The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1921-03-31
CORN C0BS ARE Diet
or HUNGRY CHINESE
Oregon Nurse Writes That
Misery Stalks Through
North China.

That a steady diet Of ground-up corn
cobs and sweet potato vines. is not
conducive to an ideal physical condt
tiOn is attested by Miss Marie Rustln,
graduate nurse, well known in Oregon,
who is now in charge Of the Taylor
Memorial hospital, under the manage
ment Of the American Presbyterian
mission at Paotingfu, China.
In a letter written by Miss Rusttn
less than eight weeks ago to the mem
bers of the Sangrael Christian En-
deavor society of the First Presbyter-
ian church in Portland Miss Rustin
tells Of the appalling conditions
| Throughout North China, where 45,-
100000 men, women and children are
confronted with starvation and where
$4,000 are dying daily Miss Rustin
has been at Paotingfu for about three
years and for many months past, like
all other mission attaches and relief
workers in China, has been concentrat-
ing all efforts on the task Of lessening
the suffering Of the famine victims.
While Paotingfu is on the outskirts
of the great drouth-ruined famine dis
trict just south of Pekin, Miss Rustin
writes that even there all the missions
and relief stations are literally swamp
ed with the supplications OF many
thousand men, women and children
who are half-clad in thin rags, weak
from undernourishment and struggling
desperately to keep alive On roots,
bark or anything that offers susten-
ance. The situation in the heart OF
the famine section, she says, is simply
beyond the imagination.
I'VE are doing all we can," writes
Miss Rustin, here in our hospital try
ing to build up the weakened bodies
of famine sufferers who come to us
in frightful condition. We are getting
patients who have been trying to live
on grOund-up corn cobs and sweet po-
tato vines. We have all been asked
to give until it hurts, and now that 1t
has grown so cold we do not dare to
think of freezing, starving thousands
right at our door. In going to a soup
kitchen where we feed go people
twice a day, / was surrounded so by
the poor creatures that | thought they
would crush the life out of me before
| could get in and coming out 1t was
the same way. They are so hungry
and cold they are desperate. Person.
ally have gone without SO worth of
milk a month that used to use, do
not eat butter at all and have only
eaten bread once day for the last
three months, In order to give to the
famine poor. Through this personal
sacr7ce have the Joy of knowing that
three girls who might have been sold
have been saved from life of shame
and misery and that one man will be
kept alive for five months.
"a friend sent me a check the other
day and was able to save a girl from
being sold and she will be put in
school. Things are being started to
help these pour souls, but there is
long, hard pull until the harvest time.
You can all help by giving to the
China famine fund and share in the
great opportunities of saving life and
opening the way for Christianity, for
the Chinese people will surely be in
terested in what we have to tell them
of the gospel If we are good to them
now in their great trouble"
State Manager j. j. Handsaker, in
charge of the executive work for Ore
gon for the combined China Near
East campaign, 606 Stock Exchange
building, Portland, says the situation
is no less serious in the near east than
in China, and liberal funds must be
raised for both causes if wholesale
death by starvation is to be prevented,
or even lessened.