abraham, the danger to life is now so great that I

dare not plead with you to remain, for we may both be slain. Still, I

cannot leave the Lord’s work now.”

The noble old Chief looked at the box and his bundles, and, musing,

said,—

“Missi, our danger is very great now.”

I answered, “Yes; I once thought you would not leave me alone to it;

but, as the vessel is going to your own land, I cannot ask you to remain

and face it with me!”

He again said, “Missi, would you like me to remain alone with you,

seeing my wife is dead and in her grave here?”

I replied, “Yes, I would like you to remain; but, considering the

circumstances in which we will be left alone, I cannot plead with you to

do so.”

He answered, “Then, Missi, I remain with you of my own free choice, and

with all my heart. We will live and die together in the work of the

Lord. I will never leave you while you are spared on Tanna.”

So saying, and with a light that gave the foregleam of a martyr’s glory

to his dark face, he shouldered his box and bundles back to his own

house; and thereafter, Abraham was my dear companion and constant

friend, and my fellow-sufferer in all that remains still to be related

of our Mission life on Tanna.

Before this plague of measles was brought amongst us, Mr. Johnston and I

had sailed round in the _John Knox_ to Black Beach on the opposite side

of Tanna and prepared the way for settling Teachers there. And they were

placed soon after by Mr. Copeland and myself with encouraging hopes of

success, and with the prospect of erecting there a Station for Mr. and

Mrs. Johnston. But this dreadful imported epidemic blasted all our

dreams. Mr. Johnston and his wife devoted themselves, from the very

first, and assisted me in every way to alleviate the dread sufferings of

the Natives. We carried medicine, food, and even water, to the

surrounding villages every day, few of themselves being able to render

us much assistance. Nearly all who took our medicine and followed

instructions as to food, etc., recovered; but vast numbers of them would

listen to no counsels, and rushed into experiments which made the attack

fatal all around. When the trouble was at its height, for instance, they

would plunge into the sea, and seek relief; they found it in almost

instant death. Others would dig a hole into the earth, the length of the

body and about two feet deep; therein they laid themselves down, the

cold earth feeling agreeable to their fevered skins; and when the earth

around them grew heated, they got friends to dig a few inches deeper,

again and again, seeking a cooler and cooler couch. In this ghastly

effort many of them died, literally in their own graves, and were buried

where they lay! It need not be surprising, though we did everything in

our power to relieve and save them, that the Natives associated us with

the white men who had so dreadfully afflicted them, and that their blind

thirst for revenge did not draw fine distinctions between the Traders

and the Missionaries. Both were whites—that was enough.

The 1st January, 1861, was a New Year’s Day ever to be remembered. Mr.

and Mrs. Johnston, Abraham and I, had spent nearly the whole time in a

kind of solemn yet happy festival. Anew in a holy covenant before God,

we unitedly consecrated our lives and our all to the Lord Jesus, giving

ourselves away to His blessed service for the conversion of the Heathen

on the New Hebrides. After evening family worship, Mr. and Mrs. Johnston

left my room to go to their own house, only some ten feet distant; but

he returned to inform me that there were two men at the window, armed

with huge clubs, and having black painted faces. Going out to them and

asking them what they wanted, they replied,—

“Medicine for a sick boy.”

With difficulty, I persuaded them to come in and get it. At once, it

flashed upon me, from their agitation and their disguise of paint, that

they had come to murder us. Mr. Johnston had also accompanied us into

the house. Keeping my eye constantly fixed on them, I prepared the

medicine and offered it. They refused to receive it, and each man

grasped his killing stone. I faced them firmly and said,—

“You see that Mr. Johnston is now leaving, and you too must leave this

room for to-night. To-morrow, you can bring the boy or come for the

medicine.”

Seizing their clubs, as if for action, they showed unwillingness to

withdraw, but I walked deliberately forward and made as if to push them

out, when both turned and began to leave.

Mr. Johnston had gone in front of them and was safely out. But he bent

down to lift a little kitten that had escaped at the open door; and at

that moment one of the savages, jerking in behind, aimed a blow with his

huge club, in avoiding which Mr. Johnston fell with a scream to the

ground. Both men sprang towards him, but our two faithful dogs

ferociously leapt in their faces and saved his life. Rushing out, but

not fully aware of what had occurred, I saw Mr. Johnston trying to raise

himself, and heard him cry,—

“Take care! these men have tried to kill me, and they will kill you!”

Facing them sternly I demanded,—

“What is it that you want? He does not understand your language. What do

you want? Speak with me.”

Both men, thereon, raised their great clubs and made to strike me; but

quick as lightning these two dogs sprang at their faces and baffled

their blows. One dog was badly bruised, and the ground received the

other blow that would have launched me into Eternity. The best dog was a

little crossbred retriever, with terrier’s blood in him, splendid for

warning of the approaching dangers, and which had already been the means

of saving my life several times. Seeing how matters stood, I now hounded

both dogs furiously upon them and the two savages fled. I shouted after

them,—

“Remember, Jehovah God sees you and will punish you for trying to murder

His servants!”

In their flight, a large body of men, who had come eight or ten miles to

assist in the murder and plunder, came slipping here and there from the

bush and joined them fleeing too. Verily, “the wicked flee, when no man

pursueth.” David’s experience and assurance came home to us, that

evening, as very real:—“God is our refuge and our strength ... therefore

we will not fear.” But, after the danger was all past, I had always a

strange feeling of fear, more perhaps from the thought that I had been

on the verge of Eternity and so near the great White Throne than from

any slavish fear. During the crisis, I felt generally calm, and firm of

soul, standing erect and with my whole weight on the promise, “Lo! I am

with you alway.” Precious promise! How often I adore Jesus for it, and

rejoice in it! Blessed be His name.

I, now accustomed to such scenes on Tanna, retired to rest and slept

soundly; but my dear fellow-labourer, as I afterwards learned, could not

sleep for one moment. His pallor and excitement continued next day,

indeed for several days; and after that, though he was naturally lively

and cheerful, I never saw him smile again. He told me next morning,—

“I can only keep saying to myself, Already on the verge of Eternity! How

have I spent my time? What good have I done? What zeal for souls have I

shown? Scarcely entered on the work of my life, and so near death! O my

friend, I never realized what death means, till last night!” So saying,

he covered his face with both hands, and left me to hide himself in his

own room. For that morning, 1st January, 1861, the following entry was

found in his Journal:—“To-day, with a heavy heart and a feeling of

dread, I know not why, I set out on my accustomed wanderings amongst the

sick. I hastened back to get the Teacher and carry Mr. Paton to the

scene of distress. I carried a bucket of water in one hand and medicine

in the other; and so we spent a portion of this day endeavouring to

alleviate their sufferings, and our work had a happy effect also on the

minds of others.” In another entry, on 22nd December he wrote:—“Measles

are making fearful havoc amongst the poor Tannese. As we pass through

the villages, mournful scenes meet the eye; young and old prostrated on

the ground, showing all these painful symptoms which accompany loathsome

and malignant diseases. In some villages few are left able to prepare

food, or to carry drink to the suffering and dying. How pitiful to see

the sufferers destitute of every comfort, attention, and remedy that

would ameliorate their suffering or remove their disease! As I think of

the tender manner in which we are nursed in sickness, the many remedies

employed to give relief, with the comforts and attention bestowed upon

us, my heart sickens, and I say, Oh my ingratitude and the ingratitude

of Christian people! How little we value our Christian birth, education,

and privileges, etc.”

Having, as above recorded, consecrated our lives anew to God on the

first day of January, I was, up till the sixteenth of the month,

accompanied by Mr. Johnston and sometimes also by Mrs. Johnston on my

rounds in the villages amongst the sick, and they greatly helped me. But

by an unhappy accident, I was laid aside when most sorely needed. When

adzing a tree for house-building, I observed that Mahanan the war

Chief’s brother had been keeping too near me and that he carried a

tomahawk in his hand; and, in trying both to do my work and to keep an

eye on him, I struck my ankle severely with the adze. He moved off

quickly, saying,—“I did not do that,” but doubtless rejoicing at what

had happened. The bone was badly hurt, and several of the blood-vessels

cut. Dressing it as well as I could, and keeping it constantly soaked in

cold water, I had to exercise the greatest care. In this condition

amidst great sufferings, I was sometimes carried to the villages to

administer medicine to the sick, and to plead and pray with the dying.

On such occasions, in this mode of transit even, the conversations that

I had with dear Mr. Johnston were most solemn and greatly refreshing. He

had, however, scarcely ever slept since the first of January, and during

the night of the sixteenth he sent for my bottle of laudanum. Being

severely attacked with ague and fever, I could not go to him, but sent

the bottle, specifying the proper quantity for a dose, but that he quite

understood already. He took a dose for himself, and gave one also to his

wife, as she too suffered from sleeplessness. This he repeated three

nights in succession, and both of them obtained a long, sound, and

refreshing sleep. He came to my bedside, where I lay in the ague-fever,

and said with great animation, amongst other things,—

“I have had such a blessed sleep, and feel so refreshed! What kindness

in God to provide such remedies for suffering man!”

At mid-day his dear wife came to me crying,—

“Mr. Johnston has fallen asleep, so deep that I cannot awake him.”

My fever had reached the worst stage, but I struggled to my feet, got to

his bedside, and found him in a state of coma, with his teeth fixed in

tetanus. With great difficulty we succeeded in slightly rousing him;

with a knife, spoon, and pieces of wood, we forced his teeth open, so as

to administer an emetic with good effects, and also other needful

medicines. For twelve hours, we had to keep him awake by repeated cold

dash in his face, by ammonia, and by vigorously moving him about. He

then began to speak freely; and next day he rose and walked about a

little. For the two following days, he was sometimes better and

sometimes worse; but we managed to keep him up till the morning of the

21st, when he again fell into a state of coma from which we failed to

rouse him. At two o’clock in the afternoon, he fell asleep, another

martyr for the testimony of Jesus in those dark and trying Isles,

leaving his young wife in indescribable sorrow, which she strove to bear

with Christian resignation. Having made his coffin and dug his grave, we

two alone at sunset laid him to rest beside my own dear wife and child,

close by the Mission House.

In Mrs. Johnston’s account, in a letter to friends regarding his death,

she says:—

“Next morning, the 17th, he rose quite well. He slept well the night

before from having taken a dose of laudanum. He also gave some to me, as

I had been ill all the day, having slept little for two or three

nights.... Two men helped Mr. Paton to his bedside, as I found him lying

very low in fever, yet he waited on Mr. Johnston affectionately. For

some time, while he was in Mr. Paton’s hands, I could scarcely keep

myself up at all. We thought it was from the laudanum I had taken. I had

to throw myself down every few minutes.... For some weeks after, I was

almost constantly bedfast. I ate little; still I felt no pain, but very

stupid.... At times, we have services with the Natives. For a week past,

we have scarcely gone to bed without fears. One night, our house was

surrounded with crowds of armed men, ready at any moment to break in

upon us for our lives. We have had to sit in the house for days past,

with the doors locked, to prevent any of the savages from entering; for

every party seems to be united against us now. The great sickness that

prevails amongst them is the cause of this rage. They say, we made the

disease, and we must be killed for it; that they never died off in this

way before the religion came amongst them, etc., etc.”

Mrs. Johnston recovered gradually, returned by the first opportunity to

Aneityum, and for nearly three years taught the girls’ School at Dr.

Geddie’s Station. Thereafter she was married to my dear friend the Rev.

Joseph Copeland, and spent with him the remainder of her life on Fotuna,

working devotedly in the service of the Mission, seeking the salvation

of the Heathen.

The death of Mr. Johnston was a heavy loss. From his landing on Tanna,

he appeared to enjoy excellent health, and was always very active,

bright, and happy, till after that attack by the savages with their

clubs on New Year’s Day. From that night, he never again was the same.

He never admitted that he had got a blow, but I fear his nervous system

must have been unhinged by the shock and horror of the scene. He was

genuinely lamented by all who knew him. Our intercourse on Tanna was

very sweet, and I missed him exceedingly. Not lost to me, however; only

gone before!

Another tragedy followed, with, however, much of the light of Heaven

amid its blackness, in the story of Kowia, a Tannese Chief of the

highest rank. Going to Aneityum in youth, he had there become a true

Christian. He married an Aneityumese Christian woman, with whom he lived

very happily and had two beautiful children. Some time before the

measles reached our island, he returned to live with me as a Teacher and

to help forward our work on Tanna. He proved himself to be a decided

Christian; he was a real Chief amongst them, dignified in his whole

conduct, and every way a valuable helper to me. Everything was tried by

his own people to induce him to leave me and to renounce the Worship,

offering him every honour and bribe in their power. Failing these, they

threatened to take away all his lands, and to deprive him of

Chieftainship, but he answered,—

“Take all! I shall still stand by Missi and the Worship of Jehovah.”

From threats, they passed to galling insults, all which he bore

patiently for Jesu’s sake. But one day, a party of his people came and

sold some fowls, and an impudent fellow lifted them after they had been

bought and offered to sell them again to me. Kowia shouted,—

“Don’t purchase these, Missi; I have just bought them for you, and paid

for them!”

Thereon the fellow began to mock at him. Kowia, gazing round on all

present and then on me, rose like a lion awaking out of sleep, and with

flashing eyes exclaimed,—

“Missi, they think that because I am now a Christian I have become a

coward! a woman! to bear every abuse and insult they can heap upon me.

But I will show them for once that I am no coward, that I am still their

Chief, and that Christianity does not take away but gives us courage and

nerve.”

Springing at one man, he wrenched in a moment the mighty club from his

hands, and swinging it in air above his head like a toy, he cried,—

“Come any of you, come all against your Chief! My Jehovah God makes my

heart and arms strong. He will help me in this battle as He helps me in

other things, for He inspires me to show you that Christians are no

cowards, though they are men of peace. Come on, and you will yet know

that I am Kowia your Chief.”

All fled as he approached them; and he cried,—

“Where are the cowards now?” and handed back to the warrior his club.

After this they left him at peace.

He lived at the Mission House, with his wife and children, and was a

great help and comfort to Abraham and myself. He was allowed to go more

freely and fearlessly amongst the people, than any of the rest of our

Mission staff. The ague and fever on me at Mr. Johnston’s death, so

increased and reduced me to such weakness that I had become insensible,

while Abraham and Kowia alone attended to me. On returning to

consciousness, I heard as in a dream Kowia lamenting over me, and

pleading that I might recover, so as to hear and speak with him before

he died. Opening my eyes and looking at him, I heard him say,—

“Missi, all our Aneityumese are sick. Missi Johnston is dead. You are

very sick, and I am weak and dying. Alas, when I too am dead, who will

climb the trees and get you a cocoa-nut to drink? And who will bathe

your lips and brow?” Here he broke down into deep and long weeping, and

then resumed,—“Missi, the Tanna men hate us all on account of the

Worship of Jehovah; and I now fear He is going to take away all His

servants from this land, and leave my people to the Evil One and his

service!” I was too weak to speak, so he went on, bursting into a

soliloquy of prayer: “O Lord Jesus, Missi Johnston is dead; Thou hast

taken him away from this land. Missi Johnston the woman and Missi Paton

are very ill; I am sick, and Thy servants the Aneityumese are all sick

and dying. O Lord, our Father in Heaven, art Thou going to take away all

Thy servants, and Thy Worship from this dark land? What meanest Thou to

do, O Lord? The Tannese hate Thee and Thy Worship and Thy servants, but

surely, O Lord, Thou canst not forsake Tanna and leave our people to die

in the darkness! Oh, make the hearts of this people soft to Thy Word and

sweet to Thy Worship; teach them to fear and love Jesus; and oh, restore

and spare Missi, dear Missi Paton, that Tanna may be saved!”

Touched to the very fountains of my life by such prayers, from a man

once a Cannibal, I began under the breath of God’s blessing to revive.

A few days thereafter, Kowia came again to me, and rousing me out of

sleep, cried,—

“Missi, I am very weak; I am dying. I come to bid you farewell, and go

away to die. I am nearing death now, and I will soon see Jesus.”

I spoke what words of consolation and cheer I could muster, but he

answered.—

“Missi, since you became ill my dear wife and children are dead and

buried. Most of our Aneityumese are dead, and I am dying. If I remain on

the hill, and die here at the Mission House, there are none left to help

Abraham to carry me down to the grave where my wife and children are

laid. I wish to lie beside them, that we may rise together in the Great

Day when Jesus comes. I am happy, looking unto Jesus! One thing only

deeply grieves me now; I fear God is taking us all away from Tanna, and

will leave my poor people dark and benighted as before, for they hate

Jesus and the Worship of Jehovah. O Missi, pray for them, and pray for

me once more before I go!”

He knelt down at my side, and we prayed for each other and for Tanna. I

then urged him to remain at the Mission House, but he replied,—

“O Missi, you do not know how near to death I am! I am just going, and

will soon be with Jesus, and see my wife and children now. While a

little strength is left, I will lean on Abraham’s arm, and go down to

the graves of my dear ones and fall asleep there, and Abraham will dig a

quiet bed and lay me beside them. Farewell, Missi, I am very near death

now; we will meet again in Jesus and with Jesus!”

With many tears he dragged himself away; and my heart-strings seemed all

tied round that noble simple soul, and felt like breaking one by one as

he left me there on my bed of fever all alone. Abraham sustained him,

tottering to the place of graves; there he lay down, and immediately

gave up the ghost and slept in Jesus; and there the faithful Abraham

buried him beside his wife and children. Thus died a man who had been a

cannibal Chief, but by the grace of God and the love of Jesus changed,

transfigured into a character of light and beauty. What think ye of

this, ye scoffers at Missions? What think ye of this, ye sceptics as to

the reality of conversion? He died, as he had lived since Jesus came to

his heart; without a fear as to death, with an ever-brightening

assurance as to salvation and glory through the blood of the Lamb of

God, that blood which had cleansed him from all his sins, and had

delivered him from their power. I lost, in losing him, one of my best

friends and most courageous helpers; but I knew, that day, and I know

now, that there is one soul at least from Tanna to sing the glories of

Jesus in Heaven—and, oh, the rapture when I meet him there!

Before leaving this terrible plague of measles, I may record my belief

that it swept away, with the accompanying sore throat and diarrhœa, a

third of the entire population of Tanna; nay, in certain localities more

than a third perished. The living declared themselves unable to bury the

dead, and great want and suffering ensued. The Teacher and his wife and

child, placed by us at Black Beach, were also taken away; and his

companion, the other Teacher there, embraced the first opportunity to

leave along with his wife for his own island, else his life would have

been taken in revenge. Yet, from all accounts afterwards received, I do

not think the measles were more fatal on Tanna than on the other Islands

of the group. They appear to have carried off even a larger proportion

on Aniwa, the future scene of my many sorrows but of greater triumphs.

A new incentive was added to the already cruel superstitions of the

Natives. The Sandal-wooders, our degraded fellow-countrymen, in order to

divert attention from themselves, stirred the Natives with the wild

faith that the Missionaries and the Worship had brought all this

sickness, and that our lives should be taken in revenge. Some Captains,

on calling with their ships, made a pretence of refusing to trade with

the Natives as long as I was permitted to live on the island. One Trader

offered to come on shore and live amongst the Tannese, and supply them

with tobacco and powder, and caps and balls, on condition that the

Missionary and Abraham were got out of the way! He knew that these were

their greatest wants, and that they eagerly desired these things, but he

refused to make any sales to them, till we were murdered or driven away.

This was fuel to their savage hate, and drove them mad with revenge, and

added countless troubles to our lot.

Hurricane and tempest also fought against us at that time. On the 3rd,

and again on the 10th March, 1861, we had severe and destructive storms.

They tore up and smashed bread-fruit, chestnut, cocoa-nut, and all kinds

of fruit trees. The ground was strewn thick with half-ripe and wasted

fruits. Yam plantations and bananas were riven to pieces, and fences and

houses lay piled in a common ruin. My Mission House was also greatly

injured; and the Church, on which I had spent many weeks of labour, was

nearly levelled with the ground. Trees of forty years’ growth were

broken like straws, or lifted by the roots and blown away. At the other

Station, all Mr. Mathieson’s premises except one bedroom were swept off

in the breath of the hurricane. The sea rose alarmingly and its waves

rolled far inland, causing terrible destruction. Had not the merciful

Lord left one bedroom at my Station and one at Mr. Mathieson’s partly

habitable, I know not what in the circumstances we could have done. Men

of fifty years declared that never such a tempest had shaken their

Islands. Canoes were shivered on the coral rocks, and Villages were left

with nothing but ruins to mark where they had been. Though rain poured

in torrents, I had to keep near my fallen house for hours and hours to

prevent the Natives from carrying away everything I had in this world;

and after the second storm, all my earthly belongings had to be secured

in the one still-standing room.

Following upon this came another spate of thirst for our blood, which

was increased in the following manner. Miaki the war Chief had an infant

son, who had just died. They told us that four men were slain at the

same time, that their spirits might serve and accompany him in the other

world; and that our death also was again resolved upon. For four days

they surrounded our diminished premises. We locked ourselves all up in

that single bedroom, and armed savages kept prowling about to take our

lives. What but the restraining pity of the Lord kept them from breaking

in upon us? They killed our fowls. They cut down and destroyed all our

remaining bananas. They broke down the fence around the plantation, and

tried to burn it, but failed. They speared and killed some of the few

goats—my sole supply of milk. We were helpless, and kept breathing out

our souls in prayer; and God did preserve us, but, oh, what a trying

time!

The horror grew, when shortly thereafter we learned that our people near

the Harbour had killed four men and presented their bodies to certain

Chiefs who feasted on them; and that they in return had given large fat

hogs to our people, one for each of ten bodies which our people had

formerly presented to them. Within a few months, thirteen or fourteen

persons, nearly all refugees or prisoners of war, were reported to us as

killed and feasted upon. We generally heard nothing of these murders

till all was over, but in any case, I would have been helpless against

their bloodthirst, even had I exposed myself to their savage enmity.

They sent two dead bodies to our nearest village, where still we

conducted Worship every Sabbath when we durst appear amongst them; but

our people refused to receive them, saying, “Now we know that it is

wrong to kill and eat our fellow-creatures.” A Chief from another

village, being present, eagerly received them and carried them off to a

great feast for which he was preparing.

At this juncture, our friendly Chief Nowar seemed to become afraid. His

life also had been threatened; and our life had been often attempted of

late. Society around was all in turmoil, and Nowar urged us all to leave

and take refuge in Aneityum till these dangers blew past, and he himself

would accompany us. I refused, however, to leave. Indeed, there was no

immediate means of escape, except my boat,—which would have been almost

madness in an open sea voyage of fifty miles, with only Nowar and the

Teachers, all inexperienced hands. Nowar, being angry and afraid, took

his revenge by laying aside his shirt and kilt, returning to his heathen

nakedness and paint, attending the meetings of the savages, and

absenting himself from the Sabbath Worship. But after about three weeks

he resumed the Christian garments, and, feeling that the danger had for

the time passed over, he returned to us as friendly as ever. Poor Nowar!

if he only knew what thousands of Christians at home do every day just

to save their skins; and then if he only knew how hardly these

Christians can speak against Heathen converts!

My first baptism on Tanna was that of a Teacher’s child. About fifty

persons were present, and Miaki the war Chief was there also. Alas, that

child died in the plague of measles, and of course the Worship was

blamed. Deaths, hurricanes all seemed to be turned against us. A

thunderstorm came in the wake of the last hurricane. A man and a woman

were killed. Not far from my house, the hill was struck, a large mass

was dislodged from its shoulder and hurled into the valley below. This

was the manifest token to them that the Gods were angry and that we were

the cause! God’s grace alone kept us from sinking, and the hope of yet

seeing them delivered from their Heathenism, and brought to love and

serve Jesus Christ. For that everything could be borne; and I knew that

this was the post of duty, for it was the Lord undoubtedly that placed

me there.

One day, about this time, I heard an unusual bleating amongst my few

remaining goats, as if they were being killed or tortured. I rushed to

the goathouse, and found myself instantly surrounded by a band of armed

men. The snare had caught me, their weapons were raised, and I expected

next instant to die. But God moved me to talk to them firmly and kindly;

I warned them of their sin and its punishment; I showed them that only

my love and pity led me to remain there seeking their good, and that if

they killed me they killed their best friend. I further assured them

that I was not afraid to die, for at death my Saviour would take me to

be with Himself in Heaven, and to be far happier than I had ever been on

Earth; and that my only desire to live was to make them all as happy, by

teaching them to love and serve my Lord Jesus. I then lifted up my hands

and eyes to the Heavens, and prayed aloud for Jesus to bless all my dear

Tannese, and either to protect me or to take me home to Glory as He saw

to be for the best. One after another they slipped away from me, and

Jesus restrained them once again. Did ever mother run more quickly to

protect her crying child in danger’s hour, than the Lord Jesus hastens

to answer believing prayer, and send help to His servants in His own

good time and way, so far as it shall be for His glory and their good? A

woman may forget her child, yet will not I forget thee, saith the Lord.

Oh, that all my readers knew and felt this, as in those days and ever

since I have felt that His promise is a reality, and that He is with His

servants to support and bless them even unto the end of the world!

May, 1861, brought with it a sorrowful and tragic event, which fell as

the very shadow of doom across our path; I mean the martyrdom of the

Gordons on Erromanga. Rev. G. N. Gordon was a native of Prince Edward

Island, Nova Scotia, and was born in 1822. He was educated at the Free

Church College, Halifax, and placed as Missionary on Erromanga, in June,

1857. Much troubled and opposed by the Sandal-wooders, he had yet

acquired the language and was making progress by inroads on Heathenism.

A considerable number of young men and women embraced the Christian

Faith, lived at the Mission House, and devotedly helped him and his

excellent wife in all their work. But the hurricanes and the measles,

already referred to, caused great mortality in Erromanga also; and the

degraded Traders, who had introduced the plague, in order to save

themselves from revenge, stimulated the superstitions of the Heathen,

and charged the Missionaries with causing sickness and all other

calamities. The Sandal-wooders hated him for fearlessly denouncing and

exposing their hideous atrocities.

When Mr. Copeland and I placed the Native Teachers at Black Beach,

Tanna, we ran across to Erromanga in the _John Knox_, taking a harmonium

to Mrs. Gordon, just come to their order from Sydney. When it was opened

out at the Mission House, and Mrs. Gordon began playing on it and

singing sweet hymns, the native women were in ecstasies. They at once

proposed to go off to the bush and cut each a burden of long grass, to

thatch the printing-office which Mr. Gordon was building in order to

print the Scriptures in their own tongue, if only Mrs. Gordon would play

to them at night and teach them to sing God’s praises. They joyfully did

so, and then spent a happy evening singing those hymns. Next day being

Sabbath, we had a delightful season there, about thirty attending Church

and listening eagerly. The young men and women, living at the Mission

House, were being trained to become Teachers. They were reading a small

book in their own language, telling them the story of Joseph; and the

work every way seemed most hopeful. The Mission House had been removed a

mile or so up a hill, partly for Mrs. Gordon’s health, and partly to

escape the annoying and contaminating influence of the Sandal-wooders on

his Christian Natives.

On 20th May, 1861, he was still working at the roofing of the

printing-office, and had sent his lads to bring each a load of the long

grass to finish the thatching. Meantime, a party of Erromangans from a

district called Bunk-Hill, under a Chief named Lovu, had been watching

him. They had been to the Mission House inquiring, and they had seen him

send away his Christian lads. They then hid in the bush, and sent two of

their men to the Missionary to ask for calico. On a piece of wood he

wrote a note to Mrs. Gordon to give them two yards each. They asked him

to go with them to the Mission House, as they needed medicine for a sick

boy, and Lovu their Chief wanted to see him. He tied up in a napkin a

meal of food, which had been brought to him but not eaten, and started

to go with them. He requested the native Narubulet to go on before, with

his companion; but they insisted upon his going in front. In crossing a

streamlet, which I visited shortly afterwards, his foot slipped. A blow

was aimed at him with a tomahawk which he caught; the other man struck,

but his weapon was also caught. One of the tomahawks was then wrenched

out of his grasp. Next moment, a blow on the spine laid the dear

Missionary low, and a second on the neck almost severed the head from

the body. The other Natives then rushed from their ambush, and slashed

him to pieces, and began dancing round him with frantic shoutings. Mrs.

Gordon, hearing the noise, came out and stood in front of the Mission

House, looking in the direction of her husband’s working place and

wondering what had happened. Ouben, one of the party, who had run

towards the Station the moment that Mr. Gordon fell, now approached her.

A merciful clump of trees had hid from her eyes all that had occurred,

and she said to Ouben,—

“What’s the cause of that noise?”

He replied, “Oh, nothing! only the boys amusing themselves!”

Saying, “Where are the boys?” she turned round.

Ouben slipped stealthily behind her, sank his tomahawk into her back,

and with another blow almost severed her head!

Such was the fate of those two devoted servants of the Lord; loving in

their lives, and in their deaths scarcely divided—their spirits, in the

crown of martyrdom, entered Glory together, to be welcomed by Williams

and Harris, whose blood was shed on the same dark isle for the name and

cause of Jesus. They had laboured four years on Erromanga, amidst trials

and dangers manifold, and had not been without tokens of blessing in the

Lord’s work. Never more earnest and devoted Missionaries lived or died

in the Heathen field. Other accounts, indeed, have been published, and

another was reported to me by Mr. Gordon’s Christian lads; but the above

combines faithfully the principal facts in the story. One young

Christian lad from a distance saw Mr. Gordon murdered; and a woman saw

Mrs. Gordon fall. The above facts are vouched for by a Mr. Milne, one of

the few respectable Sandal-wooders, who was there at the time, and

helped the Christian Natives to bury the remains, which he says were

painfully mutilated.

Some severe criticisms, of course, were written and published by those

angelic creatures who judge all things from their own safe and easy

distance. Mr. Gordon’s lack of prudence was sorely blamed, forsooth! One

would so like to see these people just for one week in such trying

circumstances. As my near fellow-labourer and dearest friend, I know

what was the whole spirit of the man’s life, his watchful care, his

ceaseless anxiety to do everything that in his judgment was for God’s

glory and the prosperity of the Mission, and my estimate of him and of

his action to the last fills me with supreme regard to his memory. The

Rev. Dr. Inglis of Aneityum, best qualified of all men living to form an

opinion, wrote:—

“Mr. Gordon was a strong, bold, fearless, energetic, self-denying, and

laborious Missionary; eager, earnest, and unwearied in seeking the

salvation of the Heathen.... Even if Mr. Gordon was to blame for any

imprudence, no blame of this kind could be attached to Mrs. Gordon. Hers

was a weak, gentle, loving spirit; quiet and uncomplaining, prudent,

earnest, and devoted to Christ. She was esteemed and beloved by all who

knew her.”

My Amen follows, soft and deep, on all that he has written; and I add,

Mr. Gordon was doing what any faithful and devoted Missionary would in

all probability for the Master’s sake in similar circumstances have

done. Those who charge him with imprudence would, doubtless, grievously

blame Stephen for bringing that stoning upon himself, which he could so

easily have escaped!

Mr. Gordon, in his last letter to me, of date 15th February, 1861,

says:—

“MY DEAR BROTHER,—

“I have news of the best and of the worst character to

communicate. A young man died in December, in the Lord, as we believe.

We are still preserved in health at our work by the God of all grace,

whose power alone could have preserved us in all our troubles, which

have come upon us by the measles _per_ the _Blue Bell_. Ah, this is a

season which we will not soon forget. Some settlements are nearly

depopulated, and the principal Chiefs are nearly all dead! And oh, the

indescribable fiendish hatred that exists against us! There is quite a

famine here. The distress is awful, and the cry of mourning perpetual.

A few on both sides of the Island who did not flee from the Worship of

God are living, which is now greatly impressing some and exciting the

enmity of others. I cannot now write of perils. We feel very anxious

to hear from you. If you have to flee, Aneityum of course is the

nearest and best place to which you can go. Confidence in us is being

restored. Mana, a native Teacher, remains with us for safety from the

fury of his enemies. I cannot visit as usual. The persecution cannot

be much worse on Tanna. I hope the worst is past. Mrs. G. unites in

love to you, and to Mr. and Mrs. Johnston. In great haste,

“I remain, dear Brother, Yours truly,

“G. N. GORDON.”

Let every reader, in view of this epistle, like a voice from the World

Unseen, judge of the spirit of the man of God who penned it, and of the

causes that were even then at work and were bringing about his sorrowful

death. Cruel superstition, measles, and the malignant influences of the

godless Traders,—these on Erromanga, as elsewhere, were the forces at

work that brought hatred and murder in their train.

Immediately thereafter, a Sandal-wood Trader brought in his boat a party

of Erromangans by night to Tanna. They assembled our Harbour Chiefs and

people, and urged them to kill us and Mr. and Mrs. Mathieson and the

Teachers, or allow them to do so, as they had killed Mr. and Mrs.

Gordon. Then they proposed to go to Aneityum and kill the Missionaries

there, as the Aneityumese Natives had burned their Church, and thus they

would sweep away the Worship and the servants of Jehovah from all the

New Hebrides. Our Chiefs, however, refused, restrained by the Merciful

One, and the Erromangans returned to their own island in a sulky mood.

Notwithstanding this refusal, as if they wished to reserve the murder

and plunder for themselves, our Mission House was next day thronged with

armed men, some from Inland, others from Mr. Mathieson’s Station. They

loudly praised the Erromangans! The leaders said again and again in my

hearing,—

“The men of Erromanga killed Missi Williams long ago. We killed the

Rarotongan and Samoan Teachers. We fought Missi Turner and Missi Nisbet,

and drove them from our island. We killed the Aneityumese Teachers on

Aniwa, and one of Missi Paton’s Teachers too. We killed several white

men, and no Man-of-war punished us. Let us talk over this, about killing

Missi Paton and the Aneityumese, till we see if any Man-of-war comes to

punish the Erromangans. If not, let us unite, let us kill these

Missionaries, let us drive the worship of Jehovah from our land!”

An Inland Chief said or rather shouted in my hearing,—

“My love to the Erromangans! They are strong and brave men, the

Erromangans. They have killed their Missi and his wife, while we only

talk about it. They have destroyed the Worship and driven away Jehovah!”

I stood amongst them and protested,—

“God will yet punish the Erromangans for such wicked deeds. God has

heard all your bad talk, and will punish it in His own time and way.”

But they shouted me down, amidst great excitement, with the cry,—

“Our love to the Erromangans! Our love to the Erromangans!”

After I left them, Abraham heard them say,—

“Miaki is lazy. Let us meet in every village, and talk with each other.

Let us all agree to kill Missi and the Aneityumese for the first of our

Chiefs that dies.”

On Tanna, as on Erromanga, the Natives have no idea of death coming to

any one naturally, or sickness or any disease; everything comes by

Nahak, or sorcery. When one person grows sick or dies, they meet to talk

over it and find out who has bewitched or killed him, and this ends in

fixing upon some individual upon whom they take revenge, or whom they

murder outright. Thus many wars arise on Tanna, for the friends or the

tribe of the murdered man generally seek a counter-revenge; and so the

blood-fiend is let loose over all the island, and from island to island

throughout the whole of the New Hebrides.

The night after the visit of the Erromangan boat, and the sad news of

Mr. and Mrs. Gordon’s death the Tannese met on their village

dancing-grounds and held high festival in praise of the Erromangans. Our

best friend, old Nowar, the Chief, who had worn shirt and kilt for some

time and had come regularly to, the Worship, relapsed once more; he

painted his face, threw off his clothing, resumed his bow and arrows,

and his tomahawk, of which he boasted that it had killed very many men

and at least one woman! On my shaming him for professing to worship

Jehovah and yet uniting with the Heathen in rejoicing over the murder of

His servants on Erromanga, he replied to this effect,—

“Truly, Missi, they have done well. If the people of Erromanga are

severely punished for this by the Man-of-war, we will all hear of it;

and our people will then fear to kill you and the other Missionaries, so

as to destroy the Worship of Jehovah. Now, they say, the Erromangans

killed Missi Williams and the Samoan, Rarotongan, and Aneityumese

Teachers, besides other white men, and no Man-of-war has punished either

them or us. If they are not punished for what has been done on

Erromanga, nothing else can keep them here from killing you and me and

all who worship at the Mission House!”

I answered,—“Nowar, let us all be strong to love and serve Jehovah

Jesus. If it be for our good and His glory, He will protect us; if not,

He will take us to be with Himself. We will not be killed by their bad

talk. Besides, what avails it to us, when dead and gone, if even a

Man-of-war should come and punish our murderers?”

He shrugged his shoulders, answering,—“Missi, by-and-by you will see.

Mind, I tell you the truth. I know our Tannese people. How is it that

Jehovah did not protect the Gordons and the Erromangan worshippers? If

the Erromangans are not punished, neither will our Tannese be punished,

though they murder all Jehovah’s people!”

I felt for Nowar’s struggling faith, just trembling on the verge of

cannibalism yet, and knowing so little of the true Jehovah.

Groups of Natives assembled suspiciously near us and sat whispering

together. They urged old Abraham to return to Aneityum by the very first

opportunity, as our lives were certain to be taken, but he replied,—

“I will not leave Missi.”

Abraham and I were thrown much into each other’s company, and he stood

by me in every danger. We conducted family prayers alternately; and that

evening he said during the prayer in Tannese, in which language alone we

understood each other,—

“O Lord, our Heavenly Father, they have murdered Thy servants on

Erromanga. They have banished the Aneityumese from dark Tanna. And now

they want to kill Missi Paton and me! Our great King, protect us, and

make their hearts soft and sweet to Thy Worship. Or, if they are

permitted to kill us, do not Thou hate us, but wash us in the blood of

Thy dear Son Jesus Christ. He came down to Earth and shed His blood for

sinners; through Him forgive us our sins and take us to Heaven—that good

place where Missi Gordon the man and Missi Gordon the woman and all Thy

dear servants now are singing Thy praise and seeing Thy face. Our Lord,

our hearts are pained just now, and we weep over the death of Thy dear

servants; but make our hearts good and strong for Thy cause, and take

Thou away all our fears. Make us two and all Thy servants strong for

Thee and for Thy Worship; and if they kill us two, let us die together

in Thy good work, like Thy servants Missi Gordon the man and Missi

Gordon the woman.”

In this manner his great simple soul poured itself out to God, and my

heart melted within me as it had never done under any prayer poured from

the lips of cultured Christian men!

Under the strain of these events, Miaki came to our house, and attacked

me in hearing of his men to this effect:—

“You and the Worship are the cause of all the sickness and death now

taking place on Tanna! The Erromanga men killed Missi Gordon the man and

also the woman, and they are all well long ago. The Worship is killing

us all; and the Inland people will kill us for keeping you and the

Worship here; for we love the conduct of Tanna, but we hate the Worship.

We must kill you and it, and we shall all be well again.”

I tried to reason firmly and kindly with them, showing them that their

own conduct was destroying them, and that our presence and the Worship

could only be a blessing to them in every way, if only they would accept

of it and give up their evil ways. I referred to a poor girl, whom Miaki

and his men had stolen and abused, that they knew such conduct to be

bad, and that God would certainly punish them for it.

He replied, “Such is the conduct of Tanna. Our fathers loved and

followed it, we love and follow it, and if the Worship condemns it, we

will kill you and destroy the Worship.”

I said, “The Word of the Holy God condemns all bad conduct, and I must

obey my God in trying to lead you to give it up, and to love and serve

His Son Jesus our Saviour. If I refuse to obey my God, He will punish

me.”

He replied, “Missi, we like many wives to attend us and to do our work.

Three of my wives are dead and three are yet alive. The Worship killed

them and my children. We hate it. It will kill us all.”

I answered, “Miaki, is it good for you to have so many wives, and many

of your men to have none? Who waits on them? Who works for them? They

cannot get a wife, and so, having to work for themselves, they are led

to hate you and all the Chiefs who have more wives than one. You do not

love your wives, else you would not slave them and beat them as you do.”

But he declared that his heart was good, that his conduct was good, and

that he hated the teaching of the Worship. He had a party of men staying

with him from the other side of the island, and he sent back a present

of four large fat hogs to their Chiefs, with a message as to the killing

of the Mathiesons. If that were done, his hands would be strengthened in

dealing with us.

Satan seemed to fill that man’s heart. He incited his people to steal

everything from us, and to annoy us in every conceivable way. They

killed one of my precious watch-dogs, and feasted upon it. So sad was

the condition of Tanna, that if a man were desperate enough in

wickedness, if he killed a number of men and tyrannized over others, he

was dignified with the name and rank of a Chief. This was the secret of

Miaki’s influence, and of his being surrounded by the outlaws and

refugees, not only of his own but even other islands. It was all founded

upon terror and upheld by cruelty. The Sacred Man, for instance, who

murdered my Teacher, and a young man who threw three spears at me, which

by God’s help I avoided, were both praised and honoured for their deeds.

But the moment they were laid aside by measles and unable to retaliate,

their flatterers turned upon them and declared that they were punished

for their bad conduct against Jehovah and His servants and His Worship!

To know what was best to be done, in such trying circumstances, was an

abiding perplexity. To have left altogether, when so surrounded by

perils and enemies, at first seemed the wisest course, and was the

repeated advice of many friends. But again, I had acquired the language,

and had gained a considerable influence amongst the Natives, and there

were a number warmly attached both to myself and to the Worship. To have

left would have been to lose all, which to me was heart-rending;

therefore, risking all with Jesus, I held on while the hope of being

spared longer had not absolutely and entirely vanished. God only knows

how deep and genuine were my pity and affection for the poor Tannese,

labouring and longing to bring them from their dark idolatry and

heathenism to love and serve and please Jesus Christ as their God and

Saviour. True, some of the awfully wise people wrote, as in the case of

Mr. Gordon, much nonsense about us and the Tanna Mission. They knew, of

course, that I was to blame, and they from safe distances could see that

I was not in the path of duty!

Perhaps, to people less omnisciently sure, the following quotation from

a letter of the late A. Clark, Esq., J.P., Auckland, New Zealand, will

show what Bishop Selwyn thought of my standing fast on Tanna at the post

of duty, and he knew what he was writing about. He says,—

“In addition, Bishop Selwyn told us that he had seen the Commodore

(Seymour), who told him that at Tanna the Natives were in a very

insulting and hostile state of mind; so much so that he felt it his duty

to offer Mr. Paton a passage in his ship to Auckland or some other place

of safety. He said, ‘Talk of bravery! talk of heroism! The man who leads

a forlorn hope is a coward in comparison with him, who, on Tanna, thus

alone, without a sustaining look or cheering word from one of his own

race, regards it as his duty to hold on in the face of such dangers. We

read of the soldier, found after the lapse of ages among the ruins of

Herculaneum, who stood firm at his post amid the fiery rain destroying

all around him, thus manifesting the rigidity of the discipline amongst

those armies of ancient Rome which conquered the World. Mr. Paton was

subjected to no such iron law. He might, with honour, when offered to

him, have sought a temporary asylum in Auckland, where he would have

been heartily received. But he was moved by higher considerations. He

chose to remain, and God knows whether at this moment he is in the land

of the living!’ When the bishop told us that he declined leaving Tanna

by H.M.S. _Pelorus_, he added, ‘And I like him all the better for so

doing!’”

For my part I feel quite confident that, in like circumstances, that

noble Bishop of God would have done the same. I, born in the bosom of

the Scottish Covenant, descended from those who suffered persecution for

Christ’s honour, would have been unworthy of them and of my Lord had I

deserted my post for danger only. Yet not to me, but to the Lord who

sustained me, be all the praise and the glory! On his next visit to

these Islands, the good Bishop brought a box of Mission goods to me in

his ship, besides £90 for our work from Mr. Clark and friends in

Auckland. His interest in us and our work was deep and genuine, and was

unmarred on either side by any consciousness of ecclesiastical

distinctions. We were one in Christ, and, when next we meet again in the

glory of our Lord, Bishop and Presbyter will be eternally one in that

blessed fellowship.

The following incident illustrates the depth of native superstition. One

morning two Inland Chiefs came running to the Mission House, breathless,

and covered with perspiration. One of them held up a handful of

half-rotten tracts, crying,—

“Missi, is this a part of God’s Word, the sacred Book of Jehovah? or is

it the work, the words, the book of man?”

I examined them and replied, “These are the work, the words, and the

book of man, not of Jehovah.”

He questioned me again: “Missi, are you certain that it is not the Word

of Jehovah?”

I replied, “It is only man’s work and man’s book.”

He continued then, “Missi, some years ago, Kaipai, a sacred Chief, and

certain Tannese, went on a visit to Aneityum, and Missi Geddie gave him

these books. On his return, when he showed them to the Tannese, the

people were all so afraid of them, for they thought they were the sacred

Books of Jehovah, that they met for consultation and agreed solemnly to

bury them. Yesterday, some person in digging had disinterred them, and

at once our Inland people said that our dead Chief had buried a part of

Jehovah’s Word, which made Him angry, and that He had therefore caused

the Chiefs death and the plague of measles, etc. Therefore they were now

assembled to kill the dead Chief’s son and daughter in revenge! But,

before that should be done, I persuaded them to send these books, to

inquire of you if this be part of Jehovah’s Book, and if the burying of

it caused all these diseases and deaths.”

I assured him that these books never caused either sickness or death to

any human being; and that none of us can cause sickness or death by

sorcery; that burying these Tracts did not make Jehovah angry, nor cause

evil to any creature. “You yourselves know,” I said, “the very ships

that brought the measles and caused the deaths; and you killed some of

the young men who were landed sick with the disease.”

The Inland Chief declared, “Missi, I am quite satisfied; no person shall

be put to death over these books now.”

They went off, but immediately returned, saying, “Missi, have you any

books like these to show to us? And will you show us the sacred Book of

Jehovah beside them?”

I showed them a Bible, and then a handful of Tracts with pictures like

those they had brought; and I offered them the Bible and specimens of

these Tracts, that they might show both to the people assembled. The

Tracts they received, but the Bible they refused to touch. They

satisfied the Inland people and prevented bloodshed; but oh, what a

depth of superstition to be raised out of! and how easily life might be

sacrificed at every turn!

On another occasion I had the joy of saving the lives of Sandal-wood

Traders, to whom neither I nor the Mission owed anything, except for

Christ’s sake. The _Blue Bell_ cast anchor in the Harbour on a beautiful

morning, and the Captain and Mate immediately came on shore. They had

letters for me; but, on landing, they were instantly surrounded by the

Chiefs and people, who formed a ring about them on the beach and called

for me to come. The two white men stood in the midst, with many weapons

pointed at them, and death if they dared to move. They shouted to me,—

“This is one of the Vessels which brought the measles. You and they made

the sickness, and destroyed our people. Now, if you do not leave with

this vessel, we will kill you all.”

Of course, their intention was to frighten me on board just as I was,

and leave my premises for plunder! I protested,—

“I will not leave you; I cannot leave you in this way; and if you murder

these men or me, Jehovah will punish you. I am here for your good; and

you know how kind I have been to you all, in giving you medicine,

knives, axes, blankets, and clothing. You also know well that I have

never done ill to one human being, but have constantly sought your good.

I will not and cannot leave you thus.”

In great wrath they cried, “Then will we kill you and this Captain and

Mate.”

I kept reasoning with them against such conduct, standing firmly before

them and saying, “If you do kill me, Jehovah will punish you; the other

men in that vessel will punish you before they sail; and a Man-of-war

will come and burn your villages and canoes and fruit trees.”

I urged the two men to try and get into their boat as quickly as

possible, in silence, while I kept arguing with the Natives. The letters

which they had for me, the savages forbade me to take into my hands,

lest thereby some other foreign disease should come to their island.

Miaki exclaimed in great wrath that my medicine had killed them all; but

I replied,—

“My medicine with God’s blessing saved many lives. You know well that

all who followed my rules recovered from the measles, except only one

man, and are living still. Now, you seek to kill me for saving your

lives and the lives of your people!”

I appealed to Yorian, another Chief, if the medicine had not saved his

life when he appeared to be dying, which he admitted to be the truth.

The men had now slipped into their boat and were preparing to leave.

Miaki shouted,—

“Let them go! Don’t kill them to-day.” Then he called to the Captain,

“Come on shore and trade with us to-morrow.”

Next day they foolishly came on shore and began to trade. Natives

surrounded the boat with clubs and tomahawks. But Miaki’s heart failed

him when about to strike; and he called out,—

“Missi said that, if we kill them, a Man-of-war will come and take

revenge on us.”

In the altercation that followed, the men thrust the boat into deep

water and forced it out of the grasp of the savages; but they caught the

Captain’s large Newfoundland dog and kept it prisoner. As a compensation

for this disappointment, Miaki urged that my life and Abraham’s be at

once taken, but again Nowar’s firm opposition and God’s goodness rescued

us from the jaws of the lion. The _Blue Bell_ left next morning, and the

dog remained behind, as no one from the vessel would venture ashore.

Revenge for the murder of the four men killed to accompany Miaki’s

child, threatened to originate another war; but the Chiefs for eight

miles around met, and, after much speechifying, agreed that as they were

all weak for war, owing to the measles and the want of food through the

hurricanes, they should delay it till they all grew stronger. Nowar was,

however, greatly excited, and informed me that Miaki had urged the

people of an inland district to shoot Nowar and Abraham and me, and he

pled with us again to take him and flee to Aneityum,—impossible except

by canoe, and perhaps impossible even so. That night and the following

night they tried to break into my house. On one occasion my valuable dog

was let out, and cleared them away. Next night I shouted at them from

inside, when they thought me asleep, and they decamped again. Indeed,

our continuous danger caused me now oftentimes to sleep with my clothes

on, that I might start at a moment’s warning. My faithful dog would give

a sharp bark and awake me. At other times, she would leap up and pull at

the clothes till I awoke, and then she turned her head quietly and

indicated by a wondrous instinct where the danger lay. God made them

fear this precious creature, and often used her in saving our lives.

Soon after this six Inland Chiefs came to see me. We had a long talk on

the evils of war, and the blessings of the Worship of Jehovah. I gave

each a knife and a fork and a tin plate, and they promised to oppose the

war which Miaki was forcing on. A man came also with a severe gash in

his hand, which a fish had given him; I dressed it, and he went away

very grateful and spread everywhere the news of healing, a kind of

Gospel which he and they could most readily appreciate.

Another incident made them well-disposed for a season; namely, the use

of a fishing-net. Seeing that the Natives had so little food—there

being, in fact, a famine after the hurricane—I engaged an inland Tribe

to make a net forty feet long and very broad. Strange to say, the Inland

people who live far from the sea make the best fishing materials, which

again they sell to the Harbour people for the axes, knives, blankets,

and other articles obtained from calling vessels. They also make the

killing-stones, and trade with them amongst the shore people all round

the island. This _kawas_ or killing-stone is made of blue whinstone,

eighteen to twenty-four inches long, an inch and a half across,

perfectly straight, and hewn as round and neat as any English tradesman

could have done it, exactly like a large scythe stone, such as they use

on the harvest fields in Scotland. The kawas seems to be peculiar to

Tanna, at least I have not seen it on any other island. The Natives,

with pieces of very hard heavy wood of the same size and shape, are

taught to throw it from infancy at a given mark; in warfare, it is

thrown first; where it strikes it stuns or kills, and then they spring

forward with their large double-handed heavy club. Every man and boy

carries his killing-stone and other weapons, even when moving about

peaceably in his own village, war being, in fact, the only regular

occupation for men!

Well, these same Inland people, the sort of artisans of the island,

being mostly the women and the girls, manufactured for me this huge

fishing-net. The cord was twisted from the fibre made out of the bark of

their own trees, and prepared with immense toil and care; and not

without touches of skill and taste, when woven and knotted and

intertwined. This net I secured, and lent about three days each to every

village all round the Harbour and near it. One night I saw them carrying

home a large hog, which they had got from an Inland Chief for a portion

of the fish which they had taken. I thought it right to cause them to

return the net to the Mission House every Saturday evening, that they

might not be tempted to use it on Sabbath. It was a great help to them,

and the Harbour yielded them much wholesome food in lieu of what the

hurricane had destroyed.

When, about this time, the _John Knox_ came to anchor in the bay, a

Native was caught in the act of stealing from her. Angry at being

discovered, he and his friends came to shoot me, pretending that it was

because the _John Knox_ knew they were in want of food and had not

brought them a load of Taro from Aneityum. Taro is a plant of the genus

_Arum_, the _Æsculentum_, or _Colocasia Æsculenta_, well known all

through Polynesia. The Natives spread it in a very simple way. Cutting

off the leaves, with a very little of the old bulb still attached, they

fix these in the ground, and have the new Taro about a year after that.

It is of several kinds and of a great variety of colours—white, yellow,

blue, etc. It grows best in ground irrigated by streams of pure water,

or in shallow, swampy ground, over which the water runs. The dry-ground

Taro is small and inferior, compared to the water-grown roots.

Nutritious and pleasant, not unlike the texture of cheese when laid in

slices on the table, in size and appearance like a Swedish turnip, it

can be either boiled or baked. Hurricanes may destroy all other native

food, but the Taro lies uninjured below the water; hence on islands,

where it will grow, it forms one of the most permanent and valuable of

all their crops.

Our people also demanded that the _John Knox_ should bring them kava and

tobacco. Kava is the plant, _Piper Methysticum_, from which they make a

highly intoxicating drink. The girls and boys first chew it, and spit

the juice into a basin; there it is mixed with water, and then strained

through a fibrous cloth-like texture, which they get from the top of the

cocoa-nut trees, where it surrounds the young nuts, and drops off with

them when they are ripe. This they freely drink; it does not make them

violent, but stupefies them and induces sleep like opium. A portion is

always poured out to their Gods; and the dregs in every mouth after

drinking are always spit out with the exclamation, “That’s for you,

Kumesam!” It is sometimes offered and partaken of with very great

ceremony; but its general use is as a soporific by the men, regularly

after the evening meal. Women and children are not allowed to drink it.

Many men have been attacked and murdered at night, when lying enfeebled

and enfolded by kava. That, indeed, is their common mode of taking

revenge and of declaring war. These angry men, who came to me about the

_John Knox_, tried to smash in my window and kill my faithful dog; but I

reasoned firmly and kindly with them, and they at last withdrew.

At that time, though my life was daily attempted, a dear lad, named

Katasian, was coming six miles regularly to the Worship and to receive

frequent instruction. One day, when engaged in teaching him, I caught a

man stealing the blind from my window. On trying to prevent him, he

aimed his great club at me, but I seized the heavy end of it with both

my hands as it swung past my head, and held on with all my might. What a

prayer went up from me to God at that dread moment! The man, astonished

and abashed at my kind words and appeal, slunk away and left me in

peace.

I had planted a few Yams, of the genus _Dioscoria_; a most valuable

article of food, nearly as precious as potatoes were to the poor in

Ireland, and used very much in the same way. Years after, when I went to

Melbourne, I took one from Aniwa, by no means the largest, weighing

seventy-two pounds, and another, forty-two. The things, however, that I

planted on Tanna the Natives stole and carried away, making themselves

extremely troublesome. But God never took away from me the consciousness

that it was still right for me to be kind and forgiving, and to hope

that I might lead them to love and imitate Jesus.

For a season thereafter, the friendly feeling grew on every side. The

Natives prepared, for payment, an excellent foundation for a new Church,

by levelling down the hill near to my Mission House. Any number of men

offered to work for calico, knives, axes, etc. All the fences were

renewed, and the Mission premises began to look nice once more, at

least, in my eyes. My work became encouraging, and I had many

opportunities of talking with them about the Worship and Jehovah. This

state of matters displeased Miaki and his men; and one day, having been

engaged thus, I rushed back only in time to extinguish a fire which they

had kindled under the verandah and close to the door of my house. Our

watch had to be unrelaxing. A cousin of Miaki’s, for instance, sold me a

fish as good for food which he knew to be poisonous, but Nowar saw in

time and warned me of its deadly character. Miaki then threatened to

shoot any of the Inland people who came to work or to receive

instruction, yet larger numbers came than before, but they came fully

armed! Nouka, the high Chief of the Harbour, Miaki’s uncle, came and sat

beside us often, and said,—

“Miaki breaks my heart! He deceives Missi. He hates the Worship of

Jehovah.”

For some time, Nouka and his wife and daughter—a handsome girl, his only

child—and Miaki’s principal wife and her two sons, and nine Chiefs

attended Worship regularly at the Mission House, on Sabbaths and on the

afternoon of every Wednesday. In all, about sixty persons somewhat

regularly waited on our ministrations at this time; and amidst all

perils I was encouraged, and my heart was full of hope. Yet one evening,

when feeling more consoled and hopeful than ever before, a musket was

discharged at my very door, and I was constrained to realize that we

were in the midst of death. Father, our times are in Thy hand.

As my work became more encouraging, I urgently applied to the

Missionaries on Aneityum for more Teachers, but none could be found

willing to return to Tanna. The plague of measles had almost demoralized

them. Even on Aneityum, where they had medicine and would follow the

Missionaries’ advice, no fewer than eleven hundred had been cut off; and

the mortality was very much greater on such islands as Tanna, Aniwa,

etc., where they were still Heathen, and either had not or would not

follow medical counsels. Of my Teachers and their wives ten were swept

away in the epidemic, and the few that were left were so disheartened

that they escaped to their own land at the first opportunity, as before

recorded, excepting only dear old faithful Abraham. But I need not

wonder; smaller perils deter God’s people at home from many a call of

duty.

In my Mission School, I offered as a prize a red shirt for the first

Chief who knew the whole Alphabet without a mistake. It was won by an

Inakaki Chief, who was once a terror to the whole community. Afterwards,

when trying to teach the A B C to others, he proceeded in something like

this graphic style:—

“A is a man’s legs with the body cut off; B is like two eyes; C is a

three-quarters moon; D is like one eye; E is a man with one club under

his feet and another over his head; F is a man with a large club and a

smaller one,” etc., etc.; L was like a man’s foot; Q was the talk of the

dove, etc. Then he would say, “Remember these things; you will soon get

hold of the letters and be able to read. I have taught my little child,

who can scarcely walk, the names of them all. They are not hard to hold,

but soft and easy. You will soon learn to read the book, if you try it

with all your heart!”

But Miaki was still our evil genius, and every incident seemed to be

used by him for one settled purpose of hate. A Kaserumini Chief, for

instance, and seven men took away a young girl in a canoe to Aniwa, to

be sold to friends there for tobacco leaf, which the Aniwans cultivated

extensively. They also prepared to take revenge there for a child’s

death, killed in their belief by the sorcery of an Aniwan. When within

sight of the shore, the canoes were upset and all were said to have been

devoured by sharks, excepting only one canoe out of six. This one

returned to Tanna and reported that there were two white Traders living

on Aniwa, that they had plenty of ammunition and tobacco, but that they

would not come to Tanna as long as a Missionary lived there. Under this

fresh incitement, a party of Miaki’s men came to my house, praising the

Erromangans for the murder of their Missionaries and threatening me.

Even the friendly Nowar said, “Miaki will make a great wind and sink any

Man-of-war that comes here. We will take the Man-of-war and kill all

that are on board. If you and Abraham do not leave us we will kill you

both, for we must have the Traders and the powder.”

Just as they were assuming a threatening attitude, other Natives came

running with the cry, “Missi, the _John Knox_ is coming into the

Harbour, and two great ships of fire, Men-of-war behind her, coming very

fast!”

I retorted upon Nowar and the hostile company, “Now is your time! Make

all possible haste! Let Miaki raise his great wind now; get all your men

ready; I will tell them that you mean to fight, and you will find them

always ready!”

Miaki’s men fled away in unconcealed terror; but Nowar came to me and

said, “Missi, I know that my talk is all lies, but if I speak the truth,

they will kill me!”

I answered, “Trust in Jehovah, the same God who sent these vessels now,

to protect us from being murdered.”

But Nowar always wavered.

And now from all parts of the island those who were most friendly

flocked to us. They were clamorous to have Miaki and some others of our

enemies punished by the Man-of-war in presence of the Natives; and then

they would be strong to speak in our defence and to lead the Tannese to

worship Jehovah.

Commodore Seymour, Captain Hume, and Dr. Geddie came on shore. After

inquiring into everything, the Commodore urged me to leave at once, and

very kindly offered to remove me to Aneityum, or Auckland, or any place

of safety that I preferred. Again, however, I hesitated to leave my dear

benighted Tannese, knowing that both Stations would be instantly broken

up, that all the influence gained would be thrown away, that the Church

would lose all that had been expended, and above all, that those

friendly to us would be left to persecution and destruction. For a long

time I had seldom taken off my clothes at night, needing to be

constantly on the alert to start at a moment’s notice; yet, while hope

burned within my soul I could not withdraw, so I resolved to risk all

with my dear Lord Jesus, and remained at my post. At my request,

however, they met and talked with all the leaders who could be assembled

at the Mission House. The Natives declared frankly that they liked me

but did not like the Worship. The Commodore reminded them that they had

invited me to land among them, and had pledged their word more than once

to protect me; he argued with them that as they had no fault to find

with me, but only with the Worship, which could do them only good, they

must bind themselves to protect my life. Miaki and others promised and

gave him their hands to do so. Lathella, an Aneityumese Chief, who was

with Dr. Geddie, interpreted for him and them, Dr. Geddie explaining

fully to Lathella in Aneityumese what the Commodore said in English, and

Lathella explaining all to the Tannese in their own tongue.

At last old Nouka spoke out for all and said, “Captain Paddan and all

the Traders tell us that the Worship causes all our sickness and death.

They will not trade with us, nor sell us tobacco, pipes, powder, balls,

caps, and muskets, till we kill our Missi like the Erromangans, but

after that they will send a Trader to live among us and give us plenty

of all these things. We love Missi. But when the Traders tell us that

the Worship makes us sick, and when they bribe us with tobacco and

powder to kill him or drive him away, some believe them and our hearts

do bad conduct to Missi. Let Missi remain here, and we will try to do

good conduct to Missi; but you must tell Queen ’Toria of her people’s

bad treatment of us, and that she must prevent her Traders from killing

us with their measles, and from telling us lies to make us do bad

conduct to Missi! If they come to us and talk as before, our hearts are

very dark and may again lead us to bad conduct to Missi.”

After this little parley, the Commodore invited us all on board, along

with the Chiefs. They saw about three hundred brave marines ranked up on

deck, and heard a great cannon discharged. For all such efforts to

impress them and open their eyes, I felt profoundly grateful; but too

clearly I knew and saw that only the grace of God could lastingly change

them!

They were soon back to their old arguments, and were heard saying to one

another, “If no punishment is inflicted on the Erromangans for murdering

the Missi there, we fear the bad conduct of the Tannese will continue.”

No punishment was inflicted at Erromanga, and the Tannese were soon as

bold and wicked as ever. For instance, while the Man-of-war lay in the

Harbour, Nowar kept himself closely concealed; but no sooner had she

sailed than the cowardly fellow came out, laughing at the others, and

protesting that he was under no promise and was free to act as he

pleased! Yet in the hour of danger he generally proved to be our friend;

such was his vacillating character. Nor was Miaki very seriously

impressed. Mr. Mathieson shortly thereafter sent his boat round to me,

being again short of European food. On his crew leaving her to deliver

their message to me, some of Miaki’s men at once jumped into the boat

and started off round the island in search of kava. I went to Miaki, to

ask that the boat might be brought back soon, but on seeing me he ran

for his club and aimed to strike me. I managed to seize it, and to hold

on, pleading with God and talking with Miaki, till by the interference

of some friendly Natives his wrath was assuaged a little. Returning

home, I sent food overland to keep them going till the boat returned,

which she did in about eight days. Thus light and shadow pursued each

other, the light brightening for a moment, but upon the whole the

shadows deepening.

CHAPTER X.

_FAREWELL SCENES._

The War Fever.—Forced to the War Council.—A Truce among the

Chiefs.—Chiefs and People.—The Kiss of Judas.—The Death of

Ian.—The Quivering Knife.—A War of Revenge.—In the Thick of the

Battle.—Tender Mercies of the Wicked.—Escape for Life.—The Loss of

All.—Under the Tomahawk.—Jehovah is Hearing.—The Host Turned

Back.—The War against Manuman.—Traps Laid.—House Broken Up.—War

against our Friends.—A Treacherous Murderer.—On the Chestnut

Tree.—Bargaining for Life.—Five Hours in a Canoe.—Kneeling on the

Sands.—Faimungo’s Farewell.—“Follow! Follow!”—A Race for

Life.—Ringed Round with Death.—Faint yet Pursuing.—Out of the

Lion’s Jaws.—Brothers in Distress.—Intervening Events.—A

Cannibal’s Taste.—Pillars of Cloud and of Fire.—Passing by on the

other Side.—Kapuku and the Idol Gods.—A Devil Chief.—In Perils

Oft.—Through Fire and Water.—“Sail O! Sail O!”—Let Me Die.—In

Perils on the Sea.—Tannese Visitors.—The Devil Chief of

Tanna.—Speckled and Spotted.—Their Desired Haven.—“I am Left

Alone.”—My Earthly All.—Eternal Hope.—Australia to the Rescue.—For

my Brethren’s Sake.—A New Holy League.—The Uses of Adversity.—The

Arm-Chair Critics Again.—Concluding Note.—Prospectus of Part

Second.

A time of great excitement amongst the Natives now prevailed. War, war,

nothing but war was spoken of! Preparations for war were being made in

all the villages far and near. Fear sat on every face, and armed bands

kept watching each other, as if uncertain where the war was to begin or

by whom. All work was suspended, and that war spirit was let loose which

rouses the worst passions of human nature. Again we found ourselves the

centre of conflict, one party set for killing us or driving us away; the

other wishing to retain us, while all old bitter grievances were also

dragged into their speeches.

Miaki and Nouka said, “If you will keep Missi and his Worship, take him

with you to your own land, for we will not have him to live at the

Harbour.”

Ian, the great Inland Chief, rose in wrath and said, “On whose land does

the Missi live, yours or ours? Who fight against the Worship and all

good, who are the thieves and murderers, who tell the lies, you or we?

We wish peace, but you will have war. We like Missi and the Worship, but

you hate them and say, ‘Take him to your own land!’ It is our land on

which he now lives; it is his own land which he bought from you, but

which our fathers sold Missi Turner long ago. The land was not yours to

sell; it was really ours. Your fathers stole it from us long ago by war;

but we would not have asked it back, had you not asked us to take Missi

away. Now we will defend him on it, and he will teach us and our people

in our own land!”

So meeting after meeting broke into fiery speech, and separated with

many threats.

To the next great meeting I was invited, but did not go, contenting

myself with a message pleading that they should live at peace and on no

account go to war with each other. But Ian himself came for me.

I said, “Ian, I have told you my whole heart. Go not to that meeting. I

will rather leave the island or die, than see you going to war about

me!”

He answered, “Missi, come with me, come now!”

I replied, “Ian, you are surely not taking me away to kill me? If you

are, my God will punish it.”

His only reply was, “Follow me, follow me quickly.”

I felt constrained to go.

He strode on before me till we reached the great village of his

ancestors. His followers, armed largely with muskets as well as native

weapons, filled one half the Village Square or dancing ground. Miaki,

Nouka, and their whole party sat in manifest terror upon the other half.

Marching into the centre, he stood with me by his side, and proudly

looking round, exclaimed,—

“Missi, these are my men and your friends! We are met to defend you and

the Worship.” Then pointing across to the other side, he cried aloud,

“These are your enemies and ours! The enemies of the Worship, the

disturbers of the peace on Tanna! Missi, say the word, and the muskets

of my men will sweep all opposition away, and the Worship will spread

and we will all be strong for it on Tanna. We will not shoot without

your leave; but if you refuse they will kill you and persecute us and

our children, and banish Jehovah’s Worship from our land.”

I said, “I love all of you alike. I am here to teach you how to turn

away from all wickedness, to worship and serve Jehovah, and to live in

peace. How can I approve of any person being killed for me or for the

Worship? My God would be angry at me and punish me, if I did!”

He replied, “Then, Missi, you will be murdered and the Worship

destroyed.”

I then stood forth in the middle before them all and cried, “You may

shoot or murder me, but I am your best friend. I am not afraid to die.

You will only send me the sooner to my Jehovah God, whom I love and

serve, and to my dear Saviour Jesus Christ, who died for me and for you,

and who sent me here to tell you all His love. If you will only love and

serve Him and give up your bad conduct, you will be happy. But if you

kill me, His messenger, rest assured that He will in His own time and

way punish you. This is my word to you all; my love to you all!”

So saying, I turned to leave; and Ian strode sullenly away and stood at

the head of his men, crying,—

“Missi, they will kill you! they will kill us, and you will be to

blame!”

Miaki and Nouka, full of deceit, now cried out,—

“Missi’s word is good! Let us all obey it. Let us all worship.”

An old man, Sirawia, one of Ian’s under-chiefs, then said,—

“Miaki and Nouka say that the land on which Missi lives was theirs;

though they sold it to him, and he has paid them for it, they all know

that it was ours, and is yet ours by right; but if they let Missi live

on it in peace, we will all live at peace, and worship Jehovah. And if

not, we will surely claim it again.”

Miaki and his party hereon went off to their plantations, and brought a

large present of food to Ian and his men as a peace-offering. This they

accepted; and the next day Ian and his men brought Miaki a return

present and said,—

“You know that Missi lives on our land? Take our present, be friends,

and let him live quietly and teach us all. Yesterday you said his word

was good, obey it now, else we will punish you and defend the Missi.”

Miaki accepted the token, and gave good promises for the future. Ian

then came to the hill-top near our house, by which passed the public

path, and cried aloud in the hearing of all,—

“Abraham, tell Missi that you and he now live on our land. This path is

the march betwixt Miaki and us. We have this day bought back the land of

our fathers by a great price to prevent war. Take of our bread-fruits

and also of our cocoa-nuts what you require, for you are our friends and

living on our land, and we will protect you and the Worship!”

For some time things moved on quietly after this. An inland war,

however, had continued for months. As many as ten men, they said, were

sometimes killed in one day and feasted on by the warriors. Thousands

had been thereby forced down from the mountains, and sought protection

under Ian and his people. All the people claiming connection with his

Tribe were called Naraimini; the people in the Volcano district were

called the Kaserumini; and the Harbour Tribes were the Watarenmini; and

so on all over the island. In such divisions, there might be from two to

twenty Chiefs and Villages under one leader, and these stood by each

other for purposes defensive and offensive. Now Nouka and Miaki had been

frustrated in all their plans to get the Inland and the Harbour people

involved in the war, as their own followers were opposed to it. In

violation of his promises, however, Nouka invited all the men who wished

to go to the war to meet him one morning, and only one appeared! Nouka,

in great wrath, marched off to the war himself, but, as no one followed,

he grew faint-hearted, and returned to his own village. On another

morning, Miaki summoned all his fighting men; but only his own brother

and six lads could be induced to accompany him, and with these he

started off. But the enemy, hearing of his coming, had killed two of his

principal allies the night before, and Miaki, learning this, turned and

fled to his own house, and was secretly laughed at by his tribe.

Next day, Nouka came to me professing great friendship and pleading with

me to accompany him and Miaki to talk with the Kaserumini, and persuade

them to give up the war. He was annoyed and disappointed when I refused

to go. Nowar and others informed me, two days thereafter, that three

persons had died in that district, that others were sick, and that the

Heathen there had resolved to kill me in revenge as the cause of all. As

Nouka’s wife was one of the victims, this scheme was concocted to entrap

me. I was warned on no account to leave my house at night for a

considerable time, but to keep it locked up and to let no one in after

dark. The same two men from that district who had tried to kill Mr.

Johnston and me, were again appointed and were watching for Abraham and

me, lurking about in the evenings for that purpose. Again I saw how the

Lord had preserved me from Miaki and Nouka! Truly all are safe who are

in God’s keeping; and nothing can befall them, except for their real

good and the glory of their Lord.

Chafed at the upsetting of all their plans and full of revenge, Nouka

and Miaki and their allies declared publicly that they were now going to

kill Ian by sorcery, _i.e._, by Nahak, more feared by the poor Tannese

than the field of battle. Nothing but the grace of God and the

enlightenment of His Spirit through the Scriptures, has ever raised

these Natives above that paralyzing superstition. But, thank God, there

are now, while I write this (1887), about twelve thousand in the New

Hebrides who have been thus enlightened and lifted out of their terrors,

for the Gospel is still, as of old, the power of God unto salvation!

Strange to say, Ian became sick shortly after the Sacred Men had made

the declaration about their Nahak-sorcery. I attended him, and for a

time he recovered, and appeared very grateful. But he soon fell sick

again. I sent him and the Chief next under him a blanket each; I also

gave shirts and calico to a number of his leading men. They wore them

and seemed grateful and pleased. Ian, however, gradually sank and got

worse. He had every symptom of being poisoned, a thing easily

accomplished, as they know and use many deadly poisons. His sufferings

were very great, which prevented me from ascribing his collapse to mere

superstitious terror. I did all that could be done; but all thought him

dying, and of course by sorcery. His people were angry at me for not

consenting before to their shooting of Miaki; and Miaki’s people were

now rejoicing that Ian was being killed by Nahak.

One night, his brother and a party came for me to go and see Ian, but I

declined to go till the morning for fear of the fever and ague. On

reaching his village, I saw many people about, and feared that I had

been led into a snare; but I at once entered into his house to talk and

pray with him, as he appeared to be dying. After prayer, I discovered

that I was left alone with him, and that all the people had retired from

the village; and I knew that, according to their custom, this meant

mischief. Ian said,—

[Illustration: “SUDDENLY HE DREW ... A LARGE BUTCHER-LIKE KNIFE.”]

“Come near me, and sit by my bedside to talk with me, Missi.”

I did so, and while speaking to him he lay as if lost in a swoon of

silent meditation. Suddenly he drew from the sugar-cane leaf thatch

close to his bed, a large butcher-like knife, and instantly feeling the

edge of it with his other hand, he pointed it to within a few inches of

my heart and held it quivering there, all a-tremble with excitement. I

durst neither move nor speak, except that my heart kept praying to the

Lord to spare me, or if my time was come to take me home to Glory with

Himself. There passed a few moments of awful suspense. My sight went and

came. Not a word had been spoken, except to Jesus; and then Ian wheeled

the knife around, thrust it into the sugar-cane leaf, and cried to me,—

“Go, go quickly!”

Next moment I was on the road. Not a living soul was to be seen about

the village. I understood then that it had been agreed that Ian was to

kill me, and that they had all withdrawn so as not to witness it, so

that when the Man-of-war came to inquire about me Ian would be dead, and

no punishment could overtake the murderer. I walked quietly till quite

free of the village, lest some hid in their houses might observe me.

Thereafter, fearing that they, finding I had escaped, might overtake and

murder me, I ran for my life a weary four miles till I reached the

Mission House, faint, yet praising God for such a deliverance. Poor Ian

died soon after, and his people strangled one of his wives and hanged

another, and took out the three bodies together in a canoe and sank them

in the sea.

Miaki was jubilant over having killed his enemy by Nahak; but the Inland

people now assembled in thousands to help Sirawia and his brother to

avenge that death on Miaki, Nouka and Karewick. These, on the other

hand, boasted that they would kill all their enemies by Nahak-sorcery,

and would call up a hurricane to destroy their houses, fruit trees, and

plantations. Miaki and a number of his men also came to the Mission

House; but, observing his sullen countenance, I asked kindly after his

wife who was about to be confined, and gave a blanket, a piece of

calico, and a bit of soap as a present for the baby. He seemed greatly

pleased, whispered something to his men, and peaceably withdrew.

Immediately after Miaki’s threat about bringing a storm, one of their

great hurricanes actually smote that side of the island and laid

everything waste. His enemies were greatly enraged, and many of the

injured people united with them in demanding revenge on Miaki. Hitherto

I had done everything in my power to prevent war, but now it seemed

inevitable, and both parties sent word that if Abraham and I kept to the

Mission House no one would harm us. We had little faith in any of their

promises, but there was no alternative for us.

On the following Saturday, 18th January, 1862, the war began. Musket

after musket was discharged quite near us, and the bush all round rang

with the yell of their war-cry, which if once heard will never be

forgotten. It came nearer and nearer, for Miaki fled, and his people

took shelter behind and around our house. We were placed in the heart of

danger, and the balls flew thick all around us. In the afternoon Ian’s

brother and his party retired, and Miaki quickly sent messengers and

presents to the Inikahimini and Kaserumini districts, to assemble all

their people and help him “to fight Missi and the Tannese who were

friends of the Worship.” He said,—

“Let us cook his body and Abraham’s, and distribute them to every

village on this side of the island!”