Mexico weekly ledger., 1902-04-10
MISS FLoT PATTON.
Writes an Interesting Letter to, the
Ladies of the Missionary Union If
This City.

Miss Floy Patton, who, with her sis
ter, Miss Anna Patton, a missionary
in Tokushima, Japan, writes the
following interesting letter 70 the la
dies OF the Missionary Union, OF this
city, during February:
To the Ladies Missionary Union. Mexico, Mo,
U.S.A.
TcKUsHIMA, JAPAN, Feb, 81, 1902. =
My Dear Friends: For the last three
weeks I have been saying, ooh, l
must write letter to the Union, ''and
have at the eleventh hour. | am try
ing to collect my scattered thoughts
to go on paper, and you have no idea
what a difficult task 1t Is. You see,
the longer you are out here, the more
you get engrossed in the people and
work. Just let me give you history
of one of the days Of the week. As
usual we had breakfast at seven
sharp. Then my sister and | have
English prayers together and lmmedi-
ately after Japanese prayers for our
Japanese household, which numbers
anywhere from five to fifteen, accord
ing to the guests we have. At nine
O'Clock work was begun. began my
teaching and during the one hour and
a half had five Interruptions by call
ers. Then my Bible woman for an
hour and a half's work with me, but
before that was begun | was sent for
to come at once to decide some ques-
tlons about our new house which we
are building; got back at twelve-thir-
ty, dinner. During the dinner hour
the Afternoon programme was talked
over and this what l had to do. Teach
ing for one hour the Bible woman was
to cover the mornings work. had
promised to go out into village to
teach woman. l had to go back
across the city to see about the house
again. / had class Of five children
coming for their catechism lesson,
which taxes two hours. had to ar
range with the japanese about secur-
ing plot of ground. We had to go
to Mrs. Myor's at six o'clock and l had
nine letters and packages get off in
the nights mail land l did, too,l and
In the morning l went to prayer meet
ing, and this was not an unusual day
by any means.
Sometimes it is so hard to decide
which to do and which to leave un-
done. The other day / had sudden
call to go to the country but decided
not to go as had an important meet
ing in the city that very day, and just
as the meeting closed, it was a child
ren's meeting, nice looking old
gentleman came in and seemed disap-
pointed that the meeting was over.
When he got inside we bowed, etc,
and all of a sudden it occurred TO us
that he might be the man of the
house, so we asked the old lady if that
was her honorable husband, and when
she said he was, we proceeded TO bow
all over again and begged him to be a
devoted friend for life, la-Japanese
The old lady then told us that he was
SO anxious TO hear about this gospel
that he had left his work and come
home early. So of course we just pro-
ceeded to have meeting No. 2. | just
thought, suppose / had gone to the
c0untryl
l spent a day in the country not
long ago and it was so fine, such good
meetings; perfectly informal they
were. We were singing hymn, one
line of which read, ''Tell Your Sins to
Jesus" when one old woman spoke
up and said, "Now what do you mean
by talking to me about my sins? l
have no sins and / never did havel' So
then we had little sermon, after
which we sang on until some one else
wanted to know what something
meant. After we were through an
old lady stepped up and said, "of
course you cannot expecb US 10 under-
stand all this in one meeting so please
come very often to teach us and the
next time l will expect you to have a
meeting in my house as WELL" l
should like to go there every week If I
could just find an extra day floating
around somewhere. Now l know you
will all feel weary over this recital Of
hustle, and hurry, but you will have a
whole year for your slghs before you
hear from me again.
| should love to hear from some Of
you or all Of you as soon as you can
write. / hope you will have happy
session this year. Love for all friends.
Affectionately,
FLORENCE PATTON.