.
"Why leave spaces with dotted lines? Why not write the whole fact?"
wrote one who did not know what she asked. Once more we repeat it, to
write the whole fact is impossible.

It is true this is not universal; in our part of the country it is not
general, for the Temple child is considered of too much value to be
lightly injured. But it is true beyond a doubt that inhumanity which may
not be described is possible at any time in any Temple house.

Out in the garden little groups of missionaries walked together and
talked. From a room near came the sound of a hymn. It was peaceful and
beautiful everywhere, and the gold of sunset filled the air, and made
the garden a glory land of radiant wonderful colour. But for one woman
at least the world turned black. Only the thought of the children nerved
her to go on.

CHAPTER XXXII

The Power behind the Work

"To Him difficulties are as nothing, and
improbabilities of less than no account."--_Story
of the China Inland Mission._

THE Power behind the work is the interposition of God in answer to
prayer.

Recently--so recently that it would be unwise to go into detail--we were
in trouble about a little girl of ten or eleven, who, though not a
Temple child, was exposed to imminent danger, and sorely needed
deliverance. I happened to be alone at Dohnavur at the time, and did not
know what to answer to the child's urgent message: "If I can escape to
you" (this meant if she braved capture and its consequences, and fled
across the fields alone at night), "can you protect me from my people?"
To say "Yes" might have had fatal results. To say "No" seemed too
impossible. The circumstances were such that great care was needed to
avoid being entangled in legal complications; and as the Collector
(Chief Magistrate) for our part of the district happened just then to be
in our neighbourhood, I wrote asking for an appointment. Early next
morning we met by the roadside. I had been up most of the night, and was
tired and anxious; and I shall never forget the comfort that came
through the quiet sympathy with which one who was quite a stranger to
us all listened to the story, not as if it were a mere missionary
trifle, but something worthy his attention. But nothing could be done.
It was not a case where we had any ground for appeal to the law; and any
attempt upon our part to help the child could only have resulted in more
trouble afterwards, for we s