5 eae ee Smee Stearate aera eae ih aD ; sa aa titty ; rn Le as sett sca ea esahas oat Tat ia tasa Tato eieht ate Gornell University Library Ithaca, Nem Bork CHARLES WILLIAM WASON COLLECTION CHINA AND THE CHINESE THE GIFT OF CHARLES WILLIAM WASON CLASS OF 1876 1918 ‘ornell University Library “aii RED, YELLOW AND BLACK Tales of Indians, Chinese and Africans BY SOPHIA LYON FAHS THE METHODIST BOOK CONCERN NEW YORK mR CINCINNATI \Wasm Vv 2087 Fis W.442% Copyright, 1918, by SOPHIA LYON FAHS First Edition Printed September, 1918 Reprinted January and April, 1919 TO THE THREE JUNIORS I KNOW BEST CONTENTS FOREWORD 24.5602 Mie es eee ha 1l PART I A BLACKSKIN AMONG THE REDSKINS I A Necro anp His Dream........... 17 II How tue Dream CaME TRUE........ 30 PART II CHINESE BABIES, DOCTORS, AND CRIPPLES III Two Cuinese Girt BaBIns.......... 53 IV Two Kinps or FEet................ 64 V Two Honoraste Lavy Docrtors..... 76 VI Tue Story or Happy PEARL......... 88 VIL Iba AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES........ 103 VUI Tue Litrte Girewu or tHE Loney Room. 115 7 IX XI XII XIII CONTENTS PART III AN AMERICAN BOY IN THE AFRICAN BUSH TueEe’CaLu OF THE Boy.............. 133 In tHe Lanp or Great ADVENTURE... 148 THe EXPERIENCES OF A JACK-OF-ALL- PARAS BS ue Ser esducche pay Reena lab Ni ie 164 A Lumser Camp IN THE Bousn...... 181 A Curistian SOLDIER IN LOVE...... 196 APPENDIX. 2.0.0.0. ccc ceeecceceeoees 213 ILLUSTRATIONS FACING PAGB A drawing of a large Iroquois bark lodge made by Jesse Cornplanter, an Indian boy....... “In the big, long council house they had danced the bear dance”. ....................005. This Chinese woman is walking the streets try- ing to sell both of these girl babies. In times of famine they even trade them for poultry. . It is more comfortable simply to sit still, for her mother has already begun to bind her feet. . So that when she grows to be a lady she may have “‘lily feet” like these................. One of the “two honorable lady doctors’’—Dr. Mary Stone... . 22.00.00... cece “As poor sick women and children lay between clean white sheets, they looked out on cheery white walls and pretty red doors”...... ... “Priests chanted prayers for her before the God- dess of Mercy”... ........2..0 02 e cece eee Spring Lotus and her “Big Sister.” “She looked with her hunched back and her shrunken limbs no larger than a child of ten”.............. 9 36 42 60 67 67 77 86 98 ILLUSTRATIONS FACING PAGE The Cripples of the Ida Gracey Cripples’ Home. Some of them “The Little Doctor” can make well, but she cannot give new feet to the two women on the left. A Red Cross nurse, a house mother, and a deaf-and-dumb teacher who teaches the cripples to embroider stand together in the top row.............200005 130 The tall jungle grass shook its blades against their faces i. 3.cscee puns heen caine cies 150 “Caravans of black carriers from the forest passed daily along this path”.............. 152 The black boys built a pretty white church... 167 He went on foot from one cluster of huts to another telling Nzambi’s message of love.... 177 Senhor Bote guided two pairs of boys who took turns at running a heavy six-foot pit saw... 185 “Almost everyone in the village had come to listen to the white man’s stories except ‘Crime of Death’ ”........ 0... ccc cece eens 202 FOREWORD To the Boys and Girls Who Read These Stories HAT I have written for you are not fairy stories or myths. They are stories of real people, some of whom are living to-day. Perhaps some time you may yourselves talk to Dr. Stone or Dr. Kahn, or to Happy Pearl, Spring Lotus, or Mr. and Mrs. Withey and their children. Watch the missionary magazines, for these may tell you more stories about them. You might write a letter to one of them some time. I have tried not to put anything into these stories which is not true. If I have made any mistakes, it has been because often it has been so difficult to find out just what was true. Though China is the land of my birth, I have never been in Kiukiang or Nanchang, and I have never been able to visit the land of the black man. Of course I could not have been living one hundred years ago when 11 FOREWORD John Stewart sat in the council house of the Wyandots. The Indian stories were written after reading some very old books written by men who knew John Stewart very well. There are a number of old books, too, about the Wyandots of Ohio. I have also talked with a man who has made Indian ways his life-long study. Nowhere, however, could I find out all the things I wished to know. So while I was writing the stories for you, I had to imagine that I was watching John Stewart and the Indians, and I put down some things which seemed to me must have been true. Before writing the stories about the Chinese babies, doctors, and cripples, I again read from books and a great many magazines, and I talked with people who know Dr. Stone and Dr. Kahn. Then, too, I had several talks with Dr. Stone’s own sister, and I asked her a great many questions. After I had written the stories, she read them over and corrected mis- takes which she found I had made. Half 12 FOREWORD a dozen missionaries from China have helped me in the same way. Two very close friends of Ida Gracey helped me with the story about her. Before writing the stories about Senhor Bote in Africa, I read all of Mr. Withey’s own diaries—notebooks in which he wrote down his experiences from day to day. When I had picked out of these diaries the stories which I thought you would like the best, and had written them over so that you could understand them, I sent what I had written to Mr. Withey. He read them all very carefully and showed me just how to change them so that they would all be true. So now I hope that you too will play that you are first in Ohio at the time your grandfathers were boys, that you will then go to China, and then to Africa; and I hope that you will like all these real heroes as well as I do. Your friend, Sopnia Lyon Fans. Morsemere, New Jersey, May 31, 1918. 13 PART I A BLACKSKIN AMONG THE REDSKINS I A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM NE hundred years ago, when your great-grand-fathers were boys, there lived in Virginia a young Negro named John Stewart. For some years his work had been to take the cloth which women made on their spinning wheels at home and to dye it for them. But one day he started forth alone with his few belong- ings tied to a pole thrown over his shoulders and with all his savings in his pocket. Thus he tramped over the mountains from his old home in Virginia to make for him- self another home in the new Western town of Marietta, on the Ohio River. His slight body was nimble in its walking, his black eyes had a manly look, and his heart was glad in the thought of what he might do in this new town. As he walked along a shaded path 17 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK through the wilderness, however, robbers pounced upon him and robbed him of all his money and left him lying in the path, helpless. When he came to himself, he felt miserable indeed, and no good Samar- itan came to his relief. ‘Here I am,” he said to himself, “a penniless Negro and a stranger traveling to a strange town.” Alas! the robbers had not only taken his money, they had also stolen the hope in his heart. His limbs moved slowly and the look in his black eyes became dull and gloomy. It took but a few days in the strange town to change this young colored man into a wretched beggar. A few odd jobs here and there he found to do, but these helped him but little, for he spent most of his nickels and dimes for whisky. “A drink will make me feel better,” he would say to himself as he walked in the door of a rum shop. As the weeks passed, he came to drink often, and then more often still; until 18 ee A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM finally spells of drunkenness would come upon him frequently when he could neither walk straight nor talk straight, and his hands would tremble so badly that only with difficulty could he feed himself. John Stewart no longer found any joy in living. As he wandered one evening along the bank of the Ohio River, he thought he heard Satan speak to him and say, “Drown yourself in the river.”” He was almost ready to obey when he heard another voice say, “John Stewart! John Stewart!” He turned and looked all about him, but saw no one near, and he was afraid. Again, on another evening as he strayed gloomy and alone along a quiet street, he heard the sound of singing. As he ap- proached the house from which the music came he heard shouting and praying. He became curious and stepped to the door and was invited in. He found himself in the midst of a Methodist prayer meeting. He liked the meeting and yet he didn’t like it. When another evening came, however, he went again, and later yet again. 19 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK The love of Jesus began to change him. He gave up his drinking of whisky. He rented a little shop of his own and became again a dyer of cloth. In the early morn- ings and in the evenings he would wander out alone in the woods, and seating him- self on the moss beneath a tree, he would read his Bible and then he would kneel down and pray to God to help him to be a true man. One Sabbath evening as he was sitting thus alone in the woods he thought he saw an Indian bedecked in buckskin and feathers step toward him and he thought he heard him say, “Thou shalt go to the Northwest into the forests of the red man and declare plainly the words of the liv- ing God.” Then he thought he saw an Indian squaw wrapped in her blanket standing beside the man, and he thought he heard her speak the same words: “Thou shalt go to the Northwest into the forests of the red man and declare plainly the words of the living God.” As he stood wondering and gazing at his strange com- 20 A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM panions, the western sky seemed to light up with a strange radiance. On other evenings as he sat alone in the woods John Stewart again heard the voices—first the voice of a man, then the voice of a woman, saying, “Thou shalt go to the Northwest into the forests of the red man and declare plainly the words of the living God.” Sometimes he thought he heard them singing together in the sweetest tones. Sometimes, before he real- ized it, he found himself standing up and preaching as if the woods were full of Indians eager to hear his message. The memory of “the voices” in the woods disturbed John Stewart as he toiled at his trade. ‘‘A wild scheme it would be for me to be a preacher,” he thought. “A preacher should have more education than I have.” Then he would remember the days of his drinking and he would say, “Such a man as I can never be worthy to preach the words of the living God.” Yet “the voices” would keep ringing in his ear: ““Thou shalt go to the Northwest.” 21 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK He tried to forget them, but he could not. He spoke about “the voices” to his friends at the Methodist prayer meetings. “It was only a dream, John Stewart,” they said, and they smiled to themselves as they pictured an ignorant Negro going forth alone to the wilds of the Northwest to teach the Indians. “They would only scalp you for all your pains,” they said. ‘No one will give you money for such a foolish undertaking.” Still he was troubled. He could not forget “the voices.”” He went to his best friend, the class leader, and asked his advice. “Well, John,” he said, “your impressions and your sense of duty are so peculiar that no one will be willing to give you money for such a dangerous enterprise. But if you really feel that it is your duty to go somewhere northwest and preach to the Indians, obey what you believe to be the command of God. You cannot rest your mind in any other way than by making the 22 A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM attempt at least and starting on your journey.” Then he and his friend prayed and while they were on their knees, John Stewart became sure of what he should do. First, he remained at his shop dyeing cloth until he had paid up all the debts he had made while he lived carelessly squandering his money on drink. Then he started forth toward the Northwest. None of his Methodist friends were there to bid him good-by, none but his best friend, the class leader. He started across the fields alone with his Bible in one pocket and his hymn book in the other. All his outfit he carried in a coarse hand- kerchief tied to the end of a pole that crossed his shoulders. In it he had put two shirts, two extra pairs of socks, and a small supply of bread and meat. Thus he tramped from town to town toward the Northwest—to him a far-away - region of primeval forests and savage red- skins, the Northwest with its lodges of bark and plain log cabins of lonely pale 23 4 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK faces; a land of scalpings and wars between redskins and white skins. Thither John Stewart walked. At first he could follow the beaten roads. Ere long he found only the trails of the animals through the wild forests. At times he pushed his way through the tall grass of the prairies. As he journeyed, he watched the sun in the sky, and when he thought he was too far east, he would ‘turn to the west, and when he thought he was too far west, he would turn to the east. Sometimes he found lodgings for the night in the cabin of a kind-hearted pioneer who gave him a fresh supply of bread and meat. Sometimes he slept on the brown leaves in the woods. With the wild turkeys, the owls, and the beavers for company, he would seat himself on a log and read his Bible and pray and sing. Thus John Stewart journeyed on day by day. He knew not whither he was going or how he would be cared for. He only knew that he was going northwest. Here and there at long distances when 24 A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM he found a log cabin, he would step to the door and tell his story. Something about his face and the way he spoke would tell the settlers that he was honest, and usually they would invite him to share with them their corn meal mush and would give him a bed on the floor. Some tried to discourage him, for the pale faces of the West were not fond of the redskins. John Stewart listened to their warnings, but he also heard “the voices,” and he was not afraid. At last, having journeyed about one hun- dred miles, he came upon a settlement of Delaware Indians. It was in October and the red men were preparing to celebrate the gathering of the corn crop by a feast and a dance. The stranger was invited to watch. Dressed in their beads, feathers, and buckskins, the red men came. They gathered in a circle about a big fire in the woods and the stranger sat among them. First, they filled the air with their shrill cries. Then all the red braves began to 25 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK dance. Wildly they leaped about near the stranger, sometimes brandishing their toma- hawks close by his head, as if to cleave his skull. Skillfully, however, they caused their weapons to miss, only now and then touching the hair on his head or grazing the skin of his face. Sometimes a big warrior chief adorned with many colored paints would point a big knife at the seated visitor and make a thrust at him as if to kill him, yet carefully missing his mark. At first the would-be missionary sat trembling. He thought that, after all, the predicted scalping would come. Then he remembered “the voices” and his heart became strong. Soon he opened his hymn book and began reading quietly. When the noise of the dancing and shouting grew less, he began to sing. The sweet tones of his voice seemed to cast a spell over the redskins. All became quiet and stood about listening. When John Stewart had finished, one of the red men cried, “Sing more,” and grunts of approval passed from every lip. 26 A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM So the stranger sang other songs. Then he asked if anyone there could speak English. An old brave offered himself as interpreter of John Stewart’s words. “The Great Spirit has sent me to teach you,” said the visitor, and he told them of the love of Jesus. That night as he slept in an Indian lodge, John Stewart felt that he had done his duty, and perhaps had found his work. The next morning, however, he thought he heard “the voices” once more saying, “Go to the Northwest.” So on and on northwest the lonely man tramped, through forests and across plains, wading through swamps and streams. The ground was his bed and the wild fruits of the forest were his food. On another hundred miles he tramped to the banks of the beautiful Sandusky River, to the lodges of the Wyandot braves. On the edge of the camp he found a white man’s cabin, the home of Mr. Wil- liam Walker, the American agent for the tribe. “A runaway slave,” thought Mr. 27 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK Walker when he first saw John Stewart. But when he had heard the black man’s story of his coming, he was more ready to trust him, and the honest look in Stewart’s face won the heart of Walker’s Indian wife, who was preparing the noonday meal. “There is another man, a Negro like yourself, named Jonathan Pointer, who be- longs to this settlement and he speaks English,” said Mr. Walker. “‘When as a boy he was working with his master in a cornfield, Indians killed his master and took him as a captive. Ever since that time Jonathan Pointer has been living as one of the Indians. He probably will be willing to be your interpreter. His lodge is eight miles northwest of here in a big hollow. There is no road, nor even a trail, leading to it, but you can find it if you keep to the northwest.” So again John Stewart trudged on alone. He found the lodge, but not a_ hearty welcome. “It is folly for you, a poor colored man, to attempt to turn these Indians from their old religion to a new 28 A NEGRO AND HIS DREAM one,” said Jonathan Pointer. “Great and learned white men have been here before you, and they used all their power, but they could accomplish nothing. You can- not expect these Indians to listen to you.” But the man who had heard ‘“‘the voices” was determined to try. 29 II HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE HE following day Jonathan Pointer was preparing to attend an Indian feast. “May I go with you?” asked John Stewart. “I cannot promise to protect you, yet I will not forbid your going,” Jonathan Pointer replied. So they rode together across the grassy plains to the feasting grounds. About a huge bonfire the red men sat with gay bands of feathers about their heads, and with faces painted with blue, red, and green pictures of snakes and other ani- mals. Some were sitting, some were stand- ing, some were lying at full length on the grass; others were walking about and throwing now and then bunches of corn or handsfull of beans into the blazing fire. 30 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE The young missionary heard sounds strange to his ears; the jingling of heavy earrings and nose trinkets, the clanking of knives and tomahawks. Now and then a chief would blow a long flute. Then another would bring forth a harsh sound from an old turtle shell. But these noises were nothing compared to the bedlam that. came when the real dance began, with the wild yells and the drumming. Through it all John Stewart sat wonder- ing, watching, and quietly praying. When a lull came in the celebration he stood up and began to sing. All about became silent. After ending his song, he began to speak. He would speak one sentence. Jonathan Pointer would then repeat it, but in the language of the red man. Then another sentence in English, and his in- terpreter would give it in the Indian lan- guage. He told them of the Great Spirit who created the heavens and put in them the sun, the moon, and the stars. He told them how this Great Spirit had sent his Son to show his children his great love. 31 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK All the feathered and painted men about the fire listened in silence. When he had finished, Stewart said, “T have one request. If you feel friendly toward me, show it by shaking hands.” A tall chief of the Bear clan spoke for all when he said: “It is right that we should show friendliness toward this stranger. It is the red man’s custom.” So one by one all these savage redskins shook hands with the black stranger. “Come to the lodge of Jonathan Pointer to-morrow evening and I will again sing for you and tell you more,” said John Stewart as he bade them good-by. So through the next day the missionary lived in hope. At eventide, however, only one lonely Indian came across the hollow to the lodge—an old woman wrapped in her blanket of deer skin. John Stewart was true to his promise. He sang and talked to this one old woman of the love of the Great Spirit. The following night, one more Indian dared to join the group to hear of the 32 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE new religion. He was Big Tree, a tall, fine-looking old chief dressed in his deer- skin jacket, and leggings richly trimmed with beads. From his ears and nose hung silver ornaments and the feathers that crowned his head made him seem all the taller and straighter. He sat quietly listen- ing to all the words of the stranger who had traveled with his message over moun- tains and hills from the land of the rising sun. This story of love was new and strange to the old warrior. He felt so great a weight on his heart because of his wicked life that the very thought crushed his spirit. The next day he wandered into the woods alone and fell on his knees and prayed: “O Father, have pity on me, your child that you have kept until his legs and arms are stiff with pains, and his whole body is worn out. This load will throw me down and I shall never rise again. The trees for me never again will blossom; the corn never again will rustle in my ears, and I shall no more bebold 33 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK the harvest. O, take this load from my heart, so that I may walk forth again, and see the beauty of the Great Spirit in the stars.” “While I was talking to the Great Spirit,” Big Tree told the missionary after- ward, “he healed my heart, and made it new. He put a voice in my inside, just here,” he said, pointing with his hand to his heart, “and this voice reached my ear and I heard it say, ‘All thy sins are for- given thee.’ My heart was emptied of its load and I felt light and happy as a child, and I could run like a deer in the chase.” The third night after John Stewart came, those who wished to hear of the new religion gathered in the council house. This was a windowless log cabin with one open side and with the hard ground for a floor. This time almost a dozen redskins came to hear him. As the days and weeks passed, it became popular to hear the new preacher. The red men liked his singing, and some were deeply impressed by his message. Some 34 | HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE spent so much time at meetings that they neglected to go as usual to hunt the deer and the beaver, or to tap the maple trees. This greatly displeased the white traders, who grew rich by buying these things of the Indians. They began to say ugly words about John Stewart. “John Stewart is but a runaway slave.” “It is a disgrace to have a nigger preach- ing to you.” “The white men would not have a black man preaching to them.” ‘He has bewitched you and in the end will only do you harm.” Even Jonathan Pointer while interpret- ing what Stewart had to say would now and then slyly add a few words of his own: “He says so, but I do not know whether it is true or not, nor do I care. I am only interpreting what he has said. You must not think that I care whether you believe or not.” All the while John Stewart lived quietly among the Wyandots. He slept wrapped in an Indian blanket on the earthern floor 35 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK of a bark lodge. He ate what they ate —locusts seasoned with maple syrup and fried in bear’s oil, or rabbit or jerked venison or whatever they had. He supped his soup out of the big wooden ladle that passed from lip to lip in the family circle. Without soap he washed his clothes in the Sandusky River. He went with his red brothers to hunt and trap animals for valuable furs. He talked with them of the love of the Great Spirit. He comforted those in trouble. In the council house he sang and prayed and told them of their wrongdoings, their whisky-drinking and their fighting. One by one and two by two many of these red men of the forest decided to follow Jesus and so began to change their ways of living. They gave up their drink- ing of whisky. They tried to be honest and to live at peace with one another. They even left their little lodges made of poles and bark for neat log cabins with glazed windows. In these cabins they built fireplaces with chimneys, and made 36 Aoq ueipuy ue ‘1ayurpdusoy ossae £q opeut aSpoy yreq stonboay osse] & jo FuiMvip y Jayleg ‘Dy Jo uorwssnusod Ag wer yg ) ~ lee Keen, Sea - = oy > HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE furniture, chairs, tables, and _bedsteads,. many of them as good as those in the cabins of their white neighbors. The Methodists down by the Ohio River heard of the wonderful changes that were taking place among the Wyandots as the result of the coming of this unlearned black man, and they sent white mission- aries to help him. Sometimes these white men preached in the council house. Some of the Indian braves, however, were only made stronger in the religion of their fathers. They would not listen to the words of “‘the white man’s Book,” and they would not believe in the “white man’s way to heaven.” “The white man has not treated us fairly. He has de- ceived us. His book cannot be good,” they said. These men also gathered some- times in the council house, and there told. the red men’s stories of the creation of the world, of giants and dwarfs and witches and of good and evil spirits. One Sunday morning a large party of these followers of the religion of the red. 37 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK man came to the meeting of the Christians at the council house. At their head was De-un-quot, the great chief of all the Wyandots. His head was decked with a band of beads and a crown of feathers. A nose jewel and earrings adorned his face and a chain of silver ornaments hung about his neck and bracelets about his arms and legs. Presently De-un-quot stepped before the circle that sat about the fire, and spoke a few words of greeting. Then striking fire with his flint, he lighted his pipe and sat down. Soon many curls of smoke went lazily up from many pipes about the fire as the Christians sang songs and one of the missionaries preached. Then De-un-quot again arose and spoke to his redskins: “My friends, this is a beautiful day and your faces look happy. I have listened to your preacher. He has said some things that are good, but they have nothing to do with us: we are Indians and belong to the red man’s God. That book was made by the white man’s God and suits him. They 38 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE can read it. We cannot. What he has said will do for the white man, but it has nothing to do with us. “Once in the days of our grandfathers, many years ago, this white man’s God came to this country and claimed us. But our God met him somewhere near the great mountains, and they disputed about the right to this country. At last they agreed to settle this question by trying their great power to remove a mountain. The white man’s God got down on his knees, opened a big book and began to pray and to talk, but the mountain stood fast. The red man’s God took his magic wand, and began to pow-wow and beat the turtle shell and the mountain trembled, and shook and stood by him. The white man’s God became frightened and ran off, and we have not heard of him since, un- less he has sent these men to see what he can do.” De-un-quot’s followers looked pleased as their great chief spoke and every now and then they uttered their grunts of 39 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK approval. “Tough gondee,” “It is true,” they said. Again one of the missionaries arose and said: “Our grandfather is a great man. He is an able warrior, a great hunter, and a good chief in many things. In all this Iam his son. But when it comes to matters of religion, he is my son and I am his father. He has told us a strange story. I would like to learn where he obtained it. He may have dreamed it or perhaps he has heard some drunken Indian tell it. But, my friends, the great chief is mistaken about his gods. If it requires a god for every color, there must be many gods. Jonathan Pointer and Stewart are black. I am white and you are red. Who made the black man? Where is his god? This Book tells you and me that there is but one God and that he made all things and all nations of the earth. God had made plants of many colors. Go to the plains and see their varied hues. So it is with men. He has given them all shades of color from black to white.” 40 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE So the missionaries pleaded with those who still refused to follow the Book. Some cried aloud; some clapped their hands; some became very angry; some ran away. “TIT am the head of the nation,” said De-un-quot, “‘and the head ought to be believed. This religion may go into every other lodge of the reservation, but into mine it shall never come.” The great chief never changed his re- solve. Until he died he continued to follow what he believed to be the religion of the red man. Yet he could not compel his people to follow him. Upon his death his widow joined the Christians and others of his tribe became more bold and ceased to sacrifice to the spirits. It was not only in the council house that the missionaries and the Christians told of the new religion. They followed the red men on their hunts in the forests. There they talked to them of God. They lived with the red men in their sugar camps when they tapped the maple trees and 41 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK made sugar. There they talked to them of God. One winter the missionaries with a few of the Christian chiefs decided to walk north through the paths in the forest to the camp of their brother red men, the Senecas. Jt was the time of the yearly mid-winter feast. For a whole week these red brothers had been feasting and dancing and sacrificing to the spirits to win their favor for another year. In the big long council house they had danced the bear dance, the false-face dance, the dance of the beans, the buffalo dance, the pigeon dance, the fish dance, the great-feather dance, the pumpkin dance, and other dances. Morning, noon, and night they danced. None seemed to tire. In between dances some old warrior would tell the deeds of braves of long ago, and some would tell stories of the great turtle, or of the witch buffalo or of stone giants. Outside the council house big kettles of venison and pork and raccoon hung over crackling fires. About these ket- 42 _20URp Iveq 94} psouep pey Aaq} esnoy jlounos gZuo] “BIq 94} U],, AISI [VINJEN JO UNasnyy uvoWeury oq} jo uorsstuJed Aq ‘UT}BD eBIoar Aq qo}Oys posojoo v wWoIg gran ay Cease costes Ee ee, gre, Sa ES cre rs ny Aah eas AE ape eae HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE tles the red men feasted from big wooden ladles. , For five days the bodies of two white dogs hung from the top of a high pole that stood in the ground just outside the council house. They were the red men’s gifts to the Great Spirit and to the spirits of the sun and the moon, to the spirits of the rivers and the brooks, to the spirits of the rain and of the thunder, to the spirits of the corn and of the maple tree and to other spirits. The red men loved their dogs, and white dogs were the most beautiful of all. They would give their best to the spirits. On the fifth day of the festival these red men came with their faces and shoulders. smeared with black and on their arms were painted pictures of snakes and of other animals. A big fire burned in the center of the assembly. Two men took down the dogs from the pole and gave them to their chief. He then carefully laid them on the fire and began chanting a long prayer. 43 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK “Oh listen, you who dwell in the sky! You look down upon us and know that we are thy children. Oh now inhale the smoke; so listen to our words. Until the next great thanksgiving, Until then may the people continue in health.” As he continued to pray, now and again he threw pieces of tobacco into the fire to add to the fragrance of the burning. On one of the last days of the great annual feast the Wyandot Christians visited the Senecas. It was Sunday morning, and about one hundred chiefs and braves were playing fiercely the Indian game of ball. The Wyandot Christians seated themselves on a log outside of the council house and waited for two hours listening to the terri- fying yells of these ball players. At last the playing ceased and the visitors were invited in. The red men seated themselves in a circle with the chief in the center. He lighted the pipe 44 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE of peace and passed it to the visitors. A woman entered with a kettle of hominy and gave to each in the circle a ladlefull as she passed. Then the great chief asked the visitors to speak their message. Be- tween-the-Logs, a chief of the Bear clan, arose and said: “Brothers, we have long had a desire to see you and to speak with you, but it has not been possible until now. Our business is from the Great Spirit. Let us begin by singing his praise.” He then announced a hymn. As they sang many left the room. Then he knelt and began to pray. As he prayed some yelled and more left the room, and when he had finished there were but few remain- ing in the council house. Then Between- the-Logs began to speak. “Fathers and brothers, from you I came out, for my father was a Seneca. As chil- dren sometimes may find a valuable thing and bring it and show it to their parents that all may have the benefit of it, so I have found a most valuable treasure. I mean the 45 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK religion of Jesus Christ. It is like cool spring water to the thirsty traveler. It refreshes our spirits. It is also strong, for it makes good husbands, good wives, good children, and good neighbors.” As he spoke many stepped back into the house. He told them of the love of the Great Spirit and of Jesus. Some of the red faces lighted with gladness as they heard his words. Dark scowls set- tled on the brows of others. Heavy earrings clinked as they shook their heads and uttered ugly grunts. The big bark house was filled with the noise of mutterings. Then arose Chief Mononcue, and his earnest eyes flashed over the assembly. His clear commanding voice ordered silence and it was obeyed. “When you meet to worship the Great Spirit and to hear his word, shut up your mouths, and open your ears to hear what is said. You have been here several days and nights worshiping your Indian gods which have no existence except in your clouded minds. You have been burning your dogs for them to smell. What kind of gods are they that can be delighted with 46 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE the smell of burnt dog? Do you suppose that the Great Spirit who spread out the heavens, who hung up the sun and the moon, and all the stars to make light, and spread out this vast world of land and water, and filled it with men and beasts, and everything that swims and flies, is pleased with the smell of your burnt dogs? I tell you to-day that his great eye is on your hearts, and not on your fires. Has your worshiping here these few days made you any better? Do you feel that you have gotten the victory over one evil? No! You have not taken the first step to do better.” He then spoke of Jesus and of his dying. He told of the awful consequences that would follow if they neglected God’s love. He burst into tears. He pulled the hand- kerchief from his head and wiped the tears from his eyes. Many about the fire sat as if they had been turned to stone. Others wept quietly. Many of the women drew their blankets over their heads and wept. “Awful, awful day of the wicked!” said 47 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK the thundering voice of this chief of the forest. ‘Your faces will look blacker with your shame and guilt than they did with your paint.” So the message of the white man’s re- ligion spread from lodge to lodge and from village to village. Sometimes the red man heard it gladly. Sometimes he would have nothing to do with it. Although John Stewart lived but six years after he first wandered into this valley of the Sandusky, he lived long enough to see a great change come to the Wyandots. He saw a neat church built and filled each Sunday morning with about two hundred Indians. He saw a large mission house put up where over fifty Indian boys and girls went to school. He saw the Christian boys plowing and planting, and later he saw them hoeing acres of growing corn and potatoes, cab- bages and other vegetables. He saw the girls learning to cook and to sew, to wash and to spin. As he walked here and there through the villages and from cabin to 48 HOW THE DREAM CAME TRUE |} cabin in the country he found many more neat gardens and larger fields of beau- tiful corn than he saw when he first arrived. He lived to see the Wyandot reservation, as white men came to call that region, become one of the very finest Indian reservations in all the country. Those who worship in Methodist churches should not forget that a poor and ignorant Negro was the first Methodist who dared to go to the red men of the forest to tell them of the love of Jesus. John Stewart loved them as a brother for Jesus’ sake, and this love changed these savage war- riors as the warm sunshine and the re- freshing showers bring the pink blossoms to the brown branches of the peach tree. Because of John Stewart’s daring and his love, the Methodist churches in the United States formed themselves into a Mission- ary Society and during the one hundred years since then they have been sending missionaries to red men and black men, to brown men and yellow men scattered far and wide the world over. 49 PART II CHINESE BABIES, DOCTORS, AND CRIPPLES III TWO CHINESE GIRL BABIES “HOU CHIEH FU YIN TANG.” FR These Chinese words were painted in large gold characters on the ~ door of a small gray brick church. $ Just across the street stood the 4 if open gate in the old stone wall that surrounded the city of Kiu- ce Kiang. As long-queued Chinese AQ crowded through this gate and down the narrow street, the great or gold characters seemed to look a straight at them. They said, “This is the Back Street Good News Hall,” yet, strange as it ‘Ee may seem, only a few of the hundreds of Chinese who passed through that gate each day had yet heard the Good News the Chinese pastor of the little church wanted to tell them. They were afraid even to step inside the door, 53 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK for they said: “’Tis the house of the fol- lowers of the ‘foreign devils.’ They have an evil magic, those ‘foreign devils,’ and whoever enters under that roof of tiles is made to forget his ancestors.” Back of the little chapel where the few faithful Christians met to sing and pray, was a small schoolroom, and back of the schoolroom was the cozy home of the Chinese pastor and his wife, Mr. and Mrs. Shih. Chinese women, carrying large baskets of clothes, passed by the little house as they walked down the hill to do their washing in the lake that lay a little far- ther on. “The angry spirits will some day fly through that door,” they said, shaking their heads wisely, “and they will bring misfortune to Mr. and Mrs. Shih for daring to worship the God of the ‘for- eign devils.’ ” These Chinese women did not under- stand that for Mr. and Mrs. Shih there were no evil spirits. The little bedroom 54 TWO CHINESE GIRL BABIES already made cheerful by its clean, white- washed walls became a glad and _ holy place. Lying at one side of the room behind the long grass-cloth curtains that hung about the bed, lay the mother and a new-born baby. The father, sitting on a stool at the bedside, was leaning over the face of his new daughter. *““Mother-of-my-child,”’ he said, lifting his eyes to those of his wife, “I am glad she is a girl. Perhaps we can now show our people that girls are as much worth while as boys. Let us this first day of her life give her to God.” Standing by the bed, at the opening in the long curtains, he prayed. “Heavenly Father, we thank thee for this child whom thou hast given us to love. We give her back to thee. Through all her life use her to do whatever kind of work may please thee most. Amen.” A smile of peaceful joy passed over the mother’s face as her husband prayed. “Tsai-yu,” she said, “she is a perfect babe. Let us call her by the name of the 55 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK greatest woman of all the nations. Let us call her ‘Mary.’ ” “That thought is good, Mother-of-my- child,”” answered the father, eagerly, “‘but let us also make her name a Chinese name so that she will not be jeered at by those ‘who hate the foreigners’ religion.”’ After a moment’s thought he added, “Mary sounds much like Mei-yu, and that means Beautiful Jewel; and is she not like a precious stone?” “Mei-yu, Mei-yu, that shall be your name, O precious jewel from the hand of God,” said the mother, gladly, as she looked at the sleeping face of the new- born babe. Fondly petting the wee soft toes she added, “and I promise God this day that these feet shall never be bound. They shall always be left as He has made them.” News of the little newcomer spread up and down the narrow street. “Those Jesus people have a little baby girl,” said one neighbor to another, “but, strange to say, they do not seem to care that she is 56 TWO CHINESE GIRL BABIES a girl. She is now ten days old and they are having a feast for her just as if she were a boy.” On the other side of the old city wall, in one of thousands of little brick houses, in the great city of Kiukiang, lay another Chinese mother and at her side slept another new-born babe. The mother’s face was turned to the wall and tears filled her eyes. A room full of noisy neighbor women stood about. “Another girl—and four girls in the family already!” said one. ‘Let this new one be drowned at once,” said another. “Five baby girls in one family and no sons! The shame of it!” “The evil spirits are very angry with the woman. She is being punished for some great sin.” Such words as these were being shrieked at the weeping mother by one after another in the room. And still more cross words came. “If you keep the babe you will never have a son. When you and your 57 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK husband are dead, there will be no son to burn paper money at your graves or to bring your spirits food. You and Mr. Kahn will wander about the next world as beggars.” “Let me drown her for you in a pail of water,” said one. “No, no,” pleaded the mother, suddenly turning over in her bed. “I cannot bear to have you do it.” “Let me have her,” cried another. “You will never need to think of her again.” Turning to a woman at her side she whis- pered, “I'll bundle the thing off to the baby pond over by the city wall.” “No, no, leave her alone,” begged the: frightened mother as she put her arms around the helpless child. ‘She is beau-. tiful. She is warm and soft. She can cry. Leave her alone!” “But your husband says you have not rice enough for any more girls, and that the gods will send you no sons if you keep her,” insisted another. “Call a fortune-teller in and let him say 58 TWO CHINESE GIRL BABIES what shall be done,” suggested the grand- mother. All heads in the room nodded their approval and added a chorus of “Yes, yes, call the fortune-teller.” The following day the fortune-teller, an old blind man dressed in a faded blue gown and red jacket, entered the home leaning on the shoulders of a boy. Being carefully seated on a stool beside a small table in the midst of a curious crowd of men and women, he asked: ““What was the day of the moon when the child was born? What was the exact hour?” Writing the dates in a book, he bowed his white head, touched a finger to his forehead and then to each cheek. He began to move his fingers about as if counting a sum in arithmetic—all the while chanting in a low sing-song voice words which no one else in the room could understand. Finally lifting his head he solemnly announced: “The child must be sold to another family, who will raise her to be the wife of their son.” All heads in the room nodded em- 59 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK phatically and all cried, “Yes, yes. Let the girl be sold!” There followed days of searching here and there up and down the narrow streets of the big city for a family who wished to buy a baby girl. Finally an agreement was made with the Wangs. They would give two dollars for her. Again the fortune-teller was called to the Kahn home. “Are the stars in favor of this deal?” he was asked. Again the old blind fortune-teller asked the hour and date of the birth of the Kahn baby girl and the date of the birth of the boy who was to be the future husband. Again he touched his finger to his fore- head and to his cheeks, and again he moved his fingers about as if counting a sum, and again he chanted in a sing-song tone words no one else could understand. Then he solemnly pronounced the de- cree. “This match will never do. The baby girl has been born under the dog star and the boy has been born under the cat star. As the dog is stronger than 60 em. & "eat ts Le, By courtesy of World Outlook This Chinese woman is walking the streets trying to sell both of these girl babies. In times of famine they even trade them for poultry TWO CHINESE GIRL BABIES the cat, so the wife would be stronger than the husband. Of course this must not be. As dogs and cats always fight so they would quarrel as husband and wife. It must not be.” Once more there was distress in the Kahn household—most of all in the heart of the mother. Must she, after all, drown her babe? She wept and tried to remember what awful sin she must have committed to make the gods so angry with her. Past many bends and turnings in the narrow streets, packed on all sides with little gray brick houses, away in another part of the big city, there stood in the midst of a grove of mulberry trees a two- storied house hidden from the street by a high stone wall. “One house is built on top of another,” said some as they passed. “The evil spirits can easily fly in through those large windows.” “Tt will serve those ‘foreign devils’ right,” said others, “for they bewitch those who come to them.” 61 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK This two-storied house was the only girls’ school in all the big city. It was also the home of Miss Gertrude Howe, the American missionary in charge. Seated with Miss Howe at a table in her study was a Chinese teacher, and an open book lay before each. Her large gray eyes were looking earnestly at the small slant eyes across the table from her, and her lips moved in an effort to speak the Chinese words just uttered by the Chinese teacher. Then for a moment the Chinese teacher forgot the lesson he was teaching the American woman. “Miss Howe,” he said, abruptly, “neigh- bors of ours, the Kahns, have had their fifth baby girl. The husband does not wish to keep the child. They tried to sell her, but the fortune-teller predicted bad luck for the match. Mrs. Kahn is in despair. She is too kind-hearted to drown the babe. Will you not take the child, Miss Howe? Bring her to your own home and teach her to be a Christian.” A few minutes later two sedan chairs 62 TWO CHINESE GIRL BABIES borne on the shoulders of men were waiting at the gate. The American woman and the Chinese teacher were hurried along the narrow streets, through noisy crowds of men and wheelbarrows and other sedan chairs, until they mene the house of the Kahns. prey ‘Not: long iee the same eee chairs were hurrying back to ‘the two-storied house. . Miss: Howe carried: in her arms a little bundle and out of the bundle peeped a sweet baby face.: As Miss Howe earried her upstairs to her own room ‘and laid ‘her on ‘her own bed, she said: “You are now mine, dear child. I will care for you. I will feed: you and clothe: you as if you had always been mine. You shall learn that there are no evil spirits to fear, and that the heavenly Father. loves little girls as well as little boys. Your name shall be Ida,” and she pressed a kiss on the warm baby cheek. 63 IV TWO KINDS OF FEET NE morning a number of years ago in a big Chinese city, a missionary and his wife sat in their rocking chairs reading Chinese books. Loud voices, the rumbling of wheelbarrows, the clatter of feet on the rough stones of the streets sounded in their ears continually from out- side the wall that surrounded their yard. These noises, however, did not disturb them as they read, for they had long since be- come accustomed to these city sounds. Then above the noise of the crowd, they suddenly heard a series of sharp screams, like the shrieks of a child. ““What do these cries mean?” asked the wile. “T am afraid that a Chinese woman is binding her daughter’s feet,’ answered the husband. The cries continued, now at the 64 TWO KINDS OF FEET top of a child’s voice; then a moment’s quiet, followed by a sudden outburst of quick screams, as if the pain were too great to bear. “T cannot sit here any longer and listen to that poor child,”’ said the woman as she rose from her chair and started toward the door. With a heart quivering with pity, she made her way out of the gate in the wall and down the narrow, crooked street to- ward the crying child. Entering an open gate in another brick wall, she found her- self in a narrow court surrounded on all sides by low houses with dark tile roofs. A few men stood about talking and laugh- ing. Women sat here and there embroider- ing and chatting. No ear was turned or seemed to hear that distressing cry. The English visitor crossed the court, but stopped before a doorway—too shocked to move— when she saw the object of her search. A little girl who looked to be about five years old sat leaning back in her chair while her mother, firmly gripping one of her ankles with one hand, with the other 65 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK was winding a long white bandage tightly around her foot, squeezing underneath all the four smaller toes and pressing the heel and great toe nearer together. The child’s face was streaked with tears and she clutched her mother’s. arm, crying: “O, stop! stop! I shall die! I shall die with the pain! I cannot bear. this bandaging any longer. O, mother, mother, unloose the bandages!’ The missionary stepped across the room and laid her hand lightly on the. mother’ s shoulder. The startled woman dropped her child’s foot and bandage, and turning around, she stared like an angry tiger at the intruder. Ag “I. have come,’’ said ithe missionary in a gentle voice, “to beg you to stop tor- turing your daughter. She is, your own child. Look at her little face, red with the pain, and listen to her crying. Do have pity on her and undo the binding.” The angry mother blazed at the in- truder. “Who are you that you come to teach me how to treat my daughter? You . ) It is more comfortable simply to sit still, for her mother has already begun to bind her feet By courtesy of World Outlook So that when she grows to be a lady she may have “‘lily feet’’ like these TWO KINDS OF FEET | think that I do not love my child? You do not understand. This foot-binding is our evil fortune handed down to us by our ancestors; no one can free us from it. If I were to stop binding her feet now, when my daughter grew up, she would curse me. No decent man will marry a woman without ‘lily feet.’ Dare I listen to her screaming now and let my daughter grow up to be a slave? Must I live to see her always wearing old blue cotton dresses, walking the streets with big bare feet and with uncombed hair, a slave, despised, jeered at, beaten with a stick? Never! Never! Let her die first!” Then bending over toward the frightened face of the child, the mother looked straight into her tear-stained eyes and _ asked, ‘Daughter, do you really wish me not to bind your feet?” The child’s wet eyes stared helplessly at her mother’s determined face, and her lips quivered as she shook her little head with so slight a shake that the visitor could scarcely see it move. 67 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK *‘See!”? shouted the mother. “If my child would only speak, she would say: ‘Don’t mind my screams. Go on and bind my feet tighter. Make them so small that no little girl in all the city can say that her feet are smaller than mine.’ ”’ The missionary herself could scarce keep back the tears. Without a word she walked quietly out of the door, across the court, and slipped down the crooked, crowded street back to her own room. “It is hopeless!’ she said as she fell into her rocking chair. “So the little girls of China have suffered for hundreds of years. O heavenly Father, when will the good news of thy love be told? When will the little girls of China be given a fair chance to be happy?” The Chinese pastor’s wee baby Mei-yu grew until she became a little girl and had her eighth birthday. Over in the two- storied house among the mulberry trees, Miss Gertrude Howe was sitting at the teacher’s table before the rows of chil- 68 TWO KINDS OF FEET dren’s desks. Mei-yu, dressed in a pretty flowered cotton jacket and blue trousers, stood beside the desk with her father and mother. “We have brought our little girl to you,” said the father. “We want you to make a doctor of her.” For a moment Miss Howe’s clear gray eyes stared in surprise at the fine face of the man. “I have watched your American doctors,” he con- tinued. “I see how much good they are doing our people. But we feel that a Chinese woman doctor might do many things for the women of China which a foreigner could not do.” “Very well,” answered Miss Howe with enthusiasm. “Bring Mei-yu to school to- morrow and leave her here. We will then see what we can do.” So it came about that Mei-yu began going to the American school for Chinese girls that stood behind a wall in the midst of a grove of mulberry trees. The school was beyond many bends and turnings in the narrow streets in another part of the 69 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK city from the pastor’s home back of the Good News Hall. Yet Mei-yu walked all the way morning and evening with one of her parents or with some other grown- up. Dressed in her bright-colored jacket and blue trousers, like other well dressed Chinese girls, she tripped along spryly over the cobble-stones of the narrow streets. “Just like a boy!” men would sneeringly say as they watched her pass. Her lithe little body, straight as an arrow, glided by and her black eyes shone with glad- ness. But now and again she would meet some other little girl, clinging to the arm of a servant woman, and hobbling slowly along on little stumps of feet squeezed into tiny embroidered slippers. Proud of her own awkward tiny steps, the Chinese girl would look down at Mei-yu’s large shoes and taunt her, saying, “See the salt junks go by,” meaning by salt junks what we would mean by river flatboats or barges. Again another morning, some fretful, hobbling child, as she met the sprightly 70 TWO KINDS OF FEET Mei-yu, would cry, “Ah! ah! you'll be fit to follow the buffaloes in the. fields with those big feet of yours.” Again one morning as Mei-yu. walked along happily to school, she met another girl trudging lamely | along, leaning on the arm of a servant. The other girl stopped short and, stretching her hands out straight on either side, she shouted, “You shall not pass until you kneel down here. on these stones at my feet.” “J will not kneel,” answered Mei-yu. “My feet are as beautiful as yours. It is right that girls should walk as. boys. | Our feet should be left to grow as the Creator made them.” ; “You. act. kneel before me,’ > answered the haughty girl. . “To bind the. feet is the custom handed down to us by our ancestors. We dishonor them if we do not follow their custom. Neither girl would yield. Their faces reddened. They stood_ stiffly facing each other, each determined to win. What might have happened no one knows had 71 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK not the two women with them parted the two girls, and made them move on. Sometimes when school was over for the day and Mei-yu stepped inside the door of her little home back of the Good News Hall, she would throw herself into her mother’s arms and cry, “I wish I did not need to walk to school. They are always taunting me. Is it true that there is not another respectable girl in the city whose feet are not bound? I am so tired of hearing the mean names they call me.” “Try to bear it all patiently for Jesus’ sake,” said Mrs. Shih to her daughter. “It matters not if sometimes you cry in your mother’s arms; but on the street walk along like a brave girl. Act as though you did not hear.” Sometimes when Mei-yu was at school, the neighbor women would step into the Shih home and chat awhile with Mrs. Shih. “You are very foolish not to bind Mei-yu’s feet,” they would say. ‘You will never find a man to marry her.” 72 TWO KINDS OF FEET “Tt matters not,” answered Mrs. Shih. ‘She will live to be more useful than your bound-footed daughters. She is going to school so that some day she may be a doctor.” ‘‘A woman doctor! they answered in surprise. ‘“‘Who ever heard of a woman doctor! Your Jesus religion certainly makes you very queer.” One Sunday morning all the girls of the school among the mulberry trees gathered in the little chapel for morning prayers. They stumped into the room on their tiny stubs of feet, some leaning on canes, others holding the arms of grown-up women. All the little bodies moved as if walking on stilts, except those of two bright-eyed girls—Ida Kahn and Mei-yu Shih. (The Chinese would say Shih Mei-yu.) Straight as two arrows they walked, light and free. No pains shot through their well-formed feet that stood in sensible shoes. Seating themselves on long benches, the girls faced the plain wooden pulpit behind 73 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK which stood Mr. Shih. The Chinese pastor opened a Bible filled with strange Chinese characters and began to read. In the midst of his reading, a ‘sharp quick cry burst from a pair of lips and a little girl buried her face in her hands as she shook with crying: ‘A few more verses were read by the man in the pulpit, when another scream disturbed the service and another suffering child dropped herself on the lap of the woman seated beside her. “My bandage will kill me. I cannot stand it any longer,” she ‘half whispered and half cried. The kind-hearted’ woman beside her gently re- moved her shoe’ and loosened a wee bit the bandage that bound her aching foot, while Miss Howe stepped quietly around and seated herself beside the other sobbing child. As the pastor told of the loving heavenly Father the little girl lay trembling and sobbing in Miss Howe’s arms. . Ida Kahn and Shih Mei-yu, sitting to- gether on a bench behind, watched the weeping girls and listened to their muffled sobs. Tears came to their eyes, too; but 74 TWO KINDS OF FEET it was not for themselves that they suffered. Ida Kahn and Shih Mei-yu thought: “(How thankful we are that our feet have not been bound. Jeers and taunts and mean names are nothing, if only we can help to bring the time when no little girls in all China will have to suffer like this.” 46 Vv TWO HONORABLE LADY DOCTORS EAR after year Ida Kahn and Shih Mei-yu studied faithfully in the Mul- berry School. They worked hard over arithmetic, geography, and history. They read books in Chinese and they learned to talk easily in English. Then their great dream came true. They sailed across the wide waters to America. Shih Mei-yu was given an English name of similar mean- ing to her Chinese name. She was called Mary Stone. The two Chinese women went to a medical college. For four years they studied about the human body and how to make it well when it is sick. When they returned across the Pacific Ocean, they were called Dr. Kahn and Dr. Stone. The day of their homecoming has never been forgotten in Kiukiang. A large crowd of long-queued Chinese, some dressed in 76 Courtesy of the One of the “two honorable lady dectors’ —Dr » World Outlook Mary Stone TWO LADY DOCTORS their silks, others wearing their old blue cotton smocks, filled the wide street, or “bund,” that led along the embankment at the side of the great Yang-tse River. A steamer slowly pushed upstream and was moored to the bank. Thousands of fire- crackers banged their welcome to two Chinese women as they stepped ashore, and many old friends greeted them with hearty Chinese handshakings. Entering two sedan chairs which were waiting for them, they became part of a procession of chairs that were carried along the “bund.” Firecrackers continued to bang and the noise attracted even greater crowds. Long-queued Chinese pushed and jammed against one another in order to get a glimpse of these women doctors. “Ah, these women are receiving more honor than was shown even to our com- mander when he arrived,” some said. As the procession of chairs made its way slowly up the “bund,” Chinese would press closely to the chair bearers and would ques- tion them. “Are these Chinese women?” 7 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK “Ts it true that these women have been studying four years in a foreign land?” “In what country were they?” “Can they really heal the sick?” “Will they live in Kiukiang?” There were vigorous noddings of heads all about and a chorus of “Good! Good!’ came from all sides. Every face in that blue- robed crowd looked pleased. Many hun- dreds followed the women through the gate in the great city wall, and up the narrow streets even to the door of the school among the mulberry trees. There a few thousand extra firecrackers were set off as the two Chinese women doctors stepped inside the door of their old school home. It was but two days after their arrival that they were first called to help a sick woman. A Chinese gentleman rattled the knocker on their door and asked for the women doctors. “My wife has been very ill for over a week,” he said. ‘The Chinese doctor is unable to help her. Will you not hurry to her and do what you can for her?” %3 TWO LADY DOCTORS Soon the two doctors were tucked away in sedan chairs and the Chinese runners carried them off on their shoulders through alley ways and crowded streets, turning and winding here and there through rows of thickly packed Chinese houses. At last the two chairs were lowered before a gate in a brick wall. They were led through a court into a neatly furnished reception hall, already filled with a goodly number of women. A grandmother and an aunt welcomed them pleasantly. ‘We are highly honored by your coming,” they said. ‘First, rest yourselves with a little tea.” So sitting each before a pretty black table, the two doctors sipped tea while they were told of the sick wife. ‘“We gave our Chinese doctor many cash to make her well,” it was said, ‘‘but he has failed. At last he admitted that he could do nothing. ‘Put her into the hands of the two women doctors who have just arrived in Kiukiang; they have traveled over mountains and seas to study these affairs,’ the Chinese doctor told us. Now, 79 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK promise that you will cure her and we will reward you well.” “We cannot make such a promise,”’ said Dr. Kahn. “What! not promise to cure her? Why, then, did you come? Did you not study all those years in a foreign land?” And to one another they said, “She is not so learned as we supposed.” “No,” repeated Dr. Stone. ‘We cannot promise to heal her. Let us first see her and let us learn what sickness she has. Then we will do our very best for her.” “No!” said the women of the house- hold, “‘we cannot allow you to see the sick woman unless you first promise to heal her.” “Very well,” said the two doctors, “‘we will have to leave,” and they started for the door. “No, no, please do not leave us,” cried several women as they fell on their knees before the doctors. ‘‘Please do not leave us. We are helpless without you. Do the best you can.” > 80 TWO LADY DOCTORS So Dr. Kahn and Dr. Stone entered the sick room. Through the opening in the curtains about the sick bed, they saw a face thin and drawn and weary with pain. For hours the two doctors worked over the suffering woman. Even though their in- struments had not yet arrived from Amer- ica, they performed as best they could a kind of operation on the woman, and they did it successfully. When they bade her good-by, a quiet grateful face looked up to them and thanked them. Three days later a messenger from the home of the healed woman again rattled the knocker on the door of the house among the mulberry trees. He left two long thin red envelopes addressed to the two doctors. When the women opened the envelopes, they found two long strips of red paper bearing black Chinese charac- ters. They were none other than invita- tions inviting the two doctors to a feast to be given in their honor. So at the appointed hour at the home, where a few days before the mother seemed 81 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK to be dying, Dr. Kahn and Dr. Stone sat in the seats of honor at a large square table. Dish after dish filled with the most tempting foods was laid before them— first watermelon and lotus seeds, candied oranges and cumquats, nuts, and cakes; then roast ducks, chickens, and pigeons, bamboo sprouts, and rice; then birds’ nest soup and tea. All the while as they sat, the guests spoke words of praise of the doctors. They asked questions about the wonderful land of the foreigners where such skill was taught. When the feasting was over, the grand- mother stepped into the room carrying on her arm a pile of red silk cloth. Stepping up to Dr. Kahn and bowing before her, she wound about her long strips of this red silk. Turning to Dr. Stone, she wound her about also with like strips of red silk. “°Tis thus we would honor the women who have cured our sick one,” she said. Then she handed them gifts, saying, ‘““These speak our very great gratitude to these honorable women.” 82 TWO LADY DOCTORS When the party was ended, a long line of gayly decorated sedan chairs moved down the street from the house of feast- ing. All the family were escorting the honorable ladies to their home—some in sedan chairs, others walking in line behind. All the way along, firecrackers were set off and voices shouted the praises of the two wonderful doctors. So it was that the news spread from mouth to mouth and from house to house from one end of the city of Kiukiang to the other. “These two Chinese women doctors who studied in a foreign land and who follow the Jesus religion—they have learned great skill. They can really heal our sick.” So the sick and the lame and the blind were brought to the door of the doctors’ home. So many came that an old Chinese house had to be purchased for use as a little hospital. The doctors had it cleaned; they placed in it a new floor of wood; they built into the walls several windows; they whitewashed the walls and ceilings. In 83 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK it they placed six plain wooden cots. There they treated patients who came to them from day to day. But it was not many months until those six beds were far too few. Many came sick with fevers or having contagious dis- eases, or with sore or blind eyes, with broken bones or with great festering sores. Some had to be turned away because there was no room in the little Chinese house. A few good friends across the wide waters in America heard how these two doctors were having to refuse to take care of sick people because there were no beds in which to put them. So it came about that they raised a sum of money and a big square piece of land was bought and a wall was built around it. Large piles of gray bricks and white stones and long sticks of timber were purchased. Chinese carpenters and masons after months of toil changed these into a beautiful two-storied gray brick building with a dark tiled roof—a hospital for women and children—the only place of its kind for hundreds of miles around, and 84 TWO LADY DOCTORS the only hospital within reach of millions of Chinese women and children. Chinese passing by the gate in the out- side stone wall would often stand and gaze in wonder at the beautiful sight before them—the white gravel path leading to the long gray-and-white building crowned with its dark tile roof. On either side of the path, masses of red, yellow, and white chrysanthemum blossoms seemed like hun- dreds of pretty fairies inviting them to come in. Then, too, the Chinese felt the roominess of this heavenly place as their eyes glanced from one side to the other of the wide green lawn, dotted here and there with banana, orange, myrtle, lime and camphor trees and occasionally a hardy pine. To the right, as strangers peered through the gate, they could see a smaller brick house with another dark tile roof, and it did not take them long to learn that there the blessed doctors lived. Inside the big hospital were small rooms and large rooms. In some of these were long rows of white iron beds spread with 85 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK clean white counterpanes. As poor sick women and children lay between clean white sheets, they looked out on cheery white walls and pretty red doors. Gentle Chinese nurses dressed in blue dresses walked quietly about from bed to bed, bringing them food and medicine and speaking words of kindness. Sometimes women of wealth were car- ried to the gate in richly decorated sedan chairs to see the doctors. Sometimes poor workmen garbed in their soiled blue cotton would bring their wives on wheelbarrows to the porch of the hospital. Sometimes fathers would carry their little boys on their shoulders. Sometimes even mothers carrying their little ones on their backs would trudge up the white path on tiny bound feet. As their eyes would first catch sight of the beautiful scene, the gray, the red, the green, and the yellow, many would exclaim, “Ah! this must be heaven! We have never seen such beauty before.” Sometimes a smile would break over a 86 _ Soop per AqJo1d pure sTTeA qty Ajeayo UO NO psyooy Aoy} ‘sIIYs IPAM WesIpo WI9aMyoq Avy UsIp[iqs puv veto Yors aood SY), TWO LADY DOCTORS care-worn face and a sick woman would say, “Evil spirits cannot live here in this loveliness. I felt them loosen their hold on me the moment I was wheeled inside the gate. Now my heart is light.” 87 VI THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL U CHEN, or Happy Pearl, was the twelve-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Tseo, who lived about one hundred miles south of the city of Kiukiang. Among all the Chinese girls who lived in the big beautiful city of Nanchang, there were very few who lived in more beautiful homes than Happy Pearl. Instead of the yard being about the house, the house was built about the yard, or court, and such a beautiful court it was, too, with its bright colored chrysanthemums, its beds of roses, its mag- nolia trees, and its ponds of twinkling gold fish. In this very lovely garden Happy Pearl played, though really very little playing Happy Pearl could do. A look at her tiny feet squeezed inside tiny pink slippers would have told you why. Such wee 88 THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL pinched feet found it hard to carry about a big twelve-year-old body; and, of course, they could not run and jump. Day and night, week after week and year after year, for six long years, Happy Pearl’s little feet had been held bound tightly with long white bandages so that they could not grow. Many a night she had cried herself to sleep because of the pain. Many a day she had spent most of her time sitting on the edge of her bed or on a bench in the garden letting her feet hang down, for every step she took would make the tears come. Now that she was twelve years old, she could limp about with but little pain, for the bound stumps of feet had lost most of their power to feel; yet she could not run and jump and play. Happy Pearl, however, had many things to enjoy that most Chinese girls do not have. She had pretty carved tables and chairs in her home. Pairs of beautiful vases stood about on tables and shelves. Her house had many rooms. Happy Pearl slept in a big bed with delicately carved 89 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK wood work and beautiful silk curtains hang- ing about it. Rich as her father was, however, Happy Pearl did not go to school. “You might as well try to teach our buffaloes to read as to send our daughters to school,” said Chinese parents. Mr. Tseo, however, had once gone to a big school for boys in another city and had learned that in America and Great Britain little girls learn to read as well as boys. So Happy Pearl, unlike all the other girls whom she knew, was taught to read. Each day a Chinese teacher came to her home and Happy Pearl had an hour or two of school all by herself. So the weeks passed, until one day Happy Pearl’s mother became very sick. Her father was away from home. A Chinese doctor was called, and he left her one hundred pills to take. However, she only grew worse. Another doctor was called. He gave her a quart of medicine. Yet Happy Pearl’s mother grew no better. “That is not your mother,” the gray- 90 THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL haired grandmother said one day to Happy Pearl. “An evil spirit has entered her body and driven your mother’s spirit away. We must shut her up in a room alone. We must keep away from her. That evil spirit may hurt us. We must pray to the gods and to the spirits of our ancestors. We must bring them gifts. Perhaps we may win their favor and they will drive away the evil spirit from her.” So Happy Pearl and her gray-haired grandmother took tall red candles and heavy incense sticks and stood them on shelves before rows of carved wooden tablets and idols in the family hall. “In these wooden tablets live the spirits of our grandfathers and our great-grand- fathers and our great-great-grandfathers. Some one of them may be angry with us,” they said to themselves. So Happy Pearl and her gray-haired grandmother knelt be- fore these ancestral tablets, bending and knocking their heads on the floor and praying the spirits not to be angry with them. All night and all day Happy Pearl 91 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK kept the candles and the incense sticks burning before these tablets to remind the spirits of their prayers, yet Happy Pearl’s mother only grew worse. Then they went to a temple that stood by the roadside not far away where upon a shelf stood a row of idols. They placed before them cups of wine, bowls of rice, and bits of sweet meats. “Accept our gifts, O gods,” they prayed, as they knelt before the idols one by one. “Be no longer angry with us, and drive away the evil spirit from this mother.” To other temples that stood further along by the roadside they went. To other idols they offered gifts and to them they prayed, yet Happy Pearl’s mother only grew worse. Then they called priests to come to their home. “The priests have more power with the gods than we,” they thought. “Per- haps they can drive away the evil spirit from our mother.” So the priests came—with their long, gray gowns and their solemn faces. They entered the large family hall where on 92 THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL shelves on one side of the room stood ancestral tablets and here and there a family idol. After accepting a large sum of money, the priests began. One stood at one side of the room crashing his cymbals together as loudly as he could, while the other knelt before one tablet after another and before one idol after another, knocking his head each time on the floor. Through it all both priests recited long prayers in loud monotonous tones. “The more noise we can make, the more surely we will frighten away the evil spirit,” they thought. Yet Happy Pearl’s mother only grew worse. The poor old grandmother was in despair. As she sat in her little room beside the window, she moaned in her sorrow: “O, what more can we do to drive away the anger of the gods! My grandson has been following some of the foreigner’s ways and the gods are showering their anger upon us.” Then she thought of the steamboat that plied up and down the Poyang Lake that lay beside their city. “That big engine is disturbing the wind and water 93 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK spirits and the spirit of the great dragon that lives under the earth, and my son rides on that boat,” she said to herself. The thin wrinkled hands trembled as the grandmother thought of these things and with frightened eyes she stared out of the window. An old woman servant standing by saw her distress and overheard the moan- ing. ‘O, venerable lady,” she said, “I know a way to satisfy the gods.” ‘‘What more can you suggest?” asked the old lady in surprise. “Let the daughter of the household go on foot to the famous temple of the loving Goddess of Mercy, that stands in Filial Piety Square. There by means of offer- ings and prayers, let her beg the goddess to forgive our sins. Let her ask the great mother with a thousand arms to plead for us to the other gods that they may drive away the evil spirit from the mistress.” During all this time Happy Pearl was sitting just outside the open door of the room. As she listened to the words of the 94 THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL old servant, her face grew white and her heart well-nigh stopped beating. “Must I walk through the streets of the city! I, the daughter of an official of Nanchang!’’ she said to herself. “I have never left the house, except in a sedan chair, in my life. Must I bring disgrace to the family of Tseo and to myself? Shall the ragged beggars and the workmen of the crowded streets look into my face? Never! Then, remembering her mother, her angry body became limp and she began to cry. “What if it might make my mother well?” she thought. “What would I not do for my mother?” As Happy Pearl struggled with herself, her grandmother and servant continued talking and Happy Pearl overheard these words: ‘“‘Very well, we can at least try it.” That night as the unhappy girl lay on her beautiful bed she tossed about from one side to the other. She could not sleep. **How can I ever live through to-morrow?” she kept crying. Early the next morning her servant pre- 95 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK pared her for the journey. Her glossy black hair was unbraided and allowed to hang in disorder over her shoulders. Her bright dress was replaced by an old blue cotton gown put on wrong side out. She looked like a poor, neglected slave girl. Then she was led by two servants out of the door of her home, while more servants followed carrying baskets full of candles, incense sticks, paper money and many “cash” for the priests. Just three steps Happy Pearl took on her little bound feet, then down on the ground she knelt, and knocked her head three times on the dirty stones of the street. She arose, walked three more steps, then down she knelt, knocked her head three times on the rough stones. Slowly thus she made her way along toward the great temple: three steps, then kneeling, knocking her head on the stones, then rising, three steps more, and so on and on. Noisy crowds pushed by her in the narrow streets. Now and again some laborer or teacher stopped to stare at her. Most of 96 THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL those who passed paid little heed to Happy Pearl. “°Tis but another pilgrim to the temple of the Goddess of Mercy,” they thought as they moved along. Still Happy Pearl continued taking slowly her three steps, kneeling, knocking her head on the stones of the streets and rising. To her it seemed hours since she had left her home. Sharp pains shot through her cramped feet. Her back felt as though it would break and her poor head began to whirl. At last her strength seemed gone. She could not rise. Then the two servants lifted her and dragged her along. They forced her to kneel. They knocked her head for her on the hard stones. When finally the temple was reached, the young pilgrim fell in a faint before the door. By pinching and pricking the servants revived her. Mustering all her strength, she entered the temple. Then again she kneeled and touched her head to the floor before the idol of the Goddess. 97 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK of Mercy, the idol with a thousand arms. As she kneeled thus on the floor of the idol room, priests standing about chanted prayers for her, while other priests lighted incense sticks and candles and placed them before the Goddess of Mercy. They also laid before the idol the paper money and the real silver pieces. At last her duty was done. The weary girl was carried home by servants in a closed sedan chair. Safe once more in her own home she threw herself on her bed and cried herself to sleep. Yet Happy Pearl’s mother only grew worse. Then word was sent to Mr. Tseo: “Your wife is very ill. Send help at once.” Now Mr. Tseo had little faith in the ideas of his mother. When he heard of his wife’s sickness, he thought at once of two Chinese women doctors he had once met in Kiu- kiang. It did not take him long to decide. He telegraphed to the hospital. The next day Ida Kahn stepped aboard the steamboat that plied down Poyang Lake. After a three days’ journey she 98 Ads] JO SSoppOr) 9} ILOJod Jo 10F ssodvid peywWeyo sjsolid,, «“ THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL landed in the city of Nanchang. Wel- comed by both Mr. Tseo and the gray- haired grandmother, she sipped a cup of tea while they told her of Mrs. Tseo’s illness. Then she entered the sick-room and talked cheerfully and quietly with the patient. Dr. Kahn was not afraid of her, for she knew that no evil spirit had caused her sickness. In but a few days’ time the mother grew very much better; and when Dr. Kahn felt she must return to Kiukiang to her other patients in the hospital, she said, ‘““Let me take Mrs. Tseo with me, and let her stay in our hospital a few weeks, and I think she will return to you a dif- ferent woman.” So it all came about that after a few wonderful weeks with the two doctors in Kiukiang, Mrs. Tseo returned home very much better. She told her friends and neighbors of her wonderful experience. Mr. Tseo told of it to one and another of the wealthy Chinese gentlemen whom he knew. So the news spread from home to home in the great city of Nanchang. 99 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK “We should have a hospital like that in our own city,” some of them said. The result was that a group of these officials met together, and among them- selves they raised enough money with which to build a hospital. Then they wrote to Dr. Kahn and said, “If you will come and live in Nanchang and take care of a hospital, we will build one for you.” Dr. Kahn could not refuse, although it meant leaving Dr. Stone alone in the hospital at Kiukiang to care for the thou- sands of patients who were coming there each year. A large beautiful hospital was built in Nanchang, in every way just as fine as the one in Kiukiang. Then Dr. Kahn began to train her own nurses and it was not long before thousands of women and children—the lame, the blind, those sick with fevers, and those with broken limbs—came to her for healing. With no other doctor to help her among all the thousands of that great Chinese city, Dr. Kahn brought the desperately sick back to health and performed the most serious 100 THE STORY OF HAPPY PEARL operations. Every one in Nanchang learned the name of Dr. Kahn. As her sedan chair was carried through the narrow streets, Chinese gentlemen would look toward her and say, “Our doctor.” Happy Pearl was allowed to go to Kiukiang to attend the school among the mulberry trees. Although she had always been accustomed to a _ beautiful home where servants were ever ready to wait upon her, in Miss Howe’s school she gladly swept and dusted just the same as girls who came from one-room huts of mud. Eager to do her very best in her studies, she often slipped out of bed in the morn- ings before the other girls; and Miss Howe would see her before breakfast sit- ting with a book in her hand out under the shade of a mulberry tree. Incense sticks, the burning of candles before ancestral tablets, the chanting of monotonous prayers to idols of wood, and the fear of evil spirits meant nothing to her any more. She learned of the loving Jesus and of the Father in heaven who 101 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK cares for us all. She gradually loosened the bandages that bound her feet until finally she could remove them entirely, for she too wanted to be useful like the two doctors. By the time she was graduated from the Mulberry School, she had decided on the work which she wanted to do as a woman, She sailed across the wide Pacific to Amer- ica to study in a medical school, that she too might care for the sick and the lame and the blind and the fevered and that she, too, might help to drive from their hearts the fear of evil spirits. 102 VII IDA AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES " HY, that child of ours limps!” exclaimed Mr. Gracey as he stood _watching his little two-year-old toddle across the parlor floor in their home at ‘Clifton Springs, New York. He then realized for the first time that the scarlet fever had left her lame. As the years passed and Ida grew larger, the slight limp became worse. Each step as she walked brought an awkward jolt to her little body. So crutches were given to help her. When old enough to go to school, Ida tried, in spite of her lameness, to do as many things as she could that other children did. She loved the summer time when all the family went to live in their cottage on one of the beautiful islands of the Saint Lawrence River. She flitted about 103 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK on her crutches almost as quickly as any- one else, as they gathered wild flowers, climbed over rocks, or chased their run- away donkey. She enjoyed equally well sitting quietly on a hillside watching the birds as they fluttered from branch to branch and from tree to tree. She learned to recognize each red and yellow breast, each white-tipped wing and each crested head. She could call the birds by name. She learned also to understand the lan- guage of their songs. She loved to handle the oars and to row a boat up and down between the islands. Now and again she sat with her father and sister, each holding a fishing rod out over the clear water waiting for a nibble. Often in the twilight she sat on the steps playing her banjo. No jollier girl than the lame Ida Gracey roamed the Thousand Islands of the Saint Lawrence. The little girl grew to be a young woman. In spite of her crutches, she worked and earned her own living. The lame limbs, however, became more useless and weak. 104 IDA AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES The doctors thought that they might help her and she went to the Sanitarium in Clifton Springs for a few weeks of special treatment. But their hopes were not real- ized. She never again became well enough to leave the Sanitarium. After a while it was not only her hips and knees and ankle bones that pained her, but her eyes grew weak and sunlight on them brought excruciating pain. When taken out into the garden in a wheel chair to see the pretty ducks in the pond, she wore dark green glasses over her eyes. The shutters before the windows of her room were always kept closed. One after- noon a very fine eye doctor came to her darkened room and for an hour he examined and tested her eyes. Then, sitting on the edge of her bed, he said, ‘Well, girlie, I know of nothing I can do.” The darkened room became her parlor. Friends who had known her for a long time liked to call frequently and to visit by her bedside. Those who had never seen her before asked for the privilege of 105 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK calling. Entering the door, they saw a dainty girl with dark hair and dark gray eyes lying on her white bed or sitting propped up against pillows, with always a few bows of pink ribbons dotting the neck of her clean white gown. Sometimes her callers came from lands far away. Dr. Mary Stone, on one of her visits to Amer- ica, lingered occasionally to chat with the cheerful cripple, and ever after she and Ida Gracey were good friends. For six long years Ida never walked. During all the hours and weeks of all those years she never knew what it was not to feel pain somewhere in some joint or limb. Sometimes for hours her suffer- ings would be so great that her weak body would be twisted and flung about on her bed in agony. The doctor of the hospital watched her with the greatest care, and gave her every comfort he could think of; for he said, “I feel as though I were caring for an angel of God.” Yet there was little he could do. In the long lonely hours of the night she suffered most. As _ she 106 IDA AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES tossed to and fro in her bed in her agony she found comfort in the Bible thought of heaven. “There shall be no night there,” she said to herself. One morning a friend. knowing that Ida had suffered much dur- ing the night before, came to her room. She saw lying on the clean white pillow a face still marked by the stains of the tears and the suffering of the night, yet bearing a sweet smile. “How can you be so bright and dear and beautiful,” asked the friend, “when you suffer so?” “The attack only lasted two hours this time,” she answered, sweetly. A stranger after just ten minutes with this cheerful sufferer came out of the room with tears in her eyes. “How can I thank you enough,” she said to the doctor, “for letting me see her? I am a better woman forever. I’m ashamed of myself. I could see she was suffering, but she paid no attention to her pains and _ talked sweetly to me with smiles on her face. How can she do it?” 107 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK “She is the jolliest girl and no one else could be so patient and sweet,” said the man who cleaned the windows of her room and who pushed her bed about while he worked the vacuum sweeper. “Flowers had a fancy for flying to her from near and far, Boston, Buffalo, Phila- delphia, Rochester, Syracuse, New York and elsewhere, sometimes more than there was room for.” Real live fairies brought them to her room. They pinned tiny pink roses near her slender white neck. They placed vases of white lilacs on the table beside the bed of their “‘little white lilac.”” These flower children of the sun seemed to like to visit in this darkened room of Ida’s, for she was its sunlight. Children brought their dolls to her to play with. They sat their Teddy Bears on the counterpane to keep her company. “Tiny chicks a few hours old and new ducklings from the duck pond in West Park, funny little bunches of fuzz, cheeped- cheeped and tumbled about her pillows, shoulders and neck. Kittens and puppies 108 IDA AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES played and live babies crept over her couch and cuddled down in her arms. The little Italian boy who danced for the guests in the foyer went up to her room to dance and sing for her.” “At Hal- loween big yellow pumpkins sat at the foot of her bed and made Jack-o’-Lantern eyes at her in the dark.” Letters too seemed to take delight in traveling to the sick room. They were piled under her pillows and something that looked like a mail bag hung over the head of her bed. She liked to write letters as well as to receive them. Propped up against a pile of pillows she would write cheerful messages to her friends. Ida had been able to lay aside only enough money to pay for a few weeks’ stay in the Sanitarium. Yet she never worried. “I trust my heavenly Father,” she said; and money too, was put into her hands as if by God’s own fairies, just when she needed it to pay her bills. Loving and jolly and cheerful herself, in spite of her constant suffering, she won 109 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK the love of everyone who saw her. In the long, lonely hours of the dark nights she used to thank the heavenly Father for all this love. Yet Ida Gracey never spent long thinking of herself. She thought rather of other cripples who did not know the joy of such love and tender care. She remembered Dr. Mary Stone and the na- tion of crippled girls across the wide waters. Some of the tears that fell on her pillow came as she was dreaming of these little Chinese girls hobbling about on their aching feet. She dreamed too of other Chinese chil- dren who like herself had been made lame by sickness. She saw them alone in dark rooms with never a kiss of love or a pretty flower or a doctor to ease their pains. In her dreams she saw crippled Chinese girls as slaves moving themselves about on stools or crawling on the floors of dirty mud huts trying to work. In her dreams she saw other crippled Chinese children beaten by grown-ups who were trying to drive out the evil spirits who, they supposed, had made the little bodies lame. Ida Gracey dreamed 110 IDA AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES too of the filthy baby pond back of Dr. Stone’s hospital where little baby girls were drowned by fathers and mothers who did not want them. Then her dreams began to turn to happy ones. She saw the dirty baby pond disappear and standing in its place she thought she saw a neat gray brick build- ing, the first home for crippled children in all the land of China. She dreamed that she was taken inside this new building and that there she saw crippled Chinese children moving about on crutches in a schoolroom where a Chinese woman was: teaching them to read and write. She saw a kindergarten of happy Chinese crip- ples and a manual training room full of busy crippled boys. She dreamed that she heard Chinese women telling them of the love of the Father in heaven. She awoke: with a smile on her face. It was but a dream, yet she felt that God was beside: her and that she heard his voice speak to: her: “Ida Gracey, you may help make. that happy dream come true.” 111 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK As friends and strangers came to call, she told them of her thoughts in the night hours. They said, ““We too want to help you make your dream come true;” and they placed in her frail hand silver pieces and dollar bills. Women gave her their rings and necklaces. ‘The medical super- intendent of the Sanitarium brought his baby girl with a big gold piece clutched in her tiny fist to drop it on the invalid’s pillow.” The pretty ducks with rainbow necks that swam in the pond were given to Ida, and their tiny baby ducklings were sold and the money saved for the cripples’ home in China. At Christmas time Ida had a Christmas tree in her room. Her sister decorated it with tinsel, bright-colored chains, gold and silver balls. Ida called it “The Chinese cripples’ Christmas tree.” Guests in the Sanitarium dropped in to see the pretty tree. They brought gold and silver pieces wrapped up in tiny boxes or rolled in little rolls tied with Christmas ribbons and hung them on the tree for the cripples of China. 112 IDA AND THE OTHER CRIPPLES Some of the bundles contained rings or solid silver spoons to be sold for the crip- ples’ home. Each day added a little to the fund. At last one thousand dollars were given to her. “See! Don’t you want to look at it?” she exclaimed to a friend one afternoon as she sat propped up against her pillows about to write a letter. “It’s my check for one thousand dollars which I am now sending to Dr. Stone so that she may buy the land for the cripples’ home.” The letter hurried over land and sea to Dr. Stone in Kiukiang. When the doctor received it she went to the Chinese gentle- man who owned the baby pond and the land about it. She persuaded him to sell her the place for one thousand dollars. Immediately they had the pond filled up with earth and they made it ready for the cripples’ home which they knew would some day stand in its place; for an American cripple on the other side of the world was dreaming and praying. The cheerful Ida lying on her bed in 113 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK the Sanitarium at Clifton Springs con- tinued to talk of her dream. The wealthy and the poor alike found it a joy to slip a bit of money or a check into her pure white hands. It was her greatest joy tc ‘watch the fund grow, from one thousand dollars to two thousand and from two thousand to three thousand. Finally the end came—the night when the sweet, pale face smiled for the last time, when the last cheerful words came from those beautiful lips. Her sister bending over her spoke of a small sum of money which their mother had left them. ‘Don’t you think it would be nice to put it into your cripples’ fund as mother’s contribution?” she asked. “Yes, lovely!’ said the voice from the pillow. Then came the long silence. As she had once said, she was no more afraid to die than to put her head on her pillow! 114 VII THE LITTLE GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM R. and Mrs. Chiang had a pretty Chinese home in the city of Kiu- kiang. Sons, daughters, and a grandmother, besides servants, lived with them in the many rooms built about the open courts. The Chiangs also had a good name among their neighbors, and the fact that they possessed more of the good things of life than many about them added to the esteem in which they were held. One misfortune had come to them, however; and in spite of all that they could do, this evil stayed with them. A daughter of the home was born a cripple. “Such a misshapen body as that should be drowned in the baby pond,” said the neighbors. One member of the family, however, 115 . RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK had heard of the Jesus religion, and he would not allow the baby’s life to be taken. Yet the mother was afraid of her own child. “This bent back and these helpless limbs are the work of an evil spirit,” she thought. “He is angry with me. This child is my punishment. I hate the sight of her.” So for much of the time the helpless little cripple was stowed away in a room by herself out of their sight. “Let us call her by a beautiful name. Let us call her Spring Lotus,” said the mother. ‘Then perhaps the evil spirits will think she is as beautiful as her name and will come and take her away.” Five years old, six years old, ten years old she became, yet her poor crumpled body seemed the size of a child half her age. For days and weeks at a time she lay on her curtained bed. Twice a day servants brought her a bit of rice and a drink of tea, just enough to keep her from starving, but not enough to feed her poor 116 GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM sick body. Sometimes by leaning on a stool she would drag herself along the hard stone floor to the courtyard; there to hear only cross words spoken in her ears. “Out of sight! Back to your room, you crawling worm! You ugly toad! Child of evil!” No flowers scented her room with their sweet fragrance. No friends came to call or to bring her toys. No one thought of reading her a story. With nothing to do and nothing to see and with no one to talk kindly to her, Spring Lotus passed the long, long days and weeks of her child- hood. No one said, ‘‘Please” or ‘Thank you” to her; she never said “Please” or “Thank you” to anyone else. No one smiled at her with a smile of love; Spring Lotus too forgot how to smile. Cross, harsh words were the kind she heard spoken to her; she learned to answer back in the same sharp, coarse tones. Her ugly de- formed body wore an ugly face—ugly be- cause of the ugly thoughts it spoke. Twelve, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen years 117 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK old she became. Still she looked with her hunched back and her shrunken limbs no larger than a child of ten. Finally, one day a son of the family said, ““Why not send Spring Lotus to the hospital of the Jesus folk? No telling what those two women doctors might do for her with their Western magic.” So in a wheelbarrow this neglected cripple was car- ried over the rough stones of the street to the gate leading to the white gravel path beside the red and yellow and white chrysanthemums. Soon a pretty nurse washed Spring Lotus and put her in a clean white nightgown and gently tucked her away between two white sheets in a beautiful big sunshiny room in the hos- pital. ““The Little Doctor’? examined ten- derly her crooked back and limbs and leaning over her pillow said sweetly, ““We are going to do all we can for you because we love you.” Spring Lotus had entered a new world. She lay on her soft pillow watching the blue-gowned nurses as they stepped quietly 118 GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM about from bed to bed, always hearing them speak in soft sweet tones. Three times a day they brought her a tray full of well-cooked food—rice, and milk and fish and vegetables of many kinds. “Eat all you wish, Spring Lotus,” they said. She knew not how to act in this new world. She never thought to say “Thank you” or “Please.” Her sour face could not learn to smile in a day. She had never been taught to speak other than in harsh cross tones. A Grumpy, however, could not live long in the love and the sunshine of that hospital. The change came to Spring Lotus just as truly as if a fairy had waved her wand over her. Her thin body grew plump. Day after day a woman came and sat by her bed- side and told her stories—stories from the Bible—stories about Jesus and of how he cared for the sick. ‘Jesus never jeered at a cripple. Jesus never feared an evil spirit,” she said. ‘He was always kind and loving to the sickest and to the ugliest. The love of Jesus is like the love of the 119 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK God of heaven. So we should all love one another. This is the Jesus religion.” “T want to follow your Jesus too,” said Spring Lotus one day. “Jesus has done so much for me, the least I can ever do is to do all I can to make others happy.” So the thin sour face grew round and pleasant. When wheeled about in a hos- pital chair, she had a cheery word to speak to those who lay on their backs in bed. Her fingers learned to be busy. She knitted babies’ bootees and sweaters and scarfs. She cut and folded bandages for the hospital. She embroidered dainty pat- terns for dresses. Spring Lotus remained in the hospital not for a few weeks or months only, but for years. There was no other place where she could live. The ‘Little Doctor” had not the heart to send her back tc that lonely dark room where she would still be feared and scolded. So the nurses taught her to read and to write, and they found her very clever; yet they were quite surprised one day when she said, “May I 120 GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM become a pupil in the Bible Woman’s Training School? I want so much to learn more so that, even though I am a cripple, I may be some use in the world.” The missionaries hesitated. ‘Would Spring Lotus be strong enough to study hard like the others in the school?” they thought. Then, too, she was so helpless. She could not go up and down stairs. She could not dress herself. Even if they had bought crutches, her limbs were too weak to use them. How could they have a pupil in the school who could move herself about only by pushing a stool in front of her and dragging her body after it? Some one would have to be ready to wait on Spring Lotus all the time. They talked the matter over for some time and they prayed God to show them the Christian thing to do. The girls of the school also thought and prayed. Then one day another surprise came to the missionaries. ‘Please,’ said Siung Ching-fung, one of the girls, “let me be 123 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK ‘Big Sister’ to Spring Lotus, and let me take care of her while she goes to school.” So this happy cripple entered the school. During all the three years of her school life, Siung Ching-fung kept faithful to her promise. Morning and night she dressed Spring Lotus; she combed her hair; many times during the day she carried her on her back up and down the stairs. She ran a hundred and one errands for her. Then when Spring Lotus finished her course, the question was again asked, “What can Spring Lotus do?” Again the courageous little cripple was ready for something hard. Back of the big hospital, above the place where once was the baby pond, there now stood a neat two-story gray brick building. To the left of the doorway, on a brass tablet, were written these words: “The Ida Gracey Cripples’ Home.”’ Spring Lotus always liked to hear Dr. Stone tell of the brave American cripple who had given them that home. Spring Lotus liked to be wheeled over there where she could watch and listen. In one cheery school- 122 Spring Lotus and her “Big Sister’’ “She looked with her hunched back and her shrunken limbs no larger than a child of ten” GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM room she saw cripple children at their desks studying. In another room she saw kindergarten children sitting in a circle of little chairs, singing and playing. In another room she watched older boys and girls, all cripples, at their work benches, handling jig saws and making toy boats. Her “Big Sister” would wheel her up the inclined plane which took the place of a stairway, and there she would see rows of clean white beds in a light, cheery room. The very contrast reminded Spring Lotus of the lonely dark room in which she had spent most of the hours of her childhood, and she said, ““We thank God for Ida Gracey.” For a while after her graduation Spring Lotus was the house mother for this household of cripples; and her faithful “Big Sister” was her helper. One day word came from the town of Tai Hu, three days’ journey from Kiukiang by wheelbarrow. “Our little school building is completed. Send us a teacher, for mothers are eager to send their children to school.” 123 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK For many days the missionaries puzzled over this request and prayed. There was no other girl who had completed her three- years’ course who could be sent except Spring Lotus. Could she, even with the help of “Big Sister,” go to teach school in the country? Would the Chinese send their children to a school taught by a hunchback cripple girl? Would they not fear that she had an evil spirit? And would not the children run away from her? So the missionaries feared. Some said, “Let her go and try it.” Others said, “No, it would be very unwise.” Finally, however, knowing that there was no one else to go, they decided to let Spring Lotus try it. So for three days, on two wheelbarrows, Spring Lotus and her “Big Sister’ were jogged along over the rough, country paths. On reaching Tai Hu they began to make themselves at home in the school building, in a couple of little rooms just back of the school room. Then when the courageous hunchback 124 GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM cripple sat at the teacher’s table and be- gan to talk to the thirty or forty Chinese girls and boys seated before her, another Christian magic began to be wrought. Day by day her spirit of happiness and goodness became more contagious. The children did not want to be naughty with Spring Lotus there trying so hard to be good to them. Then, too, Spring Lotus really needed them. There were so many things she could not do. She could not dust the desks each morning; she could not walk about to wait on the littlest children; she could not clean the black- boards. Of course the children wanted to do these things for her, and they would stay after school or come early in the mornings to help her. They liked to play at being her “Big Sister” or her “Big Brother,” and to run errands for her. In addition to reading, writing, and arithmetic, Spring Lotus taught them to make things, to crochet, to knit, and to sew dainty garments and to make things with pasteboard and paper. These pretty 125 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK things the children often took home, and they talked to their mothers about this lovely teacher of theirs. Spring Lotus also told the children stories—stories of Jesus and stories of other boys and girls—and the children retold these stories at home. Then the mothers came to the school, for they said, ““We want to see this strange cripple teacher about whom our children talk so much.” “How have you done it, Teacher Chiang?” they would ask. “It used to be when I asked my boy to do a bit of work at home, he would whine and scold; now he seems to wish to be useful.” ‘How have you done it?” another would ask. ‘“‘My little girl never seemed to be satisfied. What she had was never so nice as what some other little girl had. Now she is as busy as a bee all the day and as happy as a lark.” “We too want to learn how to make the things you have taught our children to make,” said some of the mothers. So after school Spring Lotus had a mothers’ 126 GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM class, and she taught them also to knit bootees and scarfs and to sew pretty gar- ments. To the children and mothers she kept telling stories—stories from the Bible —stories about Jesus. “Tf the foreigners’ God can make a poor hunchback cripple so beautiful, he is the God for us. He must be the true God, and we will try to please him,” they said. Her children were no longer afraid of the power of evil spirits. They would not burn incense before the ancestral tab- lets at home, nor would they burn paper money at the graves of their dead grand- fathers. They would no longer jeer at cripples on the street, and at home they tried to be helpful to their mothers, and never had they been so happy in their lives, for they were Christians. And all the while as Spring Lotus day by day taught her children, the “Big Sister” kept house in the two little rooms back of the schoolroom. Each day she dressed and undressed Spring Lotus and combed her hair. Each day she swept 127 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK the schoolroom for her; and when Spring Lotus did not need her, she went about from home to home in the village visiting the mothers and the grandmothers and doing kindnesses for the sick and the lonely. So the love of the Jesus folk spread. A missionary crossed the wide ocean to do her bit. Mr. and Mrs. Shih were among the first who forsook the ways of their ancestors, and were laughed at for fol- lowing the religion of the “foreign devils.” Two Chinese girl babies were cared for in Christian homes, one in the Shih home, and the other in the home of Miss Howe. They were the first among millions of their Chinese sisters whose feet were allowed to grow to their normal size. Becoming doc- tors, they treated in their hospital thou- sands of women and girls whose feet were bound. These patients of theirs watched the two women walking about so easily on their natural feet and saw that they were respected throughout the entire city. Some of them took courage and they, too, 128 GIRL OF THE LONELY ROOM unbound their feet. Back again in their villages, they told their neighbors. Others caught the contagion of their courage arid said, ‘We will no longer bind our daughters’ feet.” Anti-foot-binding Societies were formed here and there throughout the country. Finally, after many years, up in Peking, the capital city, a law was passed against foot-binding. Although thousands of Chinese women and girls still hobble about on crippled stumps of feet, yet the number of little girls who suffer for the sake of “lily feet”? grows smaller year by year. The two courageous doctors continued to heal thousands of sick women and children and to love them as they had never been loved before. Other missionaries left their homes to do their bit. More Chinese taught and preached and nursed for the sake of Jesus, and other Chinese girls de- cided to become doctors. A girls’ school was opened and there other girls were trained to tell Bible Stories and were taught how to teach. A cripple 129 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK lying on her bed in America persuaded others to give money for a cripples’ home in China. A crippled girl in China, made ugly and cross by neglect, was changed by love into a beautiful and courageous spirit. Then she and her “Big Sister” in their turn spread love and gladness into the hearts of a village full of boys and girls. So this contagious love, like the love of Jesus, spreads from one person to another. More children and more grown-ups learn to be loving and useful, and more boys and girls everywhere are given a better chance to be happy. This is the kingdom of God. “It is like a tiny piece of yeast,” said Jesus in substance, “which a woman hides in a big lump of dough until after a while it changes entirely the whole mass of the dough. So does the kingdom of God within you.” 130 Mod doy 94} UI 1993980} pueys Joproiqure 0} sa[ddtio 94} sayovsz OFM JOyYOVI} QuINp-pue-jeop v pue ‘JOYOU ssnoy ¥ ‘asin SsolD pey YW “Ye] 9G} UO UsUIOM OMY OT} OF 499} MOT OATS JOMULO oYs ynq ‘TJM ALU Ud OPO BWW] eL,, Wey joosmog -amoy safddii) Ad0v1yH ep] oq} Jo sofdduy ogy, PART III AN AMERICAN BOY IN THE AFRICAN BUSH IX THE CALL OF THE BOY N a small white house with green shut- ters in a village not far from Boston lived a father and mother and four children. Outside a snow coverlet hid the ground, and the wind blew hard. Indoors three little girls, Stella, Lottie and Florence, lay asleep in their warm beds. At a plain pine table in the living room, sat Mother Withey and her eleven-year-old son, Her- bert. An oil lamp hanging from the low ceiling shed a soft light over the blue patterned tablecloth. The mother was sewing while Herbert read aloud from a book about Henry M. Stanley and his adventures in the un- known continent of Africa. Page after page Herbert read of tramps through jungles, of hippopotami, of leopards, and of black savages beating their drums and dancing their war dances. A flush spread 133 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK -over his cheeks as he read. Now and again he would lay his book down and step to the side of the room where on the wall hung a map of Africa. Not for one winter’s evening only, but for many evenings, the mother and Herbert sat under the hanging lamp, one reading to the other from this book, or from some other book about Africa which found its way to the Withey home. When spring came and the green grass ‘spread its soft carpet over the pasture behind the little white house, Herbert and his three sisters and their schoolmates played they were in Africa. They turned themselves into play caravans carrying heavy burdens, with sticks for guns. They marched across play streams and swamps. They tramped through play jungle grass and thick forests. Some of the boys were powerful black chiefs and held palavers with the white men, while the white men watched the painted savages fight. At last under the big oak tree, which became the town of Ujiji, they found Livingstone. 134 THE CALL OF THE BOY Yet Herbert could not play and read interesting books about Africa all the time. He was in the seventh grade of the village school, and much of the day he spent in study. Then, too, his father being away preaching much of the time, Herbert had to be the man of the house. He sawed and split all the wood for the three stoves. Each day he carried several pails of water from a neighbor’s well, and on Saturdays he helped his mother wash the clothes. There were errands to be run to the grocery store and to the post office. In the late afternoons when the sun had early hidden his face behind the purple hills, Herbert would often return along the path in the dark alone. As he crossed the old bridge, under an overhanging oak tree, drops of water would fall on the shaky boards with a spooky drip, drip, drip. Then he would climb the hill beyond, past the empty horsesheds that stood along- side the dark, empty church. As _ he walked briskly through the shadows Her- bert kept a soldier’s brave heart, for he 135 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK was whispering the prayer, “O God, thou art with me. Take care of me.” Between his prayers he whistled till at last he reached the door of the little white house with green shutters. One afternoon as his father was working in the woodshed at the side of the house, Herbert stood by with his hands in his pockets watching the sharp saw as it cut the logs for firewood. After some time, although his eyes still watched the moving saw, they noticed nothing, for Herbert was dreaming of the time when he too would be a man. He asked his father many questions. “When did you first meet mother? How did you choose her rather than some other woman to live with you always?” The father told his boy all the wonderful story. He talked of his love for his wife and of his care for her happiness. He told his son how God had helped him in the choosing. For a moment the saw stopped moving and the father stood straight and looked his boy in the face. ‘‘Herbert,” he 136 THE CALL OF THE BOY said, “‘your future wife must be some- where in the world. Why not, even now, begin to pray for her?” This new thought sent a manly glow to the lad’s eyes, and in his heart he truly prayed for the little girl in the far-off somewhere who one day would be his wife. With his chest high and his head erect he walked through the door into the little white house, for he was thinking, “T must live worthy of her.” In the evening as he sat under the hang- ing lamp, trying to read, every now and again he let his book fall to his lap and he stared vacantly at the floor. He was wondering what he would be doing in that far-off sometime when he grew to be a man. The next summer there came to Stella, Lottie, Florence, and Herbert one of the best times of their lives. With their father and mother they moved out of the little white house with green shutters, and went to spend the summer in a tent in a big pine woods. A great many other grown-ups and children camped in other 137 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK tents in the pine woods. Each day the people of the camp gathered for preaching, singing, and praying. Their church was a hillside with the sky for a roof and with soft pine needles for a carpet. They sat on rough boards nailed at each end to posts set in the ground. Among the many preachers who spoke to them from the pulpit at the foot of this hillside was a tall man with a long, gray beard, whom every one called Bishop Taylor. Just like Herbert, this tall bishop was very much interested in the black man’s land—the land of Livingstone. Sometimes when the grown-ups were holding their meetings, the Withey children would go blueberrying. Sometimes they played in the brook. Sometimes they took their seats alongside the grown-ups on the rough planks on the hillside. One morning, Herbert seated himself near the front, for the tall bishop with the long, gray beard was going to speak. He was also eager to study the large map of Africa which had been stretched between two 138 THE CALL OF THE BOY high posts back of the preacher’s stand. No one else on the hillside listened more closely than Herbert as the Bishop told of his plan to cross the wide ocean to the west. coast of Africa. “TI want some of you as volunteers,” he said, “men and women who are willing to- spend their lives in teaching these black savages about the love of God. Unlike most other missionaries, each man who goes with me must earn his own living by farming and trading. I believe we can do it. In this way the money given in America can be used to send out more missionaries, and the work we will do will help us to become better acquainted with. the black people in Africa.” Herbert’s cheeks flushed. He thought to. himself, “I wish I were old enough to go.” Then he shook his head. ‘No, it is out of the question. I must go longer to school. If I live, however, I believe I shall some day go to Africa.” Another afternoon the Bishop passed Stella and Herbert in the path by the 139 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK brook and said, “Would you be good enough to mail these letters for me and fetch me a pitcher of water from the pump?” “Certainly,” came the cheery replies, and they skipped away, one to the post office and the other to the pump. As she tripped along the path, Stella sang one of the songs of the camp meeting. The Bishop heard the sweet notes as the breeze carried them back to him. On her return, the Bishop touched her on the shoulder and said, “I wish I could have you in Africa to sing songs about Jesus to the black children there.” A blush came to her cheeks and she too began to wonder about Africa. The time came when Bishop Taylor was to speak for the last time. When the meeting was over, Herbert’s father wedged his way through the crowd to the speaker’s stand, and spoke to the Bishop. ‘There is a lady here,” he said, “who wishes to give money to pay for the sending of one mis- sionary to Africa.” 140 THE CALL OF THE BOY The Bishop wrote her name and address in a book. Then lifting his big gray eyes, he looked Mr. Withey over from his head to his feet. ‘Mr. Withey,” he said, “I think that you yourself would make a good missionary to Africa. What is your business? How many children have you? Why couldn’t you go?” The last question Mr. Withey could not answer, for the Bishop had to hurry out of the camp ground to catch his train. A few weeks passed. The Witheys all returned to live in the little white house with green shutters. One day Herbert brought a letter home from the post office. Mr. Withey, opening it, read it aloud to his wife. This is what Herbert remembers hearing: “There are now over twenty men and women ready to go with me in this first party of missionaries to the black man’s land in Africa. We will have to travel by foot far up the black man’s trails through the jungles and wild forests. We must not expect comfortable homes. We will 141 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK have much hard work to do in order to earn our own living. We must speak languages hard to learn. We may never be able to return across the wide ocean to see our friends again. If God calls us, all will be well; but we must be prepared to give our lives for Africa as truly as Jesus gave his life for the world. Will you not pray earnestly that you may hear God’s voice showing you just the right thing to do?” At the close of the reading, Herbert heard the name, William Taylor. His thoughts went back to the big pine woods, and to the map back of the preacher’s stand. He seemed to see the tall man with the long gray beard standing at the foot of the hillside. During the days which followed, Stella, Lottie, and Herbert with their lunches in their hands started out each morning as usual to spend the day in the little red schoolhouse. As usual the little five-year- old girlie played at home alone and fol- lowed her mother about as she worked. 142 THE CALL OF THE BOY But Herbert soon learned that to his father and mother the days following the coming of the letter were very different from usual. For nine days they did only the most necessary work and spent as much time as they could in prayer. Some- times Herbert saw them sitting together in the parlor, talking with one another or thinking in silence. Sometimes he saw them go to separate rooms, and he was quite sure they went to talk with God. One evening the father and mother were sitting together under the hanging lamp. “Wife, I believe we should go,” said Mr. Withey in a firm voice. “As far as I am concerned,” answered the mother, “I would gladly go with you were it not for the children. For them to go would mean no more school. It would mean that they must grow up with none but savage black children for playmates. Then, too, how could we hope that they would grow to be strong, healthy men and women in that hot, sickly climate?” These were hard questions for a father 143 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK to answer, yet his heart did not fear, for he believed he had heard the voice of God. Yet he would not force her to think as he did. He would quietly wait. The next afternoon the mother sat alone by the window. A troubled and _ tear- stained face bent over a closed Bible. She lifted the book and for a moment she held it between her hands as she prayed, “Heavenly Father, speak to me from the Book.” Earnestly she began to search for a verse that would seem to be especially for her. Almost at once she found these words: “The Lord your God, who went in the way before you, to search you out a place to pitch your tents in, to show you by what way ye should go.” Then she thought, “God will walk before us, too, along the trails through the wild forests of Africa when we journey for him.” Then she found this verse, ““He knoweth thy walking through this great wilderness.” “Why should I fear,” she thought, “when my guide knows all the way?’ Then again she read, ‘“‘Moreover your little ones, 144 THE CALL OF THE BOY which ye said should be a prey, and your children, which in that day had no knowl- edge between good and evil, they shall go in thither, and unto them will I give it.” It was enough. She arose, for she. felt that God had spoken to her from the Book. Then she called her husband and told him of her experience. “Let us ask but one more sign from God,” he said. “Let us ask the children to tell us how they feel about going to Africa. If they too are willing and believe that God wants us all to go to Africa, then we will know surely that God is calling us.” So after supper, when the children were all sitting together about the warm fire, the father, speaking first to the oldest, said, “My son, how do you feel about going to Africa?” “Father,” the boy answered, “I decided some time ago that I wanted to be a missionary to Africa. If you go I want to go too.” The three sisters were as ready as their brother; not one of them cried, not one was afraid. 145 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK _ So it was that Father Withey wrote a letter to Bishop Taylor, saying, ““We all feel that God has called us. We are ready to go with you.” Under the letter each wrote his own name: Amos E. Withey. Estella Withey. Irene F. Withey. Lottie Withey. Herbert Withey. Florence Withey. Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went. The Withey family were very busy preparing to move from the little white house with green shutters. One very cold morning in January, in 1885, their ship sailed out from one of the piers in the New York harbor. Among the passengers who stood on the deck were about thirty men and women and a dozen children, all missionaries to Africa. As the boat slowly moved out into the channel, the missionaries stood on the windy deck and sang: “The birds without barn or storehouse are fed, From them let us learn to trust for our bread; His saints what is fitting shall ne’er be denied, So long as ’tis written, ‘The Lord will provide.’ ” 146 THE CALL OF THE BOY Across the waters from the crowds on the pier came the answering song, “In the sweet by and by, we shall meet on that beautiful shore.” Among the singing passengers on the deck stood twelve-year-old Herbert, ten- year-old Stella, eight-year-old Lottie, and six-year-old Florence. They watched the grown-up missionaries wave their handker- chiefs to the friends on the pier and saw them brush away their tears and smile; they heard them say with clear strong voices, “God is going with us; we do not fear;”’ and the four children thought, “Nei- ther are we afraid, for God has called us too.” 147 Xx IN THE LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE T seemed a wide, wide ocean—that stretch of water that separated America from the land of the black man. Two long months the missionary party were at sea before they reached the land they were seeking. Even when they arrived in the port city of Loanda, on the west coast of Africa, there were several months of wait- ing before they could journey up the trails of the black men into the interior, where they planned to settle. At last the Witheys and others of the missionary band went aboard a _ small river steamer and started up the Koanza River to make their new homes. The river was shallow and sailing was slow. It took the little boat two whole weeks to make a voyage of two hundred miles. 148 LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE The children had no reason for hurry, how- ever, and they enjoyed many new and strange sights in this wonderland of the black man. They saw sleepy old crocodiles lying in the mud along the river bank, and there was some excitement when one was shot by the engineer and brought aboard. They saw here and there along the shore vil- lages of mud-and-straw huts and they caught their first glimpse of the wild look- ing mop-headed black women as they came to the river to fetch water. They sailed past large lagoons where black fishermen were punting their canoes. For miles they moved between wide swamps where millions of mosquitoes found a happy home. Sleeping on deck, Herbert awoke one morning looking as if stung by bees. The stingers were mosquitoes. The farther up the river they went the narrower and shallower it grew until at last the boat could go no farther. They had reached the Portuguese trading town of Dondo, the end of their voyage. 149 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK Then after a few days of preparation they began a fifty-two mile walk up the winding paths made bare by the tramp- ings of many black feet. With pieces of copper money the missionaries hired black men to carry their baggage. They made hammocks out of large pieces of canvas and palm-stem poles, and in these the porters carried the women and children for portions of the way. To ride two at a time in these swaying “‘tipoias,” as the hammocks were called, which hung from the shoulders of two shiny-skinned black men, was good fun for the children. They laughed at the sing- song grunts and calls to which the porters kept step. In some places the tall jungle grass growing close against the narrow path shook its blades against the children’s faces. Again a large tree trunk fallen in the path made the carriers twist and jerk as they leaped over it. Sometimes they held the “‘tipoia”’ high as they waded waist deep through a stream. Because he was a big boy of twelve years, for two days 150 BK WAsy Ss The tall jungle grass shook its blades against their faces LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE Herbert walked like his father, until he was overcome by African fever, and he had to lie down under a bush by the wayside, and thereafter was carried in a “tipoia” for the rest of the way. At last after many adventures, Mr. and Mrs. Withey, Herbert, Stella, Lottie, and Florence were settled in their African home at Pungo Andongo. It was a long, one- story adobe house with mud floors and a wide overhanging roof thatched with heavy jungle grass. It looked small beside the great rocks that stood just back of it, towering straight up into the air hundreds of feet. To the Withey family the region seemed like a castle of God’s own making, high above the surrounding plains. Often as Herbert stood looking up at the tower- ing granite cliffs, he would think to him- self, “It took a great God to make such rocks! They are very big; we are very small! Yet this great God cares for us all!” The children delighted to explore in the passes between the rocks. Sometimes they found rabbits, wild goats, and troops of 151 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK monkeys in the thick woods. Sometimes they played in beautiful glens, where they discovered springs of clear, cool water. Sometimes they came upon banana groves, and gardens beside the little straw huts of the black men. The missionaries were not the only white men living in this wonderland of the black man. Pungo Andongo was a military post, and the military bugle each morning and evening awoke the echoes among the rocks. Portuguese traders had built for themselves a row of comfortable white houses beside the well-beaten path. They knew that caravans of black carriers from the forest many miles inland passed daily along this path bringing on their shoulders bundles of rubber, ivory, beeswax or coffee to sell to the white men. About some of the houses the Portuguese traders had made large clearings and around these they had built walls to keep away the wild beasts. In these caravansaries, as they called them, the traders invited the caravans to rest, and hundreds of black 152 .qiyed sq} Suoje Ayrep passed ysor0y oq} Woy ssatssed Yor|q Jo suvaviey,, : . SSeS at ah WEY, D "1 eth SLAATTPEITIT A, LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE feet beat hard the ground inside those walls. One morning a long line of black men walked single file up the path from the forest. Each man carried on his shoulder a sort of basket filled with rubber. They stopped before one of the houses of the white merchants and laid down their loads. Two white men stepped to the door and handed them several big round bottles of rum or ‘“ualende”’—‘“burning water,” as the black men called it. Servants gave the leaders of the caravan some dried fish and manioc flour to be cooked into “fungi,” and well content the black men passed into the caravansary. There they started a camp fire, and cooked the dried fish and flour and drank of the “burning water.” Then they began dancing. Long after the sun’s red ball had sunk behind the hills, these black men from the forest continued to dance, clapping their hands and shouting wildly. Indeed, the noise of their yelling kept up far into the night. 153 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK In the morning they stood once more before the white men’s store. Again the white men handed to them gifts, brightly colored shirts, sashes, handkerchiefs, and parasols, together with a coat and trousers for the head man of the caravan. Each black carrier found something he could put on his head, wrap around his waist or carry in his hand. So arrayed in their gay finery they marched up and down the path, beating a tin oil can for a drum, singing their savage music and looking very proud. Then came the weighing of the rubber on the white man’s scales, and the paying for it in cloth, guns and gunpowder, beads, brass wire, knives, and more of the “burning water,” or “‘ualende,” in big, round bottles. Just as the excited black men were about to start back along the trail to their vil- lages, with their baskets loaded with the bottles of “burning water,” cloth, knives, guns and all, the white merchants threw into the crowd some good-by presents— cheap hats, caps, and children’s toys. At 154 LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE once every one dropped his load, and scrambled wildly for his trinkets. Finally the long line of black bodies and brown baskets passed out of sight. The next day another long line of black bodies and brown baskets moved up the trail. Hearing of a new kind of traders, the “Ingeleje’ (English), as they called them, they decided to stop before their house and see if they would buy their wares. The missionary stepped to the door to meet them, but brought no big round bottles. “We want rum!” called the head man of the caravan. “We do not sell rum. We do not use it, nor do we keep it in our store, for we know it is poison,” said the new white trader. “Don’t I see some there?” asked the chief, pointing to some cans of kerosene. “Well, do you want to try some of that?” said the missionary. So he drew a little out in a cup and handed it to the chief, saying, “You had 155 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK better put it to your nose first.” Several of them smelled it and with disgusted looks turned away and passed it back to the missionary. “Well, we want some tobacco.” ““We do not use tobacco either, nor do we sell it.” “Well, do you want to buy any of our rubber?” asked the black chief. “Yes, I am ready to buy your rubber.” ‘What will you pay us for our rubber?” “TI will give you money if you wish, or I will give you cloth of good quality, shoes, hatchets, and knives. We also sell rice, fish, sugar, soap, anything you wish except the ‘burning water,’ tobacco, beads, and useless trinkets. These things will do you no good. We trade you things which will be useful to you.” “How much will you give us for our rubber?” asked the black chief. Then the missionary told them just what he would give them for every thirty pounds of rubber they had. ‘If you can do better somewhere else, I want you to go there,” 156 LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE said the missionary. ‘“‘We give you no gifts, but pay you the best we can in things that are useful.” “Let us give him our rubber,” said one man after another. So the missionary gave them really more in return for their rubber than the other traders had ever given— things that they would enjoy and could use after their return to their villages. “We have not come to get rich by making you suffer,” said the missionary. “We have come to live with you like brothers. Nzambi, the Creator of us all, is a God of love. He is the Father of the black man and of the white man. We are all children of one big family. Therefore, he wants us to love one another, always to tell the truth, and to do only good to one another. Come again and we will tell you more.” So the long line of black bodies with brown baskets on their shoulders wound their way down the trail and out of sight. When back again in their own villages, as they sat in circles about their camp 157 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK fires, they talked together of these new white traders—Nzambi’s men—‘the men of God.” “They were good to us,” said some, “‘but very foolish not to get from us all they could.” “They are criminals,” said others. ‘They have been sent here to this land of ours to work out their punishment.” ““No,”’ said the head man of the caravan. “They are Nzambi’s men. He has sent them. They are men of love.” Days and weeks and years passed. The black men came to like the new white traders more and more. They brought them peanuts, beans, manioc meal, corn, and coffee and received in return rice, salt, fish, cloth, and other things they really needed. Through this trading and through farming, the missionaries were able to earn enough to live on, and even a little more. Those who could earn more shared with those missionaries who could not earn enough. From a twelve-year-old, Herbert grew 158 LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE to be a tall young man. He easily learned to speak Kimbundu, the language of the black man, and he learned to talk Portu- guese, the language of the white officials. and traders. His father being away from home much of the time, Herbert was head storekeeper. He it was who talked and traded with the black carriers. Then a few black boys. came and lived with the missionary. In the mornings Herbert was busy with them, milking the cows, breaking young bullocks to the yoke, planting the garden, cutting down trees in the nearby forest, sawing the logs into boards, building chicken coops or stone walls for a sheepfold or a cattle corral. In the afternoons he taught the boys to read and to write and told them of the big world beyond the end of the trail. Anything and everything he did. Up at half-past five in the morning, he was busy until the sun went down behind the purple hills. On Sundays he taught a Sunday school class and when still in his teens, he took 159 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK his turn at preaching. He would walk to one of the caravansaries and standing by the camp fire in front of the black car- riers, he would tell them of Nzambi and of his Son Jesus. It was a very busy life to live, but Herbert liked it. One year his father and his oldest sister, Stella, moved to another white-walled house two days’ journey down the trail. Two of the party of missionaries having returned to America, Mr. Withey and Stella were trying to take their places and to do the work they had left. Stella, like her older brother, rose at half-past five in the morn- ing, cooked, made butter, kept the house in order and taught the little black chil- dren. The wish of the tall man with the long gray beard had come true, for she often sang songs for the little Sunday school. But one morning she could not rise at half-past five. A burning fever flushed her cheeks, and she tossed on her bed in pain. For two short days the father nursed her tenderly and watched alone by her side; but her fever rapidly grew worse, and she died. 160 LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE Neither her mother, nor Herbert, nor her younger sisters could say good-by, for no telegraph wire hung over the trail that led through the jungle to Pungo Andongo. The lonely father, as he sat watching for the last time the still quiet face of his daughter, thought to himself, “I thank God I shall not be lonely always. I shall see her again.” Many moons came and went. Florence was now older than her brother was when the family came to Africa and Lottie was a beautiful girl of eleven. Again sickness knocked at the door of the white-walled house. This time Lottie, the youngest, lay so ill she did not know her brother who bathed her fevered hands and face. At the other end of the house lay the mother, who too seemed to be dying, know- ing nothing of Lottie’s illness. Only thir- teen-year-old Florence and Herbert were there to care for the two so ill. For a whole week Herbert did not take off his clothes or lie on his bed to rest day or night. As he watched his loved ones with a heavy heart, he prayed as he had never 161 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK prayed before, and he felt that the God who loved him was very near. The father hurried up the trail from his work at another station to help. Then Florence took sick. Herbert and his father went from one bed to the other, bringing them broth and medicine, watching day and night to do everything possible to bring them back to health. To their great joy, they saw the mother slowly grow better, but the angel of death called away both Lottie and Florence. It was a very lonely-looking lad that went about his usual tasks. Sometimes his eyes and face showed where the tears had been. Sometimes the tears would not come, for the sorrow and ache were too deep. This land of the black man—the land for whose sake they had given their all—seemed gaunt and cruel. “People are right,” he said, “‘who call this ‘the land of the white man’s grave.’ White women and children should not try to live in this terrible country. Yet it is one of the countries in which the message 162 LAND OF GREAT ADVENTURE of God’s love must be told. This is work for men, not for women. I may never have a home of my own. I should never ask a woman to come and live here for my sake.” He felt much like a soldier in a long, hard battle. He did not wish he had not enlisted. He would not desert his Com-: mander. He did not doubt that God had called them all to this land. That question they had settled once for all back in the little white house with green shutters. As a family they had devoted themselves to the cause of the kingdom of God in Africa and they would stand at the post of duty until the last one fell. Looking to God for strength, he said, “Like a sol- dier, I will go on if need be alone to the end—faithful to the work that God has called me to do.” 163 XI THE EXPERIENCES OF A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES ROM the time Herbert Withey went to Africa as a boy of twelve until he was a grown man of twenty-four, he did not see a railroad train or a loco- motive. When finaily it was decided that the family should return to America for a year of rest, he enjoyed the luxury of traveling part of the way to the coast by train. Some of the black boys walked with him the eighty miles down the trail to the nearest station. As they heard the engine whistle and for the first time lis- tened to the chug, chug, chug of the steam, they laughed and danced about, saying, “It says: ‘Count your money! Count your money! Pay me well! Pay me well! ”’ After his visit to America, Herbert came back to the land of the jungle trail, but 164 A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES not to his old home. He was sent to Quiongua to help start work in a place where Nzambi’s men had never lived be- fore. There the missionaries had pur- chased a large piece of land with money they had earned through trading, and Herbert Withey was sent as first helper to Mr. Dodson, whose work it was to build up a mission station there. At first they lived in the roughest sort of shacks of sticks and rushes with nothing about them but bushes and grass. There was but one white neighbor within fourteen miles of them in any direction. Yet they were glad that this very spot had been chosen for a mission. When the day’s work was done and they could sit before the door of their shack they could see on the hills and valleys all about the smoke rising from hundreds of §grass- thatched roofs—from the mud huts of the simple black folk for whose sake they had come. In this new station Mr. Dodson and Herbert Withey, with the help now and 165 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK then of other missionaries, toiled patiently at the hardest kind of labor. They went to the forests, chopped down trees, and out of logs which they themselves sawed, they built houses and made their own furniture. The black men from the vil- lages of mud huts would pass by and stare at the white toilers. “It is a disgrace how those Engeleje do the work of slaves,” they said in disgust, and it was many months before any of them could be hired to help. In time, however, all this was changed. The black men looked up from their dirty mud huts, and on the little hill where the Engeleje had settled they saw a large white-walled house with a red-tiled roof higher than any they had ever seen. “The Ingeleje have built one house on top of another,” they said. Boys began to say to their fathers, “Let us go and live on the hill with the white men that we too may learn to make wonders with our hands.” So Herbert Withey began a boys’ manual training school. With the white man to 166 The black boys built a pretty white church A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES teach them these black boys built a home for themselves. They went with him for weeks at a time to the forests to cut and saw lumber. They built a schoolhouse, a printing shop, and a pretty white church. They put up several bungalows for the white men to live in, and they built a neat green picket fence about the front yard. They planted trees, and in spite of the white ants many of these trees grew to bear fruit, and year after year brought good yields of oranges, limes, guavas, mangoes, and custard apples. Banana trees and palms also dotted the yard, and a large “mungenge” spread its welcome shade over the grass. They planted some of God’s magic seeds, and ere long there was a beautiful garden filled with many good things for the table. Blue-and-white morning glory blossoms covered the rougher fences with their daintiness, and green vines wound about the pillars of the long porch of the two-storied house, and climbed over the roofs of the bungalows. It be- came a pretty sight, indeed, that delighted 167 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK many a traveler along the winding trail. Miles away those white walls and red- tiled roofs might be seen peeping out from among the green trees. Late one afternoon, Senhor Bote (for that was the black boys’ way of saying Mr. Herbert) stood by the open gate in the green picket fence. From where he stood he could see some of his boys with sickles in their hands cutting the grass in the yard while others were clearing weeds from the road. On the green slopes across the valley another boy was watch- ing the herd of cattle grazing, while nearer by two of the smaller lads were guarding the flocks of goats and sheep. Stepping over to the saw shed, Senhor Bote watched for a while the work of two pairs of boys taking turns at running a heavy six-foot pit saw that was sawing a hardwood log into boards. He looked carefully to see if the boys had lined the log straight so that the boards when sawed would be of the same thickness. Then he stepped into the carpenter shop 168 A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES to show some big boys there how to put together the tables and benches they were making. Then the bell rang for lunch. In the afternoon some of the boys were sent to hoe sweet potatoes, corn, beans, and squash. Senhor Bote walked up the steps into the printing shop to see how carefully the boys were setting type for the little magazine. Looking out of the window of the shop, he saw four young women tripping lightly by, their brown bodies neatly wrapped in blue-and-white striped cloths. He won- dered at the skill with which they balanced large jars of water on their heads while their hands hung freely by their sides. They were wives of some of the older boys who had married and were living at the mission station. The. sight of them made Senhor Bote hope that the time would soon come when they might have a girls’ school as well as one for the boys. Sunday was the best day of all at the Quiongua mission. In the morning, even before the nine-o’clock bell would ring, 169 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK one company after another would walk in through the gate in the green picket fence. Most of the men as well as the women were dressed in blue-and-white “panos.” These were long sheets of cloth wound round their bodies, tucked tight just under their arms or girdled at the waist, and hanging loosely to their knees or ankles. Many wore in addition some kind of a shirt or blouse, and some of the women would have light shawls draped from their heads or shoulders and pretty bright-colored handkerchiefs tied about their black, kinky hair. Coats, trousers, and hats would usually be found on some few men who tried hard to copy the white man. These black men, women, and children came with smiles on their faces, for they liked to come. Some came from the clusters of mud huts which the white man could see from his doorway. Some came from so far away in the bush that they had started the day before, resting at a half-way place for the night, in order to be present in time for church. The women 170 A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES came carrying baskets on their heads filled with lunches, for they expected to spend most of the day with Nzambi’s men. The white missionary greeted his black friends one by one with a cheery “Good morning.” Some simply returned the hand shake, while others carried the white hand to their foreheads as a sign of great respect. Walking into the little white church, the men would sit on one side of the room and the women on the other, and often the straw mats on the aisle between would be completely filled with boys and girls. One Sunday morning as he entered the little church, a man stepped forward and handed to Senhor Bote a string on which was hung a lion’s tooth. “Take it, O man of Nzambi,” he said. ‘For many moons I have worn it about my neck, for I be- lieved the words of the witch doctor of our village. He said, ‘I have prayed into this tooth the spirit of the lion. Wear it and the strength of the lion will be yours.’ Now I believe his words no more, for you have taught me better.” Then Senhor 171 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK Bote, taking the string with the lion’s tooth, dropped it into a basket that stood beside him already nearly filled with other queer-looking objects. A woman stepped forward and handed the white man an old piece of deer skin hung around with shells. “Take it, O man of Nzambi,”’ she said. “For many moons it has hung on the wall of my hut. I thought it would keep away sickness. Now I know it is nothing. Nzambi alone can care for us.” Then the missionary, taking the old piece of deer skin, threw it too into the basket. Again a black man from far away in the bush stepped forward, handing Senhor Bote a gnarled knot of wood. “Take it, O man of Nzambi,” he said. “For many moons I have kept this piece of wood hung above the door of my hut. I offered it food and gifts and prayed to it to protect me. Now I know it was foolishness. Burn it.” Then the missionary, taking the gnarled piece of wood, threw it too into the basket. 172 A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES When all were quietly seated, they sang heartily the songs of Jesus. Some one read a Bible story and black men and white men prayed to Nzambi. Then Senhor Bote preached. When the service was ended, all the black folks passed out. of the little white church, and arranged themselves in a rough half circle under the shade of a wide- spreading tree. Two men carrying between them the basket of queer-looking objects laid it on the ground before them. Then, making a pile of straws and sticks, they dumped the queer-looking objects in a heap upon them. A woman, draped in her blue and white “‘pano,” stepped forward and stood by the heap. “T am the widow of Kafukula, once the greatest witch doctor of Quiongoa,” she cried. “Before Nzambi’s men came you were all afraid of him. You gave him your money and cloth and chickens and goats. He often said, ‘When I die the earth will quake.’ But he died and there was no earthquake. We know now that he was 173 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK deceived and that he deceived us all. In the name of Nzambi, I, his widow, will now set fire to these worthless trinkets.” As the flames shot upward and the smoke curled high, these happy black men and women sang a song of Jesus. Sometimes Senhor Bote would join an- other missionary, and with several of their schoolboys they would make a journey lasting several weeks. Sometimes they went on foot, sometimes on bullock back, to many clusters of mud huts, now and then finding black folk who were already trying to follow Jesus, but more often telling Nzambi’s message of love to those to whom it was new. On one such journey, with Mr. and Mrs. Dodson, they traveled on bicycles, and came to the home of Mateus Inglez, one of the first black men to follow Jesus. With him lived Gaspar, his nephew, who had once been one of the mission boys. There the home stood on a hill just above the Lucala River, a long, low, whitewashed 174 A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES mud house, thatched with sticks and straw. Stepping inside the door the missionaries saw a large, clean, whitewashed room, with homemade tables and chairs, and a little bamboo book case filled with books. On the table were ink bottle, paper and pens. On the wall hung pictures and a Sunday school wall roll. Soon a drove of cattle were driven be- fore the door and the white men and lady were called. ‘Choose the ox you wish to have killed in honor of your visit,” they said. The white guests protested because such an ado was being made over their visit, but Mateus said: “Have you for- gotten how Abraham did when the three angels visited him?” What could the missionaries say? Like the patriarch of old, Mateus and Gaspar treated the white teachers to the best they had. During their visit the missionaries ate their meals from a table spread with a cloth. Gaspar served the meals in courses, each time removing the plates, knives, and forks, returning them quickly, washed and 175 4 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK ready for their next use. As occasion arose Celia, his wife, washed and ironed their soiled clothes in a way that could not be improved upon. On Sunday a deep-sounding eland horn was blown. Fifty or more well-dressed men and women gathered in the large white- washed room. Senhor Bote spoke to them of Nzambi, the God of all men, black and white, and of what He commands. All listened quietly and eagerly. Throughout the service one man of importance in the region kept his eyes fixed on the speaker’s face. Afterward he said to Mateus, “I never before heard a white man talk Kimbundu just as we do.” The visitors stayed a day or two longer, saw the boys’ school, and the farm which these black farmers were watering by means of an irrigating ditch, and they listened to the daily morning prayers in the school. When the visitors were about to say good-by, Mateus insisted on their taking with them jerked beef, and a deli- cately roasted food, made from manioc root, 176 QAO] Jo oorssoul S Iq UIeZ Ny suey Joqjoue 0} syny jo J94sn[o 9UO MOTIF JOO} UO JUOM oH A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES also sugar and coffee, more than they needed. “Why not?” Mateus said. “When I used to call in the witch doctors, they made me pay dear for it, and never did me any good. Now you who are the mes- sengers of God, who have brought me the light and shown me a new life, when you come to visit me, is it not truly my duty to do my best for you?” The missionaries’ feet were light, and their hearts were glad, as they walked down the hill from Mateus’s house. “What a dear fellow Mateus is!” said Senhor Bote to his white brother. “He has read his Bible to good purpose since the day when as a coffee trader he stopped at our door asking for Nzambi’s book.” “Yes,” replied the white brother, “and if our mission school can send out such fine Christians as Gaspar and Celia, all we have done has been worth while.” At other times when Senhor Bote walked through some of the villages of mud and grass huts on these journeys for God, 177 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK ‘men sitting on stools in the open door- ways would stare at the white man as he passed. “How tall he is!’ some would remark, “but he is not very old. It is only a few years since he first came to Angola. He was one of the children car- ried two in a hammock. His whiskers do not mean anything. They are nothing but grass.” “Ah,” another would say as the smoke from his pipe curled lazily upward. “He has grown up in our country, and talks Kimbundu and Portuguese just as we do. They say he has forgotten his own language entirely. He is strong too, and is as good a walker as the best of us. Has he not walked all the long trail from Quiongoa this morning? He can work too. He has skill in his hands. Have you seen the house he has built in Quiongoa? It is set up on big posts, and the windows have looking-glasses in them.” Again in another village the talk would be in a pitying tone: “My, but he is grow- ing old. He will soon be aged. And just 178 A JACK-OF-ALL-TRADES think, he isn’t married. He ought to have many children by this time. Did you ever see any other kind of a white man do like that?” Busy as he was with his boys about him, the shop, the school, the printing press, and the church, Herbert Withey felt very much alone. His father and mother, worn out by years of hard work in this land of palms and heat, had returned to America, thus leaving their son alone. José cooked his meals and helped him to keep his house, and very tidy and clean it always was. Part of the time there were other white friends living in one of the mission cottages who were very kind to him. But Herbert Withey knew what it meant to live a whole year at a time without even seeing the face of a white woman. At times he felt keenly the loneliness of his life. One day, standing beside his table near the open fireplace in the white man’s room, Antonio André, one of his black boys, 179 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK said to him, “Senhor Bote, why don’t you go somewhere and get a wife? No black man lives without a woman. We think it takes a woman to make a home. It is just the same with you white people too. You have a nice house, but you seem some- how like a ‘jingenji’ [a traveler], not like a person at home. It is not good for even a white man like you to be alone.” Senhor Bote could not tell Antonio why, but his thoughts wandered back many years across the wide ocean to the wood- shed beside the little white house with green shutters. Then he remembered the graves of his three sisters. After some time he turned to his black friend and said, “IT am a soldier of Nzambi, Antonio. I must be faithful to my Commander.” He could say no more. 180 XII A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH “TNHE mission house at Pungo Andongo must be reroofed,”’ said Senhor Bote to his boys one day at Quiongua. “The heavy thatch is breaking down the old timbers. We must put in new ones made of sawed hard lumber, and corrugated iron must be used in place of thatch. The people who promised to supply the lumber have failed us. Let us go and get it our- selves. Let us go up the trail into the bush beyond the high rocks at Pungo Andongo. We'll build ourselves a camp there and work until we have cut down all the trees we need. Then we will saw them into lumber and haul them into the mission yard at Pungo Andongo.” Smiles and shouts of “Good, Senhor Bote!” greeted this announcement. The thought of lumbering for six weeks in the 181 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK jungle brought no feeling of hardship to these plucky black boys. So after breakfast, but before daylight, the company started up the trail. Matulu, Samuel, and Raymundo guided the bul- locks and cart loaded with tools. Manuel, Kasuua, Jacob, Antonio André, José, Joao Kanjanja, Titumba and all the rest of the twenty boys were with Senhor Bote, each bearing a carrier’s load of supplies on his shoulder or head. They trudged single-file along the crooked path, through jungle grass, uphill and down, along the passes be- tween the high rocks at Pungo Andongo, and beyond. As the sun rose higher in the sky, its hot rays beat down upon them. At last, weary and hungry, they reached a spot near the village of Jimbia where Senhor Bote decided they should camp under a wide-spreading sycamore tree. A camp fire was lighted, the pot of “fungi,” or manioc mush, was soon boiling, and the hungry travelers ate and rested. Then a framework of poles and canvas was pulled out of the cart and almost as 182 A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH if by magic a shelter was built above and around three sides of Senhor Bote’s cot. Each boy spread grass on the ground as a sort of mattress for himself, laying a straight pole on either side. These he fastened by pegs set in the ground, in order to keep the grass from being scattered. Over this grassy cushion he spread a soft, shiny mat made of reeds, and this served him as both bed and table. Then close beside each of these beds of grass, the boys built camp fires to last all through the night. When the sun had hidden his face be- hind the trees, they sat beside their fires, sang songs, repeated Bible verses, and then Senhor Bote prayed. In the night as they lay on their beds of reeds and grass, they were sometimes waked by the doleful howling of hyenas, and now and again the short sharp bark of a jackal echoed and reechoed among the high rocks near by. Yet the campers were not afraid so long as the fires flared up beside them. It was during the latter part of the dry season that they lumbered at Jimbia. No 183 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK one had any fear of rain, but a little later when the night mists became very heavy, the boys felt the need of more shelter. So\ they built wind breaks alongside their beds of grass and made booths over their heads out of sticks and grass and banana leaves. When the work of the camp was well under way, a daily routine was started. Antonio had brought with him a dove in a bamboo cage. Before sunrise its gentle cooing would waken some of the lighter sleepers. Senhor Bote’s alarm clock would sound a sharp reveille from his camp table under the tree. Soon all were up, José first of all. Stirring up the fire, he would put on a kettle of mush and a pot of beans which had been cooked the night before. When the beans and mush were ready, the boys lined up with their plates in their hands while José served out the portions. Thus with their food before them, they stood and sang grace. After breakfast they divided into gangs, one group going to saw down some sturdy 184 Senhor Bote guided two pairs of boys who took turns at running a heavy six-foot pit saw A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH tree. Another group rolled to the saw pit logs already felled. Two boys sawed the logs at the saw pit. One standing on the log, the other down in the pit, they pulled the long saw back and forth. Another gang carried the finished planks to the cart, and later a cart load of lumber was started down the trail to the mission. All the while Senhor Bote was going from gang to gang, overseeing the work, planning new tasks and stirring the boys to labor more heartily, while now and again he pulled a saw or swung a pick himself, ready to work as hard as any of them. For two hours during the glaring heat at noon they rested. Senhor Bote gave each of the boys an allowance of food and money for each week. Grouping themselves in messes like soldiers, two or three to a mess, they started their own fires and cooked their own noon and evening meals. At midday women from the near by village came carrying on their heads bas- kets of sweet potatoes, squash, venison, chickens, eggs, and bananas to sell. From 185 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK their weekly allowances the boys would buy some of these good things. These black women from the village had much to say. Some were at first afraid to come near. “How dared you to build your camp under this sacred tree?” they said. “Have you never heard the stories of sickness and death which have come to those who dared to touch this sacred tree? Here lives the ‘Kituta,’ the god of the woods and water springs. Be quick and make an offering of bread and sugar at the foot of this tree that the ‘Kituta’ may not be angry with you.” Days passed, however, and no harm came to Senhor Bote and his boys. “Never mind,” the women would say. “It’s all because Senhor Bote is also a ‘Kituta.’ His magic is more powerful than that of the god of the woods and water springs. None of you boys dare to shoot a bird that settles on the branches of this tree.” José Manico took the dare. “T’ll do it just to prove that there is no ‘Kituta’ 186 A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH here,” he said. So he aimed, fired and the bird fell to the ground, but no “Kituta” sent evil upon them. “Never mind,” said the village women folk. “You boys wouldn’t dare to come back here alone and set up camp without your white ‘Kituta’ with you. It is his power that saves you from the wrath of the god of the woods and water springs.” Sometimes when a boy heard such words as these, the old fear of evil spirits would overshadow his heart. Then Senhor Bote would say to him: ““There may be many evil spirits in the world, but I know that they never made the trees and rocks and springs and fountains. You yourselves say so. Nzambi, who made all these things, is greater than any ‘Kituta,’ and Nzambi is a God of love. We can trust and serve him.” “But you are a good man,” answered Titumba one day. “You can trust in Nzambi and the evil spirits will not harm you. But even since I started to be a Christian I have not always walked God’s 187 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK straight road. Then I have become afraid, and have made offerings to the evil spirits, and have worn charms to protect me.” “Ah, there is truth in what you say, Titumba,” answered the white teacher. “It is sin that makes Nzambi displeased with us and takes us out of his care. But we must repent quickly if we have done wrong, and put our trust again in Nzambi. Then if we are faithful to him, he is well able to take care of us.” Lunch eaten, the boys and their leader went back to work until sundown. Then another picnic meal, and afterward they gathered in a circle about the big camp fire. Sometimes the boys told stories and folk tales of animals and chiefs. Sometimes they sang Kimbundu songs and some read from the Bible. Then when the day’s work and play were over, they scampered to their booths of grass, sticks and banana leaves. Most of the boys before turning over on the mats to sleep knelt to pray, not to the “Kituta” of the sycamore tree, but to Nzambi, the God of love. Some- 188 A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH times they said the prayer, “Now I lay me down to sleep,” but you would not have known it even though you had heard their voices, for this is what they said: “Ngeza kia mu lambalala, Nga bingi Nzambi ku ngi langa; Usuku iu se u ng’ ixana O mueniu uami hu u tula, Nga bingi a ngi beke muene, Kua kala atu e angene; Mukonda Mon’e kia ngi fuila, Nga mesena kiki.” Six weeks in the bush passed all too soon for these plucky black scouts. Then after only two weeks of rest, Senhor Bote again took his jolly band to lumber in the jungle. Part of the way they followed a narrow trail. Later they pushed their way, cart, bullocks and all, through a trackless mass of jungle grass and thorny bushes. Finally, they camped alongside a dried-up stream near a forest. Quickly they made themselves comfort- able as before. Senhor Bote’s cot was set up and the boys made their beds of grass 189 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK on the ground. Some went off for food and water, and José lit a fire. In the evening the air became lively with big, fat, flying ants. Some of these the boys caught in their hands. Other ants having lost their wings (which always fall off after flying but once) were crawling helplessly on the ground as though hunting for their wings. These ants were more easily caught. But wings or no wings all were fried for supper. Just as they had finished this luscious meal one of the boys saw a glistening reddish-brown streak moving rapidly across the clearing from the edge of the bush. Like a jack-in-the-box he jumped from his mat, and shouted, “The driver ants! The driver ants!’ Big red fellows they were, seemingly millions of them, and some of them four times as big as the ordinary wood ants. Each driver had a pair of powerful pincers on his head. Marching along like an army on a raid, they came, ready to swarm over and bite any living thing in their path. 190 “A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH Every boy, large and small, was on his feet in an instant. They took red hot coals from the fires, and hastily laid a line of these across the path of the ants. Then they made a circle of coals and hot ashes around their own grass couches and around Senhor Bote’s cot. They worked more briskly than they had worked at any time during the day, for every boy well knew the sharp sting of a fighting driver ant. “We want to sleep to-night,” they said; and it was certain that no one would get even a cat nap unless they stopped and turned aside this terrible army of little red beasts. It was during the rainy season that these black scouts and their leader set up their camp. “It may rain every day while we are here,” said Senhor Bote the next morning. ‘We must build ourselves better shelters.” So they gathered poles and heavy sticks and thinner sticks or wattles, as they are called, which could be easily bent, and grass in abundance for the thatching. 191 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK Not many days later they had a neat rectangular water-proof hut ready, with walls and roof thatched with grass, and the floor covered with clean white sand. Altogether it was large enough for a cot, a table, a cupboard, a chair or two, their tools, and the store of food supplies for all the camp. Near by stood three neatly thatched smaller beehive-shaped huts for the boys. Directly in front of the white man’s hut a saw pit was dug. All went well until one day Senhor Bote was taken sick with chills and fever. For the first day while lying on his bed he tried to tell his boys how to keep at the sawing, but only for a little time could he do this. Day after day these loyal black boys tried to nurse their big white brother back to health. They kept a pitcher of water continually by his bed. They brought a hot stone to warm him when in a chill. They tiptoed about the hut, and spoke in quiet tones to one an- other. Each morning they stepped to the door of his hut hoping to find him better, 192 A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH but each morning they turned away with sad and heavy hearts, for they knew that their Senhor Bote was very ill. Even Matulu could no longer find things to joke about, as he was always doing, and little deaf Kasuua lost the smile that usually came so easily to his face. One evening, after a solemn conference together, they decided to send Joao Nashi to Pungo Andongo to ask Mr. Dodson to come to help them. He came at once and stayed by the sick-bed day and night. Still their beloved leader lay on his cot burning with fever, unable to eat, or even to think. A week passed and the sick man seemed to grow better. Indeed, he thought the fever had gone. He dressed and sat in a steamer chair. To the sorrow of all, however, he found that the fever still clung to him and that day after day he grew no stronger. He was obliged to return to his cot. Another of his white brothers came to relieve Mr. Dodson. How Senhor Bote enjoyed hearing his new nurse play on a guitar in the doorway of 193 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK the hut, and tell stories of his home folks across the wide ocean. Mendonca, one of the older boys left behind in Quiongua, when he heard that Senhor Bote was dying in the bush, hastened to the camp. When he first looked on the pale thin face of his white teacher, and saw the weak body lying on the cot so still, Mendonca fell on his knees at the bedside and burst into tears. As soon as he was able to speak, after his sobs, he began to pray aloud. “O God, bring back our dear Senhor Bote from his grave and spare him to us yet a while longer, if it is thy will.” The white brothers and all the black boys realized that Mendonca’s prayers could not be answered if Senhor Bote re- mained in the jungle camp. So in a “‘tipoia” the boys carried their teacher back over the narrow trail and even through the trackless grass and thorn bushes to Quiongua. Back again in his own clean house Mr. Withey rested. For five weeks the fever 194 A LUMBER CAMP IN THE BUSH clung continually. The other missionaries nursed him tenderly. At last he could dress and sit again in the steamer chair out on the big porch, where he could watch the purple hills and the green meadows. Yet his wasted face was thin and pale, and one could see all the bones in his hands. When he tried to walk his body trembled all over from weakness. “‘He must be taken out of the hot climate of Angola. Only in America will he be able to grow strong again,” said his white brothers. So it was not many weeks later that Herbert Withey sailed back across the wide ocean to the shores of America, there to rest and grow strong so that once more he might return to Africa to live again for the black boys in Angola. 195 XIII A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE N the city of Los Angeles, California, Mr. Withey was calling one evening in the home of Mrs. Bassett. On the floor lay a Persian rug and on the table were pictures of Persian men and women and of Persian homes, for Mr. Bassett had been a missionary among the Persians. Two of the daughters were talking to the interesting missionary from Africa, when the youngest daughter entered the room. For a moment she waited for someone to introduce the visitor to her; but the sisters, busy in conversation, forgot for the time that he had not yet met their younger sister. So she gracefully stepped toward Mr. Withey, put out her hand and said, “T am Ruth.” Something about her— perhaps it was her pure blue eyes, per- haps it was her gentle voice—he knew not 196 A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE what—but something about her made the man from Africa like her. During the winter Mr. Withey visited many times in the Bassett home. Each time he talked with Ruth he liked her better. As he walked back and forth from her home, his thoughts wandered back far away to the time when as a boy he stood watching his father in the woodshed back of the little white house with green shutters. Could it be that Ruth was the one for whom he had been praying all these years? While he had sat at his bench in the vil- lage schoolhouse in New England, had she been playing with blocks in a missionary’s home on the other side of the world in Persia? It seemed more wonderful than a fairy tale. Then the gleam would leave his eye and the smile would flee from his face as he remembered the three graves of his sisters far across the gray ocean. Was it right for him to ask any woman to return with him to that land of sick- ness? Was it for him to know the joy of love? Was it for him to have a real 197 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK home? He could not answer. He could only pray. Still his love for Ruth tugged hard at his heart. Finally at home on his knees before the Lord he decided, “I will tell her of my love, and see if she returns it. Then we will ask God to show us the next thing to do.” So, somewhat timidly, one after- noon as he walked with her in a park, he told her in few and simple words what was in his heart. “I love you.” “I know it well,” she answered, “‘and I have long thought I would like to be a missionary.” Little more was said at the time. Full hearts speak in other ways than words. The very serious hindrance to this dream of love did not seem to take hold of Ruth until she talked the matter over with her mother and with her sisters. “You are but a girl,” they said. “You are letting a foolish love take away your good sense. You are far too delicate to stand such a climate as that of Angola. You know very well that no doctor would consent to your going.” 198 A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE So a few days later, she called at a doctor’s office. The family had insisted. “T wish you to examine me carefully,” she said, “and to find out if there is anything the matter with me, and to tell me what I can do to grow strong.” She told the doctor of her lover and of her wish to go with him to Angola. After examining her thoroughly, the doctor tried to tell her the truth about her health. “One thing I am sure of, Miss Bassett,” he said as she left the office. ‘You should never think of trying to live in such a climate as that of Angola. It must never be.” A very disappointed Ruth walked home that day. Mr. Withey would not yet give up. He himself went to the doctor’s office to talk matters over. The doctor, however, would not change his word. ‘You should either give up all thought of Miss Bassett as your wife or you should give up your plan to return to Angola,” he said emphatically. “Settle in this country and all will be 199 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK well.” A heavy-hearted lover and mission- ary walked back to his home that day. Friends, hearing the story, came quietly one at a time to Mr. Withey and said: “It would be cruel for you to take such a delicate young girl back to Africa with you. If you really love her you should settle in this country. You have lived long enough for the black folk in Africa. Why not give the rest of your life to the translating of books into the Kimbundu language?” But a soldier’s answer was always ready. “My call to be a missionary came to me when I was a boy. The years that have passed since have only deepened my con- viction that my life has been ordered by God. I feel I would be false to my God and to my calling if I should give up my work in Angola. I would despise myself for it and I am sure I would be of no use or blessing to anyone else.” During the weeks and months which followed, no one, not even Ruth, knew what it cost him to be true. The disap- 200 A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE pointment seemed harder to bear than all he had suffered through the twenty years he had lived in the land of the “white man’s grave.” He spent hours in prayer. He knew the loneliness of sleepless nights. He felt the small comfort of tears. Yet like a soldier he kept faithful to his Com- mander. The time came for him to return to his post in the land of the black man. At the appointed hour he was back again in the white-walled house with the red-tiled roof. José cooked his meals, but there was no Ruth to sit beside him at the table. He could only take her photo out of his pocket and lean it against a cup to dream over. Each morning as _ he dressed and asked for strength that he might serve patiently the ignorant black folk about him, a framed motto seemed to watch him from the wall—a motto Ruth had embroidered for him with her own hands. These were the words: “That he may please Him who hath called him to be a soldier.” 201 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK The photo he always kept in his vest pocket next his heart. Even when he walked through the jungle paths from one group of straw huts to another in his journeys for, God, the photo went with him in his vest pocket. One afternoon on such a journey, while the big red sun was still touching with gold the tops of the banana trees, Senhor Bote was stand- ing on the beaten ground in the center of a group of grass huts, telling naked black men and women about Nzambi and of what Jesus had come to do for them. Almost everyone in the village had come to listen to the white man’s stories, except “‘Crime of Death,” their big warrior chief. Sitting on a stool in the door of his hut, he called a slave to his side and said, “Give Senhor Bote this message from your chief. Tell him we welcome him to our village. Bid him stay with us through the night, and again when the sun rises let him tell us more of the white man’s magic.” Gladly the missionary accepted the chief’s 202 , cc IPI JO aUITI, Jdaoxa sars0}s SULT o}IYM aq} OF Uo}ST] OF PMOD peY oseT[IA OY} UL oMOAIDAD YsoNTY,, A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE offer, and at nightfall he set up his cot on the mud floor of one of the black chief’s. huts and slept in peace. Although “Crime of Death’ had once slain a Portuguese officer in battle and was said to use his. skull for a drinking cup, Senhor Bote. trusted him and was not afraid. The next day, although the chief would not come out and join the crowd who listened to the white man’s stories, he came to the hut of his white visitor. Sitting there on a stool alone in the hut with the white man, he asked him many questions. One question he asked over and over, as if dissatisfied with the white man’s answer. “Why, Senhor Bote, are you not married?” he said. ‘No black man lives without a woman.” At last the white man told the black warrior as best he could the story of his. love. ‘There is a woman across the blue waters in the white man’s land whom I love. I have never loved another. She would come to me, but I must not let her, for her body is not strong. In this land of 203 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK yours she would die. Because of my love for her, I will not marry another.” As he spoke he took out of his vest pocket the photo and held it out for “Crime of Death” to see. For many minutes those hard black eyes gazed at the likeness of the sweet, white face. Then without a word, he arose from his stool and stalked out of the hut. The next morning two of the chief’s wives, coarse and dirty, clothed partly in skins and partly in scraps of black greasy cloth, came bashfully to the white man as he stood before the door of his hut. ““We wish to see that picture,” they said, timidly, “that picture you carry in your pocket of the woman you love—that woman for whose sake you will not marry another.” Again Senhor Bote took the photo from his vest pocket. The two curious pairs of eyes looked at it long. “Ah!” they said, with a long drawn breath, “how beau- tiful!’ Then they lifted their black eyes toward his, and the look in them told him, “We understand and are sorry.” 204 A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE They repeated the words of their chief: “The woman you love and for whose sake you will not marry another.” Tears came to the white man’s eyes as he bade them good-by. He thought to himself, “Black skin or white skin, dirt or no dirt, men and women the world over understand love.” Across the blue waters in the Bassett home in Southern California, Ruth did not give up her lover or the hope that some day she might live with him in Africa. Each day after school she took a long walk out in the fresh air. Each morning and night in her own room she took gymnastic exercises. She studied books to find out what it was best for her to eat. Slowly, day by day, she began to feel stronger. Her cheeks became rosier, and she added to her weight. Months passed, and even a year, and then yet more months. She continued faithfully to exercise for the love of Herbert and for the love of God. Finally a rosy-cheeked, blue-eyed young woman waited again in the doctor’s office. 205 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK “I am Miss Ruth Bassett,” she said as the doctor, with a somewhat puzzled look, shook her hand. “You are looking much better than when I saw you last,” he replied. Again he examined her carefully, listening to her heart and lungs. At last he sat back in his chair and exclaimed, “What have you been doing, Miss Bassett? You are not the same woman I examined a year and a half ago. You are well.” With a heart bounding with joy, she left the doctor’s office. Back again at her desk in her bungalow home, she wrote a letter of gladness to her lover. Speeding across the continent and over the wide waters, the letter found him with his black boys again lumbering in the woods on the banks of the Koanza River. In the dusk of evening, sitting on a mat near the camp fire, he was singing softly to himself the words of one of his favorite songs. “My Lord, how full of sweet content, I pass my years of banishment. ” 206 A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE Presently his eyes caught sight of a brown body walking slowly up the trail. He jumped to his feet and ran down the path to meet the lad, for he knew well that it was mail that he brought. By the dim light of the lantern that stood on the crude table, he read the well-known, beautiful handwriting. Over and over he repeated the words. He could scarce be- lieve that his eyes were seeing right. “Every hindrance has been removed. I am well. I expect to sail in July.” He wanted to dance. He wanted to shout. He wanted to sing. In the morning he told his boys of his glad surprise. Among themselves they had often talked of Senhor Bote’s loneliness. Now they were wild with excitement. They hurried to finish the sawing. Not many weeks after this at night- fall, a rowboat was moving out from the shore of Angola to a big ocean steamer that lay at anchor not far away. Soon a tall man was climbing a ladder up the side of the ship. Setting foot on the deck, he 207 RED, YELLOW, AND BLACK peeped in through an open port hole. He saw before him, bent over a table at the farther side of the brightly lighted dining room, the fair-haired head he longed to see. Stepping inside the hallway, he stood by an open door leading into the dining room where he could be seen when those blue eyes lifted. The woman next to the fair-haired one saw him first. ‘There is Mr. Withey,” she exclaimed. Ruth startled, dropped what she was eating to her plate. Her napkin fell to the floor as she rose quickly. Forgetting all the others in the room, she rushed out of the door and into her lover’s arms. As they sat in the moonlight on the upper deck, they talked of all that had happened during the two years and more since they had parted. “I have come to stay wherever you stay,” said Ruth, “‘what- ever may be the result.” During the years that have passed since then, like the Ruth of old, she has been true to her promise. Life brings glad sur- prises, however, as well as sad ones. For 208 A CHRISTIAN SOLDIER IN LOVE Ruth, Angola has not been a land of sickness. With her coming, the simple home inside the white walled house with the red-tiled roof seemed to change as a magnolia tree changes when it bursts into bloom. The pictures on the wall looked more at home. Comfortable-looking cush- ions found their way to the couch. Pretty curtains hung in the windows, and, most of all, her presence turned a house into a home. She became very fond of the place with its morning-glories and its roses. Many new flowers and vegetables she added to the garden. She came to love the simple black women as her sisters, and they in turn would do anything for their Senhora Bote. As the years have passed Senhor Bote has spent more and more of his time in the translating of the Bible and other good books into the Kimbundu language. Often after he has sat for hours studying at his desk behind closed doors, two little blue- eyed girls will knock at his door. Running to his chair and up into his lap, they will say, “Father, we think it is time for you to play.” 209 APPENDIX REFERENCE BOOKS APPENDIX CHIEF SOURCES OF MATERIAL (For stories and teacher’s manual) PART I.—A Buacksxin Amone THE REDSKINS. Barbeau, C. M. Huron and Wyandot Mythology. Can- ada Geological Survey. Memoir 80. Anthropological Series 11. 1915. Baughman, A. J. Past and Present of Wyandot County, Ohio. 1913. Two vols. (Vol. I.) Beach, W. W. The Indian Miscellany. 1877. Blair, E. H. Indian tribes of the Upper Mississippi Valley and Region of the Great Lakes. 1911-1912. Two vols. (Vol. I.) Connelley, W. E. Wyandot Folklore. 1900. Elliott, Charles. Indian Missionary Reminiscences. 1837. Finley, J. B. Autobiography. 1853. History of the Wyandot Mission. 1840. Life Among the Indians. 1857. Sketches of Western Methodism. 1857. Journal of the Anthropological Institute. Vol. XXVI. Love, N. B.C. John Stewart, Missionary to the Wyandots, McKendree, William. Letter. (In the Methodist Maga- zine, October, 1823.) Mitchell, Joseph. The Missionary Pioneer, John Stewart. 1827. Myrtle, Minnie (pseud. for A. C. Johnson). The Iro- quois. 1855. Parker, A. C. The Code of Handsome Lake. (New York State Museum Bulletin, No. 163.) (New York State Museum Bulletin. No. 144.) 213 APPENDIX The author acknowledges with gratitude the personal help of Dr. Pliney E. Goddard of the Anthropological De- partment of the American Museum of Natural History. PART IJ.—Carnese Basies, Doctors, AND CRIPPLES. Brockman, F. S. A Daughter of Confucius. (In The Christian Advocate, October, 1914.) Burton, Margaret. Notable Women of Modern China. 1912. Central China Record. 1901, 1904. China Medical Committee of the Rockefeller Foundation. Medicine in China. China Medical Journal. December, 1896. Gamewell, M. N. A Girl’s Beautiful Thought (leaflet). Heathen Woman’s Friend (later called Woman's Mission- ary Friend). 1870-1917. (See especially March, 1911, for the story of Happy Pearl.) Kelley, W. V. A Salute to the Valiant. (In the Method- ist Review, September-October, November-December, 1917.) Macgowan, John. How England Saved China. (See especially Chapter I for story of foot-binding.) Methodist Episcopal Church. Reports of the Central China Woman’s Conference. 1906, 1910, 1912, 1913, 1914, Perkins, E. C. Christmas in China. 1914. Glimpses of the Heart of China. 1911. Woman’s Work in the Far East. November, 1892; August, 1894; November, 1896. This bibliography was supplemented by letters from Dr. Mary Stone and Miss Jennie Hughes, and by personal interviews with Miss Phoebe Stone, the sister of Dr. Mary Stone, Dr. E. C. Perkins, and other missionaries from China. 214 7 APPENDIX PART III.—An American Boy 1n tHe Arrican Buss. African News. 1889-1891. Christian Witness and Advocate of Bible Holiness. Jan- uary 7, 1886. Illustrated Africa. December, 1894. Taylor, William. Christian Adventures in South Africa. 1877. Flaming Torch in Darkest Africa, 1898, The Story of My Life. 1895. -Withey, H. C. Personal Diaries and Letters (unpub- lished). The author acknowledges with gratitude the invaluable services of the Missionary Research Library, New York City. 215