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Show i t T \ ^ . . _ _ T *9 Time: In on Tehchow, Shantung, C H I N A . Williams Porter Hospitals Training-School For Nurses. At the present rate of progress in things: scientific it may not long be necessary for me to use the commonplace medium of paper and typewriter to communicate with you dear people in the homeland, so far away in terms of miles, but ever near in spirit, thought, and love. My home papers and magazines tell me that many of you are sitting in your own homes in, the evening, "listening in" to music, lectures, sermons, and like sources of inspiration and amusement, and sometimes we, envy you,-since, we, though missionaries, are really very human folk!! But" after all, we see and experience much going on all around us out. here, which even your radios cannot broadcast for you, and so life gets evened up somewhat, io His big plan, Vacation days for the Hospital staff are over. We took them in turn, in the mountains or at the seashore, and trust we have stored up enough energy of body and grace of spirt to meet what the year shall hold for us. Many of yon who remember our flood days of 1917-18 will now be reading your' papers with especial interest. At writing our own compound is still safe, the nearest flood waters being some ten miles away, but some of our out-station villages are sadly involved, especially the En-hsien district, which has been under water for four successive years. One sometimes wonders why the; poor things do not pull up stakes, and transplant to other regions, but the' clan instinct is so strong, especially among the older people, that to leave the site of ancestral graves would be a living death to them. Chihli Province is particularly "hard hit," Numerous missionaries, civil engineers, and others have volunteered for flood investigation, and the famine relief work, that will inevitably follow as the winter wears on. To read of floods in the papers is one thing; it is quite another to ride on the train as I did when returning from my vacation for more than twenty miles south of Tientsin, with water on both sides of the track as far as I could see. And I assure you to live in the midst of water, as we did here for two years, is to hope you will never see; (or hear of) another flood. From the train I could see an occasional temple roof sticking up out of the water, but alas! the gods had not protected the; worshippers round about, and their little mud houses had melted down like chocolate creams. As at Tehchow in 1918, if passing under the telegraph wires in a boat, one would have to duck one's, head ! ! Breaks; in the; canal banks south and west of us have kept us safe this year, but, we do not like to think of the fate that befell others which saves us. It is difficult yet to give statistics, but one of the latest reports from the flood investigators is that at least 20 millions of people: are involved in Chihli Province alone. In our En-hsien district above mentioned between |