ning,
noon, and night have been full of sightseeing, of visiting mission
churches and schools, of "chotas," or little breakfasts, of "tiffins" or
substantial lunches, or afternoon-teas and dinners at the close of the
day. The social and kindly spirit of it all has turned what otherwise
would have been wearisome into a succession of pleasant experiences. But
there has been work, and there has been hard thinking also. Making three
addresses a day, longer or shorter, for three weeks in succession, is no
sinecure. I am sometimes called an "octogeranium," but I have not been
permitted to waste my sweetness on the desert air. It is a wonder to me
that I have survived so much stress and rushing, but I am compelled to
say that good appetite and good sleep have made me feel in better health
and spirits than for many months before.

What I have seen has gladdened my eyes and warmed my heart. Closer
contact with mission work and mission workers has broadened my ideas,
given me more sympathy, more zeal, and more hope. The vastness of these
heathen populations, their appalling needs, together with their infinite
possibilities, have dawned upon me as never before. Burma has sixty
millions of people. It is a most fruitful land, never visited by the
famines which ravage India proper, the land west of the Bay of Bengal.
It enshrines a religion which, with all its ignorance and superstition,
is more free from gross immorality than that which prevails on the other
side of the bay. Its people are the most heterogeneous of any upon
earth. Though the proud Burman native is still the dominant power, he
has now to compete with the rising intelligence of the Karens, the
sturdiness of the Chinese, and the subtlety of the Hindus. These last
two peoples have in late years in large numbers migrated hither.
Mohammedan mosques are rising side by side with the older Buddhist
pagodas. The Parsees are numerous and influential, and theosophists
are not rare. Rangoon is probably the capital city of Buddhism, for
here at any rate is its most splendid temple. And Rangoon is a sort of
melting-pot of all races. Burmans and Chinese are intermarrying, and
are producing a most vigorous offspring. Sikhs and Malays, by their
peculiar dress, make picturesque the streets. I know of no greater
mixture of races, unless it is in the city of New York, where we have
more Jews than there are in Jerusalem, and more Italians than there
are in Rome. Here in Rangoon, however,