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of these other nations, which arouse the righteous indignation of the Chinese, will be the real cause of our troubles. Even the missionaries are sometimes deceived, and unsuspectingly entertain as guests some of this very class of people. A captain was here not long ago who secured some maps from a Chinese official who was an 'inquirer' at the mission. He supposed that any person whom the missionaries received into their homes could be trusted."

Miss Leffingwell in her letters continually referred to the deep-rooted feeling of bitterness that nearly all of the better class of Chinese have toward the foreigners because of the opium curse that hangs like a great cloud over the people and industries of China. She relates an experience she had with her teacher whom she knew quite well, and for whose conversion she was especially anxious. She says: "There had been a drought and unless rain soon came, there would be no rice crop. I knew my teacher really believed in God. He said to me repeatedly: 'Pray for rain, or there will be but little rice and what little there is will be so expensive that the people cannot purchase it.' I assured him that we were praying for rain every day. The rain did come, the rice grew and the crop was gathered.

"Then again when the weather was unfavorable for the opium crop he asked me to pray that God would make the weather favorable. 'But,' I objected, if the Lord gives favorable weather now for this crop, the opium will be gathered, and it is this that ruins so many of your people. Is not that true?' He hung his he'd and reluctantly ad

mitted that it was. "Then,' I replied, 'I cannot pray for favorable weather' and I earnestly talked to him about how wicked it was to raise opium that brought so much misery on his people. He listened, apparently very humbly for a few moments, and then drawing himself up with a dignity I cannot describe, and a look on his face as if the climax of hypocrisy was reached when we foreigners attempted to talk to the Chinese about their sins, and with his voice full of suppressed emotion, he said: "There was a time when China was prosperous and happy. They did not raise opium nor use it, but the English envied us our happiness and wealth. They sent us ships loaded with opium. We re fused to buy, but they persisted, and because we would not, they burned our cities and killed our people, until we were compelled to yield!'

"I well knew what he said was true, and now I in turn had to cover my face with my hands (literally 'I lost my face' or 'I had no face'). I tried to explain to him that Christians would not have done this, but he could not, or would not, distinguish between us, and said that we were all alike and both believe in the same God. He said his nation had never tried to ruin any other nation, and he believed the Chinese superior to others, and I was silenced."

During these troublous times the missionaries were always closely watched and it was not unusual for men to be hanging around both their houses and their schools under one pretext or another who were actual spies, sent there by the officials. Miss Leffingwell writes about this as follows: "Just

before the riots men who looked to me as if they were spies, would come to the door of our girls' school compound which always stood open by day. The first sounds they would hear would be the cheerful voices of happy children committing their lessons to memory. When they would peer around, they would see healthy children, a smiling teacher, and well-fed and well-clothed servants. I went to the door myself one day and asked one of these men what he wanted. They usually all have the same excuse. They want some medicine. A dear little child of about four years old leaned up against me confidingly, and looking at the man, repeated my answer in her little, babylike prattle: 'Yes, the medicine is over at the other hall for men.' His face softened up, and I thought I saw an approving look at what he had seen and heard, and he contentedly walked away."

Amidst all the excitement just preceding the "Boxer" outbreak, Miss Leffingwell passed her sixth and final examination in the Chinese language. She did not, however, receive her certificate as a "Senior Missionary" until February, 1901, because she must have been in actual service in China as a missionary five years before she was entitled to receive it.

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CHAPTER XIX.

EXPERIENCES WITH THE RIOTERS.

As trees of sandalwood make sweet
The ax that lays them low,
Let love enable thee to greet

With friendliness thy foe;

And though he smite thee, still to meet
With blessing every blow.

-Rose Mills Powers.

O ye who joined but yesterday
The holy martyr throng,

Ye wear your crowns serene as they
Whose brows have borne them long.

We know not what indignity

Ye suffered ere the last;
We know He bore you company
While through the flame you passed.

We ask no shaft to mark the place

Where earth received her trust,-
We ask instead that flowers of grace
May blossom from your dust.

Our heads are bowed, our eyes are dim,
Our hearts are rent with pain:
But ye who dared and died for Him
Nor dared nor died in vain.

-Edward N. Pomeroy.

Do you think that I fear you, Goodman Death?
Then, Sire, you do not know,

1

For your grim, white face and your frosty breath
And your dark eyes browed with snow
Bring naught to me but a signal of love;
My Father sent you. He dwelleth above,
And I am ready to go.

-Mabel Lala Eaton.

The riots at Yun-nan Fu began on June 10, 1900. It would appear that the persistent and unlawful course of the French officials was made the occasion for the trouble that came to the missionaries in the province of Yun-nan. Miss Leffingwell was a born diplomat in her personal intercourse with the Chinese, and had a very remarkable way of winning the favor of all the natives with whom she had social intercourse, yet she made no pretensions to a thorough understanding of international relations.

It did not require much discernment, however, to discover where one should look for the real cause of all this trouble that came to these missionaries during that memorable June. Miss Leffingwell writes as follows: "The immediate cause of the riots here was the coming of Frenchmen with about fifty horse-loads of merchandise, believed by the Chinese and by the missionaries to be firearms and ammunition. When these loads of merchandise had arrived at Meng-tse (on the border between French Tonkin and the province of Yun-nan), the French in charge of the goods had refused to have them inspected by the Chinese custom officials, and they had forced their way past the custom inspection. The goods therefore lacked the usual seals of the Chinese customs when they reached Yun-nan.

"Moreover, the officials at Meng-tse had tele

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