The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-08-31
THE AWAKENING OF CHINA
Continued from Page Ten.l
A Medical College for Women.

iished by Yuan Shah ka and IS
supported out of the salt
Salt - a government monopoly and
one of the chief sources from which
the funds come. This
medical school is an academy rather
than a college. It is to train women
to act as teachers in MEDICAL schools
which are to be established. to tit girls
as matrons for the new hospitals and
as aids in the new sanitary work
which is to be carried on throughout
the empire.
The head of the college is DR..
Yamei Kin, a Chinese woman of
twenty-five or thirty years. who was
educated in the United States. She
spent a part of her life in Washing
ton, and came here with a strong
Endorsement from President Roose-
Welt DR.. Yamei Kin is a graduate
of the Medical College of the New
York Infirmary for Women and Chill
dren, the educational part Of which
institution has since been merged into
the edic College of Cornell Uni
Yersity. She speaks English f%luently.
and / had a most interesting talk with
! her today concerning the school and
it's possibilities.
1t was in company with Mr.. Will
| liams, our consul general to Tientsin,
that I called. We found the school in
the old Chinese city, on a street SO
narrow that we were crowded to the
wall by the carts and j~inrikishas as
we made our way in. Entering a low
door, we came into q compound filled
with many one-story buildings OF
Chinese architecture. The roofs We're
the shape of a bow, and they overhung
brick walls, in which were lattice
work windows, packed with white pa
per. The seemed old. and, upon in
quiry, I found that they had been
used for more than one hundred and
| sixty years as a Chinese orphan asy-
lum. The asylum was founded by an
emperor who reigned more than thhty
years before our Declaration OF lnde-
pendence was signed, and the 1nstltu-
ton has been kept up with money
furnished by, the Chinese government
from then until now. Dr. Kin tells
me that there are still one hundred
and eighty girls in 1t, and that II ad-
mits about one hundred rphan per
| year
Women Doctors for the Chinese.
During our stay DR.. Kin took us
| over the institution, saying that the
orphan asylum had been moved to
buildings on the opposite side of the
river, and that these buildings We're
to be devote from now on to her
| school,. There are enough or them to
| accommodate hundreds OF pupils, al
| though, so far, only twenty-five nave
been admitted. Said DR.. Yamei Kin:
women doctors are greatly needed
in China. Our customs are such that
il is not proper to call in men to at
| tend and in most of our cities
| there are neither female doctors nor
trained nurses. The few Chinese Wo-
| men who have received medical edu-
cation abroad have all and more than
| thew can do. Those trained in the
mission schools are largely employed
IN the mission hospitals, and it is al
most impossible for us to get Chinese
women teachers for this institution.
| AS it IS now, we do not claim to be
a college. We are, rather, q medical
academy, and we give such an educa-
ton as is common in England and
America for district visiting nurses.
The institution is supported by the
government and the tuition is entirely
free. Our students will enter the gov
eminent service as soon as they gradu-
ate. and they will york for the gov
ernment for a fixed nsmber of years.
For this they will receive salaries, and
erWar if they wish to practice
as physicians, they will always have
more than they can do
A Profession for Widows.
I asked DR.. Kin from what classes
Of society her students came. she
replied:
From every grade of Chinese So
| ciety. We have the daughters OF
merchants and also of some high Of
Gcials. One Of our students is a slave
| girl. We have many widows, and I
look for medicine to become a favor
ite profession with such women IN
the future. The condition of the
| Chinese widow is not as bad as THAI
of the widow of India, but it is often
She must live with her par
ents-in-law, and if they are not kind
she may be a drudge or a slave Som
Of orr widows are very Dung. and
some have families at home. With a
medical education they can earn their
own living"
AS we visited the classrooms / saw
a Chinese professor teaching the
anatomy of the brain, with a human