THE HOTEL MISSIONARY MEETING.
"It was an elegant sewing-meeting," Marty confided to her mother when
she got home Tuesday evening, "and it wasn't a bit like that one Aunt
Henrietta had the last time we were in Rochester. I liked this one best.
There, you know, the ladies came all dressed up, carrying little velvet
or satin work-bags, and we just had thin bread and butter and such
things for tea--nothing very good. Here some of the ladies--of course I
mean the ones from the village--came in calico dresses and sun-bonnets.
And they were so free and easy--sewed fast and talked fast while they
were there; and then if they had to go home a little bit, they'd just
pop on their bonnets and off they'd go. Mrs. Clarkson thought it was
going to rain, and she ran home to take in her wash, and another lady
went home two or three times to see how her dinner was getting on.
"Some of them stayed at the hotel to dinner, and all that did stay
brought something with them, pies mostly, though some brought pickles,
preserves, and frosted cake. And every time Mrs. Dutton saw something
being smuggled through the hall she'd call out,
"'Now I told you not to bring anything. The dinner is _my_ part of this
missionary meeting.'
"Then they'd all laugh. They were all real kind and pleasant. And such a
dinner! I do believe we had some of _everything_. And supper was just
the same way."
The hotel, though the boast of the surrounding country, was a very plain
establishment, being nothing more than a tolerably large, simply
furnished frame house accommodating about forty persons. But it was
bright and home-like and beautifully situated.
"Mrs. Thurston's meeting," as they called it, was held in the large,
uncarpeted dining-room, and the dinner tables were set in the shady back
yard.
The sewing-room was a busy scene, with Miss Dora and two other ladies
making the machines whir and groups of workers getting material ready
for the machines or "finishing off." Mrs. Thurston, appealed to from all
sides, quietly directed the work,--while Miss Fanny was here, there, and
everywhere, helping everybody. Almira heard, in the course of the day,
that Miss Fanny was quite wealthy, that she had contributed a great deal
towards getting up the box, and was going to pay the freight.
There were several children besides Marty and Evaline. They were
employed to run errands, pass articles from one person to another, and
fold the smaller pieces of clothing as they were completed. As the day
wore on and the novelty of the thing wore off, most of the children got
tired and went out to play; but Marty, though she ran out a few minutes
occasionally, spent most of the time in the work-room, keeping as close
as possible to Mrs. Thurston, to whom she had taken a great fancy.
Soon after dinner Miss Fanny came to Mrs. Thurston and said,
"Now, Mrs. Thurston, if you don't get out of this commotion a while you
will have one of your bad headaches. Do go out in the air. We can get on
without you for an hour."
So Mrs. Thurston took Marty and went into the grove back of the house,
and it was while sitting there on a rustic seat, with the magnificent
view spread out before them, that they had their missionary talk.
[Illustration: While sitting there on a rustic seat ... they had their
missionary talk. Page 158.]
Mrs. Thurston described her home in Southern India, and spoke of the
kind of work she and her husband did there--how he preached and taught
in the city and surrounding villages; how she instructed children in the
schools, and visited the ignorant women, both rich and poor, in their
homes. Often, when not able to leave home on account of her children,
she had classes of poor women in her _compound_, as the yards around the
houses in India are called. She also spent a good deal of time giving
her servants religious instruction.
"You know," she said, "it is very, very hot there, and we Americans can
only endure the heat by being very careful. At best we sometimes get
sick, and we must do all we can to save ourselves up to teach and
preach. That's what we go there for. If we should cook or do any work of
that kind, we should die; so we employ the natives, who are accustomed
to the heat, to do these things for us. Then, these servants will each
do only one kind of work. That is, the sweeper wont do any cooking or
washing; the man who buys the food and waits on the table wont do
anything else."
"That's very queer," said Marty.
"Yes, but it is their way. So we are obliged to have several servants.
But then the wages are very low. Altogether it does not cost any more,
perhaps not as much, as one good girl would in this country. They are a
great deal of trouble, too. They are not, as a rule, very honest or
faithful, and they have, of course, all the heathen vices, and sometimes
we have much worry with them. But what I was going to say is, that we do
our best to teach these servants about God. We used to have them come
in to prayers every day, and on Sunday I would collect them on the
veranda and try to teach them verses of Scripture, which I would explain
over and over again. On these occasions a good many poor, lame, blind
people from the neighborhood would also come. These people were so
densely ignorant that it was hard to make them understand anything, but
in some cases I think the light did get into their minds."
Then Mrs. Thurston told of the death of her three dear little children,
and Marty felt very, very sorry for her when she spoke of the three
little graves in that distant land.
"Haven't you any living children?" she asked.
"Yes, two. One of my sons is a missionary in Ceylon, and the other, with
whom I live, is a minister in New York State."
Then, it appeared, after many years of labor in that hot climate, the
health of both Mr. and Mrs. Thurston broke down, and they were obliged
to leave the work they loved and come back to America. In a short time
Mr. Thurston died.
Marty found out, somewhat to her surprise, that the "big society" her
band was connected with was not the only one. Mrs. Thurston belonged to
an entirely different one, and the young ladies, Fanny, Dora, and Mary,
to still another.
"You see we belong to different religious denominations," said Mrs.
Thurston, "and each denomination has its own Society or Board."
"This Nebraska missionary, now," suggested Marty, "I suppose he belongs
to your de--whatever it is."
"Denomination," said Mrs. Thurston, smiling. "No, he belongs to yours."
"Yet you are all working for him!" exclaimed Marty.
"Of course. It would not do for these different families of Christians
to keep in their own little pens all the time and never help each other.
But as yet it has been found best for each denomination to have its own
missionary society, though there are some Union Societies, and perhaps
in coming years it may be all union."
"Now there's this mountain band," said Marty reflectively. "The people
in it are not all the same kind. I mean some are Methodists, and some
are Presbyterians, and the Smiths are Baptists. I heard Ruth say she
didn't know what would be best to do with their money."
She afterwards heard Ruth consulting Mrs. Thurston about the matter, and
the latter spoke of one of these union societies. Ruth said she would
speak to the others and see if they would wish to send their funds
there.
By half-past four a great deal of work had been done, and the new
garments were piled up on a table in the corner of the room. Though
needles were still flying, taking last stitches, the hard-driven
machines were silent, having run out of work, as Miss Fanny said. In the
comparative quiet Ruth was heard singing softly over her work.
"Sing louder, Ruth," said Almira, and Ruth more audibly, but still
softly, sang,
"From Greenland's icy mountains."
One voice after another took up the refrain, and by the time the second
line was reached the old hymn was sent forth on the air as a grand
chorus. The children came up on the porch, the girls came out of the
kitchen to listen. The customers in Sims' store and the loungers around
the blacksmith's shop stopped talking as the sound reached them.
When the last strains died away, and before talking could be resumed,
Ruth said,
"Marty, wont you say those verses you said at our last band meeting?"
"I'll say them if the ladies would like to hear them," said Marty, who
was not at all timid, and knew the verses very thoroughly, having
recited them at the anniversary of her own band.
The ladies desired very much to hear them, and, taking her stand at one
end of the room, she repeated very nicely those well-known lines
beginning,
"An aged woman, poor and weak,
She heard the mission teacher speak;
The slowly-rolling tears came down
Upon her withered features brown:
'What blessed news from yon far shore!
Would I had heard it long before!'"
"How touching that is!" said one of the hotel ladies, and Mrs. Sims was
seen to wipe her eyes with the pillow-slip she was seaming.
"Mrs. Thurston," said Miss Fanny, who saw that a good start on a foreign
missionary meeting had been made, and was not willing to let the
opportunity be lost, "when you were in India did you meet many persons
who were anxious to hear the gospel, or were they mainly indifferent?"
In replying to this question Mrs. Thurston told many interesting things
that had come under her observation, and this led to further questions
from others, so they had quite a long talk on missionary work both in
India and other countries. Finally one of the boarders asked,
"Well, do you think the world ever will be converted to Christianity?"
"I know it will," replied Mrs. Thurston; and she quoted, "All the ends
of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord; and all kindreds of
the nations shall worship before thee."
FANNY. "For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall
bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God."
DORA. "The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the
waters cover the sea."
RUTH. "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river
unto the ends of the earth."
"Dora, Dora," said Miss Fanny, with an imperative little gesture,
"'Jesus shall reign'"--
Miss Dora obediently began to sing,
"Jesus shall reign where'er the sun
Does his successive journeys run,"
and was at once joined by the others.
"Now, dear friends," said Mrs. Thurston, when the hymn was finished,
"upon this, the only occasion we are all likely to be together, shall we
not unite in asking God to hasten the coming of this glorious time, and
ask for his blessing on our humble attempts to work in this cause?"
Work was dropped and every head bowed, as Mrs. Thurston uttered fervent
words of prayer that the Lord would fill all their hearts with love for
missions, and that he would permit them to do something towards helping
in the work. She prayed especially for the children who were engaged in
missionary work, and asked that they might have grace given them to
devote their whole lives to the service of God.
"Well," said Mrs. Clarkson, as she was leaving, "this has been a right
down pleasant meeting, and I think the last part was just about the
best."