the ladies of the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, who had charge of this hospital, were the only Europeans living within the walls of Peshawur. Every night the great city gates closed them in, and separated them from other missionaries and from Government servants. They chose to be in the midst of their work, and though outbreaks of Mohammedan fanaticism repeatedly checked teaching in schools and zenanas, ministry to the sick continued, and never lost the friendly confidence of Peshawuris.

(Photo supplied by the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society.)

STAFF AND PATIENTS OF ST. CATHERINE'S HOSPITAL, AMRITSAR.

In its early and humbler days, the fame of this hospital reached far-away Khorassan. A lady of that country who was suffering terribly, caused herself to be carried the fifteen days' journey to Peshawur. Miss Mitcheson, who opened the first dispensary, and is now the head of the hospital, saw that her case was critical and required an operation of a far more serious kind than she had ever attempted, and begged her to allow the civil surgeon to see her.

"I would rather die," the patient answered. The combined forces of suffering, fear of death, and persuasion, were powerless to move her. The Englishwoman, of whose powers she had heard in her own country, might do what she liked with her, but no man should come near her. Happily Miss Mitcheson successfully accomplished what was necessary, and the Khorassan lady made a good recovery. When the time came for parting from her new friends, she promised to use in her own country the knowledge she had gained in Peshawur. She kept her word, as more visitors from Khorassan testified, and they said she had not forgotten the benefits she had received in the mission hospital.

(Photo supplied by the Church Missionary Society.)

BACK VIEW OF NEW WOMEN'S HOSPITAL, HANGCHOW.

During Miss Mitcheson's absence in England Dr. Charlotte Wheeler, who with her fellow-workers, in the illustration on p. 102, stands in the verandah of the old building, superintended the medical work. On Miss Mitcheson's return, Miss Wheeler opened a medical mission amongst the women in Quetta. This work extended rapidly on and beyond the frontier, so that in November, 1896, when it was a year old, eight different languages were spoken on the same day in the dispensary waiting room.

Institutions for training Christian girls of India as doctors or nurses have come into existence as the number of candidates has increased and the necessity has arisen. The North India School of Medicine has been established at Ludhiana with this object. Many of the mission hospitals also have training classes. St. Catherine's Hospital, Amritsar, under the superintendence of Miss Hewlett, who has had nineteen years' experience, has provided very valuable assistant medical missionaries for stations in the Punjab and Bengal. At the last census a hundred Christian women—counting missionaries, assistants, patients, nurses and students—were within its walls. An illustration shows the inmates mustering before going to church.

One student in St. Catherine's Hospital, who had gained a scholarship, gave promise of a brilliant career. Before the time of study in which she delighted was over, the lady superintendent became suspicious of what this young girl described as broken chilblains on her fingers. A doctor was called in, and confirmed her impression that it was leprosy. An Eastern girl knows, what in Europe is only faintly imagined, of the horrors of this loathsome disease. One cry of anguish only escaped her when she was told the verdict. Then she rose above the trial, and resigned herself cheerfully to the will of God. She was prepared to start the next day for the Leper Settlement near Calcutta without meeting her friends or fellow-students for a word of farewell.

"What comforts me," she said to the Clerical Secretary of the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, who was in Amritsar at the time, "is that I may go as a missionary rather than as a patient."

She went to that place of death and banishment, to live out the rest of her days in ministry for others. In her case the days lingered into years, and the disease took a severe form, but her devotion and courage never failed. When death came to her as a friend, and her work was done, the memory of the "superior girl," who had lived among the afflicted people as a missionary rather than a patient, remained. Perhaps her fellowship in suffering gave her the final qualification to be a missionary to lepers.

India is the land which above all others cries out for lady medical missionaries; but other Eastern countries have also a claim. Wherever Islam has planted its iron heel, women are jealously guarded in harems, and it is very unusual for a man to be allowed entrance on any pretext. In China, also, women of superior class are hidden within the high walls that surround their houses. Those free to go out gain little but suffering from the barbarous attentions of native surgeons. In the East the knowledge which brings relief from pain is a power to overcome obstacles to Christianity that resist every other force.

The Church of England Zenana Missionary Society has sent out a qualified lady doctor to Foochow, and in 1894 the Church Missionary Society opened a hospital for women in Hangchow with one large and six smaller wards. One patient who was brought into this building—of which two views are given—suffering from diseased bones, has gone out to devote her recovered health and new knowledge to the service of God and her own countrywomen.

(Photo supplied by the Church Missionary Society.)

INTERIOR OF NEW WOMEN'S HOSPITAL, HANGCHOW

There is scarcely a mission hospital or dispensary that cannot tell of similar results of the double ministry to body and soul. Each year justifies the increased number of women with medical qualifications sent into the mission field. Some, like Mrs. Russell Watson, of the Baptist Mission at Chefu, are the wives of missionaries, others have been sent out by various missions, such as the Zenana Bible and Medical Mission, or by the women's branches (added during the close of the present century), to the more venerable societies.

Dr. Henry Martyn Clark, of Amritsar, once asked a friendly Hindu what department of foreign missions his people considered most dangerous.

"Why should I reveal our secrets to the enemy?" the Hindu responded. But he yielded to persuasion. "We do not very much fear your preaching," he said, "for we need not listen; nor your schools, for we need not send our children; nor your books, for we need not read them. But we do fear your women, for they are gaining our homes; and we very much fear your medical missions, for they are gaining our hearts. Hearts and homes gone, what shall we have left?"

What may be expected when medical and women's missions are combined? According to the friendly Hindu, the very citadels of idolatry and superstition might tremble at the advance of this double force to rescue the captives.

D. L. Woolmer.