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 SPEAKERS | 
 
 HAND BOOK 
 
 World Program | 
 
 Issued by the National Speakers Bureau 
 of the Young Womens Christian Associations 
 
 600 Lexington A ve. | 
 
 New York City | 
 
 1919 I 
 
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INTRODUCTION 
 
 The daily issues of life, which are topics for conver- 
 sation in every home in the United States and call for 
 headlines and editorials rewritten in many languages, 
 would have a most familiar sound to millions living in 
 i the Far and Near East and Latin America. We have no 
 corner on labor unrest, the high cost of living, shortness 
 of production, clevage in society, the new position of 
 woman and a questioning of the old faiths and practices. 
 Have you noticed the change of front on the part of the 
 newspapers large and small, the space given to the Ori- 
 ent, to happenings thousands of miles away, formerly 
 discussed with a four-line paragraph at the bottom of 
 the sheet that needed filling? 
 
 The great questions now demanding understanding 
 or solution in the United States are but a part of a world 
 problem and it is as impossible to answer them to the 
 satisfaction of ten million people without regard to the 
 other people living outside our borders as it is for a doc- 
 tor to treat one part of a body suffering from blood poi- 
 son, saying “If this sore is only healed, all will be well.” 
 This has been the policy of many a thinking man and 
 women and perhaps to a marked degree in our ccountry 
 because of its isolations, and to-day there are no spaces 
 of separation and we are feeling for the first time with 
 the world. 
 
 The United States of America is neither by qualities 
 nor accomplishments in a position to save the world any 
 more than our men won the war. They added their 
 fresh strength, their supplies, their experience and the 
 end came. But there are contributions we can make to 
 weary, seeking world that will turn the tide, not but that 
 others could do it were not their strength depleted, and 
 in the years until they recover their full powers, ours is 
 an unusual opportunity and responsibility. It is the con- 
 tributing of the experience along the lines of Christian 
 service we have been favored in being able to try. 
 
 i 
 
1 housands of women and children under twelve are 
 working in the factories of China with no labor laws for 
 protection. Thousands of women in India are working 
 outside of their home with no more outlook upon life 
 than the machine they operate; still other thousands are 
 working under most undesirable conditions in Japan. 
 Thousands of women in South America are making 
 roads and acting as beasts of burden. Shall it be years 
 and years before conditions are changed, or are we 
 willing to produce and send sufficient trained leader- 
 ship to show strong women in these countries the way 
 as far as we have gone? To be of much value, such 
 help must go now. 
 
 Students are always a factor to be reckoned with, 
 mostly in future possibilities, but in the past days Euro- 
 pean students have given of their best and many in 
 North America as opportunity came, and to-day the 
 youngest republic, numbering four millions of people 
 is following the leadership of its student body in de- 
 manding reforms from the government. Similiar move- 
 ments in Japan and India are showing much power. 
 The religion we hold dear is the only one which will 
 give the moral stamina which these leaders must have, 
 or disaster will be the result of finding their strength. 
 
 Whatever the movement may be called is of little 
 moment. The thinking world is realizing that woman’s 
 power is being exerted along new lines. Think of an 
 Oriental man in a public address last summer, saying, 
 “We realize that no nation rises above its womanhood.’’ 
 We have a message out of a few years of experience 
 to the home woman whose life is made deadly monoton- 
 ous by wealth or the lack of it. Shall we pass it on ? 
 
 Beginnings of world peace may be made by a Paris 
 conference, but the continuation and fruition of such 
 idealism is only possible if the proper foundations are 
 laid. Appreciation and understanding which shall 
 grow into love and such come only when a sufficient 
 
 2 
 
leadership of a country are shaping their lives and the 
 policies of their communities upon the teaching of Jesus 
 Christ, and this is the task that is upon our shoulders 
 to-day — to take His winning all comprehending life 
 to those in other lands and in our own, who this day 
 are making for the weal or woe of the future. 
 
 There can be no national thinking except as its leads 
 to International thinking. There can be no limited liv- 
 ing unless its intensiveness leads into an expression of 
 world service. Dare we withhold this knowledge from 
 those in our membership who have not thought it 
 through? 
 
 Katherine Willard Eddy. Sept., 1919. 
 
 3 
 
WORLD CITIZENSHIP 
 
 “The stage is set, the destiny disclosed. It has come 
 about by no plan of our conceiving, but by the hand of 
 God, who led us into this war. We cannot turn back. 
 We can only go forward, with lifted eyes and fresh- 
 ened spirit to follow the vision. It was of this that we 
 dreamed at our birth. America shall in truth show the 
 way. The light streams upon the path ahead and no- 
 where else.” 
 
 From President Wilsons speech in presenting the 
 the Peace Treaty and the League of Nations to 
 the Senate. 
 
 “The Nineteenth Century made the World a Neigh- 
 borhood; the Twentieth Century is making the World 
 a Brotherhood.” 
 
 “200,000,000 people in Asia and Africa go to bed 
 hungry every night.” 
 
 “Only Christianity can meet human need. All other 
 religions are man-made, and their inadequacy lies in 
 the fact that they can lift man no higher than man’s 
 own head.” 
 
 “To further the movement for better living condi- 
 tions through the use of facts already ascertained, the 
 Association is calling a conference in September of 
 women physicians from Europe, the Americas and the 
 Orient.” 
 
 From the Association Monthly, August, IQIQ. 
 
 “What we need is friends, who will come out and 
 settle among us, learn our language, study our condi- 
 tions, and then teach us to lead our own people.” 
 
 A Christian Woman in India. 
 
 4 
 
THE YOUTH OF TO-DAY MUST BE THE 
 BRIDGE BUILDERS 
 
 In the annals of oriental folklore there is a quaint 
 story of the man who built the road. The hills and val- 
 leys were pleasant with patches of plush green. The 
 lord of the land looked out over the softly waving fields 
 and said, “It is a good year for rice. I will repair the 
 roads and where necessary I will ^build new ones. 
 Moreover I will ask our neighbors to look to the mend- 
 ing of their ways.” 
 
 So the farmers finally harvested the rice and said, 
 “To-morrow we shall carry our grain to market. That 
 night the rains began to fall. The mountain rivulets 
 become roaring torrents. The men, however, were 
 unafraid and set out along the excellent road. They 
 came to the river, and across its swirling current they 
 could see the fine road stretching on. There was no 
 bridge; so the disappointed men were obliged to turn 
 back, their own labor and the labor of their lord having 
 been in vain. 
 
 Such is the destiny of every country that does not 
 build bridges. 
 
 Bishop Greer in one of his sermons demanding 100 
 per cent, patriotism and sacrifice, said: 
 
 “America is boastful of her material power and has 
 made wealth her god. We always supposed that sheer 
 material power expressed rulership. To-day the scales 
 fall from our eyes and we see her material power in this 
 land is not all. We see the real purpose of our wealth 
 and that we must have more to give in sacrifice and ser- 
 vice. We are beginning to realize that the priceless 
 jewel of American life is service to our country and 
 the rest of mankind.” 
 
 New York Times, May 2, IQIQ. 
 
 5 
 
SEEN BY MISS SCOTT IN JAPAN 
 
 Sept. 9, 1919. 
 
 “In one factory alone which I myself visited there 
 are 3,700 girls — think of it! as many girls as would 
 make up a good-sized little town — and there are scores 
 and hundreds of factories in Osaka, many small, not a 
 few very large. I wish that I had the power to bring 
 before your eyes the girls that I saw — rows and rows 
 and rows of them at machines, many of them looking to 
 be mere babies, although the Japanese law requires 
 that they shall be twelve years old, which, as we count 
 age, would be about ten. Pathetic little figures with 
 dull hopeless-looking faces and such tiny, tiny bodies. 
 I am not a woman given to easy tears, but I went 
 through that factory with a lump in my throat that 
 felt like a football. Most of them live in dormitories 
 within the factory enclosure, and after their twelve 
 hours’ work, are received into its dubious comfort to 
 sleep a few hours, walk about the enclosure a bit, and 
 then go back to work once more. It is true that the 
 dormitories I saw (and I visited several) were clean 
 and well kept and probably far better than the girls 
 would have at home. It is also true that industrial work 
 anywhere under any conditions means pretty drab days 
 for most girls. Conditions are as they are and they 
 change slowly, but the thing which makes me want to 
 cry out and assail the very heavens with my clamor is 
 that we are not doing anything about it.*** I do not 
 doubt that almost any factory in Osaka would be open 
 to us if we were to tap only ever so lightly at the door.” 
 
 6 
 
TALKING POINTS 
 
 The purpose of this handbook is to supply the speak- 
 ers, who are to present the advance program of the 
 Foreign Department to the Association members 
 throughout the country, with accurate information on 
 the present and future program of the Young Wom- 
 en’s Christian Association for the women of the world 
 with especial reference to the needs of the work in 
 China, India, Japan and South America. 
 
 Because of our as yet undefined relationships with 
 the Inter-Church World Movement and to the various 
 Mission Boards, we can use as speakers only those who 
 thoroughly understand the situation and who are well 
 informed on the possible dangers of inaccurate state- 
 ments. 
 
 To enable you as a speaker to secure detailed in- 
 formation on political and racial relationships, we in- 
 clude a bibliography which, though not exhaustive, 
 should prove of great value. Also we are supplying 
 figures and material for charts and blackboard work 
 for those speakers who desire to use them. 
 
 Speaking Points 
 Building a Speech 
 
 In preparing the speech it is desirable to 
 
 1. Decide what your main purpose is in talking to 
 that audience; what it is you want to make them as 
 business women, industrial girls, club women or Board 
 members, do; and never forget that purpose during 
 your talk. 
 
 2. Be accurate in statements and quotations. 
 
 3. Be prepared to name authorities for statements, or 
 to answer any objections raised to statements that you 
 make. 
 
 4. Be able to adjust your speech to suit any audience 
 you may meet in the Association. 
 
When Speaking 
 
 1. Begin with a good strong opening sentence. 
 
 2. Speak slowly and distinctly, trying to reach the 
 person farthest from the platform. 
 
 3. Never go over your allotted time ; leave your audi- 
 ence with a hunger to know more. 
 
 4. Finish strong; beware of an anti-climax. 
 
 5. If speaking with slides, moving pictures or using 
 charts for illustrations, talk to one focus. 
 
 6. However formal or informal the construction of 
 the talk is, there are three cardinal virtues which no 
 speaker can afford to neglect — TACT, CLEARNESS, 
 FORCE. 
 
 Filling Speaking Engagements 
 
 Every speaker on the Foreign Advance Program 
 will have a definite captain to report back to and from 
 whom she will receive requests to speak. Each Speak- 
 ers Bureau will attempt to find out all possible infor- 
 mation in advance about the meeting in order to let 
 the speaker know the type of audience, the hour of the 
 meeting, the place, etc. We would suggest the fol- 
 lowing request slip : 
 
 Date. . 
 Time. . 
 
 Name and address of person or organization. 
 
 Requesting speaker 
 
 Answer before 
 
 Name or type of speaker 
 Type of audience 
 
 8 
 
Approximate 
 
 Number 
 
 Date 
 
 Place 
 
 Train connections 
 
 Remarks 
 
 On arrival, speaker report to: 
 
 9 
 
THE UNITED STATES OF EUROPE 
 By Victor Hugo 
 
 A day will come when bullets and bombs shall be re- 
 placed by ballots, by the universal suffrages of the 
 people, by the sacred arbitrament of a great Sovereign 
 Senate, which shall be to Europe what the Parliament 
 is to England, what the Diet is to Germany, what the 
 Legislative Assembly is to France. A day will come 
 when a cannon shall be exhibited in our museums as 
 an instrument of torture is now, and men shall marvel 
 that such things should be. 
 
 A day will come when we shall see those two im- 
 mense groups, the United States of America and the 
 United States of Europe, in the face of each other, ex- 
 tending hand to hand over the ocean, exchanging their 
 products, their commerce, their industry, their art; 
 their genius clearing the earth, colonizing deserts, and 
 ameliorating creation under the eye of the Creator. 
 
 To you I appeal, French, English, Germans, Rus- 
 sians, Slavs, Europeans, Americans, what have we to 
 do to hasten the coming of the great day? 
 
 Love one another! 
 
 WHAT IS THE FOREIGN ADVANCE 
 PROGRAM? 
 
 The Foreign Advance Program comes as the re- 
 sponse of the Foreign Department of the National 
 Board, Young Women’s Christian Association to the 
 challenge of a shaken world. In the crash of the World 
 War, the earth has been shaken from center to circum- 
 ference, old civilization, old traditions, old ideals, old 
 superstitions, old religions, old relationships, both per- 
 sonal and national, and old provincialisms, are crumb- 
 ling. 
 
 The late Hamilton Wright Mabie, after his return 
 from the orient, said, “Foreign missions is the greatest 
 
unifying power at work among men. It is the only 
 adequate expression of that Spiritual Internationalism 
 which was the long dream of the Prophets. It is de- 
 fining a universal standard of morals, reaching and 
 practicing the gospel of love which is silently working 
 a revolution in the feelings and thoughts of men in race 
 relations. It has become the very highest statesman- 
 ship.” Sometime ago when relations between the Am- 
 erican and Japanese governments were severely 
 strained, Count Okuma, then Premier of Japan, who as 
 a boy was a pupil of a Christian missionary, said, “How 
 can questions of the character that have arisen between 
 Japan and California be solved? Personally, I am pro- 
 foundly convinced that questions of this kind can never 
 be solved by law nor by politics, nor by diplomacy. It 
 is only when these two peoples believe what Christian- 
 ity taught in regard to the Fatherhood of God and the 
 Brotherhood of Man, that they will be able to extend 
 hands across the Pacific and work together for all that 
 is good, and great and noble. The only force that can 
 solve such questions is Christianity.” Recently, the 
 President of China proclaimed to his great people 
 “that only Christianity could save China.” 
 
 The Foreign Department of the National Board is 
 fundamentally a missionary society. We cooperate with 
 and are in South American and the Orient at the urgent 
 request of the missionary bodies operating in these 
 lands. In fact, even this advance answers only in part 
 the appeals, or responds to the unparalleled opportun- 
 ity that confronts the Y. W. C. A. in these throbing 
 nations. 
 
 The unspeakable suffering of the women and chil- 
 dren of Europe and the Near East, found a sympa- 
 thetic and generous response in the hearts of the wom- 
 anhood of America, but have we realized deeply and 
 personally that while there are hungry people to be fed 
 in Belgium, Serbia, and Poland, there are more than 
 
 ii 
 
thirty million women and children in India who every 
 night cry themselves to sleep in their hunger while in 
 China untold millions live from birth to death on the 
 borderland of starvation. 
 
 There are physical as well as economic needs, we are 
 asked to meet — how our hearts were stirred during the 
 war when we heard that five million men stretched on 
 beds of pain in the hospitals of our Allies, we gave with 
 eagerness time, money and life that these brave lads 
 might have the best in the gift of medical care and skill. 
 But do we realize that there are today twenty-five mil- 
 lion women and children stretched on mats of pain, 
 without either hospital, doctor or nurse? They, too, 
 gave their brothers, their husbands, and their sons by 
 the tens of thousands to help win the war. As you love 
 and serve the American widow who gave her husband 
 to help make the world safe for us, you will not forget 
 the little Indian widow, crushed by the superstitions of 
 her cruel religion? They are in bondage, physically, 
 mentally, and spiritually. What an opportunity to 
 bring relief through our health campaigns, the develop- 
 ment of trained leadership in our School of Physical 
 Directors everywhere in such urgent demand. 
 
 This is also the response of the Foreign Department 
 to the challenge of a serving world. Girls and women 
 by the hundreds of thousands are being sacrificed on 
 the altar of modern industry in South America and the 
 Orient. The factories of China employ 4,000 men and 
 
 150.000 women and girls, 30,000 of these are in Shang- 
 hai working for one cent an hour. 
 
 In Japan, out of 1,300,000 employes in the factories 
 
 850.000 are women and girls who work 12, 14, and 16 
 hours a day, seven days a week, with but two holidays a 
 month ; 8 1 ,000 return home every year on account of ill- 
 ness, 14,000 of these die of consumption. The average 
 wage during war prosperity was from 10 to 20 cents 
 per day. The price of rice has gone up 300% in Japan 
 
while wages have remained the same. There are 500,- 
 000 girls in industry in South America, to say nothing 
 of the girl away from home in shop and office and 
 school, who are ceaselessly appealing to us for help 
 and protection. 
 
 We come to you with the assurance of new glad co- 
 operation in meeting triumphantly the challenge of the 
 women in a shaken, suffering, serving and struggling 
 world, in a way that will represent on our part real deep 
 character, development, self-sacrifice, and new depend- 
 ence on God and a victory worthy of the opportunity. 
 
 Ella D. MacLau rin. 
 
 13 
 
CHINA— HER PLACE IN THE WORLD OF 
 
 NATIONS 
 
 It is now more than a half century since William H. 
 Seward, Lincoln's great Secretary of State, prophesized 
 with reference to the Orient as follows “The Pacific 
 Ocean, its shores, its islands, and the vast regions be- 
 yond, have become the chief theatre of events in the 
 world’s great hereafter.” 
 
 It is interesting to note the march of civilization 
 from its early cradle along the Euphrates and the Nile, 
 and also to see that the great world struggles for free- 
 dom have been wrought chiefly between the 20th and 
 55th degrees of North Latitude. This narrow belt may 
 be divided into three periods: (1) Europe; (2) the 
 United States; (3) China. 
 
 Our acquisition of Hawaii, Guam and the Phillip- 
 pines has completed the westward march of the United 
 States across the continent and the Pacific, bringing us 
 into direct contact with the Orient and the problems of 
 Asia which the United States must now face with wis- 
 dom, courage and justice. 
 
 Little attention has been paid to the Far East, but 
 students of the Orient have noted the wonderful growth 
 of Japan during the past 50 years. It has not only de- 
 veloped marvelously along industrial lines but has ap- 
 parently strengthened itself as an imperial power. To- 
 day Japan represents, almost alone in the world, the old 
 idea of autocracy based upon the rule of might and the 
 “divine right” of the Emperor, and the world witnesses 
 the marvelous spectacle of 65 million people intensely 
 trained to a high point of efficiency as a militaristic na- | 
 tion wielding great power in world affairs and especi- 
 ally astute in state-craft. Opposite to this is the great 
 empire of China which of all the nations of the earth 
 has survived as a nation and as a people with cherished 
 traditions, with a history, a religion, a science, a phil- 
 
 14 
 
osophy and a principle of democracy in small groups 
 ante-dating other ancient, medieval and modern 
 countries. 
 
 These people naturally peaceful and industrious 
 have desired for thousands of years to live by them- 
 selves. To preserve themselves and their civilization 
 they built the great Chinese wall to keep out those who 
 would practice upon them the doctrine that “might 
 makes right,” and thus for centuries they kept out the 
 Tartars and others who would have subjected them to 
 bondage and destroyed them as a nation. 
 
 The noble ideals of the ancient Chinese have made 
 them victims of modern civilization — so-called — be- 
 cause the Chinese ideas are anti-militaristic, leaving 
 them helpless in the face of military powers. Outside 
 nations for personal aggrandizement have appropriated 
 slice after slice of her territory and have imposed upon 
 her not only unjust tribute of territory, and invaluable 
 “concessions,’ but have through means of trade, demor- 
 alised some of the provinces by the introduction of the 
 opium curse and other destructive articles, degrading 
 customs, and diseases. From time to time concessions 
 have been secured by foreign powers, some by threats 
 and some by intrigue with corrupt Chinese officials un- 
 til China has been stripped and impoverished by these 
 questionable methods, and the sad part of it is, by so- 
 called Christian nations. Is it any wonder that Japan 
 justifies herself by these same methods? 
 
 In spite of all her handicaps of traditions and slow- 
 moving progress, China succeeded in 1911 in starting a 
 republic through an almost bloodless revolution against 
 the Manchu dynasty. It is often said that China was 
 not ready for a representative form of government, but 
 others maintain that China with her small democratic 
 groups operated locally for centuries was better pre- 
 pared for democracy than many European nations dom- 
 inated by strong power from the top. Her people have 
 
been democratic from time immemorial and so com- 
 plete and satisfactory has been this local form of home 
 rule that they have had little use for national govern- 
 ment, and the national government had little use for the 
 communities except to collect taxes from them. There 
 has been no militaristic caste or class strong enough for 
 leadership to meet emergencies as has been the case in 
 Japan where they had a strong government from the 
 top down, where the so-called lower classes had little 
 or nothing to do with the government. But of the two 
 systems, China’s is based upon the soundest and is build- 
 ing from the bottom up, while the autocratic govern- 
 ments are tumbling from the top down the world 
 over. Failure of German and Russian autocracies are 
 examples. 
 
 The China of today is a new China and is becom- 
 ing more progressive every day, a fact obscured by the 
 great concentration upon Europe during the war. One 
 of the excuses given for keeping China out of the 
 European war was the danger of awakening 400,000,000 
 Asiatics. It must be remembered in this connection 
 that almost the only Asiatics who appeared in France 
 or Flanders were the 200,000 Chinese coolies now re- 
 turning to China with larger vision, greater experience 
 and clarified views as to the difference between auto- 
 cracy and democracy. The new republic of China is a 
 fact with which the world will now have to deal and 
 the question is, shall China be welcomed into the family 
 of free nations and saved from the rapaciousness of 
 world greed and ambition for territory and power, or 
 must she in self-defense be forced to become a great 
 military power, with sure possibilities of making Asia 
 the world’s greatest battlefield? One by one China’s 
 great seaports have been ruthlessly seized and now 
 Tsingtao, her last sea exit of note, is about to be 
 awarded to a foreign power by the Paris Peace Con- 
 ference, and that, too, at a time when the entire Chris- 
 
 16 
 
tian world is dreaming of and praying for international 
 peace. 
 
 In a word, China has needed no outside help to pre- 
 serve her nationality. She has fought her way through 
 to the present and survived in spite of outside hind- 
 rances. The curse of opium thrust upon her, poisoning 
 millions of her subjects, aroused China to the point of 
 abolishing the opium traffic and it is everlastingly to 
 her credit that only last year she bought up the stock 
 of opium available in China and deliberately destroyed 
 it by a fire at a cost of over 20 millian dollars. Not- 
 withstanding this fact, opium is still being smuggled 
 into China in great quantities and the more deadly drug 
 morphine is also being introduced. 
 
 One of China’s drawbacks today is a vast territory 
 hampered by lack of transportation and good roads. 
 She has now less than 7,000 miles of railway against 
 250,000 for the United States. The movement for good 
 roads is making great headway throughout China and 
 this fact together with the introduction of automobiles 
 and trucks will open up new developments in every di- 
 rection. China for centuries has mostly relied upon 
 water transportation and even this she has developed by 
 extending and dredging old canals. The great canal 
 of China, over 1,000 miles long, was built 200 B. C. and 
 this is now being improved. 
 
 The natural resources of China have only been de- 
 veloped to the extent of about two percent. Geologists 
 and engineers tell us that in coal, iron and other useful 
 minerals, China is one of the most richly endowed coun- 
 tries in the world. In fact, she has all the natural re- 
 sources necessary for self-support both in peace and in 
 war and can be independent for centuries, if necessary 
 without outside support. The question is simply one 
 of development without robbery, and this is where 
 America can help. If China can get aid without con- 
 
 17 
 
fiscation, she will become one of the richest and most 
 prosperous nations in the world. She has unbounded 
 natural resources and the greatest supply of cheap labor 
 in the world, — a rare combination — which puts her in 
 an incomparable position for production and world 
 trade. America can render a great service by insisting 
 upon John Hay’s policy of the open door with the hon- 
 est chance for China to become self-supporting and 
 with an equal chance for all the world to compete for 
 her trade. 
 
 Education ; 
 
 In educational matters, China is struggling up from 
 her centuries of traditions which have resulted in a pe- 
 culiar intellectual caste of mind linked closely with tra- 
 dition and sentiment for antiquity. But China is 
 emerging gradually through modern influences and is 
 headed in the right direction. She is developing in her 
 own way that which will probably be the best for her 
 own people. Outside nations should not require nor 
 expect China to adopt western methods and ideas en- 
 tirely. These would not be effective and might be re- 
 troactive. It must not be forgotten that there are scat- 
 tered throughout the world some thousands of Chinese 
 students in colleges and universities. Sixteen hundred 
 of these, of whom 150 are women, are in American in- 
 stitutions of learning. About 25% of these return every 
 year and new ones take their places. Almost all the 
 Chinese representatives in Paris at the Peace Confer- 
 ence were graduats of American universities and most 
 of them were pronounced Christians. 
 
 Statistics of the Board of Education appearing im- 
 mediately after the revolution of 1911 give the number 
 of students in all government schools and colleges as 
 1,000,000 using round numbers. In 1914 the total num- 
 ber is given as 3,500,000 and for 1917, 4,000,000. The 
 total number of schools and colleges in 1914 is 108,000 
 
and for 1917, 120,000. Thus there was a rapid increase 
 during the first three years of the republic. Under 
 American standards there should be an attendance of 
 eighty million pupils in the Chinese schools. 
 
 Phonetic Script, Hope of China. 
 
 It is not generally known that there has been in- 
 vented by the Conference for the standardization of 
 pronunciation, held in 1913, a system of phonetic script 
 which has received official recognition. This script 
 has three functions, to unify spoken dialects; second, to 
 help the study of Chinese characters; third, to educate 
 the illiterates. Institutes have been held for the pur- 
 pose of extending the knowledge of this script and some 
 of the higher normal colleges like Peking, Nanking and 
 Wuchang, have undertaken the preliminary introduc- 
 tion of it. In Peking over 100,000 people have already 
 been reached with it. An effort will be made in certain 
 towns this winter to reach every man, woman and child 
 as an experiment of its efficiency. The same plan was 
 taught to some of the coolies in France with marked 
 success. This script consists of 39 characters by which 
 an illiterate person can be taught fundamental reading 
 in two or three months. The Mandarin language is of 
 course the universal language of the educated classes 
 in China, but almost every community in China has its 
 provincial dialect so that Chinese living 20 miles apart 
 often can not understand each other. It will be seen 
 at a glance what this phonetic script means for China. 
 If carried out as now seems likely, ten years hence every 
 child and adult in China may be taught to read some- 
 thing that will be a national means of popular com- 
 munication. This means national thought, national 
 education, national sentiment and a resultant patriotism 
 which will be the ultimate defense of the republic and 
 secure its protection against dangers within and perils 
 from without. In short, it means a revolution along 
 
safe and sane lines and it is not only a promised hope 
 for China but another blessing and safeguard for peace 
 in Asia, and peace in Asia means a long step towards 
 world peace. 
 
 Dr. Yui in a stirring appeal for “a strong and regu- 
 lar propaganda for the cause of Education” in China, 
 says: — “We do not need to propagate any educational 
 theories, however sound or beautiful they may be. All 
 we need to do is to bring before the people in a most 
 vivid and convincing way the facts about education and 
 all the benefits it confers, and has already conferred 
 upon other countries which have duly emphasized it. 
 
 “In our experience of educational lecture work of 
 the Y. M. C. A.’s of China, in which especially con- 
 structed apparatus has been used, according to scien- 
 tific principles for vividness, we see tremendous possi- 
 bilities of an educational propaganda of the kind, when 
 it is carried on on a much more extensive scale. In 
 three full years’ lecturing in about fifteen provinces, 
 there has not been one place where this type of lecture 
 has not most deeply gripped the people. What we need 
 to show is the benefit of education to the individual, the 
 family, the local community, the country, and the 
 world, and how to get this education.” 
 
 The message to the world is clearly “hands off 
 China” except the hands of helpfulness. The 
 Y. M. C. A. and the Y. W. C. A. are peculiarly fitted 
 to lend the helping hand to China, and the 200,000 
 Chinese returning from France offer unprecedented 
 opportunities for those who understand the work. 
 America has an opportunity to aid generously and in- 
 telligently. 
 
 Dr. Ida Kahn, one of the first Chinese women to 
 graduate from an American university, made this re- 
 cent appeal to modern Chinese women. “Let our 
 women of education in Peking and elsewhere gather 
 themselves together to work for the schools, Red Cross, 
 
 20 
 
Y. W. C. A., and everything else which bespeaks the 
 betterment of the country, instead of staying at home to 
 play poker and “sparow,” and going out to attend end- 
 less dinners, tea parties and dances. Our country is in 
 danger of going over a precipice, and the slightest 
 push in the wrong direction will complete our undoing. 
 Let us rally our forces and help the Ship of State to 
 move safely. One person cannot accomplish much, but 
 one or two hundred millions of women can work won- 
 ders. Let us go back to a more Spartan-like simplicity 
 of living, and let us build up social service until every 
 city in China is sanitary, every section of the town has 
 its proper schools, and every child, whether girl or boy, 
 is sent to such schools. True social service brings 
 democracy in its train, and we who are citizens of a 
 new Republic can help to make it truly great by preach- 
 ing and living democracy all the time. Why not learn 
 to do our household duties, deeming it effeminate to 
 be waited upon by maids and slave girls all the time? 
 
 “Let us at the same time strive to put away slavery 
 and concubinage from our country. No true emancipa- 
 tion can take place until we firmly uproot these evils. 
 
 “The status of women in China, while leaving much 
 to be desired, still is quite hopeful when we consider 
 that she is just emerging into the sisterhood of the na- 
 tions. Our men can depend upon us to bear the burdens 
 of the day, for nowhere is there a more industrious, 
 diligent, and persevering womanhood than in China. 
 Christ alone can crown our womanhood by giving us 
 true liberty of mind, soul and body, and we who are 
 made free will herald in a new era of growth and 
 prosperity for our beloved country. 
 
 Two thousand years before Christ, the Chinese phil- 
 osophers evolved an ethical precept now recognized the 
 world over as the Golden Rule of Christianity. Con- 
 fucius recorded this in negative form about 500 B. C., 
 which freely translated says: “What you do not like 
 
 i\ 
 
when done to yourself, do not do to others.” Christ 
 put it in positive form. This simple precept is the best 
 foundation for a league of peace so far invented. It is 
 based upon righteousness and justice and there will be 
 no safe and sane peace in this world until this original 
 Chinese precept is universally recognized. Ultimate 
 world peace must come through the evolution of the 
 international mind and the international heart of the 
 peoples of the earth, restraining governments from the 
 old order of “power and pelf.” In this international 
 work the Y. M. C. A. and the Y. W. C. A. have a real 
 contribution to make towards the reclamation of a war 
 weary world. 
 
 Andrew B. Humphrey, 
 
 Oct. 8, 1919. 
 
 1 
 
 22 
 
CHINA TODAY: A BIRDSEYE VIEW 
 
 A visitor coming out of the Chinese art exhibit at a 
 recent exposition remarked in a tone of great surprise, 
 “It is a revelation to me. I never dreamed that the 
 Chinese had produced or were capable of such achieve- 
 ments.” That men did not know (and the majority of 
 men and women do not know) that for twenty-five cen- 
 turies — from a thousand years before to fifteen hundred 
 years after Christ — China was abreast of or leading the 
 world’s civilization and culture. It is only in the last 
 four hundred years, and more particularly in the last 
 one hundred years (in this modern era of applied sci- 
 ence) that China has lost the lead and straggles behind 
 in confusion. Where will the year 2000 find China.'' 
 That is possibly the single greatest question the world 
 has to answer in this twentieth century. John Hay 
 though being dead yet speaks in living, timely words 
 when he said, “The storm-center of the world has grad- 
 ually shifted to China. Whoever understands that 
 mighty empire socially, politically, economically, re- 
 ligiously has a key to world politics for the next five 
 centuries.” 
 
 This is no exaggeration. China cannot be exagger- 
 ated. China looms large on our new horizons. China’s 
 importance was foreordained. When the seas and the 
 dry land were separated and the mountains were heaved 
 out of the bowels of the earth — that day the coming 
 greatness of China for all time was assured. It was 
 written in her very location on the globe — in the world’s 
 temperate zone where alone all the world’s great cult- 
 ures have arisen. It was written into her fertile soil — 
 the alluvial deposits of her mighty rivers, further en- 
 riched by enslaved winds that bring their yearly tribute 
 of rich dust from the norwest and rain from the south- 
 east. It was written when she was underlaid with vast 
 beds of iron and coal and copper, among the largest 
 
 23 
 
and richest on earth — the raw materials for the great 
 industries that should arise when the stone age and the 
 bronze age and the iron age should give place to the age 
 of steel. Her size as a nation was decreed when the 
 mountains and the deserts shut her in from the north 
 and west and the ocean from the south and east — a com- 
 pact land two-thirds the size of ours. 
 
 But China’s present importance and future greatnes' 
 are not dependent principally on these assets which 
 have been enumerated. Her richest treasure is her peo- 
 ple and she is rich in that. If miser-like she sat down 
 to count them, each of her twenty-one* provinces a 
 heavy bag of precious human lives, she would count 
 somewhere between 350 and 400 millions. China among 
 the nations is the greatest multi-millionaire of them all. 
 She owns one-fourth of the raw material of human per- 
 sonality. And what of the quality of this quantity? 
 Those who know the Chinese best believe in them the 
 most. Those who have lived longest among them see 
 in all this mass of men and women unspeakable possi- 
 bilities. Scraping off the veneer of filth, ignorance, 
 superstition, extreme poverty, foot-binding, concubin- 
 age, and immorality (which with two exceptions are 
 found yet in distressing measure even in our own Amer- 
 ica) and getting down to the natural wood of the Chi- 
 nese temperament and nature, they find it hard, of fine, 
 smooth grain, and capable of taking a high finish. 
 These Chinese are by nature capable, resourceful, pat- 
 ient, industrious, faithful, solid, cheerful and by hered- 
 ity lovers of learning, lovers of peace, and lovers of the 
 democratic principle. Think what this means for the 
 future of the human race, after the one-fourth and the 
 three-fourths have mingled their waters in the new 
 stream of human relationship and history. 
 
 China, however, is not flowing a clear pure stream, 
 but like her own Yellow River flows muddily along. 
 
 *18 in China Proper, 3 in Manchuria. 
 
She is in utter confusion. To see the oldest and proud- 
 est and greatest nation on earth, the mother of the splen- 
 did civilization of the Far East, reduced by the turn of 
 events to a state of childish helplessness is one of the 
 saddest sights in all our time, and one of the saddest 
 stories of history. She who had lived her long life in 
 security and splendor in a golden palace fronting on the 
 sea and backed by high mountains and broad deserts has 
 had every protecting gate and door broken down by 
 ruthless nations who would brook no policy of splendid 
 isolation. The trade and resources of China were nec- 
 essary to the world and the world laid rough hands 
 upon them. To such a state of weakness has China been 
 brought that now only a sense of decency — if there be 
 any such — on the part of the nations can keep them out 
 of her apartments, several of which (and those the 
 choicest) are already tenanted by unwelcome intru- 
 ders. China has no physical power to protect her honor 
 and her privacy. She stands today a great figure ap- 
 pealing to the pity of the world, and it is a question 
 whether those who pity her and would rescue and re- 
 store her are not too late. One thing is certain: no 
 nation ever needed friends — protection, helping friends 
 — as China needs friends today. 
 
 What are the difficulties that face China? We name 
 a few of them : 
 
 1. Her own divided state. The Chinese Republic 
 established in 1911, and modelled upon the United 
 States, was an attempted solution for her weakness and 
 inefficiency. Its failures, however, have already far 
 out-numbered its successes. Those who expected the 
 Republic and the millenium to arrive simultaneously 
 have been bitterly disappointed. It takes more than 
 a constitutional democracy to save any nation. Instead 
 of a unified country we behold a divided China, the 
 radical South fighting almost continuously in more or 
 less severe civil war the conservative North. The pres- 
 
 25 
 
ent President was elected by a rump Parliament of 
 Northern men, from which the Southern delegates were 
 absent. To add to the difficulties of unification are the 
 lack of railroads (only about 7,000 miles for all of 
 China being now in operation, or approaching comple- 
 tion), the lack of money to build railroads, and the 
 lack of common vernacular. The difficulties in the way 
 of unification are at present, when China must be uni- 
 fied or perish, almost insuperable and heart-breaking. 
 
 2. Official corruption. The corruption of China’s 
 old-style officials, who are still for the most part in 
 power, is notorious. It is these men who are selling 
 China out for Japanese gold. In one year they bor- 
 rowed $220,000,000 from Japan, giving in wholesale 
 fashion, as their security, China’s most precious natural 
 resources. J apan today holds a first mortgage on China. 
 The money thus acquired is not spent for the good of 
 China, but to satisfy the selfish ambitions and sordid 
 pleasures of these military governors and civil officials. 
 
 3. Financial bankruptcy. China, in spite of her 
 potential wealth, is financially bankrupt. She owes 
 heavy sums to foreign creditors, Japanese and Euro- 
 pean. As a result, foreign control throttles the national 
 development of her economic life, for foreigners have 
 their finders on her trade, her tariffs, and various con- 
 cessions on the coast and in the heart of China. 
 
 4. Japanese aggression. This is China’s most acute 
 and critical danger today. Southern Manchuria, East- 
 ern Inner Mongolia, Shantung, the Yangtze valley, Fu- 
 kien — into all these the Japanese are infiltrating with 
 trade, concessions, and armies of soldiers and agents. 
 It is this danger, oncoming and overwhelming, which is 
 arousing China as she has never been arousd in all her 
 history. Does the Treaty of Versailles toll the bell for 
 a doomed China, doomed as a national entity, or does it 
 mark out the locus of the next World War, when ships 
 shall carry American armies across the Pacific in place 
 
of the Atlantic, or is it through a League of Nations, a 
 super-national power, to be the ultimate salvation of 
 China from her enemies that throng her round? These 
 are momentous questions of today. 
 
 5. The power of the military governors. It is the 
 military governors that hold the reins of power in 
 China today, when of all times the civil should be in 
 control. Under their leadership dominated by Japan 
 will this great peace-loving nation become a militarism 
 to disturb the peace of the world, to create race-strife, 
 to fight it out with the whites for world-supremacy? 
 
 6. The ignorance of China. A knowledge-loving, 
 knowledge-worshipping people, ruled by scholars for 
 unnumbered generations, ninety-seven per cent, illiter- 
 ate! That is the paradox of China. China to be safe 
 in the new world and safe for the new world needs a 
 million new schools and a million new teachers. Where 
 shall she get them and how train them, when her treas- 
 ury lies empty? 
 
 7. Her three religious systems (Confucianism, 
 Buddhism, Taoism) are unsuited to the twentieth cen- 
 tury civilization that is flooding the oriental lands and 
 carrying before it old institutions, old ideals and ideas. 
 Confucianism with all its splendid moral code stands 
 facing the past, while the new China rushes into the 
 future; it stands emphasizing the family, to the exclu- 
 sion of the rights of the individual, especially of wom- 
 an, the neighborhood, and the larger groups, when the 
 world is talking in terms of internationalism, social re- 
 sponsibility, industrial democracy, community life, 
 rights of woman, and a fair chance for every individ- 
 ual. Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism — all are being 
 weighed in the balances of an age of applied science, 
 historical research, and international relationships, are 
 found seriously wanting, and their dominion, as in Ja- 
 pan, is fast being given over to Agnosticism and Athe- 
 ism. “One quarter of the human race is slipping from 
 
 27 
 
its spiritual moorings. Surely, never was richer freight 
 derelict on the waters of time.”* 
 
 Shall we then despair for China? Not at all! Who 
 proved neighbor to him that fell among thieves? Was 
 it not he that rendered help in spite of his different race, . 
 heredity, profession, ability, education, and wealth? I 
 Are we as Christians to pass by on the other side of 
 China’s need, deeming it a hopeless case or not our busi- 
 ness? Are we not physically neighbor to China — in 
 this new Pacific Era of the history of the world when 
 her frontage is directly opposite to ours? Are we not 
 mentally and spiritually neighbor to the Chinese who 
 have been called because of their likeness to us in many 
 ways “the Anglo-Saxons of the East”? 
 
 Signs of hope are everywhere. The Chinese student- 
 class, students of government, missionary, and private 
 schools alike, are rising in defence of their land in one 
 of the most heroic and stirring movements ever record- 
 ed in any land. The commercial boycott is proving a 
 powerful weapon in Chinese hands. The conscience of 
 the world is being roused at the recital of the wrongs 
 done China, and no further wrong will go unchal- 
 lenged. The Christian forces are recording successes 
 that twenty years ago would have been declared beyond 
 belief. With a vastly reinforced equipment, human 
 and material, there is no limit to what may be done for 
 Jesus Christ in China during this generation. Even 
 China’s leading classes are turning to Christianity with 
 eager questioning interest, wondering if in Jesus Christ 
 lies the future safety and development of China. “The a 
 Yellow Peril has become the Golden Opportunity” for ' 
 the Christian forces of the world. Shall we then render 
 service of heart and hand and life to this peace-loving, 
 knowledge-loving, home-loving, democratic, construc- 
 
 *World’s Missionary Conference, Edinburgh. 
 
 28 
 
tive people ? Shall it be the Christian democracies of 
 China and America that together shall control, with all 
 their resources and in all their power, the destiny of the 
 world? 
 
 Oscar MacMillan Buck, 
 
 Ohio Wesleyan University. 
 
 29 
 
THE ASSOCIATION MOVEMENT IN CHINA 
 
 The Young Women’s Christian Association entered 
 China at the urgent request of both the Chinese and the 
 existing missionary body. It came into being with New 
 China and has been a part of it. With this propitious 
 background ; with its emphasis on the discovery and 
 development of Chinese leadership, and with its flexi- 
 bility of method the Association stands prepared to do 
 a unique work in China. 
 
 The Association in China is also an experiment in 
 internationalism, for though its membership is Chinese 
 its secretaryship includes young women from Great 
 Britian (England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia and 
 Canada), and from Sweden as well as from the United 
 States of America. All learn the Chinese language and 
 work shoulder to shoulder not only with the Chinese 
 women but with each other. These secretaries all work 
 under the direction of the National Committee of 
 China, a committee composed of Chinese, British and 
 American women, and under Local Boards the ma- 
 jority of which are all Chinese. Thus through interna- 
 tional cooperation is being developed an indiginous 
 Chinese Association. 
 
 The object of the Association here as elsewhere is 
 the bringing of abundant life, — social, intellectual, 
 physical and spiritual, — to the girls and women of all 
 China. The framework is very like that in America, 
 the work falling there as here into the two general di- 
 visions of City and Student work. 
 
 City work usually begins with the girl or woman in 
 her own home, — the woman whom New China has 
 found too late, for school life. Sometimes this means 
 that she has been married very young. Again the new 
 life has found her when she is too old to enter a primary 
 school and has no foundation for anything else. In 
 either case her horizon is still bounded by that traversty 
 of home which social conditions of old China have cre- 
 
 30 
 
ated. This if the family is “conservative,” if liberal, the 
 girl is swept out into a liberty of action and life that is 
 as dangerous as it is new. In both cases she stands in 
 dire need of friendship and guidance. 
 
 To these young women and girls, the City Associa- 
 tion offers wholesome social life, an intellectual chance, 
 through special classes and lectures, physical develop- 
 ment and a knowledge of Jesus Christ and the abundant 
 life in Him. The City Association also ministers to the 
 non-mission school student in that city and is beginning, 
 largely through its Chinese leadership, to touch the in- 
 dustrial girls. 
 
 It takes a long time to organize a City Association in 
 China, and get it to a place of service in a community. 
 After the invitation from Chinese and the missionaries 
 of the city has been received, pioneer secretaries must 
 be found, secretaries trained in America or some other 
 country where the Association has been established long 
 enough to produce leadership. After assigning these 
 secretaries to the city in question, they must learn Chi- 
 nese, must come to know all kinds and conditions of 
 people, must discover and secure Chinese leadership for 
 secretaries and committee members and must make a 
 thorough survey of the city, before reaching even the 
 stage known as pre-organization. Before any city can 
 be really organized it must also have as many as five 
 Bible classes under Association leadership and a 
 pledged membership, a strong nucleus of whom are 
 Christian. 
 
 The Board of Directors is elected as with us, by the 
 membership, and it decides on and raises its own bud- 
 get. City Associations in China now use the plan of co- 
 operating with the National Committee in an Annual 
 Budget campaign. This finance work is developing 
 self-confidence, cooperation, team spirit and many 
 otner desirable qualities of leadership among the Chi- 
 nese women as well as securing their funds. Their 
 
 31 
 
budgets always include a generous percentage for the 
 support of both National and World work. The only 
 help asked for from abroad is for permanent equip- 
 ment or for initiating new work. 
 
 Organized student work in China is found mostly 
 in the Mission Schools, where the necessary Christian 
 leadership can be assured. The great emphasis in this 
 work is on self-expression and the development of lead- 
 ership. It is also most strategic in our work with non- 
 mission schools, — the graduates of the mission schools 
 being much in demand as teachers, and often giving 
 the Association the only possible entrance to the school 
 to which they go. 
 
 The non-mission school student body is the most 
 potential and in many ways the most needy group of 
 young women in China. Their power of leadership 
 and something of the spirit that is in them was shown 
 in the demonstrations of the Student Strike of the past 
 summer. In the Student Unions, formed at this time, 
 in all the large centers of China, the girls had equal rep- 
 resentation 'with the boys, and though not so much in 
 the public eye, were no whit behind in their activities. 
 
 The Association has a friendly touch with these stu- 
 dents in every city where we have secretaries, — and is 
 the only Christian agency which does have this touch 
 and consequent possibility of helpfulness. Association 
 secretaries are leading physical classes and Bible clas- 
 ses in the schools themselves and in cities where we have 
 organized Association there are also week-end confer- 
 ences, recreation, lectures, special classes, clubs, etc., 
 planned especially for the students themselves, at the 
 building. 
 
 The Time Investment Club, corresponding some- 
 what to the Eight Week Club in America and enlisting 
 students in evangelistic work and social service for their 
 home communities is an integral part of the student 
 work in China. Harriet M. Smith, Sept., IQIQ. 
 
Extracts from Miss Lowry’s May, IQIQ> Report 
 
 Every profession and country has its peculiar termi- 
 nology. The newcomer in China at first thinks that the 
 majority of words used apply to the mission field and 
 its peculiar problems. One word especially is heard 
 everywhere, — contacts. We are told from the very be- 
 ginning not to let one opportunity for making a contact 
 slip by. Indeed, we may even get too exaggerated idea 
 of the importance of this term. Later when it comes to 
 mean some kind of a link between ourselves, the work 
 we are doing and some other person, we realize that its 
 importance has not been over emphasized. It does in 
 fact count one of the most important functions of our 
 work in China. After all we can only accomplish re- 
 sults as we touch and influence the lives of the individ- 
 uals we meet. A wide awake, keen missionary lets few 
 chances for gaining entrance into the homes and lives 
 of his acquaintance escape him. English classes in non- 
 mission schools or with a small group of friends, coach- 
 ing a football team, teaching tennis, giving gym lessons, 
 all with an eye to future Bible classes and friendships 
 with the students, are some of the more common meth- 
 ods of getting contacts. Here in Hangchow we have a 
 unique club which makes possible the contacts in an 
 interesting and valuable way. 
 
 The Good Fellowship Club has been the result of a 
 progressive young doctor to give the Chinese especially 
 the Christians, some healthful form of social inter- 
 course. The channels for a good clean social life among 
 the Chinese people are very limited. In the past, be- 
 coming a Christian has often meant cutting oneself off 
 from friends and relatives. The feast days, the festivals, 
 harmless in themselves were tabooed. As for joint meet- 
 ings of men and women, — well, such a thing was never 
 heard of in decent society. The universal wall that di- 
 vides men and women is stronger and more impassable 
 than any structure made of stone and wood could pos- 
 
 33 
 
sibly be. The plan of this young doctor to establish a 
 club where the men could come to enjoy a good time 
 with each other as well as bringing their wives with 
 them was discouraged. The men sniffed at the idea of 
 their wives going out of an evening, let alone accom- 
 panying their husbands. The wives shrank back and 
 muttered something to the effect that it was never done. < 
 However there were a few people willing to act as 
 pioneers in the cause of social intercourse. 
 
 The early meetings of the club were not always pleas- 
 ant. Outsiders laughed and considered the whole idea 
 a huge joke. Sitting around at home in the evening! 
 What could one do? The members kept on meeting 
 first at this home and then at that. The strangeness was 
 passing away. The men no longer felt that it was queer 
 when they started out on Tuesday night with their wives 
 for some friend’s home. The women began to enjoy 
 the outing and after a while to take part in the discus- 
 sions. The men were surprised to find out how well 
 their “stay-at-home” wives could express themselves. 
 
 It became the fashion for the members to indulge 
 in friendly chaffing and to occasionally play jokes on 
 one another. The membership grew. The fame of these 
 meetings spread until many of the erstwhile scoffers 
 were begging to be admitted. At first the discussions 
 were conducted in English but in a short time it was 
 decided to have them in Chinese so that more of the 
 women would understand and take part. This year the 
 club has become so big that it has been divided into 
 two groups. These sections meet separately three Tues- 
 day night out of the month. The fourth week there is a 
 joint meeting with a special program. The first meet- i 
 ing after the division each section had twenty-five pres- 
 ent. This number has continued to come weekly. 
 From the original idea of a mutual good time the pur- 
 pose of the club has grown until now the members feel 
 that it should aid in reaching the non-Christians they 
 
 34 
 
know and vitalizing the religion of their Christian 
 friends. To this end the discussion each time is on sub- 
 jects which interest and help the members and their 
 friends. 
 
 The personnel of a meeting is most interesting. Here 
 on this side is a doctor just back from study in Japan 
 and showing Japanese influence in his clothes and 
 thoughts. This keen-eyed man in the awagger Chinese 
 clothes is an official. Yonder in the corner is a Buddhist 
 scholar of the old type. In front is an attractive man 
 interested in Christianity, but unwilling to definitely 
 commit himself, as such a step would mean the loss of 
 a fortune. By the door is one of the pastors, a graduate 
 from one of the famous American theology schools. 
 On this side is a returned student from Germany. There 
 is a Harvard man and other graduates of American 
 colleges. Students, merchants, railroad officials and 
 others compose the men’s side of the room. The women 
 are of various types. All are still a bit shy of talking 
 out in the discussions, but at other times they show signs 
 of that leadership that in a few years will surprise the 
 world. They are for the most part well poised, clear 
 thinking individuals who will have a great influence 
 not only upon China, but upon other countries as well. 
 They discuss the group meeting in their various 
 churches, the lack of amusements for the Chinese 
 women, committee meetings for social service work, 
 subscription lists for the orphanage, cake making, types 
 of stoves, baby diets, the latest engagement especially 
 exciting because the lady in question is supposed to sub- 
 scribe for a newspaper, for HERSELF. So the chat- 
 ting goes on much the same subjects that one would find 
 at home. 
 
 The discussion of the evening is to be on the differ- 
 ences between Buddhism and Christianity. Every 
 point made the old Buddhist scholar contests. When 
 the discussion seems to have reached a dead lock the 
 
 35 
 
theologically trained students make a few remarks that 
 seem to settle the matter. Finally the old scholar speaks 
 — “There is really no difference between the two re- 
 ligions. Christianity, however, seems to make a man 
 lead a better life and to more completely change him. 
 Otherwise there is REALLY no difference.” In vain 
 the various people try to make him see that he has ad- 
 mitted the point but he shakes his head and repeats 
 “No difference.” 
 
 The social side of the program is hailed with great 
 delight. Have you ever felt a condescending pity for 
 those benighted individuals who play Buzz, Bright 
 Idea and kindred games? I have, but now I have be- 
 come their staunch patron. The first time a Chinese 
 gentleman who is willing to admit his importance plays 
 one of these games, his psychological processes, as 
 shown in his usually immobile face, are laughable. 
 When the first person who says seven or some other 
 forbidden number instead of Buzz, and as penalty has 
 to sit on the floor, this proper gentleman is shocked. 
 Indeed in his contemplation of such a breach of etiquette 
 he loses count and forgets to say “Buzz.” Someone 
 tells him to sit on the floor. In a dazed manner he rises, 
 starts to sit but half way down recollects that no Chi- 
 nese gentleman should behave in such a fashion. He 
 starts to rise. Some one again says, “You had better sit 
 down.” This time the Sien Sen sits. Soon his hat is on 
 one side, his silken shirts are in disorder and he is play- 
 ing as the rest. The next week he plays with greater 
 zest and soon is thinking up other games. A concession 
 is made for the women. They don’t have to sit on the 
 floor but on benches. Otherwise, they and the men 
 share equally. 
 
 The hostess and — yes — really her husband are pass- 
 ing around the refreshments. You sample delicious 
 fudge, pieces of lovely cake, hot butterd biscuits and 
 Chinese sweets. When you remark on the splendid re- 
 
freshments, the host proudly says, “My wife really does 
 cook foreign things well. A few months ago she had 
 never made a foreign thing.” You in America don’t 
 realize what such a statement as this means, but we here 
 in China appreciate its significance, and dream rosy 
 dreams of the future. Easter musicc, Christmas plays, 
 trips to the hills with a picnic, a free fine friendship, 
 good time of men and their wives and friends are only 
 a few things that have and are the outcome of the con- 
 tacts made in this club. Christians regardless of their 
 particular churches, non-christians as well as the for- 
 eign missionaries are finding this Fellowship Club a 
 veritable oasis. May similar clubs with their oppor- 
 tunities for contacts spring up throughout China! 
 
 37 
 
CHINA 
 
 One-fourth of the women of the world are Chinese, 200,000,000 
 women — 93 women doctors. 70 babies in every 100 die. 
 
 There are 7 times as many physicians in New York City as there 
 are medical missionaries in all the non-Christian world. 
 
 300.000 people in Canton make their homes on small boats. 
 
 150.000 women work in factories. 
 
 Maximum wage for women 40c per day 
 
 Maximum wage for girls 15c per day 
 
 The Y. W. C. A. in China 
 Asso- 
 
 Fields ciations Members Secretaries 
 
 China has... 5 81 3889 44 American, 17 Chinese 
 
 U. S. A. has. 11 1309 373599 2042 
 
 In China — less than one secretary to one Association. 
 
 In U. S. A. — almost two secretaries to one Association. 
 
 The Chinese Woman’s Triangle. 
 
 She wants. 
 
 She has. 
 
 38 
 
REFERENCE BIBLIOGRAPHY ON CHINA 
 
 New Life Currents in China Mary Ninde Gamewell 
 
 Missionary Education Movement in 1919. 
 
 A book written to emphasize the fact that the present task of the 
 missionary is to develope a Chinese church which will assume the 
 burden of evangelizing the land. 
 
 The Changing Chinese Edward Alsworth Ross 
 
 The Century Company, 1911. 
 
 Impressions of modern China showing the conflict of Oriental and 
 Occidental civilizations. 
 
 The Development of China Latourette 
 
 Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1917. 
 
 A book giving the essential facts of Chinese history as a background 
 for the study of present day problems in China. 
 
 The Gateway to China Mary Ninde Gametuell 
 
 Fleming Revell Company, N. Y., 1916. 
 
 A delightful picture of Shanghai which portrays the fascination of 
 this Oriental City. 
 
 Ancient Peoples at New Tasks Willard Price 
 
 Missionary Education Movement. 
 
 Chapter III tells of economic conditions in China and of the exten- 
 sive Industrial Mission Movement which is taking its place as a 
 part of the Gospel. 
 
 China — An Interpretation Bishop Bashford X 
 
 Methodist Book Concern. 
 
 A first hand study of Chinese history and an interpretation of the 
 principles underlying the ancient Chinese civilization, and of the 
 effect of Western ideas and ideals. 
 
 The Uplift of China Arthur H. Smith 
 
 Methodist Book Concern. 
 
 A condensed but comprehensive account of mission work. 
 
 Chinese Characteristics Arthur Smith 
 
 Some critics call this the book on the Chinese that is before the public. 
 
 39 
 
INDIA TODAY 
 By Fred B. Fisher 
 
 The swift-moving currents of modern life are no- 
 where deeper or more portentous than in the Indian 
 Empire. It matters not by what name you call it — rena- 
 issance, reformation, revolution, reconstruction — there 
 is a potent movement at work in India today. The war 
 has helped to precipitate a molding of the national 
 mind. This must be the inevitable outcome of a crisis 
 which has suddenly thrown together in brotherly rela- 
 tionships such divergent groups as Hindu, Moslem, 
 Buddhist, Sikh, Christian, Anglo-Indian and Colonist. 
 
 The evidences of a great social awakening are legion, 
 but none more far-reaching than the demand for the 
 advancement and education of women. Ancient Hin- 
 duism regarded womanhood with bitter contempt and 
 suspicion. The sacred books declared that “to educate 
 a woman would be like feeding a serpent milk; she 
 would but turn her education into poison.” Over 
 against this ancient superstition regarding woman, and 
 in contrast to the haughty tyranny of orthodox Hindu- 
 ism, reform conferences by the score are adopting 
 sweeping resolutions. 
 
 In a great congress of Hindus, held in the Punjab, 
 three out of four major resolutions referred to the con- 
 dition of women: (a) Prohibition of early marriage; 
 (b) Education of women; (c) Relief of widows and 
 orphans. In another great conference held in Bombay, 
 the following declaration was made: “We are strongly 
 of the opinion that every effort should be made to pro- 
 mote and expand the education of women — elementary, 
 secondary and higher.” 
 
 The root of all social progress in any country lies in 
 the condition of womanhood. Miss Eleanor McDou- 
 gall has issued a trenchant challenge: “India needs, as 
 never before, a supply of native women trained to habits 
 
 40 
 
of independent thought and serious study. The college 
 women of India, whose influence will be out of all pro- 
 portion to their numbers, must be trained by Chris- 
 tians” This is a call to Occidental Christian woman- 
 hood to provide much of the leadership necessary at 
 this hour to lift the womanhood of India into a place 
 of commanding influence in the nation and in the home 
 
 Fred B. Fish er. 
 
REPORT 
 
 Martha C. W healdon, Poona, India, July, IQIQ 
 
 India has always been characterized as the land of 
 unrest. More than ever is this true just now. After two 
 years’ absence from the country, one feels the difference 
 in spirit and seeks to trace the changes and determine 
 their cause. 
 
 We must recognize that the same burdens that the 
 world has been under have come in full force to India. 
 Here has not been the Vision of Hope or the consola- 
 tion of Faith to make strong the heart or to shield from 
 the terror of despair. 
 
 You have read and heard of the part that India, as a 
 loyal member of the British Empire, has taken at the 
 front. Only time will tell that story as is true of all na- 
 tions whose subjects gave of life at the front in service. 
 Though it was a very small fraction of India’s men who 
 left India, yet the military life which has here touched 
 the life of the millions in various ways, has brought a 
 new interpretation to the meaning of patriotism and 
 has stirred a National consciousness which has never 
 been articulate before. Sir Sinha, an Indian of learn- 
 ing, has been given a seat in Parliament overseas. This 
 is the first Indian to receive this privilege. There is a 
 movement for “woman suffrage” though but few wom- 
 en know what this means or have any desire for a voice 
 in government. One hears much of “Home Rule.” 
 
 Influenza probably took a heavier toll in India than 
 in any other land. There were six million deaths. 
 More than ever occurred in any one year from cholera 
 or plague combined! Whole villages were wiped out 
 with no one to come to their relief. 
 
 Over a wide section the rains failed last year and 
 the famine has caused much suffering and death. The 
 Government has come to the relief of those who were 
 without food by providing work to earn their food, yet 
 
 42 
 
so many were reduced by influenza and starvation that 
 they had not strength to work and relief came too late. 
 Cattle have fallen by the thousands. When the family 
 milk supply and the means of livelihood depended up- 
 on the one bullock and there was not food to keep it 
 alive, the whole family was in despair. Often the owner 
 waited until too late to take the animals to relief sta- 
 tions. The Agricultural Department has demonstrat- 
 ed the value of the cactus for fodder. True to the re- 
 ticence of the Indian to do other than his anccestors, he 
 pleads with the expert who prepares the cacti to save 
 his precious bullock, “O, Sahib, give but two spears of 
 grass, I pray you, but not that to my beloved.” In spite 
 of his anxiety the animal soon grows fat. Cacti is one of 
 the plentiful products of India and is chiefly cultivated 
 along the railroad track as a fence, — a hidden blessing 
 for just this time of need. 
 
 The life-giving rain has come at last. There has been 
 great anxiety over the delay. Of the eight propicious 
 signs usually trusted, six failed. God has heard the 
 prayer for His Mercy and this week we have had 
 enough to promise that the seed will spring up. The 
 “latter rains” are expected in August and very much 
 depends upon them just as in the days of Moses. 
 
 Through your representatives in India for the past 
 years, you have heard much of Bombay and have been 
 asked to think and pray for the work there in particu- 
 lar. Now, if you have not heard it already, I have a 
 surprise for you. It comes in the form of a challenge 
 here to us and we have found that you do not fail us 
 under those circumstances ever. Miss Withers has just 
 i begun her new work as Indian N ational T raveling Sec- 
 retary as evangelistic worker. You will be glad of this 
 and as she will have all India for her parish, you see 
 the challenge for your larger faith. 
 
 The term “Field Work” needs no explanation — you 
 know this plan of organization well. It is scarcely start- 
 
 43 
 
ed in India. There are to be nine districts or fields. In 
 the absence of workers or field secretaries, the two 
 fields now organized are being carried on by volunteer 
 workers and the help the local secretary can give. 
 
 The field I want you to know and feel you have a 
 part in is called the “Western India District.” It is to 
 belong to you by adoption and you may think of me as 
 the connecting link. As “National Field Secretary,” 
 my place of residence is Poona, a city of about 200,000 
 population, four hours south of Bombay. Look on your 
 map for Karachi, a city on the Arabian sea coast in the 
 very northwestern part of India. This is the N. W. 
 limit of the district. Belgaum, south of Bombay 16 
 hours by rail, is the southern limit. Later, when I visit 
 the ten Associations now organized in the district, it 
 will be a pleasure to take you on tour. Before this tour 
 can take place, we plan to hold a conference in the 
 most central place we can find. The representatives of 
 each Association will spend at least three days together 
 and we hope that so much inspiration will be given that 
 the most isolated and alone Association will find new 
 purpose and joy in service for the Master. You will 
 pray for us. The dates are now set for November 20-25. 
 
 Poona is my parish just at hand, so I must tell you 
 about it. It is one of the political centers of India. 
 There are cantonments and 40,000 men have been sta- 
 tioned here at various times during the past four years. 
 This is the seat of government during the rains — June 
 to September. By this we mean that the Governor, his 
 household and staff, with many of high rank of the 
 Capitol, Bombay, are here in residence. Presidency is 
 a political division which corresponds with a State at 
 home. This is “Bombay Presidency.” The new Gov- 
 ernor is Lord Lloyd, and it is with joyful anticipation 
 that we find Lady Lloyd is a woman who is definitely 
 interested in Christian work. She has said she will be 
 president of the Bombay Y. W. C. A. 
 
Poona Association is one of the oldest in India. It 
 has now a membership of 40, and I am sorry to say that 
 there are but four girls on the list. The average age of 
 the membership is 45 and they have not been able to 
 make the girls welcome. The past weeks have been 
 spent in finding girls. 
 
 There is a little brick building, the property of the 
 Association, used for all purposes. It has one room, 
 15x50. Its walls are pale blue, the eight windows are 
 large and the woodwork is painted black. The floor is 
 uneven and covered with hemp carpet. The front half 
 of the room is almost blocked with willow chairs filled 
 with huge cushions. The walls are lined with huge 
 bookcases filled with old discarded books, most of them 
 are presented, by well-intentioned, retiring ministers 
 from their theological libraries. There are many vol- 
 umes of bound magazines, “The Sunday at Home” 
 chiefly. The building is located on the main street, 
 has no grounds, and though it can serve as a center, it 
 badly needs some attractive features. 
 
 Last December a missionary who has been for years 
 in Poona associated with the Scotch Church Mission, 
 visited one of our holiday rest homes. While there, she 
 died. When her will was examined, she had left her 
 home in Poona to the Y. W. C. A. to be used as a home 
 for girls. The papers are not yet complete, but soon 
 this house will come into our possession. It will ac- 
 commodate 10 persons. The house is in fairly good con- 
 dition, will need all furniture and comforts. It is lo- 
 cated very nicely for a restful home, but is so far out of 
 the city that it is not practical as a social center, which 
 is most needed now. 
 
 For the past fourteen years Bombay has been the 
 residence of the national secretaries and the national 
 headquarters. Two months ago, it was decided that it 
 was best to move to Calcutta. As India has no National 
 buildings, this is not serious. The impartiality of such 
 
 45 
 
a body should insure their help to all local Associa- 
 tions alike, but personally I feel that a prop has been 
 removed. It is as though your Field Office has been 
 taken to a city four days away by post, when you had 
 always had it in the same street. There are reasons to 
 expect it to be for the best good and increased strength 
 in Calcutta. 
 
THE WOMAN OF MODERN INDIA 
 
 In order to understand the woman of Modern India 
 and the problems attendant upon the formation of what 
 may rightly be called a “Woman’s Movement,” it is 
 necessary to look first at the background of custom and 
 tradition from which she is emerging. And may we 
 try to remember that in the essential and fundamental 
 things of the mind and spirit there are few differences 
 between her and us? Read some of the poems of Sir 
 Rabindranath Tagore or Mrs. Naidu to see how the 
 spirit of play and love of games is the same in the little 
 children, how home is honored as the source of influ- 
 ences that can mould the characters of those within it, 
 how the ideal of devotion and sacrificial love pertains 
 to all relationships between friend and friend, parents 
 and children, husband and wife. Or re-read that beau- 
 tiful hymn written by an Indian Christian woman, “In 
 the Secret of His Presence How My Soul Delights to 
 Hide” and ask yourself if we must not have much in 
 common with one who can voice so perfectly our soul’s 
 yearnings. Any difference we shall find are external 
 and due to circumstances, not to any inherent differ- 
 ence in the men, women, and children as human beings. 
 
 To what causes can we trace the repression and op- 
 pression from which the Indian woman is only just 
 consider the country itself. India, a vast continent 
 beginning to receive her emancipation? First, we must 
 rather than a country, for many centuries divided by 
 one hundred and forty-seven distinct languages, by two 
 thousand three hundred and seventy-eight separate 
 castes, by several religions existing side by side, in con- 
 stant conflict and mutual hatred and distrust, by great 
 spacial distances and by great extremes of climate. A 
 heterogenous population of more than three hundred 
 millions of people can hardly achieve unity under such 
 conditions and without unity any appreciable progress 
 is impossible. The women have suffered most, for caste 
 
 47 
 
regulations and social practices have drawn about them 
 more and more tightly the shackles of illiteracy and 
 superstition, of confinement to the home and almost 
 unalleviated slavery to its domestic demands. The Law 
 of Manu says, “Day and night must women be kept in 
 dependence by the male members of the family; they 
 are never fit for independence.” Caste originated in 
 “race feeling,” and was an effort on the part of the in- 
 vading Aryan at self-protection against the dark- 
 skinned aboriginal; and the “Pardah” system of com- 
 plete seclusion for women can be traced to a desire to 
 protect them; but both customs rest on false premises 
 and the results have been tragic. 
 
 We find in Hinduism, the prevailing religion of the 
 country, a scond cause. It has been truly said that 
 Hinduism has done worse for its women than any other 
 religion in the world. One would not wish to be un- 
 fair or uncharitable, but the universal test must always 
 be, “By their fruits shall ye know them.” The fruits 
 of early marriage for girls, of an iniquitous dowry sys- 
 tem, of enforced widowhood, of Temple girls (i. e. girls 
 being“dedicated”to the temples and Gods, which means 
 in reality a life of prostitution carried on in the name 
 of religion), of seclusion and illiteracy and consequent 
 superstition seem to be directly traceable to Hinduism. 
 Today only one per cent, of the women in India is liter- 
 ate, and the last census (1911) revealed that there were 
 1,014 widows under one year of age, 17,700 under five 
 years, and 335,000 under fifteen years. A widow is 
 doomed to a life of austerity and drudgery because of 
 the supposed sin for which widowhood is only a just 
 punishment. Is it any wonder that in olden days, be- 
 fore it was forbidden by the British Government, the 
 practice of “Sati,” of burning oneself on the husband’s 
 funeral pyre, was welcomed as a way of blessed relief? 
 
 Such is life in Old India — a glimpse into conditions 
 as they have prevailed. We may fairly ask what con- 
 
ditions prevail today. Is India standing still, while all 
 the world around her seethes with unrest and works 
 its way through to new achievements of progress and 
 democracy? Far from it. A new spirit of Nationalism 
 is abroad ; on every side one hears the cry “Home Rule.” 
 There is a party of agitators who have not learned the 
 price that must be paid for independence, and to com- 
 ply with their demands for immediate Home Rule 
 would be suicidal. The more serious, thinking leaders, 
 both Indian and British, realize that a people still 
 ninety per cent, illiterate, still torn asunder by the di- 
 visions of caste and conflicting religions, is not ready 
 for home rule. A long road of preparation and patient 
 adjustment stretches ahead. New ideals of unselfishness 
 and justice and brotherhood must be attained, and new 
 lessons of humble, sacrificial service must be learned. 
 So we find in Madras, for example, a Social Service 
 League, composed of men and women, Indians and 
 non-Indians, Christians and non-Christians, banded to- 
 gether to study and relieve the needs of their city. In 
 the words of one of their leaders, “It is necessary to 
 get rid of five existing devils, all beginning with ‘D,’ 
 debt, disease, darknss, drink and dirt.” A comprehen- 
 sive program! and one which cuts directly across the 
 old regulations of caste, whereby man was not his broth- 
 er’s keeper. Nor does such a program leave room for 
 religious indifference, for the evils mentioned are no 
 respector of class, or creed. 
 
 The part that women must play in this new awak- 
 ening and in the striving toward an equal chance for 
 every individual and a better life for the Nation, is un- 
 mistakable. A leading Hindu man writes, “Mere talk 
 of Nationalism does not produce a Nation. It should 
 be obvious to every man in India that the future of the 
 country depends upon its motherhood.” In contrast to 
 the life of the average Indian woman under the old 
 regime I should like to introduce you to a few scenes 
 
 49 
 
which are typical of the new day. In one of the great 
 residence cities we find 22,000 women employed in fac- 
 tories; in a Ladies’ Recreation Club there are women 
 and girls meeting each other easily and gladly, in spite 
 of difference in caste and creed, playing tennis and 
 badminton, and also learning to serve, as they study * 
 
 first aid and home nursing, and sew and knit for a few * 
 
 of the 1,400,000 Indian men who went to the front! In 
 commercial classes we find Indian and Anglo-Indian 
 young women learning to be typists, stenographers and 
 bookkeepers; in hospitals we find them training as 
 nurses, and in many different kinds of schools they are 
 fitting themselves to become teachers, doctors and even 
 lawyers ; we see one young woman doctor giving all her 
 time to district visiting and the work of a thoroughly 
 up-to-date “Baby Saving Scheme” in connection with 
 the Government Maternity Hospital; in a Woman’s 
 College we find a debating society, a dramatic club, a 
 musical association, and organized athletics exactly as 
 we should expect to find them in any college in this 
 land; we can subscribe to an “Indian Ladies’ Maga- 
 zine” printed in English and managed and edited by 
 Indian Women; at a convocation of one large Univer- 
 sity we see twenty-two women in caps and gowns re- 
 ceiving their degrees with all the dignity and all the 
 high hopes of any young graduates; and among the 
 married women (and the majority of India’s women 
 still consider marriage and home making the great ob- 
 ject of life) we find an ever-increasing per cent, who are 
 able to be intelligent wives and mothers, real compan- 
 ions to all the members of their housholds, and dispen- 
 sors to the less fortunate ones around them of the light ( 
 and freedom which they have received. 
 
 Can you not feel that the ideals and ambitions and 
 capacities of the women of India are all like our own? 
 
 The problems which must accompany this period of 
 transition, when a new era is being inaugurated and the 
 
 50 
 
women are stepping forth into new liberties, are prob- 
 lems which we can help them solve. As yet they have 
 not been able to develop an adequate number of native 
 leaders, and we are needed as doctors and nurses and 
 teachers and Young Women’s Christian Association 
 Secretaries to guide them in their new path and to help 
 train leaders. Their groping days will soon be over and 
 we can help them now to establish a Christian standard 
 of leadership. The Indian women have a gentleness 
 and a power for devotion and a capacity for faithful un- 
 selfish service which it is our privilege to help capture 
 for the Kingdom of God. May I tell you in the words 
 of one of their own women, Miss Elizabeth Zachariah, 
 now student secretary of the Y. W. C. A. in Madras, 
 what they want from us? 
 
 1. “To help us work up the feeling of National- 
 ism along right lines, encouraging it and rousing at 
 the same time an International consciousness, that 
 we may not develop along selfish and self-centered 
 lines but may feel ourselves part of a whole, a 
 whole that could not be complete without us, as we 
 could not develop into the fullest life without the 
 whole. 
 
 2. “To remember that we are in a land with a 
 glorious past, of rich and rare traditions, and that 
 the great seeking after Truth and God that has 
 been going on forever, however wrong and misdi- 
 rected and blind and narrow, is based on sound 
 principles, and on these principles we must build a 
 new structure on Christian lines, firmer and 
 Broader. 
 
 3. “It is not a matter of organization or institu- 
 tions or heavy machinery, but of personal rela- 
 tionships. Give us unreservedly of your love and 
 you will have ours. You set us the standard, then, 
 
 51 
 
let us see the ideal in you, the love of God in Christ, 
 the love and friendship of Christ in man. Per- 
 sonal relationship is the one bond that links up the 
 whole world when all else fails, we feel we want 
 you, not for what you bring us, but for yourselves.” 
 
 Margaret Melcher, Sept., IQIQ^ 
 
QUOTATIONS ABOUT INDIA 
 
 The Source of Caste 
 
 “The religion rigidly prescribes for the Brahman 
 those who may sit with him, and no woman, even his 
 own wife nor any member of any other caste may enter 
 that charmed circle.” 
 
 Stoicism 
 
 “Nature with her sudden desolating visitation of pes- 
 tilence and famine sweeping away helpless myriads in a 
 few months, has certainly helped to breed in the Indian 
 that calm dignity of patience which to the end of the 
 chapter will be the wonder and admiration of all who 
 know.” 
 
 Inferior Females 
 
 “One of the monster evils that disfigures India is the 
 degradation of women. Spiritually, she belongs to a 
 lower order of beings. It is because of a sin in a former 
 life that she has been born a woman.” 
 
 Slums 
 
 “There is not much difference between the slums of 
 Birmingham, England, and the slums of Calcutta.” 
 
 Behind the Purdah 
 
 “The great majority of women converts have con- 
 fessed Christ as the result of evangelistic and educa- 
 tional work within the zenanas” (harem). 
 
 A Common Task 
 
 “No longer can the two motives of Business Man and 
 Missionary be considered exclusive of, or opposed to 
 each other. Theirs is a common task — to develop the 
 latent resources — physical, intellectual and moral — of 
 backward people, without robbing them of anything 
 or any quality essential to the preservation of their in- 
 dependent national life.” 
 
 53 
 
Indian and Indian 
 
 “The word Indian is too loose a term to apply to the 
 women of India. For example, the Parsee woman, al- 
 though she represents an infinitesimal fraction of In- 
 dian sisterhood has long held a position quite equal to 
 that of the Filipino woman. Five hundred women at- 
 tended the meeting of the Hindu National Congress 
 in Lucknow in 1917. Two hundred led the singing, 
 Mrs. Naidau, wife of the Court Physician to His High- 
 ness the Nazam of Hyderadad, a poetess of note, 
 moved the resolution asking the British Government to 
 rescind its laws forbidding Indians to carry firearms. 
 India a land of purdah and mystery, and yet — ” 
 
 J ustice for the Country’s Sake 
 
 “We are, and always shall be, called a backward race 
 till we properly appreciate the right of Indian woman- 
 hood. Till we admit them to their proper position, we 
 deny them the simple rights of human beings and how 
 and when are we going to realize that they are veritable 
 goddesses on earth? It is no use our bragging about our 
 progress while the Indian woman has even a single com- 
 plaint against us to make before God! Brother readers, 
 my dear co-religionists, if you ever wish to take your 
 proper place in the committee of nations, stop all the 
 shameful injustice you are dealing out to your noble sis- 
 ters. For God’s sake, bestow thought upon the condi- 
 tion of the Hindu widows! Your indulging in political 
 homilies, your assuming airs in the national press, your 
 passing before the world as wronged innocents, all will 
 be of no avail. There is justice in God’s Kingdom! And 
 ye shall get it if ye deserve. His Kingdom endureth 
 forever for those that deserve it. May you try your best 
 to deserve even a particle of it.’’ — S. S. Rhat, a Hindu 
 Social Reformer. 
 
 54 
 
By-Products of Mission W ork 
 
 “The indirect influence of the missionary on social 
 evils is nowhere more marked than in India. There are 
 today no less than a dozen active agencies for social re- 
 form which, while not Christian — some of them being 
 even violently anti-Christian— can be traced directly to 
 the influence of the missionaries.” 
 
 “The editor of the Indian Social Reformer, K. Na- 
 tarajan said: ‘The fear of the missionary has been the 
 beginning of much social wisdom in India. The mis- 
 sions have interpreted the spiritual side of Western 
 civilization to us, whereas without their presence we 
 would only have seen its material expressions.’ ” 
 
 “The most striking political development is shown in 
 increasing participation of Moslems in the nationalis- 
 tic movement. The significance of this new spirit 
 among their women was a manifesto signed by an edu- 
 cated and enlightened woman at a Woman’s Confer- 
 ence in Lahore in 1918 protesting against the evils and 
 hardships of polygamous marriages.” 
 
 “In recent years many hopeful attempts have been 
 made to modify the prospects of widows in India, many 
 of them starting from within Hinduism. These take 
 the form of Hostels for Brahman widows, established 
 in increasing numbers throughout the country, where 
 a good normal teachers’ training is given.” 
 
 Economic Parasites 
 
 India has 5,200,000 Sadhus, who are wandering 
 priests. They never work, but live upon the gifts (many 
 of them from women), they beg from the superstitious 
 people of the poorest classes. If a dollar a month sup- 
 ports a man in India, we can see that these drones are 
 sapping India of more than $60,000,000 a year and 
 making no contribution to the economic condition of 
 India. It would be good for India to lose her supersti- 
 tions! 
 
Signs of the Times 
 
 Travancore has thrown open 146 girls’ schools to all 
 classes. The Seva Sedan Society of Bombay reports the 
 free education of fifty widows, medical relief of 1,500 
 women and children, the training of 60 Marathi prim- 
 ary school teachers, the holding of literary classes for 
 women, provision for 150 maternity cases. 
 
 Another indication of improvement is that, accord- 
 ing to one report, “More women comb their hair and 
 nearly all change their clothes once a week. Three 
 years ago, perhaps a dozen out of two hundred combed 
 their hair. The other day at a Church Service more 
 than eighty out of one hundred and forty-five had their 
 hair combed.” 
 
 There is an ancient proverb, “There be many sects 
 in India but upon two main points they be all agreed, 
 the sacredness of the cow and the depravity of women.” 
 
 Wrongs against Womanhood (social) 
 
 1st. Marriage in infancy to a man arbitrarily 
 chosen. 
 
 2nd. Child widowhood. 
 
 3rd. Married life beginning at 10 to 12 years. 
 
 4th. Physical injuries of premature motherhood. 
 25% die; 25% are invalid because they are 
 mothers too early. 
 
 5th. Absolute ignorance. 
 
 6th. Enforced and unnatural seclusion. 
 
 7th. Polygamy and possible infanticide. 
 
 In Industry 
 
 Report of Indian Factory Labor Commission — shows 
 that 30% to 40% of children employed half time in jute 
 factories are under the legal age of nine; that 25% of 
 the young on full time are under fourteen that in seven- 
 teen of the twenty-nine cotton factories outside of Bom- 
 bay all its children are worked as adults. 
 
 54 
 
Association Inklings, India (south) ( Myra Withers, 
 
 June IQIQ ) 
 
 One of our Indian girls, Margaret, has come out most 
 beautifully in her examinations and wants six years at 
 Delhi Medical College. She is 20 and can enter in 
 | August. She is a born helper, and already has a fol- 
 lowing of high caste girls and she has won girls in the 
 non-Christian school; Margaret was changed into a 
 real Christian at our school girl camp three years ago. 
 It will cost about $50 a year, beyond the scholarship she 
 has, to make a doctor of her. 
 
 One great overweight of joy came late in April when 
 a Parsee, Mr. Karaka, began to inquire why the Chris- 
 tian Association did so much for Parsee teachers, etc., 
 and after several talks in his office and mine, he asked 
 me to help him present this kind of Christianity to his 
 Parsee community. We sent out personal invitations 
 and used his opera house — 400 came. Our school girls 
 sang gospel hymns and a beautiful presentation of our 
 gospel was given by an Anglo-Indian, Mr. E. W. 
 Fritchley. God’s power was certainly there and all 
 went away asking for more. Two weeks later 1000 
 people came, all non-Christians, and the lectures are 
 going on. 
 
 Travellers’ Aid Chairman visited ships in harbor and 
 assisted nurses there and in town 
 
 During February and March we held a series of 
 Bible Lectures, given by ministers and missionaries in 
 Madras, Miss Madge followed these with two Bible 
 classes. 
 
 | Our Sunday night song services have been unusually 
 well attended, reaching 180. 
 
 March 25 — The cornerstone was laid, in the new 
 home for business girls in Madras. 
 
 February 24 — March 6 — Secretarial Conference was 
 held in Bombay. It was recommended to the Indian 
 
 57 
 
National Committee that a Training School for secre- 
 taries be established in India, that physical education 
 be developed and such a Training School be established. 
 It was determined to call more and more upon the na- 
 tive resources for woman-leadership. So much vision 
 for the future and so few in sight to do the work. 
 
 Martha Downey. 
 Better Health 
 
 Graduates’ Union (Calcutta) has translated into the 
 vernacular and published pamphlets on Typhoid 
 Tuberculosis, etc. It has collected material for a hand- 
 book on Social Service for Indian Women, and is start- 
 ing the first Baby Clinics in Calcutta. 
 
 Excelsior ! 
 
 Teachers’ Guilds in Calcutta and Bombay aim at 
 raising professional ideals. Courses of lectures are 
 given and in Calcutta a course in practical work had 
 127 teachers enrolled. 
 
 58 
 
INDIA 
 
 350.000. 000 
 
 329.000. 000 
 
 100 . 000 . 000 
 
 50.000. 000 
 
 40.000. 000 
 
 26.000. 000 
 
 Inhabitants 
 
 Illiterates 
 
 Hunger stricken 
 Outcasts 
 Secluded women 
 Widows 
 
 India has the highest death rate in the world. 32 in ever}' 1,000 
 die each year. 
 
 56% of the infants in central provinces die before they are 1 
 year old. 
 
 Average weekly wage for women — 35 cents. 
 
 One woman in every 16 is a prostitute. 
 
 22 Hindu women mobilized for service. 
 
 India gave $500,000,000. 
 
 In the Great War. 
 
 The Y. W. C. A. in India. 
 
 131 Associations for 150,000,000 women. 
 
 845 Members. 
 
 167 Bible classes. 
 
 7 Camps and Conferences. 
 
 14 U. S. A. Secretaries. 
 
 28 British Secretaries. 
 
 59 
 
REFERENCE BIBLIOGRAPHY ON INDIA 
 
 India — Its Life and Thought Jones 
 
 The Macmillan Co., 1908. 
 
 For these interested in understanding better the conditions and 
 characteristics of the people of India. 
 
 Modern India Curtis 
 
 Fleming Revell Co., 1905. 
 
 A delightful, readable book giving vivid pictures of the India of 
 today. 
 
 India Awakening Sherwood Eddy 
 
 Missionary Education Movement — U. S. and Canada, 1911. 
 
 A bird’s eye view of the work of the missionaries in India — with a 
 strong plea for greater effort in behalf of the people of India. 
 
 India and the Future William Archer 
 
 Alfred Knopp, New York, 1918. 
 
 A sane, unprejudiced study of British rule in India and of the Indian 
 people and their fitness for self government. 
 
 Eyes of Asia Rudyard Kipling 
 
 Doubleday, Page & Co., 1918. 
 
 A contrast between East and West is pictured in these letters written 
 by an Indian soldier serving in France, to his family in India. 
 
 Within the Purdah S. Armstrong Hopkins 
 
 Graphic description of the life of Hindu women as seen by an Amer- 
 ican medical woman. 
 
 The New Era in Asia Sherwood Eddy 
 
 Methodist Book Concern. 
 
 A survey of the Far Eastern situation. 
 
 Religions of India M. E. A. Barth 
 
 Methodist Book Concern. 
 
 A resume of modern study of the religions of India. 
 
 The Silent Revolution Fisher and Williams 
 
 Methodist Book Concern. 
 
 The Author deals with the agricultural problem, the British policy 
 of education, the position of women in India, and the work of the 
 missionaries. 
 
 Among India’s Rajahs and Ryots Fraser 
 
 Lippincott Company. 
 
 60 
 
The author — a true friend of India — gives many chapters on the dif- 
 ferent phases of Indian life, including judgments on both political 
 
 and missionary affairs. 
 
 Wrongs of Indian Womanhood Fuller 
 
 Missionary Education Movement. 
 
 Ancient Peoples at New Tasks Willard Price 
 
 Missionary Education Movement. 
 
 Chapter 5 urges Christian missionary work in India through the 
 medium of agriculture. 
 
 61 
 
SISTERS IN JAPAN 
 
 What is your mental picture of a Japanese girl? Do 
 you think of her as typified in “Madame Butterfly” or 
 as one of the toddling chorus in the burlesque “Mi- 
 kado”? Or have you a fanciful picture of her dressed 
 in a brilliant and flowing kimona and coquetting over 
 her wide spread fan? 
 
 How I wish you could see her as we have seen her 
 for the past few months and could learn to know her 
 graciousness, her sweetness, her eagerness to know 
 about other girls and how they live. Will it surprise 
 you to know that after all they have many points in 
 common with our girls here in America, and that there 
 are quite as many kinds or types of them as there are 
 among the girls of your part of the country? 
 
 We met the charming, daintily dressed girls of the 
 wealthier class, and marvelled at their wonderful skill 
 in embroidery and flower arrangement, and in the art 
 of “bonseki” or sand tray picturing — and we knew that 
 Japanese girls loved beauty. We met also, groups of 
 school girls in their quaint student skirts, and listened to 
 their singing, and watched them in their gym. work 
 and in their play— and knew that Japanese girls liked 
 recreation. Time after time we met school girls clatter- 
 ing along on their way to visit some shrine or place of 
 interest, and as we listened to their clatter and laughter 
 we knew that Japanese girls enjoyed “hikes” and com- 
 panionship. Many times we watched young women 
 and girls as they bowed before some shrine — some in- 
 different, some most punctilious in their form of wor- 
 ship others with a real agony in their faces as they 
 tugged at the great rope before the shrine to call the 
 gods attention — and we came to know that Japanese 
 girls in many instances are seeking to find God. 
 
 And then — we saw girls by the hundreds and thou- 
 sands at work in factories, in shops and offices, in tele- 
 
 62 
 
 < 
 
 t 
 
phone exchanges and in Railway Stations — and we 
 knew that Japanese girls, like ours, were being drawn 
 from homes into new and abnormal surroundings, there 
 to earn a living, or an existence. Can you see them as 
 they come to the great cities from their little country 
 villages? Can you picture to yourself their ignorance 
 of city life and of business customs — and can you see 
 the grave danger that confront them in their ignorance? 
 All their lives they have been taught two things — to be 
 obedient, especially to men, and to believe themselves 
 greatly inferior to men. Can you see how that makes 
 them an easy prey to unscrupulous men, Japanese and 
 foreign? These girls need our world sisterhood in- 
 finitely — they need it as a friend who understands, a 
 friend who counsels wisely, a friend who shelters and 
 protects. 
 
 If our American girls need decent shelter, help in 
 securing the right employment, coaching in preparation 
 for their jobs, wholesome recreation; if they need char- 
 acter standards held up to them, and if they need to find 
 God through Jesus Christ our Lord — then, in a deeper 
 more pressing way the need of these J apanese girls calls 
 to us. If the Association can help American girls to 
 find their best selves, and can bring them to a knowl- 
 edge of Him who came that they might have an abund- 
 ant life, then in even greater measure it can do this for 
 these Japanese girls who today face danger and need. 
 They need the very best we have, and they are worthy of 
 it. What are we going to do about it? 
 
 Katherine H. Hawes, IQIQ. 
 
JAPAN TODAY 
 
 Extract from Article by Sidney Gulick, IQ IQ 
 
 Japan today is an amazing compound of the East and 
 the West. Since 1868, her leading citizens have been 
 attempting a new feat in human history — the attempt 
 to combine in a single national life the best elements of 
 the two great streams of civilization, that of the Orient 
 that has gone through a long development covering at 
 least five thousand years, with that of the Occident cov- 
 ering an equally long period. 
 
 He who would understand Japan today must ever 
 keep in mind this central factor, for it is the background 
 and vital element in every experience and every phe- 
 nomenon of that “land of many contradictions.” 
 
 OLD JAPAN, To 1868. 
 
 NEW JAPAN, Since 1868. 
 
 The turning point was the definite decision of the 
 young Emperor and his cabinet to abandon the ancient 
 policy of national seclusion which had been in opera- 
 tion for 250 years and to plunge boldly into the stream 
 of world civilization. 
 
 This decision was announced in the “Five Articled 
 Edict” summarized by Dr. Iyenaga (Constitutional 
 Development of Japan) as follows: 
 
 “1. A deliberative assembly should be formed, and 
 all measures be decided by public opinion. 
 
 “2. The principles of social and political economics 
 should be diligently studied by both the superior and 
 the inferior classes of our people. 
 
 “3. Every one in the community should be assisted 
 to persevere in carrying out his will for good purposes. 
 
 “4. All the old absurd usages of former times should 
 be disregarded, and the impartiality and justice dis- 
 
played in the workings of nature be adopted as a basis 
 of action. 
 
 “5. Wisdom and ability should be sought after in 
 all quarters of the world for the purpose of firmly estab- 
 lishing the foundations of the Empire.” 
 
 * * * *- % 
 
 The Emperor Meiji Tenno, on ascending the throne 
 in 1868, set forth in his first edict a policy of which the 
 essential elements were: 
 
 1. To abandon ancient superstitions. 
 
 2. To establish deliberative assemblies and be gov- 
 erned by public opinion. 
 
 3. To learn from all the world. 
 
 Japan’s social, industrial, educational, and religious 
 conditions and her place in the world today are the 
 result of remarkably successful efforts to put the prin- 
 ciples of that edict into operation. It has made Japan 
 a New Japan, profoundly different from old Japan. 
 
 That edict is a document of world significance for it 
 marks the vital turning point in the relations of the Far 
 East with the West, and establishes a new attitude of 
 mind between the Yellow and White races. 
 
 By that decision, so successfully carried out now for 
 more than half a century, J apan has not only placed her- 
 self among the “great powers,” but has inspired 800,- 
 000,000 Asiatics to follow in her footsteps, if not under 
 her leadership. 
 
 What this means for the future none can definitely 
 forsee. This, however, is clear. As Japan and China 
 have discovered that they cannot carry on their life in 
 haughty disregard of the nations of the West, so the 
 West should learn that it cannot carry on its life in 
 haughty disregard of the nations of the East. 
 
 Both East and West should now make haste to learn 
 mutual respect, good will, and genuine cooperation. 
 Otherwise there is danger, ominous though not imme- 
 diate, of vast world tragedy. 
 
 65 
 
CHRISTIAN MISSIONS IN NEW JAPAN 
 
 Japan’s success in appropriating so much from west- 
 ern lands is in part due to the work of Protestant Mis- 
 sions. The first Protestant Missionaries landed in 
 Japan in 1859. Christianity was still forbidden by 
 “banning” boards. Not until 1873 were these pro- 
 hibitions removed. The first Christian church was es- 
 tablished in 1872 and for ten years Christianity was 
 more or less persecuted, though not officially. 
 
 During the eighties along with all foreign things and 
 customs Christianity was in high favor. So rapidly 
 were Christians multiplying that glowing predictions 
 were made during that decade of the day not far distant 
 when Japan would be one of the Christian nations. 
 
 But international complications arose in the nineties 
 which brought on a violent anti-foreign reaction. Many 
 Japanese, moreover, both Christian and non-christian 
 began to discover how un-christian Christendom was 
 in many respects. The anti-foreign reaction became 
 also an anti-christian reaction. And for more than a 
 decade the new converts were so few that they hardly 
 made up for the many defections. 
 
 With the revision of the treaties and the straighten- 
 ing out of some of the international tangles, the blind 
 and furious anti-foreign and anti-christian reaction 
 gradually passed away. Beginning with the present 
 century there has been a slow and steady progress in 
 missionary work and in the power of the Japanese 
 church. The latest available figures (Report of Jan- 
 uary, 1918) show the facts be these: 
 
 Protestant Missionaries (including women) 1,074 
 of whom 322 were ordained. 
 
 Japanese workers 3,011 of whom 850 were or- 
 dained. 
 
 Total Church members 101,571 of whom 10,656 
 were adults baptized during the year 1917. 
 
Total number of organized churches, 1,038 of 
 which 269 were self-supporting. 
 
 Japanese contributions for evangelistic work, 
 $331,000. 
 
 Contributions from Foreign Mission Boards for 
 evangelistic work, $173,000. 
 
 Roman Catholic Christians, 75,000. 
 
 Greek Catholic Christians, 36,000. 
 
 A Japanese pastor recently summed up the contribu- 
 tion of Christian Missions to Japan in the following 
 significant statement. 
 
 “What has Christianity added to the former civiliza- 
 tion of Japan? First it has given a new idea of God. 
 Formerly the idea of deity meant to the Japanese the 
 defied forces of nature, and the spirits of heroes. Now 
 the people have assimilated the conception of God 
 taught by Christianity. Christianity has brought about 
 a higher respect for man, so that the laws recognize the 
 rights of individuals and everybody thinks of the soul 
 as immortal. The old pessimistic view of Buddhism 
 that the world is only evil and the Oriental view of 
 human life that treats it as a passing jest, have been dis- 
 placed by a hopeful and earnest moral conception of 
 the world as introduced by Christianity. Further, the 
 personality of Christ is the most valuable gift that 
 Christianity has brought to Japan ; the Bible is read by 
 high and low more than any other book and is a treas- 
 ured possession of many who are disciples of other than 
 the Christian religion; Christianity has brought to 
 Japan the conception of a pure home founded upon 
 the union of one man with one woman, whereas Con- 
 fucianism did not. Buddhism and the native Bushido 
 did not teach the sacredness of the marriage relation or 
 present monogamy as its ideal. Christianity has created 
 a new respect for woman and opened to her, modern 
 avenues of activity. Buddhist charity had long since 
 degenerated into mere ceremonies and Shinto did prac- 
 
 67 
 
tically nothing in that direction, but Christianity has 
 been the fruitful mother of many philanthropic enter- 
 prises. Japan has officially put aside its former system 
 of holidays and adopted the Christian Sabbath as a 
 day of rest though it is not satisfactorily kept as a day 
 of worship. Finally Christianity has been a spur to 
 other religions arousing them to great spiritual earnest- * 
 ness and to some degree of activity in educational and 
 charitable work.” 
 
 INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 
 
 With feverish haste Japan strove to qualify for a full 
 and equal place among the great nations of the world. 
 By the end of the eighties she felt that she had sufficient- 
 ly qualified, to secure the restoration of the treaty ports, 
 to complete national control and the abrogation of the 
 offensive and humiliating provisions regarding extra 
 territoriality and of the foreign regulation of her tariff. 
 
 The traders and governments of Europe were loath 
 to surrender their special privileges in Japan and re- 
 fused to accede to Japan’s claims. That led to violent 
 anti-foreign reactions during the last decade of the cen- 
 tury and the rising conviction that the West is primarily 
 selfish, that its spirit is aggressive, and that Japan must 
 rely on her own military and naval power to secure jus- 
 tice and fair dealing at the hands of the West. This 
 conviction led to the rapid development of her army 
 and navy. It was made more definite when at the close 
 of a brief war with China (1894-5), Germany, Russia, 
 and France intervened with an ultimatum to restore 
 Port Arthur to China. 
 
 Russian acquisition of Port Arthur, shortly after , 
 (1898), and her policies in Manchuria and Korea, led 
 to the Russo-Japanese War (1904-5). This stopped the 
 partition of China by the Western nations. That parti- 
 tion had vigorously started up (1897-8) and had pre- 
 cipitated the Boxer uprising in China (1900). 
 
 68 
 
The refusal of Canada, the United States, Australia, 
 and New Zealand to permit Japanese immigration has 
 served to irritate still further the national feeling 
 against western nations. Each of these countries has 
 passed laws regarded by Japan as invidious and hu- 
 miliating, because, as they insist, the legislation implies 
 Japanese race inferiority, which is emphatically re- 
 sented. 
 
 Japan’s success in the Russo-Japanese War was made 
 possible by the Anglo-Japanese Alliance (1902). It 
 was this Alliance that inevitably brought Japan into 
 the World-War (September, 1914), when Great Brit- 
 ain called upon her to drive Germany out of Kiao-Chou, 
 which had been taken by Germany in 1897. 
 
 After capturing it (November 1914), Japan insti- 
 tuted negotiations with China known as the “twenty-one 
 demands.” These produced in China bitterest enmity 
 toward Japan, and among the people of the West wide- 
 spread suspicion of Japan’s policies and diplomatic 
 methods. 
 
 Japan’s relations with Korea date back many cen- 
 turies. Collision with China on Korean politics led to 
 the China-Japan war (1894-5), and the declared inde- 
 pendence of Korea from Chinese allegiance. Russian 
 ambitions for the enlargement of her Siberian empire to 
 include all of Manchuria and Korea led to the Russo- 
 Japanese war (1904-5). Japan then assumed the pro- 
 tectorate of Korea, pledging autonomy. The utterly 
 corrupt Korean Government, however, proved itself 
 unable to maintain order or provide justice. It in- 
 trigued, moreover, with Russia. In the turmoil, a Kor- 
 ean assassinated Japan’s principal statesman — Prince 
 Ito. These difficulties resulted in Japan’s annexation 
 of Korea in 1910. While much that Japan has done 
 in Korea has been admirable, and Korean economic, 
 industrial and agricultural life has been improved, yet 
 
 69 
 
in many respects her methods have been harsh and 
 sometimes cruel. 
 
 Japan’s efforts by militaristic pressure to transform 
 Koreans into loyal Japanese, together with the world 
 agitation of subject peoples to secure freedom on the 
 principle of “self-determination,” led to the amazing 
 Korean "passive resistance uprising” and “Declaration 
 of Independence. Japanese efforts at repression were 
 accompanied by widespread brutalities on the part of 
 the police and gendarmes. 
 
 WOMAN’S LIFE IN NEW JAPAN 
 
 With the increasing acceptance of Occidental ideals 
 and life in modern Japan, Japanese women of the mid- 
 dle and higher classes have been experiencing progres- 
 sive emancipation, while those of the working classes 
 have been falling into the destructive maelstrom of in- 
 dustrialism. 
 
 The universal education of girls in primary schools 
 was adopted from America along with the ideal of the 
 universal education of boys. Until the beginning of the 
 twentieth century, however, few Japanese believed in 
 the higher education of women. Thanks to the energy 
 of Mission Girls’ Schools, the capacity of Japanese 
 women to profit by their higher education has been 
 proven. All Japan now is pushing forward along these 
 lines. A few women are now in the universities. A 
 number of remarkable women are already in public 
 life. 
 
 But the world sweep of Occidental industrialism has 
 brought a mighty disaster to girls and women of the in- 
 dustrial classes. Hundreds of thousands have been 
 swept into the cities and into the factories, to work long 
 hours in unhygienic conditions and in immoral sur- 
 roundings. Disease, death and licentiousness have 
 played havoc among them. 
 
 A medical authority after full investigation a few 
 
 70 
 
years ago estimated that of 500,000 women in factories, 
 300,000 were under twenty years of age; the vast ma- 
 jority of them worked from thirteen to fourteen hours 
 daily. Where they work in day and night shifts — in the 
 factory dormitories, the day-shift girls slip into the beds 
 just vacated by the night-shift girls; and vice versa. 
 
 Those beds accordingly are never aired nor sunnde; 
 terrible breeders of disease. Some 200,000 women are 
 newly recruited yearly, of whom 120,000, it is said, 
 never return to their homes. They become “birds of 
 passage, maids in dubious tea-houses and prostitutes.” 
 In a few years disease and death claims them all. 
 
 A NEW ERA IN HUMAN HISTORY 
 
 The adoption by Japan and China of the mechanical, 
 economic, social, and political elements of Occidental 
 civilization constitutes the beginning of a new era in 
 human history. The changes rapidly occurring in Asia 
 demand attention. What is the duty of America at this 
 time in its relations to Asia? What responsibilities 
 have we, if any, and, what is even more pertinent, what 
 may we do to put and keep ourselves right with the 
 Orient? 
 
 Both China and Japan are facing mighty problems. 
 The early solution of those problems concerns, not 
 themselves alone, but all the world. Our fate is in truth 
 involved in theirs. The urgency accordingly of their 
 appeal should command our earnest and sympathetic 
 attention and secure our action. Our own national wel- 
 fare through the long future, no less than our national 
 character, are intimately involved in our response to 
 that appeal. 
 
 China’s appeal for justice and friendly treatment 
 was made decades ago, but has been completely ig- 
 nored by the statesmen and Christians of America. Ja- 
 pan’s appeal is more recent. Will America heed it any 
 
 better? c , n r u 
 
 Sydney Lriilick. 
 
 71 
 
JAPANESE SNAPSHOTS IN 1919 
 In order to have any intelligent understanding of the 
 present situation in Japan it is necessary to speak some- 
 what of the conditions existing in that country at this 
 time and in doing so it must be borne in mind that only 
 the broadest statements can be made regarding the rap- 
 idly changing conditions. So kaleidoscopic are these 
 changes that the most well-informed person would hesi- 
 tate to express opinions and the things which are true 
 today may be quite changed tomorrow. But broadly 
 speaking there are certain facts which help one to an 
 understanding of the situation in Japan and our rela- 
 tion to it. 
 
 While it would be the sheerest presumption to at- 
 tempt any discussion of political conditions it is not out 
 of place, perhaps, to recall some facts which are well 
 known, for the most part, but which have a distinct 
 bearing upon our relation to work for women in Japan. 
 
 The first of these is the growth of the democratic 
 spirit. As every one knows, the militaristic rule in 
 Japan is imposed by a rather small group of older 
 statesmen who are clinging most tenaciously to the old 
 order in government and are unable or unwilling to see 
 the trend of the times. But this militaristic rule does 
 not grow out of the will of the people as a whole and 
 every passing day swells the numbers of those who have 
 tasted of the wine of democracy and found it pleasant to 
 the taste and exhilarating to the spirit. At the same 
 time one must remember that, taken as a mass, the peo- 
 ple do not read, as our people read, and the press is 
 quite heavily censored. One must also take into ac- 
 count the ages old training in respect for authority 
 which is ingrained in the average Japanese. Venera- 
 tion for the emperor, who embodies in his person the 
 ideals of government, is part of the religion of a Japan- 
 ese and these deeply rooted traits of character change 
 slowly. 
 
 72 
 
This whole political situation is inextricably en- 
 twined with the economic conditions and these have a 
 direct bearing upon the place and work of the Young 
 Women’s Christian Association. The rice riots which 
 occurred in the summer of 1918 focused the attention 
 of the reading world upon the food situation in Japan 
 and those who have a deep interest in the affairs of 
 women saw in the conditions which those riots dis- 
 closed a grave menace to the women of Japan. The 
 same thing is happening there which happened long 
 ago here in that women were forced out of the home by 
 economic pressure and obliged to find their places in 
 the business and professional world. 
 
 But the situation is far more serious in Japan than it 
 ever was here because of the utterly different condi- 
 tions under which the women of Japan have always 
 lived. Through countless years she has been man’s ser- 
 vant and the mother of his children and those two 
 functions summed up the reasons for her existence. 
 Men do not know how to accept any other status for 
 women nor do women know how wisely to assume the 
 new position. A wise and far-seeing missionary who 
 has spent his life in Japan when asked what group of 
 girls in his opinion most needed the ministry of the 
 Y. W. C. A. answerd without a moment’s hesitation, 
 “The business women.” And then he added, “I sup- 
 pose you are surprised that I did not say the factory 
 girls. They are very needy, but their need is not so 
 great as is that of the business women.” 
 
 Girls and women in Japan are eagerly and voraci- 
 ously reading translations of French and Russian novels 
 and such authors as Ellen Key and are seeing on the 
 moving picture screen pictures of American life which 
 are too indecent to be shown in this country and are 
 forming their ideas of the freedom of women from 
 these sources. The harm that is being done through 
 these is too great to be estimated. 
 
 73 
 
The industrial situation in Japan beggars descrip- 
 tion. We all know how she has risen like a rocket into 
 the commercial sky and she has done this by using up 
 the lives of women and children as one burns up a 
 candle. Incredibly long hours, insupportable condi- 
 tions of labor and pitifully insufficient pay tell their 
 story in the stunted bodies and blank, unintelligent ( 
 faces of thousands and thousands of Japanese girls, 
 many of them looking to be mere babies though the 
 law requires that they shall be twelve years old. Then 
 there is the great army of girls in the government 
 schools and the girls in their homes who have no need 
 to work but do have a great need for guidance and help 
 as they try to interpret the changing conditions about 
 them. One of our secretaries says that the girls come to 
 her asking her to help them find an abiding-place — 
 they use a Japanese word that means just that — some- 
 thing that will be the same yesterday, today, and to- 
 morrow. One gets the feeling of a whole people grop- 
 ing about in the dark trying to find themselves when all 
 the familiar landmarks are whirling about them. 
 
 It will readily be seen that the general situation in 
 Japan has but been touched upon in the most cursory 
 manner, but perhaps enough has been said to give some 
 appreciation of the great need. What are we doing 
 and what can we do to meet this need? 
 
 At the present time we have Associations in Kobe, 
 Osaka, Tokyo, and Yokohama while pre-organization 
 work is going on in Kyoto. Kobe and Yokohama are of 
 course emphasizing emigration work and are giving a 
 very real and valuable service to girls who are coming 
 to America. Not only are they working with the girls / 
 themselves before they leave Japan but they have estab- 
 lished such relations with cooperating organizations 
 here— both Associations and churches — that the girls 
 are assured of welcome and sympathy on their arrival. 
 Their preparation includes classes in English and in 
 
 74 
 
demonstration of American cookery, housekeeping and 
 general customs. The secretaries also undertake with 
 the girls the pleasant task of helping them to outfit 
 themselves with American clothes and teach them how 
 to put them on and wear them. The Association is a 
 busy place just before a big ship sails as the girls sit at 
 their low tables sewing industriously on the strange gar- 
 ments under the kindly and interested guidance of the 
 secretary. While the emigration work is the special 
 and peculiar feature of the work in these two cities, the 
 regular forms of Association activity are not neglected 
 and the ordinary educational classes, clubs and social 
 gatherings proceed as in any other Association. 
 
 Osaka has an appalling industrial need but Miss 
 Hard has very wisely taken the position that the other 
 girls in Osaka also need the Association and has insisted 
 that a balance be kept in establishing the activities of 
 the infant Association. So girls from all sorts of groups 
 are coming to the building and finding there an oppor- 
 tunity to learn the things which they particularly desire, 
 finding friendships with other girls whom they would 
 not meet through any other channel and finding an op- 
 portunity to serve as they share with others whatever 
 gift life has brought to them. The industrial group is 
 so enormous and its need so great that Miss Hard, her- 
 self a trained and experienced industrial secretary, has 
 shown wisdom in declining to undertake industrial 
 work until the Association is able to do more than dab- 
 ble at it and by its ineffectiveness create in the minds of 
 factory managers a disappointment which will close to 
 us doors which are now swinging wide open. But we 
 must enter them soon and to do so there must be rein- 
 forcements in Osaka. 
 
 Multiplied thousands of girls in Osaka are finding in 
 the gray smoke which rises day and night into the gray 
 sky of that gray city a counterpart for their own lives — 
 gray, all gray! No home life — for the girls live in 
 
 75 
 
dormitories within the walls of the factory enclosure — 
 no fun, no play, only hard, grinding, relentless toil 
 through long weary hours seven days in the week for 
 the merest pittance sufficient only to keep soul and body 
 together. One can understand why the toll of suicide is 
 so high when one remembers the hopelessness of the ^ 
 future for a people who have no Christ. A present 
 without a gleam of joy or brightness, a future without 
 a ray of hope! If we could actually make real to our- 
 selves the condition of these thousands and thousands 
 of girls we should not rest until we could be sure that 
 we had done everything in our power to bring to them 
 only the tiniest bit of what life offers to us with every 
 new day and which we accept as a matter of course it 
 has become so commonplace. 
 
 Tokyo has a good building which was built by friends 
 in America and is not unlike an Association here in the 
 general scope of its work. To be sure, the girls who 
 throng its rooms are in appearance very unlike those 
 one sees here at home but after all girls are girls the 
 world over and a group of high schools girls in Tokyo 
 having a party or giving a play are just as full of sup- 
 pressed giggles as such a group would b eat home while 
 the older girls, demure as they seem with their soft 
 voices and gentle manners enjoy the normal life of a 
 real girl quite as much as do their American sisters. 
 
 Any discussion of work for women in Japan even the 
 briefest, must pay tribute to the remarkable potential 
 leadership of the Japanese women. When one con- 
 siders the position which women have occupied for 
 centuries in Japan one is filled with amazement at see- 
 ing the initiative and power of achievement which 
 they display when they are given the least opportunity 
 to develop it. They ask only that we help them in 
 finding the paths and getting them started in the way 
 of working together for all women of their country, 
 bringing to their service what fifty years of experience 
 
 76 
 
has taught us about working together. They will carry 
 the burden very soon and in a decade or two they will 
 not need us to show them the way. The pre-organiza- 
 tion work in any city, which is now in process in Kyoto, 
 means sitting down in that city and finding that poten- 
 tial leadership, choosing wisely those who will guide 
 the work along the right lines and getting together 
 groups of girls who will constitute the Association 
 when it shall be organized. 
 
 America, of all nations, should be making an earnest 
 and intelligent effort to understand the Japanese people 
 and this can be done only by taking toward them an 
 attitude which shall be wholly sympathetic in its desire 
 to arrive at truth. Japan is neither a land wholly given 
 over to artistic expression and flowers and color and 
 light-hearted laughter, nor is it a land whose people are 
 essentially dishonest, scheming, untrustworthy and un- 
 scrupulous as some would have us believe — but they 
 are just folks, like ourselves, with human sympathies 
 and desires and aspirations, eager to learn and ranging 
 over the wide world in a search for all that appeals to 
 them as being best in civilization everywhere. We have 
 called them imitators, not originators, and that is in a 
 large measure true. But whom and what do they imi- 
 tate? Practically everything which we so severely cri- 
 ticise in the Japanese finds its parallel in some expres- 
 sion of national life in our own or some other western 
 nation. An open mind on the part of our people and 
 the friendly desire to help which a non-christian nation 
 might reasonably expect from those nations which call 
 themselves Christian would go far toward establishing 
 that peace and good will without which we must in- 
 evitably crash on the rocks toward which we are drift- 
 ing. 
 
 Jane Niel Scott. 
 
 11 
 
JAPAN 
 
 Factory Women 
 
 IV orkers — 60% of factory workers are women. 
 
 1.3 are in their “teens.” 
 
 10 hour day and up. 
 
 Wages — 15c to 20c daily pay. 
 
 Housing — Dormitory system — 2 shifts of workers in same beds. 
 
 Health — 80,000 taken ill and leave yearly. 
 
 14,000 die of consumption. 
 
 Rtligion — 777 shrines and temples in Osaka. 
 
 4,322 priests. 
 
 207 Church and Sunday Schools. 
 
 105 Missionaries and Christian Workers. 
 
 What the Y. W. C. A. Is Doing 
 
 27 Student Associations — 3,500 members. 
 
 5 Centers. 
 
 14 U. S. A. Secretaries. 
 
 ( 
 
 78 
 
REFERENCE BIBLIOGRAPHY ON JAPAN 
 
 The Development of Japan Latourette 
 
 The Macmillan Co., 1918. 
 
 A summary of the development of Japan — Its people, civilization 
 problems and policies. 
 
 Japan in World Politics Kawakami 
 
 The Macmillan Co., 1917. 
 
 A book written by a Japanese to remove some of the misunderstand- 
 ings between the nations. 
 
 Japanese Girls and Women Bacon 
 
 Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1902. 
 
 Through this account of Japanese women in their homes— the social 
 fabric of the country is better understood. 
 
 Education of Women in Japan Burton 
 
 Fleming Revell Co., 1914. 
 
 Showing woman as she was in old Japan and as she is today under 
 the educative influence that is emancipating her. 
 
 The Mastery of the Far East Arthur Judson Brown 
 
 Scribner’s, 1919. 
 
 The story of Korea’s transformation and Japan’s rise to supremacy 
 in the Orient. The place and influence of Christian missions as a 
 potent force for a better world order is clearly shown. 
 
 Working Women of Japan Gulick 
 
 Missionary Education Movement, 1915. 
 
 The effect that Japan’s industrial conditions are having upon 
 the womanhood of the country is admirably treated in this little 
 book. 
 
 The Far East Unveiled Frederick Coleman 
 
 Cassel & Co., Ltd., 1918. 
 
 A strikingly interesting and impartial account of political and indus- 
 trial conditions in Japan and China during 1916. 
 
 Asia at the Door Kawakami 
 
 Fleming Revell, 1914. 
 
 Written by a Japanese to protest against the discrimination shown by 
 the U. S. Government toward Japanese immigrants. 
 
 Japan Today Ruth Emerson 
 
 Woman’s Press, 1916. 
 
 A delightfully instructive and entertaining book on the life of girls 
 and women in Japan and the opportunities for service that the Young 
 Women’s Christian Association has among them. 
 
 Democratic Movement in Asia Tyler Dennett 
 
 Association Press, 1918. 
 
 79 
 
An analysis of the forces contributing to the progress of democracy 
 in the Orient. 
 
 Ancient Peoples at New Tasks Willard Price 
 
 Missionary Education Movement, 1918. 
 
 Chapter 2 contains a resume of industrial conditions in Japan. 
 
 Tama — The Diary of a Japanese School Girl. 
 
SOUTH AMERICA— ITS PROBLEMS 
 By John Barrett, IQIQ 
 
 There is a growing demand in South America for 
 social and industrial reforms, as evidenced by work- 
 men’s compensation, old age pension and similar laws, 
 anti-alcohol crusades, child welfare congresses, etc. In 
 many of these movements women are taking an active 
 part, but they need guidance to avoid mistakes and 
 catch the spirit of “team work.” 
 
 South American women are capable of just as great 
 advancement as any when the keen native intelligence 
 which is joined to their admirable qualities of devo- 
 tion and purity in the home is given proper training 
 and opportunity. Modern industrial conditions have 
 forced many of them, all unprepared, into stores, of- 
 fices and factories, while public opinion still frowns on 
 a woman doing anything outside of her home, and many 
 unscrupulous men still think of any unprotected wom- 
 an as their natural prey. 
 
 In the great industrial development which is bound 
 to come, women can help largely to improve conditions. 
 Professional women are increasing in number and in- 
 fluence, and are powerful agencies in solving South 
 America’s social and industrial problems. The wom- 
 en students must be won for a social, not an individual- 
 istic ideal of life. What unlimited possibilities there are 
 for leadership in the young womanhood of South Amer- 
 ica ! The Y. W. C. A. has no greater opportunity today 
 than the sisterly, unpatronizing encouragement and 
 guidance of the young women of South America. 
 
 If what little is said here arouses particular interest 
 in Pan American relations, the Pan American Union, 
 as the international organization of American repub- 
 lics and central bureau of information for Pan America, 
 will be glad to answer as far as possible any questions 
 asked of it. 
 
 81 
 
THE CHALLENGE OF SOUTH AMERICA TO 
 THE YOUNG WOMEN’S CHRISTIAN 
 ASSOCIATION 
 
 South America is not a country, but a continent, in 
 which six out of eleven countries are confidently expect- 
 ing that the Y. W. C. A. will be of some help to its wom- 
 en. It is a land full of great cities and vast country 
 places which because of their isolation from the devas- 
 tation of war have grown remarkably. 
 
 There is an extraordinary increase in the commercial 
 relationships between North and South America, and 
 the League of Nations has only strengthened the Pan- 
 American bond, which is going to bring all of us in the 
 Western Hemispheres closer together. Already there 
 are beginnings of a progressive women’s movement in 
 that land. The time was when the South American 
 women lived exclusively within four walls of her home, 
 and did not even do her own shopping or ever walk on 
 the streets. Now many changes have come rapidly to 
 her. In Brazil there are at least five great cities in 
 which there ought to be soon some kind of work done 
 for women. We are already planning to enter Rio 
 Janeiro, with its million or more inhabitants, and San 
 Paulo, with its 600,000 inhabitants. Women are begin- 
 ning to enter the business world. In both these cities 
 there are several hundreds of women now employed in 
 telephone centrals. Even the banks have anywhere from 
 six to twenty women clerks, and the number of women 
 entering the higher educational institutions is steadily 
 on the increase. 
 
 Industrially women’s work is just beginning. Their 
 entrance has been so recent that at the present neither 
 wages nor hours of work nor factory conditions have 
 been adjusted to meet their needs. In Rio Janeiro there 
 is no place where she may have an opportunity to meet 
 other women through the fellowship of a social club. 
 
The Association has the unique chance to start the first 
 center for women in the city. 
 
 In San Paulo we are facing a work for students, as 
 many of them come from the provinces round about to 
 study in the normal schools. Our work for them should 
 include a hostel, because there is literally no place 
 where a woman may live in either of these cities out- 
 side of her own family, unless she is a younger girl 
 studying in a convent. There are women of the finest 
 moral leadership who are ready to stand back of her 
 work in both of these cities. Some of them single hand- 
 ed and alone have tried to work for the women of their 
 city, but have needed some force to draw them together 
 and unite them for a common purpose. 
 
 In Montevideo, the heart of that most progressive 
 country, Uruguay, there is also the greatest need for a 
 city Association. There is adequate backing for it 
 among the fine women who are residents there, and 
 business women and women in society alike are impat- 
 iently waiting for us to show them the way. They have 
 never had a chance to see what a Y. W. C. A. can be 
 like, but all they know is that they want something for 
 their women and girls that shall be like the Y. M. C. A., 
 which has a flourishing Association there. The heads 
 of business firms are hindered from employing as many 
 women as they would like, because there is not in the 
 entire city a club or residence for girls who may be liv- 
 ing away from home. In this city there is endless op- 
 portunity for educational and vocational work for girls 
 which shall prepare them for self-support. There is 
 also a great need here, as in Brazil, for some place 
 where the social life of the women and girls can be de- 
 veloped, for at persent outside of their families and a 
 few exclusive groups there is not a possibility for what 
 we would call a general social life in the city of Monte- 
 video. 
 
 83 
 
As we cross the river to the Argentine, we enter the 
 great city of Buenos Aires, with its million and a half 
 of inhabitants, and the meeting place, literally, for all 
 nations on earth. Here our one Association has strug- 
 gled for twelve years to maintain itself with no sort of 
 quarters which were adequate to the situation. The 
 new building which will soon be under way and in 
 which the people of the city are heartily cooperating 
 will open many new avenues of service and demand a 
 work adequate to the needs of this great metropolis. 
 
 Buenos Aires is also the center of great industrial and 
 student classes. Scarcely any country in the world is as 
 progressive in its student spirit as is Argentine. They 
 have control, even in the administration of the univer- 
 sity and there are many hundreds of women now press- 
 ing into higher education, which only a few years ago 
 was almost unknown throughout the city. 
 
 It is literally possible to influence almost every coun- 
 try of the world via Buenos Aires. The connection be- 
 tween this city as well as all South American cities, is 
 very close, and if we enter the open doors of South Am- 
 erica we are surely helping in a great advance in Eu- 
 rope. 
 
 As one crosses the mountains of Chile, one comes into 
 a country of extraordinary beauty, with its snow- 
 capped mountains and its progressive people. There 
 are probably more women in Chile in institutions for 
 higher education in proportion to the population than 
 in any other country, and student life is powerfully or- 
 ganized. 
 
 At Santiago the capitol and seat of culture, we have 
 been besieged by the educational, political and social 
 leaders of the city to do something toward the establish- 
 ment of an Association for women. Already in the city 
 there is a most interesting women’s club, the first of its 
 kind in South America, and carrying on a most worth- 
 while service. Even the leaders of this club unitedly 
 
urge that some organization like our own should enter 
 in quickly to help direct the thinking of the women who 
 are just reaching out for something more in their lives. 
 
 In Valparaiso, the great seaport on the western coast, 
 a large group of business women besieged the Y.M.C.A. 
 and insisted on being organized into a club because 
 of the dire need for better living conditions and for 
 some sort of educational and social interest in that great 
 city. We could organize a city Association there to- 
 morrow which would have the patronage of all the best 
 elements in the life of the city. Almost every business 
 house has woven in its employ, not only Chileans, but 
 also women of foreign birth, and the need is very great. 
 
 The same conditions are beginning to show them- 
 selves in Bolivia and Peru, though the immediate neces- 
 sity for work there is not so pressing as in these other 
 cities. 
 
 There is likewise a supreme chance given the Asso- 
 ciation to minister to the spiritual needs of South Am- 
 erica. The great proportion of thinking people who 
 are in business, in professional life, in student life, and 
 in literary life, practically call themselves agnostics. 
 On closely questioning, we find that they are agnostic so 
 far as ecclesiastical systems go, but are not so far as the 
 needs of their inner life are concerned. It is possible to 
 do a great work in the religious life of countless women 
 in this continent if we have secretaries who can give 
 themselves to this service. There are many thousands 
 of women whose lives have not been influenced either 
 by Catholicism or Protestantism, who are sheep with- 
 out a shepherd, and for whom the great appeal is the 
 social passion for bringing the Kingdom of God 
 through a sense of brotherhood and a moral responsi- 
 bility for bringing into life of humanity new hope and 
 courage. 
 
 South America must have the opportunity not only 
 to have Christian Associations there, but the Associa- 
 
 85 
 
tions in North America must do more than has yet been 
 done to bring the ideals of America into the lives of 
 thousands who come here as students. We cannot es- 
 cape the influence of South America upon our North 
 American life. It will increase as the days go by, and 
 we owe it to them not only for our own sakes but for 
 their sakes to give the best in our North American life (| 
 to them, that the idealism of a Christian democracy may 
 be perpetuated in the Western Hemisphere. 
 
 Bertha Gonde, September, IQIQ. 
 
 ( 
 
 86 
 
Extracts from Mrs. Ida Clyde Clark's Report on Her 
 South American Survey. July, IQIQ 
 
 In South America there are possibly 20,000,000 wom- 
 en, and with regard to our responsibility toward them 
 they may be divided, roughly, into three classes, the 
 home women, the working women, and the women stu- 
 dents. 
 
 THE HOME WOMEN 
 
 First, there are the millions of home women, rich and 
 poor, who are suffering under the fearful handicap, 
 whether they are conscious of it or not, of a standard of 
 morals that is shockingly low, a system of education that 
 closes the door of opportunity to them at a time when 
 they should be most ready to enter it, and a code of laws 
 that offers no sort of protection either regarding own- 
 ership of property, control of children, or any of those 
 things that are vital to the welfare and happiness of 
 women. 
 
 It should be borne in mind that in speaking of South 
 America we are speaking of a dozen separate republics, 
 each with its separate laws and customs, and in some of 
 
 these countries fairly good and equitable laws exist. 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 I found in every country evidences of an awakening, 
 and while there is neither co-ordination nor organi- 
 zation, I found here and there groups of women who 
 are beginning to see the light, and who, in one way 
 or another, are trying to express themselves. The 
 world is much more of a neighborhood now than it 
 has ever been before. News of the activities of women 
 in countries heretofore remote, is sifting into South 
 America and the germs of progress and of advancement 
 are taking root. In one place we find it flourishing 
 among the high-class women and in another place 
 among the middle classes, while in Peru women of the 
 lower classes are joining with the men in protesting 
 
 87 
 
against intolerable conditions. But fundamentally the 
 leaders are actuated by the same impulse. 
 
 I have a strong conviction that it is a duty laid 
 heavily upon the Young Women’s Christian Associa- 
 tion to bring to the situation its program of socialized 
 religion and to make articulate the ideals toward which 
 the thinking women of South America are, consciously 
 or unconsciously, striving. One by one the pieces 
 are being fitted into a structure whose torrets will 
 never rise to their proper height unless they rest on a 
 foundation that is purely and unmistakably Christian. 
 The Young Women’s Christian Association is the only 
 woman’s organization in the world that is fitted to give 
 to the woman movement in South America the impetus 
 that will sweep it surely and permanently out to the 
 open sea of woman’s greater opportunity and woman’s 
 broader usefulness. If it fails, in the degree or in the 
 quality of its effort at this critical moment, it will not 
 only be neglecting a privilege, it will be shirking a re- 
 sponsibility. 
 
 ifc # 
 
 One incident showing that there are signs of restless- 
 ness among the best women of Latin America: I met 
 at the home of a leading woman a number of charming, 
 cultured women. They were greatly interested in hav- 
 ing me speak to them of what women of North Amer- 
 ica were doing, and I was able to tell them of the work 
 of the Young Women’s Christian Association and of 
 how the Government, in the necessity that rose out of 
 the war, made that organization one of the six organ- 
 izations comprising the Commission on Training Camp 
 Activities. Later this lady of Chile was showing me 
 through a beautiful palace and at last we came to 
 the handsome chapel where the family worshipped. 
 Many candles were burning on the exquisite altar 
 and paintings of great value adorned the walls. 
 I remarked on the impressive beauty of the room 
 
and she said, with a pathetic note in her voice, “Ah, 
 Senora, but I have realized for some time that it 
 doesn’t mean anything! Think how much more worth 
 while are the things about which you have been telling 
 us.” 
 
 WOMEN WHO WORK 
 
 The second class of women whom we must consider 
 in dealing with South America are the women who 
 work, and they are far more numerous than we realize. 
 In Rio de Janeiro alone there are said to be 25,000 for 
 whom nothing is being done. There is no profession or 
 calling into which South American women have not 
 entered in large numbers, and these numbers are in- 
 creasing rapidly. There is scarcely a place in all South 
 America where a business or professional woman can 
 go alone and get a noon-day luncheon, although every 
 few doors places are provided where men go and drink 
 coffee at all hours of the day. 
 
 The situation concerning trained nurses in South 
 America is appalling. It is bad enough that there 
 should be no private nurses, but even in the large ma- 
 jority of the hospitals, the nursing is done by Sisters 
 of Charity who have had no professional training. But 
 we cannot conscientiously encourage women to take up 
 the nursing profession in a country where there are no 
 decent places for them to live and where they are sur- 
 rounded by every form of danger. 
 
 The cities of South America are over-supplied with 
 school teachers, and there are not enough to supply the 
 country districts. This is largely because there is no 
 way in which a woman alone can live in that country. 
 
 Of the need for the work of the Association for the 
 large and growing class of working and business women 
 I feel that it is wholly unnecessary for me to speak 
 further. The scope for the work in this field is un- 
 limited. 
 
 89 
 
THE WOMEN STUDENTS 
 
 I presume it is hardly necessary for me to dwell on 
 the very ripe field for Association work among the stu- 
 dent class of South America. It is here that probably 
 the greatest possibility for successful work of the imme- 
 diate future lies. 
 
 It is undoubtedly from this class that the leaders of 
 the future must come and the importance of the field 
 cannot be over-stated. It has been said that from 
 ninety to ninety-five per cent, of the students in the uni- 
 versities are in a state of unbelief and I have no doubt 
 but that is true. When we consider this fact, and when 
 we realize that the women who are now studying in the 
 universities of the country are destined to be leaders 
 among the women of tomorrow we know that we can- 
 not neglect work among women students in South 
 America and be true to our great responsibility of the 
 future. 
 
 * * # # * 
 
 A. Hyatt V errill in “ Getting Together with 
 Latin America.” 
 
 “In fact, a large part of what we think we know 
 about South America is utter nonsence and the first 
 thing we must do is to unlearn nearly all our accepted 
 ideas of South America and its inhabitants. So let us 
 cast aside all prejudice, all traditional foolishness and, 
 with an open mind, consider the facts as they are and 
 not as we would wish them and try to see wherein we 
 have so signally failed to establish the mutual confi- 
 dence and friendship, the brotherly relations and the 
 lucrative commerce and business which should exist be- 
 tween the northern and the southern continents and 
 then, having analyzed this side of the question, we may 
 better understand what we may do in the future.” 
 
SOUTH AMERICA 
 
 Three republics in South America (Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela) 
 are larger than the United States of America. 
 
 The cities of the Americas are, in order of their size, New York, 
 Chicago, Buenos Aires, Philadelphia, Rio de Janiero. 
 
 The one Y. W. C. A. boarding home in South America accommo- 
 dated in one year a succession of 617 women of 16 different nation- 
 alities. 
 
 Rio de Janeiro has over 15,000 women workers. 
 
 The Y. W. C. A. in South America. 
 
 9 Secretaries. 
 
 2 Secretaries in Brazil with a field larger than the whole U. S. A. 
 Centers — Buenos Aires, Montivideo, Rio de Janiero. 
 
 91 
 
REFERENCE BIBLIOGRAPHY ON 
 SOUTH AMERICA 
 
 South America — Observations and Impressions Bryce 
 
 Macmillan Company, 1914. 
 
 A book dealing with the scenic, social and economic phenomena of 
 South America. A valuable reference book. 
 
 The Future of South America Babson 
 
 Little, Brown & Company, 1915. 
 
 An interesting volume on the commercial and industrial interests of 
 South America. 
 
 A History of Latin America Sweet 
 
 The Abingdon Press, New York, 1919. 
 
 A concise text of Latin American History. 
 
 South of Panama Edward Alsworth Ross 
 
 The Century Company, 1914. 
 
 An interesting interpretation of the difference in ideas and ideals be- 
 tween North and South America. 
 
 Understanding South America Cooper 
 
 The Doran Co., 1918. 
 
 A book devoted to promoting a more sympathetic and intelligent 
 conception of South American characteristics and ideals. 
 
 South American Problems Robert Speer 
 
 The South Americans Hale 
 
 Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1907. 
 
 History of the South American republic — their history and progress — 
 with special reference to their commercial relations with the United 
 States. 
 
 Latin America Brown 
 
 Fleming Revell Co. 
 
 This book makes the spiritual needs of the South Americans very 
 real. Their struggle for political and religious liberty is vividly told. 
 
 Getting Together with Latin America Verrill 
 
 Dutton Co., 1918. 
 
 A book written to further our trade relations with South America 
 through a dissemination of information about South American 
 
 peoples. 
 
 South America Neely 
 
 A Mission Field — Its Missionary problems. 
 
 Young People’s Movement of U. S. and Canada, 1909. 
 
 The author reveals the religious conditions of South America and 
 urges greater zeal in promoting Protestant missions. 
 
 92 
 
Willard Price 
 
 Ancient Peoples at New Tasks 
 Missionary Education Movement. 
 
 Chapter I deals with the industrial conditions in South America and 
 contains a plea that we shall not permit South America to repeat the 
 industrial mistakes of the United States. 
 
 93