Letters and Articles 33–46

Dear Mr Stevenson

Youre a fine flatterer I can gather from your letter, & the present occasion gives you a good chance I must say, to set it off, but O if you only kent(Note 2) how small & ashamed I feel at the very thought of such a piece of Xtian(Note 3) Philanthropy being associated with my poor name you would never speak of my writing about myself or my wanderings, for I feel as if I can never come out of the bush & go among other people with this distinguishing mark on me. Why should I be lifted up above the others who are working better, & perhaps far more successfully in God’s sight than I am? & what have I ever been able to do except what God has done Himself, & could have done as easily without me. I’ve not sacrificed a single happiness or incurred a single hardship by any work, for I have such an even, happy, peaceful, *satisfied* life, that I feel quite a fraud. I think there is not a woman on earth more highly blessed than I am. However it is a *grand* gift this of Mr Kemps, & I’m so glad with & for our people in its bestowal. Then too, Itu is already being justified as the site for such a house of healing, for there are hundreds of men on the river frontage there, making a Railway Embankment. It will be the base of lines for Road & Rail which shall intersect the whole of this Ibibio Country, down to the estuary, & across to the Niger. Such things are being rushed before our eyes, things that never entered the wildest dreams of Calabar.

In all this how plainly has God been leading me! I had not a thought of such things in my lifetime, nor indeed in the next generation, & yet my steps have been *led*, apart from any plan of mine, right to the line of God’s planning for the Country. First Itu; then the Creek; then back from Aro, where I had set my heart, to a solitary wilderness of the most forbidding description; where the silence of the bush had never been broken, & here, before 3 months are past, there are miles of road, & miles & miles more all surveyed & being worked upon by gangs of men from every where, & free labour is being created & accepted as quickly as even a novelist cd. imagine. And the Minutes say, “ I am to return to Akpap in April”.(Note 4)

It *would* be “going home” as you say, & Okoyon & its people are very dear to me. No place on earth now is quite as dear, but to leave these hordes of untamed, unwashed, unlovely Savages, & withdraw the little rushlight begun to flicker out over its darkness!! I dare not think of it! Whether the Church permits it or not, I feel I must stay here, & even go on farther, as the roads are made. I cannot walk now, nor dare I do any thing to trifle with my health, which is very queer now & then, but, if the roads are all the easy gradients of those already made, I can get 4 wheels made, & set a box on them & the children can draw me about. They are going *round* the hills, & in that case it wd. be easy for us. The officers are running past on ’Bikes’ even now & there is waterway up to the beach here all the year round for even deep draught steamers. There is already a factory at the beach, so we can buy things as easily as they can in Calabar. This is a wealthy country, & our Mission must haste to enter, or ask others to do so, before R.C. or Mohamedans do so, as the Govt. will take any one willing & able to teach the people. Also the weak part in our Calabar Mission work is the want of any industry or shelter for women. Where are Mrs Goldies Girls? & many more brought up in the Mission, but whom the Missionaries do not need in their service. Either living with Coast Men, or sitting any how, rather than go into a harem. For there is nothing but market & sewing machines for women, & (Note 5) every woman has a machine & all women can’t earn a living in the market. We *must* have something at which a decent Xtian woman who wishes to earn her living, can do so, apart from native marriage. We must really try *at* *once* to get something done, & that something must not be in the evil & overcrowded environment of a shipping port like Calabar. Every woman born here can work land, raise stock, & etc, & we could get land up country for this purpose, & for women who cd. do laundry work, near the river, as there are weekly strs(Note 7), & will soon be more than weekly service, & officers are scattered all over the Cross River & Aro Chuku, & Ibibio districts with strs & runners to carry & fetch every week at least. Then too, there is baking, & this great tribe are still naked, so there could be dress making up here! Then there shd. be Elementary schools both for boys & girls, with farm work, mat making, & etc attached, & these scattered about will supply the Sabbath services just as well as the formulae of the Church & Minister would. This is an absolute necessity at once. The value of land will soon rise to a fictitious value, & it is true economy to invest in something that will be a basis for work in the future. Had our Church kept on her brickfield, & got a saw mill 5 years ago, we wd. have had practically all the workmen in the country in our influence. It has been lost to us, & we have not only lost the moral influence, but the Govt employ hundreds of men at hese two branches alone at immense profits in £.s.d. The same salaries as we are paying, if scattered over new places with inexpensive houses, & with girls schools, & a Minister with a boys industrial school station, wd. cover the country with a net work of simple agencies, & let the old stations be manned at Calabar by one man, one man at a Station. I can give up this very good comfy little house to any one you may send up here & I shall go farther on, or I shall get up a place farther on inexpensively for any one & stay here, just as the case may be, & as there is no isolation, & as the Dr is at Itu, there is no risk, & this is healthy high land - well watered every where, so one or two ladies are safe - aye safer, than in Duke or Creek Towns. With such views & facts * pressing* on me at every point, you will understand my saying, *I* *dare* *not* go back, even for my bonny up stairs house & my own people. I shall rather take the risks of finding my own Chop(Note 6), if the Mission do not see their way to go on.

Then too, Miss Wright has proved herself abundantly able to superintend a station, & the Okoyon people like her, & respect her, & she can both hear & speak to them in their own tongue. Why should I go and interrupt her work. It wd. be unfair except she were going on furlough, & Miss Amess should keep to where she takes root. It is truest economy both in the temper of the worker & in the results of the district. Okoyon is well supplied.

Now you will see this is not for publication. It is for digestion, & if the Church can see its way to go on in some such way to meet the new needs & requirements, I shall do all in my power to further them without extra expense to the Church.

As regards the Creek, the Churches are doing fairly well as far as I know. As Dr Robertson is now in charge of those, of course I do not like to poke my nose in, but the first Communion at Itu, was something thrilling. It is his place to tell you of it, not mine.

The new teacher too at Akani Obio seems to find a good field for his energies & zeal, & the converts there seem quite as enthusiastic as ever. Asan I am not so sure about. It has peculiar difficulties on account of the relationships of old families to slaves, but they too have got a teacher & I trust the Word will conquer all the old fashions & the passions of the people.

My oldest girl is at Okpo doing a little among the women & girls at school & she says the services go on steadily & prosperously. The lads there too, do a little in the Ibibio land behind them. I have money from friends which I can only spend conscientiously on teachers, & its the lack of those! Pray for boys & girls taught of God to teach small schools all over the land. There are 700 men on the 4 or 5 miles of road between here & Itu, living in grass huts all by the road side.(Note 8) They are from every part of the land & it is such a grand chance to sow the seed, & have it carried far & near as they return to their homes, but I’m not able to walk, & I cant get anyone to work amomg them. This navvy work will go on, & on, & O if only a young man were here to catch hold of them. If the Board cd. send Mr Rankin, or Collins here, it wd. be a grand field for them, for all the men are willing to hear. There are two gangs near, who come from the place where at first the Govt. had to go & fight. It is far off, but I do not know the locality myself. They come to Church without being asked now, & are very attentive. Of course, by Church, you don’t think for a moment of your Church service. It is very informal & crude, but the church building is almost ready. We are worshipping in it these two months, & it is Gospel they hear, if it is not oratory.

Well, Well! this is all I can send for a letter. I *can* *not* write a ’Report’, & specially for Synod or Record. I can only do what my heart spills over, & as I’m old & not able to change my ways you must just bear with me. We have 40 scholars, & a fairly good congregation wherever we go, a hundred or so just now in Morning service as it is farm time, & for the rest, it is just *living* among them & doing every daily & social duty in such a way as will win their confidence & attention & affection. Thats all, & if you wrote to me, I might be in a mood some times to write to you. As you don’t, then we’re quits.

Excuse Government paper, I havent a scrap of my own till I get from Calabar.

I am dear sir

Yours very sincerely

Mary M Slessor

The first twins were saved here last moon, their Mother is here now. Another case some 6 miles distant was reported yesterday, but the children were dead they say. Killed I have no doubt. Still the very reporting is a step in the right direction.

MMS

A note is appended in a different hand in very small neat characters thus: “In answer to a letter telling of the gift of the Mary Slessor Hospital for the district” (signed) (NS?)