“We are trying to find just the right man and wife for our school in Loanda, but would rather wait for years than to get unsuitable persons.

“From Loanda we proceed by steamer sixty miles south by sea, and cross the bar into the mouth of Coanza River, as large as the Hudson, and ascend 180 miles to Dondo, at the head of steamboat

navigation. Dondo is a noted trading centre, and has a population of about 5,000, mostly negroes.

“We had good property in Dondo, worth about $5,000. A great deal of hard work, successful preparatory work, has been done in Dondo. Its school-work and machine-shop were self-supporting when manned, but is now in the same position as Loanda, awaiting good workers to man it.

MAP OF ANGOLA. [Larger.]

“Our Presiding Elder, E. A. Withey, of Angola District, and his daughter Stella, a rare linguist in Portuguese and Kimbundu, and of great missionary promise, were holding the fort at Dondo when I recently visited that region. Their home was at Pungo Andongo, eighty-nine miles distant. Stella and I walked a mile or more to visit the graves of Sister Cooper, and of our grandest Dondo worker, Mrs. Mary Myers Davenport, M.D., in the cemetery, which is inclosed by a high stone wall. Her last words are inscribed on her tombstone. They were addressed to Him who was nearest and dearest to her in that lone hour—to Jesus: ‘I die for Thee, here in Africa.’ She would have died for Jesus anywhere, but had consecrated her all to him ‘for Africa.’ In about a month from that time our dear Stella, so ripe for heaven, but so greatly needed in

Africa, was laid by her side. So that three of our missionary heroines sleep in Jesus at Dondo. Their ashes are among the guarantees of our ultimate success in giving life to millions in Africa, who are ‘dead in trespasses and sins.’

“From Dondo, we ‘take it afoot’ fifty-one miles over hills, mountains and vales, by the old caravan trail of the ages to Nhanguepepo Mission Station. Our property there is worth about $6,000. It was designed to be a receiving station, in which our new-comers might be acclimatized, taught native languages and prepared for advance work. Under the superintendency of Brother Withey a great preparatory work has been done at this station. It has, however, become specially a training school for native agency, under the leadership of one young man of our first party from America, Carl Rudolph. We already have an organized Methodist Episcopal Church at this station, composed of thirteen converted native men and boys, who are giving good proof of the genuineness of the change wrought in them by the Holy Spirit. From 5 to 6 o’clock every morning they have a meeting for worship, Scripture reading and exposition by Carl, singing, prayers and testimony for Jesus by all in English, Portuguese and Kimbundu, intermingled with hallelujah shouts of praise to N’Zambi the God of their fathers and of our fathers.

“The forenoon is devoted to manual labor by all hands, then school and religious exercises in the afternoon. The work of each day is distributed; two of our boys, called “pastors,” have the care of about 100 head of cattle belonging to the mission. Several boys are taught to yoke and work oxen in sled or plow; several boys have learned to be stone-masons, and when I was there last were engaged in building a stone wall round the cattle corral. One boy is trained to business in the little store belonging to the mission. One very trusty fellow is the man-of-all work about the house and the cook. All these varieties of work are done by our own converted people, and not by heathen hirelings. This station yields ample sustentation for all these workers. The brethren are making improvements continually, and paying for them out of their net profits. In building a chapel next summer they may need a little help, but probably not.