Religious Tract Society.)

ANNA HINDERER, AND THE GOSPEL IN THE YORUBA COUNTRY

'The White Man's Grave' and 'No White Man's Land' are the ominous names
that have been bestowed on several unhealthy countries where Europeans
have been compelled to reside; but there were none, fifty years ago,
more deserving of being so described than Ashantee, Dahomey, and the
Yoruba country. Nothing but the prospect of growing rich rapidly would
persuade a white man, unless he were a missionary, to live in any of
those countries, and a European woman was almost unknown there.

One of the first white women to risk the dangers of the Yoruba climate
was Anna Hinderer, to whom belongs the honour of being the first of her
colour to visit Ibadan. It was not, however, a mere visit that she
paid to this unhealthy West African town; for seventeen years she lived
there with her husband, devoting herself almost entirely to educating
the native children.

Her mother died when she was five years old, and it was probably owing
to her own childhood being sad and lonely that Anna Martin, afterwards
Mrs. Hinderer, early in life began to take an interest in the welfare
of poor and neglected children. In 1839, when only twelve years of
age, she went to live with her grandfather at Lowestoft, and soon made
two lifelong friends. They were the Rev. Francis Cunningham, Vicar of
Lowestoft, and his wife, who was sister of that noble Quakeress,
Elizabeth Fry. The friendship began by Anna Martin asking Mrs.
Cunningham to be allowed to take a Sunday School class. She feared
that being only twelve years old her request would not be entertained,
but to her great joy it was granted at once. A little later she went
to live with the Cunninghams, and was never so happy as when assisting
in some good work. When only fourteen years of age she started a class
for ragged and neglected children, and eventually she had as many as
two hundred pupils. Many other schemes for the happiness of children
were suggested by her, and, with the aid of Mr. and Mrs. Cunningham,
successfully carried out.

Anna Martin had long wished to be a missionary when she made the
acquaintance of the Rev. David Hinderer, who had returned to England
after labouring for four years in the Yoruba country, which stretches
inland from the Bight of Benin almost to the Niger Territory, and is
bordered on the west by Dahomey. Anna Martin was deeply interested in
all that Mr. Hinderer told h