Leaving the home (in China), you go out into the street, and
what is there that first offends your friends--those whom you
have come to help? Very possibly it is your dress. You do not
have enough of it oftentimes. One function of garments is to
conceal the form, and many modes of dress do not conceal but
simply reveal it. While we are to remember this, going to the
other extreme and walking the streets in bathrobe coats is also
questionable. Anything approaching decolleté would weaken a
woman’s influence, even if she appeared thus only on a state
occasion.
Over against this lack of dress is too much dress, which is
quite as offensive. I saw the other day a photograph of Governor
Tuan, one of the two commissioners who have just been visiting
the United States. He sat in his yamen surrounded by some
missionaries and other foreigners living in the governor’s
province. It was a very beautiful picture, but one of the
missionaries in the group, who was stylishly drest, had a
cane--a dapper little pipe-stem cane in China! To Governor Tuan
there could be no rational explanation of that sort of thing.
If it had been a staff and the missionary had been lame, it
would have been appropriate. But he was not lame, no beggars
were allowed in the governor’s yamen, there were no dogs to
bite him, and why in the world should this man bring a cane?
It was just as if native Australians were being received by
President Roosevelt and had brought with them boomerangs.
Boomerangs have their place, but not in the White House; and to
swing a cane causes trouble for China missionaries. Glasses are
a necessity, but the missionary to the Chinese unconsciously
offends high officials by his glasses, especially if he does
not remove them when greeting the official. Many, even of the
older missionaries, do not know such a fact as that.--H. P.
BEACH, “Student Volunteer Movement,” 1906.
(2563)
=Prosperity and Temperance=--See PROHIBITION.