During the night the little band of Christians could hear the war-horn calling the natives together, and the shouts of the cannibals as they came in from all parts.
In the meanwhile Mr. and Mrs. Chalmers had made up in parcels the compensation which they intended to offer the people; but when, at four o'clock in the morning, the chief arrived to make a last demand he declared that they were not sufficient.
'If you will wait till the steamer comes I may be able to give you more,' Chalmers said, 'but at present I cannot.'
'I must have more now,' the chief declared, and departed.
The attack was now expected every minute, but hour after hour passed and the natives did not re-appear. At three o'clock in the morning Chalmers turned in, but he had not long been asleep when his wife discovered the cannibals approaching. Chalmers, aroused by his wife, ran to the door and faced the savages.
'What do you want?' he asked.
'Give us more compensation,' the leader replied, 'or we will kill you and burn the house.'
'Kill you may, but no more compensation do I give,' Chalmers answered. 'Remember that if we die, we shall die fighting.'
Then Chalmers took down his musket and loaded it in sight of the cannibals, who, having seen the missionary shoot birds, feared his skill. They withdrew and discussed what to do. For about an hour and a half the band of Christians waited for the attack to be made. Many of them were, naturally enough, much distressed at the thought of being killed and eaten, but throughout this trying time Jane Chalmers remained calm, assured that whatever might happen would be in accordance with God's will.
But the Chalmers' life-work was not yet ended. The chief of the village decided that they should not be killed. 'Before this white man came here with his friends I was nobody,' he said to the men who had assembled from other parts of New Guinea. 'They have brought me tomahawks, hoop-iron, red beads and cloth. You have no white man, and if you try to kill him, you kill him over my body.'