['The Headman made it generally known that he expected all the
men, both Christian and heathen, to subscribe to the funds. One
man refused to give anything, and was taken before the Magistrate
in consequence.' Extract from a South African Church paper,
December 22, 1910.]
The transepts had been built and blessed, the five leper windows
were no longer over-crowded. Xanthos and Melanthos, gods of the
fair and the swart skins, had in a measure met together, and in a
sense kissed each other. Much remained to be achieved in the
matter of mutual good understanding, and much more again in the
supercession of these tribal deities by a Greater.
On the other hand, something had been done to teach the devotees
of Xanthos toleration and a spirit of alms. The Bishop now turned
his attention towards Melanthos more particularly what could he
do to ennoble the aims and methods of his clients? He had made a
journey to England and back not long before the blessing of the
transepts. He regretted leaving his flock at the time. Yet
certain observations he had made just ere he started gave him
much food for thought on the voyage. And when he was home in the
old country he was glad to find time and occasion to observe
afresh, supplementing Africa by Europe, intuitions by research.
The Rev. Charles Topready, a keen missionary, had asked him to
visit him the week before he went homewards. It was the season
when that countryside threshed out its millet-grain in a revel
of rhythmic labor. The Bishop delighted in some of those airs
that the sticks beat time to. He was greedy of fantastic
interpretations as he wrote their voweled refrains down in a
note-book.
'We may have a Harvest Thanksgiving in church, may we not, this
coming Sunday?' he said.
Now Harvest Thanksgivings were as red rags to Topready. 'Why
should we bind upon Africa a burden that irks England?' he
groaned. 'Surely it is a mercy that we can start afresh on the
veld with no tradition of a Feast of Pumpkins.'
The Bishop smiled and smoked and argued by the hour. His point
was that festivals of the soil were serviceable for sons of
the soil. That agricultural festivals were serviceable for
husbandmen, pastoral feasts for shepherds and goat-herds, hunting
commemorations like that of Saint Hubert, for those who hunted.
His knowledge of Greece and Rome, pagan and Christian, of
mediaeval England and modern Brittany helped him with many apt
illustrations. Topready stuck out his chin and kept bravely to
his two points the danger of materialism and the menace to the
spiritual cults and festas of Holy Church as by law established
in the England of to-day.
'All right,' said the Bishop, 'let us have no Harvest
Thanksgiving for the tillage of African earth. That is to say not
this year. But keep an open mind.' Topready promised dubiously.
That struggle and waiving of victory had put the Bishop on his
mettle. He had thought out the subject to some purpose before
they met again.
Here are some pages from his English diary:
Sept. 21. Preached at a Thanksgiving in Essex. 'Happy harvest
fields,' quiet tints in the Vicarage garden. A sun that seemed to
make better use of a short day than an African sun would of a
long one. What a festival Topready might have just about this
time if he only liked. The masasas tinted with copper, crimson;
mauve, and pink, and other leaves showing faery green and gold.
Saint Matthew's Day. The festival of the foolery of riches when
Spring is everywhere and the sun is shining.
Oct. (date illegible). Preached at the blessing of the boats in a
small Sussex harbor the herring season just beginning. What
glorious girls' names some of the boats had that we prayed for
'Diana Elizabeth,' for instance, might have sailed out of the
'Faerie Queene.'
Nov. 1 (All Saints'). Went to church at Saint Paul's in a side
chapel.
Nov. 2 (All Souls'). Went to pray in a cemetery chapel.
Both were misty mornings, but the sun each day came out before we
had done, and broke through the dingy windows in a carnage of
color. How fine a side of death, November, the month of the dead,
presents here. Damp and fog and fall of the leaf doubtless the
sorryness of the bad business of decay and punishment but on the
other hand what bravery of sunlight at times, and what colors for
the sun to shine upon. In Africa it's so different. There the
month is a spring month. The gay side of death as a release from
Africa's plentiful curses and bondages is happily prominent. All
Saints' Day our May Day our Feast of Flora and the Rosa Mystica!
What a day for converts suckled in animism! Let us commemorate
the African Saints with garlands of spring flowers as well as
with palms in their hands. Have written to Topready to suggest a
May-Day Festival with African drums to dance to, if no English
May-pole to plait.
Jan. 21 (St. Agnes' Day). Went to a down church, where they had a
sort of special service. Lambing-time among the South Downs just
coming on. The sacrifice pleaded with one main request in view
the blessing on the flocks. If they had only brought some lambs
in! I hope to live to see some pied African lambs and kids in
church yet.
June 21. Went to Stonehenge on the longest day. Would have camped
out there on the eve if the policeman would have let me. Took
observations as to Flame-Stone. Compared notes with those I took
at Zimbabwe this time last year on my way to Topready's.
June 24 (Saint John). Yes, in African Mission Stations we should
have St. John's Fires or fires corresponding to them about
Christmas time.
Then in Mashonaland, summer is at height. Yes, the other Saint
John's Day, or its Eve, would do. Let us give thanks for the
Light of the World and the Sun of Righteousness symbolized by
things seen and enjoyed. What did Saint Patrick do about the
sacred fire? He kept it going, didn't he? Let us light our
bonfires with a good will this coming Christmastide we who live
by sun-time so often.
Back from England came the Bishop full of the lore of early
missions. He had enriched his zeal for broad-basing the people's
worship on their own everyday earth, and for enlightening things
opaque with effulgences invisible. He saw his way more clearly to
further what he had at heart. Topready had had many letters, and
they had had their effect. But he had not capitulated yet. He
capitulated at a price, as we shall see.
'Church ready by Christmas,' wrote Topready, 'please come and
consecrate.' 'Expect me the day after,' telegraphed the Bishop.
He thought about a bonfire as he rode along on that Saint
Stephen's Day. 'The kopje above the Mission!' he reflected. 'A
magnificent place for a beacon-fire.'
To his delight the new church crowned the very kopje he had been
thinking of. There it stood on the sky-line, its gold of fresh
thatch crowned a huge pole building, and was itself crowned by a
white cross.
'How fine!' said the Bishop to himself, 'but there's no room up
there for a bonfire as well, alas!'
Topready did not look over-cheerful when his leader greeted him
with congratulations on the building of the church.
'It's all very well, or rather it might have been ever so much
better,' he said, as they went in.
In the evening there was much time to talk. They sat on the stony
rise above the house with a wide valley view. The starlight was
brilliant above them eager, perfervid, passionate. They were on
the rocks smoking, the Bishop between Topready and Manners, who
was not a parson, but a policeman.
'It's like this,' said Topready. 'Holy Innocents' is the first
church that has been built since I came here. It was built on a
system.'
He explained roughly how it worked. The native teacher used his
personal and official majesty for what it was worth. The people
on the Mission ground were asked for poles, grass, work, &c.
'These were given,' said Topready, 'or at least "given" is the
word that I understand my predecessor would have chosen. The
headman proclaimed that his will coincided with the will of the
native teacher. They wanted a church built that would compare
favorably with churches erected under the auspices of other
native teachers and other headmen.
'The contributions came in plentifully, sylvan or grassy. People
who never come to church, heathens who do not seem much overjoyed
with the Gospel, gave just as handsomely as Church officers. No
one was paid. The church is cheap and big, and the headman and
native teacher are both unhealthily contented.'
'Well, what's the matter?' said Manners; 'it's the way we do
these little things in Africa. White men don't build churches
from base to spire on ideal principles exactly, do they. Bishop?'
'At least we haven't had a cafe chantant lately,' the Bishop
said.
'Well, don't you be too sure one isn't going on in some outlying
parish while we sit here. As it happens, I know of one advertised
for next month.'
'Be sure of your facts,' said the Bishop.
'Anyhow, before you came, plenty of the society lash used to be
applied to get church-building doles out of Europeans. Moreover,
if you look into it, generally you'll find things at Missions
much as you find them here. These gloriously "given" Mission
churches on Mission lands that the home magazine ecstasizes over
are not given so very freely, to say the least of it. They are
put up by a sort of social pressure immensely effective,'
Topready broke in.
'They say most of the churches this side of the river are built
the one way and I don't like the one way. Archdeacon Maynard used
to advocate the one way, and impress it on his missionaries black
and white. It was he who started the church-rate and debarred
defaulters from Easter Communion. I've stopped that, and I want
to stop the one way.'
The Bishop groaned. 'Archdeacon Maynard's a vice-president of the
Free and Open Churchmen in England. I heard him speak eloquently,
if a little floridly, on the right of the poor to the House of
God.'
Manners chuckled. 'England's some way off,' he said.
Topready spoke from his heart. 'I don't like it. I told the
people that the proper way was for Christians and philo-Christians
to build accordingly as they could spare money and time. But they
said that they were too few. I answered "Then let them wait in the old
church awhile." They said they wanted a new church this year, and that
the heathen should be called to help the faithful as in other places.
They said they ought to have a kraal levy as other places did it saved
a great deal of trouble. They thought me mad, I think. Azariah, the
teacher, practically told me so.'
The Bishop lit his pipe again.
'We'll think about it,' he said. 'The consecration is fixed for
the day after to-morrow, is it not? It was to be christened Holy
Innocents' Church on Childermas Day, was it not? Will you have it
consecrated on the Eve instead, Saint John's Night? Time Sunset.'
Topready started. 'Rather late, is it not?' he asked.
It was a great concourse that lined the hillside on the morrow
when the sun was going down. The Bishop had spoken that morning
in the old plain church of how he wished them to observe certain
days of prayer and thanksgiving.
He asked them to keep a festival of flocks on Saint Agnes' Day.
He asked them to keep a festival of herds on Saint Luke's Day.
He asked them to keep the feasts of Loaf-Mass in August and
Wood-Mass in September as feasts of Harvest and Forestry.
He asked them to keep a thanksgiving for summer after Christmas
on the night of Saint John, if they and their priest thought
good.
He spoke of how the heathen had worshipped the sun in the grey
northern lands. Then Christians better taught had thanked Christ,
the Light of the World, for the glory of the sun, and lighted
their joy-fires to a better purpose.
Doubtless, some in this land long ago, not only at Zimbabwe, but
on many hills and high places, had honored the strong sun of the
South. He asked them as Christians to be glad for that same sun's
blessings at Christmas time. It seemed to him good for those who
wished it (he gave no law) for those to light their bonfires
to-night and to thank God not only for the summer, but for the Sun
of righteousness. He himself had a mind to light a fire on that
Saint John's Night to the glory of God.
Topready looked thoughtful after church. 'If I adopt your
calendar loyally as far as may be, do you see your way to help me
against the system?' he asked of a sudden. His grey-blue eyes
were full of fight.
The Bishop nodded. He talked with him quietly a little while.
'The pact is made, then?' said Topready. 'No, I don't think we
have sold our convictions, either of us. I don't feel penitent
about my side of the bargain.'
'I feel it's a holy alliance,' said the Bishop, and his face
glowed. 'People will keep this night, and remember what was done
on it, may be, long after we are forgotten.'
That sunset a mighty crowd was there among the rocks. Much dead
wood had been brought. Fathers, mothers, and children in costumes
that ranged from skins to European fashions shouldered or headed
their faggots.' A grim thought obsessed the Bishop as he watched
them. These people, so quiet and yielding as to the selling of
sacrament, and levying of church vote how easily they might be
swayed to more sinister reminiscences of the Middle Ages! If he
and Topready and Azariah and the headman enjoined it, what would
save certain aged heathen neighbors from an auto-da-fe for
alleged witchcraft one of these nights? Were not some of those
old scenes at the stake much like this scene before him? Did not
country people come together much as these, with dark impassive
faces and bundles of firewood? Did not they listen and listen so,
until the time came to pile faggots to the glory of God?
He stood on a rock and looked down on the faces. Topready stood
close beneath him looking cheerful, the native teacher was near
looking dubious, next to him stood the headman with his white
beard, looking amused. Around them the crowd poised and posed
itself among the rocks with innate grace and imposing silence.
Even the babies in the goatskins were quiet.
The Bishop spoke of alms-giving. He said he did not like their
plan of raising a house for Christ. Let people who loved Christ
build churches if they wished to, but let them build churches
according to their power to give! Let them not seek the labor or
money of others, careless how it came! Rather let them worship in
the old and the small, than build a new and great church anyhow!
He, their Bishop, wished to buy their new church from them,
paying back those who had helped to build, giving to each his
due. He asked them, would they sell this church to him, to do
with it as seemed to him good? If, when they built, they had
made, as it were, a false start, let them start again, and this
time so run that they might obtain the Promises of Christ. Would
they sell their church to him?
He waited for an answer.
There was a hush. The eyes that watched him seemed almost
overwhelming in their vigilance.
His eyes went wistfully off to the sky in front of him. What
beaches of gold and weed-tangles of rose-color those were to the
north-west the way of England.
Suddenly the silence was broken.
Azariah spoke out bravely. He had heard the words of his
herdsman, and he knew that he had' gone astray, even like a lost
bull. As for this thatched cattle-byre that they had built, let
him who asked for it have it! Was it not his own?
One after another spoke. Their speeches all had the same import
let the church be handed over to him that asked.
A roar of acclamation worth many speeches went up from the
hill-side Then the Bishop asked those who carried faggots to follow
him to the consecration. His shepherd's staff went before him. An
earthen vessel smoked with incense in front of that again. He
followed up the steep path in his shining robes. Behind him came
blazing grass torches, and behind them again wood-carriers. When
they reached the hill's crown there was some delay in the
gathering dusk. They were stacking the wood for the sacrifice. At
last Topready turned to his chief with a happy face. All was
prepared. The Bishop's voice rang out in one sonorous prayer of
oblation. Then someone handed him a grass torch and he kindled
the thatch above the altar. The church that misbegotten innocent
flamed up toward heaven amber and grey and crimson under the
stars.