The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1900-07-28
MISSIONS
TO CHINESE
Danger They Always
Experience.
INSTANCES OF HERO|SN
Enormous MODS Quickly Raised and
Sometimes as Quickly Quieted--
Narrow Escapes.

POMONA, Cal, July THE Rev. |
Edward j. Porter, who after eleven
years of missionary labor in China
came here to work for the conversion
of Chinese in Los Angeles and southern
California, said the other day:
mo one who has not lived in the in
! terror of China can have any idea of
/ how the life of almost every Christian
missionary is constantly beset with
mortal dangers. There are no more
courageous People than some of the
young men and women who go to the
! fields Of missionary effort in the In
terror of China. They realize all the
perils of their position. They know
how a thoughtless act, an utterance
unusual in the locality, perhaps an ar
| ticle of dress never seen before by the
natives, or the prevalence of a plague
in fact, anything apt to create curiosity
or suspicion among densely ignorant,
superstitious and excitable people
1 may breed q mob and Lead to a mas
/ sacre of the foreigners. Yet some of
4 them never falter in their determine
ton / have seen American mission
aries of both sexes ask to be sent into
districts in China where hut fortnight
or so before the natives had risen in
mob and stoned and cut to death every
white person there. Twenty days after
the swat kwe, meaning the death to
the foreign DEVILS riots in the Flu Kien
province in October, 1890, three young
women connected with the Presbyte-
rian Board Of Missions went alone and
| will
, coast into Flu KEN and took up the
work of the murdered missionaries
among the red -handed murderers. Not
, only that. but the women lived in the
house where the Chinese mob had slain
the missionaries. There were still
there great blotches Of dried blood on
: the floor where the former missionaries
, had been struck down.
"It is very hard for people who know
little about the lower classes of Chinese
to appreciate how quickly an enormous
crowd of rioters may be assembled in
China When / was stationed at
g KNOW AChow, about one hundred and
4 sixty miles northwest from Canton In
: the Kwangtong district, a riot arose
!. and spent itself in an hour, and only by
a miracle all the German, French and
"A
ders. KNOW Chow is a place of some
six thousand people in thickly popu-
i lated part of China. The five foreign
n missionaries had been there about a
e wear and the work seemed particularly
$ promising. The natives held aloof and
u were suspicious for few months, but
) when the two big men of the town
treated us with conspicuous civility
| x,,,t tsf,r, rat
d heed to our teachings. The German
|, missionary was a physician, and ne
: had with him quantity of medicines.
To win the attention and good Will OF
;, the Chinese, he opened a sort of free
d dispensary. After awhile he got few
of the more trusting natives to come
to him to have flesh wounds and mild
l. disorders treated But every one OF
: the natives believed that devils had a
$, hand in the -missionary's skill
:, Time and again the German was beg
- ged by the more friendly Chinese tc
}. confess that he made use or some eVl
spirit in his practice.
1T happened that little child mys-
N teriously disappeared from KNOW
~ Chow. Now the Chinese are particu.
% larly fond of their children The whole
Ii miles around was searched @ithoui
9 success. Several weeks later, just a
sunset, mother went screaming abou
that her baby boy had also disappear
le ed. People poured out OF their tin,
- mud, bamboo and grass houses lik'
1s bees from an apiary. The communit,
to was shaken. Everybody had a differ
s. ent theory concerning this second dis
l~,,% lie ooas
dragons played part in almost all tn
. theories An American woman out o
"A sympathy went out on the crowde'
e. street and tried to persuade the Chi
x nese that the child having been seel
nd two hours before could not be very ia
OF away She saw that the excited crow
-; suddenly grew silent and studied he
face with a peculiar intensity The
afterwards said that the disappearanc
er of the second child was associated wit
,e, the German physicians practice. The
list believed that he kidnapped and kille
~ ~ babies to get a certain eure-aH trof
- the head of the dead.
q 'eThe cry 'Tong-kwei,.' Butcher tn
a foreign devilsD went up from on
vn mans throat. Instantly the shou
'Tong-kw Tong-kweil was taken u
by several thousand men. Even tn
Die bows and women howled 'Tong-kwei
nj Hundreds Of men ran and armed them
~ selves to put their words into eHee
all The roar of hoarse shouts reached tn
le- ears of every white person there. "
of had all heard similar words from riot
sh. ers before. OF course the five white
were helpless against SO many. gu
only hope was to get the superstition
an Ipopulace to hear us while we pleade
as for suspension of judgment concernin
me our share in the disappearance of tn
en child.
re- "The German missionary, who Wa
Is a fluent speaker of Chinese, bravel
Sa went out into the little yard at h
arc home to talk with the natives WI
CHI. were floclSing there with clubs, pole
OIL stones and firearms. He happened to 81
in the crowd a man who had once bee
tax-gatherer in Canton and who Wa
re- popular and intelligent. The Germa
-, o. in shouts that rose above the din
a voices. addressed himself to this ma
ths and asked him to ask his countryme