of the
various schools were gathered, and I addressed them on "Faith, as Both
a Giving and a Taking"--a giving of one's self, and a taking of Christ
to be ours. Doctor Ashmore interpreted my talk to the audience,
sentence by sentence. The whole service was to me an inspiring
illustration of New Testament order and simplicity, for my address and
the sermon of Doctor Ashmore which followed had been preceded by free
participation of members of the church, in which one happy father arose
to give thanks for the birth of a girl-baby, after five sons had been
given him--a great change from the time when new-born girls were
despised and often thrown out into the street. This reverent
congregation, worshiping God in freedom and sincerity, seemed the
prophecy of a redeemed China. This congeries of schools, from
kindergarten to theological seminary, with Ashmore, Capen, Page, and
Waters for instructors, and Groesbeck, Speicher, Lewis, Foster, and
others for evangelists, has already permeated a whole province with
Christian teaching. It needs an institutional plant in the city, where
it already has a noble location, and it also needs a motor-launch to
carry its students to the field across the bay, where they can find
opportunity to win the multitude to Christ.

Even Swatow is partly Anglicized. We wished to see old China, heathen
China, and Brother Groesbeck gave us the opportunity. Only twenty miles
from Swatow lies the city of Chao-yang, where this pioneer missionary
has for eighteen years been stationed. Chao-yang is a larger city than
Swatow; the Chinese count it as containing a population of three hundred
thousand. It is the converging point of all the trade that reaches
Swatow from a hundred miles to the south and the west. Yet all this
trade is conducted through a narrow canal, so congested with boats that
there are innumerable delays. Even when the boats reach the waters of
the bay, the remaining channel is shallow for lack of dredging, and
launch-progress is very slow. We had ocular proof of this latter evil;
but we at last reached the dock.

Then came a reception entirely new to our experience, and one which we
can never forget. Eighty young men from the mission school met us, all
in white uniforms with sashes of blue. We passed through their lines,
forty boys on each side baring their heads as we passed. Then a
procession was formed. A brass band, with bugles and resounding drums,
led the way. The student escort follo