Thirty years in Madagascar

by Thomas T. Matthews

Madame Escande published a selection of her husband’s private letters to her while he was in Madagascar, under the title ‘Nine Months in Madagascar.’ The first edition was sold out in a short time, and all who wish to understand the condition of Madagascar at this time should carefully read this book.

A change gradually came over the policy which had been pursued towards us and our adherents up to this time. The eyes of the General had been opened to the true state of affairs, and to the fact that we were missionaries pure and simple. About the same time, the Jesuits received rebuffs they little expected. They had received a check from even the government of M. Milne. A letter was sent them by the colonial secretary, reminding them that the law for the expulsion of the Jesuits from France had not been repealed, and that as Madagascar had become a French colony, and so a part of France, if they did not alter their tactics and behave better, it might be applied to them even in Madagascar, and they would be expelled.

The late action of the government of M. Waldeck-Rousseau with regard to the Jesuits and other Roman Catholic institutions in France was another blow to their influence and power even in Madagascar. This has been followed up by the action of the present government, so that while the work of all the Protestant missions is flourishing, the Roman Catholic Mission does not flourish. There are fewer adherents, and the Jesuits have less power to-day than they had before the war. The Malagasy have had their eyes thoroughly opened with regard to them and their aims. For this the Jesuits have themselves to blame. Boasting of their services to France in procuring the new colony of Madagascar, they have alienated the good will of the natives, whom they have taught to regard them as the robbers of their fatherland. Of course the Jesuits were furious at the proclamation of religious liberty.

The Directors of the London Missionary Society sent out in 1897 the foreign secretary of the Society, the Rev. R. Wardlaw Thompson, and Alderman Evan Spicer of London, L.C.C., as a deputation to visit Madagascar, to have an interview with the General, and to talk over the situation and the work of the Society. The result was most satisfactory. The change that had gradually been coming over the spirit of the General’s policy before their arrival was still more apparent after their advent. The deputation were able to save the girls’ central school for the mission, to lead the General to understand, as he had never done before, the ends and aims of the Society’s work, and to convince him that the Society had no connexion whatever with the British government, and had no ulterior motives for being in Madagascar. They were able to get the fullest concession of religious liberty for all London Missionary Society agents, and the contract has been faithfully carried out, while the General shortly afterwards wrote to H.B.M. consul acknowledging, and even praising, the good work that had been, and was still being done in the island by the Society’s agents.

On our return from our first furlough in 1882, we had been greatly disappointed at not being allowed to return to our old station in Vònizòngo; but after the severe way in which we had both suffered from fever there it was not thought advisable. Instead we were located in the capital. Some had always had the greatest anxiety to get located there, and never rested until they were. We, on the other hand, never felt drawn towards it as we did to our old home. Still, as years went on, it became plainer to us that there was work for us to do in the capital, some of it of a kind that I could not have done in Vònizòngo. By giving up my evenings mainly, and most of my spare time, to desk work, I was able to prepare and publish a number of translations, compilations, and books I had written, as I could not have done at Fìhàonana.

In 1883 I was able thoroughly to revise the third edition of my translation of the Shorter Catechism, with proofs. I published my Exposition of the Sermon on the Mount, Religious Tales and Anecdotes, Scientific, Monumental, and Historical Illustrations of the Truth of the Old Testament Scriptures; A Digest of the Books of the Bible with Notes; The Life and Times of Razàka, Pastor at Fìhàonana; A Short History of the Scottish Covenanters; A Short History of the French Camisards; Booklets I and II, The Children’s Portion; a translation of Hodge’s Outlines of Theology; and Dr. John Laidlaw’s Foundation Truths of Scripture with regard to Sin and Salvation; and When the fullness of Time was come, and other Sermons, being the eighth small volume of sermons, the series representing 60,000 copies of ninety-six sermons.

During our last year I had to undertake the editorship of the Malagasy monthly, Good Words. This was done to save it from extinction, and as no one else would do it. During that year I was able to do the magazine some service, if in no other, from a commercial point of view. I persuaded our own people connected with the mother-church and country district of A-kànga to take 650 copies a month; the Paris Missionary Society missionaries to take 500, and others to push the circulation among theirs, and thus the circulation rose from a thousand to nearly four thousand monthly.

All these books, and also the magazines, were printed on paper granted by the Religious Tract Society of London. During the last thirty years that Society has made liberal annual grants of printing paper, and occasional grants of electrotypes to the missionary press in Madagascar. This timely aid has greatly assisted the important work of building up a Christian literature for the Malagasy.

It was of great encouragement to note the progress of our people during the time we had known them. They had grown in grace and in the knowledge of their Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and had been building themselves up in their most holy faith, by adding to their faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge the graces that go to adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour, and by a life and conversation becoming the Gospel. There had been some sad changes in these later days—by the rising some 500 village churches had been more or less destroyed. A large number of villages had been burned, many pastors, evangelists, and church members had lost their little all, and some their lives. A large number of the people were carried off captive to the rebel camp, where they were kept prisoners, some of them for nearly two years. Some few escaped, some were shot for attempting to escape, while others were ransomed by their relatives.