“Why do you drill out of sight like this? Why not let every one see that you are ‘Volunteers.’ You must come to church, and sit together in the gallery.”
The first Sunday after that a few of them came to church. The next week many more came, and from that time the Sunday Service became part of their drill. So eager were they to look well when they came to it, that they began to plant their lands that they might sell the fruit they grew, and buy clothes.
Coral for the new staircase
By-and-by the little church in Rarotonga needed a new platform and a new staircase. Then a great joy came to Tamate. He saw his young bushmen, whom he had first seen round their midnight fires, wild and fierce and useless, away out on the reefs cutting coral for the new staircase. They had learned to love the church and its services, and some of them became soldiers in the army of Jesus Christ.
When the church was ready to be opened again, there was great eagerness and stir. The natives had given nearly all that was needed. But there was still £25 worth of wood unpaid for.
Tamate was sure that the gifts that would be brought on the opening day would be worth much more than £25, but when he said so to a group of men, the doorkeeper said to him:
“How are you going to get in?”
“Why, by the door, of course.”
“No, you will not. I have the keys, and I will not open the door until everything is paid. Of course you may try the windows.”