St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1908-02-15

| was TALKING ABOUT. linen, TO their Ut
ter confusion, along came the presid
ing Methodist Episcopal bishop Of
China, fully substantiating the charge
but generating the missionary from
wrong intention and assuming respon
sibility himself.
Similarly, more effective admins
tration of the missionary propaganda
will furnish the travelling public with
the easily ascertained facts of the mis-
sion fields, and will put forth effort to
introduce them to missions in actual
operation. 1t will also grapple with
the problem of the moral and spiritual
condition of the port cities; for SO
long as the European portion of these
ports remain as they are the work of
missions is bound to be seriously
| hampered.
| Missionary Mistakes.
Before leaving this subject I must
make rather sweeping criticism
which the board should have dealt
with long ago. 1t is that an astonish-
! ing proportion of missionaries display
bad manners and bad taste on ship
board. To deny this charge, which,
in one form or another, has been made
times without number, is to turn ones
| back on the facts. The conduct of
some missionaries aboard ship is one
! of the most prolific sources of the
antimissionary spirit which pervades
| passenger ships the world over, and
practically all of the port cities of the
| orient. Some of the criticisms made
in this connection are simply unan-
swerable.
What is to be said, for example, in
defe' Sc of the woman missionary
whose place at.the table had to be
changed shree times on the voyage
across the Pacific last month? In the
first place, her astounding meddle-
someness had brought upon her re-
buke at which she felt offended and
changed her seat; later, the passen-
gers with whom she was seated found
her so uncomfortable a companion
that they complained to the steward
and insisted on having either her seat
or theirs changed. The answer COM
monty made to stories like this is that
the missionary's goodness no doubt
rebuked the sinfulness of the other
passengers, which is neither a modest
nor a charitable rejoinder. In this
case, the story was told me by prom
inent American business man, a
church member, who himself had been
attending u Of
ings in Omaha just before leaving
home, and SO could hardly be called
a hostile critic.
| could write literally columns of
incidents concerning the conduct of
missionaries on shipboard, whereby
they have earned the disfavor OF off,
GERS and fellow passengers. Summed
up, though, they amount to this: Some
missionaries seem inclined to fiaunt
their moral and spiritual superiority
in the face of others; they insist on
having an identity as missionaries
rather than as quiet. modest, we'll
bred ladies and gentlemen; they pro-
test, often in unseemly fashion,
against the indulgence in tobacco or
liquor or cards on the part of other
passengers. All this may be compre-
hended in the word "provincialism.
They forget that, as Kipling says:
There's a world outside the one Won
know"
and that the people of this world have
all the personal rights and liberties
which are to be accorded to the mem
bers OF the missionary circle. Some
times this provincialism goes to the
length of stupidity, as when a Pacific
liner crossed the meridian on Sunday.
and so dropped that day from the cal
endar, whereupon the missionaries
appealed in body to the captain to
drop some other day, and save Sun
day, as if the matter were optional
with him!
Not all missionaries are guilty of
these things; far from it, The ablest
missionaries deprecate them serious
ly for they realize their far-reaching
effects upon the cause they represent.
In explanation, if not in extenuation
they point out that missionaries leav-
ing the homeland are still in the shirt
of exaltation created by their farewell
meetings, by the glorification of their
friends and by the role of saint, hero
and martyr with which they have
been invested. For the time they are
in crusader mood, and they have not
yet learned to view all things in pro-
portion. Their feet have not vet
found the hard ground of .actuality
One of these unwise missionaries can
do more harm than a hundred sensi-
bic ones can undo.
/ must confess, moreover, that / do
not see why Pacific mail captain
should forbid missionaries to sing
hymns at the piano on the boat deck,
except on Sunday, and yet allow other |
passengers to make the night vocal, |
on the same spot, with the latest |
popular" songs, or why the mission
aries should not be permitted to hold |
a prayer meeting in the saloon, while
a noisy, drinking coterie is uproarious-
ly gambling in the smoking room. / |
freely criticise much In the conduct |
Of many missionaries aboard ship, but
believe in "a square deal" The
man who drinks whisky on shipboard
should be given no advantage over
the man who drinks water, other
things being equal, nor the man who
CANDLES over the man who prays, nor
the woman who sings "risque' songs
over the one who prefers "Old Hun
bred" Plain words need to be spoken