T H E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S I U N I O R
Two Little Navajos
Go To School
By DOROTHY M. ELLERTON
Navajos at Native Cafeteria Bah has decided to become a nurse. She wants not only to take care of other Navajos when they are sick, and to help them to have strong bodies, but she wants to help them to accept the Lord Jesus as their Saviour. She hopes to be a really, true home missionary.
I F BAH goes to school, do I just have to go, too?” Little Ebah did not like the idea of going to school. She wanted to be free to play, and to help her father to haul the wood for the fire which burned bright- ly on the mud floor of their hogan, and to take care of the sheep. Too, she loved her mother and father and she did not want to leave them. But the mother and father of Ebah and her sister, Bah, wanted their little girls to learn to read and to write English. They wanted them to have an education and to be able to do useful things. T h e y had learned about the mission school across the desert from their village, and they de cided that the two little girls should g o .there. Early one bright morning the four of them started off across the sandy desert in their small covered wagon drawn by two scrawny horses. On the way Ebah and Bah were in terested in everything they saw—the dark red and gray rocks that formed many pictures, the lizards and squir rels that scurried across the road; and when Ebah and Bah grew tired of riding, they ran along beside the wagon and picked some of the pretty flowers growing in the sand by the roadside. It .was late afternoon when they came in sight of the mission—a group of low, adobe buildings shaded by a few gray-green cedar trees. The little girls were excited and thrilled when the missionaries wel comed them, and when they saw the clean, pretty room where they and several other girls were to sleep, the cool dining room, and the cheery classroom where they were to study, they were happy. But when it was
time to say "good-bye” to their par ents, big lumps came into their throats, and these two little Indian girls suddenly felt very lonely. They were homesick that night; and after everyone else was asleep, they slipped away and started to run across the desert to their hogan. The next morning when the missionaries discovered that the two little girls were gone, they sent word to Ebah and Bah’s mother and father, who started right out in their wagon to find them. They looked for them almost all day, and when they found them, they took them right back to the school. This happened several times, and finally Ebah and Bah learned that the school was the best place for them, and they began to love their teachers, and to study their lessons well. They espe cially liked the time in the evening when all the girls in the school gath ered in one room with one of the teachers for devotions—the time when they learned Bible verses and prayed. After a few months had passed, Ebah and Bah loved their school so dearly, had learned so many Bible verses, and could sing so many hymns that the missionary asked them to be her helpers when she went to the hos pital to sing, and pray, and to tell the stories in God’s Word to the Navajo men and women who were ill. The next summer when vacation time came, Bah chose to stay right at the school instead of going home. She and her sister have learned to love the Lord Jesus as their Saviour, and they both want to do something very im portant for Him when they grow up to be women. Ebah ir asking the Lord Jesus each day to show her*what He would like her to do.
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