"'They's quite a number o' things,' she says, 'that I want to do so much it seems like I can't die without doin' 'em. But I guess prob'ly I will die without. Folks seems to drop off leavin' lots of doin's undone. An' one o' my worst is, I want to see palm trees growin' in hot lands—big spiky leaves pointin' into the blue sky like fury. 'Seems if I could do that,' s'she, 'I'd take in one long breath that'd make me all lungs an' float me up an' off.'
"We all laughed, but we knew what she meant well enough, because we all felt the same way. I think most North folks do—like they was cocoanuts an' dates in our actions, 'way back. An' so we was all ready for Mis' Toplady's idee when it come—which is the most any idee can expect:—
"'I tell you what,' s'she, 'le's hev a Ladies' Foreign Missionary Circle, an' get read up on them tropical countries. The only thing I really know about the tropics is what comes to me unbeknownst when I smell my tea rose. I've always been meanin' to take an interest in missions,' says she.
"So we started it, then an' there, an' she an' I was the committee to draw out a constitution an' decide what officers should be elected an' do the general creatin'. We made it up that Mis' Sykes should be the president—that woman is a born leader, and, as a leader, you can depend on the very back of her head. An' at last we went off to the minister that then was to ask him what to take up.
"'Most laudable,' s'he, when he'd heard. 'Well, now, what country is it you're most interested in?' he says. 'Some island of the sea, I s'pose?' he asks, bright.
"'We're interested in palms,' Mis' Timothy Toplady explained it to him frank, 'an' we want to study about the missionaries in some country where they's dates an' cocoanuts an' oaseses.'
"He smiled at that, sweet an' deep—I know it seemed to me as if he knew more about what we wanted than we knew ourselves. Because they's some ministers that understands that Christianity ain't all in the bottle labelled with it. Some of it is labelled 'ointment,' an' some 'perfume,' an' some just plain kitchen flavourin'. An' a good deal of it ain't labelled at all.
"I forget what country it was we did study. But they was nine to ten of us, an' we met every week, an' I tell you the time wa'n't wasted. We took things in lavish. I know Mis' Holcomb-that-was-Mame-Bliss said that after belongin' to the Ladies' Foreign Missionary Circle she could never feel the same absent-minded sensation again when she dusted her parlour shells. An' Mis' Toplady said when she opened her kitchen cabinet an' smelt the cinnamon an' allspice out o' the perforated tops, 'most always, no matter how mad she was, she broke out in a hymn, like 'When All Thy Mercies,' sheer through knowin' how allspice was born of God an' not made of man. An' Mis' Sykes said when she read her Bible, an' it talked about India's coral strand, it seemed like, through knowin' what a reef was, she was right there on one, with her Lord. I felt the same way, too—though I'd always felt the same way, for that matter—I always did tip vanilla on my handkerchief an' pretend it was flowers an' that I'd gone down South for the cold months. An' it got so that when the minister give out a text that had geography in it, like the Red Sea, or Beer-elim, or 'a place called The Fair Haven,' the Ladies Foreign Missionary Circle would look round in our seats an' nod to each other, without it showin', because we knew that we knew, extra special, just what God was talkin' about. I tell you, knowledge makes you alive at places where you didn't know there was such a place.
"In five months' time we felt we owed so much to the Ladies' Foreign Missionary Circle that it was Mis' Sykes suggested we give the Ten Cent Tropical Fête, an' earn five dollars or so for missions.
"'We know a great deal about the tropics now,' she says, 'an' I propose we earn a missionary thank-offering. Coral an' cocoanuts an' dates an' spices isn't all the Lord is interested in, by any means,' s'she. 'An' the winter is the time to give a tropic fête, when folks are thinkin' about warm things natural.'