210
THE KING’ S BUSINESS
pleased to come over here and see Billy. She came to Kijabe with her daughter first about eight years ago, another daugh ter being a missionary in India, and she said she wasn’t going to stay at home all alone, so shej has been living here with Mrs. Probst. She has built her own home here, and it is the cosiest, and “homiest” place in Kijabe. She does real missionary ,work, and has saved several people who were put in the bush to die. One o f the Women she took care o f was the big, black woman who. carried Billy up from the station the 'night we arrived here. She looks more like a Southern “Mammy” than a Southern mammy looks like herself. Her name is Gikuwi. The Youngkens have a new girl baby that is a month old today, and Gikuwi helps take care o f it. Gardens and farms are very hard to take care o f here, because o f the animals. I don’t know how many big animals Mr. McKendrick has gotten in his garden, but every once in a while he gets a buck right near the house, and not long since,- a whole crowd o f baboons got in his garden, and he shot the leader from his bedroom win dow. There are so many animals, big and little, that take chickens, that most people get discouraged trying to keep them. It is very hard to get land here. Set tlers sometimes have to keep at it for seven or eight years before they can get their claims adjusted. It took Mr. Hurlburt eight years to get the land which the Mis sion owns here. À CENT’ S WORTH OF WOOD How awfully fast the Jays fly past. I just don’t have time, or at least don’t know how to use my time : so that, I can get half o f my letter's written. I cannot tell you how much the letters from home are appreciated; I can'tell you we are tickled to death when they come. It is cool enough for us to want a cosy fire, evenings and mornings. The fuel is wild olive wood, or something similar to it ; it makes a splendid fire and we have all wè can usé. It costs about one cent, American money, for forty pounds—and that means all cut, split and delivered right
herel Fruit is very scarce here; there are figs and some lemons, and we can send to Narrobi for oranges, a sort o f mean variety, but I got some and made marmalade. We do get awfully hungry for fruit, and we buy some in tin cans—California pears, peaches and apricots—but o f course they are very expensive, and we count them a special treat. Not so very many miles away, at some o f the other mission sta tions, there are many kinds o f lovely fruit, but this is not á land o f railroads and refrigerator cars; the only way to get it is on the backs o f natives, so that it doesn’t get very far from where it is grown. We are so high here that many things will not grow which grow beautifully on the plain below. Today has been beautiful and bright, and the view o f the great, won derful plain below us was surely magnifi cent—all the colors o f a brilliant and ever- changing opal. W e all went to church this morning and it was so crowded that some had to sit along the edge o f the platform. Mr. Mc Kendrick is pastor o f the native church, but he asked Wamunyu to preach, and he did, from the first few verses o f Mark. He is one o f Dr. Alleft’s assistants in the hos pital work. O f course every word o f the service was in Kikuyu, and as yet yve can only understand a little o f it, but it was a wonderful service. In the native school, I have two classes in Bible study, and if ever I felt my ina bility and unworthiness, it is when I stand before those classes. I have to talk through an interpreter, and I’m afraid I don’t know how to say things so they really understand me.. Often our timé is too full for much study, and by night we are too tired to do anything but sleep. I. tell you, I have my opinion o f whoop ing cough, and would enjoy its non-exist ence very much. Ken and Billy and I have all been afflicted with it. A MONKEY AND A MULE W e have a nice little mule now—that is we have the use o f him—heiis working for his board. He is as strong as a little; ox, and can climb hills like a jack rabbit. He
Made with FlippingBook - Online Brochure Maker