A few slave-girls are all she finds in the next yard, the other inmates
having gone to work at the farms; but she speaks to them and they
listen respectfully. Another yard is crowded with women, some eating,
some sleeping, some dressing each other's hair, some lounging half-
naked on the ground gossiping--a picture of sheer animalism. Her advent
creates a welcome diversion, and they are willing to listen: it helps
to pass the time. They take her into an inner yard where a fine-looking
young woman is being fattened for her future husband. She flouts the
message, and is spoken to sternly and left half-crestfallen, half-
defiant. It is scenes like this which convince Mary that the women are
the greatest problem in the Mission Field. She does not wonder that the
men are as they are. If they are to be reached more must be done for
the women, and a prayer goes up that the Church at home may realise the
situation.

Farther on is a heathen house. The master is dead: the mistress is an
old woman, hardened and repulsive, the embodiment of all that is evil,
who is counting coppers in a room filled with bush, skulls, sacrifices,
and charms. A number of half-starved cowed women and girls covered with
dirt and sores are quarrelling over a pipe. The shrill voice and long
arms of the mistress settle the matter, and make them fly helter-
skelter. They call on Mary to speak, and after many interruptions she
subdues and controls them, and leaves them, for the moment, impressed.

She arrives at a district which the lady agents have long worked. The
women are cleanly, pleasant, and industrious, but polished hypocrites,
always ready to protest with smooth tongue and honeyed words that they
are eager to be "god-women," but never taking the first step forwards.
Mary, who is learning to be sarcastic, on occasion, gives them a bit of
her mind and goes away heart-sick. But she is cheered at the next yard,