She made them go to the river and get a large canoe and fill it with yams and plantains (these were gifts for the Calabar people), and with bags of palm nuts and a barrel of oil (these were to begin trading with). But they knew little about boats, and they loaded it so high that it sank. Another was got, and all was ready, when some of the chiefs drew back and said they would only go if Ma allowed them to take their guns and swords.
"No, no," she said, "that would be foolish. We are going in peace and not in war."
"Ma, you make women of us! No man goes to a strange place without arms."
But she would not yield, and they started. Suddenly she caught sight of some swords hidden under the bags of nuts, and, stooping, she seized them and pitched them out on the bank. "Go on," she cried, and the canoe swept down the river.
King Eyo received the trembling chiefs like a Christian gentleman, spoke to them kindly, and showed them over his large house. There was a palaver, and all quarrels between the two peoples were made up, and all evil thoughts of one another vanished, and the men from Okoyong went back astonished and joyful. They began to trade with the coast, and so busy did they become in their fields growing food and making palm oil that they had less time for drinking and fighting, and grew more sober and prosperous.
They were very grateful to Ma.
Ma's Tiny Compass.
"We are not treating her well," they said to one another. "We must build her a better house."
And they began to erect a large one with upstairs rooms and a verandah, but they could not manage the woodwork. Ma begged the Mission authorities to send up a carpenter to put in the doors and windows, and by and by one came from Scotland, named Mr. Ovens, and appeared at Ekenge with his tools and Tom, a native apprentice, and set to work. Mr. Ovens was bright and cheery, and had a laugh that made everybody else want to laugh; and he made so light of the hard life he had to live that Ma praised God for sending him. Like herself, he spoke the dear Scots tongue, and at night he sang the plaintive songs of their native land until she was ready to echo the words of Tom, "Master, I don't like these songs, they make my heart big and my eyes water."