the Mission, and he has lately, during my absence
in Africa, established, a branch mission at
Kidudwe. It is evident that, if supported constantly
b y his friends in France, the Superior
will extend his work still farther into the interior,
and it is, therefore, safe to predict that
the road to Ujiji will in time possess a chain o f
mission stations affording the future European
trader and traveller safe retreats with the conveniences
o f civilized life.
There are two other missions on the east
coast o f Africa, that o f the Church Missionary
S o c ie ty , and the Methodist Free Church at
Mombasa. T he former has occupied this station
for over thirty years, and has a branch establishment
at Rabbai Mpia, the home o f the Dutch
missionaries Krapf, Rebmann, and Erhardt. But
these missions have not obtained the success
which such long self-abnegation and devotion
to the pious service deserved.
It is strange how British philanthropists, clerical
and la y , persist in the delusion that the
Africans can be satisfied with spiritual improvement
only. T h e y should endeavour to impress
themselves with the undeniable fact that man,
white, yellow, red or black, has also material
wants which crave to be understood and supplied.
A barbarous man is a pure materialist.
He is full o f cravings for possessing something
that he cannot describe. He is like a
child which has not y e t acquired the faculty
o f articulation. The missionary discovers the
barbarian almost stupefied with brutish ignorance,
with the instincts o f a man in him, but y e t living
the life o f a beast. Instead o f attempting to
develop the qualities o f this practical human b e ing,
he instantly attempts his transformation b y
expounding to him the dogmas o f the Christian
aith, the doctrine o f transubstantiation and
other difficult subjects, before the barbarian
has had time to articulate his necessities and
to explain to him that he is a frail creature
requiring to be fed with bread, and not with a
stone.
My experience and study o f the pagan prove
to me, however, that, i f the missionary can
show the p oor materialist that religion is allied
With substantial benefits and improvement o f his
degraded condition,, the task to which he is
about to devote himself will be rendered comparatively
easy. F o r the African once brought
in contact with the European becomes docile
enough, he is awed b y a consciousness o f his
own immense inferiority, and imbued with a
vague hope that he may also rise in time to
the level o f this superior being who has so
challenged his admiration. It is the story o f
Caliban and Stefano over again. He comes to
him with a desire to be taught, and, seized with
an ambition to aspire to a higher life, becomea