Some of Mackay's happiest days were spent with his students. He was such
a wonder of a man for work himself that he inspired every one else to
do his best, so the young men made rapid strides with their lessons. No
matter how busy he was, and he was surely one of the busiest men that
ever lived, he somehow found time for them.
Sometimes in his house, sometimes on the road, by the seashore, under
a banyan tree, here and there and everywhere, the missionary and his
pupils held their classes. If he went on a journey, they accompanied him
and studied by the way. And it was a familiar sight on north Formosan
roads or field paths to see Mackay, always with his book in one hand and
his big ebony stick under his arm, walking along surrounded by a group
of young men.
Sometimes there were as many as twenty in the student-band, but
somewhere in the country a new church would open, and the brightest of
the class would be called away to be its minister. But just as often a
young Christian would come to the missionary and ask if he too might not
be trained to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Whether at home or abroad, pupils and teacher had to resort to all sorts
of means to get away for an uninterrupted hour together. For Kai Bok-su
was always in demand to visit the sick or sad or troubled.
There was a little kitchen separate from the house on the bluff, and
over this Mackay with his students built a second story. And here they
would often slip away for a little quiet time together. One night, about
eleven o'clock, Mackay was here alone poring over his books. The young
men had gone home to bed except two or three who were in the kitchen
below. Some papers had been dropped over a pipe-hole in the floor of the
room where Mackay was studying, and for some time he had been disturbed
by a rustling among them. At last without looking up, he called to his
boys below: "I think there are rats up here among my papers!"
Koa Kau, one of the younger of the students, ran lightly up the stairs
to give battle to the intruders. What was his horror when he saw fully
three feet of a monster serpent sticking up through the pipe-hole and
waving its horrible head in the air just a little distance from Kai
Bok-su's chair.
The boy gave a shout, darted down the stair, and with a sharp stick,
pinned the body of the snake to the wall below. The creature became
terribly violent, but Koa Kau held on valiantly and Mackay seized an
old Chinese spear that happened to be in the room above and pierced
the serpent through the head. They pulled its dead body down into the
kitchen below and spread it out. It measured nine feet. The students
would not rest until it was buried, and the remembrance of the horrible
creature's visit for some time spoiled the charm of the little upper
room.
The rocks at Kelung harbor were another favorite spot for this little
traveling university to hold its classes. Sometimes they would take
their dinner and row out in a little sampan to the rocks outside the
harbor and there, undisturbed, they would study the whole day long.
They always began the day's work with a prayer and a hymn of praise, and
no matter what subjects they might study, most of the time was spent on
the greatest of books. After a hard morning's work each one would gather
sticks, make a fire, and they would have their dinner of vegetables,
rice, and pork or buffalo-meat. Then there were oysters, taken fresh off
the rocks, to add to their bill of fare.
At five in the afternoon, when the strain of study was beginning to
tell, they would vary the program. One or two of the boys would take
a plunge into the sea and bring up a subject for study,--a shell, some
living coral, sea-weed, sea-urchins, or some such treasure. They would
examine it, and Kai Bok-su, always delighted when on a scientific
subject, would give them a lesson in natural history. And he saw with
joy how the wonders of the sea and land opened these young men's minds
to understand what a great and wonderful God was theirs, who had made
"the heaven and the earth and the sea, and all that in them is."
When they visited a chapel in the country, they had a daily program
which they tried hard to follow. They studied until four o'clock every
afternoon and all were trained in speaking and preaching. After four
they made visits together to Christians or heathen, speaking always a
word for their Master. Every evening a public service was held at which
Mackay preached. These sermons were an important part of the young men's
training, for he always treated the gospel in a new way. A Hoa, who was
Mackay's companion for the greater part of sixteen years, stated that he
had never heard Kai Bok-su preach the same sermon twice.
On the whole the students liked their college best when it was moving.
For on the road, while their principal gave much time to the Bible and
how to present the gospel, he would enliven their walks by conversing
about everything by the way and making it full of interest. The
structure of a wayside flower, the geological formation of an
overhanging rock, the composition of the soil of the tea plantations,
the stars that shone in the sky when night came down upon them;--all
these made the traveling college a delight.
Although his days were crammed with work, Mackay found time to make
friends among the European population of the island. They all liked and
admired him, and many of them tried to help the man who was giving his
life and strength so completely to others. They were familiar with his
quick, alert figure passing through the streets of Tamsui, with his
inevitable book and his big ebony cane. And they would smile and say,
"There goes Mackay; he's the busiest man in China." (*)
* See CHAPTER XIII, Formosa becomes Japanese territory.
The British consul in the old Dutch fort and the English commissioner
of customs proved true and loyal friends. The representatives of foreign
business firms, too, were always ready to lend him a helping hand where
possible. His most useful friends were the foreign medical men. They
helped him very much. They not only did all they could for his own
recovery when malaria attacked him, but they helped also to cure his
patients. Traveling scientists always gave him a visit to get his help
and advice. He had friends that were shipcaptains, officers, engineers,
merchants, and British consuls. Everybody knew the wonderful Kai Bok-su.
"Whirlwind Mackay," some of them called him, and they knew and admired
him with the true admiration that only a brave man can inspire.
The friends to whom he turned for help of the best kind were the English
Presbyterians in south Formosa. They, more than any others, knew his
trials and difficulties. They alone could enter with true sympathy into
all his triumphs. At one time Dr. Campbell, one of the south Formosan
missionaries, paid him a visit. He proved a delightful companion, and
together the two made a tour of the mission stations. Dr. Campbell
preached wherever they went and was a great inspiration to the people,
as well as to the students and to the missionary himself.
One evening, when they were in Kelung, Mackay, with his insatiable
desire to use every moment, suggested that they spend ten days without
speaking English, so that they might improve their Chinese. Dr. Campbell
agreed, and they started their "Chinese only." Next morning from the
first early call of "Liong tsong khi lai," "All, all, up come," not one
word of their native tongue did they speak. They had a long tramp that
morning and there was much to talk about and the conversation was all in
Chinese, according to the bargain. Dr. Campbell was ahead, and after
an hour's talk he suddenly turned upon his companion: "Mackay!" he
exclaimed, "this jabbering in Chinese is ridiculous, and two Scotchmen
should have more sense; let us return to our mother tongue." Which
advice Mackay gladly followed.
His next visitor was the Rev. Mr. Ritchie from south Formosa, one of the
friends who had first introduced him to his work. Every day of his visit
was a joy. With nine of Mackay's students, the two missionaries set out
on a trip through the north Formosa mission that lasted many weeks.
But the more pleasant and helpful such companionship was the more alone
Mackay felt when it was over. His task was becoming too much for one
man. He was wanted on the northern coast, at the southern boundary of
his mission field, and away on the Kap-tsu-lan plain all at once. He
was crowded day and night with work. What with preaching, dentistry,
attending the sick, training his students, and encouraging the new
churches, he had enough on his hands for a dozen missionaries.
But now at last the Church at home, in far-away Canada, bestirred
herself to help him. They had been hearing something of the wonderful
mission in Formosa, but they had heard only hints of it, for Mackay
would not confess how he was toiling day and night and how the work
had grown until he was not able to overtake it alone. But the Church
understood something of his need, and they now sent him the best present
they could possibly give,--an assistant. Just three years after Mackay
had landed in Formosa, the Rev. J. B. Fraser, M. D., and his wife and
little ones arrived. He was a young man, too, vigorous and ready for
work. Besides being an ordained minister, he was a physician as well,
just exactly what the north Formosan mission needed.
Along with the missionary, the Church had sent funds for a house for him
and also one for Mackay. So the poor old Chinese house on the bluff was
replaced by a modern, comfortable dwelling, and by its side another was
built for the new missionary and his family. One room of Mackay's house
was used as a study for his students.
After the houses were built and the new doctor was able to use the
language, he began to fill a long-felt want. Mackay had always done a
little medical work, and the foreign doctor of Tamsui had been most kind
in giving his aid, but a doctor of his own, a missionary doctor, was
exactly what Kai Bok-su wanted. Soon the sick began to hear of the
wonders the missionary doctor could perform, and they flocked to him to
be cured.
It must not be supposed that there were not already doctors in north
Formosa. There were many in Tamsui alone, and very indignant they were
at this new barbarian's success. But the native doctors were about the
worst trouble that the people had to bear. Their medical knowledge, like
their religion, was a mixture of ignorance and superstition, and some
of their practises would have been inexcusable except for the fact that
they themselves knew no better. There were two classes of medical men;
those who treated internal diseases and those who professed to cure
external maladies. It was hard to judge which class did the more
mischief, but perhaps the "inside doctors" killed more of their
patients. Dog's flesh was prescribed as a cure for dyspepsia, a chip
taken from a coffin and boiled and the water drunk was a remedy
for catarrh, and an apology made to the moon was a specific for
wind-roughened skin. For the dreaded malaria, the scourge of Formosa,
the young Canadian doctor found many and amazing remedies prescribed,
some worse than the disease itself. The native doctors believed malaria
to be caused by two devils in a patient, one causing the chills, the
other the fever. One of the commonest remedies, and one that was quite
as sensible as any of the rest, was to tie seven hairs plucked from a
black dog around the sick one's wrist.
But when the barbarian doctor opened his dispensary in Tamsui, a new
era dawned for the poor sick folk of north Formosa. The work went on
wonderfully well and Mackay found so much more time to travel in the
country that the gospel spread rapidly.
But just when prospects were looking so fair and every one was happy
and hopeful, a sad event darkened the bright outlook of the two
missionaries. The young doctor had cured scores of cases, and had
brought health and happiness to many homes, but he was powerless to keep
death from his own door.
And one day, a sad day for the mission of north Formosa, the mother
was called from husband and little ones to her home and her reward in
heaven.
So the home on the bluff, the beautiful Christian home, which was
a pattern for all the Chinese, was broken up. The young doctor was
compelled to leave his patients, and taking his motherless children he
returned with them to Canada.
The church at home sent out another helper. The Rev. Kenneth Junor
arrived one year later, and once more the work received a fresh impetus.
And then, just about two years after Mr. Junor's arrival, Kai Bok-su
found an assistant of his own right in Formosa, and one who was destined
to become a wonderful help to him. And so one bright day, there was a
wedding in the chapel of the old Dutch fort, where the British consul
married George Leslie Mackay to a Formosan lady. Tui Chhang Mai, her
name had been. She was of a beautiful Christian character and for a long
time she had been a great help in the church. But as Mrs. Mackay she
proved a marvelous assistance to her husband.
It had long been a great grief to the missionary that, while the men
would come in crowds to his meetings, the poor women had to be left at
home. Sometimes in a congregation of two hundred there would be only two
or three women. Chinese custom made it impossible for a man missionary
to preach to the women. Only a few of the older ones came out. So the
mothers of the little children did not hear about Jesus and so could not
teach their little ones about him.
But now everything was changed for them. They had a lady-missionary, and
one of their own people too. The Mackays went on a wedding-trip through
the country. Kai Bok-su walked, as usual, and his wife rode in a
sedan-chair. The wedding-trip was really a missionary tour; for they
visited all the chapels, and the women came to the meetings in crowds,
because they wanted to hear and see the lady who had married Kai Bok-su.
Often, after the regular meetings when the men had gone away, the women
would crowd in and gather round Mrs. Mackay and she would tell them the
story of Jesus and his love.
It was a wonderful wedding-journey and it brought a double blessing
wherever the two went. Their experiences were not all pleasant. One
day they traveled over a sand plain so hot that Mackay's feet were
blistered. Another time they were drenched with rain. One afternoon
there came up a terrific wind storm. It blew Mrs. Mackay's sedan-chair
over and sent her and the carriers flying into the mud by the roadside.
At another place they all barely escaped drowning when crossing a
stream. But the brave young pair went through it all dauntlessly. The
wife had caught something of her husband's great spirit of sacrifice,
and he was always the man on fire, utterly forgetful of self.
For two years they worked happily together and at last a great day came
to Kai Bok-su. He had been nearly eight years in Formosa. It was time he
came home, the Church in Canada said, for a little rest and to tell the
people at home something of his great work.
And so he and his Formosan wife said good-by, amid tears and regrets on
all sides, and leaving Mr. Junor in charge with A Hoa to help, they
set sail for Canada. It was just a little over seven years since he had
settled in that little hut by the river, despised and hated by every one
about him; and now he left behind him twenty chapels, each with a native
preacher over it, and hundreds of warm friends scattered over all north
Formosa.
He was not quite the same Mackay who had stood on the deck of the
America seven years before. His eyes were as bright and daring as ever
and his alert figure as full of energy, but his face showed that his
life had been a hard one. And no wonder, for he had endured every kind
of hardship and privation in those seven years. He had been mobbed times
without number. He had faced death often, and day and night since his
first year on the island his footsteps had been dogged by the torturing
malaria.
But he was still the great, brave Mackay and his home-coming was like
the return of a hero from battle. He went through Canada preaching in
the churches, and his words were like a call to arms. He swept over the
country like one of his own Formosan winds, carrying all before him.
Wherever he preached hearts were touched by his thrilling tales, and
purses opened to help in his work. Queen's University made him a Doctor
of Divinity; Mrs. Mackay, a lady of Detroit, gave him money enough to
build a hospital; and his home county, Oxford, presented him with $6,215
with which to build a college.
He visited his old home and had many long talks of his childhood
days with his loved ones. And he was reminded of the big stone in the
pasture-field which he was so determined to break. And he thanked his
heavenly Father for allowing him to break the great rock of heathenism
in north Formosa.
He returned to his mission work more on fire than ever. If he had been
received with acclaim in his native land, his Formosan friends' welcome
was not less warm. Crowds of converts, all his students who were not
too far inland, and among them, Mr. Junor, his face all smiles, were
thronging the dock, many of them weeping for joy. It was as if a
long-absent father had come back to his children.
The work went forward now by leaps and bounds. Mackay's first thought,
after a hurried visit to the chapels and their congregations, was to see
that the hospital and college were built.
All day long the sound of the builders could be heard up on the bluff
near the missionaries' houses, and in a wonderfully short time there
arose two beautiful, stately buildings. Mackay hospital they called one,
not for Kai Bok-su--he did not like things named for him--but in memory
of the husband of the kind lady who had furnished the money for it. The
school for training young men in the ministry was called Oxford College,
in honor of the county whose people had made it possible.
Oxford College stood just overlooking the Tamsui river, two hundred feet
above its waters. The building was 116 feet long and 67 feet wide, and
was built of small red bricks brought from across the Formosa Channel.
A wide, airy hall ran down the middle of the building, and was used as
a lecture-room. On either side were rooms capable of accommodating fifty
students and apartments for two teachers and their families. There
were, besides, two smaller lecture-rooms, a museum filled with treasures
collected from all over Formosa by Dr. Mackay and his students, a
library, a bathroom, and a kitchen.
The grounds about the college and hospital were very beautiful. Nature
had given one of the finest situations to be found about Tamsui, and Kai
Bok-su did the rest. The climate helped him, for it was no great task to
have a luxurious garden in north Formosa. So, in a few years there were
magnificent trees and hedges, and always glorious flower beds abloom all
the time around the missionary premises.
But all this was not accomplished without great toil, and Kai Bok-su
appeared never to rest in those building days. It seemed impossible
that one man should work so hard, he was in Tamsui superintending the
hospital building to-day, and away off miles in the country preaching
to-morrow. He never seemed to get time to eat, and he certainly slept
less than his allotted four hours.
A great disappointment was pending, however, and one he saw coming
nearer every day. The trying Formosan climate was proving too much for
his young assistant, and one sad day he stood on the dock and saw Mr.
Junor, pale and weak and broken in health, sail away back to Canada.
But there was always a brave soldier waiting to step into the breach, and
the next year Kai Bok-su had the joy of welcoming two new helpers, when
the Rev. Mr. Jamieson and his wife came out from Canada and settled in
the empty house on the bluff. Yes, and in time there came to his own
house other helpers--very little and helpless at first they were--but
they soon made the house ring with happy noise and filled the hearts of
their parents with joy.
There were two ladies now to lead in the work for girls and women. Their
sisters in Canada came to their help too. The young men had a school in
Formosa, and why should there not be a school for women and girls? they
asked. And so the Women's Foreign Missionary Society of Canada sent to
Dr. Mackay money to build one. It took only two months to erect it.
It stood just a few rods from Oxford College, and was a fine, airy
building. Here a native preacher and his wife took up their abode and
with the help of Mrs. Mackay and two other native Christian women
they strove to teach the girls of north Formosa how to make beautiful
Christian homes.
And now to the two missionaries every prospect seemed bright. The
college, the girls' school, the hospital, were all in splendid working
order. Mr. and Mrs. Jamieson were giving their best assistance. A Hoa
and the other native pastors were working faithfully. God's blessing
seemed to be showering down upon the work and on every side were signs
of growth. And then, right from this shining sky, there fell a storm
of such fierceness that it threatened to wipe out completely the whole
north Formosan mission.