1928 (3 of 3)

Methodist Mission
South Gate
Tientsin, China
February 26th, 1928
Dear Friends of the Nanchang Hospital:
Back to Nanchang has Qeen the urge for a long time. A
lull in the military situation here in the north.,justifled my leav~
ing the family, and the Chinese New Year vacation in the school
made it possible for me to leave the work here. And so I have open
able to satisfy the urge.
It was a long trip. First, there was the rail journey
of about six hundred miles to Tsingtao, a magnificent port that
Germany made in her day out he r e, The signs there, "Keep to the
Right" looked good. Elsewhere in China it is, "Keep to the Left."
From this port to Shanghai there was a thirty-six hour boat trip on
the China Sea upon which Neptune seemed to vent his spite, From
Shanghai the next lap of the trip extended up the yellow Yangtze
for three days. A stop over night in the "City of Nine Rivers",
and a five-hour, tedious journey on rail ended the journey across
from Nanchang. On the way back I ran into military activity on the
railroad up here. Repeatedly our train was sidetracked for mili~
tary freights filled with soldiers, and then we had to go and run
into a wreckt We were thirty hours late. And it was cold. To
keep at all comfortable I had to keep putting on extra layers of
~lothes until at last I had on eight layers! 1 I was glad,I had
my baggage with me in the train compartment.
But this trip was much pleasanter than my retarn to
Nanchang last spring. The Chinese everywhere were not hostile,
and in many places were friendly. That air of apprehension and
alarm was lacking. The river boats pulled up alongside the hul~s
as they used to do, to load and unload. The business offices on
shore were open and doing business. The coolies were reasonable
in their charges, A chance to work seemed to be the controlling
desire..
Back in Nanchang I had a most cordial welcome. The
Chinese did the best they could to make me comfortable, even offer~
ing to give me "foreign style" food to eat. It was a great encour~
agement to see Doctor Wu again and to see how he had maintained
the work of the hospi tal. Time and aga.in it had.s eemed almost cer~
tain that the soldiers passing thru the city would succeed in their
demands to occufY the hospitals but always he succeeded in keeping
them out. The rest of the 'staff had passed thru petty differences
but had come to support Dr.. Wu completely.. When the finances ran
low last year they took a cut in their salaries and with Dr, Wu
raised nearly a thousand dollars from local friends of the hospital.
In these times when war, taxes, and misfortune have so heavily
drained the purse of the people, to get gifts like these reveals a
very cordial attitude toward the hospital on the part of the respect~
a.ble Chinese of the community. Another evidence of this attitude is
a grant of Two Hundred and Fifty Mexican dollars a month to the hos~
pital from the local branch of the International Famine Relief Com~
mi ttee. The grati tude f or the ext ens ive relief work done by the