could Jesus come, when it is said He is
always with us; and how about the souls who died before Jesus came.
'At last the sun got low, and the Mandarin, with many words of
friendship, rode away, promising to come another day. But he never
came.'
In a later journey they had a very narrow escape from one of the
frequent perils of this tent life:--
'In Mongolia we had one rather serious adventure. The south edge of
the Plain is famed for storms, and the night we camped there, just
after dark, began one of the fiercest thunderstorms I can remember
having seen. The wind roared, the rain dashed, the tent quivered;
the thunder rattled with a metallic ring, like shafts of iron
dashing against each other, as it darted along a sheet-iron sky;
the water rose in the tent till part of our bed was afloat. It was
hardly possible to hear each other speak; but amid and above all
the din of the tempest rose one sound not to be mistaken, the roar
of rushing water. There was a river to right of us, but the sound
came more from the left. Venturing out, I found there was a great
swift-flowing river on both sides of us; that we could not move
from the little piece of elevated land plain on which we had our
tent; and that a few inches more water, or an obstacle getting into
the path of the upper river, would send the full force of the
current down on our tents. Flocks, herds, men are said to be swept
away now and again in Mongolia, and for an hour our case seemed
doubtful; but about 11 P.M. the storm ceased and the danger was
over, and, though we had hardly anything left, we went to sleep,
thanking God for His preserving mercy.'
Courageous, undoubtedly, Mrs. Gilmour was; her example of self-sacrifice
in the Master's cause was lofty in itself, and is stimulating to every
Christian mind. Yet it is to be greatly feared that the first of these
journeys aggravated, if it did not actually develope, the disease from
which she ultimately died. She found the ceaseless round of millet and
mutton so unpalatable as at the last to be able hardly to eat at all;
and experience of tent life was needful before she could realise how
absolutely devoid it was of almost everything that a European lady looks
upon as essential to daily existence, and thus make adequate preparation
for the life. Yet, in 1878, she not only accompanied her husba
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