St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1908-02-08

inc school in the homeland emerging
from this sort Of ordeal more sue.
cessfulIy
The Living Dead.
At Allahabad is situated a large
leper asylum, maintained jointly by
the government and by the benefcent
Mission to Lepers in the East. It fs
managed by Mr. Samuel Higginbot-
tom, Of the Presbyterian mission
one of the innumerable extras that
found missionaries everywhere carry
ing. "Salaam, sahib,' the lepers
would cry as we passed, lifting pitt
full stumps of fingerless hands to their
foreheads. A more desolate spectacle
than a leper asylum can scarcely be
imagined; yet here was to be found,
in some cases, the grace of Christian
resignation, with cheerfulness, which
is not always present amid scenes of
health and prosperity.
Not all leeprs are in asylums; I'M
numbered thousands roam the streets
at will. While attending the daily
clinic of DR.. Charles r. Cook, of Luck
now, the only missionary in all India
of the Reformed Episcopal church,
sat within five feet of two lepers
crowded in the press. Next to one of
them was man whose family was
suffering with the plague, five having
died, and four being, Ill at the mo-
ment. Another one Of the patients
had, within few days, lost baby,
wife and four brothers, and his
father lay dangerously i'll, all with the
plague. One convalescent plague pa
tient, whom the doctor had cured, was
mildly rebuked by this quiet, unruf1ed
missionary for leaving his bed too
soon. A boy smitten with the plague
was brought by mother with dread
filled eyes, and carefully examined by
the bare hands of the doctor.
This one doctor, with single ma
tive assistant, had 61,63S cases last
year, including few in his well-kept
little hospital. All classes, rich and
poor, Mohammedans, Hindus and
Christians, come for help. / counted
80 crowded into the small room at
one time, while outside larger crowd
of waiting patients was listening to
the native preacher
A MedaIed Missionary.
One of the star missions of the
American board is at Ahmednagar,
where Rev. DR.. Robert A. Hume is
senior missionary. Dr. Hume is less
widely known as the recipient of a
medal from King Edward for his fam
inc relief work than as the author of
Missions from the Modern View
point" That he and his associates
stand high in native esteem was evil
dent from the constant salaams he re-
ceived as We rode about the city to-
gether in tonga, or native cart
Many non-Christian natives have
given largely to this mission work for
Indians, and the government also con.
tributes to the Industrial school.
found all sorts of educational and
industrial enterprises under way,
some of them, from bicycle repair
shop to tract depot, being wholly or
in part self-supporting. The big
church in native style, where even
Hindus have been known to worship
unknown gods, interested me less
than the extensive industrial esrab.
1ishments where oriental rugmaking,
weaving, woodcarVing, carpentry and
brass and silver working are carried
on for the market, under the direction
of D. G. Churchill, of Oberlin college
and the Massachusetts Institution Of
Technology, and ]. B. Knight, of Am
herst college, and an agricultural col
lege-types of the nonministerial, col
lege-bred missionaries who are doing
pioneer work for the orient. Mr..
Churchhill has invented a new hand
loom that is within the compass of
the average Indian mind and purse.
Miss Emily R. Bissell and her bro
Their, Rev. H. G. Bissell, carry on in
this mission the work which their
mother, who had been 81 years in In
dia, laid down last year. While watch
ing the arrival at the hospital here of
woman patient in a bullock cart
%" MISo NOu1LOu comforting the
weeping husband, a Christian teacher,
in manner which revealed to me tn,
beautiful devotion of the missionaries
to this people.
It takes devotion of an unselfish
sort to do this work, especially among
the villages. One Sunday morning |
sat, with Rev. Mark Keaslar. of the
Agra Methodist Episcopal mission. in
blistering, life-shriveling heat, in a
low, dirty, malodorous dwelling on the
outskirts of the city, while he told a
crowd of Notwithstanding natives the
gospel story and answered their inter.
ested questions; which looks roman.
tic and picturesque from this dis.
lance; but is work to take the heart
out of anybody less devoted than a
missionary; and it is the work which
many hundreds Of missionaries are
doing all over India to-day.
Copyright, by Joseph B. Bowles.I