sion, and gave their pennies and halfpennies to it just as Ma herself
had done when a little girl. About this time they gathered up enough
money to build a steel steamer for use on the inland rivers and creeks,
and it was now plying up and down, carrying mails and parcels and
missionaries. It was called the _David Williamson_, after a minister of
the Church who visited Calabar, but the natives named it the _Smoking
Canoe_.

[Illustration: THE _DAVID WILLIAMSON_.]

You can imagine the excitement at the Mission House at Ekenge when a
half-naked messenger, his dark body perspiring and glistening in the
sun, appeared, and cried:

"Ma, the _Smoking Canoe_ is at the beach."

"Ho-ho! gifts from Makara land," sang half a dozen throats. "Oh, Ma,
when can we go? Let us go now."

Ma was as excited as the rest, so off went men, women, and children,
streaming along the path to the river, where the _David Williamson_ lay.

As the boxes were usually too heavy to be carried, they were opened up
on the beach and the contents made into parcels. These the natives
balanced on their heads and went off, a long file of them, through the
forest to Ekenge.

Sometimes it needed a second and a third journey before all the goods
were together again.

What a delight it was to Ma to open the packages! What cries of rapture
came from the children and the people looking on as they saw all the
things that were to them so wonderful and beautiful.

There were print garments by the dozens, woollen articles, caps,
scarves, handkerchiefs, towels, ribbons and braids, thimbles, needles
and pins, beads, buttons, reels, spoons, knives, scrap-books,
picture-books and cards, texts, pens, and a host of other things. It was
almost with awe that the women touched the pretty baby-clothes, and the
men clapped their hands as Ma held up a blue or scarlet gown or jacket.

The dolls were looked upon as gods, and Ma would not give them away in
case they were worshipped: she kept the prettily dressed ones to teach
the women and girls how clothes were made and how they were worn. Some
common things, which children at home would not value, they treasured.
When Janie was handed a penwiper, "Oh, Ma," she said reproachfully,
"wipe a dirty pen with that? No, no." And she put it up on the wall as
an ornament!

One old woman was given a copy of the picture "The Light of the World."
"Oh," she cried in joy, "I shall never be lonely any more!"

If you had watched Ma clo