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Assistance given by Religious Bodies.
MAZAGON SISTERS.
The All Saints Sisters went to help in nursing at the Parsee Plague Hospital at
the request of the Municipal Commissioner on the 6th January.
There were about 20 patients when they first went there ; they soon increased
to 35. When the English nurses arrived, the Sisters gave over charge to them.
On February 6th two Sisters went to the Arthur Road Hospital and found over
u hundred patients, all very ill, and no nurses at all. The work was very heavy,
and in a few days there were in all five Sisters working there, doing both day and
night duty. The first night one Sister was on duty eleven patients died.
The Sisters worked at the Arthur Road Hospital till the end of April, when the
English nurses arrived and relieved them.
Another Sister started the work in the Wari Bunder Hospital and worked there
till an English nurse relieved her.
Before the arrival of the Nurses sent for by the Plague Committee from England,
almost all the nursing in the plague hospitals was undertaken by the Sisters of the
different religious bodies described below. Their services were entirely gratuitous,
and how much these were appreciated by those to whom they were given will be seen
from the following account of their work.
The Thana Hospital was also organised by a Sister sent for the purpose. The
Sisters also worked at the Worli, Reay Road, Jamsetji Bunder, and Modi Khana
Hospitals. Money and clothes were supplied the Sisters by the public to relieve the
urgent needs of the patients. The Cutch Memon Hospital at Pydhownie was supplied
with nurses by the All Saints' Sisters.
BANDORA SISTERS.
The following interesting account of the experience gained in the various
hospitals by the Daughters of the Cross, Bandora, has been furnished by the Pro-
vincial'Superior :—At Government House, Parel, were placed six Sisters, who went
there on the 21st February ; two Sisters nursed at the Khari Hospital at Bandora,
winch was opened on the 2nd March. Mahim hospital was opened on the 23rd
March ; two sisters were sent there at the request of the Plague Committee.
Their experience shows that the repugnance which all natives have for hospital
treatment and their aversion to European methods can be made to yield to kind-
ness. The Sisters give many interesting stories which prove this, out of which the
following have been selected as the most striking :—
"A rich Mahomedan, whose grandson was attacked with the plague, came with
him to the Khari Hospital and for some time could not bring himself to leave him
in the care of the Sisters. But, on seeing the hospital for himself and the attention
of the Sisters, he went away content. When, after three weeks' careful nursing,
the boy was cured and went back to his home the gratitude of the old man could
not be expressed ; he called the Sister who had nursed the boy his daughter, and
cried with joy."
In another case at the same hospital a poor woman brought her only surviving
son to the hospital and sat by his side the whole day, watching lest the nurses-
should poison him, as she thought. The next clay he became delirious, and, thinking
that all was over, the mother ran away in order to avoid seeing him die. Some time
afterwards the sister of the patient came to ask for the clothing that the boy had
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