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—10—, when excited by his charms, devour a good quantity of live coals from a fireside with the same pleasure, seemingly, with which one would enjoy cakes. This may have been done by some enchantment, or may not have been a reality, but it so seemed. I have heard the Kofong and magician Sama, of this place, boasting of his capability of dancing in two different places at the same moment. This comes very closely to what is said of Pythagoras, the philosopher, magician, and fire-worshiper,–that he appeared on the same day and at the same instant in the cities of Crotona and Metapontum. But the whole, I believe, is based on deceitfulness and falsehood.

The secret society of the Sherbro country was once her governor and legislature. The king was not exempt from fines or capital punishment should he violate its laws or reveal its secret. But its power has greatly diminished, and its influence is dying out. In conversation a few weeks ago with Chief T. N. Caulker on the subject, he said, “I believe the society will, in God’s time, die out of our midst. It will not be by violence, but by the power of the gospel.”

The great contest with ignorance and sin was begun by Rev. D. K. Flickinger, twenty-eight years ago, and continued by these self-sacrificing and self-denying men. Revs. J. K. Billheimer, J. A. Williams, the sainted O. Hadley, and others whose names shall forever be engraved in the memory of Africans as Christian philanthropists and fathers of Sherbro’s civilization. They did what they could, and all they could.

In the year 1870, the United Brethren Church adopted the policy of an English philanthropist who once claimed, “The evils of slavery and the superstition of the dark continent must be rooted out! It is by African exertions can be destroyed.” Accordingly a negro. Rev. J. Gomer, was sent out, to whom the present stage of Sherbro’s civilization is largely attributed. The work of