From there Siyaya also went along to Umvunzi's home. Poor boy! he followed us around, seemingly hungry for the Word, but helplessly overcome by the gross darkness surrounding him. At this last place there were only a few present. The men from all these kraals had gone a long distance to buy goats. Here the powers of darkness were so great that I could not shake off the feeling and have victory in speaking. I wonder what my spiritual status would be at the end of the year, if I were obliged to live long amid such surroundings; and yet I have Christ and His Spirit in my soul and much of His Word written in my heart, while these poor ones have only generations of paganism back of them.
We then turned our faces homeward, moving in something of a circle and coming first to Seba's village. This is not far from the mission, and yet it is our first visit to this place. The people seemed very glad to see us, and some here had the privilege for the first time of hearing the Gospel, and were eager to catch every word. While we were speaking, a native, carrying poles, was passing, and he put his poles down and entered to listen. He was a stranger to me. A tall fine-looking fellow he was. He informed us that he had moved near and was building a hut. Mapita and his wife also had entered during the services. Seba invited us to remain for dinner and eat of their inkobe (boiled corn), but it was not yet ready, so thanking him for his hospitality we continued our journey.
First, the stranger invited us to go over and see his wife and the hut he was building, which was only a short distance away. We did so and here we met two women from our nearest kraal. We then proceeded on our homeward way, and had gone only a short distance when we met John (a Christian) and his brothers, who followed us home.
On the way we stopped a few minutes at Mapita's home to see the children, and then reached the mission at midday. The boys remained a short time to talk. I then tidied my hut, made a dress and gave it to a little girl, and entertained a number of native women. After our three o'clock dinner and worship I read and studied the language, and here it is evening and the close of a very enjoyable day.
This account has been given, not because there was anything unusual about it, but because it is typical of many Saturdays on the mission field, and some of them have been days of the most exquisite enjoyment we have ever known. Such days never seem to become monotonous. One forgets the long and tiresome walk if he finds eager and interested listeners at the end. Even if some steel their hearts against the Word, there is still the consciousness to the messenger that he has done what he could. Then again much of one's time on the mission station is spent talking to the natives who come. They may not be anxious for the Gospel, but one always hopes some word or message may sink into their hearts.
The first few years of the mission, the country was occasionally visited by locusts, sometimes in such large swarms as almost to darken the face of the sky. These were not the seventeen-year cicadas, which some people are pleased to term locusts, but large grasshoppers, various kinds of which made their appearance to the great destruction of crops and vegetation. Sometimes the corn and the kafir corn would be stripped. Again, an immense swarm would come suddenly and alight—so that in a very short time the whole face of nature would be transformed from a bright green to a reddish brown, the color of the locusts—and would then as suddenly fly off without doing much harm. Wherever the locusts settled for the night, the natives would be there early in the morning with their nets and catch them for food.
The year 1900 was especially one of these locust years. During the dry season, the adult locusts selected suitable places, remained to feed for a time, then deposited their eggs in the earth and died. As at this time the insects cannot fly, the natives catch them in large numbers and carry them home for food. One such swarm settled about two miles from the mission, and thither day after day went the women and girls to catch them. They would put them in bags or large baskets and carry them home. One could often see ten or twelve women walking through our premises, each one carrying on her head a bushel or more of locusts. They would cook them in large earthen pots, then spread them on the rocks to dry, after which they would go for a fresh supply. When the locusts were dry they would be stored away for food. In eating them the natives would remove head, wings, and legs and eat them somewhat after the manner of dried herring, and considered them a great delicacy, saying, "They are our meat." We have partaken of them in this manner and found them not unpalatable, and they are certainly a cleaner food than many things eaten in civilized lands. The natives' favorite way of preparing the locusts, however, was to stamp them in a stamping block, then cook them, together with ground peanuts, into a gravy to be eaten with their porridge.
Although many of the locusts had been safely stowed away in the native storehouses, during this year, yet numbers remained in various parts of the country to lay their eggs in the ground. When the rains came and softened the ground these eggs hatched. After a colony hatched, the little wingless larvæ, or hoppers, started forth as an army, all going in one direction. These armies were generally about a rod or two in width and much greater in length, and woe to the young garden that came in their way! They would spread over it, devour the tender shoots, and then proceed in the same general direction in which they had been traveling. The natural grass and herbage of the country was too tough for them to eat. Not only one but several such armies coming from different directions passed through our gardens that season, and some of the cornfields had to be planted two or three times. One was finally left unplanted, while our potatoes and many of the garden vegetables were destroyed. At first we endeavored to fight them with fires when they were seen to be approaching a garden, but this was soon found to be useless. The missionaries felt the loss of their crops and vegetables, but their loss could not be compared with that of the poor natives, many of whom could not procure grain for a second planting, and they had nothing else to depend upon.
During this year we were seriously contemplating an advanced step in the work, by opening the way for more boys and girls to come as boarders. They would thus be given a Christian home and be trained to work and to habits of cleanliness. Up to this time the largest number staying at one time was four boys; and one girl had come lately. The day was not far distant when it would be necessary to erect better and more permanent dwellings, as the huts were already showing signs of decay; and if more boys could be received and these trained to make brick and assist in building, it would be an advantage both to the boys and to the mission. As the year drew near to a close there began to be a desire on the part of some of the older boys to attend school and perhaps come to stay with us. We knew enough of the native character to believe that it was best not to throw out any special inducement, as it is always best for them to desire a thing for themselves and to be fully persuaded in their own minds so that they might not be wavering.
On New Year's Day, 1901, after the close of the services, a boy, probably nineteen years of age, stood at the open door of my hut with rather a wistful look on his face. He was well dressed and had been working for white people, but had shown no interest in school or in the Gospel up to this time. Something in his face that day prompted me to say,
"Ndhlalambi, when are you coming to stay at the mission and give your heart to the Lord?"
He promptly replied, "I am coming one week from tomorrow."