CMR-^yp^RICA. 
 
 "mELii 
 
 i. Pattotm 
 
 
NOVIHM? i 
 
 BV 3500 .P48 1917 
 Patton, Cornelius Howard, 
 
 1860-1939. 
 The lure of Africa 
 
EDITED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE 
 
 MISSIONARY EDUCATION MOVEMENT 
 
 OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA 
 
 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
CORRESPONDENCE CONCERNING 
 MISSION STUDY 
 
 Send the proper one of the following blanks to the secretary of 
 your denominational mission board whose address is in the "List of 
 Mission Boards and Correspondents" at the end of this book. 
 
 We expect to form a mission study class, and desire to have any 
 suggestions that you can send that will help in organizing and 
 conducting it. 
 
 Name 
 
 Street and Number 
 
 City or Town State . . , 
 
 Denomination Church. 
 
 Text-book to be used 
 
 We have organized a mission study class and secured our books. 
 Below is the enrolment. 
 
 Name of City or Town State 
 
 Text-book Underline auspices under 
 
 which class is held : 
 Denomination ^^^^^ Y. P. Soc. 
 
 Church Men Senior 
 
 Women's Soc. Intermediate 
 Name of Leader Y. W. Soc. Junior 
 
 Address Sunday School 
 
 Name of Pastor I^ate of starting 
 
 State whether Mission Study Class, Frequency of Meetings, 
 Lecture Course, Program Meet- 
 ings, or Reading Circle Number of Members . . , 
 
 Does Leader desire Helps? , 
 
 Chairman, Missionary Committee, Young People's Society 
 
 Address 
 
 Chairman, Missionary Committee, Sunday School , 
 
 Address 
 
ZULU WARRIOR 
 
fa |i I'll 
 
 THE 
 LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 
 
 ^' 
 
 % 
 
 
 
 ( NOV I 
 
 ■^ 1917 
 
 
 
 ^^^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 BY 
 
 y 
 
 
 
 CORNELIUS H 
 
 . PATTON 
 
 
 SECRETARY, HOME DEPARTMENT, 
 AMERICAN BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS FOR FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 MISSIONARY EDUCATION MOVEMENT 
 
 OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA 
 
 1917 
 
COPYRIGHT, 19 1 7, BY 
 MISSIONARY EDUCATION MOVEMENT 
 OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA 
 
TO MY WIFE AND DAUGHTERS 
 
 WHO REMAINED BEHIND 
 DURING MY AFRICAN WANDERINGS 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 A Personal Word xi 
 
 I The Lure of Africa i 
 
 II Strongholds of Mohammedanism 31 
 
 III Mohammedanism on the March 57 
 
 IV Strongholds of Christianity 85 
 
 ; V Africa's Debit and Credit Account with Civilization 109 
 
 VI The Heart of Paganism 137 
 
 VII Africa the Laboratory of Christianity 165 
 
 Bibliography 194 
 
 Index 199 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGB 
 
 Zulu Warrior Frontispiece 
 
 Victoria Falls — Over a Mile of Falling Water. View from the 
 
 West End of the Gorge 8 
 
 In the Desert of Sahara 24 
 
 Athletics at Assiut College, Egypt 48 
 
 The United Presbyterian Mission Field in Egjrpt (Map) 48 
 
 Algerian Boys ^ 56 
 
 Swahili Ivory Carriers. This Tribe is Becoming Mohammedan 64 
 
 A Mohammedan Prayer Service in the Desert 68 
 
 Proposed Lines of Mission Stations to Prevent the Mohamme- 
 dan Advance (Map) 78 
 
 Mission Station, Doleib Hill, Egyptian Sudan 80 
 
 Zones of Mohammedan and Christian Advance (Map) 86 
 
 Zulu Chief and Headmen 88 
 
 A Smeller-out Woman 88 
 
 Natives on the Way to Execution for Cannibalism 120 
 
 Carrying Rum into Africa 120 
 
 Johannesburg, the Hub of South Africa (Map) 126 
 
 A Johannesburg Gold Mine. Mountains of Tailings 128 
 
 Natives in Mining Compounds. A Good Chance for Missions. 128 
 
 Kikuyu Women, British East Africa 137 
 
 A Witch-doctor Treating an Old Chief. Pouring Quarts of 
 
 Medicine Down His Throat 144 
 
 Raw Material on the Congo 152 
 
 A Heathen Native's Home 176 
 
 A Christian Native's Home 176 
 
 A Missionary Making Bricks, Healing the Sick, and Preaching 
 
 the Gospel, All on the Same Day 184 
 
 Map End 
 
 ix 
 
A PERSONAL WORD 
 
 When I returned a few years ago from a rather 
 extended trip in Africa, several friends remarked, "Of 
 course, you will write a book on the subject." "That," 
 I took pains to assure them, "is exactly what I shall 
 not do." I had no desire to add to the large number 
 of books of African travel on the strength of a single 
 trip in that continent. Had it not been for the earnest 
 sohcitation of the Missionary Education Movement, 
 I should have adhered to my resolution. The fact that 
 a work was desired covering the entire continent 
 appealed to me, as in my observations and reading I 
 had come to think of Africa as a whole, and I was 
 obliged to admit that there are few books covering 
 so wide a range, which are also brought up to date. 
 Another consideration was the unusual chance to 
 interest the young people of our churches in the study 
 of the missionary enterprise. Africa appeared to me 
 to offer a unique opportunity in that direction. The 
 compelling thought, however, was this. On my travels 
 I discovered that many of the missionaries in Africa 
 are discouraged over the attitude of the home churches 
 toward their beloved continent. In the very day of 
 their greatest successes, when the work of decades 
 is coming to a large fruitage, they detect, or think they 
 do, a waning interest at home. Some say it is the 
 result of race prejudice, which appears to them to be 
 
xii A PERSONAL WORD 
 
 gaining ground in the United States. More attribute 
 it to the fact that Africa has been cast somewhat into 
 the shade in missionary interest by China and other 
 countries which have come to the front in recent years. 
 In either case they are convinced that, both in the 
 matter of support of the work and in the obtaining 
 of recruits, Africa is not getting her dues. This 
 gloomy outlook has affected some of the missionaries 
 to the extent that they begin to doubt if Africa really 
 possesses the attractions which appeal to the home 
 constituency. 
 
 The depression on the part of the missionaries was 
 so apparent that I came home resolved to cheer them 
 up in every way in my power. I undertook to 
 demonstrate that Africa not only is not lacking in fea- 
 tures which interest the Christian public, but that it 
 is peculiarly the field which lends itself to romantic 
 description and appeal. I have always held that, next 
 to highly cultivated beings like poets and inventors, 
 the most interesting thing in the world is primitive 
 man. And surely Africa is not lacking in material 
 of this kind. As for the attitude of student volunteers, 
 that is largely a matter of education. With their hearts 
 inclined toward the foreign work, if we give them the 
 facts, interest will follow as a matter of course. This 
 at least has been my theory in the more than 200 
 addresses I have been enabled to give on Africa and 
 its needs. If this book helps in any wise to turn the 
 tide of interest toward this neglected continent, I shall 
 be amply repaid. 
 
A PERSONAL WORD xiii 
 
 The time for writing has been short, and the more 
 have I appreciated the help of many friends. I would 
 especially mention the Rev. Frederick B. Bridgman, 
 D. D., of Johannesburg, who was my traveling com- 
 panion in several parts of Natal and throughout my 
 Angola trip, and whose knowledge of native affairs, 
 as they relate to governmental and economic con- 
 ditions, is not surpassed. I particularly appreciate 
 the coming to Boston of the Rev. Joseph Clark, of the 
 American Baptist Foreign Mission Society, for the 
 express purpose of enlightening me upon conditions 
 on the Congo, a region of which I have no personal 
 knowledge. Professor Williston Walker, of Yale, 
 put me on the right track as to certain historical ques- 
 tions in North Africa, and Professor Harlan P. Beach, 
 of the same institution, who shares in my enthusiasm 
 for Africa, was helpful in many ways, especially in 
 preserving a proper balance in the treatment of the 
 various missions. The secretaries of mission boards 
 having work in Africa made my interests their own 
 and have placed much valuable material in my hands. 
 In the matter of books, I have had abundant reason 
 to appreciate the facilities of the Missionary Research 
 Library in New York City, of which Mr. Charles H. 
 Fahs is the librarian. Mr. Fahs not only placed at 
 my disposal this collection, which is rich in works on 
 Africa, but interested himself in running down sev- 
 eral obscure questions which I was endeavoring to 
 solve. It has given me a particularly comfortable feel- 
 ing that these pages, before publication, have passed 
 
xiv A PERSONAL WORD 
 
 under the critical eye of my colleague, Dr. William E. 
 Strong, whose suggestions were incorporated almost 
 without change. I must say, also, how much I have 
 enjoyed the cooperation of the editorial committee of 
 the Missionary Education Movement. Their criticisms 
 have been discriminating and helpful in many ways, 
 particularly in maintaining the pedagogical point of 
 view. 
 
 Finally, let me disavow for the book any claim to 
 erudition or completeness. All I would urge is that it 
 has been written out of a real love for Africa and with 
 the single aim of advancing the Kingdom in that 
 continent. C. H. P. 
 
 Boston, Massachusetts, 
 
 March i, 191 7 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 A company of young people was recently asked 
 to vote upon the question, "In which continent would 
 you prefer to travel, should you be given the oppor- 
 tunity of making just one journey into the mission 
 field?" The alluring features of Europe, Asia, Africa, 
 and North and South America were spread before 
 them and they were requested to state their prefer- 
 ences. Not one favored Africa. This is not wholly 
 surprising, in view of the special attention which has 
 been paid to the other continents in recent missionary 
 literature, and when we consider how many interests 
 other than missionary enter into our thought of Asia 
 and Europe, not to mention nearer sections of the 
 world. I hope to demonstrate that Africa is second 
 to no continent in those features which interest the 
 traveler and student and that, when it comes to mis- 
 sionary affairs, Africa's claims are unique. Let me 
 begin by taking five typical scenes. 
 
 The Streets of Cairo 
 
 World travelers never forget their first view of 
 oriental life. When they land at their first port and 
 the blaze of the Eastern color and strange custom 
 bursts upon them, they know it is an epoch in their 
 
2 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 lives. Such letters as they write home! Some- 
 times it is Smyrna, sometimes Constantinople, some- 
 times Bombay, or Yokohama; but the effect is al- 
 ways entrancing; the impression never wears off. 
 When the directors of the Columbian Exposition at 
 Chicago were looking over the world for a bit of 
 oriental life which could not fail to interest and charm, 
 they chose the streets of Cairo, and the majority of 
 travelers will agree that the choice was a wise one, 
 whatever they may have thought of the merits of the 
 reproduction. The streets of Cairo — who will attempt 
 their description! Your traveler friend characteristi- 
 cally stops at Shepheard's Hotel (where, according to 
 Richard Harding Davis, is to be found one of the 
 sights of the world), and five or six pages of the first 
 letter are taken up with picturing the strange people 
 who pass the doors of the famous hostelry — Egyp- 
 tians, Copts, Turks, Syrians, Nubians, negroes from the 
 Sudan, Bedouins, — an unending pageant of oriental 
 life. But this is merely the portal to the city. It Is 
 when your friend enters old Cairo and penetrates the 
 maze of streets and passageways of the bazaars, that 
 his rhetoric breaks down and you are told to come over 
 and see for yourself. 
 
 Stanley Lane-Poole speaks of Cairo as "The City 
 of the Arabian Nights," and he recalls the dreams of 
 our childhood days by such passages as this : "Every 
 step in the old quarters of the Mohammedan city tells a 
 story of the famous past. The stout remnant of a 
 fortified wall, a dilapidated mosque, a carved door, 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 3 
 
 a Kufic text, — each has its history, which carries us 
 back to the days when Saladin went forth from the 
 gates of Cairo to meet Richard in the plains of Acre, 
 or when Bibars rode at the head of his Mamekikes in 
 the charge which trampled upon the crusaders of St. 
 Louis." 1 
 
 Cairo, with its cosmopolitan population of 650,000, 
 is Africa's great city. But its interest for us lies more 
 in the fact that it is the intellectual center of the Mo- 
 hammedan world. Its multitudinous mosques, if not 
 architecturally impressive, appeal to us as the power- 
 house of the religion which disputes the world with 
 Christianity. Cairo is a point of departure for the 
 great pagan areas of central Africa; a hundred million 
 primitive blacks seem to beckon to you when you as- 
 cend her towers. Cairo also is the vestibule to the 
 wonders of ancient Egypt. A writer has said, "Three 
 things never fail to satisfy the tourist. They are the 
 Sphinx of Egypt, the Taj Mahal of India, and the 
 Great Wall of China." Note that he places the Sphinx 
 first; and well he may. From the ramparts of the 
 citadel of Cairo you can see not only the countless 
 houses and mosques of the city, but the broad stream 
 of the Nile, and far off on the verge of the Libyan 
 plateau rise the Great Pyramid and the gray forms 
 of those other monuments of an antiquity so remote 
 that they were hoary with age when Abraham jour- 
 neyed to Egypt from Canaan. 
 
 ^Stanley Lane-Poole, Cairo: Sketches of its History, Monu- 
 ments, and Social Life, p. vii. 
 
4 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 Perhaps the young people who voted against Africa 
 forgot about Cairo and Egypt. 
 
 Mombasa 
 Now let us drop the curtain on that famous scene 
 and take a look at something more suggestive of 
 Africa to-day. Mombasa will serve our purpose ex- 
 cellently. It means a trip down the east coast, which 
 is so full of strange sights, as we poke our way into 
 port after port, that a selection is somewhat difficult. 
 The joys of the east coast have yet to be adequately 
 portrayed, although Milton seems to have had them 
 in mind when he wrote: 
 
 As, when to them who sail 
 Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past 
 Mozambic, off at sea northeast winds blow 
 Sabean odors from the spicy shore 
 Of Araby the blest.' 
 
 Milton also mentions Mombasa by name, in the pas- 
 sage in "Paradise Lost," where the Mount of Temp- 
 tation is contrasted with the hill up which Michael 
 leads Adam to show him in vision how widely his 
 descendants will be scattered.* To the Puritan poet it 
 was one of the remotest points of geography, a sort 
 of Ultima Thule of his day; and it is a commentary 
 upon the newness and yet oldness of Africa that even 
 to us Mombasa seems one of the most distant spots 
 on the globe. 
 
 From Cairo you journey by rail to Port Said, which 
 
 1 "Paradise Lost," Book IV, 11. 159-163. 
 2/Wd., Book XI, 1.399. 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 5 
 
 has been called the most religious city in the world, 
 because so many travelers leave their religion there 
 on their way to the East. Taking a steamer, you pass 
 through the Suez Canal and on down the coast of 
 British, German, and Portuguese Africa. The im- 
 mense size of the continent is suggested by the fact 
 that you are four days passing through the Red Sea. 
 Mombasa is located on an island at the mouth of 
 a river in British East Africa. A traveler has com- 
 pared it with Stevenson's ''Treasure Island" because of 
 the romantic charm of the tropical scenery. As the 
 steamer winds its way up the channel, palms wave a 
 welcome from the shore, while here and there the 
 sepulchral baobab stands out against the cloudless sky. 
 All Africa is upon you the moment you land. The 
 Somali and Swahili of the coast, the warlike Masai 
 of the uplands, and the virile Baganda of the lake coun- 
 try all have their representatives at the dock. You 
 can imagine a hundred other tribes from these. There 
 is an old Portuguese fort on the harbor front which 
 takes you back to buccaneer days. It was built in 1594. 
 When you look up the history of the place, you find 
 the city has changed hands thirteen times. Once the 
 imam of Oman invested the fortress for five years. 
 Once it was held by the Turks. Several times it had 
 an independent government. Since 1887 it has en- 
 joyed peace and prosperity under the British flag. In 
 the streets of Mombasa you see camels ignominiously 
 hitched to carts and driven about like ponies! The 
 railroad to Uganda and the big game country starts 
 
6 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 from here and Englishmen are much in evidence. A 
 fine cathedral, in memory of Hannington, the martyr 
 bishop, attests that some good missionary work has 
 been done. Altogether, Mombasa is the typical city of 
 the east coast. The importance of this port will be 
 enhanced if ever the Cape-to-Cairo railroad is brought 
 to completion, so that the products of the undeveloped 
 sections of central Africa may be brought to the coast. 
 German East Africa is now the only missing link in the 
 great system which Great Britain is endeavoring to put 
 through "all red." 
 
 Victoria Falls 
 
 We choose one of the sublime spectacles of the 
 world for our next scene. Imagine you are on the 
 upper Zambezi, floating down in a native canoe, just 
 as Livingstone did when he discovered the great cata- 
 ract in 1855. The tawny stream sweeps through the 
 tropical forest silent and solemn, offering not a hint 
 of the mighty leap into the chasm below. Islands 
 abound in mid-stream, full of strange bird life. Vines 
 and parasitic creepers, like tangled cordage, trail from 
 the overhanging trees. Troops of monkeys gallop over 
 the tree-tops in an incredible way. Bands of giraffes, 
 the most picturesque of quadrupeds, and Africa's ex- 
 clusive possession, gaze timidly at you where the river 
 jungle gives way to glades of a thinner forest growth. 
 Suddenly there is a disturbance in the water ahead; a 
 rounded rock appears to rise from the surface. The 
 canoemen shake their paddles in excitement and send 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 7 
 
 up a mighty shout, "Hippo, Hippo!" There he is in 
 all his fascinating ugliness, a huge beast who opens 
 his jaws as though to swallow the canoe and all its 
 contents, and then, puffing and snorting like a fat old 
 man going up-hill, slowly disappears under the surface. 
 Livingstone's canoe was upset by one of these beasts, 
 and the entire party was endangered. 
 
 The current now runs very swiftly, circling in great 
 eddies around the rocks and islets. The canoemen call 
 your attention to columns of mist rising a thousand 
 feet in the air. Simultaneously a dull roar, as of a 
 double Niagara, smites your ear. It is Mosi-oa-tunya, 
 "Sounding Smoke," and you realize that the cataract 
 lies just ahead. The natives are paddling desperately 
 to make the point of an island in mid-stream — Liv- 
 ingstone's Island. Smoother water follows and you 
 reach the landing in safety. You make your way 
 through the tangled creepers and underbrush to the 
 lower end of the island, and there from a projecting 
 ledge you look down into the gorge of the Victoria 
 Falls. The river, 1,860 yards wide, with almost a 
 straight front, but broken by islands and rocks, makes 
 a leap of 343 feet into a fissure so narrow that it seems 
 as if a stone might be thrown across. The clouds of 
 mist, which seem blown out of the depths by great 
 explosions, and which fall about you in heavy rain, add 
 to the sense of mystery and awe. The fierce rays of 
 the tropical sun, breaking through, project full-circled 
 rainbows against the wall of falling waters. It is a 
 scene unmatched in all the world. 
 
8 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 When Livingstone stood upon this spot, he appre- 
 ciated fully the interest people would take in his dis- 
 covery, and it was with reverent affection that he 
 named the falls for his own queen. He also cut his 
 initials in the bark of a great tree close to the brink 
 of the cataract, and there are those who claim to make 
 out the letters to this day. We owe it to Cecil Rhodes 
 and his Cape-to-Cairo railroad that the falls are now 
 made accessible from the south. Rhodes instructed 
 his American engineers to bridge the gorge so close 
 to the cataract that the spray would fly into the pas- 
 sengers' faces as the trains crossed. They literally did 
 this thing, and there in the heart of Africa you have 
 that graceful steel arch, said to be the highest railroad 
 bridge in the world, an engineering feat of astonish- 
 ing boldness. It is worth a trip to Africa to see the 
 Victoria Falls, especially if you can be there when 
 the river is high. 
 
 A Native War-Dance 
 
 Now for an African war-dance — not the real thing, 
 of course, but the kind they arrange for European vis- 
 itors when the missionary sends word to the neighbor- 
 ing chiefs, "I have a visitor at the station from over the 
 sea ; I desire him to meet you and as many of your peo- 
 ple as you can call. I desire you to bring your war- 
 clubs and spears. We kill an ox when the sun is high." 
 They need no second invitation. Let it be noted right 
 here that kings and chiefs in Africa are not as rare as 
 in some parts of the world. A modern poet has it: 
 

THE LURE OF AFRICA 9 
 
 There's a king on every ash-heap, 
 
 There's princes not a few, 
 There's a whole raft-load of potentates 
 
 On the road to Timbuktu. 
 
 So you are sitting in the missionary's bungalow the 
 day of your arrival. Tea has been served and you 
 have settled down to read your mail from home, when 
 the missionary comes in and says, "There are some 
 friends out here who would like to see you." All un- 
 suspecting you go out upon the lawn. Moving up the 
 hillside you behold a phalanx of black humanity — some 
 hundreds of men in rows so compact that they seem 
 to touch breast to back. They are naked except for 
 a leopard skin or some other pelt about the waist. 
 Their bodies shine like the top of a stove; their teeth 
 glisten like ivory. Every man carries a knobkerrie 
 or spear, which they raise simultaneously to the rhythm 
 of a deep-throated, minor-strained war-song. That 
 song — how it wails and moans through interminable 
 stanzas, always ending with a chord of indescribable 
 richness! You say to yourself, "I will remember that 
 song forever." Five minutes later you cannot recall 
 one line. 
 
 The phalanx is marching up the hill, or rather it is 
 inching along, with much stamping of bare feet, as 
 the solid mass sways to the right and left. And now 
 braves come dancing out from the front rank to per- 
 form special stunts for your benefit. One stabs at 
 imaginary leopards in the grass — such feats of valor 
 that the throngs of women who trail on the borders 
 
lo THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 halloo shrilly, clapping their hands over their mouths. 
 Another jumps into the air an incredible distance, then, 
 bounding forward as lithe as a cat, shakes his war-club 
 as though to brain a dozen men at a stroke. There 
 is terrific applause from the side lines. The women 
 are now greatly excited and are drawn into the melee. 
 One hugely stout dame prances up and down in what 
 an American school-girl would call "an absolutely 
 killing way." Her rolls of fat keep time with the 
 music. 
 
 The warriors are now within fifty feet of the receiv- 
 ing line and their attentions grow more familiar. A 
 beefy brave assumes a statuesque pose in front of the 
 mass and levels his spear at your head. Now is the 
 time of testing, white man! Keep your smile going 
 and don't move an inch. He strides forward to within 
 six feet of where you stand. With rolling eyes and 
 devilish grimaces, he thrusts his spear to within a few 
 inches of your nose. At that critical moment the mis- 
 sionary's wife comes to your rescue and, suddenly 
 opening her sun umbrella, she shoos him away. 
 
 Yes, this is a war-dance, but a highly good-natured 
 one, with a big ox roasting on a spit over in the grove. 
 You return to the bungalow and your mail from home, 
 rejoicing that times have changed so that the natives 
 are to feed on the ox instead of on yourself. The 
 thing impresses you as horribly heathenish but mighty 
 interesting. After all, the most fascinating thing in 
 Africa is the African. 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA ii 
 
 The Great Zulu Choir at Durban 
 
 By way of contrast let us shift now to a scene about 
 as different from the last as can well be imagined. We 
 may the more appropriately speak of it as a scene, 
 since it was staged on the platform of the city hall 
 in Durban, the leading city of Natal. In connection 
 with the seventy-fifth anniversary of the starting of 
 mission work among the Zulus, held in 191 1, the vari- 
 ous mission boards united in a great public meeting 
 of felicitation and thanksgiving. The city hall was 
 offered for the purpose, a superb auditorium, not un- 
 like Carnegie Hall, New York, with a seating capacity 
 of 3,000. It was a daring enterprise, as only white 
 people were to be admitted, except for 250 natives in 
 the topmost gallery ; and the whites of Durban had not 
 shown much sympathy with what the missionaries 
 were doing. But Lord Herbert Gladstone, the gov- 
 ernor-general of South Africa, was to preside; Lady 
 Gladstone, the mayor, and other persons of prominence 
 were to attend ; and good speaking was promised. The 
 leading attraction, however, proved to be the Zulu 
 choir, 345 strong, drawn from the near-by mission 
 schools and led by Lutuli, a native teacher. The choir 
 was banked in front of the great organ and made a 
 brave sight, the young men in dark suits relieved by 
 red ribbon rosettes, the young women in white dresses, 
 set off by large Quaker collars of pink and blue in 
 alternate rows. 
 
 Every seat in the hall was occupied, and not less 
 
12 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 than one thousand persons stood throughout the eve- 
 ning. When Lord Gladstone entered, the chorus rose 
 and gave him in mighty shout the royal salute of a 
 Zulu king, "Bayete!" Lord Gladstone was visibly 
 moved by this mark of respect and loyalty. The 
 speeches were good, but when the chorus rendered sev- 
 eral of the great anthems of the church, enthusiasm 
 swept over the audience, wave upon wave, until it was 
 well-nigh impossible to stop the applause. Some of 
 the numbers sung were Grieg's "The Ransomed 
 Hosts," Stainer's "Who Are These?", Palmer's "Trust 
 Ye in the Mighty God." The African is a born singer, 
 as everyone knows; but the possibilities of a drilled 
 chorus of Africans just out of the jungle, rendering 
 the noblest Christian compositions, had seemingly 
 never been suspected. The volume which came from 
 those sable breasts, the richness of tone, the velvety 
 effects of the quiet passages, the swelling crescendos, 
 the vigor of attack, the significance they put into the 
 words, — here was a unique and thrilling combination. 
 The soul of Africa was speaking in the music of that 
 hour. A particularly strong impression was produced 
 by the rendering of "Diademata" : 
 
 Crown him with many crowns, 
 
 The Lamb upon his throne ! 
 Hark, how the heavenly anthem drowns 
 
 All music but its own! 
 Awake, my soul, and sing 
 
 Of him who died for thee, 
 And hail him as thy matchless King 
 
 Through all eternity. 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 13 
 
 Here was Africa giving back to the white man in 
 beautiful harmonies the gospel she had received. Here 
 was Africa pledging herself to join the white man in 
 sending that gospel to the continent's remotest bound. 
 One missionary who was present writes that he has 
 since heard those very songs of the Zulu choir sung 
 in distant places, out in the wilds of Natal and in 
 remote parts of the Transvaal. 
 
 Possibly these five glimpses into Africans life will 
 help us to realize that the continent is not such a dull 
 place after all. It has been called the monotonous con- 
 tinent, in reference to its regular coast-line and the 
 sameness of its topography in certain sections; but to 
 one alive to historical, anthropological, scenic, and 
 present-day human interest, it oifers a bewildering 
 array of attractions. 
 
 How Great Is Africa? 
 
 At one time, strictly speaking, Africa was hardly 
 more than a corner of what we call Tunis, where dwelt 
 a Berber tribe, known as Afarik, which is said to have 
 given its name to the Roman colony of Africa. This 
 name gradually expanded until it embraced the en- 
 tire continent, very much as Asia came to be named 
 from a small section of Asia Minor. To the Egyp- 
 tians, Africa was the Nile valley as far south as 
 Abyssinia, together with the southern coast of the 
 Mediterranean and the western coast of the Red Sea. 
 To the Phoenicians, Africa may have extended as far 
 
14 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 south as the Zambezi on the east coast and even far- 
 ther; it depends upon where you locate the Ophir of 
 the Bible, whether in Arabia or in South Africa. 
 Ptolemy, the geographer and mathematician, living in 
 the second century A. D., drew a map on which he 
 traced the source of the Nile to two lakes near the 
 equator — a remarkably accurate calculation, or was it 
 a guess ? For several centuries the Romans based their 
 ideas on Ptolemy's map. At the time of the Mohamme- 
 dan invasion in the seventh century, nothing seems to 
 have been known of Africa south of the Sahara 
 Desert. But it was not long before the enterprising 
 Arab traders opened up the great Sudan region as far 
 south as the forests of the Congo. 
 
 It is to the Portuguese navigators that we owe our 
 knowledge of Africa's size and shape. When they 
 began their explorations late in the fifteenth century, 
 the continent was supposed to be a stunted affair, about 
 half its real size. It was this mistake which led them 
 to seek a route to India by rounding the southern point 
 of Africa, just as Columbus, by a similar miscalcula- 
 tion, sought to reach India by sailing westward. It is 
 a curious coincidence that it was the lure of India 
 which led both to the discovery of America and the 
 delimiting of Africa. The work of these venturesome 
 Portuguese should be kept clearly in mind. A good 
 date to remember is 141 5, which may be said to mark 
 the beginning of modern exploration. In that year 
 Prince Henry emerged as the national hero of Portu- 
 gal in connection with the capture from the Moors of 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 15 
 
 Ceuta, the port in Morocco directly opposite Gibraltar. 
 This was little Portugal's "comeback" upon Moham- 
 medanism after six centuries of oppression. 
 
 Then began the voyages down the west coast by 
 Prince Henry and other daring souls, by which they 
 passed cape after cape, until they discovered the mouth 
 of the Congo in 1484. It was in 1497 that Bartholo- 
 mew Diaz rounded the Cape of Good Hope and passed 
 into the Indian Ocean. Ten years later, the greatest 
 of them all, Vasco da Gama, with four small ships, 
 explored the east coast as far north as Mombasa and 
 then, by one of the most daring decisions of history, 
 struck across the waste of waters until he landed on 
 "India's coral strand." We Americans do well to 
 sing the praises of Columbus and the Cabots, to whom 
 our continent owes so much; but let us not forget the 
 equally thrilling adventures of Prince Henry and da 
 Gama, who placed the great bulk of Africa on the 
 map as we find it to-day. 
 
 It is hard for us to realize that Portugal, through 
 her ownership of Brazil, her grip on India, and with 
 three quarters of the coast of Africa hers by the right 
 of discovery, was the great commercial and colonizing 
 power of the sixteenth century. In those days that 
 little country of two million souls styled her monarch 
 "King of Portugal and of the Two Lands of the Set- 
 ting Sun on this Side and on that Side of the Sea 
 in Africa, Lord of Guinea and of the Conquest and 
 Navigation of Ethiopia, Arabia, Persia, and India." 
 Had Portugal's life been quickened by the Reforma- 
 
i6 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 tion, so that she could have swung into line with the 
 modern states, she might easily have rivaled England 
 in her influence upon the world. As it was, an exten- 
 sive trade with India and with the African coasts was 
 developed, only to have the great prizes of commerce 
 fall to the English and the Dutch. 
 
 How great then is Africa? To say that it contains 
 12,000,000 square miles conveys little; the mind takes 
 in such figures with difficulty. The method of com- 
 parison is better; so we might say that Africa is three 
 times the size of Europe, half as large again as North 
 America, or about the size of North America and 
 Europe combined. In round numbers it measures 
 5,000 miles north and south and 4,500 miles east and 
 west. It ranks second among the continents in size. 
 
 A Continent of Great Things 
 
 But it is when we penetrate the mysterious depths 
 of this continent that our enthusiasm begins to kindle. 
 What lakes and rivers! One of the pallbearers at 
 Livingstone's funeral in Westminster Abbey was 
 Henry M. Stanley, who, three years before, had 
 rescued the famous missionary and explorer on the 
 shore of Lake Tanganyika. A few days later Stanley 
 found himself in the office of the London Daily Tele- 
 graph. Mr. Edward Lawson, the editor, came in, and 
 they fell to discussing Livingstone and the completion 
 of his task. Lawson asked how much remained to be 
 done. Stanley answered : ^'The outlet of Lake 
 Tanganyika is undiscovered. We know nothing 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 17 
 
 scarcely, except what Speke has sketched out, of Lake 
 Victoria. We do not even know whether it consists 
 of one or many lakes, and therefore the sources of the 
 Nile are still unknown. Moreover, the western half 
 of the central African continent is still a white blank." 
 
 "Do you think you can settle all this if we commis- 
 sion you?" 
 
 *'WhIle I live there will be something done. If I 
 survive the time required to perform all the work, all 
 shall be done." 
 
 They reached an agreement on the spot, and a cable 
 was at once dispatched to James Gordon Bennett of 
 the New York Herald in these words : "Will you join 
 the Daily Telegraph in sending Stanley out to Africa 
 to complete the discoveries of Speke, Burton, and Liv- 
 ingstone?" Back came the laconic reply, "Yes. Ben- 
 nett." Who could have foreseen what great events 
 for the world hinged on the chance meeting of Stan- 
 ley and Lawson that day! The immediate result was 
 the opening up of the lake and river system of cen- 
 tral Africa. Victoria Nyanza was circumnavigated 
 and established as the source of the Nile, and as the 
 second greatest lake in the world. On the same trip 
 Stanley discovered Albert Edward Nyanza and fin- 
 ished the exploration of Tanganyika, which he had 
 begun with Livingstone. It must have been a tender 
 moment when he stood again at Ujiji where, five 
 years before, he had found Livingstone, "looking pale 
 and weary," and where he accosted him in the simple 
 words, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" Stanley then 
 
i8 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 set out to solve the secrets of the Lualaba, that mysteri- 
 ous stream which had so puzzled Livingstone, and near 
 whose banks his career came to an end. The Lualaba 
 proving to be nothing else than the Congo, Stanley de- 
 termined to explore the river to its mouth. When he 
 emerged at the coast after that perilous voyage of 
 1,500 miles, it may be said that Africa's veil was lifted. 
 
 Some who read these pages will recall the profound 
 interest which was stirred by Stanley's books and even 
 how he appeared on the lecture platform, with the 
 deep furrows on his face, and his strangely white hair. 
 Yet the task he brought to a conclusion was begun by 
 the Rornan Emperor Nero, who seems to have been 
 the first " interest himself in discovering the sources 
 of the Nile. How old and yet how new is Africa ! 
 
 Against this historical background it is easy to sketch 
 the remaining features of Africa's interior regions. 
 To lakes Victoria Nyanza and Albert Edward Nyanza 
 we add Albert Nyanza, as comprising the reservoirs 
 of the Nile. Tanganyika, we now know, empties into 
 the Congo. Add Lake Chad in the Sudan, which has 
 no outlet, and which yet remains fresh, and Lake 
 Nyasa, toward the east, which empties into the Zam- 
 bezi, and you have the leading lakes of the continent. 
 
 Of the four great rivers which penetrate the conti- 
 nent, three take rise in the lake region of the cen- 
 tral plateau, the Nile running north, the Congo run- 
 ning west, and the Zambezi running south. The Niger, 
 which ranks third in size, drains the vast territory 
 lying to the north of the Gulf of Guinea, as far up 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 19 
 
 as the Sahara. Its immense size is indicated by the 
 delta, which extends one hundred miles inland. 
 
 Closely associated with the rivers are the great for- 
 ests of Africa. Stanley's description of how, on his 
 search for Emin Pasha, he hacked his way through the 
 dark forest of the upper Congo to the lake region, is 
 the classic on this subject. Stanley speaks of forest 
 growth so dense that the rays of the sun never pene- 
 trated to the ground. He describes how he found 
 himself depressed, almost overwhelmed by these 
 gloomy shades. Subsequent explorers say they have 
 never found the forest as dense as that. They speak, 
 however, of the luxuriance of the undergrowth and the 
 tangle of creepers and parasitic vines which beset the 
 traveler the moment he leaves the beaten path. The 
 Congo basin throughout is heavily forested, as are the 
 river bottoms elsewhere. Detached tropical wood- 
 lands of great density and beauty are found on the 
 mountain slopes in various parts of the continent. 
 
 The world has yet to discover the commercial value 
 of Africa's tropical forests. Red and brown mahogany 
 is much sought after, but other woods as beautiful are 
 unknown in Europe and America. Mr. Arthur Orner, 
 the forester of the American Board at Mt. Silinda, 
 Rhodesia, has listed over twenty trees whose wood 
 takes on a beautiful color and finish. In the Mt. Silinda 
 forest mahoganies grow ten and twelve feet in diam- 
 eter and 200 feet tall. 
 
 In general, however, it may be said that the African 
 forests are thin affairs, the trees being far apart, 
 
20 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 rather scraggly, and not heavily leaved. The tree- 
 trunks, as a rule, are so crooked and knotty as to be 
 the despair of industrial missionaries. The wood is 
 also exceedingly hard. Travelers are often surprised 
 to find that on the interior plateau, the continent offers 
 almost no suggestion of the tropics, the landscape 
 being much like that of North America or Europe. 
 Palms are rarely seen, except along the streams. It 
 is a mistake, however, to generalize too freely from 
 particular journeys. Africa not only is of vast ex- 
 tent, but it is divided almost equally by the equator, 
 so that it presents much variety and contrast in its 
 various parts. Even so careful a writer as Henry 
 Drummond occasionally overlooks this fact. From his 
 journeys in the Nyasa region he concludes that the 
 characteristic animal life of tropical countries is rarely 
 found here. "A man must be satisfied," he remarks, 
 "if he sees a monkey once a month." Drummond 
 should have traveled on the Congo or on the Zambezi, 
 or even in Rhodesia, where mission stations are in- 
 fested with these imps of the wood, and where every 
 native corn-field has a watch-hut for keeping off the 
 baboons. 
 
 On the plateau, where the thin forest does not pre- 
 vail, we have the grass country, the savannas for 
 which Africa is famous, and where the big game is 
 found. These prairie sections are extensive in the 
 Sudan, the lake country, and in west Africa, south 
 of the Congo belt. The growth of the coarse grass 
 is an astonishment to travelers. One rides on horse- 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 21 
 
 back for miles, with the grass waving high above one's 
 head. Lions, leopards, and other beasts hide in the 
 tall grass, and have a way of emerging at inopportune 
 moments. 
 
 But the interior is not all prairie and forest. It may 
 not be to the credit of a continent to possess deserts; 
 yet we must think of Africa as peculiarly well-fur- 
 nished in this respect. The Desert of Sahara easily 
 outranks all the deserts of the world in size and in 
 reputation. Its extent is enormous, stretching from 
 the Atlantic to the Red Sea, and covering twenty 
 degrees of latitude in the widest part. It should not 
 be thought of as a monotonous waste of level sand. 
 There are wide varieties in elevation, and extensive 
 oases, supporting considerable population. A study 
 of the map will reveal that in the little known Tibesti 
 region there is a mountain range rising to an altitude 
 of 8,000 feet, from which numerous streams run 
 down into the burning sands. In the Sahara, say 
 the desert tribesmen, is the "Garden of Allah." Un- 
 doubtedly a book could be written on the majesties and 
 beauties of the sand stretches of northern Africa. 
 Undoubtedly another book could be written on the 
 terrors of the region. Consider that the Nile, which 
 traverses the Sahara for one thousand miles, has not 
 changed the character of the country in any respect, 
 except for a narrow fringe of arable land along either 
 bank. 
 
 Then there is the great Kalahari Desert in South 
 Africa, which lay across the path of the early mis- 
 
22 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 sionaries as an almost insuperable barrier, and which 
 has hindered the development of German Southwest 
 Africa in our day. As the North African states, with 
 their fertile soil and equable climate, are shut off from 
 central Africa by the Sahara on the south, so the South 
 African region, still more favorable for European 
 settlement, is shut off by the Kalahari Desert on the 
 north. 
 
 And how about mountains? Here alone Africa 
 seems to fall short of full interest. Everything seems 
 great except the mountain ranges. There is nothing 
 comparable to the Himalayas, the Alps, the Canadian 
 Rockies, the Andes. Yet we must not forget the Atlas 
 range which zigzags across Morocco and Algeria and 
 which boasts peaks 15,000 feet high, on which, ac- 
 cording to the ancients, the heavens themselves rested ; 
 or the tangled mass of mountains in Abyssinia, which 
 some have ventured to call the Switzerland of Africa. 
 Those who have vivid recollections of the mountain 
 fighting in the Boer War will think the Drakensbergs in 
 Natal are worthy of mention. Africa's characteristic 
 mountains, however, are solitary peaks, like Kiliman- 
 jaro in German East, which rises to an altitude of 
 19,321 ; Kenia in British East, 17,007 feet; Ruwenzori, 
 near Albert Edward Nyanza, discovered by Stanley, 
 16,619 feet, and Mt. Cameroun on the west coast, 
 13,370 feet. These are volcanic cones which rise with 
 snow-capped summits from the midst of tropical for- 
 ests, an incomparably beautiful sight. 
 
 In its broadest terms, Africa may be described as 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 23 
 
 consisting of a low-lying coast strip, a few hundred 
 miles wide, hot and unhealthy; a mountain strip back 
 from the coast, high and salubrious; and an interior 
 plateau, diversified by mountains and hills, with an 
 elevation averaging 3,000 feet, and a climate in which 
 virile whites can live. Africa has been compared to an 
 inverted saucer — the rim being the coast region, the 
 projecting circle on which the saucer rests being the 
 mountain ranges; and the slightly depressed center, 
 the interior plateau. This figure implies a rather broad 
 generalization, but it has its value. 
 
 The mineral wealth of Africa passes all computa- 
 tion. Johannesburg produces one third of the world's 
 gold supply. Ninety per cent, of our diamonds come 
 from Kimberly and the other mines of South Africa. 
 In these treasures the continent stands supreme. 
 When we add the copper deposits of the Katanga dis- 
 trict, on the upper Congo, said to be the greatest in 
 the world, the iron, the tin, and the coal of various 
 sections, being uncovered by the prospector, we are 
 inclined to agree with those who claim that the natural 
 wealth of Africa is equal to that of any two of the 
 other continents. What this means in the way of 
 commercial development in coming years it is not diffi- 
 cult to imagine. 
 
 A Continent of Strange People 
 
 Our real interest is to be in the people of Africa. 
 What sort of beings inhabit these solitudes, range 
 through these forests, paddle down these streams, and 
 
24 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 hunt the wild beasts of the grass country? The best 
 way will be to let the people disclose themselves as we 
 proceed, section by section ; but a general classification 
 is desirable at the outset. At first there appears to be 
 a perfect jumble of tribes, only one characteristic 
 standing out sharp and clear — they are all of dark 
 color. Closer attention, however, develops marked 
 dissimilarities; even the color breaks up into half 
 a dozen different hues. Speaking roughly, we may say 
 there are five fairly distinct peoples in Africa. First 
 are the aborigines of the Mediterranean states; Lib- 
 yans, the Romans called them; Berbers, we call them 
 to-day. Egypt has always been a distinct part of 
 Africa, but racially the native Egyptians belong to this 
 Hamitic stock. Second, we place the Arabs and other 
 Semitic folk who have come over from western Asia 
 and who seem to think that, religiously, at least, the 
 continent belongs to them. Third are the negroes 
 proper, who dwell largely in the Sudan, but whose 
 most characteristic development is on the Guinea 
 coast, whence most of our American negroes came. 
 Fourth are the widely scattered Bantu people, stretch- 
 ing all the way from the lakes to the tip of the con- 
 tinent. They are quite similar to the negroes, but 
 must be classed together as a distinct language group. 
 Historically they probably represent an invasion or a 
 migration from the north in very ancient times. We 
 shall have much to say about these Bantus. Finally, 
 there are those strange people, the Pigmies of the 
 Congo, and the Hottentots and Bushmen of the Cape. 
 
I- 
 
 IN THE DESERT OF SAHARA 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 25 
 
 How shall we class them? The best way seems to be 
 to lump them together as survivals of the most ancient 
 of Africans, the bona fide aborigines, coming about 
 as close to the primitive man-animal as any race on 
 earth. These people are all ilitensely interesting. 
 
 As to the languages, we find a bewildering array, 
 and this constitutes one of the most difficult problems 
 of mission work. Although the British and American 
 Bible Societies have printed the Scriptures in one 
 hundred African tongues, there remain 423 tongues 
 without the Word of God. The accepted computation 
 is 523 distinct languages and 320 dialects, making 843 
 varieties of speech. Was the Tower of Babel located 
 somewhere in Africa? 
 
 The population of Africa is variously stated, figures 
 running from 100,000,000 to 180,000,000. Census 
 officials have not abounded in the Congo forests and 
 other interior sections, so that perhaps one man's guess 
 is as good as another's. The latest governmental esti- 
 mates appear to favor the more moderate figures. If 
 we settle tentatively upon 130,000,000 we should not 
 be far astray. 
 
 Africa and the War 
 
 A new interest in Africa has arisen because of the 
 world war. Into four widely separated sections of 
 the continent has the mighty struggle been projected. 
 Not only has Europe presented to the natives the spec- 
 tacle of warring '^Christian nations," but the natives 
 themselves have been drawn into the conflict, so that 
 
26 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 we have tribe arrayed against tribe in the service of 
 their masters. Imagine Zulus from the British province 
 of Natal fighting their brethren i,8oo miles to the 
 north, merely because they happen to live under the 
 German flag ! It is to the credit of the African that his 
 confidence in the white man and the white man's re- 
 ligion has not been destroyed through this experience. 
 While mission work for the most part has gone on un- 
 diminished, the change of control in the Cameroun 
 from German to French has proved embarrassing in 
 several ways, especially in the requirement that the 
 French language shall be substituted for the German 
 in mission schools. In German East the work of the 
 German missionaries has been suspended, owing to the 
 fact that the fighting has been carried into every corner 
 of the colony. In German Southwest, also, the work 
 has been brought to a standstill. Africa of the present 
 day claims every human interest as her own — even the 
 saddest. 
 
 A Continent of Great Adventurers 
 
 Africa has lured the stalwart souls of many ages. 
 The Portuguese navigators were great discoverers and 
 builders of civilization because they were great ad- 
 venturers. They had a sublime trust in themselves and 
 also in God, according to their light. They were great 
 men. Let this fact lay hold upon us at the very out- 
 set. Africa beckons the great. The modern explorers, 
 like Speke, Grant, Stanley, and Cameron, form a 
 worthy succession. They have not been surpassed in 
 
THE LURE OF AFRICA 27 
 
 their field. To these add the adventurers in government 
 and industry, of whom Cecil Rhodes is the king. They 
 have not been above criticism. That is putting it rather 
 mildly. But they were men of colossal nerve and dar- 
 ing; and they have accomplished wonders. Of late the 
 sportsman is having his turn with Africa. What stories 
 they tell, what books they have written, what amazing 
 creatures they have placed in our museums ! The same 
 type again — from Roosevelt to Rains ford and Stewart 
 Edward White. 
 
 The greatest adventurers of all are the missionaries. 
 Have you ever considered the fact of the large number 
 of really great missionaries, missionaries whose lives 
 are upon our shelves, who felt the lure of this con- 
 tinent? Moffat, Livingstone, Mackenzie, Grout, Coil- 
 lard, Hannington, Stewart, Mackay, Pilkington, Laws, 
 Grenfell, Good, Lapsley, Mary Slessor — what a list! 
 Some of these men were explorers and founders of 
 states as well as preachers of the Word. They had 
 just one life to live and they chose Africa. Why was 
 it? Because the lure of the divine quest laid its spell 
 upon them. Their idea was that Africa, the continent 
 of the storied past, the continent of beauty, the con- 
 tinent of barbarism and wo, should be the continent 
 of Christ. He who studies Africa should study in the 
 spirit of a great adventure. 
 
STRONGHOLDS OF MOHAMMEDANISM 
 
o 
 
 STRONGHOLDS OF MOHAMMEDANISM 
 
 On March 30, 1912, the sultan of Morocco, sitting 
 in his capital at Fez, signed the treaty which estab- 
 lished the power of France throughout his nation. 
 Since then the tricolor has waved over the land of the 
 Moors from the ports of the Atlantic to the high peaks 
 of the Atlas range. 
 
 On October 15, 19 12, Mohammed V, sultan of 
 Trukey, sitting in his palace on the Bosporus, signed 
 the treaty of Lausanne, which relinquished to Italy the 
 vilayet of Tripoli. To-day the red, white, and green 
 banner floats over this immense area from the Ben- 
 ghazi to Fezzan. 
 
 In December, 1914, on the occasion of the entry of 
 Turkey into the war on the side of the Central Powers, 
 Great Britain deposed the khedive of Egypt, who was 
 ruling in the name of the Turkish sultan, and who had 
 become overfond of that connection. She placed on 
 the throne, with the title of sultan, Hussein, an uncle 
 of the former khedive, and formally declared Egypt 
 to be a protectorate of Great Britain. 
 
 Thus within five years Mohammedanism has lost 
 control of the three states which remained to it in 
 North Africa. Should Turkey some day forfeit her 
 
 31 
 
32 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 independence — and there are those who think she has 
 done so already — not a self-governing country will be 
 left of all the lands once ruled by the followers of the 
 Arabian prophet. These are days of the rapid dis- 
 integration of Mohammedanism as a political power. 
 It would be a serious mistake, however, for us to as- 
 sume that Islam is everywhere losing her grip upon 
 the thought and life of the people. In Persia, in India, 
 and even in Turkey it may be true, but alas! not in 
 Africa. The tier of states which are washed by the 
 Mediterranean — Morocco, Algeria, Tripoli, Egypt — is 
 the stronghold of the Mohammedan faith. For twelve 
 centuries this rival religion has been entrenched 
 throughout this region, and it shows but slight evi- 
 dences of yielding to-day. On the contrary, it is from 
 the North African states as a base that Islam is carry- 
 ing on her active missionary propaganda throughout 
 the Sudan and beyond. How all this came to be is a 
 lesson of first importance to every Christian. 
 
 When Christianity Dominated North Africa 
 
 If we could go back to the days of the saintly 
 Augustine, and could visit Alexandria, Cyrene, Car- 
 thage, Hippo, and the other cities of the coast, we would 
 say, "Christianity is so strongly established in this 
 region that its overthrow is inconceivable." We would 
 find hundreds of bishoprics, great churches with their 
 endowments, extensive monasteries, clergy of various 
 ranks, impressive rituals, fasts and feasts in great 
 abundance, and an all-around development of church 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 33 
 
 service and life. Alexandria in the fifth century was 
 one of the great capitals of the empire. The ancient 
 Caesareum, converted into a church, was one of the 
 noblest structures in the city, being marked by two 
 obelisks, known as Cleopatra's Needles. We read that 
 there were no less than 600 monasteries in the 
 neighborhood of Alexandria. Egypt for centuries was 
 the most splendid seat of oriental Christianity. 
 
 In North Africa proper, that is, the coast region 
 aside from Egypt and Cyrenaica, the situation was 
 somewhat different. In this vast domain, of which 
 Carthage was the capital, Christianity was strong in 
 leadership and fairly strong in numbers; but it pos- 
 sessed no such powerful organization as most writers 
 have supposed. We read of six church provinces be- 
 ing formed in the reign of Diocletian (284-305), not- 
 withstanding his fierce edicts against Christianity and 
 the resulting persecutions. In the year 411 a con- 
 ference was called at Carthage over doctrinal difficul- 
 ties, attended by more than 500 bishops. These 
 bishops, however, were hardly more than pastors, 
 since in Augustine's time the parishes numbered a 
 little over 500. Augustine, himself, if we may 
 judge from one of his sermons, presided over about a 
 dozen priests and deacons. The strength of the church 
 in North Africa was primarily the strength of tower- 
 ing personalities, like Tertullian, Cyprian, and Augus- 
 tine, to whom the Roman world went to school. Under 
 their leadership considerable progress was made in 
 the conversion from heathenism of the Berber tribes; 
 
34 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 but these tribes, never loyal to Rome, were not over- 
 zealous in behalf of the Roman Church. Many of 
 these peoples had strong leanings toward Judaism. 
 Yet, after due allowance is made for these facts, when 
 we consider the extent of the North African church, 
 and especially when we take in view the splendor of 
 the establishment in Egypt, it would seem that Chris- 
 tianity should have been able to withstand any as- 
 saults, from within or without. As a matter of fact, 
 it went down with a crash before the Mohammedan 
 invaders. 
 
 The Mohammedan Invasion 
 
 The man primarily responsible for the subjugation 
 of North Africa and for the annihilation of the church 
 boasted the name of Amr-ibn-ei-Asi. In spite of his 
 name this man was no "hyphenate.'* He was an Arab 
 of the most fanatical brand, knowing but one al- 
 legiance — the faith of Islam. Back of him towered the 
 personality of Mohammed, dreamer, fanatic, despot, 
 only six years in his grave, but raging like a simoom 
 from the desert in the souls of his lieutenants. There 
 can be no more striking commentary upon the power 
 of this movement which burst upon the world from the 
 heart of Arabia, than the fact that Amr-ibn-el-Asi 
 invaded Egypt in 640 A. D. with a force of only 4,000 
 men. Apparently one Arab was equal to ten Egyptians. 
 In fact, Alexandria surrendered without a struggle, 
 and shortly the entire Nile valley was in the possession 
 of the invaders. There followed an extensive immi- 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 35 
 
 gration from Arabia, and in an almost incredibly short 
 space of time, the proud structure of Roman civiliza- 
 tion and Christian institutions became a thing of the 
 past. The loss of the collection of ancient manu- 
 scripts in the great library of Alexandria, the largest 
 in the ancient world, is everywhere recognized 
 by scholars as one of the tragedies of history. The 
 story goes that Amr consulted Omar, the caliph, as to 
 what he should do with the books, and Omar replied, 
 "If these writings of the Greeks agree with the book 
 of God, they are useless and need not be preserved; 
 if they disagree, they are pernicious and ought to be 
 destroyed." Whereupon, it is stated, "the rolls were 
 distributed among the 4,000 baths of the city, and it 
 took six months to burn them all." The story is pic- 
 turesque, and in a way characteristic ; but since it is of 
 doubtful validity it should not be used to the discredit 
 of Islam.^ 
 
 The rapidity of the Mohammedan movement in its 
 sweep westward is highly significant. A succession 
 of conquerors came to the front — their names need not 
 bother us — and by 66S what is now Tripoli was a 
 Moslem state. Algeria went down with little resistance 
 and the Arab hordes swept onward to the Pillars of 
 Hercules. The story is told that Akba, who raided 
 Morocco, rode his horse far out into the surf and cried, 
 "Great God, if I were not stopped by this raging sea, 
 I would go to the nations of the west, preaching the 
 
 1 The grounds on which this story is discredited are set forth con- 
 vincingly by W. F. Adeney in his The Greek and Eastern Churches. 
 
36 TPE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 unity of thy name and putting to the sword those who 
 would not submit." This is rather too melodramatic 
 to be true, but it suggests the fierce impetuosity which 
 everywhere characterized the North African invasion. 
 
 The year 711 is usually given as the date when the 
 entire north coast was in the hands of the invaders. 
 In the same year Tarik, a Berber prince, who had been 
 converted to Islam, landed at Gibraltar with 13,000 
 men and commenced the invasion of Europe. 
 
 In all this history we are to bear in mind that 
 Christianity went down as completely as did Roman 
 government and law. To the Arab conquerors, as also 
 to many of the Berber tribes, the two were bound up 
 in the same bundle. It is quite conceivable that the 
 church might have maintained herself under a Moslem 
 government; but this was not to be. The plain fact 
 is that Christianity was wiped out in North Africa, 
 and in the Nile valley remained only in two struggling 
 and degenerate branches of the church. Islam glories 
 in this fact to-day and is not averse to throwing it 
 in the face of the Christian who seeks to maintain the 
 superiority of his religion. 
 
 Why Christianity Was Overthrown 
 
 As Christians we should have a clear philosophy 
 of the failure of the North African branch of Chris- 
 tianity, so that we may help save our religion from 
 similar calamities in the future. Probably the lesson 
 had to be demonstrated at some time, in some place, 
 for the benefit of the church universal, and especially 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 37 
 
 for those sections of the church which are emerging 
 out of paganism. 
 
 A diagnosis of the situation reveals four fatal de- 
 fects in North African Christianity. In the first place 
 the North African church was a disputing church. A 
 large part of its time was taken up with squabbles over 
 doctrinal matters of a more or less technical nature. 
 Its leaders were more given to intellectual pride than 
 to humble-mindedness. In those days what an African 
 bishop didn't know about the nature of the Supreme 
 Being an angel wouldn't care to inquire into. Chris- 
 tianity was, in the main, an intellectual proposition. 
 Orthodoxy, of the knife-edge variety, was the supreme 
 end of man. From this condition it was but a step to 
 the use of physical force. It is ominous to read that in 
 the early days of struggle between Christianity and 
 heathenism, mobs of monks gathered to destroy the 
 pagan temples. One of these mobs, instigated by Cyril, 
 the patriarch of Alexandria, stripped and tore to pieces 
 the beautiful Neo-Platonic philosopher and priestess, 
 Hypatia, immortalized by Charles Kingsley. It is 
 still more ominous to find that heathenism was finally 
 crushed out, or supposed to be, by governmental edict. 
 
 In the second place, the church was a divided church. 
 This was an inevitable outcome of the bitter con- 
 troversies. Parties sprang up like weeds, each one 
 calling the other heretics. The dominant faction would 
 brutally persecute its fellow Christians. As early as 
 Augustine's time the impression made upon the world 
 was of a split Christianity, since nearly half of the 
 
38 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 500 bishops who met at Carthage were in the 
 opposition, being known as Donatists. Thus the church 
 was hopelessly weakened, its energy being dissipated 
 in factional strife rather than against the common foe. 
 How stupid and how wicked it all looks to us a 
 thousand years after ! Perhaps some of our differences 
 to-day will appear stupid and wicked to later genera- 
 tions. 
 
 The North African church, furthermore, was a 
 formal, rather than a vital church. The glorious soul- 
 life, the personal connection with God through prayer, 
 and with man through service, so characteristic of the 
 early Christians, became buried under an elaborate 
 system of rites and ceremonies. Christianity was a 
 performance, not a life. Even the rites of heathen 
 temples, with not a few of their degrading super- 
 stitions, gained a foothold among the members of the 
 church of Christ. What with their images and their 
 relics, there was little to choose between them and some 
 of the heathen devotees. 
 
 It goes without saying, as our fourth count, that 
 this church was a non-missionary church. Back from 
 the coast lived native tribes steeped in idolatry and 
 given over to all the base practises of paganism. Yet 
 the African Christians cared not. Their interest was 
 in orthodoxy, not in men. Their thought was turned 
 in upon themselves. The church had ceased to be 
 an army for spiritual conquest, and had become a 
 debating society. Like some churches to-day it had 
 turned its back upon a perishing world. Zealous for 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 39 
 
 the truth, it yet denied the fundamental principle of 
 our religion. It became unorthodox in the sphere 
 where orthodoxy involved the very life of the church. 
 Such is our diagnosis. Intellectual pride, party strife, 
 formalism, self-engrossment — these all spell death to 
 organized religion in any age. History contains no 
 greater lesson than this. 
 
 Twelve Centuries After 
 
 "By their fruits ;ye shall know them." Let us now 
 take a look at Mohammedanism as it has actually 
 worked out in this region. We have spoken unspar- 
 ingly of the faults of the North African branch of the 
 Christian church ; let us deal as frankly with the system 
 which took its place. 
 
 Mohammedanism is a religion of the desert. It 
 arose in the midst of Arabian sands, was developed by 
 Bedouin tribes, and to-day boasts the place of its 
 origin as the religious center of the world. Mohamme- 
 danism has in it both the mystery and the hardness 
 of the desert. On the one hand, it allures; on the 
 other, it repels. It emphasizes the unity of God, but it 
 is the unity of an arbitrary, cruel sovereign, like a 
 Bedouin chief. Need we wonder if the fruitage of this 
 religion suggests the desert also ? 
 
 The first effects of Islam in North Africa were un- 
 doubtedly beneficent. It came like a breath of life upon 
 a decaying civilization. Commerce was revived, the 
 arts and sciences were quickened. We must not for- 
 get that civilization owes a large debt to Arabia for 
 
40 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 mathematics and astronomy. North Africa naturally 
 shared in the revival of culture which followed in the 
 wake of the Saracen armies. Religiously, this is to be 
 noted : the use of images and pictures was ruled out 
 of worship as smacking of idolatry, and a simple ser- 
 vice of prayer in the mosque took the place of the 
 barren ritual of the church. The heathen tribes were 
 sought out, and their idolatry, so offensive to the Mo- 
 hammedan, became a thing of the past. This may have 
 been done with a high hand ; but we must put it over 
 against the indifference of the church. 
 
 Having admitted all this, we have said about all that 
 can be said in favor of the new regime. The thing 
 began to work out in Africa just as it has in other parts 
 of the world. When the first burst of enthusiasm was 
 over, the inherent defects of the system, intellectually 
 and morally, came to the front. A pure and stern 
 monotheism did not prevent its theology from being 
 fatalistic to the core. Man is the victim of inexorable 
 fate. This served to paralyze human energy. There 
 was no room for freedom or for growth in Moham- 
 med's scheme. The word Islam means submission, the 
 submission of the slave. By the same process shackles 
 were placed on the human mind. Truth was fossilized. 
 The Koran became a dead weight upon the intellectual 
 development of the mass of the people in all Moslem 
 lands. Islam is a book religion in the narrowest sense 
 of the word, an affair of statutes and forms. 
 
 To make matters worse, many of these statutes were 
 guides to evil rather than to good. It is not necessary 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 41 
 
 in a book of this kind to give a detailed description of 
 Mohammedan theology and life; but certain ethical 
 defects are so notorious that they cannot be passed 
 by. Polygamy, easy divorce, concubinage, the seclusion 
 of women, the appeal of the sensual, slavery, in- 
 tolerance, cruelty, these are some of the things which 
 became ingrafted upon North African life when the 
 Arabs took possession. They have borne their deadly 
 fruits in personal character and social custom. We 
 think of North Africa to-day as a blighted land, one 
 of the most backward sections of the world, a mill- 
 stone upon the neck of civilization. 
 
 Before the Great War, thousands of American trav- 
 elers visited the North African ports every winter in 
 connection with the Mediterranean trip, and the tales 
 they brought of ignorance, sloth, dirt, and disease are 
 not challenged by Mohammedan writers. E. Alexander 
 Powell, once connected with the United States con- 
 sular service in Egypt, describes, in his informing and 
 entertaining book, The Last Frontier, the typical Moor 
 in vigorous fashion : **The town Moor is sullen, sus- 
 picious of all strangers, vacillating; the pride, but none 
 of the energy of his ancestors remains. In his youth 
 he is licentious in his acts ; in his old age he is licentious 
 in his thoughts. He is abominably lazy. He never 
 runs if he can walk; he never walks if he can stand 
 still; he never stands if he can sit; he never sits if he 
 can lie down. The only thing he puts any energy into 
 is his talking; he believes that nothing can be done 
 really well without a hullabaloo." In another place 
 
42 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 Mr. Powell speaks of the Moors as probably the most 
 licentious race in the world. "Compared to them, the 
 inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah were positively 
 prudish." ^ 
 
 In Southern Algeria live the Ouled-Nails, famed for 
 the rare beauty of the women and for the heartless 
 fashion in which the girls are sold into lives of shame 
 until such time as they can bring a sufficient dowry to 
 their expectant husbands. As one writer puts it, these 
 beautiful creatures "from earliest childhood are trained 
 for a life of indifferent virtue as a horse is trained 
 for the show ring." All this is supposed to be en- 
 tirely consistent with religion. Another Moslem tribe, 
 or conglomeration of tribes, known as the Kabyles, 
 has adopted the pagan custom by which matrimony 
 is made a commercial affair. Mr. Powell states : "A 
 fine upstanding Kabyle maiden of fifteen or there- 
 abouts, with the lines of a thoroughbred, the profile of 
 a cameo, and a skin the color of a bronze statue, will 
 fetch her parents anywhere from eighty to three 
 hundred dollars."' These are not pleasant facts, but 
 they must be known if we are to have an intelligent 
 idea of the needs of this part of the world. 
 
 Fortunately the condition of women is not so bad 
 in all sections ; but everywhere the wives, the mothers, 
 and the daughters, by that abominable system, invented 
 by Mohammed himself, are kept in rigid seclusion, 
 
 ^ E. Alexander Powell, The Last Frontier, pp. 37, 38. 
 2 lUd., p. 66. 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 43 
 
 living practically the life of prisoners. Even Moslem 
 writers are beginning to realize the pernicious effects 
 of this custom, particularly in keeping half of the com- 
 munity in ignorance and degradation. 
 
 As to governmental and social conditions, Ameri- 
 cans had their first look into North Africa in connec- 
 tion with the little war of 1801 in which, for a time, 
 the Stars and Stripes floated over the fortress of 
 Derna on the Tripoli coast. When the United States 
 frigate Philadelphia ran aground in the harbor of 
 Tripoh, she was captured by the natives and her crew 
 enslaved. At that time Americans learned more about 
 the Moslems of North Africa than all the books had 
 taught them. Italy now rules over Tripoli, and France 
 over Tunis, Algeria, and Morocco, and outward con- 
 ditions have somewhat improved. But down below we 
 find the same old Mohammedanism as in the days of 
 the caliph Omar. 
 
 An exceedingly unfortunate condition exists in con- 
 nection with public health. One missionary writes, 
 "Immorality and frequency of divorce, and the total 
 lack of hygiene, combined with superstitious practises, 
 have sapped the brains and constitutions of quite eighty 
 per cent, of the children." It is stated on good authority 
 that the natives of Algeria are, with few exceptions, 
 tainted with syphilis. Smallpox and other virulent dis- 
 eases abound, and the superstitions of the people are 
 such that little can be done to prevent the spread of 
 such plagues. Even in Egypt, after thirty years of 
 British occupancy, astonishing figures are given as 
 
44 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 to infant mortality. A recent government report 
 states that over half the children die before they are 
 five years old. Whatever North Africa may desire for 
 itself, it is a region which needs to be cleaned up for 
 the benefit of the rest of the world. 
 
 Such is the working out of Mohammed's religion 
 in a region where it has had full swing for a thousand 
 years. Lord Cromer, for many years British agent 
 and consul-general in Egypt, is not oversanguine as 
 to what can be done by Christianity in this part of the 
 world; but as for Islam, he admits the case is hope- 
 less. His position is that Islam is incapable of ref- 
 ormation. A reformed Islam would not be Islam at 
 all. Where, then, is the hope of North Africa? 
 
 Christian Survivals 
 
 Naturally we turn first to those branches of the 
 ancient church which have survived, although im- 
 mersed in Mohammedan civilization. Are they dead 
 branches, or can they be revived and become a saving 
 element in African society? 
 
 Before the Mohammedan invasion, the Egyptian, or 
 Coptic Church, as it came to be called, had fallen 
 out with the church at large in connection with the 
 Monophysite controversy. This was a highly technical 
 discussion over the relation of the human to the divine 
 in the nature of Christ, the Monophysites holding to 
 a single nature in which the human element appeared 
 to be ruled out. The Coptic bishops favored this view, 
 and no end of trouble arose on that account. At the 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 45 
 
 time of the Mohammedan invasion the orthodox 
 party was making it so hot for the bishops that the 
 coming of the Arabs was actually welcomed as a re- 
 lief. The spectacle of this ancient church standing 
 in with these conquerors of its country and the enemies 
 of its faith is humiliating in the extreme. It was re- 
 warded by a temporary period of toleration, but also by 
 an unusual degree of degradation. Principal Adeney 
 puts the matter mildly when he says of the Coptic 
 Church : "With all its endowments it never flourished, 
 never grew. It has remained to this day a phantom 
 church, with offices, but without functions." 
 
 Yet we recall that these Copts are the direct descen- 
 dants of the men who built the pyramids and who, 
 when the rest of the world was asleep, developed a 
 civilization which has been the wonder of the ages. 
 Their church, too, has suffered much persecution — 
 possibly more than any other body except the Ar- 
 menians. It has cost them dearly to hold out. The 
 pressure of Islam has reduced the Coptic membership 
 from several millions to less than 700,000. A ray of 
 hope just now is found in the fact that they want their 
 children educated and that they are sending them in 
 large numbers to mission schools. These children 
 will eventually be heard from. The question as to the 
 possibilities of revival in a decadent nation of long 
 standing is a very difficult one. History has not given 
 her final answer to this question. It remains to see 
 what the grace of God can accomplish, when Christian 
 people of other lands are willing to turn in and help. 
 
46 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 Then there is the Httle Abyssinian Church — a most 
 interesting survival. Buried in the mountains of the 
 easternmost projection of the continent, the Abys- 
 sinians have maintained themselves all these centuries 
 against Mohammedan and heathen pressure. During 
 most of this time, they have been shut off from all con- 
 tact with other Christian bodies. That Abyssinia has 
 kept the faith at all is to her credit. There is a strong 
 admixture of Jewish elements in the life of this church, 
 since it holds to circumcision, distinctions between 
 clean and unclean food, and the observance of 
 the seventh day. Adeney gives us an interesting pic- 
 ture of the worship of the Abyssinians. "There are 
 prayers and psalms and one lesson, all shouted rather 
 than intoned or merely read. The mass begins with a 
 shout of hallelujah, and concludes with a procession 
 of four or five crosses, to an accompaniment of drums, 
 cymbals, and incense, carried round the church quite 
 thirty times." 
 
 The Church of England undertook missionary work 
 among these mountain people in 1829, but their mis- 
 sionaries were driven out by the intolerant priests. At 
 present there is only one small mission station in the 
 country, under Swedish auspices. Yet one cannot rid 
 himself of the idea that some day Abyssinia will be 
 reached and that her sturdy people will have a hand 
 in the redemption of Africa. 
 
 Rallying Points of Christianity 
 From this checkered history of the church in North 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 47 
 
 Africa we come now to the era of modern missions. 
 It fell to the lot of the United Presbyterian Church 
 of North America to be the pioneer in missionary 
 efforts among the Copts and Moslems of the Nile 
 valley, and right nobly has this comparatively small 
 body risen to the task. 
 
 In Cairo and in Assiut the United Presbyterian 
 Board of Foreign Missions maintains an array of in- 
 stitutions which fairly bewilders the tourist. It is a 
 typical development of higher educational work on the 
 mission field. In the midst of the day-school for boys 
 and girls, the various boarding or high schools, 
 and the theological seminary, there stand out conspicu- 
 ously two colleges, which should be known and 
 honored in all our churches, the Asslut College for 
 young men and the Cairo College for young women. 
 The former is a well-established Institution, having 
 been organized In 1865. It has sent over one hundred 
 men into the Christian ministry, twenty into medicine, 
 prepared numerous teachers, and In less degree stocked 
 all the professions and pursuits. The college occupies 
 a campus of eleven acres In one of the choicest spots In 
 Egypt. It is a credit to Christianity, a center of mighty 
 influence for good. 
 
 The college for young women at Cairo draws its 
 students from the most Influential families of Cairo 
 and Egypt. A large number of them are daughters 
 of pashas and beys and the most eminent men in ofli- 
 cial and social life. Both British and Egyptian officials 
 place a high value upon this college, as a contribution 
 
48 
 
 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 MEDITERRANEAN SEA 
 
 THE UNITED 
 PRE;5BTTER1AN ''^ 
 MISSION TIELD 
 IN EGYPT 
 
 Population Our Share 
 
 ^,000, 000 
 
 Number of Cities and 
 
 The 20a (*)dot3 ^ 
 Indicate Villages Hola.- 
 \n(, Christian Services 
 The 2.6 7? Oaot^ 
 Indicate Vi II idges ythcrc 
 Ho Services are held 
 
 to the social, in- 
 tellectual, and 
 moral regenera- 
 tion of the land. 
 One writer 
 speaks of it as 
 "t h e greatest 
 asset for the in- 
 troduction and 
 dissemination 
 of Christian 
 ideals and influ- 
 ences in Egypt." 
 Already its 
 graduates are 
 reshaping the 
 home life of 
 this ancient 
 land. 
 
 Dr. Charles 
 R.Watson, well 
 known in mis- 
 sionary circles 
 as the secretary 
 of the United 
 Presbyterian 
 Board and as a 
 speaker in con- 
 ventions, has 
 recently re- 
 
 THE UNITED PRESBYTERIAN ISIISSION FIELD 
 EGYPT 
 
 IN 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 49 
 
 signed the secretaryship that he may devote himself, 
 as president, to the building of a union Christian uni- 
 versity in Cairo, an institution of the highest grade, 
 which shall become the keystone to the educational 
 arch of the Nile country. Already considerable sums 
 have been contributed for this purpose. The leading 
 Mohammedan university, if we may so speak of it, 
 is located at Cairo, in the famous El Azhar mosque. 
 Here not less than 10,000 youths, gathered from 
 the whole Moslem world, assemble each year to study 
 the tenets of Islam in the expectation of becoming 
 teachers and preachers of the faith. It is appropriate 
 that in this very city Christianity should establish a 
 seat of the highest learning. What Robert College has 
 been to Turkey and the Balkan states, and what the 
 Syrian Protestant College of Beirut has been to Syria, 
 this union university should be to the land of the 
 Pharaohs. 
 
 There is an excellent medical work at Tanta, in the 
 Nile delta, and at Assiut, and of course an extensive 
 evangelistic enterprise all up and down the valley. A 
 boat is maintained on the Nile, in which the mis- 
 sionaries live and itinerate. The figures in this depart- 
 ment are good — a church membership of 13,034, and 
 yearly additions of a thousand. In 19 15 the native 
 church contributed $42,931 for the salaries of African 
 pastors and the support of evangelistic and local church 
 work, not counting the support of educational and 
 medical work. There are 214 Sunday-schools, with 
 almost 17,000 pupils. 
 
50 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 Mr. George Innes, a Philadelphia business man, who 
 recently visited Cairo, sent this description of one of 
 the converts from Islam. It is prophetic of great 
 things to come. 
 
 "One of the strong preachers to this crowd is 
 Mikhail Monsoor. He was an Azhar graduate; sat 
 and rocked back and forth on the floor for twelve 
 years ; got his diploma and struck out. He hadn't seen 
 a Bible, but he did know the Koran, and with that 
 knowledge he started out to challenge Christianity. He 
 went to an Egyptian Christian preacher, a wise man, 
 wise with his Master's wisdom, who never enjoined 
 arguing, but always prayer and witnessing. He gave 
 Mikhail a Bible and bade him take it home, read it 
 and pray. Mikhail told me he read it, was interested 
 but not converted until he came to read of Christ's 
 life, and when he read that matchless and perfect life, 
 he saw for the first time his own imperfect life, and, 
 no longer a believer in Islam, became Christ's. He's 
 a powerful preacher. The teachers and students of 
 the Azhar flock to his meetings. Twenty of the sheiks 
 of the Azhar University were turned away to-night; 
 couldn't get in; no room. For years he has kept this 
 up, and the continued hammer is making great cracks 
 in the walls of Islam in Egypt and all the Moslem 
 world." 
 
 Perhaps no missionary leader is better known than 
 Dr. Samuel M. Zwemer, famous for his Arabian work, 
 his many books, and his eloquent addresses on the 
 missionary platform. Let us remember with gratitude 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 51 
 
 that Dr. Zwemer is now located at Cairo, where he is 
 chairman of the editorial committee of the Nile Mis- 
 sion Press. This extensive printing establishment and 
 Christian literature bureau is sending out an immense 
 quantity of leaflets and books calculated to win the 
 attention of Moslem readers. This agency should be 
 ranked with the school and the hospital in the solution 
 of Africans greatest religious problem. 
 
 Taking everything into consideration, we may say 
 Christianity has made a splendid new start in Egypt. 
 Side by side with the American workers, the Church 
 Missionary Society of England conducts a strong work 
 at Cairo and other centers in the medical, educational, 
 evangelistic, and publication fields. It has a force of 
 some twenty-five persons, among whom Canon W. H. 
 T. Gairdner is well known. Other English societies 
 at work are the Egypt General Mission and the North 
 Africa Mission. The vital New Testament type of 
 our religion is making itself felt up and down the 
 Nile in a way to give great encouragement. More than 
 that, the missionary enterprise in Egypt must become 
 a model for the other sections of the coast. 
 
 The Door With a Thousand Dents 
 
 There remains the vast area covered by Tripoli, 
 Tunis, Algeria, and Morocco. What has been done 
 to reach the 14,000,000 Moslems in these states? For 
 the most part the mission boards have fought shy of 
 this whole region. Mr. Freese, of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Board of Foreign Missions, is attempting a 
 
52 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 heroic work under trying conditions in Algeria and 
 Tunis; and the French Baptists have recently taken 
 hold at certain points. There are less than 200 mis- 
 sionaries, all told, in this section of Africa; but no 
 North African church has been formed and no sta- 
 tistics are given out. Practically we may regard it as 
 an unoccupied field, a challenge not taken up by the 
 church. 
 
 There is one bright spot, however, which we are 
 thankful to mention. On one of the narrow, dark 
 streets in Algiers is a house whose front has been bat- 
 tered by many a stone. The door alone is said to con- 
 tain a thousand dents. This is the home of Miss Lilias 
 Trotter, a heroine, if God ever made one. Here she 
 lives and here she manages the work of the "Algerian 
 Band," an organization which she established in 1888, 
 and which she has supported by her own efforts, aided 
 by friends in England and America. The dents in 
 the door are the contributions of the natives, little 
 marks of attention which rabble mobs have bestowed 
 upon her. No wonder she calls her home her *'battle- 
 field." Her specialty is Arab boys, whom she gathers 
 into schools at Algiers and in some eight other places, 
 although, of course, she does not overlook the girls 
 and adult Moslems. 
 
 Miss Trotter is winning out. The stones do not fly 
 quite so frequently as of yore, neighbors are becom- 
 ing friendly, her children are growing up into fine men 
 and women, hopeful converts are being made. So she 
 works on with her little band of helpers, in the midst 
 
MOHAMMEDAN STRONGHOLDS 53 
 
 of the filth, disease, ignorance, bigotry, and violence 
 of the Algerian coast towns. She is a woman of 
 literary gifts, rare artistic ability, undaunted courage, 
 unlimited common sense, and a faith like an apostle's. 
 Miss Trotter was the favorite pupil of John Ruskin. 
 When she went to Africa, Ruskin remarked to a 
 friend, 'T have lost the one pupil I had of real talent. 
 She has decided to throw away her life teaching 
 Arabs." 
 
 Sobering Considerations 
 
 As we leave this section of the continent, let us re- 
 mind ourselves of the stupendousness of the task. This 
 is the stronghold of Mohammedanism. This is where 
 ancient Christianity made a frightful mess of things. 
 This is where modern, evangelical Christianity has 
 barely begun to work. We are not likely to overstate 
 the difficulties. Certainly the workers on the ground 
 are not. As President R. S. McClenahan, of Assiut 
 College, once put it, "We are asking the proudest man 
 in the world (the Moslem) to accept a religion which 
 he hates from a man whom he despises.'* We must 
 remember that, with rare exceptions, Moslems have 
 never been brought into contact with vital Christianity. 
 The Christianity which makes love its central truth 
 and motive is unknown to them. Their idea of the 
 religion which we offer is gained from the violence 
 of the crusaders, from the quarreling churches of 
 North Africa, from the decadent oriental churches of 
 to-day. What a difference there might have been to 
 
54 
 
 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 the world if Mohammed himself had ever come into 
 contact with one genuine Christian ! 
 
 Remember also the resisting power of Islam. Re- 
 member the dents in Miss Trotter's door. To this day 
 Morocco has the death penalty for those who are con- 
 verted from Islam to Christianity. With these things 
 in mind, think of yourself in the position of a North 
 African missionary. Can you imagine a more difficult 
 task? As a Christian, what is your attitude toward 
 this part of the world? What strategy on the part of 
 the churches do you advocate? The globe-trotter re- 
 turns from North Africa and nonchalantly remarks, 
 "Christianity will never take this stronghold of Islam." 
 Shall we accept his verdict? 
 
 " In tKe^"wiUe.rne;S3 ^liall 'vvate473 Lreak out 
 
 g^tlnt^^f^^/- and streams in i he^ cloge>rt ' 
 
MOHAMMEDANISM ON THE MARCH 
 
ALGERIAN BOYS 
 
Ill 
 
 MOHAMMEDANISM ON THE MARCH 
 
 The region lying immediately south of the Sahara, 
 some 700 miles wide, and stretching from the At- 
 lantic to the Red Sea, a distance of 4,000 miles, is 
 known as the Sudan. Since the Anglo-French agree- 
 ment of 1904, the eastern section is called the Egyp- 
 tian Sudan, the western section (apart from certain 
 maritime colonies) is known as the French Sudan. 
 This vast area, for the most part fertile and arable, 
 is inhabited by a large number of warlike tribes. The 
 population is placed by some authorities as high as 
 40,000,000. The name comes from an Arab word 
 meaning "the country of the blacks." We associate 
 this region with the uprisings of the Mahdi, who 
 claimed to be the second Mohammed, appointed by 
 Allah for the extermination of the infidels ; the exploits 
 of Emin Pasha, who was rescued in so dramatic a 
 fashion by Stanley; the tragic death of General Gor- 
 don; and with the brilliant military achievements 
 which brought Kitchener his fame. Of late the Sudan 
 has come into prominence in religious circles because 
 of the rapid advance of Mohammedanism. Through- 
 out this region in recent years Mohammedan "mis- 
 sionaries" have been exceedingly active, annexing tribe 
 
 57 
 
58 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 after tribe, until now by far the larger part of the 
 Sudan has been preempted for that faith. These 
 tribes might have been won to Christianity had our 
 missionaries been on hand to present the message. 
 But Christianity was conspicuously absent, while Islam 
 was on the ground in the persons of multitudes of 
 traders on fire with fanatic zeal. According to Mo- 
 hammedan ideas, every Moslem is a missionary. Be 
 he prince or slave, sailor or merchant, wherever he 
 goes he is expected to proclaim his religion. In Africa 
 as in no other part of the world the Moslem approaches 
 this lofty ideal. He is a missionary, not as one sent 
 out by a society or board, such as we have in Christian 
 lands, but as one impelled by zeal for the Prophet 
 of God. The fact that to-day the larger part of the 
 Sudan is Mohammedan ground attests the power of 
 a witnessing faith. 
 
 In the opinion of many missionary leaders the Mo- 
 hammedan advance in central Africa constitutes the 
 greatest crisis before the Christian churches to-day. 
 The World's Missionary Conference at Edinburgh, in 
 1910, after reviewing the situation in every land, called 
 particular attention to what is going on in the heart of 
 Africa. "The absorption of native races into Islam 
 is proceeding rapidly and continuously in practically 
 all parts of the continent." The conference at Luck- 
 now, India, called in 191 1 to consider exclusively 
 Moslem problems, issued definite suggestions for the 
 meeting of this crisis. A chain of mission stations 
 across Africa was proposed for the holding back of 
 
 \ 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 59 
 
 the Moslem advance, and the mission boards were 
 called upon to unite their efforts in such a movement. 
 Immediate, concerted action they considered essential 
 if the situation is to be saved. Other authorities might 
 be quoted, all urging the critical nature of this Mo- 
 hammedan drive. The Rev. William J. W. Roome, 
 writing in The International Review of Missions,^ 
 maintains that the whole strategy of missions in Africa 
 should be viewed in relation to Islam. In this chapter 
 we are to study the facts of the case, inquire into the 
 causes, and consider certain remedies. 
 
 The Mohammedan Hinterland 
 
 We are to remember that Islam in Africa has al- 
 ways had its hinterland. Hardly had the Arabs estab- 
 lished themselves in the coast region before they be- 
 gan pushing into the interior. In the Sahara they 
 naturally found themselves much at home, and being 
 born traders they were not slow to press into the popu- 
 lated sections and annex the people, possibly 800,000 
 of them, to their religion and their civilization. They 
 appear to have introduced the camel into this region; 
 at any rate, they soon opened up caravan routes from 
 the interior to the various coast cities and made large 
 use of the Nile for reaching the eastern Sudan. When 
 the Portuguese navigators explored the east coast in 
 the fifteenth century, they found rich Arab cities along 
 the coast as far south as Sofala, near the mouths 
 
 ^W. J. W. Roome, "Strategic Lines of Christian Missions in 
 Africa," The International Review of Missions, July, 19 16. 
 
6o THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 of the Zambezi. These coast cities were undoubtedly 
 built by immigrants from across the Red Sea. A 
 century earlier the Arabs had crossed the Sudan and 
 had established themselves in Kordofan, Darfur, 
 Wadai, and other states. From all these centers they 
 carried on an extensive trade in the twin industries, 
 ivory and slaves, which everywhere have brought such 
 wo to the Africans. 
 
 In the western Sudan the Moslems seem to have 
 made their impression even before they were estab- 
 lished in the east. On the upper waters of the Niger 
 there was a remarkable tribe, with a long line of kings, 
 and maintaining a capital, known as the Songhai. This 
 tribe was converted to Islam about loio. The Song- 
 hai, in turn, converted the great Fula tribe, which oc- 
 cupied the region south of Timbuktu. This was in the 
 twelfth or thirteenth century. The Songhai also won 
 over the Mandingos of Senegambia on the west coast. 
 The Fulas, becoming aggressive, invaded the region 
 to the east of the Niger, subduing and converting the 
 Hausa people, who, as traders, are a mighty factor in 
 spreading Islam to-day. So it went on, until Moham- 
 medanism dominated not less than one third of the 
 people of the continent. All this happened from 900 
 to 300 years ago. At the very time when the crusaders 
 of Europe were endeavoring to wrest the original seats 
 of Christianity from the Moslems, the Moslems were 
 quietly taking possession of the Sudan. Writers and 
 speakers who dwell upon the peril of Islam in Africa 
 often overlook this history of unchecked conquest, 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 6i 
 
 which runs back so many centuries. Islam is no new 
 thing to the tribes north of the Congo. 
 
 The New Advance 
 
 The startHng thing in the situation is the new re- 
 ligious impetus which has come to the Arabs and to 
 the converted tribes, as the result of modern condi- 
 tions. Having remained quiescent for some three cen- 
 turies, the hosts of Islam once more are on the march. 
 The remaining sections Ox the Sudan are being won 
 over, tribe by tribe, and Mohammedan missionaries 
 are pressing southward into the Congo country and 
 along the two coasts. Nigeria, one of the richest and 
 most populous sections of the continent, is now two- 
 thirds Mohammedan. The Swahili, the dominant 
 tribe in British East Africa, are becoming Mohamme- 
 dan. The Swahili, being the artisans of East Africa, 
 are in great demand in the interior. They carry their 
 religion wherever they go. In German East Africa 
 one sixth of the population has recently become Mo- 
 hammedan. Even in Nyasaland, below German East, 
 not less than 50,000 natives have lately been converted 
 to Islam. To make matters worse we are learning 
 now of Christian villages in west Africa which, under 
 the pressure of Mohammedan neighbors, have deserted 
 Christ and gone over to the rival faith. 
 
 Until the facts were made known at the Edinburgh 
 Conference, Christian people had no idea of this new 
 Mohammedan peril. They are beginning now to real- 
 ize that all central Africa is threatened, that this is 
 
62 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 not a matter of the neglect of the church five hundred 
 years ago, but of the neglect of the church to-day. 
 The missionary movement of the church had not begun 
 or even been dreamed of when Islam won her initial 
 victories in the Sudan ; but this new advance finds the 
 churches supposedly girded for the task of winning 
 the world. Surely we must move quickly if we are 
 to save the situation in central Africa. 
 
 How Islam Gets Its Chance 
 
 I have spoken of modern conditions as favoring the 
 new aggression of Mohammedanism. What are these 
 conditions? Strange as it may seem, the suppression 
 of the African slave trade has proved to be a prominent 
 factor in the process. It is one of the paradoxes of 
 history that the putting down of the traffic in slaves 
 has worked for the spread of the religion in which 
 slavery is openly inculcated and practised. What 
 would Livingstone say, were he alive to-day, to see the 
 very Arab traders he labored so hard to suppress be- 
 come the religious teachers of his beloved African 
 tribes? Would he regret what he had done? Surely 
 not. He would probably say: "One reform at a 
 time. I devoted my life to the putting down of the 
 great evil of slavery. Other evils have now arisen. It 
 is for you to attend to these." 
 
 What happened was this. The Arab traders, driven 
 from their nefarious traffic, turned to general trade as 
 a substitute. They became importers of guns, gun- 
 powder, cloth, tools, anything the African desired, re- 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 63 
 
 ceiving ivory, rubber, ostrich feathers, and other prod- 
 ucts in exchange. This required a reversal of attitude 
 on their part toward the natives. Since mutual trust is 
 the basis of commerce, the proud Arab sought the 
 friendship of the humble African. He became very 
 condescending. He v^as anxious to receive the de- 
 spised natives into the fellowship of his world-con- 
 quering religion. "Let us be brothers. We have 
 much to offer you. We can protect you from your 
 enemies; we can give you standing among the great 
 people of the earth; we can teach you the faith of the 
 one true God." Behold the slave-driver become a 
 missionary! Can we wonder that such arguments 
 proved enticing to many a native king? Moreover, 
 the Arab has not failed to keep his word. He actually 
 receives his black brother into his tent, he shares with 
 him his faith and his civilization. He is not troubled 
 with race prejudice. He is a true friend so long ar 
 the African gives him the monopoly of friendship 
 and the privilege of trade which goes therewith. 
 Other higher motives will appear as we proceed; but 
 bear in mind that the economic factor has a prominent 
 place in this strange situation. 
 
 A prime factor in the Mohammedan advance is the 
 attitude of the European governments which now con- 
 trol the Sudan. The battle of Omdurman, in 1898, 
 in which Lord Kitchener shattered the power of the 
 Khalifa, the successor of the Mahdi, marks the begin- 
 ning of British rule over the Egyptian Sudan. A few 
 years later Great Britain and France came to an agree- 
 
64 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ment by which the latter country should have undis- 
 puted sway over the western section of the Sudan. 
 Since then, England and France, working in close ac- 
 cord, have maintained law and order throughout this 
 vast territory. Tribal wars, which had hitherto 
 abounded, were now suppressed, and freedom of travel 
 and trade assured. This highly desirable end, how- 
 ever, deprived the pagan chiefs of their one protection 
 against the aggression of the Mohammedan rulers. 
 What the Moslem chiefs had not been able to achieve 
 by the power of the sword, they now began to accom- 
 plish by peaceful penetration. 
 
 Had England and France stopped at this point, no 
 just complaint could be made; but unfortunately they 
 went a step farther and practically became patrons of 
 the Mohammedan faith. Christian missionaries are 
 at liberty to settle and work among the heathen tribes, 
 and in certain large centers, like Khartum, but in 
 areas which the government has designated as Moslem, 
 Christian activity is forbidden. 
 
 This amazing attitude on the part of two powers 
 which in other parts of the world have done so much 
 to promote Christian civilization, is defended on 
 the ground that it will not do to arouse the fanaticism 
 of the Moslem chiefs, without whose friendly help 
 it would be impossible to maintain peace in that far- 
 off section of the world. It is the familiar argument 
 of political expediency. That the problem of govern- 
 ing colonies in the interior of a continent like Africa 
 is an exceedingly difficult one must be recognized. 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 65 
 
 Moreover, we must admit that Great Britain and 
 France have received the reward of their poHcy in 
 the loyalty of the Mohammedan tribes during the 
 European War, when a revolution in the Sudan would 
 have been an exceedingly embarrassing circumstance. 
 None the less must we deprecate carrying the policy 
 of sympathy and toleration to the point where the im- 
 pression is given that the governing powers actually 
 favor the Mohammedan religion. As it is, the Koran 
 is taught by Moslems in the government schools 
 throughout the Sudan, while Gordon College, a state 
 institution at Khartum, where "Christian Gordon" laid 
 down his life, is to-day practically a Mohammedan in- 
 stitution. The Koran is taught ; the Bible is excluded. 
 Even Turkey, Mohammedan to the core, tolerates 
 Christian institutions and the use of the Bible in the 
 schools. But in the Sudan we have the spectacle of 
 Christian England and France refusing sanction to 
 Christian people for the extension of their own faith. 
 
 In Northern Nigeria the British authorities state 
 that the present restrictive policy toward Christian 
 missions will be removed when railroads and other de- 
 velopments make possible the better protection of mis- 
 sionaries and other white settlers. This suggests a 
 phase of the problem which in fairness we must not 
 overlook. Certainly we welcome the indication that 
 Christianity is to have a free hand and a fair chance 
 some of these days. 
 
 The present policy of England and France is the 
 more indefensible in that it runs counter to experience 
 
66 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 in other parts of the world. In the most fanatical 
 lands, like Arabia, Turkey, and northwest India, medi- 
 cal missions have been allowed and have won the favor 
 of the people. Should Christian physicians withdraw 
 from these lands the Moslems themselves would rise 
 up and protest. It would seem that only in the Sudan 
 must Mohammedans be protected against hospitals and 
 other institutions which render service in the name of 
 Christ. 
 
 It is frequently stated that the head and center of 
 the Mohammedan advance is the El Azhar University 
 in Cairo, to which allusion has already been made. 
 Tourists who see the thousands of youths undergoing 
 training in this famous mosque are informed that one 
 of the main objects of the school is the capturing of 
 the continent of Africa for Islam. It is explained that 
 the Moslem powers^ being now practically excluded 
 from Europe and making little headway in Asia, are 
 turning to Africa, which they claim as their peculiar 
 field. The best information does not bear out this 
 contention. It is doubtful if any of the El Azhar 
 graduates go as missionaries to central Africa. Their 
 ambition lies in the direction of the great mosques 
 of Mohammedan countries. Nor is there evidence that 
 from this institution or other Islamic centers is there 
 an organized movement for the conquest of Africa= 
 
 Yet we may say one section of the Mohammedan 
 world is, in a sense, organized for the propagation of 
 the faith, and especially for the winning of Africa. 
 Not a little has been heard in recent years of the 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 67 
 
 Senussi of North Africa, and especially of their ac- 
 tivity against the French and Italians during the Great 
 War. One hardly knows whether to speak of them as 
 a tribe or as a brotherhood. They appear to be the 
 strongest of the more than one hundred orders of 
 Islam. Founded by the Arab sheik, Senussi, in 1835, 
 they have withdrawn to strongholds in the desert 
 wastes of Tripoli and Algeria, where they defy all 
 control. They exist for the spread of Islam and re- 
 fuse all Christian contacts. It is interesting to find 
 that they are bitterly opposed to the Turks, whom they 
 consider to be usurpers. The order is strongly puritan 
 in its tendencies, prohibiting music, singing, dancing, 
 smoking, and coffee-drinking. It has a rule that no 
 member shall live in a country governed by a non- 
 Mohammedan power. The present sheik is a remark- 
 able man, and it is in his direction that we must look 
 for the explanation of some things which have been 
 happening of late in the Sudan. 
 
 JVhy the Mohammedan Missionary Wins 
 
 In addition to the general considerations adduced 
 above there are certain special reasons why the Moslem 
 advance is making such rapid progress. First of all 
 is the simplicity of the Mohammedan creed : "La- 
 ilaha-illa-'llahu ; Muhammadu-Rasulu-'allah" (There 
 is no god but God; Mohammed is the apostle of God). 
 Five times a day, wherever Islam goes, the muezzin 
 summons the faithful to prayer in words substantially 
 similar to the creed. The fundamentals of this re- 
 
68 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ligion are few and they are ingrained in the soul of 
 every disciple. It is an easy faith to understand, an 
 exceedingly easy one to pass along. Reduced to its 
 lowest terms the Mohammedan message is this : *'We 
 have the one true God; the one true prophet; the one 
 true book; the one true brotherhood." 
 
 Consider also the passion in which this faith is held. 
 Easy-going Westerners, who hold their religion lightly, 
 have little conception of the intensity of the Moham- 
 medan's belief. He knows he is right, and he preaches 
 his doctrine with a passion and a dogmatism which 
 is well-nigh compelling to the African mind. We read 
 of Kitchener's victory over the Mahdi at Omdurman, 
 but we forgot that ten thousand bodies of Moslem 
 "martyrs" were left on that battlefield as a witness 
 to their faith in Islam. Dr. John R. Mott tells how 
 he once asked a little girl in Egypt if she were a Mo- 
 hammedan. "Yes," she replied, "thank God, I am a 
 Mohammedan." 
 
 We are to consider, also, that this religion of the 
 desert appeals to the African because it comes from a 
 man like himself. The Mohammedan missionary 
 reaches him on his own level; he is one of his own 
 sort, not unlike him greatly in color; much closer so- 
 cially than the white-faced stranger from over the 
 seas. Dr. Blyden, a Baptist missionary, gives the fol- 
 lowing illuminating description of how Mohammedan 
 missionaries in the Sudan gain their foothold : 
 
 "On a certain day the inhabitants of the town ob- 
 served a man, black like themselves, but clad in a 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 69 
 
 white garment, advancing down the main street. Sud- 
 denly the stranger prostrated himself and prayed to 
 Allah. The natives stoned him and he departed. In 
 a little while he returned and prostrated himself as 
 before. This time he was not stoned, but the men 
 gathered about him with mockery and reviling. The 
 men spat upon him and the women hurled insults and 
 abuse. His prayer ended, the stranger went away in 
 silence, grave and austere, seemingly oblivious to his 
 unsympathetic surroundings. For a space he did not 
 renew his visit, and in the interval the people began 
 to regret their rudeness. The demeanor of the stranger 
 under trying circumstances had gained their respect. 
 A third time he came, and with him two boys, also 
 clothed in w^hite garments. Together they knelt 
 and offered prayer. The natives watched and forbore 
 to jeer. At the conclusion of the prayer a woman 
 came timidly forw^ard and pushed her young son 
 toward the holy man, then as rapidly retreated. The 
 Moslem arose, took the boy by the hand, and, followed 
 by his acolytes, left the village in silence as before. 
 When he came again he was accompanied by three 
 boys, two of them those who had been with him before, 
 the third the woman's boy, clad like the rest. All 
 four fell upon their knees, the holy man reciting the 
 prayer in a voice that spoke of triumph and success. 
 He never left the town again, for the people crowded 
 round him, beseeching him to teach their children. In 
 a short time the entire population of that town, which 
 for three centuries had beaten back the assaults of 
 
70 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 would-be Moslem converters by the sword, had volun- 
 tarily embraced Islam !" 
 
 Add now, as a clinching consideration, the fact of 
 certain obvious advantages in the acceptance of Islam. 
 It offers at once to the African tribe political stability, 
 association with other organized peoples, commercial 
 activity, and a measure of civilization. To the indi- 
 vidual African, should he attend a government school, 
 the new faith becomes a passport to government em- 
 ployment. In certain sections only Mohammedans are 
 hired by the powers that be. 
 
 With so many advantages in his favor can we 
 wonder that the Mohammedan missionary is winning 
 his way? The wonder would seem to be that Chris- 
 tianity has any chance whatever in these regions. 
 
 Is Mohammedanism a Step Tozvards Christianity ? 
 
 I was once addressing a convention of American 
 negroes on the perils of Islam in Africa, when one of 
 their prominent bishops took me aside and informed 
 me that he considered it a distinct advantage for his 
 people in Africa to be Islamized, since in that way 
 they would become prepared for Christianity as the 
 final stage in their progress. This accords with the 
 view of some European officials who have labored in 
 Africa. Captain Orr, of Northern Nigeria, is quoted 
 as saying : ''Even if it be true that Islam lays a dead 
 hand on a people who have reached a certain standard 
 of civilization, it is impossible to deny its quickening 
 influence on African races in the backward state of 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 71 
 
 evolution. Among the pagan tribes of Northern 
 Nigeria it is making its converts every day, sweep- 
 ing away drunkenness, cannibalism, and fetishism; 
 mosques and markets spring into existence, and the 
 pagan loses his exclusiveness and learns to mingle with 
 his fellow men. To the negro, Islam is not sterile or 
 Hfeless. The dead hand is not for him." Mr. E. D. 
 Morel, whose books on the Congo atrocities have at- 
 tracted such attention, maintains that Africa will un- 
 doubtedly become a Mohammedan continent, and that 
 it is right and good that it should be so. 
 
 We must admit that Islam brings certain immediate 
 advantages to the people of tropical Africa. The 
 Mohammedan convert stands up straighter, he holds 
 his head in the air, he has attained self-respect, he has 
 put off certain disgusting practises, he has taken on a 
 certain degree of civilization, — not a few counts in 
 its favor. On the other hand, Mohammedanism is 
 Mohammedanism. It has had a history, and from that 
 history we know it has blighted the life of every na- 
 tion coming under its power. Until the story of 
 Morocco, of Algeria, of Arabia, of Turkey is wiped 
 out, the presumption will be strong against Islam's 
 becoming a blessing in the Sudan. The taint lies too 
 deep. Grant that it favors reverence, cleanliness, and 
 temperance; but how about sensuality, polygamy, the 
 suppression of womanhood ; the practise of magic ; the 
 darkening of the mind; the inculcation of hate; the 
 spirit of massacre? It is these offsetting evils that 
 have dragged down the population of every Moslem 
 
72 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 land, and they will always drag them down. Central 
 Africa will be no more of an exception than North 
 Africa has been. If the enlightenment of the mind 
 has anything to do with civilization, what hope is there 
 in Islam? Is it possible for a religion of darkness 
 to become a dispenser of light ? I once asked a Moslem 
 camel driver what, on the average, was the life-time 
 of the camel. He replied in surprise, *'How should I 
 know? Allah alone knows such things. When Allah 
 wants to take a camel, he takes him. Why should I 
 inquire?" There you have the Moslem mind in a 
 typical attitude. To the Christian, what God knows 
 he seeks to have his children know and understand. 
 He is a self-revealing deity. His wisdom is a challenge 
 to our highest faculties and endeavors. To the Mos- 
 lem it is the other way. Because God knows we must 
 not know. Legitimate inquiry is ruled out ; the motive 
 for education is suppressed. 
 
 But theory aside, the facts are against the conten- 
 tion that Islam is a half-way house toward Chris- 
 tianity. Prof. Starr of the University of Chicago, 
 who has traveled extensively in West Africa, even 
 denies the material advantages which come with the 
 adoption of the new faith. He says the Mohammedan 
 towns are no better than the pagan towns, and that 
 the apparent superiority of certain tribes who have 
 embraced Islam is due not to their religion but to their 
 inherent racial qualities. However that may be, it is 
 a settled thing that Islam invariably works for the 
 degradation of African womanhood. The women of 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 73 
 
 the African harems are actually in worse plight than 
 when they were in their heathen state. It is demon- 
 strated also that after a few years the native mind be- 
 comes set in the Mohammedan mold, so that it is vastly 
 harder to win him to Christianity than before he 
 dropped his pagan ways. If Christianity is the goal, 
 then conversion to Islam is a step downward, not up- 
 ward. It is doubtful if an instance can be cited where 
 Islam has led to the higher faith. Any number of 
 instances can be cited where it has worked in the op- 
 posite direction. 
 
 Back of all these considerations is the fact, which 
 we must not blink, that Mohammedanism is by its very 
 essence antichristian. It seeks to blot out Christianity, 
 not to promote it. If we believe that Christ is the 
 hope of the race and that his civilization is to prevail 
 everywhere, then we cannot be too forward in our 
 effort to save the African tribes, not only from pagan- 
 ism, but also from the impending spread of this rival 
 faith. "Those who have found in Christ the secret 
 of comfort, strength, and moral victory, cannot with- 
 hold the knowledge of him from the peoples of Africa 
 at a time when they are exposed to new and grave 
 dangers to their moral health and social well-being. 
 The fact that paganism is doomed and must almost in- 
 evitably give place within the next few decades either 
 to Islam or Christianity makes the task which Provi- 
 dence has laid on our generation of peculiar responsi- 
 bility and urgency." These words from the Rev. J. H. 
 Oldham, secretarv of the Continuation Committee of 
 
74 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 the Edinburgh Conference, would seem to close the 
 debate. 
 
 How Christianity Has Met the Challenge 
 
 The Mohammedan problem in Africa may best be 
 considered in connection with two zones of influence. 
 The first zone comprises the North African states, 
 where the situation has been set forth in a former 
 chapter. This may be called the zone of Moham- 
 medan consolidation, since throughout the coast strip 
 Islam has been in control from the days of the con- 
 quest in the seventh century. The southern boundary 
 in general follows the line of political division as found 
 on the maps. To the south lies the zone of Moham- 
 medan advance. Here it is not so easy to mark out 
 boundaries. Roughly speaking, we may say the 
 southern line begins on the west coast at the tenth 
 degree of north latitude and runs across the continent, 
 trending southward until it crosses the equator and 
 reaches the Indian Ocean at the north border of Ger- 
 man East. There are pagan tribes north of this line 
 and Mohammedan tribes or portions of tribes to the 
 south, especially along the east coast; but this division 
 serves our purpose for a general view. The zone as 
 thus defined includes the Mohammedan hinterland and 
 also the sections into which Islam has pushed in recent 
 years. 
 
 All mission boards working within this second zone, 
 or in proximity to its southern border, are either en- 
 gaged in stemming the Mohammedan tide or acting 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 75 
 
 as buffers for the rest of the continent. Throughout 
 this region a twofold purpose is in view : to win the 
 pagan population to Christianity, and to hold back the 
 Mohammedan advance. 
 
 The Foreign Missionary Society of the United 
 Brethren in Christ, after sixty-two years of valiant 
 work in Sierra Leone, now finds itself in the forefront 
 of this struggle with Mohammedanism for the mastery 
 of the pagan tribes. The propaganda they encounter 
 is not that of the simple, sincere believer in Islam, but 
 of the unscrupulous official of the mosque, whose in- 
 struments are intrigue, lying, and intimidation. The 
 high-handed methods of these men keep the native 
 chiefs in such a state of terror that some are inclined 
 to profess conversion as a means of safety. The work 
 of this board is well established, with Freetown as a 
 base, and with lines running into the far interior. At 
 Rotifunk five of their missionaries suffered martyrdom 
 in 1898. At this station to-day is located a remark- 
 able missionary in the person of Dr. Zenora Griggs, 
 who treats 8,000 cases a year in her dispensary. Secre- 
 tary Hough aptly describes her as "a little woman 
 doing a big work." This board conducts one of the 
 best schools on the west coast in Albert Academy, at 
 Freetown. In all, twenty-four missionaries are main- 
 tained on the field. The founder of the mission, the 
 Rev. W. J. Shuey, who went out in 1855, is still living. 
 Three quarters of the people of Sierra Leone are now 
 Mohammedan. The Mohammedan population of Free- 
 town has increased fifty per cent, in ten years. 
 
76 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 All the societies located on the Guinea coast and as 
 far north as Senegal are, in a sense, involved in this 
 struggle. The American societies concerned are the 
 Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the 
 Protestant Episcopal Church, the Board of Foreign 
 Missions of the General Synod of the Evangelical 
 Lutheran Church, and the Foreign Mission Board of 
 the Southern Baptist Convention. The Episcopalians 
 have been working in Liberia since 1835, the initial 
 undertaking being in behalf of freed slaves, colonized 
 from America. Bishop Ferguson (colored), who was 
 consecrated in 1885, and who has recently died, broad- 
 ened the work so that it has vital bearings upon the 
 one million native people in the interior, many of whom 
 are being won to Mohammedanism. The bishop left be- 
 hind a remarkable record for fidelity and industry. His 
 specialty was raising up an African clergy, but he also 
 conducted forty-five excellent schools scattered along 
 the coast. 
 
 The Muhlenberg Mission of the Lutheran General 
 Synod began work in Liberia in i860, in behalf of 
 natives from the Congo region who were taken from 
 a slave ship. The Rev. Morris Officer gathered forty of 
 the children into a school which continues to this day 
 and is doing excellent work. There is a girls' board- 
 ing institution at the coast and eight schools are con- 
 ducted in the interior. A prominent feature of the 
 work is a coffee plantation, which serves as a center 
 of industrial training. The Rev. David A. Day was 
 connected with the work for twenty-five years, until 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH jj 
 
 his death, and at one time he was chief of one of the 
 tribes. This mission is now turning toward the native 
 tribes, but along with all other agencies in Liberia, is 
 handicapped by the inefficiency of the government. 
 
 The Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board oc- 
 cupies a position of strategic importance in Southern 
 Nigeria among the Yoruba people, one of the virile 
 races of Africa. They occupy the gateway to the 
 Hausa states, where the struggle between Christianity 
 and Islam is focused. Working from four principal 
 centers, by means of a well-developed medical work, 
 industrial missions, and trained negro preachers, their 
 task is to win the Yoruba and fill them with a mis- 
 sionary zeal in behalf of the other tribes. A victory 
 at this point is vital to success throughout the con- 
 tinent. 
 
 The center of this mighty struggle is Northern 
 Nigeria, where the Fula and Hausa tribes are en- 
 trenched, actively engaged in the Mohammedan propa- 
 ganda. Here our chief reliance has been the Church 
 Missionary Society of England. This is the work 
 made famous by Samuel A. Crowther, "the Black 
 Bishop," he being the first African to be consecrated 
 to that office. There are now in the Niger Mission 
 four bishops, three of them native. The work of the 
 Niger delta is one of the noteworthy achievements of 
 modern missions. In Northern Nigeria they have 
 seven stations well placed in pagan communities. Re- 
 cently they have been allowed to build a hospital in 
 Zaria, a Hausa center, the Mohammedan emir and 
 
78 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 the British governor consenting. Captain Orr speaks 
 of this new venture as productive of good results. We 
 may well be thankful that a great organization like the 
 Church Missionary Society is standing so nobly in the 
 breach. 
 
 On the extreme eastern edge of the Sudan again we 
 find the American United Presbyterians at work. Dol- 
 eib Hill on the upper Nile and Nasser, farther up the 
 Sobat, are their leading stations, where they are seek- 
 ing to win the important Shilluk tribe. Hospitals, 
 schools, preaching places, and industrial training are 
 the agencies upon which they depend. The natives are 
 of a savage character, and the country is infested with 
 wild beasts. These outposts of Christianity call for a 
 rugged and courageous type of missionary. The kill- 
 ing of Mr. Ralph W. Tidrick by a lion illustrates the 
 risks taken in the Sudan. A Shilluk village had com- 
 plained of the ravages of some lions which were in- 
 festing the neighborhood, and Mr. Tidrick took his 
 rifles and led a relief expedition. With a company of 
 natives, armed only with spears, he attacked a band 
 of lions, killing one and driving the others into the 
 tall grass. The grass was then set on fire and a huge 
 lion rose up to see where the fire was located. Mv. 
 Tidrick fired, and the lion dropped, but soon rose again 
 and was struck by a second bullet, after which he 
 did not appear. Shortly afterwards a second lion ap- 
 peared, and Mr. Tidrick dropped it also; but it, too, 
 bounded up a second time, and was hit again. With 
 the natives, Mr. Tidrick pushed into the grass. The 
 
PROPOSED LINES OF MISSION STATIONS 
 
 DPiriSflCAST 
 ATT2ICA 
 
 ^GCCnAN EAST 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 79 
 
 first lion was found stone-dead; the second was 
 wounded, but Mr. Tidrick, being suspicious, turned to 
 his gun-carrier for a particular rifle, and at that mo- 
 ment the huge beast w^as upon him. Before his helpers 
 could come to the rescue with their spears, the mis- 
 sionary was mauled beyond recovery. By a relay of 
 steamers, they managed to carry his mangled body to 
 the government hospital at Khartum, but fever set in, 
 and in a few^ days the brave soul took its flight. By 
 such acts as this the missionaries of the Sudan reveal 
 to the Africans how ready they are to serve them, even 
 to the laying down of life. 
 
 No account of Christian activities in the Sudan 
 would be complete without a reference to the excellent 
 work of the Sudan United Mission and Dr. H. K. W. 
 Kumm, its knight errant. This union organization 
 was effected in 1904 for the express purpose of check- 
 ing the Mohammedan advance. Its staff of fifty-eight 
 missionaries works from centers among seven tribes 
 in Northern Nigeria, and from one station on the 
 upper Nile. It is carrying on evangelistic, educational, 
 and medical activities and is translating the gospel into 
 several of the very numerous languages of these pagan 
 tribes. Between Numan, the easternmost station of 
 this society in Nigeria, and Melut on the Nile is a 
 stretch of country 1,500 miles wide, with not a mis- 
 sionary. Dr. Kumm states that thirty-five pagan tribes 
 live in this unoccupied field, each one an open door of 
 opportunity. 
 
 Dr. William J. W. Roome has recently taken a jour- 
 
8o THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ney across Africa through Egypt, the Anglo-Eg3^ptian 
 Sudan, and the Congo, for the purpose of investigating 
 the Mohammedan advance movement. He found that 
 there is grave danger of Islam capturing not only the 
 remaining tribes of the Sudan, but also those of the 
 Congo basin which have not been reached by Christian 
 missions. He urges that two lines of mission stations 
 should be established. The first line is practically the 
 one proposed at the Lucknow conference, running 
 from the upper Nile to Northern Nigeria, where it 
 will join the stations of the Church Missionary So- 
 ciety and the Sudan United Mission. The other line 
 connects the mission stations of the upper Nile with 
 those of the upper Congo and its tributaries. Here 
 a comparatively small gap is found, some 200 miles in 
 length; but if this should be filled it would form a wall 
 of Christian influence through the very heart of the 
 continent. Those who are interested in the strategy 
 of African missionary work should study Mr. Roome's 
 map with care. 
 
 In view of what has been disclosed in this chapter, 
 is it not plain that the Mohammedan advance in cen- 
 tral Africa constitutes one of the greatest, if not the 
 greatest issue before Christianity to-day? Bishop 
 Hartzell of the Methodist Episcopal Church says, *The 
 importance and greatness of this question to the Chris- 
 tian churches in America cannot be overestimated. It 
 represents the largest world missionary problem con- 
 fronting the whole church at the beginning of the 
 twentieth century. By common consent, the most im- 
 
ISLAM ON THE MARCH 8i 
 
 mediate and insistent duty of the churches of Christ 
 is to give the gospel to Africa's millions, thus saving 
 them from the Moslem faith and the continent for 
 Christ." 
 
 What Mohammedan Africa needs is a new crusade 
 — of love. In the middle ages the Christian nations 
 of Europe were possessed by the idea that they must 
 drive out the Moslems and recover the sacred seats of 
 their religion by the power of the sword. In this they 
 miserably failed, as they deserved to do. They under- 
 stood neither the spirit nor the power of Christ. If 
 we are to win to-day, it must be by an effort to help 
 the Moslems, not annihilate them, by a crusade of 
 good-will, appreciation, of sympathy, of friendly help, 
 in the name of Christ. Raymond Lull, the six-hun- 
 dredth anniversary of whose death we celebrated in 
 191 5, the first missionary to the Moslems, a man who 
 sealed his devotion by a martyr's death, said, "He 
 who loves not, lives not." It would not take a very 
 large army of persons, living and working in the spirit 
 of Lull, to win Africa's Moslems to Christ. 
 
STRONGHOLDS OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
IV 
 STRONGHOLDS OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
 If North Africa is the stronghold of Mohammedan- 
 ism, we may claim that South Africa is the stronghold 
 of Christianity. If the Sudan may be considered a 
 zone of Mohammedan advance, then, with equal pro- 
 priety, we may say that central Africa is a zone of 
 Christian advance. In this way the outstanding fea- 
 tures of the continent, religiously considered, can be 
 kept easily in mind. In no other part of the world 
 is the situation so clearly defined. The Zambezi River, 
 which in its lower course runs east and west, forms the 
 dividing line between central Africa and what is called 
 South Africa, or the "subcontinent.'' This line is ap- 
 proximately 15 degrees south latitude, which is also the 
 latitude of the northern boundary of the territory 
 designated, prior to the European War, as German 
 Southwest Africa. All south of this line we will call 
 the zone of Christian consolidation. All north, as 
 far as the Sudan, we will call the zone of Christian ad- 
 vance. Africa thus presents the spectacle of two 
 missionary armies advancing for the conquest of the 
 continent, the Mohammedan army from the north and 
 the Christian army from the south. These four zones 
 are useful, also, as indicating in a rough way the popu- 
 
 85 
 
86 
 
 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 >< 
 
 r*! 
 
 XOKC OF MOnAnplEDAN ADVA^Ct 
 
 ZONE/or CHClSriAN 
 ^DVAIMCtl 
 
 U-... 
 
 1. 
 
 Zone oFcnDoriAN 
 
 C0NSOHDAT1ON 
 
 ZONES OF MOHAMMEDAN AND CHRISTIAN PROGRESS 
 
 lation areas of Africa ; the Libyans and Arabs in zones 
 I and 2, the negroes in zones 2 and 3, and the Bantus 
 in zones 3 and 4. 
 
 There are those who fear that Mohammedanism 
 will spread throughout Africa, even down to the Cape 
 of Good Hope. They point out that settlements of 
 Moslems are to be found in Cape Town, and in the port 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 87 
 
 cities of the eastern coast, and that these groups are 
 growing stronger from year to year. I cannot share 
 in their apprehension. It is inconceivable to me that 
 Mohammedanism can penetrate below the Zambezi 
 River in sufficient force to affect the religious situation 
 in a serious way. Even if the churches should not 
 become aroused sufficiently to hold the advance in 
 the lake region and the Congo basin, the Christian 
 forces would seem to be sufficiently entrenched in 
 South Africa to assure, at least, that the native tribes 
 shall not become Mohammedan. Whether they be- 
 come Christian or not is another question. The Mos- 
 lems of the coast are not of the aggressive, fanatical 
 type; they are content to live and let live so long as 
 they are allowed freedom of trade. Not a few of them 
 are friendly toward their Christian neighbors. More- 
 over, South Africa is as much a white man's country 
 as the Sudan is a brown man's country. Settled by 
 the Dutch in 1652, and taken over through various 
 stages by the British and Germans, the subcontinent 
 is definitely organized on the European basis, with 
 Christianity well to the front. The struggle in South 
 Africa is clearly between Christianity and paganism. 
 
 The Natives and Their Religion 
 
 And what paganism! Recently a distinguished 
 American college president, who considers himself an 
 expert on ethnology, was addressing a body of Chris- 
 tian people in the city of Hartford. He pictured the 
 life of the native Africans in almost idyllic phrase- 
 
88 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ology. He deplored teaching them to wear clothes, 
 which gave them new diseases, especially the disease 
 of false shame, and cumbersome conventionalities. He 
 also deprecated leading them away from a religion 
 which was sufficient for their level of culture, and a 
 system of education which would separate them from 
 their primitive, simple, and innocent relations with 
 nature. A considerable tract of African territory 
 ought to be set apart where one or more of these tribes 
 should be left alone to live as they have always lived. 
 All this sounded very wise and plausible. But there 
 happened to be sitting in the audience President Wil- 
 liam Douglas Mackenzie of the Hartford Theological 
 Seminary, who was born in South Africa, his father 
 being the famous John Mackenzie of the London 
 Missionary Society. President Mackenzie, being called 
 upon to speak, thanked the lecturer for an entertain- 
 ing evening, and then proceeded to portray some of the 
 conditions of African life, which he had learned at 
 first hand, and which illumined considerably the state- 
 ments as to the simplicity, innocence, and universal 
 gentleness of the natives. The idea of setting apart a 
 tract for the perpetuation of native customs reminded 
 President Mackenzie of Cecil Rhodes' scheme for 
 maintaining a large section of Rhodesia for the preser- 
 vation of the wild animals of Africa. The coincidence 
 of ideas appealed to him as peculiarly amusing. The 
 impression which was left upon the audience by the 
 two speakers may be imagined. As one person who 
 was present put it, *T feel pretty sure that Dr. 
 
ZULU CHIEF AND HEADMEN 
 
 
 A SMELLER-OUT WOMAN 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 89 
 
 will probably not give that particular part of his lec- 
 ture again, or at any rate, that he will try to make sure 
 beforehand that no innocent 'native' African is in the 
 audience." 
 
 It is not stated just what customs President Mac- 
 kenzie cited in defense of his position, but for anyone 
 who has traveled in South Africa it is not difficult to 
 imagine. Possibly he referred to the practise of eat- 
 ing one's foe in order to obtain his bravery and 
 strength, or the custom of making "medicine" of parts 
 of the human body, the same being administered to 
 the young braves before they go into war. It was 
 this latter superstition which led to the Zulu uprising 
 in 1906, which spread terror throughout Natal, and 
 in which thousands of innocent natives perished. I re- 
 call seeing the very spot where a white man was 
 murdered in order to make ''war medicine," and how 
 gruesome were the details of the transaction. The 
 soles of the victim's feet were cut off, along with cer- 
 tain other parts of his body, and of these a decoction 
 was made which the witch-doctor sprinkled over the 
 Zulu warriors. The soldiers were assured that by this 
 means they would be immune to the white man's bul- 
 lets, and that the bullets, as soon as they struck, would 
 melt and run off like water. Not less than 3,000 Zulus 
 believed that word and, armed only with their short- 
 handled assagais, they charged the Maxim guns of 
 the British. A missionary showed me where their 
 bodies were left rotting in the sun. 
 
 Possibly President Mackenzie told of those evil 
 
90 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 geniuses of the South African tribes, the witch-doctor 
 and the smeller-out-woman, who used to spread terror 
 and death among the kraals, until they were sup- 
 pressed by the British government. It is interesting 
 to imagine what developments might occur in an area 
 set apart for the preservation of native life, with the 
 witch-doctor roaming at his own sweet will. More 
 likely there was reference to the lovely custom known 
 as lobolo, by which the girls are sold by their fathers 
 to husbands at so much per head. In the old days 
 the exchange was in cattle — twenty head for a likely 
 maid; now it is an equivalent sum of money. Under 
 this arrangement, universal in the South African 
 tribes, marriage is a commercial transaction, pure and 
 simple, and womanhood is rated as goods. The prac- 
 tise, we can understand, is popular with the fathers; 
 but, who in his senses would consider it an idyllic 
 state for the girls? Put yourself in the place of a 
 Zulu maid, sold, without consultation on her part, to 
 an old man who already has eight wives ! From lobolo 
 has sprung a brood of practises so revolting as to make 
 description undesirable. A condition of society in 
 which the mothers instruct their daughters in im- 
 morality can hardly be considered as a state of inno- 
 cence. 
 
 The South African tribes have a number of excel- 
 lent traits, which the missionaries seek not only to 
 preserve but to develop. Their respect for authority, 
 their unswerving loyalty, their bravery, their capacity 
 for devotion mark them as worthy subjects for Chris- 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 91 
 
 tian culture. Undoubtedly there are grave perils for 
 these children of nature in the advent of European 
 civilization; this will be made clear in the following 
 chapter. But let us not deceive ourselves as to the 
 moral and intellectual degradation of the South Afri- 
 can tribes, or as to the need of Christian sympathy and 
 help, if they are to be anything more than savages and 
 pagans. There are those who regard the condition of 
 certain tribes as beyond all hope; the early settlers, 
 as a rule, took this view; but, thank God, there are 
 others who find in these very conditions a sublime chal- 
 lenge to faith and devotion. As we proceed it will 
 become apparent that the optimistic view is not with- 
 out good historical foundation. 
 
 The Demonstration at Umvoti 
 
 In a trip which carried me through important sec- 
 tions of South Africa I was much favored in an early 
 experience which enabled me to estimate the possibili- 
 ties and values of the missionary work in practical 
 as well as spiritual ways. It was at Umvoti in Natal, 
 a station of the American Board of Commissioners 
 for Foreign Missions, where work had been carried 
 on for many years. A reception in my honor had been 
 arranged in the large stone church and, as I approached 
 the building, I was wondering what impression would 
 be made upon me by a Christian congregation after 
 the scenes of pagan degradation which I had witnessed 
 in other parts of the continent. Entering by the pulpit 
 door, with a missionary who was to act as my inter- 
 
92 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 preter, I found myself looking into the faces of an 
 African congregation which completely filled the 
 church. They were divided, the men to the left of 
 the center aisle, the women to the right. All were 
 neatly clothed, the men with trousers, coats, shirts, 
 collars, and even a few neckties; the women in well- 
 laundered calicoes and wearing sunbonnets of brilliant 
 hues. There was perfect decorum, as in an American 
 church; their faces indicated earnestness and intelli- 
 gence; the impression was of a congregation not only 
 civilized but educated and prosperous. To look upon 
 that throng was in itself a demonstration of the value 
 of missions. 
 
 Finally, my eyes dropped to the seats immediately 
 in front of the pulpit, and there I beheld a row of the 
 nakedest, the dirtiest, the most unutterable pagans I 
 had ever seen. They stretched from one wall to the 
 other, the men on the left, the women on the right. 
 The men were nude, save for a bunch of monkey-tails 
 hung at the loins and a headdress of feathers which 
 gave them a peculiarly weird appearance. Each man 
 carried a spear. The women — how can I make my 
 readers see those women ? About their shoulders they 
 wore a cloth which was saturated with red clay and 
 grease. Their hair was done up also in clay and 
 grease and hung in snake-like strings to the level of the 
 tip of the nose. Their wild eyes peered out from 
 among these strings like the eyes of a French poodle. 
 They were all of one color — skin, clothes, and hair. 
 They were of the earth, earthy. They looked as if 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 93 
 
 they had just been created by being pushed up through 
 the mud. I had seen many savages, but none hke these. 
 While I was wondering what brought these crea- 
 tures into this decent assembly, the native chief came 
 forward and made all clear. The chief was garbed 
 like a city gentleman, long black coat, starched shirt, 
 and all the paraphernalia of civilization, with not a 
 detail omitted, even to the necktie pin. He was a 
 Christian and a highly prosperous man, being the 
 owner of a sugar-cane plantation. It seems he had 
 set this scene for my special benefit. In his Zulu head 
 he had thought out a scheme by which this American 
 visitor should get an idea of what the missionaries 
 had been about. Turning to the row of heathen men 
 he commanded in a loud voice, "Stand up!"; and up 
 they got, spears in hand, a dangerous looking bunch. 
 Turning to the women, in a still louder voice he com- 
 manded, "Stand up !" ; and up they got. Then turning 
 to me he said, ''Mfundisi (teacher), take a good look 
 at these people." And I did; I took them all in — 
 through more than one of my senses. The chief con- 
 tinued : "These are heathen, as you see, just like the 
 wild beasts ; and, Mfundisi, we want you to know that 
 all of us people [he waved his arm impressively across 
 the congregation] were once like that, just like the 
 wild beasts, until Mr. and Mrs. Grout came among 
 us to live. And, Mfundisi, we want you to know what 
 a great change has come over us Zulus, and we want 
 you to know how grateful we are to those who sent 
 Mr. and Mrs. Grout and the other missionaries who 
 
94 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 have lived among us ; and, Mfundisi, when you go back 
 to your people over the seas, we want you to tell them 
 what a change has come over us and how grateful we 
 are." 
 
 Was there ever a better speech or demonstration 
 made in behalf of foreign missions? There was not 
 another word to be said or thought on the subject. It 
 was staring you in the face. In my response I said, 
 "Chief, if I could take you and this row of heathen 
 men and women with me to America, and could have 
 you visit our churches in New York, Boston, Chicago 
 and other places; and if I could have you make this 
 same speech, I would convert every last remaining un- 
 believer in foreign missions." 
 
 Beginnings 
 
 South Africa is full of just such evidences of the 
 gospel's power. They are written all over the land- 
 scape, and the evidence of this part of the continent 
 is of peculiar value because this was the place of be- 
 ginning; the experiment has gone on long enough to 
 warrant drawing some pretty sure conclusions. As 
 early as 1737, George Schmidt, the devoted Moravian 
 missionary, began work among the Hottentots of Cape 
 Colony, and before he retired under the compulsion 
 of the authorities, he demonstrated that this race, one 
 of the most degraded on earth, was susceptible to the 
 uplifting influences of the gospel. 
 
 In 1797 the London Missionary Society, founded 
 only four years before, sent three missionaries to work 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 95 
 
 among the Kafirs and Bushmen of Cape Colony. A 
 few years later they pushed northward beyond the 
 Orange River and established themselves among the 
 Griquas and the Bechuanas, where a great work was 
 to be performed. Four names should stand out in our 
 minds in connection with this mission : Robert Moffat, 
 one of the great names of missionary history, pos- 
 sibly the greatest missionary ever sent to Africa, who 
 settled among the Bechuanas at Kuruman, and under 
 whose leadership the moral life of the tribe underwent 
 a complete revolution; Mrs. Moffat, who, three years 
 before a church had been formed, wrote to a friend 
 in England who had asked what useful thing she could 
 send out, "Send a communion service, we shall need 
 it some day"; David Livingstone, who married Mary 
 Moffat, the daughter, and became the most famous of 
 modern explorers; and John Mackenzie, already re- 
 ferred to, who succeeded Moffat, was the first to urge 
 Great Britain to extend her protecting arm over the 
 vast region to the north, now known as Rhodesia, and 
 under whose influence the famous African king Khama 
 was nurtured in Christianity. What a list ! The lives 
 of these all should be known to the missionary student. 
 As early as 18 16, the English Wesleyans sent out 
 Barnabas Shaw, who settled in the Namaqua country, 
 not far from the mouth of the Orange River. On the 
 journey, Shaw fell in with a Namaqua chief who was 
 on his way to Cape Town, over 400 miles from his 
 kraal, to plead for a teacher who "could instruct them 
 in the great Word." No wonder the Namaquas re- 
 
96 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ceived the word gladly and that a great work sprang 
 up. From this point the Wesleyans spread until they 
 occupied many points throughout South Africa. They 
 now lead all the missions in the number of church- 
 members. 
 
 Add the fact that the United Free Church of Scot- 
 land began work at Lovedale in 1824, and that the 
 American Board sent its first missionaries to Natal 
 in 1835, ^^d it becomes clear what a relatively long 
 period of missionary endeavor we have in this part of 
 the continent, as the basis of any judgment we may 
 form. 
 
 Pioneer Experiences 
 
 There were many exciting experiences connected 
 with the lives of the South African pioneers. The 
 conditions which made the Boers one of the hardiest 
 races on the earth contributed to build missionary fiber 
 in this section. The distances were tremendous, when 
 we consider that all travel was by ox-wagons. When 
 Moffat went to Kuruman, he left Cape Town over 600 
 miles behind. Rivers like the Orange and Vaal, when 
 in high water, had to be crossed by means of rafts. 
 Livingstone and his bride, trekking north, nearly per- 
 ished in a desert experience, 
 
 Mid spectral lakes bemocking thirsty men, 
 And stalking pillars built of fiery sand. 
 
 The savages in those days were exceedingly savage, 
 and they kept on the warpath with painful assiduity 
 in their efforts to stave off the coming of the white 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 97 
 
 settlers. Zulu chiefs, like Chaka, Dingaan, and 
 Mosilikatse, laid waste large sections of the subcon- 
 tinent, destroying entire tribes and putting to death, 
 it is estimated, not less than 2,000,000 of the native 
 population. In the Kafir War nearly every white man 
 in a large district was murdered. 
 
 Then there were the wild beasts, especially lions, 
 leopards, crocodiles, and snakes. The prize snake 
 stories of the world come from this region. The 
 deadly imamha, eight to ten feet in length and as 
 large as a man's arm, took a fancy to living under the 
 floors of the missionaries' houses. Not infrequently 
 they would come into the houses and, lifting their 
 ugly heads four or five feet from the floor, would dis- 
 pute control. The rats would build nests in the 
 thatched roof, and the snakes would go up after the 
 rats, occasionally dropping down on the tables and 
 beds within, a habit which the lady missionaries re- 
 garded as particularly objectionable. 
 
 Lion stories galore are narrated. One of the best is 
 that of the Rev. Daniel Lindley, one of the American 
 Board pioneers in the Transvaal. On account of the 
 native uprising, he was obliged to pack his goods 
 and his family on a cart and trek through the veldt 
 to the coast at Natal. One day he was followed by 
 a band of four lions. Unwilling to fire a gun or build 
 a camp-fire for fear of revealing his whereabouts, he 
 was in a precarious position. Should the lions kill 
 his oxen at night, his escape would be impossible. This 
 is what he did. Outspanning in the late afternoon, 
 
98 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 he left the camp in charge of his wife, and taking the 
 Boer ox-whip, with its long lash, he went after the 
 lions. They were watching operations from the top 
 of a ridge; but when the missionary came along, crack- 
 ing his whip, they turned and walked solemnly away. 
 Lindley followed and, coming to the crest of the ridge, 
 was surprised to see the lions far away walking up the 
 ridge beyond. Still pursuing, he chased them over 
 that ridge, and when he arrived at the top he saw them 
 making slow progress toward a third rise of ground. 
 The next time he ran quickly to the top of the ridge 
 and, peering over without revealing himself, he saw 
 the lions running with the utmost speed toward the 
 next hill. He understood then that, so long as he was 
 in sight, those princely beasts, for the sake of preserv- 
 ing their dignity, would not proceed faster than a 
 walk; but the moment they had the hill between them 
 and that man with the whip, they would break into 
 a run. Needless to say, they did not return. 
 
 Great Successes 
 
 If one is looking for missionary demonstrations. 
 South Africa furnishes one of the best fields in the 
 world. Only three can be mentioned here. 
 
 In Basutoland we have an independent native state, 
 under British protection, completely surrounded by 
 the South African Union. Should the Basutos ever 
 come into the Union, it would be of their own free 
 will and accord. Moreover, we find this to be a state 
 of civilized, educated, prosperous, and, for the most 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 99 
 
 part, Christianized people. Here is one of the signal 
 successes of modern missions, and we are to attribute 
 it, under God, to the Paris Society for Evangelical 
 Missions. Many noble workers have conjoined to 
 bring about this result, among them the famous Coil- 
 lard of the Zambezi, the first part of whose career 
 was spent in Basutoland. The missionaries for many 
 years have been the honored counselors of the chiefs. 
 One of them was spoken of as "the uncrowned king 
 of the Basutos." The Paris Society has been much 
 favored by the fact that, under treaty, no white person 
 can settle in Basutoland without the consent of the 
 native government. Thus they have been free from 
 the evil-minded whites who have so hindered mission 
 work in other sections. Another favoring factor is 
 the willingness of other boards to keep out and leave 
 the field exclusively to this society. 
 
 The whole missionary world knows about Lovedale 
 in southeastern Cape Colony, and the wonderful in- 
 stitution built up by Dr. James Stewart. Stewart of 
 Lovedale is a biography which educational and es- 
 pecially industrial missionaries the world over regard 
 as a classic. The United Free Church of Scotland 
 in all parts of the world places emphasis upon educa- 
 tion in order that the native church may have trained, 
 efficient leaders. At Lovedale, under Stewart's di- 
 rection, education has developed strongly on the prac- 
 tical side. In addition to normal and ministerial 
 training, they lay stress on carpentry, masonry, wagon- 
 making, blacksmithing, and printing. In these ways 
 
loo THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 they endeavor to suit educational processes to the 
 special conditions of native life. Their graduates are 
 found throughout South Africa and are giving a good 
 account of themselves. Lovedale is the Hampton of 
 South Africa. 
 
 The American Board work among the Zulus in 
 Natal and Zululand is noteworthy because of the char- 
 acter of the people. The Zulus are the most aggres- 
 sive and warlike of the African tribes. Solidly built 
 and of more than average height, they are said to be 
 the finest piece of muscle on the face of the earth. 
 Their mentality is also beyond that of the average 
 tribe. Theologically we find them reaching the high- 
 est point in African heathenism. Their belief in 
 Unkulunkulu, ''the great, great One,'* approaches the 
 idea of a supreme being. Under their king, Chaka, 
 they conquered a large part of South Africa by means 
 of a series of wars which revealed an unusual capacity 
 for organization. Such was the warlike character of 
 these people that the early colonists laughed at the 
 efforts of the American missionaries. They said, 'Tt 
 is impossible to convert the Zulus." 
 
 What has been the outcome? In a visit to Natal 
 in 191 1, in connection with the seventy-fifth anni- 
 versary of this work, I asked a company of mis- 
 sionaries and Zulu pastors to meet me for an early 
 morning prayer-meeting at the grave of the first con- 
 vert from this race. She was an old blind woman 
 named Bhulosi, who came one day to Dr. Adams, 
 after he and his colleagues had labored eleven years 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS loi 
 
 without a single conversion, and said, "I choose God." 
 Near-by, so that it was shown in the same photograph, 
 was the grave of Dr. Adams himself. Standing on 
 this spot, I asked the pastors how many Zulu church- 
 members there are to-day. They replied, "Sixty 
 thousand, sir." "And how many adherents have you, 
 children and others who are practically Christians?" 
 They put their heads together and estimated there 
 were at least four adherents to each member. "That," 
 said I, "means 300,000 Christian Zulus to-day; and 
 here [pointing to the grave] is number one." It 
 seemed the most fitting thing possible to close that 
 service with the doxology. 
 
 Other societies have cooperated with the Americans 
 in bringing about this splendid result ; the outcome be- 
 longs to the church universal. In this work emphasis 
 has been placed upon Zulu leadership, both in evangel- 
 ism and education. Every male Zulu Christian is ex- 
 pected to preach, and some churches send out twenty 
 and thirty lay preachers every Sunday. The Zulu 
 churches are self-supporting. The British government, 
 seeing tjie value of the educational work, gives liberal 
 grants to the schools, in which some 5,000 children 
 and youth are gathered. The educational scheme 
 heads up at Amanzimtote, where the higher institu- 
 tions are located. Mrs. Mary K. Edwards, who went 
 to Natal in 1868 under the Woman's Board of Mis- 
 sions, of Boston, the first missionary to be sent by a 
 denominational woman's board in America, still lives 
 and is active at Inanda, where she has built up a 
 
102 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 boarding school for Zulu girls that is famed far and 
 wide. 
 
 The Unfinished Task 
 
 I have called South Africa the stronghold of Chris- 
 tianity; yet it would be a grave mistake to think of 
 our task there as completed. Take, as one example, 
 the Zulu work. The successes have been noteworthy ; 
 yet to-day three quarters of this great tribe are as 
 pagan as ever. They live in their hive-like huts, with 
 their superstitions and their pagan ways still upon 
 them. Polygamy is the accepted thing, loholo prevails 
 on every hand, and unspeakable immoralities abound. 
 A Herculean task remains if this tribe is to be saved. 
 There are blocks of heathenism in other sections of 
 South Africa which have not felt the touch of Chris- 
 tianity. This is particularly true of the "locations," 
 or reserves set apart by the government, where the 
 natives live under conditions scarcely better than 
 primitive paganism. 
 
 We are to remember, also, that the subcontinent 
 includes vast regions outside of the Union. Southern 
 Rhodesia is pioneer territory to-day. So far as the 
 conditions and character of the work are concerned, 
 Rhodesia should be classed with central Africa, rather 
 than with the subcontinent. What was formerly 
 German Southwest Africa covers an area one and one 
 half times that of the German Empire. Much of this 
 region is desert, but in the interior are many native 
 tribes offering missionary opportunity. The Rhenish 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 103 
 
 and the Finnish Missionary Societies have divided 
 this field between them; but even so, there are tribes 
 where no missionary work has been attempted. 
 
 On the opposite side of the continent is Portuguese 
 East Africa, a region of great fertiHty, with a coast- 
 line of 1,400 miles. One half of this territory, that 
 lying south of the Zambezi, is included in the South 
 African zone. Here is a native population of about 
 one million, for the most part unreached by Christian 
 influence. This great region, lying in abysmal dark- 
 ness, is the most important unoccupied area south of 
 the equator. Work in Portuguese East is rendered 
 difficult on account of the deadly climate, and, until 
 recently, by the hostility of the Portuguese govern- 
 ment. Since the republican regime began at Lisbon, 
 missions, under proper auspices and conditions, are al- 
 lowed, not only in the coast cities but also in the 
 interior. Portuguese East Africa to-day is one of the 
 great unanswered challenges of the pagan world. 
 
 Help From New Quarters 
 
 Beyond question, it belongs to the white churches 
 of the South Africa Union to fill up the gaps between 
 the mission boards of Europe and America. Certainly 
 the reaching of the natives in the "locations" should be 
 regarded as a home mission task. From early days the 
 Dutch Reformed Church of Cape Colony, which is -an 
 exceedingly strong organization, has taken a certain 
 amount of interest in the pagan tribes, and not a little 
 good work has been done. It deserves the more credit 
 
I04 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 because of the hostile attitude of the Boers who have 
 occupied the outlying regions, and whose notion is that 
 Christianity "spoils the natives." To-day Christendom 
 rejoices to learn that the missionary spirit is taking 
 possession of this important communion, as also of 
 the Wesleyans, Presbyterians, Anglicans, and other 
 churches of South Africa. Even the Boers are more 
 sympathetic in their attitude. By a strange provi- 
 dence, this new attitude on the part of the Boers arose 
 through the sending of Boer prisoners to India and 
 Ceylon at the time of the Boer War. Shut up in the 
 prison camps of these distant lands, in their homesick 
 condition they were visited by American missionaries, 
 and many of them were brought to Christ. At the 
 same time they came to see the value and beauty of 
 mission work. At the close of the war a goodly num- 
 ber of these converts returned to South Africa as 
 missionary volunteers, determined to do for the 
 negroes what the American missionaries had done for 
 the Hindus. Does the history of missions contain a 
 more romantic episode than this? I recall stumbling 
 upon a mission station occupied by one of these con- 
 verted Boer soldiers, when tramping through an ex- 
 ceedingly unhealthy section of Mashonaland in 
 Southern Rhodesia. It was interesting to find this 
 lonely man in that far-away spot, reading the reports 
 of the Edinburgh Conference. Some Boer volunteers 
 have pushed north of the Zambezi as far as the Nyasa 
 country. They should make good missionaries. 
 Christian people the world over have heard of 
 
CHRISTIAN STRONGHOLDS 105 
 
 Andrew Murray, who died in 191 7 at his home in 
 Wellington, South Africa, and have read his devo- 
 tional books. But how many know that Dr. Murray's 
 leading interest was the evangelization of the pagans 
 of his continent, and that his pet enterprise was the 
 South Africa General Mission? This union society 
 was founded in 1889. It has stations in Swaziland 
 and in other parts as far north as the Congo country. 
 It does not attempt to compete with the older boards 
 in the matter of settled educational work; but special- 
 izing upon evangelism, it is welcomed as a new agency 
 in a very needy part of the world. 
 
 Can the South African church become a missionary 
 force as her sister churches in Uganda and Cameroun 
 are coming to be? It might seem, after all these years, 
 that the black churches of Natal, Basutoland, and Cape 
 Colony should be sending out missionaries on their own 
 account to the unreached tribes of the interior. If they 
 have been something of a disappointment in this re- 
 spect, we must remember the repressive influences to 
 which they have been subjected by the European gov- 
 ernments, which, as a rule, do not wish them to 
 become aggressive. We must bear in mind, further- 
 more, that the modern missionary movement is Chris- 
 tianity at its noblest, the flowering out of Protestant- 
 ism after centuries of development. Should it be 
 an occasion of surprise if churches only one or two 
 generations out of paganism are not yet ready to pour 
 themselves out in this high service of love? To these 
 considerations we must add the fact that the gifts of 
 
io6 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 administration, which make for sound financial man- 
 agement and for wise direction of forces on the for- 
 eign field, are among the rarer things of life. Possibly 
 no enterprise calls for greater stability of character 
 and for a firmer grasp upon the principles underlying 
 administrative efficiency than the building of a Chris- 
 tian civilization in a pagan land. Some day, beyond 
 doubt, the rising churches of the Dark Continent will 
 assume a worthy share of the task of redeeming 
 Africa. When that time comes, South Africa may be 
 counted upon as a fresh base of supplies, a strong- 
 hold from which a new army of Christ will march for 
 the conquest of the regions beyond. 
 
AFRICA'S DEBIT AND CREDIT ACCOUNT 
 WITH CIVILIZATION 
 
V 
 
 AFRICA'S DEBIT AND CREDIT ACCOUNT 
 WITH CIVILIZATION 
 
 If you wish to obtain a correct idea of what Euro- 
 pean civiHzation means to Africa, a good way is to 
 push into the interior of some British colony and spend 
 a day with the magistrate. It is no hoHday jaunt. At 
 the head of a long line of sweating carriers, under 
 the blazing tropical sun, you tramp for days before 
 reaching the border of the district. When at last your 
 caravan swings into the government clearing you are 
 in a state of mind and body to admire the pluck of 
 the man who, even for the sake of ruling, is willing 
 to live in so remote a spot. 
 
 The first thing that strikes your attention is the bare- 
 ness of the grounds about the magistrate's residence. 
 You take early occasion to remark: "Why, in a fer- 
 tile region like this, don't you have some grass or at 
 least flowering shrubs and trees growing about your 
 house?" "Well, don't you see?" the magistrate re- 
 plies, "we couldn't exactly do that, on account of the 
 mosquitoes, these pesky Anopheles which hide under 
 the vegetation. It is rather bad around here in that 
 respect. All the white men catch the fever sooner 
 or later, and most of them have to get out. There were 
 
 109 
 
no THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 sixteen of us in the district last year; only eight are 
 left now. Three were ordered home; the others 
 waited a bit too long and 'black-water' got them. You 
 must have passed the carriers with the grave-stones, 
 as you came in — some very nice ones sent out from 
 home, they tell me." 
 
 The British flag flies from a rather crooked pole in 
 the center of the clearing, and down the hillside you 
 see the government house, where the court is held. It 
 is a simple affair — the magistrate in his immaculate 
 white cotton suit, sitting at a deal table, a clerk or 
 two, several native aides, a white policeman in khaki, 
 a group of black men waiting outside. The natives 
 come in, bend level with the ground, clap their hands 
 twice in token of respect, and state their case. Solo- 
 mon in all his glory never had more puzzling questions 
 to pass upon. Here is a father who cannot pay his 
 hut-tax; he will send his boy of fifteen to the white 
 settlement to earn the money. He asks for a permit 
 for the boy to leave the district. Decision: Request 
 refused — boy too young and untried ; temptations too 
 great. 
 
 "Next." Another father claps his hands; looks 
 anxiously to left and right. His daughter ran away 
 to live a wild life in a mining town. Will the magis- 
 trate bring her back ? Decision : A policeman is or- 
 dered to investigate and report. If true, case will be 
 taken up with magistrate of mining district. This 
 means a seventy-mile ride on horse-back for the police- 
 man ; but the father goes away satisfied. 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION iii 
 
 "Next." A most peculiar matter is brought to his 
 attention by a letter from a missionary. Nomusa mar- 
 ried a widower having several sons. Her husband 
 died. For several years she worked to support herself 
 and children, never failing also to give her share to 
 the local church. In time she became engaged to 
 marry again. But her eldest stepson, a boy in his 
 teens, is her owner, and he has been lost sight of 
 for several years and is not to be found. Yet he 
 it is who must agree on the number of cattle as 
 the marriage price of his mother! No relative can 
 be found to act in his place, it being feared that the 
 boy may return and take exception to the marriage 
 bargain. Hence, the wedding cannot take place. Will 
 the magistrate legalize the marriage? This he does, 
 by consenting to act as trustee for the stepson, author- 
 izing the marriage, and holding the dowry (money 
 in Heu of cattle). 
 
 So it runs all the morning. Mounted police arrive 
 to report upon the patrolling of wide areas; native 
 chiefs call to turn in the tax money they have col- 
 lected ; a village headman reports the ravages of lions ; 
 the telephone jingles from the far-away railroad 
 center, announcing the leaving of carriers with sup- 
 plies, or the departure of the weekly post. It is a busy 
 and highly useful life lived by this lonely Englishman 
 in the clearing. He is a chief and a father, and, we 
 are inclined to add, a missionary, all rolled into one. 
 Naturally there are some of a different stamp; but, 
 taking them all in all, they are a fine set of men. For 
 
112 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 one I say, "Hats off to the British magistrates in the 
 heart of Africa/* 
 
 We are going to take a square look at this matter 
 of European rule. It is a complicated problem, and 
 many things have been said on both sides; but there 
 can be no question as to the place of responsibility. 
 The responsibility lies at the door of the nations which 
 have deprived the Africans of their land. The 
 scramble for Africa, which began with the opening 
 up of the Congo basin by Stanley and the entering 
 in of Germany in 1884, came to an end with the 
 passing of Morocco to France in 1912. Of the black 
 man's Africa there remain now only Abyssinia on the 
 east and little Liberia on the west. War may change 
 the alignment of territory, and adjustments may be 
 made from time to time by treaty; but nothing points 
 to the return of the Africans into control in any part 
 of the continent. Europe is in possession and must 
 give an account of herself. 
 
 The question is not whether Europe had a right to 
 carve up Africa ; but, whether, having done so, Europe 
 has made a right use of her privileges. We will grant 
 as a general principle that it is for the good of the 
 world that large sections of the earth should not be 
 left in barbarism; that no race can be said to have a 
 right to territory which it is unable to use or which 
 it uses in such a way as to prove a detriment to man- 
 kind. It was in accordance with this principle that our 
 own continent was colonized by Europe in the seven- 
 teenth and eighteenth centuries and the Indians made 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 113 
 
 to give way. But, alongside of that principle, let us 
 insist upon another. In taking over the territory of 
 barbarians, civilized nations are bound to give proper 
 compensation; to make adequate provision for the 
 preservation of the native race ; and, in general, to rule 
 in such a way that the natives shall share in the 
 benefits of the new order. In a word, Europe has 
 no business in Africa unless it is for the good of the 
 Africans as well as for the good of Europeans. It 
 will help us to appraise the case for civilization if we 
 keep these two principles in mind. In this discussion 
 we shall use the word "civilization" in the sense in 
 which it is used by the men (and there are a good 
 many of them) who place civilization over against 
 mission work as of equal or greater benefit, also by 
 those who maintain that intellectual and practical cul- 
 ture should precede missionary effort, under the theory 
 that the African is incapable of appreciating Chris- 
 tianity, until he has been "civilized." The civilization 
 we are examining is the thing which the European 
 powers, unaided by the churches, are trying to do in 
 Africa — in a word, secular civilization. Let us take 
 up the credit items first. 
 
 The Benefits of Civilization 
 
 When David Livingstone journeyed from central 
 Africa to Cape Colony to wed Mary Moffat, he was 
 six months trekking back to the Zambezi River. The 
 traveler can make the same journey now on the "Zam- 
 bezi Express" in four days; and instead of encounter- 
 
114 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ing all sorts of perils and hardships, as did Livingstone 
 and his bride, he can recline in a sumptuous compart- 
 ment, have excellent meals served in a dining-car, en- 
 joy a good bed at night, refresh himself with a 
 shower-bath in the morning, and, in general, have 
 solid comfort along every mile of the way. I wonder 
 how many tourists who take this "train de luxe" for 
 the purpose of visiting the Victoria Falls stop to think 
 of how much they owe to the British government for 
 making possible this steel highway through the Afri- 
 can jungle. Think of the cost of throwing that arch 
 across the Zambezi gorge below the Falls! Yet that 
 is but one item in a colossal enterprise. 
 
 In the Sudan Great Britain has built 1,500 miles of 
 railway in fifteen years, not to mention the inaugura- 
 tion of 2,000 miles of steamboat service and the 
 stringing of 5,000 miles of telegraph wires. Germany, 
 before the war, planned to construct a transcontinental 
 line from her colony on the east to her colony on the 
 west. Already this line has reached Lake Tan- 
 ganyika from the east. France, not to be outdone, 
 would build a line from Tangier, opposite Gibraltar, 
 through Morocco, over the Atlas Mountains, across 
 the Sahara to Timbuktu on the Niger, where connec- 
 tions would be made with a steamboat and railroad 
 service to the west coast. An even more daring 
 French scheme is to build a railroad from Algeria to 
 Lake Chad, and thence eastward through the Sudan, 
 across the Nile, emerging at some point on the Indian 
 Ocean. A group of London financiers are building a 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 115 
 
 line from Benguela, in Portuguese West Africa, to 
 Katanga in the interior, where it will join the Cape- 
 to-Cairo system, and tap the immense copper deposits 
 of the upper Congo basin. This means 900 miles of 
 rail through the coast range and across the interior 
 plateau, with little revenue in sight until the last spike 
 is driven. The railroads of Africa are not all dreams. 
 Eight lines already penetrate the interior from the east 
 coast. The west boasts sixteen such lines. 
 
 With the railroads go government, law and order, 
 peace, agriculture, business enterprise, sanitation. 
 Take the Nile valley as an example. Mr. Powell, in 
 The Last Frontier, expresses the opinion that the 
 development of Egypt under Lord Cromer is the best 
 example of England's genius as a colonizing nation. 
 He begins his chapter on the Nile valley with these 
 words : "This is the story of how a handful of white 
 men jerked a nation out of the desert and the depths 
 of despair, as though by its collar, set it on its feet, 
 and taught it to play the game.''^ What Great Britain 
 has done for the Nile region by means of its railroads, 
 steamboat lines, the Assuan dam, irrigation schemes, 
 and, above all, through the administration of justice, 
 presumably she intends to do elsewhere. Read Captain 
 Orr's book on Nigeria, and you will see how a splen- 
 did beginning has been made in that colony.^ 
 
 The aboHshing of tribal wars in practically every 
 part of the continent is a tremendous gain. It is stated 
 
 * The Last Frontier, p. io8. 
 
 * C. W. J, Orr, The Making of Northern Nigeria. 
 
ii6 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 that not less than 6,000,000 natives perished in the 
 campaigns of the Mahdi and Khalifa. To-day peace 
 reigns in the Sudan. Kitchener was ten years building 
 his railroads and steamboats and gathering his army 
 before he commenced the Dongola campaign. He 
 settled the issue in the one battle of Omdurman. Since 
 then, under the administration of Sir Reginald Win- 
 gate, the Egyptian Sudan has settled down to raising 
 cotton and cattle, and is to-day not only a peaceful 
 but a prosperous state. South Africa, once ravaged 
 by the Zulu chiefs, now has a Bantu population dou- 
 bling every twenty-five or thirty years. The French and 
 Germans deserve similar credit within their spheres 
 of influence. 
 
 Law and order — how much we sum up under that 
 head in our own communities! By the use of a little 
 imagination we can understand what this may mean 
 in an African village. Protection of life, security of 
 property, a chance to work and save and build a happy 
 home, unmolested by one's neighbors or by a tyrant 
 chief — these are some of its fruits. Under this item 
 VvTC must include the putting down of certain revolting 
 and destructive native customs, such as slavery, canni- 
 balism, human sacrifices, the strangling of twin babies, 
 and the criminal activities of the witch-doctor. 
 
 An important consideration is the labor market 
 which has been opened in many parts of the continent. 
 The character of the African has suffered immeasur- 
 ably through the lack of a proper incentive to work. 
 Adolphe Cureau, in his exceedingly valuable book, 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 117 
 
 Savage Man in Central Africa, says, "what we are be- 
 ing continually told of the negro's idleness is sheer 
 slander. He is not in the least idle, but simply unem- 
 ployed.'" Samuel Johnson said, "Every man is as lazy 
 as he dares to be." With civilization there comes to 
 the African the needed stimulus and also a remunera- 
 tive opportunity. Throughout the colonies labor is in 
 demand and, as a rule, good wages are paid. 
 
 Here, too, we must take account of what the Euro- 
 pean governments are doing for education. Germany 
 has a particularly good record in this matter. In the 
 Cameroun and Togoland, under German control, the 
 school facilities surpassed those of the neighboring 
 British colony, Nigeria. The French and British gov- 
 ernments encourage education and make sizable appro- 
 priations for this purpose. Great Britain makes large 
 grants to mission schools and in certain colonies has 
 practically placed education under church control. A 
 university for natives has recently been established in 
 South Africa. 
 
 If the account stood at this point the showing for 
 Europe would be exceedingly creditable. But the evi- 
 dence is not all in. 
 
 What the Native Thinks About It 
 
 Strange to say, the native does not seem to appre- 
 ciate what is being done for him by his rulers. It is 
 not that he denies these things, but that certain other 
 things occupy his mind, and bulk much larger than the 
 * Adolphe Louis Cureau, Savage Man in Central Africa, p. 64. 
 
ii8 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 benefits of civilization. This is particularly true of 
 those aspects of civilization which infringe upon his 
 personal liberties. To begin with, the contemptuous 
 attitude of the white man is gall and wormwood to 
 his soul. He is a human being and he resents being 
 kicked around like a dog. In many parts of Africa 
 the sjambok (a large, thick whip made of rhinoceros 
 hide) is the badge of the white man, and this instru- 
 ment of torture and relic of slavery he uses with cruel 
 and contemptuous frequency. In some of the cities 
 the natives are not allowed on the sidewalk, and along 
 all the trails the natives flee in terror from the white 
 traveler or hide in the bushes until convinced that the 
 foreigner is a friend, not a foe. In every possible way 
 the African is made to feel his "inferiority." 
 
 Then there is the hut-tax. As a rule a tax of not less 
 than one pound is placed on each native hut. This seems 
 to him a tremendous sum, and in many instances such 
 is the case. That he resents the imposition only marks 
 him as human. The Zulu uprising in 1906 was caused 
 by the British government's adding a poll-tax to the 
 hut-tax. This was a cruel exaction, and the Zulu was 
 driven nearly wild with rage. His mind worked in 
 this way : "They have taxed my hut ; they have taxed 
 my cattle ; they have taxed everything I own ; and now 
 they are taxing my head. Well, let them take my head. 
 I am for war." 
 
 One day, when I was passing through Gazaland, 
 several native chiefs waited upon me with a long string 
 of requests, at the head of which was the plea that 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 119 
 
 I should pay their taxes, and if I was unwilling to do 
 this, that I should use my influence to have the taxes 
 remitted by the government. I saw this was rankling 
 in their breasts as a great injustice. They were sur- 
 prised enough to find that I had to pay a tax on my 
 own hut in the United States; and when I told them 
 how much I had to pay, they clapped their hands over 
 their mouths and exclaimed, *'Wow V 
 
 Another galling restriction under which the native 
 chafes is the limitation of travel. By all the tides of 
 his blood he is a hunter or a trader, yet, living in ''his 
 own land," he finds himself shut up in a district and 
 not allowed to pass its borders without a permit, se- 
 cured only with difficulty. It is bad enough to be con- 
 sidered merely a taxable commodity, but by this law he 
 feels himself a slave. And slave he is in those parts 
 of Africa where enforced labor prevails. It is true 
 the old slavery has gone, but often an industrial slav- 
 ery takes its place. 
 
 The case is stronger yet. It has been said that the 
 history of commerce may be traced by the weeds 
 which have grown up along its pathway. The history 
 of civilization in Africa may be traced by the diseases 
 which spring up in its track. The cattle pests, which 
 bear particularly hard upon the live stock of the na- 
 tives, were unknown and were restricted to certain 
 localities until the railroad and steamboat spread the 
 germs far and wide. The African accuses the white 
 man of bringing these things, and he names them over : 
 rinderpest, tick-fever, east-coast fever, each one a 
 
120 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 terrible indictment. The native stands gazing sadly 
 at his empty cattle kraal. The magistrate, passing by, 
 remarks, "Build a dipping-tank." The native replies, 
 "Give me back my herds." 
 
 To the cattle pests we must add certain human dis- 
 orders, like tuberculosis, smallpox, and the venereal 
 diseases to which the African is peculiarly susceptible, 
 and which have worked sad havoc. When the black 
 man brings in this accusation, what is the white man 
 to say ? 
 
 In South Africa the breaking down of tribal and 
 family restraints is a serious thing. Even the white 
 settlers are beginning to recognize this. Paganism 
 had its laws and its sanctions. Crude as these were, 
 they formed a certain basis for society; they were 
 vastly better than nothing. European law abolishes 
 these, but is unable to put anything effective in their 
 place. The result is that certain tribes are more im- 
 moral than before civilization came. 
 
 What shall we say of the unjust and cruel wars of 
 suppression in which every European power has en- 
 gaged, of punitive expeditions which have been little 
 better than massacres? How about the Congo atroci- 
 ties ? The things Europe has done under this category 
 are a disgrace to civilization. They will rankle for 
 generations in the African breast. 
 
 The land question in the South African Union is 
 so intricate that it can barely be mentioned; but the 
 intelligent African will put it well to the front. A 
 law has been passed making it a criminal offense to 
 
Copyright. Under\v<j.jd & Underwood. 
 
 NATIVES OX THE WAY TO EXECUTION FOR CANNIBALISM 
 
 CARRYING RUM INTO AFRICA 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 121 
 
 sell or transfer land to a native. The purpose is to 
 force the natives on to the ''locations/' or native reser- 
 vations, where paganism is rampant, or else to become 
 the serfs of the white men. The African is not to have 
 a home on his own continent ! This would appear to 
 be the limit of white meanness and oppression. Can 
 we wonder that the educated natives, rising up in a 
 mighty protest, voted to send a deputation to London 
 in the hope of enlisting the sympathy of Parliament 
 and the king? The wonder is that under such rank 
 injustice they remained loyal; that when, shortly after, 
 the Great War broke out, they decided to hold their 
 grievance in abeyance and to enlist for the defense of 
 the empire. To-day thousands of these protesting 
 Africans are fighting the battles of white men in dis- 
 tant parts of the continent. Britain loves fair play, 
 and when peace comes, she cannot fail to restore these 
 loyal black subjects to their rights. 
 
 We have approached this question from the stand- 
 point of the native who thinks. But we must not for- 
 get the inert mass, unable to state its case, or perhaps 
 to understand that it has a case to state. Think 
 what the tide of civilization means to the untutored 
 African. For untold ages he has been a child of nature, 
 living in a wicker hut, wearing only a bunch of monkey 
 skins or a leather apron about his loins, eating the 
 fruit of the land, hunting the abundant game with his 
 unerring assagais, or raising a few cattle on his na- 
 tive hills, content to squat and smoke and drink beer, 
 undisturbed and uninspired by the fierce competition 
 
122 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 of the world beyond his shores. Now that world is 
 upon him with a rush. With its railroads, steamboats, 
 plantations, factories, mines, laws, taxes, magistrates, 
 police, armies, Maxim guns, gin-shops, and prisons, 
 civilization has descended upon the poor African like 
 an avalanche. Is it any wonder that he sits among 
 his beer pots, half dazed and half crazed by the situa- 
 tion, and that the demand of the white man that he 
 go to work and live like a civilized being finds him 
 unable to respond? If ever there was a man deserving 
 our pity and our help it is the African of the present 
 time. 
 
 The Liquor Problem 
 
 In the liquor traffic we have an evil against which, 
 unfortunately, the native does not protest. It has re- 
 mained for Christian Europe and America to inveigh 
 against the ruin of Africa by the white man's drink. 
 No race is so quickly and so utterly demoralized by 
 strong drink as the African. Self-interest alone on 
 the part of the colonial governments dictates that the 
 traffic be suppressed. Yet a faltering course is fol- 
 lowed. In the South African Union there is a law, 
 not well enforced, prohibiting the sale of liquor to 
 natives. In Nigeria the traffic is permitted under re- 
 strictions. Portugal rules out distilled beverages, but 
 permits light liquors and wines. Colonial governors 
 realize the destructive effects of alcohol upon native 
 character and health, and would gladly be rid of the 
 traffic; but financial considerations stand in the way. 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 123 
 
 In Southern Nigeria the importation of spirits fur- 
 nishes fifty per cent, of the revenues. Rum pays a 
 duty of 200 per cent., and gin a duty of 3(X) per cent. ; 
 and yet these deadly Hquors are shipped into the coun- 
 try in almost unbelievable amounts. 
 
 The sinning nations are principally Holland, Ger- 
 many, Great Britain, and the United States. The 
 British Board of Trade reports that during the year 
 ending in April, 19 16, there were imported into British 
 West Africa 3,815,000 gallons of spirits. During 
 1914-15, from the port of Boston, there were shipped 
 to the west coast of Africa 1,571,353 gallons of rum. 
 There is no pushing of this evil upon the shoulders of 
 Europe. America is too deeply involved for that. The 
 question is often asked, "Cannot something be done to 
 stop the shipping of liquor from the United States to 
 African ports?" Yes; Congress could pass a prohibi- 
 tory law on the subject; but without international 
 action it would be ineffective, since American vessels 
 cannot be prevented from transshipping liquor to 
 vessels of other nations. For instance, it would be 
 easy and remunerative for American liquor merchants 
 to ship to Lisbon or the Azores and there transship in 
 Portuguese bottoms to African ports. No American 
 law could prevent this under present circumstances. 
 What we need is an international agreement such as 
 prevails in respect to certain Pacific islands and the 
 Congo State. The urgency of this question is such 
 that it should engage the attention of the American 
 government at the earliest possible moment. The evil 
 
124 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 is one of colossal magnitude, threatening the very 
 existence of the west coast tribes. 
 
 From the Black Man's Kraal to the White Man's City 
 
 It is the old story of the finding of gold; of the 
 rushing in of eager, unscrupulous men; of the spring- 
 ing up of cities in the wilderness; of the exploiting 
 of the weak by the strong. Only, in South Africa, 
 we are to add diamonds to gold. Of all the upheavals 
 in native conditions and life which civilization has 
 brought to Africa there is none to compare with this. 
 Has there ever been such a landslide from the outer 
 world, such a revolution in the life of a quiet people? 
 As late as 1885 herds of antelope were roaming over 
 the veldt where Johannesburg now stands. To-day 
 we find a great modern city, with asphalt pavements, 
 electric cars, and public buildings which would be a 
 credit to Omaha or Denver. Johannesburg is the 
 center of a mining district, known as "The Rand," 
 which is some forty miles in length and has a popula- 
 tion of close to 500,000. Forty per cent, of the world's 
 gold comes from this region. The output per month 
 runs as high as $17,000,000. 
 
 With the owners the problem is largely one of 
 labor — how to persuade the natives to exchange their 
 indolent village life for the exacting service of a min- 
 ing compound. This difficulty has been overcome by 
 offering special inducements in the way of good pay 
 and short terms of service. Some 300,000 natives are 
 steadily employed at Johannesburg and along the 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 125 
 
 Rand, and these natives are gathered from every tribe 
 south of the Zambezi, and even from regions farther 
 away. Since they come and go at short intervals, we 
 may estimate that not less than half a million blacks 
 each year come under the influence of this one indus- 
 trial center. 
 
 Consider what this means to the African in the way 
 of changed environment and exposure to the worst 
 evils of civilization. Johannesburg has been called 
 "a university of crime," and the epithet seems de- 
 served. The Rev. Frederick B. Bridgman, a Hfe-long 
 student of governmental and economic conditions in 
 South Africa, states the case under the following 
 three heads : 
 
 "(i) These tens of thousands who are thrust into 
 the novel and complex environment of a modern city 
 are young men, sixteen to twenty-five years old. Very 
 few are past thirty. (2) They are wholly removed 
 from family and tribal restraints. Moreover, the new 
 conditions of life at the gold fields appear to place 
 a premium on unbridled license. At the mines the 
 natives are housed in compounds or barracks, where 
 from 2,000 to 6,000 males live a segregated existence. 
 Those engaged in the city find living quarters as best 
 they can, and this usually means drifting into slum 
 areas of the worst type. (3) Of course, to such a 
 mining center and frontier town as Johannesburg there 
 inevitably gravitate many of the worst crooks and 
 criminals of Europe and America. There seems to be 
 no depth to which low-down whites will not descend 
 
126 
 
 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 URBAN 
 
 .CAPE TOWN 
 
 JOHANNESBURG — THE HUB OF SOUTH AFRICA 
 
 What Rome with its golden milestone was to that ancient empire, 
 Johannesburg is to the subcontinent of Africa, where native 
 paths, civilized highways, and railroads all converge on and 
 radiate from the Golden City. The spokes indicate districts 
 from which native laborers are drawn, and to which they 
 eventually return. Shall these tens of thousands carry back 
 to their villages the corruption of civilization, or the sav- 
 ing salt of Christianity? 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 127 
 
 in order to separate the native from his hard-earned 
 cash. The result is that we find natives succumbing 
 to drunkenness, gambHng, robbery, murder, sodomy, 
 and prostitution. To the vices of heathenism, the 
 heathen are now adding the crimes of civiHzation.'* 
 
 To Johannesburg we must add Pretoria, Kimberley, 
 Durban, Cape Town, and various smaller cities, where 
 similar conditions prevail. Everywhere in South 
 Africa economic changes of a revolutionary character 
 bear heavily upon native life. The working out of 
 this problem justly, scientifically and in the spirit of 
 Christ will have much to do with the future of the 
 African race. 
 
 Striking the Balance 
 
 How, then, stands the case for secular civilization? 
 The problem is a highly complicated one, because so 
 many personal and social factors enter in. It is not 
 a problem in mathematics, but in sociology. Possibly 
 no two persons would place the same values upon the 
 various items we have been considering; but as to the 
 main issue there should be no divergence of judgment. 
 Clearly civiHzation finds itself on the wrong side of 
 the account : It has brought more evil than good to 
 the African. The plain and ugly fact is that in many 
 parts of Africa the natives would be better off, physi- 
 cally and morally, if European enterprise had never 
 come. The best authorities do not differ on this sub- 
 ject. There are those who fear that our so-called 
 Christian civilization will make as bad a mess of things 
 
128 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 in South Africa as Islam has made in North Africa. 
 This is a startHng judgment for Christian nations to 
 consider. A prominent missionary has said, "While 
 we must balance the good and evil effects of civiliza- 
 tion, yet for my part i consider the real peril to 
 Africa, south of the equator, to be civilization and 
 not Islam." Mr. Gibbons, in his invaluable book, The 
 New Map of Africa, remarks: "Unless they [the 
 natives] are given the moral foundation upon which 
 to build, material prosperity that comes with European 
 control is to aboriginal races certain destruction — a 
 rapid disappearance following deterioration."^ 
 
 When the shocking conditions and atrocities on the 
 part of the French concessionaries on the Congo came 
 to light, the Comte de Brazza declared that he would 
 never have explored this country and brought it under 
 European control, had he realized what suffering and 
 disaster European penetration was going to bring to 
 the natives. M. de Brazza died on the west coast of 
 Africa, broken-hearted through brooding over these 
 things. Great Britain bears strong testimony to the 
 evils of colonial civilization when she refuses to have 
 the Basutos and Bechuanas come under South African 
 control. She regards these tribes as the wards of the 
 empire and she declines to pass them over to the Union, 
 realizing that they will receive scant justice at the 
 hands of their white neighbors, should they ever be- 
 come integral parts of the dominion. 
 
 * Herbert Adams Gibbons, The New Map of Africa, p. 210. 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 129 
 
 The Church to the Rescue 
 
 "Ye are the salt of the earth." Africa is to be saved, 
 not by laws, but by lives. If the church of the living 
 God can be planted and made to flourish among the 
 Africans, the continent will be saved; not otherwise. 
 What are we to expect when the only white man with 
 whom the African has practical dealings is the un- 
 scrupulous trader or the brutal policeman? What 
 ideas of our civilization are the natives likely to re- 
 ceive under such conditions? Many a negro mind 
 works in this way: "The white men are powerful; 
 the white men are wise ; the white men bring us many 
 useful things; the white men are also dishonest and 
 immoral; I will be like the white men." This gospel 
 of the godless civilization is being preached far and 
 wide. Fortunately there are regions where the natives 
 gained their first impressions from the missionary 
 and not from the trader. Such a region is Barotseland 
 on the upper Zambezi, where Livingstone traveled ex- 
 tensively and where Coillard and the French Protes- 
 tant missionaries settled in the early days. The result 
 is that the Barotse, knowing civilization on its best 
 side, are not likely to be corrupted by commercial 
 greed. The same may be asserted with even stronger 
 emphasis of Uganda, where Christianity gained the 
 upper hand before the railroad appeared. 
 
 It is too late to preempt the ground in many sections 
 of the continent, but by a truly wonderful providence 
 the churches find a new opportunity in the very situa- 
 
I30 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 tion which is working such havoc in the industrial 
 centers. Never has there been such a chance to reach 
 the natives in large numbers as in Johannesburg and 
 Kimberley to-day. In the old days the missionary 
 sought out the natives in their kraals, often making 
 long journeys only to find the men absent on a hunt 
 or the whole population engaged in beer-drinking. 
 At best he could preach to only a small group. To- 
 day the natives are coming to the missionary by hun- 
 dreds of thousands. Johannesburg spells opportunity 
 in capital letters. Every African converted in such a 
 center goes back, after his six or twelve months of 
 service, as a missionary to his people. In this way 
 every tribe in the subcontinent and some farther north 
 can be reached. 
 
 Already good work is being done by way of seizing 
 this opportunity. The Anglicans and the Wesleyans 
 have taken hold vigorously, and a group of Johannes- 
 burg business men, under the leadership of Mr. A. W. 
 Baker, have formed the "South Africa Compounds 
 Mission." Americans will be especially interested in 
 the plans of the Rev. Frederick B. Bridgman, of the 
 American Board, who has become the apostle of a 
 movement centering in Johannesburg, in which evan- 
 gelism and social service are to go hand in hand. Mr. 
 Bridgman was born in Natal of missionary parents, 
 and he brings to the Johannesburg problem the re- 
 sults of a long and successful ministry for the native 
 laborers of Durban. His idea is to establish a center 
 in which the natives who flock to the city can find 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 131 
 
 congenial and helpful surroundings and where they 
 will be brought under the influence of Christian men 
 and women who can help them in every department 
 of life. He would group together the church, the 
 school-room, the lecture-room, the amusement hall, 
 and offices for medical and legal advice. The staff will 
 include an ordained missionary, a medical missionary, 
 a legal adviser, a physical and social director, with 
 native helpers. This dream is likely to come true 
 through the generous gift of a New York business 
 man. Already over fifty lay preachers go out every 
 Sunday to preach in the mining compounds, where 
 are congregated from 1,000 to 6,000 laborers. Wher- 
 ever the Johannesburg converts go they carry the 
 Bible in the vernacular and tell of Christ to their pagan 
 neighbors. Near Delagoa Bay, 400 miles to the east, 
 seven chapels have been built and hundreds of con- 
 verts made by spontaneous native effort. When Mr. 
 Bridgman has his new plant, he will be in a position 
 to influence the life of an immense area. 
 
 In such ways the churches may come to the rescue 
 and turn evil to good account. We must place before 
 us nothing less than the task of Christianizing every 
 contact with African life and enterprise. The Rev. 
 John M. Springer, the Methodist missionary at 
 Katanga, who is face to face with the industrial prob- 
 lem in a new center, and whose work will be described 
 in the next chapter, in his addresses at home has been 
 emphasizing that there are three factors in the African 
 problem, the church, the state, and commerce; that 
 
132 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 the church was first on the ground in the persons of 
 Livingstone and the early missionaries; but that in 
 many districts the state and commerce are now the 
 sole representatives of western ideals and life. He 
 argues with much force that these great human 
 agencies must be brought together on a common plat- 
 form, if the African tribes are to be saved from de- 
 moralization. Thus we see how intimately reform 
 movements in government and business at home are 
 bound up with missionary endeavor abroad. 
 
 The situation is not without hope. The European 
 governments are learning many things, among them 
 that missions are essential to civilization ; that, without 
 the Christian motive and the Christian morality, there 
 is little hope of making the African honest and re- 
 sourceful. Economic considerations also are leading 
 Europe to pay more regard to the welfare of the 
 native people, without whom their colonies would be 
 barren enterprises indeed. The era of atrocities may 
 be said to be passed. The liquor traffic will be brought 
 to an end by governmental action one of these days, 
 and the lesser evils are bound to give way in the process 
 of time. The infusion of the Christian spirit into com- 
 merce will be a slower process, but even business 
 houses will at times join the ranks of the reformers, as 
 witness the suppression of slavery in Portuguese West 
 Africa, through the action of the chocolate manufac- 
 turers. When the Cadburys and other importers of 
 London learned that a large part of their cocoa supply 
 came from contract labor which was indistinguish- 
 
AFRICA AND CIVILIZATION 133 
 
 able from slavery, in the islands of Principe and Sao 
 Thome, the slaves having been brought from the 
 Angola mainland, and that Portugal had refused to 
 blot out this evil, they ordered that no purchases should 
 be made from these islands until slavery should be 
 abolished. Certain firms in the United States joined 
 this righteous boycott, and the result was that Portu- 
 gal lost no time in passing laws making the recruit- 
 ment of contract labor voluntary, under restrictions. 
 Let it be placed to the credit of commerce that slavery 
 is now practically extinct in all that region. 
 
 Civilization in Africa will be godless only in case 
 the Christian people of Europe and America fail in 
 their duty. There is not a section of the continent 
 where the situation could not be saved by aggressive 
 action on the part of state and church, working in 
 harmony. Selfish commercialism can be held in check, 
 justice administered, education promoted, and the 
 Christian religion established as the basis of society. 
 Only the beginnings have been made in Africa; the 
 great work yet remains to be done. Throughout this 
 vast continent there will be a movement of civilization 
 greater than any we have yet witnessed. Shall it be 
 guided by Christ or by greed? 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 
 
Copyright, Underwood & Underwood. 
 
 KIKUYU WOMEN, BRITISH EAST AFRICA 
 
VI 
 
 THE HEART OF PAGANISM 
 
 Considering the continent from the standpoint of 
 the struggle between Islam and Christianity we have 
 spoken of central Africa as the "zone of Christian 
 advance." From the standpoint of the dominant re- 
 ligion, it might with more propriety be called the "zone 
 of pagan supremacy;" since in this section we have 
 the largest area of pagan barbarism to be found in 
 the world. India is non-Christian, for the most part, 
 but India has a civilization dating from very ancient 
 times. There is no evidence that the natives of central 
 Africa have ever known a state higher than that they 
 now occupy. Through all the changes of history they 
 have lived on in virgin simplicity, untouched by the 
 currents of the world's life. There are approximately 
 40,000,000 natives in this zone, and whether we con- 
 sider them in the mass or as individual human beings, 
 their appeal to the sympathy of the Christian world is 
 pathetic beyond words to express. 
 
 Natural Features 
 
 Central Africa is tropical Africa. The sun is di- 
 rectly overhead and its rays beat down in a merciless 
 and unremitting fashion. Even where the high eleva- 
 
 137 
 
138 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 tion brings cool nights and occasional frosts, the days 
 are intensely warm. Rain is abundant in its season, 
 and except for a narrow strip on the western coast, 
 south of the Congo, the region is devoid of desert. 
 This is the country of the mangrove and the palm 
 and all the picturesque features of tropical life. It 
 is the paradise of hunters, where lions, leopards, 
 rhinos, and elephants disport themselves, and where 
 antelope and deer abound in endless variety and un- 
 believable numbers. Some who read these pages will 
 say, "We have come to real Africa at last." 
 
 Yes, it is real Africa, because it is the black man's 
 Africa. The white man is not tempted to linger in 
 these parts. Aside from the uplands of the east coast 
 and the tableland of Angola, climatic conditions render 
 colonization from Europe undesirable, if not impos- 
 sible. There will always be government officials, 
 plantation overseers, and, of course, missionaries, who 
 will be able to maintain themselves by the aid of fre- 
 quent furloughs and rigid attention to health, but so 
 far as white people generally are concerned, over the 
 Congo valley and the lake country God has hung the 
 sign. Keep Out. This much, at least, of the earth's 
 surface is to be the undisputed abode of the dusky 
 members of the race. 
 
 This is the Africa of Livingstone and Stanley, and 
 it is rendered peculiarly sacred to Christian people 
 because Livingstone's heart lies buried under an oak 
 at Chitambo's, near the southern border. This is the 
 Africa of the great lakes and the mighty Congo. It 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 139 
 
 is the Africa for which the European powers have 
 scrambled as for no other part of our planet. A glance 
 at the map will show that in this zone we have the 
 whole of German East Africa, the whole of Uganda, 
 a large part of British East Africa, more than half 
 of Portuguese East Africa, more than half of 
 Rhodesia, all of Angola, all of the Congo Free State, 
 all of the French Congo, practically all of the Cam- 
 eroun, together with Southern Nigeria and the entire 
 Guinea coast. Its natural resources, in the forests, the 
 farm lands, and the mining regions, mark the zone as 
 one of extraordinary wealth. Add the fact of accessi- 
 bility on account of the lakes and streams, and you have 
 the basis for a sure prophecy of a great development 
 in coming years. 
 
 The Land of Footprints 
 
 Stewart Edward White has written a delightful 
 book on his hunting experiences in central Africa, 
 which he calls "The Land of Footprints." The ref- 
 erence is to the innumerable tracks of wild animals 
 at the water-holes and on the river banks, which every 
 hunter of big game hopes some day to see with his 
 own eyes. With equal appropriateness a missionary 
 could have used this title in describing the life of 
 Africa's human animals. If you could study the con- 
 tinent from an aeroplane, the most characteristic fea- 
 ture of the landscape would be the cobweb system of 
 paths, which spreads out in every direction. One can- 
 not think of Africa without these paths. Some of 
 
140 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 them are of great antiquity, worn deep with the patter- 
 ing feet of hunters, warriors, traders, slave gangs, and 
 women going to their fields. The paths are the nervous 
 system of African society, and the villages are the 
 ganglia. 
 
 The thing to know above everything else in Africa 
 is the native village, since each village is an African 
 world. In spite of all the diversity of tribe, language 
 and custom, the main features of the life of the people 
 may be discerned in the ongoings of each little collec- 
 tion of huts. This is particularly true of the great 
 Bantu race, inhabiting the southern half of the con- 
 tinent. 
 
 Let us imagine ourselves in a typical village of 
 central Africa. It occupies a clearing in the forest, 
 made by cutting off the tops of the trees and leaving 
 the ground bristling with bare trunks. The one hun- 
 dred or more huts are constructed of palm sticks and 
 leaves, not circular in form, like those in South Africa, 
 but rectangular. The door is low and if you wish to 
 call upon the leading families you will have to get 
 down on your hands and knees. The general impres- 
 sion is that of shabbiness and destitution. The popula- 
 tion is about 500 and it strikes you at first as remark- 
 ably democratic and homogeneous. Aside from the 
 headman there seem to be no distinctions of class or 
 occupation. Later on you find that not less than a 
 third of the population are slaves. Domestic slavery, 
 although frowned upon by the government, is well- 
 nigh universal. The slaves, however, are treated 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 141 
 
 kindly, as a rule, and they appear to be contented with 
 their lot. They are restrained by the practical diffi- 
 culty of returning to their distant tribal homes, and 
 even more by an inherent consciousness and recogni- 
 tion of ownership on the part of their masters. 
 
 Scientists would not class these people as savages, 
 but as barbarians, since they use tools forged from 
 native ore. At some time in remote history they took 
 one step toward civilization and then stopped. Not 
 a village, not a tribe has a literature of its own or 
 even an alphabet. You are surprised to find the people 
 kindly disposed. They conduct you to the palaver- 
 house in the center of the village and bring you gifts 
 of manioc, yams, and bananas. It is much in your 
 favor that you come from the mission station, since 
 these people long ago learned the difference between 
 a missionary and a trader. By their deepest nature 
 they are law-abiding, inoffensive, and friendly, stirred 
 to anger only when fearing war or when treated with 
 injustice. If this statement is doubted, let it be noted 
 that Great Britain maintains her rule throughout the 
 colony of Gambia by means of seventy-five native 
 policemen and soldiers. In Nyasaland she has the im- 
 mense force of 135 native soldiers! Can that achieve- 
 ment be equaled in any other part of the world ? 
 
 There is a darker side to native life. Everywhere 
 the women live on a plane of degradation far below 
 the men. Women are chattels, just so much property. 
 Polygamy ^is universal, immorality a commonplace. 
 The women raise all the food, which the men eat by 
 
142 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 themselves. Miss Jean Kenyon Mackenzie, in her 
 articles in The Atlantic, and even more in her recent 
 books, Black Sheep, An African Trail, and African 
 Adventurers, has given the world a vivid picture of 
 what it means to be an African woman. 
 
 The most brutal elements of the Bantu come out 
 in connection with his religion. The thing which ought 
 to elevate is the very thing that drags him down. The 
 religion of the primitive African is usually classed as 
 animism, that is, the worship of spirits. This is one 
 step higher than fetishism, which is the worship of 
 natural objects endowed with religious significance. 
 The African's religion abounds in fetishistic elements, 
 but the thing that dominates his thought is the in- 
 numerable company of demons which envelop him on 
 every side. The fact that many of these demons are 
 the spirits of his departed ancestors does not add to his 
 comfort. The African lives in a haunted land. Demons 
 in the stones of the brook, demons along the forest 
 path, demons in the tree-tops, demons in the people he 
 meets — the African never escapes from the terror of 
 his supernatural world. Nothing untoward that hap- 
 pens to him is of natural occurrence; some witch is 
 always to blame. When he is ill, or an accident be- 
 falls him, or bad luck comes, or a relative dies, there 
 is a guilty party who must be "smelled out." Because 
 the vital element in the African's religion is witch- 
 craft, the witch-doctor becomes the great figure in the 
 community. With his head-dress of feathers and his 
 weird ornaments, his appearance is calculated to in- 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 143 
 
 spire terror and awe in the stoutest hearts. When 
 employed to ferret out evil he gathers the people in a 
 circle, spreads a skin on the ground, shakes his rattles 
 made of gourds, in order to call the spirits near, and 
 divines the event by means of a basket full of charms, 
 each of which has a special meaning as he spills them 
 on the sacred skin and notes their relations one to 
 another. It is from the witch-doctor that the people 
 obtain the fetishes which they hold in such high es- 
 teem. These may be almost any curious natural ob- 
 ject or figure carved in wood: animal forms, heads 
 of birds, teeth, pieces of glass, odd-looking pebbles, 
 knotted strings, bags of colored earth, which are worn 
 on the person or treasured in the hut. 
 
 Among the foul customs which arise from witch- 
 craft are the poison test and burying alive in connec- 
 tion with the funeral of a chief. The former is the 
 favorite method of chiefs in detecting witchcraft or 
 the evil eye. Almost any untoward event may lead 
 to the arrest of a large group of suspected people who 
 are required to drink a decoction of poisonous herbs, 
 in which the African forests abound. Those who re- 
 cover are deemed innocent; those who die, guilty. It 
 will never be known what multitudes of innocent 
 people have perished in this way. Frederick Perry 
 Noble maintains that the belief in witchcraft has done 
 only less than the slave trade to depopulate sections 
 of Africa. Sir Henry Hamilton Johnston, the greatest 
 of all authorities on Africa, whose books would fill 
 a shelf, speaks of the African as "fetish-ridden, tor- 
 
144 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 tured in mind and body by some of the most hideous 
 forms of religion ever invented." 
 
 In a word, the religion of the African is a religion 
 of terror and hate. Naturally of a buoyant and lov- 
 able disposition, he has surrounded himself with phan- 
 toms which weigh upon his soul like lead. In the 
 things which pertain to God he lives in abysmal dark- 
 ness. When most religious, he is most fiendish. Will 
 anyone deny that something ought to be done for these 
 people ? 
 
 Uganda, the Brightest Spot on the Map 
 
 We come now to the fascinating story of mission 
 work in central Africa, and we are at once cheered by 
 the thought that the "zone of Pagan darkness" is also 
 the "zone of Christian advance." It is in this very 
 region that the churches have scored some of their 
 greatest successes. Historically, the work began in 
 the east, and it will serve our purpose best if we start 
 with that section and proceed westward through the 
 Congo valley to the Atlantic coast. And first comes 
 the story of Uganda, the brightest spot on our African 
 map. 
 
 "Oh, that some pious, practical missionary would 
 come here! Such an one, if he be found, would be- 
 come the savior of Africa. Where is there in all the 
 pagan world a more promising field than Uganda? 
 Here, gentlemen, is your opportunity ; embrace it. The 
 people on the shores of the Nyanza call upon you." 
 This ringing message to the Christian people of Great 
 
Copyright, Underwood & Underwood. 
 
 A WITCH-DOCTOR TREATING AN OLD CHIEF 
 Pouring Quarts of Medicine down his Throat 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 145 
 
 Britain was found by General "Chinese" Gordon con- 
 cealed in one of the boots of a French explorer, who 
 had been killed by the natives on the upper Nile. It 
 was from none other than Henry M. Stanley, who in 
 1875 was visiting King Mtesa on Victoria Nyanza. 
 The letter created a sensation in England. Volunteers 
 came forward at once; the Christian public responded 
 with money; and in a surprisingly short time the 
 Church Missionary Society reached the decision to ac- 
 cept the challenge and to open up work in Uganda. 
 In the first group of missionaries who sailed in 1876 
 there were a naval lieutenant, two civil engineers, an 
 architect, a doctor, a builder, and an artisan. The 
 leading spirit was Alexander Mackay, the Scotch en- 
 gineer, who was to become a famous figure in mis- 
 sionary history.^ The story of their early struggles 
 and their later successes reads like a romance. They 
 found the Baganda all that Stanley had represented, a 
 really remarkable people, of rich, reddish brown color, 
 with short woolly hair, active, well-knit figures, ex- 
 pressive physiognomy, and easy and graceful move- 
 ments. Nudity, when out of doors, was repugnant to 
 them. They were cleanly in their habits, and they 
 looked down upon the surrounding tribes who prac- 
 tised the hideous mutilations which we usually as- 
 sociate with African life. Mtesa, the representative 
 of a line of kings which had ruled from the time of 
 
 * See Sophia Lyon Fahs, Uganda's While Man of Work; and Mrs. 
 J. W. Harrison, Mackay of Uganda. 
 
146 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 Henry IV of England, proved to be a man of great 
 force of character, and he remained friendly until 
 the coming of the Roman Catholics filled his court with 
 jarring factions. 
 
 Under Mtesa's successor a fierce persecution broke 
 ^ut. The entire mission was expelled from the coun- 
 try and many of the native Christians suffered martyr- 
 dom. Some of the Christian boys went to the flames 
 singing the hymns the missionaries had taught them. 
 Such testimony could not fall to the ground, and 
 back the missionaries came after a short period. Then 
 the Uganda church started upon a career of rapid 
 growth, which has continued to this day. The Chris- 
 tian population of Uganda, according to the latest 
 figures, now numbers 374,264, being divided about 
 equally between Protestants and Catholics. Since 191 5 
 the Christians have outnumbered the non-Christians 
 by nearly 100,000. Schools flourish, there is material 
 prosperity on every side, and recently the native lead- 
 ers inaugurated a missionary movement in behalf of 
 the neighboring tribes. It is particularly gratifying 
 to find that Mohammedanism, once rampant in this 
 region, is steadily giving way before this strong Chris- 
 tian advance. From every point of view the enter- 
 prise which Stanley inspired has been a success, one 
 of the greatest successes in the history of Christianity. 
 The story, as told by Pilkington and others, calls to 
 mind that phrase of the psalmist which meant so much 
 to God's people of old, ''Wonderful works in the land 
 of Ham." 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 147 
 
 Nyasaland and Dr. Laws 
 
 It is remarkable how often these missionary suc- 
 cesses in Africa hinge upon a single personality, like 
 Mackay. It is remarkable, also, how one personality 
 has kindled another. Robert Laws, while a student in 
 Scotland, went with his mother to hear an address by 
 the aged Dr. Moffat, then lately returned from South 
 Africa. On the way home his mother was overjoyed 
 to hear him say that he was resolved to be a missionary 
 and that he wanted to go to the heart of Africa. This 
 decision became a link in an important chain of events. 
 Moffat inspired Livingstone; Livingstone inspired 
 Stewart of Lovedale; Stewart was the man who per- 
 suaded the Christian people of Scotland to establish a 
 Livingstone Memorial Mission on Lake Nyasa; Dr. 
 Laws, who had come under the influence of Moffat, 
 offered himself for the task. 
 
 That was in 1875. In 19 15 the fortieth anniversary 
 of the work was celebrated, and from the historical 
 sketch by Donald Eraser we learn what has happened 
 in between. Dr. Laws and his associates found the 
 natives of Nyasaland degraded by superstition, the vic- 
 tims of hideously cruel customs, existing by plunder 
 or by selling one another into slavery. Nevertheless, 
 the missionaries received a joyous welcome because 
 they were "the brothers of Livingstone, the tribe that 
 loves the black man." To-day the Arab slave dealer 
 has gone out of business, and scores of thousands of 
 men are engaged in remunerative labor. Eight 
 
148 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 languages have been reduced to writing, 850 schools 
 have been started, 51,000 pupils are enrolled, and it 
 is a rare village which does not have its little school- 
 building. At Kondowe there is a central training 
 school, modeled after Lovedale. Churches are found 
 throughout the region, and when the first African 
 preacher was ordained an audience of 1,600 filled the 
 church, while 5,000 waited outside. There is a church- 
 membership of 10,000 and a Christian community of 
 40,000. Such is the fruitage of only forty years. 
 
 To the south of Lake Xyasa, in the Shire highlands, 
 the Church of Scotland Foreign Mission Committee 
 established the Blantyre Mission, named from the 
 birthplace of Livingstone. This enterprise has been 
 greatly prospered and is widely known for the impres- 
 sive cathedral which was built by native hands. The 
 Nyasa work, like that in Uganda, just now suffers 
 severely from the prevalence of the sleeping-sickness, 
 which has depopulated many of the villages on the lake 
 shore. This scourge, which is spread by the sting of 
 the tsetse fly, afflicts whites and blacks alike, and is 
 proving an almost insurmountable obstacle. It may 
 be that the completion of the work in the lake coun- 
 try-, where such a splendid beginning has been made, 
 will have to wait upon discoveries in the schools of 
 tropical medicine in Hamburg, London, and Boston. 
 The Blantyre work of late has suffered from an in- 
 undation of Mohammedan missionaries. In nearly 
 every village where a church has not been built a hut 
 has been set apart as a mosque. 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 149 
 
 The Congo Mission of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 
 The southern section of the Cape-to-Cairo railroad 
 is now completed to Bukama, on the river which Liv- 
 ingstone called Lualaba, but which Stanley found to be 
 the upper waters of the Congo. There connection is 
 made with a mixed steamboat and railroad service 
 to the mouth of the great river, 2,100 miles away. 
 Thus the traveler can ascend the Congo to its head 
 waters and proceed thence by rail to Cape Town, Dur- 
 ban, or Beira. This route has been made possible 
 through the diversion of the Cape-to-Cairo system 
 to the Katanga district of the Belgian Congo State, 
 where valuable copper and other mineral deposits have 
 been located. Already extensive mining operations 
 have been begun and, as in the case of South Africa, 
 thousands of native laborers are being drawn from 
 tribes near and far. One mine employs 5,000 natives, 
 another 2,000. Some prophesy that Kambove, the 
 capital of the district, is to be a second Johannesburg. 
 Here is a chance for the churches "to come in on the 
 ground floor," as the investors say, and to capture the 
 situation before commercial greed gets in its deadly 
 work. Thank God, the chance is not to be lost. 
 Hither came the Rev. John M. Springer, of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Board of Foreign Missions, in 
 191 3, to preempt the situation for Christ. The work 
 has opened up so encouragingly that it is now desig- 
 nated as the Congo Mission. The effort at present 
 is largely evangelistic, although a beginning has been 
 
ISO THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 made in education and literature. At eleven services 
 held on one Sunday, Mr. Springer had representatives 
 of thirty-five tribes in his audience, some of them from 
 a thousand miles away. After a furlough in America, 
 he returns with a splendid band of workers and liberal 
 sums of money pledged for the development of the 
 new field. Mr. Springer has started an enterprise at 
 one of the most strategic points in the continent, which 
 we all should watch with interest and earnest prayer 
 for its success. 
 
 Evangelistic Harvestings on the Congo 
 
 And now we come to the great river itself, with its 
 9,500 miles of navigable waterways, a drainage area 
 second only to that of the Amazon, its untold natural 
 wealth, and its population of over 30,000,000 souls. 
 Stanley, after his famous trip down the river, returned 
 as the representative of the European powers and made 
 treaties with 450 native chiefs, thus laying the founda- 
 tion for the Congo Free State. If ever there was an 
 encouraging start in African colonization, it was this. 
 The natives showed a willing spirit and the prospects 
 were excellent for the working together of Europe and 
 Africa on a harmonious basis for mutual good. 
 Yet in this very region we have had the most disgrace- 
 ful exhibition of greed, injustice, and murderous bru- 
 tality, on the part of the white man, to be found in 
 the annals of our selfish race. Now that the atrocities 
 are over, and that the good King Albert is on the 
 throne of Belgium, we recall with gratitude the mis- 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 151 
 
 sionaries who had the courage to state the facts and 
 to endure the calumny and persecution which followed. 
 It remains now for the missions to heal the sores of 
 hatred and revenge, and lead in a movement for the 
 rapid civilization and Christianization of the entire 
 Congo basin. In this stupendous task the American 
 societies are likely to take the leading part. 
 
 The Baptists were the first to see or at least to seize 
 the great opening made by Stanley's explorations. To- 
 day both the English and American Baptists are 
 strongly established on the river. The stations of the 
 English Baptists reach from Matadi, the port city near 
 the mouth of the river, to Stanley Falls, and even 
 beyond to the country north of Tanganyika. The hero 
 of this mission is George Grenfell, one of the first 
 figures in African exploration and missionary pioneer- 
 ing, the only missionary who may appropriately be 
 spoken of as "the successor of Livingstone." It was 
 Grenfell who discovered the Ubangi, the largest 
 affluent of the Congo. The story of how, in his little 
 steamer called Peace, he pushed his way up this stream 
 past cannibal villages, and often through a shower 
 of spears and poisoned arrows, for exciting interest 
 is not surpassed by Stanley or any explorer. Sir 
 Harry Johnston considered Grenfell worthy of a two- 
 volume biography.^ 
 
 The American Baptist Foreign Mission Society has 
 ten stations scattered from Matadi to the region above 
 Stanley Pool. Of these, Ikoko, only thirty miles from 
 
 ^ Sir Harry H. Johnston, George Grenfell and the Congo. 
 
152 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 the equator, is perhaps the best known, through its as- 
 sociation with Rev. Joseph Clark, who has been heard 
 on so many missionary platforms, and who took such 
 a prominent part in exposing the Congo atrocities. 
 Twenty-two years ago every man at Ikoko was a 
 cannibal. To-day there are 500 church-members, of 
 whom forty have gone to as many pagan villages to 
 live and witness for Christ. A deacon, named Epundr, 
 the son of a cannibal, during the absence of the mis- 
 sionary carried through the press the Gospel of Mat- 
 thew in a language not his own, correcting proof and 
 attending to every detail as well as Mr. Clark him- 
 self could have done. The working principle of this 
 mission is that every Christian must be ready to render 
 any service required by the church. At Banza a great 
 revival has set in, and already, under the leadership 
 of Henry Richards, a church of 1,800 members has 
 been gathered. The mission is rejoicing over the 
 raising of the money for the building of four new 
 hospitals. The total membership of the mission is 
 about 5,000, the English Baptists enrolling the same 
 number. Up to 1880 there was not a Christian in all 
 the region, only savages and cannibals. 
 
 The missionaries of the Foreign Christian Mis- 
 sionary Society are near neighbors of the Baptists. 
 Bolenge, on the equator, is their typical station, con- 
 cerning which we hear inspiring stories of progress. 
 Dr. Stephen J. Corey tells of addressing an audience 
 of 1,400 and of participating in the baptism of 207 
 persons on one Sunday. They have one church which 
 
Copyright, Underwood & Underwood. 
 
 RAW MATERIAL ON THE CONGO 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 153 
 
 supports fifty missionaries from their own congrega- 
 tion. Dr. Corey also tells a remarkable story of a con- 
 vert named Bonjolongo, who was one of the fiercest 
 of King Leopold's tax collectors, and who had been 
 instrumental in slaying thousands of his countrymen. 
 Upon conversion he insisted that he must carry the 
 gospel to the very people he had injured. He could not 
 be dissuaded. "Bonjolongo," said the missionary, "if 
 you go back the people will slay you, because they hate 
 and fear you." His reply was, "Bonjolongo must go 
 and witness for Christ in those villages." So, clothed 
 in the blue denim garb of a Christian, he made the jour- 
 ney of six days into the jungle, unarmed and alone. 
 Upon entering the town he was immediately recog- 
 nized and the war-drum began to sound. In a moment 
 he was surrounded by warriors armed with spears and 
 knives. There was no time to explain his change of 
 heart and his desire to do them good. In a moment he 
 would be a dead man. But Bonjolongo was a resource- 
 ful African. The missionary had given him for the 
 journey an aluminum canteen for drinking water, 
 and he w^as carrying this on a strap over his shoulder. 
 Knowing that the natives had never seen such an 
 object, he took it from his shoulder quickly, pointed 
 the cork at them, and exclaimed, "If you come a step 
 closer, I will pull this cork out." He advanced a step 
 and they fled precipitately into the forest. An hour 
 later when the warriors came slinking back they found 
 Bonjolongo preaching Christ to the villagers. He is 
 now pastor of a flourishing congregation in that place. 
 
154 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 The Southern Presbyterians on the Kassai 
 
 Draw a line from the mouth of the Congo to Lake- 
 Tanganyika and right in the middle of it you can locate 
 the field of the Executive Committee of Foreign Mis- 
 sions of the Presbyterian Church in the United States. 
 This is one of the most remote spots in the continent. 
 The mission is reached by steamer on the Kassai River, 
 one of the branches of the Congo, but so long is the 
 trip that American mails are three months old when 
 they arrive. Provisions have to be ordered six months 
 in advance. The nearest post-office is five hundred 
 miles away. In this far-off region we find a work 
 of large proportions and great variety, one of the 
 "show-spots" on the missionary map. The country 
 is thickly populated, the leading tribes being the Bakete 
 and the Bakuba, among whom the Southern Presby- 
 terians are the sole workers. The steamer which plies 
 between Stanley Pool and Luebo, the central station 
 of the mission, bears the honored name of Samuel 
 Lapsley, the founder of the enterprise and one of the 
 hero figures of central Africa. What Mackay was to 
 Uganda, Dr. Lapsley was to the Kassai tribes. 
 
 This mission, in the very heart of paganism, w^as not 
 started until 1891 ; the results are truly extraordinary. 
 Think of a church of 15,674 members gathered in 
 that time, and a Christian community of 85,000! 
 Think of 2)^,77S children attending Sunday-schools, 
 and 15,835 in day schools! The total force of white 
 workers is but thirty-four. Nothing could indicate the 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 155 
 
 ripeness of this field better than the fact that forty dele- 
 gations from as many villages called upon a missionary 
 about to return on furlough, begging him to bring 
 them teachers. On the average, seven such delegations 
 journey to Luebo every week. Such a record should 
 entice other boards to occupy the virgin territory 
 stretching to the south and east for hundreds of miles. 
 
 The Southern Methodists as Pioneers 
 
 Already the Board of Missions of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South, has accepted the challenge of 
 the vast unoccupied territory at the headwaters of the 
 Kassai River. Under the leadership of Bishop Lam- 
 buth, who has twice visited the field, in 19 14 they 
 planted a station at Wembo-Niama, 700 miles by the 
 river to the northeast of Luebo. This step was taken 
 only after painstaking exploration, in conjunction with 
 the Presbyterian missionaries, who have cooperated 
 earnestly at every step in the undertaking. We find 
 no better illustration of Christian unity than in the 
 relations of these boards in this African work. When 
 the field was chosen and the consent of the native chief 
 had been obtained, two native pastors of the Presby- 
 terian mission volunteered to join the Methodist force, 
 and with them went nineteen others who constituted 
 the nucleus of the new church. This is the latest 
 enterprise to be started in the Congo basin; but the 
 prospects are for large and speedy returns. The en- 
 tire support of this work has been undertaken by the 
 Epworth Leagues of the Southern Methodist churches. 
 
156 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 The Enchanter's Wand in Angola 
 
 When Charles Darwin visited New Zealand in 
 1835 and saw the effect of mission work among the 
 Maoris, he wrote, ''The lesson of the missionary is 
 the enchanter's wand." The same may be said for 
 many a field in Africa, where conditions to-day re- 
 semble those in New Zealand seventy-five years ago, 
 and where the transformations in community life al- 
 most pass belief. Angola, or Portuguese West Africa, 
 equal in area to fourteen Portugals, with a popula- 
 tion of 7,000,000, is being worked by the Northern 
 Methodists from Loanda as a center, and by the Con- 
 gregationalists of Canada and the United States in 
 the region back of Benguela. These fields are note- 
 worthy for their demonstration of social regeneration. 
 In this region we have the spectacle of Christian vil- 
 lages side by side with pagan villages and presenting 
 the sharpest contrasts. In the pagan villages, dis- 
 order, filth, immorality; in the Christian villages, 
 streets laid out in squares; houses of several rooms, 
 with doors, windows, and furniture; a family life cen- 
 tering in the common meal; a community life taking 
 its color from the daily prayer service in the church; 
 on every side cleanliness, intelligence, prosperity, 
 morality. To travel in Angola is to know the social 
 power of Christianity. 
 
 At Chisamba, one of the stations of the Canada 
 Congregational Foreign Missionary Society, a con- 
 gregation of 900 gathers on Sunday. When Kan- 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 157 
 
 jundu, the chief, was living, he occupied a front pew 
 among the elders of the church. So far as we know 
 he was the first chief to adopt compulsory education. 
 Every child was obliged to go to school and everybody 
 else was urged to go. The result for a time was a 
 strange jumble of old grannies, little children, young 
 men, and mothers with babies on their backs. Kan- 
 jundu was short on pedagogy, but his ideal of an edu- 
 cated community has not been surpassed in Africa. 
 
 The conversion of this chief is worth knowing 
 about. When, under the preaching of Dr. Currie, 
 Kanjundu accepted Christ, he at once liberated his 
 one hundred slaves, presenting to each one a house. 
 He also released seven superfluous wives, honorably 
 providing for each. Best of all, he lived an exemplary 
 life, notwithstanding the persecution of the governor. 
 Before conversion, a cruel chief; after conversion, a 
 loving, kindly, childlike Christian. I told him about 
 the Mohammedan advance, and asked if he was afraid 
 for his people. A gleam came into the old chief's eyes 
 as he replied, "Let them come. We will take care of 
 them." 
 
 The Africans throughout this region are rapidly 
 giving up their fetishes and charms, and bringing them 
 to the missionaries for public burning in connection 
 with the services of the church. It not infrequently 
 happens that at the close of a service, in the space 
 in front of the church, a bushel of charms is burned 
 at one time, while the people stand around in awed si- 
 lence. Those who have witnessed this performance 
 
158 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 state that it calls vividly to mind the scene described 
 in Acts xix. 19. Passing along a native trail in a re- 
 mote region, I once met a company of native hunters, 
 armed with bows and arrows. The missionary could 
 interpret and we fell to talking. I asked the leader 
 of the band, ''Have the 'words' come to your village 
 yet?" His face lighted up as he replied, "Oh, yes, the 
 'words' have come; a Christian teacher came to live 
 among us only a week ago." I then inquired, "Would 
 the other villages about here like to have the Svords' ?" 
 He sw^ept the horizon with his arm and said, "All of 
 them, all of them are waiting for the words to come." 
 There you have Angola in a picture — 7,000,000 people 
 are waiting for us to send them the words. 
 
 Mass Movements in Cameroiin 
 
 Of all the missionaries who work in Africa to-day 
 the Northern Presbyterians are to be most con- 
 gratulated. One of these is Miss Jean Mackenzie, whose 
 articles and books have been previously referred to. 
 Miss Mackenzie, in her inimitable way, speaks of their 
 working during the past ten years in a "tumult of 
 development." She says, "The forest tribes and the 
 tribes by the sea crowded into the tribe of God." It 
 is one thing to read missionary reports of success; 
 it is quite another thing to be led, as Miss Mackenzie 
 leads, into the very atmosphere of success. "All these 
 years to have been praying, perhaps mechanically, 'Thy 
 Kingdom come,' and then one day to see it coming, 
 crowding up an old path that has been made straight 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM 159 
 
 and the way of the Lord!" In one letter she writes, 
 ^*Two thousand people assemble of a Sunday. The 
 work is exceedingly encouraging, the people exceed- 
 ingly responsive." In a later letter we have this : 'T 
 did, indeed, see an Elat communion service — a most 
 exciting adventure. I saw 246 Christians admitted to 
 the church, and a congregation of 5,000." 
 
 The story of Cameroun is the story of Uganda over 
 again. Each mail brings something new. At an Elat 
 communion in July, 19 16, there were 8,000 present, 
 and from the report I cull such expressions as these: 
 "The work is moving in a way that is absolutely beyond 
 "human control. Hundreds are confessing Christ every 
 month. The Lord is doing glorious things for Africa. 
 The prayers of the home church are being answered." 
 Among the wonders of Cameroun is the development 
 of beneficence. In this field the every-member canvass 
 has been carried out in its fullest extent, and they 
 enroll to-day 18,000 Christians making a weekly gift 
 to the Lord's work. 
 
 Naturally under such conditions it is a problem how 
 to keep out unworthy members. The mission guards 
 against this by a course of instruction and testing in 
 a catechism class lasting two years ; also by a thorough- 
 going system of church discipline. Even so, one church 
 has a waiting list of 1,650. The average Sunday at- 
 tendance for the entire presbytery is over 77,000, while 
 the number of adherents is slightly less than 100,000. 
 
 The mission has established an extensive educational 
 system, including large industrial and agricultural de- 
 
i6o THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 partments. During die \-acation season, selected 
 schoolboys in the higher grades go out two by two 
 among the neighboring tribes, where thev conduct 
 vacation schools and preaching centers. When vaca- 
 tion is over they bring back witli them to die central 
 school all the boys who have made the proper grade 
 in the vacation schools. At the beginning of the Euro- 
 pean War there were seven station schools where the 
 teachers were under :he super\-ision of missionaries, 
 and there were nearly 200 \-illage schools imder black 
 teachers. In the schools of this mission there were 
 over 17,000 pupils. 
 
 Summarizing statements made by t^*o missionaries 
 on furlough, Messrs. Dager and Johnson, the follow- 
 ing reasons for the Cameroun mass movements are 
 given: i. The Bulu are an energetic, ^-irile tribe, hv- 
 ing among the hills, just ripe for something new and 
 better. 2. The leadership and personal influence of 
 Dr. Adolphus Good, *'that prince of Presb\i:erian pio- 
 neer missionaries.'*^ 3. The rapid spread of the village 
 school system, by which each school-house became an 
 evangelistic center. 4. Rigid requirements for church- 
 membership, with corresponding training in catechism 
 classes. 5. Placing responsibiUt)^ for the salvation 
 of their people upon the native church. 6. The spirit 
 of prayer per^*ading the church. 7. Insistence upon 
 self-support. 8. The absence of any competing and 
 confusing denomination working in Cameroun. 
 
 In all these favoring circumstances the missionaries 
 
 » See EUen C. Parsons, A Life for Africa. 
 
THE HEART OF PAGANISM i6i 
 
 see how wonderfully God has prepared this field for 
 the laborers he has sent to gather its harvest, and in 
 their many striking and inspiring successes they feel 
 the working of the Holy Spirit. 
 
 Christianity Advancing 
 
 There are other missionary enterprises in central 
 Africa of which it would be pleasant to speak, did 
 space permit ; but enough has been said to demonstrate 
 that the "heart of paganism" is also the ''zone of 
 Christian advance." From the east and the west and 
 the south the boards have pushed in and have occupied 
 strategic positions. There are vast territories still un- 
 occupied on the upper waters of the Congo, along some 
 of the northern affluents and south of the great bend ; 
 the work is only fairly under way in several of the 
 occupied fields; but even so, great things have been 
 accomplished and the evidence of success has been 
 piled so high that he must be a feeble Christian indeed 
 who thinks that central Africa cannot be won for 
 Christ. There is only one real problem, and that is 
 in the home churches. Will the people at home have 
 vision and courage and consecration enough to do this 
 great thing? The Africans are ready ; the missionaries 
 on the ground are ready ; God is ready ; are we ready ? 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY OF CHRISTIANITY 
 
VII 
 
 AFRICA THE LABORATORY OF CHRIS- 
 TIANITY 
 
 The significance of Africa as the laboratory of 
 Christianity may best be set forth through an experience 
 which came to me on an Easter Sunday at a remote 
 mission station in Gazaland, Southern Rhodesia. This 
 station, which is called Chikore, was founded by the 
 Rev. George A. Wilder, a missionary of the American 
 Board who sixteen years before had pushed into the 
 jungle from Mt. Silinda for the purpose of beginning 
 work among a virile but degraded tribe. They were 
 known as cannibals, although their cannibalism was 
 confined to the eating of one of their foes in war, under 
 the idea that the prowess of the foe would thus pass 
 into their own bodies. The flesh of the slain foe would 
 be cut in long strips, which they hung from the 
 branches of a great tree, known as the Chikore tree. 
 The warriors would be drawn up in a circle and at a 
 signal would rush in and eagerly devour the strips of 
 flesh. 
 
 Easter at Chikore 
 
 Riding through the forest on horse-back that Satur- 
 day morning, I was eager to see what impression had 
 
 165 
 
1 66 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 been made upon these wild people during the sixteen 
 years of work among them. I was prepared to wit- 
 ness lurid scenes of savagery. Imagine then my sur- 
 prise on being met, about a mile from the station, by a 
 band of well-dressed young people, headed by Lincoln, 
 their African teacher, each one carrying a palm branch. 
 They separated into two lines, the boys on one side 
 of the road and the girls on the other, while Mr. 
 King and I rode through. As we passed between the 
 lines the children waved their palm branches in rhythm, 
 while they sang in English, 
 
 Prom Greenland's icy mountains, 
 ^ From India's coral strand; 
 
 Where Afric's sunny fountains 
 
 Roll down their golden sand; 
 From many an ancient river, 
 
 From many a palmy plain, 
 They call us to deliver 
 
 Their land from error's chain. 
 
 It is impossible to convey the impression produced by 
 hearing that missionary hymn sung in the heart of 
 Africa by the children of those who so recently had 
 been cannibals. The effect was electric, and I found 
 every fiber of my being thrilling under the significance 
 of the scene. Evidently Dr. and Mrs. Wilder had not 
 labored in vain. 
 
 I soon learned, however, that paganism had not been 
 entirely overcome in the Chikore tribe. The same 
 day there waited upon me a company of heathen men 
 and women, headed by their ten chiefs, who came, as 
 they said, to extend "a welcome to their country." 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 167 
 
 Their idea as to what was demanded on such an oc- 
 casion was highly original. In a solid mass they 
 squatted by the roadside, the ten chiefs in front. Each 
 chief then insisted upon making a speech and each 
 chief made practically the same speech. The tenor of 
 their remarks was as follows: ''Mfundisi, we don't 
 like these people you have sent to us. We don't like 
 them and we don't like their ways. We don't want 
 to give up our wives. We don't want to wear 
 clothes. We don't want to live in square houses. 
 We don't want to dig the ground in the way they 
 teach. We don't want our children to go to school. 
 We want to be let alone. We like the old ways be- 
 cause the old ways were best. Mfundisi, when you go 
 away to your own country, take all these people with 
 you." These remarks were repeated over and over 
 by the chiefs, not without murmurs and exclamations 
 of dissent from the throng of Christians standing 
 around. But I allowed the chiefs to have their say, 
 each sentence being interpreted by Mr. King, who, in 
 the absence of Dr. Wilder, was in charge of the sta- 
 tion. Before they were half through I made up my 
 mind that they were a set of shrewd old heathen ; also 
 that, so far as the feelings of the people were con- 
 cerned, they were telling me a pack of lies. When, 
 at last, they had finished, I said, "Chiefs, these are 
 strange words which come to my ears. I must think 
 them over. I want to meet you and your followers 
 to-morrow at the Chikore tree, when the sun is there 
 [pointing, African fashion, to the meridian]. To- 
 
i68 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 morrow is a great day for us Christians, and I shall 
 have something important to say to you." 
 
 Now the Chikore tree had been the center of their 
 superstitious rites and orgies for many generations 
 and the chiefs pricked up their ears when I named this 
 spot as our rendezvous; but they all agreed to come. 
 The next morning, being Easter, we held a communion 
 service in the thatched church, which was attended by 
 the entire Christian community. At its close I asked 
 them all to go to the great tree to meet their chiefs 
 and their heathen friends, and I asked them to stand 
 ready to do whatever I desired of them. It was ar- 
 ranged that Lincoln should march them up in a body. 
 Mr. and Mrs. King, Dr. Lawrence, and I went ahead 
 to the place of meeting. The tree proved to be a giant 
 timtomhe, fully fifteen feet in diameter, and with a 
 shade area capable of sheltering a thousand people. 
 The tree stood on a ridge and was a landmark for 
 twenty miles around. The heathen were there in large 
 numbers, and we found they had seated themselves 
 in circles under the outer branches, leaving the interior 
 of the space clear. The chiefs sat in a row by them- 
 selves. There could not have been a better setting for 
 the effect I hoped to produce. 
 
 While we were greeting the people, the sound of 
 gospel hymns came up over the tops of the trees, and 
 I knew Lincoln and his band had started from the 
 station. They made a beautiful sight as they emerged 
 from the forest in double file, singing as they went, 
 each carrying a hymn-book, like a cathedral choir. 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 169 
 
 The men were clothed in white and the women in 
 colors. They marched around the tree and seated 
 themselves on the ground in a solid mass, close to the 
 trunk. 
 
 After prayer and a hymn, the speaking began. Al- 
 luding to the complaint of the chiefs and their state- 
 ment that they wanted back the old days because the 
 old days were best, I told them how I had traveled 
 in many parts of the world, and always had found that 
 Christianity brought a blessing, more food, better 
 clothes, pleasant homes, peace in the heart; but evi- 
 dently that was not the case at Chikore. "Here, you 
 say, the Christian religion is a curse, not a blessing; but 
 let us hear some other testimony. Mr. King, call out 
 some of your converts and let them speak to this 
 question : 'Were the old days best ?' " It took the 
 balance of the afternoon to hear all who wanted to 
 speak. Not one man knew he was to be called upon, 
 yet each one made a new point and nearly all alluded 
 to what used to go on under the Chikore tree. 
 
 Bhande was the first. He said he was the son of 
 a chief. Once when there was trouble in the kraal 
 his father sent him to this place to sacrifice to the 
 spirits. The ground was wet with blood. He added 
 to the blood that day; but no peace came to their 
 kraal. Now they are Christians and their hearts are 
 full of joy. 
 
 Zonzo told how, in the old days, the bush was full 
 of lions, leopards, and hyenas, and how their lives were 
 full of terror; but now the missionaries with their 
 
170 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 wond-erful guns have driven these beasts away, and the 
 women and children can walk through the bush in 
 safety. 
 
 Tom Mapangisana said that in his opinion the old 
 spirit-worship was *'all a farce." He told how this 
 used to be called *'the hungry country," but now they 
 had plenty of food because the missionaries had 
 brought them better seed and had taught them to dig 
 the ground deep. Someone mentioned what a won- 
 derful thing it was to read and write, so that they 
 could send messages to their children and friends when 
 far away. Another had a good word for Dr. Law- 
 rence — ^how he had healed their wounds and given 
 them medicine when they were sick. All this time the 
 chiefs were giving close attention. They began to lean 
 forward and to look to the right and left to see what 
 effect it was having upon their followers. 
 
 Then came forward Ndhlo-hla-hla, the evangelist, 
 who kept smiting his breast and saying, "My heart 
 cries out for you, O chiefs, because you are yet in 
 your sins. You have told a lie to Mfundisi, Where 
 would you go if you were to die this day? Where 
 would you go ?" And he told them where they would 
 go in most explicit fashion. Then he softened in his 
 tone and pleaded very tenderly with them. He drew 
 his Bible from his pocket, and holding it high in the 
 air, he said, "What can you do against the little book ? 
 You have had all the power in your hands, the fighters 
 and the spears, and you have tried to stop this work. 
 You would not let your women go to church, or 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 171 
 
 your children go to school. Have you succeeded? 
 Look how many we are to-day. The little book did 
 it. We had only the little book. Don't you know all 
 this region is to be Christian? O chiefs, you must be- 
 lieve in the little book." 
 
 The sun w^as getting low, and feeling that we had 
 won the day, I brought the service to an end by ask- 
 ing the Christians, both missionaries and natives, to 
 join hands in a circle about the tree. A great circle 
 was formed, as large as the space allowed, and so 
 many wished to be included that a second inner circle 
 was necessary. As Lincoln marched them around the 
 trunk singing a native hymn, I invited the heathen, 
 any who wished to stand with the Christians, to join 
 hands with us. As they came over, young men and 
 young women, mothers with babies on their backs, we 
 opened the circle and took them in, making a strange 
 contrast with the cleanly, well-dressed people of the 
 church. Then I turned to see what effect this was 
 having upon the chiefs, and lo, they were all gone. 
 One by one they had slunk off into the forest. 
 
 Thus closed this strange Easter service in the heart 
 of pagan Africa. Could one desire a surer sign of the 
 living Christ than what we had witnessed that day? 
 In Europe and America the churches were having their 
 flowers and their anthems. Their great organs were 
 pealing forth praise to God and the ministers were 
 preaching eloquent sermons on the resurrection; but 
 to us under that Chikore tree, it seemed that Christ 
 had been in our very midst, revealing his glory in the 
 
172 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 transformed lives of this pagan tribe and demonstrat- 
 ing his power to save unto the uttermost. 
 
 Significance of the Chikore Incident 
 
 Five things emerge from this Chikore incident 
 which have a vital bearing upon missionary work. 
 First J we note the practical benefits which came to the 
 people as a result of the residence of the missionaries 
 in their midst. The speakers mentioned protection 
 from wild beasts, abundance of food, medical relief, 
 and education. The list was by no means complete. 
 Other advantages were suggested by the appearance 
 of the Christian group in contrast with their heathen 
 neighbors, and were in the minds of all. Among these 
 may be mentioned cleanliness, industry, proper hous- 
 ing, and the practise of monogamy. 
 
 Second, we must consider the rapidity of the change. 
 All this was accomplished within sixteen years. In 
 that brief period a whole section of the population 
 had been lifted from barbarism, practically from the 
 bottom level of society, up through all the interven- 
 ing stages of evolution, and placed on a fairly high 
 plane of civilization. That which it had taken us 
 these many centuries of struggle to achieve, these 
 Africans, by our help, achieved in half a generation. 
 This is a sociological fact of the first importance. It 
 is not necessary for barbarous people to struggle up- 
 ward as the white races have done. They can reach 
 civilization at a bound. 
 
 Third, it is to be noted that the change came to these 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 173 
 
 natives as a community. The children were brought 
 under the control of the missionaries, the parents also 
 accepted the leadership of the missionaries in practical 
 affairs, and all advanced together as a distinct group 
 in the midst of the surrounding pagan population. 
 Thus we find support for the sociological axiom that 
 society must be saved as a whole, and that environment 
 plays a prominent part in determining the direction of 
 social progress. 
 
 Fourth, this community was formed by the coming 
 over from heathenism of individuals like Bhande, 
 Zonzo, Tom Mapangisana, and Ndhlo-hla-hla. The 
 missionaries, being in control of the situation, were 
 able at once to place these men in a helpful environ- 
 ment; but let it be noted that they came one by one, 
 each of his own accord, and that certain ones emerged 
 as leaders of the rest. The individualist and the 
 sociologist meet on common ground in the Chikore 
 incident. 
 
 Fifth, spiritual and moral regeneration was at the 
 bottom of the whole process. This was not civiliza- 
 tion by culture or education, but civilization by con- 
 version. It resulted primarily from the working of 
 repentance and faith in the hearts of individual pagans 
 and savages through the preaching of Jesus Christ. 
 Apart from the message of the "Little Book," we are 
 unable to explain the rapidity and the thoroughness 
 of the change. Unless a divine power had been lodged 
 in the lives of these Africans, freeing them from sin 
 and propelling them toward the life of righteousness 
 
174 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 and love, such results never would have been achieved. 
 Environment played an important part, but it was en- 
 vironment shaped by spiritual men. If the history of 
 missions in Africa teaches anything, it is the value 
 of soul transformation as a basis for social improve- 
 ment. When the heart life of a pagan is set right, 
 turning him toward God and away from sin, then his 
 whole being awakes ; a hundred aspirations appear and 
 clamor for satisfaction. Thus we find conversion 
 leading to cleanliness, orderliness, industry, intelli- 
 gence, and material prosperity, as well as to character 
 and peace of mind. When I visited a Christian na- 
 tive's house and found it approached by a good road 
 and set in a well ordered garden, and when within 
 I found the room which was assigned to me well 
 matted, the walls neatly papered, the bed covered with 
 a snow-white counterpane, the table furnished with 
 pen, ink, paper, and a lamp, when I found on the 
 washstand a pitcher, a bowl, and a cake of Pears' soap, 
 then I knew that a spiritual force had taken hold of 
 African society which nothing could withstand. 
 
 Africa is the laboratory of Christianity because it 
 is the field for such experiments as Chikore, Uganda, 
 and Cameroun. The Africans are the raw material 
 of the human race ; here is found some of earth's most 
 refractory ore. If, now, we can take this crude ma- 
 terial and shape it into goodly forms of Christian 
 character and social attainment, then there is nothing 
 in the earth too hard for us to do, then the gospel is 
 indeed the power of God unto salvation. The time 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 175 
 
 is coming when the world will recognize the unique 
 value of this African work as a demonstration of the 
 adequacy of the Christian message to meet the most 
 difficult of human problems. Perhaps Africa will say 
 the last word when it comes to Christian evidences. 
 
 The Final Test 
 
 But someone will ask, do these converts from pagan- 
 ism never relapse ? Are they capable of understanding 
 the loftier truths of the Christian religion, and do they 
 take on the finer graces of Christian character? The 
 first question can be answered briefly; the second is 
 more fundamental. Yes, the converts do relapse in 
 an unfortunate number of instances, and this fact 
 causes the missionaries great trouble and sorrow. 
 Every precaution is taken to refuse church-member- 
 ship to any who come from unworthy motives or with- 
 out sufficient instruction, as also to protect the new 
 members from undue temptation. Catechumen classes 
 are the rule in every mission, and church discipline 
 is maintained with a rigidity unknown in the homer 
 land. Yet after all is said and done, these converts 
 are hardly more than babes in Christ. Behind them 
 are untold ages of animalism. Before them are the 
 exacting ideals of the New Testament. Who can 
 wonder that some fall away? Is it not the wonder 
 that so many stand true? Are all converts to Chris- 
 tianity in Europe and America faithful to their vows ? 
 Do all live consistent Christian lives? I have before 
 me the statistics of the West African Mission of the 
 
176 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 Presbyterian Board, where church disciphne Is en- 
 forced with great strictness, and I find that out of a 
 total membership of 7,407 there were suspended in 
 191 5, 464 persons. This may be regarded as fairly 
 typical, although the mass movement in this mission 
 may increase somewhat the risks which must be taken 
 if new converts are given the encouragement of 
 baptism. 
 
 As to the ability of native Christians to appreciate 
 the lofty truths of our religion and to take on its 
 graces of character, the evidence is abundant and con- 
 clusive. The African is of a deeply religious nature. 
 When once he is freed from fear, and discovers 
 that, humble as he is, he can talk and walk with the 
 infinite God, he not infrequently comes into a spiritual 
 experience of a high order. The very contrast between 
 his present position as a child of God and the heathen 
 darkness out of which he came helps him to aspire. 
 The experience is so new, so wonderful, so limitless 
 in soul possibilities that he often progresses by leaps 
 and bounds. Entering the kingdom of heaven as a 
 little child, in the simplicity and openness of his mind, 
 he sometimes sees things which more cultured Chris- 
 tians overlook. 
 
 Such an one was Bishop Crowther, who was an ex- 
 ample as well as a leader of his great flock in Nigeria. 
 Such is King Khama, who in his eightieth year still 
 lives an exemplary life among the Bamangwato. Such 
 was Kanjundu, the Angola chief, whose Christian 
 spirit in the matter of forgiveness toward his enemies 
 
A HEATHEN NATIVE'S HOME 
 
 A CHRISTIAN NATIVE'S HOME 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 177 
 
 and persecutors has not been surpassed by any mis- 
 sionary. Dr. Hough, secretary of the Foreign Mis- 
 sionary Society of the United Brethren, tells of an 
 African pastor in Sierre Leone, the Rev. R. Cookston 
 Taylor, who not only displayed rare executive effi- 
 ciency in the management of the native church, but 
 who set an inspiring example of practical devotion, 
 often giving not less than one half of his meager in- 
 come to the Lord. There is a tablet to his memory 
 in the church which he served which speaks of "His 
 indomitable courage, sublime faith, unfaltering indus- 
 try, and self-sacrificing devotion." 
 
 Nor are the women outdone by the men in the at- 
 tainment of Christian character. Dr. Halsey, of the 
 Presbyterian Board, tells of "Old Nana,'* who was the 
 second person in Bululand to accept Christ, and who 
 was preeminently first in faithful service and Christ- 
 likeness. It would be hard, if not impossible, to name 
 a Christian virtue which this aged saint did not pos- 
 sess. 
 
 Instances like the above could be multiplied in- 
 definitely and they need not be confined to the educated 
 and privileged Christian natives. Many of the hum- 
 blest converts have shown a remarkable insight into 
 Christian truth. 
 
 To those who have traveled in Africa and have 
 had heart-to-heart talks with Christians like these, 
 there is no room for doubt as to the African's ca- 
 pacity to appreciate the highest truths and to attain to 
 the highest forms of religious life. For those who have 
 
178 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 not had this privilege, the fate of the Uganda martyrs 
 and the story of Livingstone's servants, Susi and 
 Chuma, who would not surrender his body until they 
 had placed it in the hands of the proper British 
 authorities, may well be sufficient. 
 
 Africa's Special Problems 
 
 Africa is differentiated from the other leading mis- 
 sion fields by the fact that her missionaries must be 
 builders of civilization. In lands like Persia, India, 
 China, Japan, the missionaries deal with a culture and 
 a literature older than our own. Their problem is to 
 vitalize and improve. In Africa their task is to build 
 society from the ground up. They must reduce the 
 language to written forms, they must teach the arts 
 and trades, they must establish social customs and in- 
 stitutions, they must formulate a moral code, and they 
 must do all this in ways adapted to the African nature. 
 Their problem is the creation of a Christian African 
 civilization; it is the "naturalization of Christianity" 
 in a race separated from our own by the widest pos- 
 sible racial and temperamental gulf. 
 
 Africa is par excellence the field for industrial edu- 
 cation, and in every large mission the teaching of 
 agriculture and the trades occupies a basal position 
 in the educational scheme. As Du Plessis puts it, "The 
 Bible and the plow must go together in South Africa." 
 Possibly more has been accomplished in Africa by 
 way of relating the system of education to the prac- 
 tical needs of the people than in other mission lands, 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 179 
 
 and certainly far more than has been done at home. 
 Industrial education in the United States is in a chaotic 
 condition, both as to theory and practise. Possibly 
 some of our educational experts might learn a thing 
 or two from schools like Lovedale in Cape Colony, 
 Tiger Kloof in Bechuanaland, and Kondowe in 
 Nyasaland. Nevertheless, industrial education in 
 Africa is bristling with problems. It is easy to give the 
 African a smattering of carpentry or blacksmith- 
 ing, so that he can support himself in a native village 
 and be of some advantage to his neighbors; it is a 
 supremely difficult task to change the economic status 
 of African society, so that it may support churches 
 and schools, and, in general, be placed upon a self- 
 sustaining basis. There are missions where agriculture 
 has been taught and exemplified for thirty years and 
 still the villagers use the native hoe and are content 
 with five or six bushels of corn to the acre. 
 
 When we come to general education the problems 
 are such as to challenge the brightest experts. What 
 should an African girl be studying when she is six- 
 teen? What when she is twenty? Should these chil- 
 dren of the forest be put through the course prescribed 
 for boys and girls in England and America, or should 
 a curriculum be invented, adapted to their constitution 
 and needs? What should an African curriculum con- 
 tain? How much of the course should be taught in 
 the vernacular and how much in the language of the 
 governing power ? How may we preserve what is good 
 in the indigenous customs and life, while engrafting 
 
i8o THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 the culture of the West? What is an ideal normal 
 course for teachers? How shall we train pastors? 
 How shall we inculcate Christian morality while meet- 
 ing governmental standards in school work? These 
 are some of the questions over which our educators in 
 Africa are struggling to-day. 
 
 Then comes medicine. The medical missionary in 
 Africa has been called the advertising agent for the 
 gospel, because so often it is for him to overcome 
 prejudice, break down superstition, and, in general, 
 prepare the way of the Lord. But he is far more 
 than that. There are no more fundamental problems 
 than those which confront the medical men in Africa. 
 With pests sweeping off the cattle in South Africa, 
 with sleeping sickness depopulating large areas in the 
 lake country and along the Congo, with the diseases 
 of civilization spreading among the tribes, and with 
 malaria and black-water fever wrecking many a mis- 
 sionary career, the physician who invests his life in this 
 continent will not lack for a challenging task. Of all 
 workers for Africa, physicians are the hardest to ob- 
 tain. This probably arises from misapprehension 
 as to the scientific quality of the work. One board 
 is in the field with appeals for four physicians, and so 
 highly do they rate the quality of the service that they 
 offer to accepted applicants a special course in tropical 
 medicine at Harvard. 
 
 In the sphere of evangelism and the development 
 of the African church, the great problem is to secure 
 moral stability and self-reliance. Owing to the fact 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY i8i 
 
 that so many regions are not suitable for white resi- 
 dence, Africa, more than any other mission field, must 
 be Christianized by the native church. A strong in- 
 digenous church, self-supporting and self -propagating, 
 is a prime requisite. Upon this problem the ordained 
 men are perpetually at work. Mohammedanism 
 propagates itself, in the main, through the accretion 
 of native tribes. Christianity must provide a higher 
 motive and a mightier propulsion of native forces. 
 Another problem is the coordination of evangelism 
 and of education and social service. The missionaries 
 in Africa are determined that these agencies for human 
 uplift shall not pull apart as they have done to such 
 an unfortunate extent in America ; but that all depart- 
 ments shall aim at spiritual regeneration as the supreme 
 need. To a remarkable degree the missionaries have 
 succeeded in this aim. 
 
 The Race Problem 
 
 At every point in his work the missionary is con- 
 fronted by the race problem, which in Africa takes on 
 an exceedingly acute form. Probably in no part of 
 the world do the passions and prejudices which sepa- 
 rate race from race reach a greater intensity than here. 
 This is particularly true of South Africa, where the 
 whites are bound to possess the land and to rule in 
 their own way and for their own ends, although the 
 blacks outnumber them four to one. We consider that 
 there is something of a race problem in our own United 
 States, but this is a mild affair compared to the 
 
i82 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 strained relations between whites and blacks in certain 
 sections of the Union of South Africa. Nor is it con- 
 fined wholly to these two races. In recent years 
 Hindus and Chinese in considerable numbers have been 
 brought to South Africa for work on the plantations 
 and in the mines, and these people have met with scant 
 courtesy on the part of their white neighbors. A 
 prominent church in a certain city of South Africa 
 was recently holding a revival service when two 
 Hindus wandered in and innocently took their seats 
 among the inquirers. Consternation fell upon preacher 
 and people alike and the proceedings were stopped 
 while the intruders were summarily ejected. Those 
 precious white people were unwilling even to be 
 "saved" in the presence of "the heathen." Apparently 
 this was no place "to get religion" for those who 
 needed it most, or did they need it most? 
 
 The people of South Africa have a good case, on 
 governmental and economic grounds, against import- 
 ing Orientals in large numbers. As with us in the 
 United States, they have enough of a race problem 
 without this new complication. But the intensity of 
 feeling revealed by this incident, and by others which 
 might be cited, indicates the special and peculiarly 
 difficult form which the problem takes in the leading 
 African colonies. In Portuguese territories the more 
 friendly, or shall we say easy-going ideas of the Latin 
 races prevail, and the African is not debarred from 
 lucrative and responsible positions. Portuguese who 
 marry native women, and there are many such, regard 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 183 
 
 their children as essentially white, and send them to 
 the home country for education. In the other Euro- 
 pean colonies the lines of race are drawn with a 
 rigidity unknown in other parts of the world. South 
 Africa solicits the blacks with great earnestness for 
 work in the mines, on the farms, on the docks, and 
 in the homes as domestic servants; but renders it 
 exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, for them to 
 succeed in the trades and the higher callings. The 
 trade unions are well organized and they watch with 
 jealous eye every movement which tends to bring 
 the Africans into competition with their own members. 
 An enterprising Zulu, of my acquaintance, who be- 
 came a skilled cobbler, and set up a shop in Durban, 
 was boycotted by the entire white population. As his 
 fellow Zulus are not addicted to the use of shoes, his 
 enterprise was brought to an untimely end. Had he 
 been satisfied with being employed by a white man, 
 even though that white man had never handled a piece 
 of leather, he could have plied his trade without 
 hindrance; but on no account must he be allowed to 
 get on for himself. From this unjust and cruel posi- 
 tion it is but a step to where the African is shut out 
 from skilled labor of every kind in behalf of the white 
 population. There are those in South Africa who 
 realize the ridiculous position in which they are placed 
 in this matter. They say, "Here we are at one moment 
 calling the natives good-for-nothing heathen, little 
 better than the beasts, and in the next moment raising 
 barriers against them for fear they will deprive the 
 
i84 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 white man of his job." Behold an illustration of the 
 truth that selfishness knows no reason. 
 
 In addition to the fear of competition on the part 
 of native laborers there is the dread of native up- 
 risings which is never entirely absent from the white 
 man's mind. Bloody uprisings have characterized the 
 early days of the European rule in every colony on the 
 continent, and the possibility of their recurrence is by 
 no means eliminated to-day. It is at this point that 
 the missions can be of special service, since they uni- 
 formly inculcate loyalty to the existing government. 
 The British authorities have come to place such a high 
 estimate upon this service that they make liberal grants 
 for mission schools and not infrequently entrust the 
 entire structure of native education to missionary 
 leadership. A prominent British official is on record 
 as saying, "One missionary is worth more than a bat- 
 taHon of soldiers." 
 
 The race problem is a complicated and tortuous sub- 
 ject. It varies greatly in different parts of the con- 
 tinent, but in almost every section it embarrasses the 
 work of the missionary. The prejudice against skilled 
 native laborers creates a special problem for our 
 industrial schools. If, the more we educate the 
 Africans in the trades, the less the white people care 
 to have them around, is such education desirable ? The 
 answer depends upon whether African missions are 
 to be conducted primarily for the whites or for the 
 blacks. If the African needs our arts on his own 
 account and has an inherent right to them, there is 
 
A MISSIONARY MAKING BRICKS, HEALING THE SICK. AND PREACH- 
 ING THE GOSPEL, ALL ON THE SAME DAY 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 185 
 
 nothing for us to do but to go on and give him every 
 possible chance, in the expectation that in the process 
 of time Christian forbearance and love on the part of 
 both races will bring about such adjustments as are 
 desirable. 
 
 Who Is Sufficient for These Things? 
 
 From what has been said, it is clear that a heavy 
 burden of responsibility in every department of work 
 rests upon the African missionary. It is a most exact- 
 ing field, calling for rich endowments of personality 
 and character and for the best possible training. As 
 President Mackenzie has remarked, "It takes the 
 highest to raise the lowest." Yet, strange to say, the 
 opposite idea has prevailed throughout the churches, 
 and, to an unfortunate extent, even in mission boards. 
 There has been too much of the notion that anyone 
 will do for Africa. Not so has it been with the great 
 European societies, which have sent to this field such 
 leaders as Moffat, Livingstone, Mackay, Laws, Gren- 
 fell, and Coillard. The annals of modern missions 
 contain no greater names than these. If America is 
 to do her share in meeting the problems of this con- 
 tinent, she must send out men and women upon whom 
 can hinge social and spiritual movements of large 
 significance. 
 
 Africa peculiarly demands what we call "all-around" 
 men and women. Each missionary must have his 
 specialty, he must be an expert in his chosen field, but, 
 over and above that, he should incarnate the spirit 
 
i86 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 and form of Christianity as a whole. In the affairs 
 of his home, in his business activities, in his govern- 
 mental relations, as well as in the work of his church, 
 his school, or his hospital, he should personify what is 
 best in the Christian religion. Such an one was John 
 Mackenzie of South Africa, who has already been 
 mentioned, and who to the ordinary missionary 
 activities added the functions of a government com- 
 missionership. His biographer (President Mackenzie, 
 his son) pertinently remarks : 
 
 "It is when one reads the life-story of these mis- 
 sionaries in heathen and primitive lands that one 
 realizes the breadth and the strength of grasp which 
 the Christian religion lays upon human society. The 
 missionary presents in his personality and in his actual 
 work that synthesis which some economic students of 
 our day discuss so much, and about which a few of 
 them have so many dreams. Here is a man who at 
 once is a builder of houses, showing people a new 
 ideal of permanence and beauty in the structures 
 which he rears ; he is at the same time the agriculturist, 
 giving them new ideas and desires in the development 
 of lands which have been for ages treated as waste 
 lands; he is the teacher, laboring to awaken the intel- 
 lect of picked men and lead them at least into the 
 vestibule of the intellectual life; he is also at the same 
 time, as we shall see, the ruler who, for a long time, 
 actually represents the British government among 
 them, and to whom natives of all classes come from 
 many towns in all directions for help, and to whom 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 187 
 
 government officials look for information and for ad- 
 vice; he is also the preacher, proclaiming the gospel 
 of the grace of God in Christ Jesus, believing in his 
 heart of hearts that that is the root and crown of all 
 human experience, and that all his other work re- 
 ceives its true interpretation in the light of this funda- 
 mental relationship; and we see finally that he is the 
 spiritual shepherd of a very large flock, striving to 
 know each sheep by name and disposition, giving every 
 week many hours of his congested days to that which 
 he believes to be his supreme task, namely, dealing with 
 the characters of men and women in the light of the 
 law of God and the cross of Christ."^ 
 
 Two lives have recently been given to Africa which 
 illustrate in strangely different ways the qualities which 
 win. They are Dr. Albert Schweitzer, the German 
 scholar and musician, and Mary Slessor, the Scottish 
 factory girl. Dr. Schweitzer stands in the front rank 
 of thinkers and writers upon theological and critical 
 subjects. His book, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, 
 has been read far and wide and is regarded by some 
 as an epoch-making work. Almost equally has he 
 been known as a physician, and as an organist and 
 interpreter of Bach. This man is at work to-day at 
 Lambarene, in the French Congo, as a medical mis- 
 sionary. In odd moments he sits at his cabinet organ 
 and plays the fugues of Bach, while the natives stand 
 around in wondering silence. Dr. Schweitzer sup- 
 
 ^ W. Douglas Mackenzie, John Mackenzie, South African Mission- 
 ary and Statesman, pp. 198-9. 
 
i88 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 ports himself from a fund he accumulated by giving 
 musical recitals in the Fatherland. The breadth of his 
 mind is shown by the fact that he affiliated his work 
 with the mission of the Paris Society for Evangelical 
 Missions. With such a man dedicating his life to 
 missionary work on the Congo, let no student in 
 America say he is too good for Africa- 
 Mary Slessor's life^ should be read by every student 
 of missions. In the matter of professional training 
 she stands at the other end of the line from Dr. 
 Schweitzer. The years she would gladly have devoted 
 to securing a higher education were spent at the mill, 
 where she earned the support of her drunken father 
 and her godly but dependent mother. Hers was the 
 power of a great personality, wholly given to God. 
 When circumstances permitted her to go out as a mis- 
 sionary she was found to possess the qualities needed 
 for pioneer work among the most savage of all the 
 tribes of the Calabar hinterland. When a chief died, 
 scores of innocent people were buried alive. The 
 poison test was almost a daily occurrence. Practically 
 singlehanded, Mary Slessor tamed and civilized this 
 degraded tribe. When the church was established in 
 their midst and the work entered the secondary stage, 
 she asked for another assignment. Pushing farther 
 into the forest, she settled in a savage community where 
 a similar transformation was effected. Later in life 
 she entered a third field as pioneer. Three pagan com- 
 munities surrendered to this slip of a woman, who, at 
 1 W. P. Livingstone, Mary Slessor of Calabar. 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 189 
 
 home, was so timid she would not cross a crowded 
 street alone. In Miss Slessor we have an illustration 
 of the missionary who succeeds, not because of special 
 training, but from courage, versatility, unquenchable 
 ardor, and a profound trust in God. 
 
 Grand Strategy 
 
 In round numbers there are in Africa 80,000,000 
 pagans, 40,000,000 Mohammedans, and 10,000,000 
 Christians. Of the Christians, possibly 3,000,000 are 
 Protestants, the balance being adherents of the Abys- 
 sinian, Coptic, and Roman Catholic Churches. On the 
 numerical basis, the task before Christianity is one 
 of vast dimensions. When we take into consideration 
 the character of the opposing forces, the stolidity of 
 paganism, the aggressiveness of Mohammedanism, the 
 demoralizing selfishness of commercial enterprises, the 
 task becomes stupendous. 
 
 Consider also the matter from the standpoint of 
 unoccupied fields. In North Africa we found the 
 Christian forces well under way in just one section. 
 In the vast expanse of the Sudan a bare beginning has 
 been made. In the Congo basin the boards occupy 
 only narrow strips along the streams. In Portuguese 
 West Africa we have made a scratch upon the sur- 
 face. In Portuguese East Africa a million natives 
 live without a missionary in their midst. Even in 
 Uganda, the best occupied field, nearly one half of the 
 people have not been reached. This is not a situation 
 which the churches of Christ, in the twentieth century 
 
I90 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 after he gave the great command, can view with com- 
 placency. In the mind of every earnest Christian it 
 constitutes a sad indictment of the churches. As a 
 recent missionary speaker said, 'There should be no 
 unoccupied fields." 
 
 All these considerations will be enhanced by the era 
 of peace following the Great War in Africa and in the 
 world. Whether there is to be a "new map of Africa" 
 or not, there is bound to be a speeding up of colonial 
 enterprises throughout the continent. Railroad com- 
 panies, commercial corporations, and governments will 
 be engrossed in new activities. Every resource of the 
 continent will be exploited. There must be a corre- 
 sponding acceleration of the Christian movement, or 
 the churches will fail in the presence of an opportunity 
 unparalleled in their history. 
 
 The military experts have what they call ''grand 
 strategy." That is what we must have in Africa if 
 the continent is to be won. Unrelated local enterprises 
 are not sufficient. We must have plans continental in 
 their scope. We must have leaders of heroic mold, 
 but also such a coming together at the home base as 
 will place the power and resources of the whole Chris- 
 tian church behind the man at the front. As has been 
 said of China, so it should be said of Africa, "No one 
 denomination is equal to this task, and all the de- 
 nominations are unequal to it, working apart." 
 
 What then does "grand strategy" demand ? Clearly 
 it demands a getting together of the Christian forces 
 throughout the world. Suppose the mission boards of 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 191 
 
 Europe and America could establish a board of strategy 
 for Africa, and suppose their constituents would stand 
 loyally and unitedly behind such plans as might be 
 projected, what wonderful things could be done! The 
 task could be parceled out among these allies for 
 Christ, according to some equitable and effective plan. 
 The various sections of North Africa could be allotted 
 to France, Great Britain, Canada, and the United 
 States. The line of mission stations through the 
 Sudan for the winning of the pagan tribes and for 
 the holding back of the Mohammedan advance might 
 materialize through the apportioning of the area to 
 such boards as have little or no work in Africa. In- 
 stead of the overlapping of mission forces in certain 
 parts of South Africa and an entire absence of mis- 
 sionaries in certain parts of Portuguese East Africa, 
 there would result a wise disposal of forces in every 
 part of the continent. Is this a dream, or is it a prac- 
 tical measure of cooperation forced upon us by the 
 exigencies of the situation, and into which the churches 
 are being led by the Spirit of God ? 
 
 The Great Partnership 
 
 "Africa has suffered many wrongs in the past at 
 the hands of the stronger nations of Christendom, and 
 she is suffering wrongs at their hands to-day; but the 
 greatest wrong, and that from which she is suffering 
 most, is being inflicted by the church of Christ, It 
 consists in withholding from so many of her children 
 the knowledge of Christ." Let these burning words 
 
192 THE LURE OF AFRICA 
 
 from the Edinburgh Conference, that greatest gather- 
 ing of missionary boards the world has ever seen, sink 
 into our hearts. 
 
 Volunteers, money, prayers, cooperation, these are 
 the things which Africa demands of the home churches. 
 There should be at least an immediate trebling of the 
 staff of missionaries in the field. Let student volun- 
 teers take notice that Africa is the final test of the mis- 
 sionary motive. Climate, isolation, the primitive 
 character of the people, and race prejudice haunt the 
 minds of not a few volunteers. *'Send me anywhere 
 except to Africa," more than one candidate for mis- 
 sionary appointment has remarked. If that spirit is 
 to prevail, not only Africa will be lost to the kingdom, 
 but the home churches as well. Christianity cannot 
 flourish with one continent left in darkness. 
 
 Then there is the test of money. We shall never 
 win Africa or any other part of the non-Christian 
 world on the present scale of beneficence. There are 
 those who give nobly, but they are pitiably few. As 
 to the rank and file of church-membership, the work 
 of winning the world to Christ is not regarded as a 
 serious obligation. What Christ placed first on his 
 program they place last. Africa calls for the invest- 
 ment of large sums on the part of the Lord's stewards. 
 New regions must be opened up, new tribes approached, 
 new stations founded, new institutions built. Money 
 is needed in strategic amounts, as well as in a multi- 
 tude of small but sacrificial gifts. Some day a million 
 dollars may be donated at one stroke for the saving 
 
AFRICA THE LABORATORY 193 
 
 of Africa. Some day our Christian business men may 
 display the same enterprise and daring for the 
 evangehzation of this continent as the business men of 
 Germany, France, and Great Britain are showing for 
 its commercial development. 
 
 The churches must pray earnestly for these things. 
 The task, humanly speaking, is impossible; it is crush- 
 ing to our spirits. But it is presented to us by Al- 
 mighty God, in whom all resources are found. If we 
 join in the great partnership for the redemption of 
 Africa, we must have the heroic faith of a Livingstone 
 and a Hannington. Livingstone died on his knees. 
 Hannington marched to Uganda and his death, each 
 morning greeting the sunrise with the words of the 
 "Traveler's Psalm" : "I will lift up mine eyes unto 
 the hills, from whence cometh my help." Africa's 
 great missionaries have been preeminently men of 
 prayer. When the obstacles in their way appeared in- 
 surmountable, they took refuge in God. At such a 
 time. Pastor Harms, a Lutheran missionary in South 
 Africa, wrote in his diary, "I had knocked at men's 
 doors and found them shut ; and yet the plan was mani- 
 festly good and for the glory of God. What was to be 
 done? 'Straight-forward makes the best runner.' I 
 prayed fervently to the Lord, laid the matter in his 
 hand, and as I rose up at midnight from my knees, I 
 said, in a voice that almost startled me in the quiet 
 room, ToRWARD Now, in God's Name !' " 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 GENERAL 
 
 Adeney, W. F. The Greek and Eastern Churches. 1908. Fleming 
 
 H. Revell Co., New York. $1.00. 
 Bryce, James. Impressions of South Africa. 1897. Century Co., 
 
 New York. $3.50. 
 Butcher, E. L. Things Seen in Egypt. 19 13. E. P. Button and 
 
 Co., New York. $1.00. 
 Cromer, Earl of. Modern Egypt. 1908. Macmillan Co., New 
 
 York. $6.00. 
 Cureau, Adolphe L. Savage Man in Ce7itral Africa. 1915. T. 
 
 Fisher Unwin, London. 12s. 6d. 
 Drummond, Henry. Tropical Africa. 1896. Charles Scribner's 
 
 Sons, New York. $1.00. 
 Encyclopedia Britannica. Article on Africa. 
 Evans, Maurice S. Black and White in South East Africa. 191 1. 
 
 Longmans, Green & Co., New York. $2.25. 
 Gibbons, Herbert Adams. The New Map of Africa. 19 16. Cen- 
 tury Co., New York. $2.00. 
 Johnston, Sir Harry. A History of the Colonization of Africa by 
 
 Alien Races. 1899. University Press, New York. $1.50. 
 Johnston, Sir Harry. The River Congo. 1884. Sampson Low & 
 
 Co., London. 21s. 
 Johnstone, P. de Lacy. Muhammad and His Power. 1901. Charles 
 
 Scribner's Sons, New York. $1.25. 
 Kelly, R. Talbot. Egypt. 1908. Macmillan Co., New York. 55 
 
 cents. 
 Keltie, John Scott. The Partition of Africa. ' 1895. Stanford, 
 
 London. i6s. 
 Kidd, Dudley. The Essential Kafir. 1904. Macmillan Co., New 
 
 York. $6.00. 
 Lane-Poole, Stanley. The Story of the Barhary Corsairs. 1890. 
 
 G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York. $1.75. 
 Lane-Poole, Stanley. Cairo: Sketches of its History, Monuments, and 
 
 Social Life. 1892. J. S. Virtue & Co., Ltd., London. 4s. 6d. 
 
 194 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 195 
 
 Lane-Poole, Stanley. Egypt in the Middle Ages. 1905. Charles 
 
 Scribner's Sons, New York. $1.75. 
 Livingstone, David. Livingstone's Travels in Africa. 1857. John 
 
 Murray, London. 
 Mackenzie, John. Austral Africa. 2 vols. 1887. S. Low, Marston, 
 
 London. 32s. 
 Morel, Edmund D. Red Rubber. 1906. American Tract Society, 
 
 New York. 60 cents. 
 Morel, Edmund D. The Affairs of West Africa. 1902. William 
 
 Heineman, London. 12s. 
 Nassau, Rev. R. H. Fetishism in West Africa. 1904. Charles 
 
 Scribner's Sons, New York. $2.50. 
 Nevinson, Henry W. A Modern Slavery. 1906. Harper & Brothers, 
 
 New York. $2.00. 
 New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia. Article on Donatists. 
 Orr, Capt. C. W. J. The Making of Northern Nigeria. 191 1. Mac- 
 
 millan Co., New York. $2.75. 
 Powell, Alexander. The Last Frontier. 1914. Charles Scribner's 
 
 Sons, New York. $1.50. 
 Weeks, J. H. Among Congo Cannibals. 1913. J. B. Lippincott 
 
 Co., Philadelphia, Pa. $3-50. 
 White, Stewart Edward. The Land of Footprints. 1912. Double- 
 day, Page & Co., New York. $1.50. 
 Young, Brig.-Gen. G. F. East and West through Fifteen Centuries. 
 
 4 vols. Vols. I, II issued, 1916. Longmans, Green & Co., New 
 
 York. $12.00. 
 Zwemer, S. M. Islam, a Challenge to Faith. 1907. Student Volun- 
 teer Movement, New York. 50 cents. 
 Zwemer, S. M. The Moslem Doctrine of God. 1905. American 
 
 Tract Society, New York. 50 cents. 
 
 MISSIONS 
 
 Beach, Harlan P. Geography and Atlas of Protestant Missions. 
 
 Vol. I. 1902. Student Volunteer Movement, New York. $2.00. 
 Bentley, W. H. Pioneering on the Congo. 1900. Fleming H. 
 
 Revell Co., New York. $5.00. 
 Capen, Edward Warren. Sociological Progress in Mission Lands. 
 
 1914. Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. $1.50. 
 
196 BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 Coillard, F. On the Threshold of Central Africa. 1903. American 
 
 Tract Society, New York. $2.50. 
 Crawford, Dan. Thinking Black. 1912. George H. Doran Co., 
 
 New York. $2.00. 
 Dennis, James S. Christian Missions and Social Progress. 3 vols, 
 
 1 897- 1 906. Missionary Research Library, New York. $5.00. 
 Du Plessis, J. A History of Christian Missions in South Africa. 
 
 191 1. Longmans, Green & Co., New York. $3.50. 
 Edinburgh Conference Reports. Vol. L 
 Fraser, Donald. Livingstonia. Foreign Missions Committee of the 
 
 U. F. Church, Edinburgh, is. 
 Fraser, Donald. Winning a Primitive People. 1914. E. P. Dutton 
 
 & Co., New York. $1.50. 
 Giffin, Kelly. The Egyptian Sudan. 1905. Fleming H. Revell Co., 
 
 New York. $1.50. 
 Harris, John H. Dawn in Darkest Africa. 1912. Smith, Elder & 
 
 Co., London. 
 Hogg, Rena. A Master Builder on the Nile (John Hogg). 1914. 
 
 Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. $1.50. 
 Jack, J. W. Daybreak in Livingstonia. 1901. Fleming H. Revell 
 
 Co., New York. $1.50. 
 Kumm, H. K. W. The Sudan. 1906. Marshall Brothers, London. 
 
 3s. 
 Kumm, H. K. W. From Haiisaland to Egypt Through the Sudan. 
 
 1910. A. Constable & Co., London. i6s. 
 Mackenzie, Jean Kenyon. African Adventurers. 1917. Central 
 
 Committee on the United Study of Foreign Missions, West 
 
 Medford, Mass. Cloth, 50 cents; paper, 30 cents. 
 Mackenzie, Jean Kenyon. An African Trail. 1917. Central Com- 
 mittee on the United Study of Foreign Missions, West Medford, 
 
 Mass. Cloth, 50 cents; paper, 30 cents. 
 Mackenzie, Jean Kenyon. Black Sheep. 19 16. Houghton Mifflin 
 
 Co., Boston. $1.50. 
 MUligan, R. H. The Jungle Folk of Africa. 1908. Fleming H. 
 
 Revell Co., New York. $1.50. 
 MuUins, J. D. The Wonderful Story "of Uganda. 1904. Church 
 
 Missionary Society, London, is. 6d. 
 Noble, F. P. The Redemption of Africa. 2 Vols. 1899. Fleming 
 
 H. Revell Co., New York. $4.00. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 197 
 
 Oldham, J. H. The World and the Gospel. 1916. United Council 
 for Missionary Education, Cathedral House, London. 50 cents. 
 
 Parsons, Ellen C. Christus Liberator. 1910. Macmillan Co., New 
 York. 50 cents. 
 
 Roome, William J. W. Strategic Lines of Christian Missions in 
 Africa. July, 1916. Article, International Review of Missions. 
 
 Springer, John M. Pioneering in tlie Congo. 1916. Methodist 
 Book Concern, New York. $1.00. 
 
 Stewart, J. Dawn in the Dark Continent. 1902. Oliphant, Ander- 
 son & Ferrier, London. 6s. 
 
 Tucker, A. R. Eighteen Years in Uganda and East Africa. 191 1. 
 Longmans, Green & Co., New York. $2.10. 
 
 Watson, C. R. In the Valley of the Nile. 1908. Fleming H. Revell 
 Co., New York. $1.00. 
 
 Watson, C. R. Egypt and the Christian Crusade. 1907. Board of 
 Foreign Missions (United Presbjrterian) . 50 cents. 
 
 Zwemer, S. M. Mohammed or Christ. 19 15. Seeley Service Co., 
 London. 5s. 
 
 BIOGRAPHY 
 
 Battersby, Harford. C. E. Pilkington of Uganda. 1899. Fleming 
 H. Revell Co., New York. $1.50. 
 
 Blaikie, W. G. The Personal Life of David Livingstone. 1880. 
 Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. $1.50. 
 
 Fitzpatrick, Sir Percy. Jock of the Bushveld. 1909. Longmans, 
 Green & Co., New York. 90 cents. 
 
 Harrison, Mrs. J. W. Mackay of Uganda. 1900. George H. Doran 
 Co., New York. $1.50. 
 
 Hawker, G. The Life of George Grenfell. 1909. Fleming H. Revell 
 Co., New York. $2.00. 
 
 Hubbard, Ethel D. The Moffats. 19 17. Missionary Education 
 Movement, New York. Cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
 
 Johnston, Sir Harry. George Grenfell and the Congo. 2 vols. 1908. 
 D. Appleton & Co., New York. $7.50. 
 
 Livingstone, W. P. Mary Slessor of Calabar. 19 16. George H. 
 Doran Co., New York. $1.50. 
 
 MacKenzie, W. Douglass. John MacKenzie. 1902. A. C. Arm- 
 strong & Son, New York. $2.00. 
 
 McCabe, Joseph. St. Augustine and His Age. 1903. G. P. Put- 
 nam's Sons, New York. $2.00. 
 
igS BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 Mcintosh, C. W. Coillard of the Zambezi. 1907. American Tract 
 
 Society, New York. $2.50. 
 Mathews, Basil. Livingstone the Pathfinder. 19 12. Missionary- 
 Education Movement, New York. Cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 
 
 cents. 
 Page, J. The Black Bishop. 1909. Fleming H. Revell Co., New 
 
 York. $2.00. 
 Parsons, E. C. A Life for Africa: Adolphus Clement Good. 1898. 
 
 Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. $1.25. 
 Stanley, Dorothy, Editor. The Autobiography of Henry M. Stanley. 
 
 191 1. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston. $5.00. 
 Wells, James. Stewart of Lovedale. 1909. Fleming H. Revell Co.; 
 
 New York. $1 .50. 
 
53 
 
 ; reli- 
 
 3reign 
 
 33.36 
 
 an, 25 
 f Mo- 
 
 work, 
 
 131; 
 Mo- 
 
I ^.... 
 
INDEX 
 
 Abyssinia, 13. 22, 46, 112; missions in, 
 46 
 
 Abyssinian Church, 46, 189 
 
 Adams, Newton, 100, loi 
 
 Adeney, Walter Frederic, quoted, 45, 
 46 
 
 Afarik, 13 
 
 Africa: area, 16; deserts, 21; explora- 
 tion, 13-18; forests, 19, 20; lakes, 18; 
 languages, 25; mineral wealth, 23; 
 mountains, 22; partition, 112, 139; 
 people, 23-25; population, 25; rivers, 
 18-19; village life, 140, 141; western 
 civilization: benefits, 1 09-1 17; evils, 
 117-133. See also North, Central, and 
 South Africa, and Sudan. 
 
 Akba, 35 
 
 Albert, King of Belgium, 150 
 
 Albert Edward Nyanza, 17, 18 
 
 Albert Nyanza, 18 
 
 Alexandria, 32-35 
 
 Algeria, 32, 35, 42, 71; French railroad 
 projected, 114; mission work, 51-53; 
 moral conditions, 43; the Scnussi, 67 
 
 "Algerian Band," 52 
 
 Amanzimtote, 10 1 
 
 American Baptist Foreign Missionary 
 Society, 151 
 
 American Board of Commissioners for 
 Foreign Missions, 19, 91, 96, 97, 100, 
 130, 165 
 
 Angola, 133, 138, 139, 156; area and 
 population, 156; missions in, 156-158. 
 See also Portuguese West Africa 
 
 Animism, 142 
 
 Amr-ibn-el-Asi, 34 
 
 Arabia, 14, 34, 35, 71; rise of Moham- 
 medanism, 39; success of medical 
 missions in, 66 
 
 Arabs, 24, 34, 36, 59-61, 86; as Mo- 
 hammedan missionaries, 61, 62; their 
 methods, 63 
 
 Assiut, 47, 49; Assiut College, 47, 53 
 Atlantic Ocean, 57 
 Atlas range, 22, 114 
 Augustine, 32, 33, 37 
 
 B 
 
 Baganda, the, 5, 145 
 
 Baker, A. W., 130 
 
 Bakete, the, 154 
 
 Bakuba, the, 154 
 
 Bantu people, 24, 86, 116, 140; reli- 
 gion, 142 
 
 Banza, 152 
 
 Baptists, English, 151, 152 
 
 Baptists, French, 52 
 
 Baptist Convention, Southern (Foreign 
 Mission Board), 76, 77 
 
 Barotse, the, 129 
 
 Barotseland, 129 
 
 Basutoland, 98, 99". results of missions, 
 98 
 
 Basutos, 98, 128 
 
 Bechuanas, 95, 128 
 
 Bedouins, 2, 39 
 
 Beira, 149 
 
 Belgian Congo State, 149 
 
 Benguela, 156 
 
 Bennett, James Gordon, 17 
 
 Berbers, 13, 24; early conversion, 33, 36 
 
 Bhulosi, 100 
 
 Bibars, 3 
 
 Bible Societies, British and Am.erican, 25 
 
 Blantyre Mission, 14&; inroads of Mo- 
 hammedanism, 14S 
 
 Blyden, quoted, 68-70 
 
 Boers, 96, 104; hostile to mission work, 
 94 
 
 Boer War, 22, 104 
 
 Bonjolongo, story of, 153 
 
 Bridgman, Frederick B., 130, 131; 
 quoted, 125-127 
 
 British East Africa, s, 61, 139; Mo- 
 hammedan advance in, 61 
 
 199 
 
200 
 
 INDEX 
 
 British West Africa, liquor trafiBc in, 
 
 123 
 Bulu, the, 160 
 Buxton (explorer), 17 
 Bushmen, 24, 95 
 
 Cairo, 2; population, 3; Church Mis- 
 sionary Society in, 51; United Pres- 
 byterian work in, 47-51 
 
 Cairo College, 47 
 
 Calabar, 188 
 
 Cameron (explorer), 26 
 
 Cameroun, 26, 139; Germany's educa- 
 tional plans, 117; missions: mass 
 movements, 160; native church, 105; 
 success, 158-160 
 
 Cameroun. Mt., 22 
 
 Canada Congregational Foreign Mis- 
 sionary Society, 156 
 
 Cannibalism, 116, 165; in the Congo, 
 
 152 
 
 Cape Colony, 94, 99 
 
 Cape of Good Hope, 15, 86 
 
 Cape-to-Cairo railroad, 6, 8, 115, 149 
 
 Cape Town, 86, 95, 96, 127, 149 
 
 Carthage, 32, 33, 38 
 
 Central Africa, 137-161; animal life, 
 138; characteristics of people, 141; 
 climate, 137, 138; missions, 144-161; 
 natural resources, 139; population, 
 137; religion, 142-144; village life, 
 140, 141; women, 141, 142 
 
 Ceuta, 15 
 
 Chad. See Lake Chad 
 
 Chikore, 165-174 
 
 Chisamba, 156 
 
 Chitambo's, 138 
 
 Christianity: early church, 32-34; 
 downfall, 34-39; challenge of Mo- 
 hammedanism, 74; task to-day, 189- 
 193 
 
 Christians, number in Africa. 189 
 
 Church Missionary Society, 51. 77. 78, 
 80; in Uganda, 145 
 
 Clark, Joseph, 152 
 
 Cleopatra's Needles, 33 
 
 Cocoa industry and slavery, 132, 133 
 
 Coillard, 27, 99, 129. i8s 
 
 Commerce and zeal for Mohammedan- 
 ism, 62, 63 
 
 Congo atrocities, 120, 128. 150, 152 
 
 Congo Free State, 139. 150 
 
 Congo River, 14, 15, 18-20, 23, 138, 
 149, 150; population along basin, 
 150 
 
 Copper deposits. 23, 115, 149 
 
 Coptic Church. 44. 45, 189 
 
 Copts, 2, 45; missions among. 47 
 
 Corey. Stephen J., 152, 153 
 
 Cromer, Lord, 44. 115 
 
 Crowther, Samuel A., 77, 176 
 
 Crusades, effect on Mohammedanism, 
 S3. 60. 81 
 
 Cureau. Adolphe, quoted, 117 
 
 Currie, Walter T., IS7 
 
 Cyprian, 33 
 
 Cyrenaica, 33 
 
 Cyrene, 32 
 
 Cyril, patriarch of Alexandria, 37 
 
 D 
 
 Darfur, 60 
 
 Darwin. Charles, quoted, 156 
 
 Davis, Richard Harding, 2 
 
 Da Gama, Vasco. 15 
 
 Day, David A., 76 
 
 De Brazza, Comte, 128 
 
 Diam.ond mines, 23, 124 
 
 Diaz. Bartholomew, 15 
 
 Diocletian. 33 
 
 Diseases, introduced by western civili- 
 zation. 119. 120 
 
 Domestic and Foreign Missionary So- 
 ciety of the Protestant Episcopal 
 Church. 76 
 
 Donatists. 38 
 
 Dongola campaign, 116 
 
 Drakensbergs, 22 
 
 Drummond, Henry, quoted, 20 
 
 Du Plessis, quoted, 178 
 
 Durban, 11, 127, 149 
 
 Dutch, 16; settlement of South Africa, 
 87 
 
 Dutch Reformed Church, 103, 104 
 
 E 
 Edinburgh Conference, 58, 61, 74. 104, 
 191 
 
INDEX 
 
 20I 
 
 Educational missions, 47-49i lOl, l6o 
 
 Edwards, Mary K., loi 
 
 Egypt, 24, 31, 32, 115; early church in, 
 33; Mohammedan invasion, 34; Cop- 
 tic Church, 44, 45; social conditions, 
 43, 44; missions, 47-49 
 
 Egypt General Mission (English), 51 
 
 Egyptian Sudan, 57, 63; benefits of 
 British rule, 116 
 
 Egyptians, 2, 13, 24 
 
 Elat, 159 
 
 El Azhar, 49, SO, 66 
 
 Emin Pasha, 19, 57 
 
 European control of Africa, 109-127: 
 Benefits, 112-117: industrial devel- 
 opment, 117; railroads, 113-115; tel- 
 egraph, 114; suppressing social evils, 
 116. Evils, 117-133: diseases, 119, 120; 
 industrial problems, 124-127; land 
 problem, 120, 121; liquor traffic, 122, 
 123; race problem, 181-184; taxes, 
 118, 119; wars, 120. Attitude of 
 governments to missions, 132 
 
 European War, 25, 26, 31. 41. 65, 67, 
 8s, 121, 160, 190 
 
 Ferguson, Bishop, 76 
 
 Fetishism, 142 
 
 Fez, 31 
 
 Finnish Missionary Society, 103 
 
 Foreign Christian Missionary Society, 
 152 
 
 France, agreement with Great Britain 
 regarding Sudan, 57, 63, 64; aid of 
 education in colonies, 117; attitude 
 toward Mohammedanism, 64, 65; 
 railroad projects, 114; rule in North 
 Africa, 43; treaty with Morocco, 31 
 
 Eraser, Donald, 147 
 
 Freetown, 75 
 
 French Congo, 139, 187 
 
 French Sudan, 57 
 
 Fvila tribe, 60, 77 
 
 Gazaland, 118, 165 
 
 Germany, 112; railroad projects, 114; 
 educational work in Africa, 117; 
 liquor traffic, 123 
 
 German East Africa, 5, 6, 22, 26, 139; 
 Nohammedan advance in, 61 
 
 German Southwest Africa, 22, 26, 8s, 
 102 
 
 Gibbons, Herbert Adams, quoted, 128 
 
 Gibraltar, 15. 36 
 
 Gladstone, Lord Herbert, 11, 12; Lady 
 Gladstone, 11 
 
 Gold production, 124 
 
 Good, Adolphus C, 27, 160 
 
 Gordon, Charles George, 57, 6s, 145 
 
 Gordon College, 65 
 
 Grant (explorer), 26 
 
 Great Britain, 16, 31, 63; agreement 
 with France regarding Sudan, 57, 63, 
 64; as a colonizing nation, 115, 128; 
 attitude toward Mohammedanism, 
 64, 65; educational development in 
 colonies, 117; liquor traffic, 123; rule 
 in Gambia and Nyasaland, 141 
 
 Great War, the. See European War 
 
 Grenfell, George, 27, 151, 185 
 
 Griggs, Zenora, 75 
 
 Griquas, 95 
 
 Grout, Alden, and Mrs., 27, 93 
 
 Guinea Coast, 139; missions on, 76 
 
 Gulf of Guinea, 18 
 
 H 
 
 Halsey, A. W., 177 
 
 Hannington, 6, 27, 193 
 
 Harms, Pastor, 193 
 
 Hartzell, Bishop, quoted, 80 
 
 Hausa, people, 60; states, 77 
 
 Henry, Prince (of Portugal), 14, 15 
 
 Hippo, 32 
 
 Holland, liquor traffic from, 123 
 
 Hottentots, 24; beginning of missions, 
 
 94 
 Hough, S, S., 75, 177 
 Hussein (sultan of Egypt), 31 
 
 Gairdner, Canon W. H. T., 5: 
 Gambia, 141 
 
 Ikoko, 151, 152 
 Inanda, loi 
 
202 
 
 INDEX 
 
 India, 14, 15, 32 
 
 Indian Ocean, 15 
 
 Industrial missions: essential for Af- 
 rica, 178, 179; in the Cameroun, 159; 
 Lovedale, 99; problems, 184 
 
 Innes, George, quoted, 50 
 
 International Review of Missions, The, 
 59 
 
 Irrigation, iis 
 
 Islam, meaning of term, 40. See a]so 
 Mohammedanism 
 
 Italy, 31, 43 
 
 Johannesburg, 23; missionary opportu- 
 nity in, 130, 132; neighboring popula- 
 tion, 124; social and industrial prob- 
 lems, 124-126; social service in, 130, 
 
 131 
 Johnson, Samuel, quoted, 117 
 Johnston, Sir Harry, 151; quoted, 143, 
 
 144 
 Judaism, 34 
 
 Kabyles, 42 
 
 Kafirs, 95 
 
 Kafir War, 97 
 
 Kalahari Desert, 21, 22 
 
 Kambove, 149 
 
 Kanjundu, 156, 157. 176 
 
 Kassai, River, 154; tribes, 154 
 
 Katanga, 23, 115, 131. I49; copper de- 
 posits, 23 
 
 Kenia, Mt., 22 
 
 Khalifa, the, 63. 116 
 
 Khama, King, 95, 176 
 
 Khartum, 64. 65, 79 
 
 Kilimanjaro, Mt., 22 
 
 Kimberley mines, 23, 127; missionary 
 opportunity in, 130 
 
 Kingsley, Charles, 37 
 
 Kitchener, 57. 63, 68, 116 
 
 Kondowe, 148, 179 
 
 Koran, 40, 65 
 
 Kordofan, 60 
 
 Kufic text, 3 
 
 Kumm, H. K. W., 79 
 
 Kuruman, 95, 96 
 
 Lake Chad, 18, 114 
 
 Lake Nyasa, 18 
 
 Lambuth, Bishop, 155 
 
 Land question, 120, 121 
 
 Lane-Poole, Stanley, 2 
 
 Lapsley, Samuel, 27, 154 
 
 Lausanne, treaty of, 31 
 
 Laws, Robert, 27, 147, 185 
 
 Lawson, Edward, 16, 17 
 
 Leopold, King, 153 
 
 Liberia, 76, 77, 112 
 
 Libyan plateau, 3 
 
 Libyans, 24, 86 
 
 Liquor traffic, 122, 123, 132 
 
 Lindley, Daniel, 97. 98 
 
 Livingstone, David, 6, 8, 16-18, 27, 62, 
 
 95, 96, 113. 114. 129, 132, 138, 147- 
 
 149, i8s, 193 
 Livingstone Memorial Mission, 147 
 Loanda, 156 
 
 Lobolo, or wife purchase, 90, 102 
 London Missionary Society, 88, 94; 
 
 beginnings in South Africa, 94 
 Lovedale, 96, 99, 179 
 Lualaba, 18 
 
 Lucknow Conference, 58, 80 
 Luebo, 154. I55 
 Lull, Raymond, 81 
 Lutheran Church, Board of Foreign 
 
 Missions of General Synod of, 76 
 Lutuli (native teacher) , 1 1 
 
 M 
 i.v5ackay, Alexander, 27, 145, 147, 185 
 Mackenzie, Jean Kenyon, 142; quoted, 
 
 158, 159 
 Mackenzie, John, 27, 88, 95, 186 
 Mackenzie, William Douglass, 88, 89; 
 
 quoted, 185-187 
 Mahdi, the, 57, 68, 116 
 Mamelukes, 3 
 Mandingos, 60 
 Masai, the, 5 
 Mashonaland, 104 
 Mass movements in the Cameroun, 
 
 158-160 
 Matadi, 151 
 McClenahan, R. S., quoted, 53 
 
INDEX 
 
 203 
 
 Medical missions: in Congo Mission, 
 152; in North Africa, 49; in Sierra 
 Leone, 75; problems, 180; success in 
 other Mohammedan fields, 66, 75, 77 
 
 Mediterranean coast, 13 
 
 Melut, 79 
 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, Board of 
 Foreign Missions of, 51, 149, is6 
 
 Methodist Episcopal Church South, 
 Board of Missions of, 155 
 
 Milton, quoted, 4 
 
 Missionaries, type needed, 185-188; 
 number needed, 192 
 
 Missions: attitude toward governments, 
 184; development of African church, 
 180, 181; education, 47-49, loi, 160, 
 179; industrial training, 178, 179; 
 literary work, 25, 51; medical work, 
 49, 152, 170, 180; necessary to offset 
 evils of civilization, 129, 130; prin- 
 ciples, 173, 174; problems, 178, 181- 
 184; results, 169-172, 174; strategy, 
 58, 59, 75. 80, 81, 189-193; war's 
 effect, 25, 26. See also Missions 
 under North, central, and South Af- 
 rica, and Sudan 
 
 Moflat, Robert, and Mrs., 27, 95, 96, 
 147. 185 
 
 Mohammed, 34, 54; attitude toward 
 women, 42 
 
 Mohammed V., 31 
 
 Mohammedanism: rise in Arabia, 39; 
 conception of God, 39; creed, 67; 
 defects, 40-44; fatalism, 40; Koran, 
 40. Effect of Crusades upon, 53. 
 Early advance: North Africa, 34-36, 
 39, 40, 45 ; Europe, 36. Present ad- 
 vance: Sudan, 59-70, 80; in North 
 Africa, 39; in Congo, 80; in South 
 Africa, 87. Effect on pagan tribes, 
 71-73. El Azhar University, 49, 50, 
 66. Missionary methods, 68-70. 
 Numerical strength, 189. Political 
 power waning, 31, 32. Religious 
 strength, 32, 146. Relation to Chris- 
 tianity, 70-73. Senussi, 67. Atti- 
 tude of English and French govern- 
 ments, 64-66 
 
 Mombasa, 4, 6, 15 
 
 Monophysite controversy, 44 
 
 Moors, 14, 31; described by Alexander 
 Powell, 41, 42 
 
 Morel, E. D., 71 
 
 Morocco, 15, 32, 35, 43, 71; mission 
 work, 51; death penalty for conver- 
 sion, 54; railroads, 114; sultan of, 31 
 
 Mott, John R., 68 
 
 Mtesa, King, 145, 146 
 
 Muhlenberg Mission, Lutheran General 
 Synod, 76 
 
 Murray, Andrew, 105 
 
 N 
 
 Namaquas, 95 
 
 Natal, II, 13, 22; missionary begin- 
 nings, 96; uprising in 1906, 89 
 
 Native church: North Africa, 49, SO; 
 among Zulus, loi; in Cameroun, 159; 
 in Nyasaland, 148; in Uganda, 146; 
 on the Congo, 152; on the Kassai, 
 154. Character of converts, 176, 177. 
 Church discipline, 159, 175, 176. 
 Possibilities, 105, 106. Problems, 
 180, 181 
 
 Nigeria, 61, 65, 77; attitude of Great 
 Britain to Mohammedanism, 65; 
 liquor law, 122. Northern Nigeria. 
 Mohammedan influence on tribes 
 71; Christianity and Mohammedan- 
 ism, 77; missions, 79- Southern Ni 
 geria, 139; liquor traffic, 123 
 
 Niger Mission, 77 
 
 Niger River, 18 
 
 Nile Mission Press, 51 
 
 Nile River and valley, 3, 13, 14, 17, 18, 
 21, 34. 36 
 
 Noble, Frederick Perry, 143 
 
 North Africa: early Christian church in, 
 32, 33. 36-39; European control, 43; 
 invasion of Mohammedanism, 33; 
 missions, 46-53; Senussi, 67; social 
 conditions, 39-44; surviving oriental 
 churches, 44-46; unoccupied fields, 
 52-54. 189 
 
 North Africa Mission, 51 
 
 Nubians, 2 
 
 Nimian, 79 
 
 Nyasa. See Lake Nyasa 
 
2 04 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Nyasaland, British rule, 141; missions, 
 147, 148; Mohammedan advance, 61 
 
 OflBcer, Morris, 76 
 
 Oldham, J. H., quoted, 73 
 
 Omar (Caliph), 35, 43 
 
 Omdurman, battle of, 63, 68, 1 16 
 
 Omer, Arthur, 19 
 
 Orr, Captain, 78, iis; quoted, 70, 71 ■,] 
 
 Ouled-Nails, 42 
 
 Pagans, number of, 189 
 
 Paris Society for Evangelical Missions, 
 
 99. 188 
 Pigmies, 24 
 Pilkington, 27, 146 
 Port Said, 4 
 
 Portugal, 133; early conquest and ex- 
 ploration, 14, IS 
 Portuguese East Africa, S. 103, 139; 
 
 race question, 182; unoccupied fields, 
 
 189, 191 
 Portuguese navigators, 14, 26, 59 
 Portuguese West Africa. 115, 132, is6; 
 
 race question, 182; unoccupied fields, 
 
 189. See also Angola 
 Powell, E. Alexander, quoted, 41, 42, 
 
 "5 
 Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., 
 
 Board of Foreign Missions, 158, 159, 
 
 176 
 Presbyterian Church in the U. S. 
 
 (Southern), Executive Committee of 
 
 Foreign Missions, 154 
 Pretoria, i; economic problems, 127 
 Principe (island), 133 
 Ptolemy, 14 
 Pyramids, 3 
 
 Race problem, 181-184 
 
 Railroads, 113-115 
 
 Rainsford, 27 
 
 Rand, The, 124, 125 
 
 Red Sea, 5, 13, 57 
 
 Rhenish Missionary Society, I02, 103 
 
 Rhodes, Cecil, 8, 27, 88 
 
 Rhodesia, 19, 20, 9S, 102, 139 
 
 Richards, Henry, 152 
 
 Robert College, 49 
 
 Roman Catholic Church, 189; in 
 
 Uganda, 146 
 Roome, William J. W., 59. 79. 80 
 Roosevelt, Theodore, 27 
 Rotifunk, 75 
 Ruwenzori, 22 
 
 S 
 
 Sahara Desert, 14, 19. 21, 57, 59. "4 
 
 Salad in, 3 
 
 Sao Thom^, 133 
 
 Saracens, 40 
 
 Schmidt, George, 94 
 
 Schweitzer, Albert, 187, 188 
 
 Senussi, the, 67 
 
 Shaw, Barnabas, 95 
 
 Shilluk, the, 78 
 
 Shuey, W. J., 75 
 
 Sierre Leone, 75 
 
 Silinda, Mt., 19, 165 
 
 Slave trade: early Arab, 60; effect of 
 European rule upon, 116; relation to 
 Mohammedan advance, 62; suppres- 
 sion in Portuguese West Africa, 132; 
 domestic slavery, 140, 147 
 
 Sleeping sickness, 148, 180 
 
 Slessor, Mary, 27, 187-189 
 
 Social evils, 102; effect of European 
 rule upon, 116 
 
 Social service, 130 
 
 Sofala, 59 
 
 Somali, the, 5 
 
 Songhai, the, 60 
 
 South Africa: British rule, 116; char- 
 acteristics of people, 90; Dutch set- 
 tlement, 87; industrial problems, 124- 
 127. Missions: beginnings, 94-96; 
 difficiilties, 96-98; results, 91-101; 
 cooperation of British government, 
 loi; strategy, 191; task of native 
 churches, 103-106; unoccupied fields, 
 102, 103. Race problem, 181-183; 
 social conditions, 89, 90 
 
 South Africa Compounds Mission, 130 
 
 South Africa General Mission, 105 
 
 Speke, 17, 26 
 
INDEX 
 
 205 
 
 Springer, John M., 131. I49. ISO 
 
 Stanley, Henry M., 16-19, 22, 26, 112, 
 138, 146, 149, ISO; rescue of Emin 
 Pasha, 57; quoted, 144 
 
 Stanley Falls, 151 
 
 Stanley Pool, 151, 154 
 
 Starr, Prof.. 72 
 
 Stewart, James, 27. 99. I47 
 
 Sudan, 2, 14, 18, 20, 24, 32, 85. British 
 rule, 63-65. Mohammedanism: early 
 invasion, 59, 60; present advance, 57- 
 63, 67. Missions: United Presbyte- 
 rian work, 78; strategy, 191; unoccu- 
 pied fields, 189. Population, 57. 
 Railroads, 114 
 
 Sudan United Mission, 79, 80 
 
 Suez Canal, s 
 
 Swahili, the, 5, 61 
 
 Swedish missions, 46 
 
 Syrian Protestant College, Beirut, 49 
 
 Tanganyika, Lake, 16-18, 114, 151 
 
 Tanta, 49 
 
 Tarik, 36 
 
 Taylor, R. Cookston, 177 
 
 Tertullian, 33 
 
 Tibesti, 21 
 
 Tidrick, Ralph W., 78, 79 
 
 Tiger Kloof, 179 
 
 Timbuktu, 60, 114 
 
 Togoland, 117 
 
 Trade unions, 183 
 
 Translation of Scriptures, 25 
 
 Transvaal, 13, 97 
 
 Tripoli, 31, 32, 35, 43; mission work in, 
 
 51; the Senussi, 67 
 Trotter, Lilias, 52-54 
 Timis, 13, 43; mission work in, 51, 52 
 Turkey, 31, 32, 49. 65, 66, 71 
 Turks, 2, s; attitude of Senussi toward, 
 
 67 
 Twin babies, strangling of, 116 
 
 U 
 Ubangi, 151 
 
 Uganda, 5, 105, 129, 139; missions in, 
 144-146; unoccupied sections, 189 
 
 Ujiji. 17 
 
 Umvoti, 91 
 
 Union of South Africa, 98, 103; land 
 question, 120; liquor law, 122; race 
 problem, 182, 183 
 
 United Brethren, Foreign Missionary 
 Society of the, 75, 177 
 
 United Free Church of Scotland, 96, 99 
 
 United Presbyterian Church of North 
 America, 47-49. 78 
 
 United States, 43; attitude toward slav- 
 ery on cocoa plantations, 133; liquor 
 traffic with Africa, 123 
 
 Unoccupied fields, 52, 189. 190 
 
 Victoria Falls, 6-8, 114 
 Victoria Nyanza, 17. 18 
 
 W 
 
 Wadai, 60 
 
 War-dance, 8-10 
 
 Watson, Dr. Charies R., 48 
 
 Wembo-Niama, 155 
 
 Wesleyan Missionary Society, English, 
 
 95. 96 
 White, Stewart Edward, 27, 139 
 Wilder, George A., 165-167 
 Wingate, Sir Reginald, 116 
 Witchcraft and witch-doctor, 142, 143 
 Woman's Board of Missions, Boston, 
 
 lOI 
 
 Women, Condition of, under Moham- 
 medanism, 41-43, 72, 73; in central 
 Africa, 141, 142; in South Africa, 90, 
 92 
 
 Yoruba people, 77 
 
 Z « 
 
 Zambezi, 6, 14. 18, 20, 60. 85, 87, 103 
 Zulus, 11; characteristics, 100; results 
 of missions, 91-93. 100, loi; unoccu- 
 pied fields, 102; uprising of 1906, 89, 
 118 
 Zwemer, Samuel M., 50, Si 
 
Eist of 
 Corressponbentsi 
 
 THE Missionary Education Movement is conducted in behalf of the Foreign 
 and Home Mission Boards and Societies of the United States and Canada. 
 Orders for literature on foreign and home missions should be addressed 
 to the secretaries representing those organizations, who are prepared to furnish 
 special helps to leaders of mission study classes and to other missionary workers. 
 
 If the address of the secretary of the Foreign or Home Mission Board or Society 
 of your denomination is unknown, orders may be sent to the Missionary Educa- 
 tion Movement. All persons ordering from the Missionary Education Movement 
 are requested to indicate their denominations when ordering. 
 
 Advent Christian — American Advent Mission Society, Rev. George E. Tyler, 
 i6o Warren Street, Boston, Mass. 
 
 Associate Reformed Presbyterian — Young People's Christian Union and Sab- 
 bath School Work, Rev. J. W. Carson, Newberry, S. C. 
 
 Baptist (North) — Department of Missionary Education of the Cooperating 
 Organizations of the Northern Baptist Convention. 23 East 26th Street, 
 New York City. 
 
 Baptist (South) — Foreign Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, 
 Rev. T. B. Ray, 1103 Main Street, Richmond, Va. (Correspondence con- 
 cerning both foreign and home missions.) 
 
 Baptist (Colored) — Foreign Mission Board of the National Baptist Conven- 
 tion, Rev. L. G. Jordan, 701 South Nineteenth Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 
 
 Christian — The Mission Board of the Christian Church; Foreign Missions, Rev. 
 M. T. Morrill; Home Missions, Rev. Omer S. Thomas, C. P. A. Building, 
 Dayton, Ohio. 
 
 Christian Reformed — Board of Heathen Missions, Rev. Henry Beets, 2050 
 Francis Avenue, S. E., Grand Rapids, Mich. 
 
 Church of the Brethren — General Mission Board of the Church of the Breth- 
 ren, Rev. Galen B. Royer, Elgin, 111. 
 
 Congregational — American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, Rev. 
 D. Brev/er Eddy, 14 Beacon Street, Boston, Mass. 
 American Missionary Association, Rev. C. J. Ryder, 287 Fourth Avenue, New 
 
 York City. 
 The Congregational Home Missionary Society, Rev. William S. Beard, 287 
 Fourth Avenue, New York City. 
 
 Disciples of Christ — Foreigri Christian Missionary Society, Rev. Stephen J. 
 Corey, Box 884, Cincinnati, Ohio. 
 The American Christian Missionary Society, Mr. R. M. Hopkins, Carew Build- 
 ing, Cincinnati, Ohio. 
 
Evangelical Association — Missionary Society of the Evangelical Association, 
 Rev. George Johnson, 1903 Woodland Avenue, S. E., Cleveland, Ohio. 
 
 Evangelical Lutheran — Board of Foreign Missions of the General Council of 
 
 the Evangelical Lutheran Church in N. A., Rev. George Drach, Trappe, Pa. 
 Board of Home Missions of the General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran 
 
 Church in North America, 805-807 Drexel Building, Philadelphia, Pa. 
 Board of Foreign Missions of the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran 
 
 Church in the U. S. A., Rev. L. B. Wolf, 21 West Saratoga Street, Baltimore, 
 
 Md. 
 Board of Home Missions and Church Extension of the Evangelical Lutheran 
 
 Church, Rev. H. H. Weber, York, Pa. 
 Board of Foreign Missions of the United Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran 
 
 Church in the South, Rev. C. L. Brown, Columbia, S. C. 
 
 Friends — American Friends Board of Foreign Missions, Mr. Ross A. Hadley, 
 Richmond, Ind. 
 Evangelistic and Church Extension Board of the Friends Five Years' Meeting, 
 Mr, Harry R. Keates, 13 14 Lyon Street, Des Moines, Iowa. 
 
 German Evangelical — Foreign Mission Board, German Evangelical Synod of 
 North America, Rev. E. Schmidt, 1377 Main Street, Buffalo, N. Y. 
 Board of Home Missions of the German Evangelical Synod of North America, 
 
 Evansville, Ind. 
 
 Methodist Episcopal — The Department of Missionary Education. Represent- 
 ing the Board of Foreign Missions, the Board of Home Missions and Church 
 Extension, and the Board of Sunday Schools, 150 Fifth Avenue, New York 
 City. 
 
 Methodist Episcopal (South) — The Educational Department of the Board of 
 Missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, Rev. E. H. Rawlings, 
 810 Broadway, Nashville, Tenn. (Correspondence concerning both foreign 
 and home missions.) 
 
 Methodist Protestant — Board of Foreign Missions of the Methodist Protestant 
 Church, Rev. Fred. C. Klein, 316 North Charles Street, Baltimore, Md. 
 Board of Home Missions of the Methodist Protestant Church, Rev. Charles H. 
 Beck, West Lafayette, Ohio. 
 
 Moravian — The Department of Missionary Education of the Moravian Church 
 in America, Northern Province, Rev. F. W. Stengel, Lititz, Pa. 
 
 Presbyterian (U. S. A.) — The Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian 
 
 Church in the U. S. A., Mr. B. Carter Millikin, Educational Secretary; Rev. 
 
 George H. Trull, Sunday School Secretary, 156 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 
 
 ''oard of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., Mr. J. 
 
 Edward Tompkins, 156 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 
 
 Presbyterian (U. S.) — Executive Committee of Foreign Missions of the Presby- 
 terian Church in the U. S., Mr. John I. Armstrong, 154 Fifth Avenue, North, 
 Nashville, Tenn. 
 General Assembly's Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. 
 Rev. S. L. Morris, 1522 Hurt Building, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 Protestant Episcopal — The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the 
 Protestant Episcopal Church in the U. S. A., Mr. W. C. Sturgis, 281 Fourth 
 Avenue, New York City. 
 
 Reformed Church in America — Board of Foreign Missions. Rev. E. W, Miller; 
 Board of Home Missions, Rev. W. T. Demarest; Board of Publication and 
 Bible School Work, Rev. T. F. Bayles. 25 East Twenty-second Street, New 
 York City. 
 
 Reformed Church in the United States — Mission Study Department. Rep- 
 resenting the Boards of Home and Foreign Missions, Mr. John H. Poor- 
 man, 304 Reformed Church Building, Fifteenth and Race Streets, Philadel- 
 phia, Pa. 
 
United Brethren in Christ — Foreign Missionary Society, Rev. S, S. Hough, 
 Otterbein Press Building, Dayton, Ohio. 
 Home Missionary Society, Miss Lyda B. Wiggim, United Brethren Building, 
 
 Dayton, Ohio. 
 Young People's Work, Rev. 0. T. Deever, Otterbein Press Building, Dayton, 
 Ohio. 
 
 United Evangelical — Home and Foreign Missionary Society of the United 
 Evangelical Church and Board of Church Extension, Rev. B. H. Niebel, 
 Penbrook, Pa. 
 
 United Norwegian Lutheran — Board of Foreign Missions United Norwegian 
 Lutheran Church of America, Rev. M. Saterlie, 425-429 South Fourth Street, 
 Minneapolis, Minn. 
 Board of Home Missions, United Norwegian Lutheran Church of America, Rev. 
 Olaf Guldseth, 425 South Fourth Street, Minneapolis, Minn. 
 
 United Presbyterian — Mission Study Department of the Board of Foreign Mis- 
 sions of the United Presbyterian Church of North America, Rev. James K. 
 Quay, 200 North Fifteenth Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 
 Board of Home Missions of the United Presbyterian Church of North America, 
 Rev. R. A. Hutchison, 209 Ninth Street, Pittsburgh, Pa. 
 
 Universalist — Department of Missionary Education of the General Sunday 
 School Association of the Universalist Church, Rev. A. Gertrude Earle, 
 Methuen, Mass. 
 
 CANADIAN BOARDS 
 
 Baptist — The Canadian Baptist Foreign Mission Board, Rev, J. G. Brown, 223 
 Church Street, Toronto, Ontario. 
 
 Church of England — The Missionary Society of the Church of England in 
 Canada, Rev. Canon S. Gould, 131 Confederation Life Building, Toronto, 
 Ontario. 
 
 Congregational — Canada Congregational Foreign Missiona.ry Society, Miss Effie 
 Jamieson, 23 Woodlawn Avenue, East, Toronto, Ontario. 
 
 Methodist — Young People's Forward Movement Department of the Missionary 
 Society of the Methodist Church, Canada, Rev. F. C. Stephenson, 299 Queen 
 Street, West, Toronto, Ontario. 
 
 Presbyterian — Presbyterian Church in Canada, Board of Foreign Missions, Rev. 
 A. E. Armstrong, 439 Confederation Life Building, Toronto, Ontario. 
 
 Revised to May i, 1917 
 
Date Due 
 
 L«^ *'/ 
 
 '4« 
 
 
 
 4 A -» n »r« 
 
 
 
 
 ";ov2 d 
 
 i' 
 
 
 
 n -1 
 
 'PTtt 
 
 
 
 
 or 
 
 
 
 -*;" 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 - 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 f)