Another time news came that twins had been born.  All the people had thought a lot of the mother, even though she was a slave.  Now everyone hated her.  The other women in the house cursed her.  They broke up the few dishes she owned.  They tore up her clothes.  They would have killed her but they were afraid of Mary Slessor and what she would do.

They took the two babies and stuffed them into an empty gin box and shoved it at the woman.

“Get out!  Get out!” they said, “you have married the Devil.  You have a devil in you.”  They threw rocks at her and drove her out of the village.

Mary met the poor woman carrying her babies in the box on her head.  The screaming, howling crowd of people were following her.

“Go back!  Go back to your village,” Mary told the crowd.  Then turning to the woman she said, “Give me the box and come with me to my house.”

When Mary opened the box, she found one child dead.  The baby’s head had been smashed when it was jammed into the box.  Mary buried the poor little baby.  Soon the owner of the woman came and took her back.  She was willing to do this as long as she had no children.  The little baby stayed with Mary and became another of her family.

One evening Mary was sitting on the porch of her mission house talking to the children.  Suddenly they heard a loud noise.  They heard the beating of drums.  Then they heard men singing loudly.

“What’s that?” asked Mary.  She took the twin boys that were with her and rushed down to the road to see what was going on.  Here she found a crowd of people.  They were all dressed up.  Some wore three-cornered hats with long feathers hanging down.  Some had crowns.  Some wore masks with animal heads and horns.  Some put on uniforms with gold and silver lace.  Some just covered their bodies with beadwork and tablecloths trimmed with gold and silver.

When Mary came, the shouting stopped.  The king came forward to meet her.

“Ma,” said the king, “we have had a palaver.  We have made new laws.  The old laws were not God’s laws.  Now all twins and their mothers can live in town.  If anyone kills twin babies or hurts the mothers, he shall be hung.”

“God will bless you for making those wise laws,” said Mary.

The mothers of the twins who lived at the mission and other mothers, too, gathered around Mary.  They laughed and shouted.  They clapped their hands, and with tears running down their cheeks, cried:  “Thank you!  Thank you!” They made so much noise that Mary asked the chief to stop them.

“Ma, how can I stop these women’s mouths?” asked the chief.  “How can I do it?  They be women.”

Mary was happy, but after a while some of the people began to forget the new laws.  Quietly and underhandedly they began to go back to doing the old bad things again.  This was because they were not Christians.  They did not love and trust the Saviour.  Mary knew that the main thing to do if she were to get them to live right and do right was to change their hearts.  New laws could not really change them.  Only faith in Jesus could do that.