"If we did not beat our women, they would never work; they
would not fear and obey us; but when we have beaten, and killed, and
feasted on two or three, the rest are all very quiet and good for a long
time to come!"

I tried to show him how cruel it was, besides that it made them unable
for work, and that kindness would have a much better effect; but he
promptly assured me that Tannese women "could not understand kindness."
For the sake of teaching by example, my Aneityumese Teachers and I used
to go a mile or two inland on the principal pathway, along with the
Teachers' wives, and there cutting and carrying home a heavy load of
firewood for myself and each of the men, while we gave only a small
burden to each of the women. Meeting many Tanna-men by the way, I used
to explain to them that this was how Christians helped and treated their
wives and sisters, and then they loved their husbands and were strong to
work at home; and that as men were made stronger, they were intended to
bear the heavier burdens, and especially in all labors out of doors. Our
habits and practises had thus as much to do as, perhaps more than, all
our appeals, in leading them to glimpses of the life to which the Lord
Jesus was calling them.

CHAPTER XVII.
STREAKS OF DAWN AMIDST DEEDS OF DARKNESS.

ANOTHER war-burst, that caused immense consternation, passed over with
only two or three deaths; and I succeeded in obtaining the consent of
twenty Chiefs to fight no more except on the defensive,--a covenant to
which, for a considerable time, they strictly adhered, in the midst of
fierce provocations. But to gain any such end, the masses of the people
must be educated to the point of desiring it. The few cannot, in such
circumstances, act up to it, without laying themselves open to be
downtrodden and swept away by the savages around.

About this time, several men, afraid or ashamed by day, came to me
regularly by night for conversation and instruction. Having seen the
doors of the Mission House made fast and the windows blinded so that
they could not be observed, they continued with me for many hours,
asking all strange questions about the new Religion and its laws. I
remember one Chief particularly, who came often, saying to me, "I would
be an Awfuaki man (_i. e._ a Christian) were it not that all the rest
would laugh at me; that I could not stand!"

"Almost persuaded"--before you blame him, remember how many in Christian
lands and amid great