religious persecution and violation of human rights can be. She barely escaped with her life from war-torn Liberia, where a civil war between tribes has ripped apart the country she loves so deeply.

Before her forced departure, Miss Jennings had devoted 31 years of her life to running a mission in the interior of the West African country.

"When I first arrived it was so peaceful. Monrovia was very beautiful and somewhat like Bermuda with hibiscus and oleaners,'' she recalled.

But the civility of the city soon gave way to muddy and rocky roads, hills and valleys as she made her way inland to the mission.

Once there, she had no transport and had to walk about 30 minutes before reaching the transportation that would take her into the city occasionally to buy meal and groceries. Mostly, the mission grew its own cassava and cultivated rice farms -- a main food source.

The population was a mixture of Christians and Moslems, and Miss Jennings said that many Moslems wanted their children to know more about Christianity, particularly the Old Testament scriptures.

"Some of our students really accepted Christianity, but their parents did not. They wouldn't look after them and drove them away from their homes so the mission became responsible because we didn't want to let them go,'' she recalled.

In the course of her missionary work, she often walked for three hours to take her message to other villages, where it sometimes met with a mixed reception.

One incident, in particular, came vividly to mind.

"I walked for two days to get to a village and when I arrived I was turned back,'' Miss Jennings said. "They said they didn't want my God, they had their own.'' But time was on the missionary's side. Miss Jennings was also a practical nurse and her mission was the only clinic in the area.

"It so happened the Great Chief's baby was taken very ill and they brought it to the mission. I said, `You were the ones who turned me away and now you want me to help you,' but I took the baby and nursed it for three weeks and they were able to take it home. So they said, `Well mom, you can come into the village any time you want.' Thus I had an inlet to go and take them the word of God,'' she said.

As the years went by, agriculture grew in the area and the mission continued peacefully in its work. Miss Jennings watched many children grow up as still more arrived to take their places. She was much loved by all.

Then came the war, with all its horrors, memories of which still break Miss Jennings' heart.

Food became very scarce. People began to starve. When relief trucks rolled into Monrovia with supplies, people crowded around them. Famished though the people were, the soldiers grabbed the food for themselves and sold it.

"They were breaking peoples' arms and beating them up with their guns. The people couldn't get anything to eat and they fled,'' Miss Jennings said.

As the war spread to the interior, her mission came under shell attack. Sleep was almost impossible because it was unsafe to sleep in bed. Instead, they slept on the floor.

Finally, things got so bad some of the children were bundled up and walked 10 days to reach the St. Paul river in a desperate bid to get to Monrovia.

"They were being chased from pillar to post,'' Miss Jennings noted. Still the Bermudian missionary remained firm.

"I said `Lord, if I am going to die, it is for the purpose of You because I am doing Your work,'' she related. "In the end, however, it got on my nerves and I was very sick.'' Taken 50 miles by remaining mission children to a Government hospital, Miss Jennings found that its Chinese doctors had gone. The hospital had no food or medicine. Foreigners were fleeing the country in droves and the British Embassy urged the plucky Bermudian to do likewise. Again she refused.

"Because things were so bad at the hospital, and I was so ill, the children were told, `If you want your mother (for that is what they called me) to live, try to get her into the city, so they took me to the Catholic hospital where I was detained for ten days.'' It was while she was there that the British Embassy arranged to get her out on a cargo plane. Soldiers had bombed the regular airport and it is no more. To this day Miss Jennings feels very badly at leaving, and continues to pray for the day when it will be safe to return.

Among her many painful memories are those of soldiers going into a university and killing all the students; raping women in their homes and killing the children; rampant looting; and destruction of farmlands.

Of her return to Bermuda she said: "When I first came here it was terrible for me. It seemed like I was crying inside all the time. There is a lot of work to be done in Liberia so I am anxious to get back.'' A few weeks ago she had a letter from one of her "children'' -- a 21-year-old who, because of his education at the mission, is what is known locally as a Congo boy.

"That means civilised,'' Miss Jennings explained. "There are two sets of people in Liberia: country people and civilised people. The latter have been to school.'' Because the young "Congo'' doesn't speak the local dialect fluently, he has been captured three times by soldiers and flung into jail.

"It seems to me they are against educated people and try to kill them. He has written begging me to get him out of the country because his life is in jeopardy,'' she related. "I had to respond, `You just have to keep praying.

The Lord will open up the way. I don't have anybody who can get you out'.'' Meanwhile, the missionary wholeheartedly supports the work of Amnesty International in its fight against religious persecution and the preservation of human rights.

"I think Amnesty's efforts are wonderful. It's an outreach.''