Lotus Buds
by Amy Carmichael · English · Gutenberg #29427 · 468,301 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Lotus Buds
Author: Amy Carmichael
Release date: July 16, 2009 [eBook #29427]
Language: English
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LOTUS BUDS
[Illustration]
[Illustration: The Great Rock. (_Page 338._)]
LOTUS BUDS
by
AMY WILSON-CARMICHAEL
Keswick Missionary C.E.Z.M.S.
Author of
"Things As They Are"; "Overweights of Joy";
"The Beginning of a Story," Etc.
With Fifty Half-Tone Illustrations
from Photos Specially Taken for This Work
Morgan and Scott Ld.
12 Paternoster Buildings
London MCMXII
Copyright, Morgan & Scott Ld., 1909
First Edition, _Quarto_ (_Fifty Photogravure
Illustrations_) 2,000 _Nov., 1909_
Edition De Luxe (_Fifty Photogravures on Japon
Vellum_) 250 _Nov., 1909_
Octavo Edition (_Fifty Half-tone Engravings_) 5,250 _July, 1912_
_TO THOSE WHO CARE_
DOHNAVUR, TINNEVELLY DISTRICT,
SOUTH INDIA
_Christmas, 1909._
Each for himself, we live our lives apart,
Heirs of an age that turns us all to stone;
Yet ever Nature, thrust from out the heart,
Comes back to claim her own.
Still we have something left of that fair seed
God gave for birthright; still the sound of tears
Hurts us, and children in their helpless need
Still call to listening ears.
OWEN SEAMAN.
_From_ "In a Good Cause."
_FOREWORD TO THE PRESENT EDITION_
_WHEN first "Things as they are" trod the untrodden way, it walked as a
small child walks when for the first time it ventures forth upon young,
uncertain feet. It has to walk; it does not know why: it only knows
there is no choice about it. But there is an eager looking for an
outstretched hand, and an instant gratefulness always, for even a
finger. A whole hand given without reserve is something never
forgotten._
_It was only a child after all, and it had not anticipated having to
find its way alone among strangers. It had thought of nothing further
than a very short walk among familiar faces. If it had understood
beforehand how far it would have to walk, I doubt if it would have had
the courage to start; for it was not naturally brave. But once on its
way it could not turn back; and thanks to those kindly outstretched
hands, it grew a little less afraid, and it went on._
_Then another small wayfarer followed. It also was very easily
discouraged; an unfriendly push would have knocked it over at once. But
nobody seemed to want to push so unpretentious a thing, so it gained
courage and went on._
_And now a more grown-up looking traveller (though indeed its looks
belie it) has started on its way; more diffident, if the truth must be
told, than even its predecessors. For it thought within itself--Perhaps
there will be no welcoming hands held out this time; hands may grow
tired of such kind offices. But it has not been so. And now the sense of
gratefulness cannot longer be repressed._
_All of which means that I want to thank sincerely those kings of the
Book World--Reviewers--and those dwellers in that world who are my
Readers, for their insight and the sympathy to which I owe so much._
_Once I read of a soldier who wrote a letter home from the midst of a
battle, on a crumpled piece of paper laid upon a cannon ball. His home
people he knew would overlook the appearance of the paper and the lack
of various things expected in a letter written in a quiet room upon a
study table. And he knew he could trust them not to bring too fine a
criticism to bear upon the unstudied words hot from the battle's heart._
_I have thought sometimes that these books were not unlike that
soldier's letter; and those who read them seem to me very like his home
people, for they have been so generous in the kindness of their
welcome._
_Amy Wilson-Carmichael._
_Dohnavur,_
_Tinnevelly District_
_S. India._
_Feb. 19, 1912._
THE WRITER TO THE READER
THE photographs (except two) were taken by Mr. Penn, of Ootacamund,
whose work is known to all who care to possess good photographs of the
South Indian hills. The babies were a new experience to him, and
something of a trial, I fear, after the mountains, which can be trusted
to sit still.
The book has been written for lovers of children. Those who find such
young life tiresome will find the story dull, and the kindest thing it
can ask of them is not to read it at all.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. LOTUS BUDS 1
II. OPPOSITES 5
III. THE SCAMP 15
IV. THE PHOTOGRAPHS 23
V. TARA AND EVU 31
VI. PRINCIPALITIES, POWERS, RULERS 41
VII. HOW THE CHILDREN COME 51
VIII. OTHERS 61
IX. OLD DÉVAI 67
X. FAILURES? 75
XI. GOD HEARD: GOD ANSWERED 85
XII. TO WHAT PURPOSE? 95
XIII. A STORY OF COMFORT 103
XIV. PICKLES AND PUCK 113
XV. THE HOWLER 121
XVI. THE NEYOOR NURSERY 129
XVII. IN THE COMPOUND AND NEAR IT 141
XVIII. FROM THE TEMPLE OF THE ROCK 153
XIX. YOSÉPU 159
XX. THE MENAGERIE 169
XXI. MORE ANIMALS 183
XXII. THE PARROT HOUSE 191
XXIII. THE BEAR GARDEN 201
XXIV. THE ACCALS 213
XXV. THE LITTLE ACCALS 227
XXVI. THE GLORY OF THE USUAL 235
XXVII. THE SECRET TRAFFIC 245
XXVIII. BLUE BOOK EVIDENCE 253
XXIX. "VERY COMMON IN THOSE PARTS" 261
XXX. ON THE SIDE OF THE OPPRESSORS THERE WAS POWER 269
XXXI. AND THERE WAS NONE TO SAVE 279
XXXII. THE POWER BEHIND THE WORK 291
XXXIII. IF THIS WERE ALL 301
XXXIV. "TO CONTINUE THE SUCCESSION" 309
XXXV. WHAT IF SHE MISSES HER CHANCE? 321
XXXVI. "THY SWEET ORIGINAL JOY" 331
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
THE GREAT ROCK _Frontispiece_
LOTUS FLOWERS 3
"GOD'S FIRE" 8
"AIYO! DID YOU THINK I WOULD HAVE DONE IT?" 12
CHELLALU WATCHING THE PICTURE-CATCHER 18
"OH, IT'S A JOKE!" 20
"THAT THING AGAIN!" 25
PYÂRIE AND VINEETHA 26
"DISGUSTING!" 28
"LOOK AT THE POSE!" 30
TARA 33
STURDY AND STOLID, AND LITTLE VEERA 63
PEBBLES 66
LATHA (FIREFLY) BLOWING BUBBLES 72
SEELA, MALA, AND NULLINIE 105
THE COTTAGE NURSERY 108
"PICKLES" AND HER FRIENDS 115
THE DOHNAVUR COUNTRY IN FLOOD 124
PAKIUM AND NAVEENA 126
ON THE ROAD TO NEYOOR 131
ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF NAGERCOIL 132
THE NEYOOR NURSERY 136
THE OLD NURSERY (THE "ROOM OF JOY") 143
THE COURTYARD 144
A COMING-DAY FEAST 146
THE RED LAKE 148
AT THE DOOR OF THE TEMPLE 150
THE WATER CARRIERS 161
THE BELOVED TINGALU 164
TWO VIEWS OF LIFE 171
MORE ANIMALS: DEPRESSED 185
TUBBING 188
RED LAKE, AND HILL AS SEEN FROM THE TARAHA NURSERY 193
CHILDREN WADING 196
CHILDREN WADING 197
ESLI, AND LITTLE KOHILA 198
PREETHA AWARE OF A FOE 200
JULLANIE AMONG THE GRASSES 203
ARULAI AND RUKMA, WITH NAVEENA 210
PONNAMAL, PREETHA, AND TARA 215
SELLAMUTTU AND SUSEELA 216
SUHINIE, AND HER BABY, SUNUNDA 218
THREE CONVERT WORKERS: SUNDOSHIE, SUHINIE, AND JEYANIE 220
SEWING-CLASS IN THE COURTYARD 222
THREE LITTLE ACCALS 229
PREENA AND PREEYA 230
AFTER HER BOTTLE 237
NORTH LAKE AND HILLS 238
FROM THE ROCK, DOHNAVUR 338
THE PLACE OF BAPTISM 340
CHAPTER I
Lotus Buds
[Illustration: LOTUS FLOWERS.
From that same pool, afterwards gathered by permission and given to
us.]
LOTUS BUDS
CHAPTER I
Lotus Buds
NEAR an ancient temple in Southern India is a large calm, beautiful
pool, enclosed by stone walls, broken here and there by wide spaces
fitted with steps leading down to the water's edge; and almost within
reach of the hand of one standing on the lowest step are pink Lotus
lilies floating serenely on the quiet water or standing up from it in a
certain proud loveliness all their own.
We were travelling to the neighbouring town when we came upon this pool.
We could not pass it with only a glance, so we stopped our bullock-carts
and unpacked ourselves--we were four or five to a cart--and we climbed
down the broken, time-worn steps and gazed and gazed till the beauty
entered into us.
Who can describe that harmony of colour, a Lotus-pool in blossom in
clear shining after rain! The grey old walls, the brown water, the dark
green of the Lotus leaves, the delicate pink of the flowers; overhead,
infinite crystalline blue; and beyond the old walls, palms.
With us was a young Indian friend. "I will gather some of the lilies for
you," he said, with the quick Indian desire to give pleasure; but some
one interposed: "They must not be gathered by us. The pool belongs to
the Temple."
It was as if a stone had been flung straight at a mirror. There was a
sense of crash and the shattering of some bright image. The Lotus-pool
was a Temple pool; its flowers are Temple flowers. The little buds that
float and open on the water, lifting young innocent faces up to the
light as it smiles down upon them and fills them through with almost a
tremor of joyousness, these Lotus buds are sacred things--sacred to
whom?
For a single moment that thought had its way, but only for a moment. It
flashed and was gone, for the thought was a false thought: it could not
stand against this--"All souls are Mine."
All souls are His, all flowers. An alien power has possessed them,
counted them his for so many generations, that we have almost acquiesced
in the shameful confiscation. But neither souls nor flowers are his who
did not make them. They were never truly his. They belong to the Lord of
all the earth, the Creator, the Redeemer. The little Lotus buds are
His--His and not another's. The children of the temples of South India
are His--His and not another's.
So now we go forth with the Owner Himself to claim His own possession.
There is hope in the thought, and confidence and the purest inspiration.
And, stirred to the very depths, as we are and must be many a time when
we see the tender Lotus buds gathered by a hand that has no right to
them, and crushed underfoot; bewildered and sore troubled, as the heart
cannot help being sometimes, when the mystery of the apparent victory of
evil over good is overwhelming: even so there will be always a hush, a
rest, a repose of spirit, as we stand by the Lotus-pools of life and
seek in His Name to gather His flowers.
CHAPTER II
Opposites
BALA is nearly four. There are so many much younger things in the
nursery, that Bala feels almost grown up: four will be quite grown up;
it will be nice to be four. Bala takes life seriously, she has always
done so; she thinks it would be monotonous to have too many frivolous
babies. But Bala's eyes can sparkle as no other eyes ever do; and her
mirth is something by itself, like a little hidden fountain in the heart
of a wood, with the sweetness of surprise in it and very pure delight.
When Bala came to us first she was between one and two, an age when most
babies have a good deal to say. Bala said nothing. She was like a book
with all its leaves uncut; and some who saw her, forgetting that uncut
books are sometimes interesting, concluded she was dull. "Quite a
prosaic child," they said; but Bala did not care. There are some babies,
like some grown-up people, who show all they have to show upon first
acquaintance and to all. Others cover the depths within, and open only
to their own. Bala is one of these; and even with her own she has
seasons of reserve.
Her first remark, however, shown rather than said, was not romantic. She
was too old for a bottle, and she seemed to feel sore over this. But
she noted the time the infants were fed, and followed the nurses about
while they were preparing the meal; and when they sat down to give it,
each to her respective baby, Bala would choose the one of most uncertain
appetite, and sit down beside it and wait. There was an expression on
her face at such times which suggested a hymn, set it humming in one's
head in fact, in spite of all efforts to escape it. More than once we
have caught ourselves singing it, and pulled up sharply: "Even me! Even
me! Let some droppings fall on me."
[Illustration: "God's Fire."
Taken on the bank of the Red Lake, near Dohnavur.]
Most of our family remind us very early that they trace their descent to
the mother of us all. Bala, on the contrary, was good: so we almost
forgot she was human, and began to expect too much of her; but she got
tired of this after a while, and one day suddenly sinned. The surprise
acted like "hypo," and fixed the photograph.
The place was the old nursery, which has one uncomfortably dark corner
in it. Something had offended Bala; she marched straight into that
corner and stamped. We can see her--poor little girl--as she rumpled her
curls with both her hands, and flashed on the world a withering glance.
"Scorn to be scorned by those I scorn" was written large all over the
indignant little face.
After this shock we were prepared for anything, but nothing special
happened; only when the demands made upon her are unreasonable, then
Bala retires into herself and turns upon all foolish insistence a face
that is a blank. If this point is passed, the dark eyes can flash. But
such revealings are rare.
When Bala was something under three, she was very tender-hearted. One
evening, after the first rains had flooded the pools and revived the
mosquitoes, the nursery wall was the scene of many executions; and Bala
could not bear it. "Sittie, don't kill the poor pûchies!" she said
pitifully; and Sittie, much touched, stopped to comfort and
explain. The other babies were delighting in the slaughter, pointing out
with glee each detested "pûchie"; but Bala is not like the other babies.
Later, the ferocious instinct common to most young animals asserted
itself in a relish for the horrible, which rather contradicted the
mosquito incident. Bala visibly gloats over the gory head of Goliath,
and intensely admires David as he operates upon it. Her favourite part
of the story about his encounter with the lion is the suggestive
sentence, "I caught him by the beard"; and Bala loves to show you
exactly how he did it. But then that is different from seeing it done;
and after all it is only a story, and it happened long ago.
I have told how the ignorant once called Bala prosaic. Bala knows
nothing of poetry, but is full of the little seeds of that strange and
wonderful plant; and the time to get to know her is when the evening sky
is a golden blaze, or glows with that mystic glory which wakens
something within us and makes it stir and speak.
"God has not lighted His fire to-night," she said wistfully one evening
when the West was colourless; but when that fire is lighted she stands
and gazes satisfied. "What does God do when His fire goes out?" was a
question on one such evening, as the mountains darkened in the passing
of the after-glow; and then: "Why does He not light it every night?"
"Amma! I have looked into Heaven!" she said suddenly to me after a long
silence. "I have seen quite in, and I know what it is like." "What is it
like? Can you tell me?" and the child's voice answered dreamily: "It was
shining, very shining." Then with animation, in broken but vivid Tamil:
"Oh, it was beautiful! all a garden like our garden, only bigger, and
there were flowers and flowers and flowers!"--here words failed to
describe the number, and a comprehensive sweep of the hand served
instead. "And our dolls can walk there. They never can down here, poor
things! And Jesus plays with our babies there" (the dear little sisters
who have gone to the nursery out of sight, but are unforgotten by the
children). "He plays with Indraneela--lovely games."
"What games, Bala?" I asked, wondering greatly what she would say. There
was a long, thoughtful pause, and Bala looked at me with grave,
contented eyes:--
"New games," she said simply.
Bala's opposite is Chellalu. We never made any mistake about her. We
never thought her good. Not that she is impossibly bad. She was created
for play and for laughter, and very happy babies are not often very
wicked; but she is so irrepressible, so hopelessly given up to fun, that
her kindergarten teacher, Rukma, smiles a rueful smile at the mention of
her name. For to Chellalu the most unreasonable thing you can ask is
implicit obedience, which unfortunately is preferred by us to any amount
of fun. She will learn to obey, we are not afraid about that; but more
than any of our children, her attitude towards this demand has been one
of protest and surprise. She thinks it unfair of grown-up people to take
advantage of their size in the arbitrary way they do. And when,
disgusted with life's dispensations, she condescends to expostulate, her
"Ba-a-a-a" is a thing to affright. But this is the wrong side of
Chellalu, and not for ever in evidence. The right side is not so
depressing.
It is a brilliant morning in late November. The world, all washed and
cooled by the rains, has not had time to get hot and tired, and the air
has that crystal quality which is the charm of this season in South
India. Every wrinkle on the brown trunks of the trees in the compound,
every twig and leaf, stands out with a special distinctness of its own,
and the mountains in the distance glisten as if made of precious
stones.
Suddenly, all unconscious of affinity or contrast, a little person in
scarlet comes dancing into the picture, which opens to receive her, for
she belongs to it. Her hands are full of Gloriosa lilies, fiery red,
terra-cotta, yellow, delicate old-rose and green--such a mingling of
colour, but nothing discordant--and the child, waving her spoils above
her head, sings at the top of her voice something intended to be the
chorus of a kindergarten song:--
Oh, the delight of the glorious light!
The joy of the shining blue!
Beautiful flowers! wonderful flowers!
Oh, I should like to be you!
"But, Chellalu, where did you get them?" for the lilies in the garden
are supposed to be safe from attack. Chellalu looks up with frank, brown
eyes. "For you!" she says briefly in Tamil; but there is a wealth of
forgiveness in the tone as she offers her armful of flowers. Chellalu
wonders at grown-up hearts which can harbour unworthy suspicions about
blameless little children. As if she would have picked them!
"But, Chellalu, where did you get them?" and still looking grieved and
surprised and forgiving, Chellalu explains that yesterday evening the
elder sisters went for a walk in the fields, and brought home so many
lilies, that after all just claims were met there were still some
over--an expressive gesture shows the heap--so Chellalu thought of her
Ammal (mother) and went and picked out the best for her. Then by way of
emphasis the story is attempted in English: "Very good? Yesh. Naughty?
No. Kindergarten room want flowers? No. I" (patting herself approvingly)
"very good; yesh." With Chellalu, speech is a mere adjunct to
conversation, a sort of footnote to a page of illustration. The
illustration is the thing that speaks. So now both Tamil and English are
illuminated by vivid gesture of hands, feet, the whole body indeed;
curls and even eyelashes play their part, and the final impression
produced upon her questioner is one of complete contrition for ever
having so misjudged a thing so virtuous.
[Illustration: "AIYO!"
(Fingers and toes curled in grieved surprise.)
"Did you think I would have done it?"]
But Chellalu wastes no sympathy upon herself. She is accustomed to be
believed; and perfectly happy in her mind, casts a keen glance round,
for who knows what new delights may be somewhere within reach!
"Ah!"--the deep-breathed sigh of content--is always a danger signal
where this innocent child is concerned. I turn in time to avert
disaster, and Chellalu, finding life dull with me, departs.
Then the little scarlet figure with its crown of careless curls scampers
across the sunny space, and dives into the shadow of a tree. There it
stays. Something arresting has happened--some skurry of squirrel up the
trunk, or dart of lizard, or hurried scramble of insect, under cover out
of reach of those terrible eyes. Or better still, something is "playing
dead," and the child, fascinated, is waiting for it to resurrect. And
then the song about the lilies begins again, only it is all a jumble
this time; for Chellalu sings just as it comes, untrammelled by thoughts
about sequence or sense, and when she forgets the words she calmly makes
them up. And I cannot help thinking that Chellalu is very like her song;
here is an intelligible bit, a line or two in order, then a cheerful
tumble up, and an irresponsible conclusion. The tune too seems in
character--"Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing"; the swinging
old Jacobite air had fitted itself to a nursery song about the brave
fire-lilies, and something in its abandon to the happy mood of the
moment seems to express the child.
It is not easy to express her. "If you had to describe Chellalu, how
would you do it?" I asked my colleague this morning, hoping for
illumination. "I would not attempt it! Who would?" she answered
helpfully.
"Chellalu! Oh, you need ten pairs of eyes and ten pairs of hands, and
even then you could never be sure you had her"--this was her nurse's
earliest description. She was six months old then, she is three and
three-quarters now; but she is what she was, "only more so."
Before Chellalu had a single tooth she had developed mother-ways, and
would comfort distressed babies by thrusting into their open mouths
whatever was most convenient. At first this was her own small thumb,
which she had once found good herself; but she soon discovered that
infants can bite, and after that she offered rattle-handles. Later, she
used to stagger from one hammock to another and swing them. And often,
before she understood the perfect art of balance, she would find
herself, to her surprise, on the floor, as the hammock in its rebound
knocked her over. She felt this ungrateful of the baby inside; but she
seemed to reflect that it was young and knew no better, for she never
retaliated, but picked herself up and began again. These hammocks, which
are our South Indian cradles, are long strips of white cotton hung from
the roof, and they make delightful swings. Chellalu learned this early,
and her nurse's life was a burden to her because of the discovery.
"She could walk before she could stand"--this is another nursery
description, and truer than it sounds. Certainly no one ever saw
Chellalu learning to walk. She was a baby one day, rapid in unexpected
motion, but only on all fours; the next day--or so it seems, looking
back--she was everywhere on her two feet. "Now there will be no place
where she won't be!" groaned the family, the first time she was seen
walking about with an air of having done it all her life. And appalling
visions rose of Chellalu standing on the wall of the well looking down,
or sitting in the bucket left by some careless water-drawer just on the
edge of the wall, or trying to descend by the rope.
Before this date such diversions as the classic Pattycake had been much
in favour. Chellalu's Attai (the word here and hereafter signifies Mrs.
Walker, "Mother's elder sister") had taught it to her; and whenever and
wherever Chellalu saw her Attai, she immediately began to perform "Prick
it and nick it" with great enthusiasm. But after she could walk,
Chellalu would have nothing more to do with such childish things. "Show
us Edward Rajah!" the older children would say; and instead of standing
up with a regal dignity and crowning her curls with the appropriate
gesture, Chellalu would merely look surprised. They had forgotten. She
was not a baby now. Such trifles are for babies.
CHAPTER III
The Scamp
"PAT-A-CAKE is a thing of the past, but the stage from the highest point
of view is still distinctly attractive"; so decided Chellalu, and
resolved to devote herself thenceforth to this new and engrossing
pursuit. She chose the scene of her first public performance without
consulting us. It was the open floor of the church, on a Sunday morning,
in the midst of a large congregation. This was how it happened.
Chellalu's Attai, who in those days was unaware of all the painful
surprises in store, had taken her to morning service, and allowed her to
sit beside her on the mat at the back of the church. All through the
first part of the service Chellalu was good; and as the sermon began,
she was forgotten. In our church we sit on the floor, men on one side,
women and children on the other. A broad aisle is left between, and the
Iyer (Mr. Walker), refusing to be boxed up in the usual manner, walks up
and down as he preaches. This interested Chellalu.
That morning the sermon was to children, and the subject was "Girdles."
The East of this ancient India is the East to which the prophet spoke by
parable and picture; and, following that time-worn path, the preacher
pictured the parable of Jeremiah's linen girdle: the attention of the
people was riveted upon him, and no one noticed what was happening on
the mat at the end of the church. Only we, up at the front with all the
other children, saw, without being able to stop it, the dreadful
pantomime. For Chellalu, wholly absorbed and pleased with this
unexpected delight, first stood on the mat and acted the girdle picture;
then, growing bolder, advanced out into the open aisle, and, following
the preacher's gestures, reproduced them all exactly. It was a moment of
tension; but if ever a child had a good angel in attendance, Chellalu
has, for something always stops her before the bitter end. I forget what
stopped her then; something invisible, and so, doubtless, the angel. But
we did not breathe freely till we had her safe at home.
[Illustration: CHELLALU, WATCHING THE PICTURE-CATCHER WITH SOME
SUSPICION.
"Whatever is he doing with that black box?"]
Chellalu's visible angel is the gentle Esli, a young convert-helper, of
a meek and lowly disposition. At first sight nothing seems more
unsuitable, for Chellalu needs a firm hand. But firmness without wisdom
would have been disastrous; so as we had not the perfect combination, we
chose the less dangerous virtue, and gave the nursery scamp to the
gentlest of us all. Sometimes, to tell the whole unromantic truth, we
have been afraid less Esli was spilling emotion in vain upon this
graceless soul; and we have suggested an exchange of angels--but somehow
it has never come to pass. Once we almost did it. For a noise past all
bounds called us down to the nursery, and we found the cause of it in a
huddled heap in the corner. "Chellalu! what is the matter?" Only the
softest of soft sobs, heard in the silence that followed our advent, and
one round shoulder heaved, and the curly head went down on the arm in an
attitude of woe. Now this is not Chellalu's way at all. Soft sobbing is
not in her line; and I turned to the twenty-nine children now prancing
about in unholy glee, and they shouted the explanation: "Oh, she is Esli
Accal! She was very exceedingly naughty. She would not come when Accal
called; she raced round the room so fast that Accal could not catch
her, and then she jumped out of her cumasu" (the single small garment
worn), "and ran out into the garden! And Esli Accal sat down in a corner
and cried. And Chellalu is Esli Accal!"
But the pet opportunity in those glad days was when some freak of manner
in friend or visitor suggested a new game. We used to wish, sometimes,
that these kind people understood how much pleasure they were giving to
the artless babe who was studying them with such interest, while they,
all unconscious of their real use, imagined probably she was thinking of
nothing more serious than sweets. After an hour in the bungalow,
Chellalu would wander off, apparently because she was tired of us, but
really because she was full of a new and original idea, and wanted an
audience. Once she puzzled the nursery community who had not been
visiting the bungalow, by mincing about on pointed toes, with shoulders
shrugged like a dancing master in caricature. The babies thought this a
very nice game, and for weeks they played it industriously.
Chellalu talked late--she has long ago made up for lost time--but she
was never at a loss for an answer to a question which could be answered
by action. "Who is in the nursery now?" we asked her one afternoon when
she had escaped before the tea-bell, that trumpet of jubilee to the
nursery, had rung. She smiled and sat down slowly, and then sighed.
Another sigh, and she proceeded to perform her toilet. When the small
hands went up to the head with an action of decorously swinging the back
hair up and coiling it into a loose knot, and when a spasmodic shake
suggested it must be done over again, there was no doubt as to who was
in charge. No one but the excellent Pakium, one of our earlier workers,
ever did things quite like this. No one else was so ponderous. No one
sighed in that middle-aged manner, no one but Pakium. We never could
blame Pakium for Chellalu's escape. As well blame a mature cat for the
escapades of her kitten. Chellalu, watching for a clue as to her fate,
would sigh again profoundly. It was never easy to return her.
[Illustration: "OH, IT'S A JOKE!"]
We were not sorry when this phase passed into something safer for
herself, though perhaps not so charming to the public. Chellalu at two
and three-quarters had surgical ambitions. Medical work she considered
slow. She liked operations. Her first, so far as we know, was performed
upon the unwilling eye of a smaller and weaker sister. "Lie down!" she
had commanded, and the patient had lain down. "Open your eyes!" At this
point the victim realised what she was in for, and her howls brought
deliverance; but not before Chellalu had the agitated baby's head in a
firm grip between her knees, and holding the screwed-up eye wide open
with one hand, was proceeding to drop in "medicine" with the other.
Mercifully the medicine was water.
Thwarted in this direction, Chellalu applied herself to bandaging. She
would persuade someone to lend her a finger or a toe; the owner was
assured it was sore--very sore. She would then proceed to bandage it to
the best of her ability. But all this was mere play. What Chellalu's
soul yearned for was a real knife, or even only a needle, provided it
would prick and cause red blood to flow. Oh to be allowed to operate
properly, as grown-up people do! Chellalu had seen them do it--had seen
thorns extracted from little bare feet, and small sores dressed; and it
had deeply interested her. The difficulty was, no one would offer a
limb. She walked up and down the nursery one morning with a bit of an
old milk tin, very jagged and sharp and inviting, and secreted in her
curls was a long, bright darning needle; but though she took so much
trouble to prepare, no one would give her a chance to perform, and
Chellalu was disgusted. Someone who did not know her suggested she
should perform on herself. This disgusted her still more. Do doctors
perform on themselves!
Chellalu's latest phase introduces the kindergarten. For an educational
comrade, perceiving our defects in this direction, furnished a
kindergarten for us, and gave us a kind push-off into these pleasant
waters; so the little boat sails gaily, and the children at least are
content.
Chellalu has never been so keen about this institution as the other
babies are. "Do you like the kindergarten?" some one asked her the other
day; and she answered with her usual decision: "Yesh. No." We thought
she was talking at random, and tested her by questions about things
which we knew she liked or disliked. But she was never caught. "Well,
then, don't you like the kindergarten?" "Yesh. No." It was evident she
knew what she meant, and said it exactly. Bits of it she likes, other
bits she thinks might be improved. The trouble is that she has an
objection to sitting in the same place for more than a minute at
longest. Other babies, steady, mature things of five, are already
evolving quite orderly sentences in English--the language in which the
kindergarten is partly taught--and we feel they are getting on. Chellalu
never stops long enough to evolve anything, and yet she seems to be
doing a little. From the first week she has talked all she knew in
unabashed fashion. "Good morning very much" was an early production; and
it was followed by many oddments forgotten now, but comical in effect at
the time, which perhaps may explain the otherwise inexplicable fact that
she sometimes learns something.
One only of those early dashes into the unexplored land is remembered,
because it enriched us with a new synonym. It was at afternoon tea that
a sympathetic Sittie (the word means "Mother's younger sister"), knowing
that Chellalu had received something thoroughly well earned, asked her
in English: "What did Ammal give you this morning?" Chellalu caught at
the one familiar word in this sentence (for the babies learn the names
of the flowers in the garden before they are troubled with lesser
matters), and she answered brightly: "Morning-glory!" So Morning-glory
has become to us an _alias_ for smacks.
This same Morning-glory is the subject of one of the kindergarten songs.
For after searching through two or three hundred pages of nursery
rhymes, and interviewing many proper kindergarten songs, we found few
that belonged to the Indian babies' world; and so we had to make them
for ourselves. These songs are about the flowers and the birds and other
simple things, and are twittered by the tiniest with at least some
intelligence, which at present is as much as we can wish. All the babies
sing to the flowers, but it is Chellalu who gives them surprises. One
day we saw her standing under a bamboo arch, covered with her favourite
Morning-glory. She had two smaller babies with her, one on either side.
"Amma! _Look!_" she called; but italics are inadequate to express the
emphasis. "LOOK, Morning--glory--kissing--'chother," and she pointed
with eagerness to the nestling little clusters of lilac, growing, as
their pretty manner is, close to each other. Then, seizing each of the
babies in a fervent and somewhat embarrassing embrace, she hugged and
kissed them both; and finally wheeling round on the flowers, addressed
them impressively: "For--all--loving--little--Indian--children--want--
to--be--like--you."
CHAPTER IV
The Photographs
[Illustration: "THAT THING AGAIN!" (_Page 28._)]
I DO not know how they will strike the critical public, but the photos
are so much better than we dared to expect, that we are grateful and
almost satisfied. Of course, they are insipid as compared with the
lively originals; but the difficulty was to get them of any truthful
sort whatsoever, for the babies regarded the photographer--the kindest
and mildest of men--with the gravest suspicion: and the moment he
appeared, little faces, all animation before, would stiffen into
shyness, and the light would slip out of them, and the naturalness, so
that all the camera saw, and therefore all it could show, was a
succession of blanks.
Then, too, when our artist friend was with us we were in the grasp of an
epidemic of cholera. Morning and evening, and sometimes into the night,
we were tending the sick and dying in the village; and in the interval
between we had little heart for photographs. But the visit of a real
photographer is a rare event in Dohnavur, and we forced ourselves to try
to take advantage of it. Remembering our difficulties, we wonder we got
anything at all; and we hope that stranger eyes will be kind.
[Illustration: PYÂRIE AND VINEETHA.
"Do smile, you little Turk!"]
Often when we looked at the pretty little reversed picture in the camera,
with its delicate colouring and the grace of movement, we have wished
that we could send it as we saw it, all living and true. The photos were
taken in the open air; underfoot was soft terra-cotta-coloured sand;
overhead, the cloudless blue. In such a setting the baby pictures look
their brightest, something very different from these dull copies in
sepia. An Oriental scene in print always looks sorry for itself, and
quite apologetic. It knows it is almost a farce, and very flat and poor.
Then there were difficulties connected with character. Our photographer
was more accustomed to the dignified ways of mountains than to the
extremely restless habit of children; and he never could understand why
they would not sit for him as the mountains sat, and let him focus them
comfortably. The babies looked at things from an opposite point of view,
and strongly objected to delays and leisureliness of every description.
Sometimes when the focussing process promised to be much prolonged, we
put a child we did not wish to photograph in the place of one upon whom
we had designs, and then at the last moment exchanged her. But the baby
thus beguiled seemed to divine our purpose; and, resenting such
ensnarements, would promptly wriggle out of focus. It was like trying to
observe some active animalculæ under a high power. The microscope is
perfect, the creatures are entrapped in a drop of water on the slide;
but the game is not won by any means. Sometimes, after spoiling more
plates than was convenient, our artist almost gave up in despair; but he
never quite gave up, and we owe what we have to his infinite patience.
Pyârie was the most troublesome of these small sitters, though she was
old enough to know better. My mother was with us when she came to us, a
tiny babe and very delicate. She had loved her and helped to nurse
her, and so we wanted a happy photograph for her sake; but nothing was
further from Pyârie's intentions, and instead of smiling, she scowled.
Our first attempt was in the compound, where a bullock-bandy stood.
Pyârie and Vineetha, a little girl of about the same age, were very
pleased to climb over the pole and untwist the rope and play see-saw;
but when the objectionable camera appeared, they stared at it with
aversion, and no amount of coaxing would persuade Pyârie to smile.
"Can't you do something to improve her expression?" inquired the
photographer, emerging from his black hood; then someone said in
desperation: "_Do_ smile, you little Turk!" Vineetha, about whose
expression we were not concerned, obediently smiled; but Pyârie looked
thunderclouds, and turned her head away. She was caught before she
turned, poor dear, so that photograph was a failure.
Once again our kind friend tried. This time he gave her a doll. Pyârie
is most motherly. She is usually tender and loving with dolls, and we
hoped for a sweet expression. But in this we were disappointed. She
accepted the doll--a beautiful thing, with a good constitution and
imperturbable temper; and she looked it straight in the face--a rag face
painted--smiling as we wanted her to smile. Then she smote it, and she
scolded it, and called for a stick and whacked it, and called for a
bigger stick and repeated the performance. Finally she stopped, laid the
doll upon the step, sat down on it, and smiled. But she was hopelessly
out of focus by this time, and it was weary work getting her in. She
smiled during the process in a perfectly exasperating manner, but the
moment all was ready she suddenly wriggled out; and when invited to go
in again, she shook her head decidedly, and pointing to the camera with
its glaring glass eye, covered at that moment with its cloth, she
remarked, "Naughty! Naughty!" and we had to give her up.
[Illustration: "DISGUSTING!" SHE REMARKED IN EXPLICIT YOUNG TAMIL, AND
LOOKED DISGUSTED.]
"Perhaps she would be happier in someone's arms," next suggested the
long-suffering artist; and so one morning, just after her bath, she was
caught up, sweet and smiling, and played with till the peals of merry
laughter assured us of an easy victory. But the camera was no sooner
seen stalking round to the nursery, than suspicions filled Pyârie's
breast. That thing again! And the photograph taken under such
circumstances is left to speak for itself. Why did it follow her
everywhere? Life, haunted by a camera, was not worth living--in which
sentiment some of us heartily concur.
Once an attempt was made when Pyârie and two other little girls were
busily playing on the doorstep. Pyârie soon perceived and expressed her
opinion about the fraud--for the camera's stealthy approach could not be
kept from the children. "Disgusting!" she remarked in explicit young
Tamil, and looked disgusted. The photograph which resulted was perfect
in detail of little rounded limb and curly head, but it was lamentable
as regards expression; so once more our persevering friend tried to
catch her unawares. He showed us the result at breakfast in the shape of
a negative which we recognised as Pyârie. He seemed very pleased. "Look
at the pose!" he said. There was pose certainly, but where was the
smile? Pyârie's one idea had evidently been to ward off something or
someone; and our artist explained it by saying that in despair of
getting her quiet for one second, he had directed his servant to climb
an almost overhanging tree, and the child apparently thought he was
going to tumble on the top of her, and objected. "I got another of her
smiling beautifully, but the plate is cracked," we were told, after the
table had admired the pose. That is a way plates have. The one you most
want cracks.
Poor little Pyârie; we sometimes fear lest her "pose" should be too
true of her. She takes life hardly, and often protests. "_I_ want a
birthday!"--this was only yesterday, when everyone was rejoicing over a
birthday jubilation. Pyârie alone was sorrowful. She stood by her poor
little lonely self, with her head thrown back and her mouth wide open,
and her tears ran into her open mouth as she wailed: "Aiyo! Aiyo! (Alas!
Alas!) _I_ want a birthday!"
[Illustration: "'LOOK AT THE POSE!'
He said. There was pose, certainly, but where was the smile?" (_Page
28._)]
But she is such a loving child, so loyal to her own and so unselfish to
all younger things, that we hope for her more than we fear. And yet
underneath there is a fear; and we ask those who can understand to
remember this little one sometimes, for the world is not always kind to
its poor little foolish Pyâries.
I am writing in the afternoon, and two little people are playing on the
floor. One has a picture-book, and the other is looking eagerly as she
turns the pages and questions: "What is it? What is it?" I notice it is
always Pyârie who asks the question, and Vineetha who answers it: "It is
a cow. It is a cat." "Why don't you let Vineetha ask you what it is?" I
suggest; but Pyârie continues as before: "What is it? What is it?"
varied by "What colour is it? What shape is it? Who made it?" and the
mischief in her eyes (would that our artist could have caught it!)
explains the game. It is decidedly better to be teacher than scholar,
because suitable questions can cover all ignorance. Pyârie has not been
to the kindergarten of late, and has reason to fear Vineetha is somewhat
ahead of her; so she ignores my proposals, and continues her safe
questions. We sometimes think we shall one night be heard talking in our
sleep, and the burden of our conversation will be always--"What is it?
What colour is it? What shape is it? Who made it?"
CHAPTER V
Tara and Evu
[Illustration: TARA.]
OUR nurseries are full of contrasts, but perhaps the two who are most
unlike are the little Tara and Evu, aged, at the hour of writing, three
years and two and a half. I am hammering at my typewriter, when clear
through its metallic monotony comes in distinct double treble, "Amma!
Tala!" "Amma! Evu!" They always announce each other in this order, and
with much emphasis. If it is impossible to stop, I give them a few toys,
and they sit down on the mat exactly opposite my table and play
contentedly. This lasts for a short five minutes; then a whimper from
Tara makes me look up, and I see Evu, with a face of more mischief than
malice, holding all the toys--Tara's share and her own--in a tight
armful, while Tara points at her with a grieved expression which does
not touch Evu in the least. A word, however, sets things right. Evu
beams upon Tara, and pours the whole armful into her lap. Tara smiles
forgivingly, and returns Evu's share. Evu repentantly thrusts them back.
Tara's heart overflows, and she hugs Evu. Evu wriggles out of this
embrace, and they play for another five minutes or so without further
misadventure.
Only once I remember Evu sinned beyond forgiveness. The occasion was
Pyârie's rag-doll of smiling countenance, which had been badly
neglected by the family. But Tara felt for it and loved it. She was
small at the time, and the doll was large, and Tara must have got tired
of carrying it; but she would not tell it so, and for one whole morning
she staggered about with the cumbersome beauty tilted over her shoulder,
which gave her the appearance of an unbalanced but very affectionate
parent.
This was too much for Evu, to whom the comic appeals much more than the
sentimental. She watched her opportunity, and pounced upon the doll.
Tara gave chase; but Evu's fat legs can carry her faster than one would
suppose, and Tara's wails rose to a shriek when across half the garden's
width she saw that ruthless sinner swing her treasure round by one arm
and then deliberately jump on it. It was hours before Tara recovered.
Such a breach of the peace is happily rare; for the two are a pretty
illustration of the mutual attraction of opposites. At this moment they
are playing ball. This is the manner of the game: Tara sits in a high
chair and throws the ball as far as she can. Evu dashes after it like an
excited kitten, and kitten-wise badly wants to tumble over and worry it;
for it is made of bits of wool, which, as every sensible baby knows,
were only put in to be pulled out. She resists the temptation, however,
and presents the ball to Tara with a somewhat inconsequent "Tankou!"
"Tankou!" returns Tara politely, and tosses the ball again. This time
Evu sits down with her back to Tara, and proceeds to investigate the
ball. It is perfectly fascinating. The ends are all loose and quite
easily pulled out. Evu forgets all about Tara in her keen desire to see
to the far end of this delight. "Evu!" comes from the chair in accents
of dignified surprise. "Tala!" exclaims Evu abashed, and hurries up with
the ball. "Tankou!" she says as before, and Tara responds "Tankou!" This
is an integral part of the game. If either forgets it, the other
corrects her by remarking inquiringly, "Tankou?" whereupon the echo
replies in a tone of apology, "Tankou!"
Both these babies are devout, as most things Indian are. But Evu cannot
sit still long enough to be promoted to go to church; and perhaps this
is the reason why in religious matters Tara takes the lead, for she does
go to church. In secularities it is always Evu who initiates, and Tara
admiringly follows. The ball game was exceptional only because Evu
prefers the _rôle_ of kitten to that of queen.
This little characteristic is shown in common ways. The two are sitting
on your knee entirely comfortable and content. The prayer-bell rings.
Down struggles Tara. "To prayers I must go!" she says with decision in
Tamil. "Evu too," urges Evu, also in Tamil. "Tum!" says Tara in superior
English, and waits. Evu "tums," and they hastily depart.
Or it is the time for evening hymns and good-night kisses. We have sung
through the chief favourites, ending always with, "Jesus, tender
Shepherd." "Now sing, 'Oh, luvvly lily g'oing in our garden!'" This from
Tara. Echo from Evu: "Yes; 'Oh, luvvly lily g'oing in our garden!'" You
point out to the garden: "It is dark, there are no lovely lilies to be
seen; besides, that is not exactly a hymn; shall we have 'Jesus, tender
Shepherd,' again, and say good-night?" But this is not at all
satisfactory. Tara looks a little hurt. "Tender Shepperd, _no_! Oh,
luvvly lily!" Evu wonders if we are making excuses. Perhaps we have
forgotten the tune, and she starts it:--
Oh, lovely lily,
Growing in our garden,
Who made a dress so fair
For you to wear?
Who made you straight and tall
To give pleasure to us all?
Oh, lovely lily,
Who did it all?
Oh, little children,
Playing in our garden,
God made this dress so fair
For us to wear.
God made us straight and tall
To give pleasure to you all.
Oh, little children,
God did it all.
Then Tara smiles all round, and you are given to understand you have
earned your good-night kisses. Evidently to Tara at least there is a
sense of incompleteness somewhere if the lovely lilies are excluded from
the family devotions.
To Tara and to Evu, as to most babies, the garden is a pleasant place.
But when they grow up and make gardens, they will not fill them with
forbidden joys as we do. One of the temptations of life is furnished by
inconsiderate ferns, which hold their curly infant fronds just within
reach. Then there are crotons, with bright leaves aggressively yellow
and delightful, and there are "tunflowers"; and the babies think us
greedy in our attitude towards all these things. The croton was
especially alluring; and one day Tara was found tiptoe on a low wall,
reaching up with both hands, eagerly pulling bits of leaf off. She was
brought to me to be judged; and I said: "Poor leaves! Shall we try to
put them on again?" And hand in hand we went to the garden, and Tara
tried. But the pulled-off bits would not fit on again; and Tara's face
was full of serious thought, though she said nothing. Next day she was
found on the same low wall, reaching up tiptoe in the same sinful way to
the shining yellow leaves overhead. Quite suddenly she stopped, put her
hands behind her back, and never again was she known to pick croton
leaves to pieces.
The same plan prevailed with the ferns. The poor little crumples of
silver and green moved her to pity, and she left them to uncurl in peace
when once she had tried and sadly failed to help them. But the
sunflowers' feelings did not affect her in quite the same way. The kind
we have in abundance is that little dwarf variety with a thin stalk, and
a cheerful face which smiles up at you even after you behead it, and
does not seem to mind. Tara was convinced such treatment did not hurt
them. They would stop smiling if it did. But one day she suddenly
seemed to feel a pang of compunction, for she looked at the little
useless heads and sighed. I had suggested their being fitted on again,
as with the croton leaves and ferns. But this idea had failed; and what
worked the change I know not, for Tara never told. But "tunflowers" now
are left in peace so far as she is concerned; and she is learning to
pick the free grasses and wild-flowers, which happily grow for
everybody, and to make sure their stalks are long enough to go into
water, which is the last thing untutored babies seem to think important.
There is much to be done for all our children, but perhaps for Tara
especially, if she is to grow up strong in soul to fight the battles of
life. We felt this more than ever on the day of our last return from the
hills, after nearly seven weeks' absence. On the evening when we left
them, we had gone round the nurseries after the little ones had fallen
asleep, and said goodbye to each of them without their knowing it; but
when we came to Tara's mat, and kissed the little sleeping face, she
stirred and said, "Amma!" in her sleep; and we stole away fearing she
should wake and understand. Now in the early morning we were home again,
and all the children who were up were on the verandah to welcome us,
each in her own way. It was Tara's way which troubled us.
At first most of the babies were shy, for six weeks are like six years
to the very young; but soon there was a general rush and a thoroughly
cheerful chatter. Tara did not join in it. She stood outside the little
dancing dazzle of delight--the confusion of little animated coloured
dots is rather like the shake of a kaleidoscope--and she just looked and
looked. Then, as we drew her close, the little hands felt and stroked
one's face as if the evidence of eye and ear were not enough to make her
sure beyond a doubt that her own had come back to her; and then, as the
assurance broke, she clung with a little cry of joy, and suddenly burst
into tears.
If only we could hold her safe and sheltered in our arms for ever! How
the longing swept through one at that moment: for the winds of the world
are cold. But it cannot be, it should not be, for such love would be
weak indeed. Rather do we long to brace the gentle nature so that its
very sensitiveness may change to a tender power, and the fountain of
sweet waters refresh many a desert place. But who is sufficient for even
this? Handle the little soul carelessly, harden rather than brace,
misinterpret the broken expression, misunderstand the signs--and the
sweet waters turn to bitterness. God save us from such mistake!
We covet prayer for our children. We want to know that around them all
is thrown that mysterious veil of protection which is woven out of
prayer. We need prayer, too, for ourselves, that our love may be brave
and wise.
Evu's disposition is different. It would not be easy to imagine Evu
overcome by her feelings as Tara was at that hour of our return. One
cannot imagine a kitten shedding tears of joy; and Evu is a kitten, a
dear little Persian kitten, with nothing worse than mischief at present
to account for. Of that there is no lack. "Oh, it is Evu!" we say, and
everyone knows what to expect when "it is Evu." Evu's chief sentiment
that morning, so far as she expressed it, was rather one of wonder at
our ignorant audacity. "You vanished in the night when we were all
asleep, and now you suddenly drop from the skies before we are properly
awake, and expect us all to begin again exactly where we left off. How
little you know of babies!" Doubtless this sentence was somewhat beyond
her in language; but Evu is not dependent on language, and she conveyed
the sense of it to us. She backed out of reach of kisses, and stood with
a small finger upraised; much as a kitten might raise its paw in mock
protest to its mother. She soon made friends, however, and proved
herself an affectionate kitten, though wholly unemotional.
When Tara is naughty, as she is at times, like most people of only
three, a reproachful look brings her spirits down to the lowest depths
of distress. Evu is more inclined to hold up that funny little warning
first finger, and shake it straight in your face. This, at two and a
half, is terrible presumption; but the brown eyes are so innocent, you
cannot be too shocked. Sometimes, however, the case is worse, and Evu
tries to sulk. She sits down solemnly on the ground, and throws her four
fat limbs about in a dreadful recklessness, supposed to strike the
grown-up offender dumb with awe and penitence. Sometimes she even tries
to put out her lower lip, but it was not made a suitable shape, for it
smiles in spite of itself; and then there is a sudden spring; and two
little arms are round your neck, and you are being told, if you know how
to listen, what a very tiresome thing it is to feel obliged to sin.
Then, with the comforting sense of irresponsible kittenhood fully
restored, Evu discovers some new diversion, and you find yourself weakly
wishing kittens need not grow into cats.
CHAPTER VI
Principalities, Powers, Rulers
IT may seem a quick transition from nursery to battle-field; but rightly
to understand this story, it must be remembered that our nursery is set
in the midst of the battle-field. It is a little sheltered place, where
no sound of war disturbs the babies at their play, and the flowers bloom
like the babies in happy unconsciousness of battles, and make a garden
for us and fill it full of peace; but underlying the babies' caresses
and the sweetness of the flowers there is always a sense of conflict
just over, or soon coming on. We "let the elastic go" in the nursery. We
are happy, light-hearted children with our children; sometimes we even
wonder at ourselves; and then remember that the happiness of the moment
is a pure, bright gift, not meant to be examined, but just enjoyed, and
we enjoy it as if there were no battles in the world or any sadness any
more.
And yet this book comes hot from the fight. It is not a retrospect
written in the calm after-years, when the outline of things has grown
indistinct and the sharpness of life is blurred. There is nothing
mellowed about a battle-field. Even as I write these words, the post
comes in and brings two letters. One tells of a child of twelve in whom
the first faint desires have awakened to lead a different life. "She is
a Temple girl. Pray that she may have grace to hold on; and that if she
does, we may be guided through the difficult legal complications. Poor
little girl! It makes one sick to think of her spoiled young life!" The
other is a Tamil letter, about another child who is in earnest, so far
as the writer can ascertain, to escape from the life planned out for
her. She learned about Jesus at school, and responded in her simple way;
but was suddenly taken from school, and shut up in the back part of the
house and not allowed to learn any more. "Like a little dove fluttering
in a cage, so she seemed to me. But she is a timid dove, and the house
is full of wickedness. How will she hold out against it? By God's grace
I was allowed to see her for one moment alone. I gave her a little
Gospel. She kissed it with her eyes" (touched her eyes with it), "and
hid it in her dress."
Only a little while ago we traced a bright young Brahman girl to a
certain Temple house, and by means of one of our workers we made friends
with her. The child, a little widow, was ill, and was sent to the
municipal hospital for medicine. It was there our worker met her, and
the child whispered her story in a few hurried words. She had been
kidnapped (she had not time to tell how), and shut up in the Temple
house, and told she must obey the rules of the house and it was useless
to protest. "If we could help you," she was asked, "would you like to
come to us?" The child hesitated--the very name "Christian" was
abhorrent to her--but after a moment's doubt she nodded, and then
slipped away. Our worker never saw her again. The conversation must have
been noticed by the child's escort, and reported. She was sent off to
another town, and all attempts to trace her failed.
And the god to whom these young child-lives are dedicated? In South
India all the greater symbols of deity are secluded in the innermost
shrine, the heart of the Temple. In our part of the country the
approach to the shrine is always frequented by Brahman priests, who
would never allow the foreigner near, even if he wished to go near.
"Far, far! remove thyself far!" would be the immediate command, did any
polluting presence presume to draw near the shrine. There are idols by
the roadside, and these are open to all; but they are lesser creations.
The Great, as the people call that which the Temple contains, is
something apart. It is to these--The Great--that little children are
dedicated; the whole Temple system is worked in their name.
"Have you ever seen the god to whom your little ones would have been
given?" is a question we are often asked; and until a few days ago we
always answered, "Never." But now we have seen it, seen it unexpectedly
and unintentionally, as we waited for an opportunity to talk to the
crowds of people who had assembled to see it being ceremonially bathed.
We cannot account for our being allowed to see it, except by the fact
that the Brahmans had withdrawn for the moment, and we being, as our
custom is, in Indian dress, were not noticed in the crowd.
Near the place where the idol was being bathed, with much pomp by the
priests, was a little rest-house, where we had waited till some child
told us all was over. Then we came out and mingled with the throng, not
fearing they would misunderstand our motive. While we talked with them,
the Brahmans, who had been bathing in the river after the water had been
sanctified by the god, began to stream up the steps and pass through the
crowd, which opened respectfully and made a wide avenue within itself:
for well the smallest child in that crowd understood that no touch might
defile those Brahmans as they walked, wringing out their dripping
garments and their long black hair.
How we searched the faces as they passed!--sensual, cynical, cold faces,
faces of utter carelessness, faces full of pride and aloofness. But
there were some so different--earnest faces, keen faces, faces sensitive
and spiritual. Oh, the pathos of it all! How our hearts went out to
these, whose eager wistfulness marked them out as truly religious and
sincere! How we longed that they should hear the word, "Come unto Me,
and I will give you rest"! They passed, men young and old, women and
children, and very many widows; and then suddenly two palanquins which
had been standing near were carried down to the awning where the idol
had been bathed; and before we realised what was happening, they passed
us. In the first was the disk, the symbol of the god; in the second, the
god itself.
"We wrestle not against flesh and blood; but against principalities,
against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world,
against spiritual wickedness in high places"--this was the word that
flashed through us then. That small, insignificant, painted, and
bejewelled image, in its gaudy little palanquin, was not only that. It
was the visible representative of Powers.
We thought of a merry child in our nursery who was dedicated at birth to
this particular Power. By some glad chance that little girl was the
first to run up to us in welcome upon our return home in the evening. We
thought of her with thankfulness which cannot be expressed; but the
sorrow of other children bound to this same god swept over us as we
stood gazing after the palanquins, till they became a coloured blur in
the shimmering sunshine. There was one such, a bright little child of
eight, who was in attendance upon an old blind woman belonging to that
Temple. "Yes," she had answered to our distressed questions, "she is my
adopted daughter. Should I not have a daughter to wait upon me and
succeed me? How can I serve the god, being blind?" We thought of
another, only six, who was to be given to the service "when she was a
suitable age." Her parents were half-proud and half-ashamed of their
intention; and when they knew we were aware of it, they denied it, and
we found it impossible to do anything.
We turned to the people about us. They were laughing and chatting, and
the women were showing each other the pretty glass bangles and necklets
they had bought at the fair. Glorious sunshine filled the world, the
whole bright scene sparkled with life and colour, and all about us was a
"lucid paradise of air." But "only as souls we saw the folk thereunder,"
and our spirit was stirred within us. There is something very solemn in
such a scene--something that must be experienced to be understood. The
pitiful triviality, the sense of tremendous forces at work among these
trivialities; the people, these crowds of people, absorbed in the
interests of the moment--and Eternity so near; all this and much more
presses hard upon the spirit till one understands the old Hebrew word:
"The burden which the prophet did see."
Does this sound intolerant and narrow, as if no good existed outside our
own little pale? Surely it is not so. We are not ignorant of the lofty
and the noble contained in the ancient Hindu books; we are not of those
who cannot recognise any truth or any beauty unless it is labelled with
our label. We know God has not left Himself without witnesses anywhere.
But we know--for the Spirit of Truth Himself has inspired the
description--how desolate is the condition of those who are without
Christ. We dare not water down the force of such a description till the
words mean practically nothing. We form no hard, presumptuous creed as
to how the God of all the earth will deal with these masses of mankind
who have missed the knowledge of Him here; we know He will do right.
But we know, with a knowledge which is burnt into us, how very many of
the units live who compose these masses. We know what they are missing
to-day, through not knowing our blessed Saviour as a personal, living
Friend; and we know what it means to the thoughtful mind to face an
unknown to-morrow.
A Hindu in a town in the northern part of our district lay dying. He
knew that death was near, and he was in great distress. His friends
tried to comfort him by reminding him of the gods, and by quoting
stanzas from the sacred books; but all in vain. Nothing brought him any
comfort, and he cried aloud in his anguish of soul.
Then to one of the watchers came the remembrance of how, as a little
lad, he had seen a Christian die. In his desperation at the failure of
all attempts to comfort the dying man, he thought of this one little,
far-back memory; and though he could hardly dare to hope there would be
much help in it, he told it to his friend. The Christian was Ragland,
the missionary. He was living in a little house outside the town, when a
sudden hæmorrhage surprised him, and he had no time to prepare for
death. He just threw himself upon his bed, and looking up, exclaimed,
"Jesus!" and passed in perfect peace. Outside the window was a little
Hindu boy, unobserved by any in the house. He had climbed up to the
window, and, leaning in, watched all that happened, heard the one word
"Jesus," saw the quick and peaceful passing; and then slipped away
unnoticed.
The dying Hindu listened as his friend described it to him. And this
little faint ray was the only ray of comfort that lightened the dark way
for him.
Compare that experience with this:--
The missionary to whom this tale was told by the Hindu who had tried to
console his dying friend, was himself smitten with dangerous illness,
and lay in the dim borderland, unable to think or frame a prayer. Then
like the melody of long familiar music, without effort, without strain,
came the calming words of the old prayer: "Lighten our darkness, we
beseech Thee, O Lord; and by Thy great mercy defend us from all perils
and dangers of this night; for the love of Thine only Son, our Saviour,
Jesus Christ."
Could any two scenes present a more moving contrast? Could any contrast
contain a more persuasive call?
As we went in and out among the crowd, there were many who turned away
uninterested; but some listened, and some sat down by the wayside to
read aloud, in the sing-song chant of the East, the little booklets or
Gospels we gave them. We, who are constantly among these people, feel
our need of a fresh touch, as we speak with them and see them day by
day. We need renewed compassions, renewed earnestness. It is easy to
grow accustomed to things, easy to get cool. We pray not only for those
at home, who as yet are not awake to feel the eloquence and the
piteousness of the great "voiceless silence" of these lands, but we pray
for ourselves with ever deepening intensity:--
Oh for a love, for a burning love, like the fervent flame of fire!
Oh for a love, for a yearning love, that will never, never tire!
Lord, in my need I appeal unto Thee;
Oh, give me my heart's desire!
CHAPTER VII
How the Children Come
THEY come in many ways through the help of many friends. We have told
before[A] how our first two babies came to us through two pastors, one
in the north, the other in the south of our district. Since then many
Indian pastors and workers, and several warm-hearted Christian
apothecaries and nurses in Government service, have become interested;
with the result that little children who must otherwise have perished
have been saved.
One little babe, who has since become one of our very dearest, was
redeemed from Temple life by the wife of a leading pastor, who was
wonderfully brought to the very place where the little child was waiting
for the arrival of the Temple people. We have seldom known a more
definite leading. "I being in the way, the Lord led me," was surely true
of that friend that day, and of other Indian sisters who helped her.
Later, when she came to stay with us, she told us about it. "When first
I heard of this new work, I was not in sympathy with it. I even talked
against it to others. But when I saw that little babe, so innocent and
helpless, and so beautiful too, then all my heart went out to it. And
now----" Tears filled her eyes. She could not finish her sentence. Nor
was there any need; the loving Indian heart had been won.
My mother was with us when this baby came; and she adopted her as her
own from the first, and always had the little basket in which the baby
slept put by her bedside. When the mosquitoes began to be troublesome,
the basket was slipped under her own mosquito net, lest the little pink
blossom should be disturbed. But the baby did not thrive at first; and
the pink, instead of passing into buff, began to fade into something too
near ivory for our peace of mind. It was then the friend who had saved
the little one came to stay with us; and she proposed taking her and her
nurse out to her country village, in hopes of getting a foster-mother
for her there. So my mother, the pastor's wife, the baby, and her nurse,
went out to the Good News Village, and stayed in the pastor's hospitable
home. The hope which had drawn them there was not fulfilled; but the
memory of that visit is fresh and fragrant. We read of alienation
between Indian Christians and missionaries. We are told there cannot be
much mutual affection and contact. We often wonder why it should be so,
and are glad we know by experience so little of the difficulty, that we
cannot understand it. We have found India friendly, and her Christians
are our friends. In these matters each can only speak from personal
experience. Ours has been happy. There may be unkindness and
misunderstanding in India, as in England; but nowhere could there be
warmer love, more tender affection.
All sorts of people help us in this work of saving the children. Once it
was a convert-schoolboy who saw a widow with a baby in her arms.
Noticing the bright large eyes, and what he described as the "blossoming
countenance of the child," he got into conversation with the mother, and
learned that she had been greatly tempted by Temple women in the town,
who had admired the baby and wanted to get it. "If I give her to them,
she will never be a widow," was the allurement there. The bitterness of
widowhood had entered into her soul, and poisoned the very mother-love
within her; and yet there was something of it left, for she did not want
her babe to be a widow. The boy, with the leisureliness of the East,
dropped the matter there; and only in a casual fashion, a week or so
later, mentioned in a letter that he had seen this pretty child, and
that probably, the mother would end in yielding to the temptation to
give her to the Temple--"but it may be by the grace of God that you will
be able to save her." We sent at once to try to find the mother; but she
had wandered off, and no one knew her home. However, the boy was stirred
to prayer, and we prayed here; and a search through towns and villages
resulted at last in the mother being traced and the child being saved.
Christian women have helped us. One such, sitting on her verandah after
her morning's work, heard two women in the adjoining verandah discuss
the case of a widow who had come from Travancore with a bright little
baby-girl, whom she had vowed she would give to one of our largest
temples. The Christian woman had heard of the Dohnavur nurseries, and at
once she longed to save this little child, but hardly knew how to do it.
She feared to tell the two women she had overheard their conversation,
so in the simplicity of her heart she prayed that the widow might be
detained and kept from offering her gift till our worker, old Dévai,
could come; and she wrote to old Dévai.
Happily Dévai was at home when the letter reached her; otherwise days
would have been lost, for her wanderings are many. She went at once, and
found the mother most reasonable. Her idea had been to acquire merit for
herself, and an assured future for her child, by giving it to the gods;
but when the matter was opened to her, she was willing to give it to us
instead. In her case, as in the other, our natural instinct would have
been to try to make some provision by which the mothers could keep their
babies; but it would not have been possible. The cruel law of widowhood
had begun to do its work in them. The Temple people's inducements would
have proved too much for them. The children would not have been safe.
Once it was a man-servant who saved a lovely child. He heard an aside in
the market which put him on the track. The case was very usual. The
parents were dead, and the grandmother was in difficulties. For the
parents' sake she wanted to keep the dear little babe; but she was old,
and had no relatives to whose care she could commit it. Mercifully we
were the first to hear about this little one; for even as a baby she was
so winning that Temple people would have done much to get her, and the
old grandmother would almost certainly have been beguiled into giving
her to them. How often it has been so! "She will be brought up carefully
according to her caste. All that is beautiful will be hers, jewels and
silk raiment." The hook concealed within the shining bait is forgotten.
The old grandmother feels she is doing her best for the child, and the
little life passes out of her world.
"It is a dear little thing, and the man (its grandfather) seemed really
fond of it. He said he would not part with it; but its parents are both
dead, and he did not know what might happen to it if he died." This from
the letter of a fellow-missionary, who saved the little one and sent her
out to us, is descriptive of many. "Not the measure of a rape-seed of
sleep does she give me. I have done my best for her since her mother
died, but her noise is most vexatious." This was a father's account of
the matter only a week or two ago. "Have you no women relations?" we
asked him. "Numerous are my womenfolk, but they are all cumbered with
children: how can they help me?"
Given these circumstances of difficulty, and the strong under-pull of
Temple influence--is it wonderful that many an orphaned babe finds her
way to the Temple house? For in the South the child of the kind we are
seeking to save is never offered to us because there is no other place
where she is wanted. Everywhere there are those who are searching for
such children; and each little one saved represents a counter-search,
and somewhere, earnest prayer. The mystery of our work, as we have said
before, is the oftentimes apparent victory of wrong over right. We are
silent before it. God reigns; God knows. But sometimes the
interpositions are such that our hearts are cheered, and we go on in
fresh courage and hope.
Among our earliest friends were some of the London Missionary Society
workers of South Travancore. One of these friends interested her
Biblewomen; and when, one morning, one of these Biblewomen passed a
woman with a child in her arms on the road leading to a well-known
Temple, she was ready to understand the leading, and made friends with
the mother. She found that even then she was on her way to a Temple
house. A few minutes later and she would not have passed her on the
road.
There was something to account for this directness of leading. At that
time we had our branch nursery at Neyoor, in South Travancore, ten miles
from the place where the Biblewoman met the mother. On that same
morning, Ponnamal, who was in charge there, felt impelled to go to the
upper room to pray for a little child in danger. She remained in prayer
till the assurance of the answer was given, and then returned to her
work. That evening a bandy drove up to the nursery, and she saw the
explanation of the pressure and the answer to the prayer. A little
child was lifted out of the bandy, and laid in her arms. She stood with
her nurses about her, and together they worshipped God.
This prayer-pressure has been often our experience when special help is
needed to effect the salvation of some little unknown child. It was our
Prayer-day, July 6, 1907. Three of us were burdened with a burden that
could not be lightened till we met and prayed for a child in peril. We
had no knowledge of any special child, though, of course, we knew of
many in danger. When we prayed for the many, the impression came the
more strongly that we were meant to concentrate upon one. Who, or where,
we did not know.
Five days later, a letter reached us from a friend in the Wesleyan
Mission, working in a city five hundred miles distant. The letter was
written on the 8th:--
"On the morning of the 6th, a woman who knows our Biblewomen well, told
them of a little Brahman baby in great danger; so J. and two others went
at once and spent the greater part of the morning trying to save the
child. It was in the house of a so-called Temple woman, who had adopted
it, and she had taken every care of it. For some reason she wanted to go
away, and could not take it with her. Two or three women of her own kind
were there and wanted it. One had money in her hand for it. But J. had
already got the baby into her arms, and reasoned and persuaded until the
woman at last consented. They at once brought it here. Had the friendly
woman not told J., the baby would now be in the hands of the second
Temple woman. I visited the woman afterwards. She had two grown girls in
the room with her, the elder such a sweet girl. She told me openly it
was all according to custom, and that God had arranged their lives on
those lines, and they could not do otherwise. It is terribly sad, and
such houses abound."
Happenings of this sort--if the word "happen" is not irreverent in such
a connection--have a curiously quieting effect upon us. We are very
happy; but there is a feeling of awe which finds expression in words
which, at first reading, may not sound appropriate; but we write for
those who will understand:--
Oh, fix Thy chair of grace, that all my powers
May also fix their reverence . . .
Scatter, or bind, or bend them all to Thee!
Though elements change and Heaven move,
Let not Thy higher court remove,
But keep a standing Majesty in me.
FOOTNOTE:
[A] "Overweights of Joy."
CHAPTER VIII
Others
[Illustration: STURDY AND STOLID, AND LITTLE VEERA
--whose story, however, is different.]
WE have some children who were not in Temple danger, but who could not
have grown up good if we had not taken them. "If peril to the soul is of
importance," wrote the pastor who sent us two little girls, "then it is
important you should take them": so we took them. These little ones were
in "peril to the soul," because their nominal Christian mother had,
after her husband's death, married a Hindu, against the rules of her
religion and his. The children were under the worst influence; and both
were winning little things, who might have drifted anywhere. We have
found it impossible to refuse such little ones, even though danger of
the Temple kind may not be probable.
Such a child, for example, is the little girl the Moslem is ready to
adopt and convert to the faith. Our first redeemed from this captivity
(literally slavery under the name of adoption) was a cheerful little
person of six, with the sturdy air the camera caught, and a manner all
her own. An American missionary in an adjoining district heard of her
and her little sister, and wrote to know if we would take them if he
could save them. We could not say No; so he tried, and succeeded in
getting the elder child; the little one had been already "adopted," and
he could not get her. "The whole affair was the most astonishing thing I
have ever seen in India," he wrote when he sent the little girl. The
child upon arrival made friends with another, and confided to her in a
burst of confidence: "Ah, she was a jewel, my own little sister--not
like me, not dark of skin, but 'fair' and tender; and the great man in
the turban saw her and desired her, and he took her away; and she cried
and cried and cried, because she was only such a very little girl."
"The business was being discussed out in the open street"--the writer
was another missionary--"the pastor heard of it from a Christian who was
passing, and saw the cluster of Muhammadans round the mother and her
children. It was touch-and-go with the child." These two, Sturdy and
Stolid, side by side in the photograph, are in all ways quite unlike the
typical Temple child; but the danger from which they were delivered is
as real, and perhaps in its way as grave.
One of the sweetest of our little girls, a child with a spiritual
expression which strikes all who see her, came to us through a young
catechist who heard of her and persuaded her people to let her come to
Dohnavur. She is an orphan; and being "fair" and very gentle, needed a
mother's care. Her nearest relatives had families of their own, and were
not anxious for this addition to their already numerous daughters; and
the little girl, feeling herself unwanted, was fretting sadly. Then an
offer came to the relations--not made expressly in words, but
implied--by which they would be relieved of the responsibility of the
little niece's future. All would not have been straight for the child,
however, and they hesitated. The temptation was great; and in the end it
is probable they would have yielded, had not the catechist heard of it,
and influenced them to turn from temptation. It was the evening of our
Prayer-day when the little Pearl came; and when we saw the sweet little
face, with the wistful, questioning eyes like the eyes of a little
frightened dog taken away alone among strangers, and when we heard the
story, and knew what the child's fate might have been, then we welcomed
her as another Prayer-day gift. We do not look for gratitude in this
work; who does? But sometimes it comes of itself; and the grateful love
of a child, like the grateful love of a little affectionate animal
lifted out of its terror and comforted, is something sweet and tender
and very good to know. The Pearl says little; but her soft brown eyes
look up into ours with a trustful expression of peaceful happiness; and
as she slips her little hand into ours and gives it a tight squeeze, we
know what her heart is saying, and we are content.
Two more of these "others" are the two in the photograph who are playing
a pebble game. Their parents died leaving them in the care of an aunt, a
perfectly heartless woman whose record was not of the best. She starved
the children, though she was not poor; and then punished them severely
when, faint with hunger, they took food from a kindly woman of another
caste. Finally she gave them to a neighbour, telling her to dispose of
them as she liked.
About this time our head worker, Ponnamal, was travelling in search of a
child of whom we had heard in a town near Palamcottah. She could not
find the child, and, tired and discouraged, turned into the large Church
Missionary Society hall, where a meeting was being held to welcome our
new Bishop. As Ponnamal was late, she sat at the back, and could not
hear what was going on; so she gave herself up to prayer for the little
child whom she had not found, and asked that her three days' journey
might not be all in vain.
[Illustration: PEBBLES.]
As she prayed in silence thus, another woman came in and sat down at the
back near Ponnamal. When Ponnamal looked up, she saw it was a friend she
had not met for years. She began to tell her about her search for the
child; and this led on to telling about the children in general, and the
work we were trying to do. The other had known nothing of it all before;
but as she listened, a light broke on her face, and she eagerly told
Ponnamal how that same morning she had come across a Hindu woman in
charge of two little girls. The Tamils when they meet, however casually,
have a useful habit of exchanging confidences. The woman had told
Ponnamal's friend what her errand was. Ponnamal's talk about children in
danger recalled the conversation of the morning. In a few hours more
Ponnamal was upon the track of the Hindu woman and her two little
charges. It ended in the two little girls being saved.
CHAPTER IX
Old Dévai
SHE has been called "Old Dévai" ever since we knew her, twelve years
ago; and she is still active in mind and body. "As I was then, even so
is my strength now for war, both to go out and to come in," she would
tell you with a courageous toss of the old grey head. Her spirit at
least is untired.
We knew her first as a woman of character. One Sunday, in our Tamil
church, a sermon was preached upon the love of the Father as compared
with the love of the world. That Sunday Dévai went home and acted upon
the teaching in such fashion that she had to suffer from the scourge of
the tongue in her own particular world. But she went on her way, unmoved
by adverse criticism. Some years later, when we were in perplexity as to
how to set about our search for children in danger of being given to
temples, old Dévai offered to help. She was peculiarly suitable, both in
age and in position, for this most delicate work; and we accepted her
offer with thanksgiving. Since then she has travelled far, and followed
many a clue discovered in strange ways and in strange company. Perhaps
no one in South India knows as much as Dévai knows about the secret
system by which the Temple altars are supplied with little living
victims; but she has no idea of how to put her knowledge into shape and
express it in paragraph form. We learn most from her when she least
knows she is saying anything interesting.
When first we began the work, our great difficulty was, as it is still,
to get upon the track of the children before the Temple women heard of
them. Once they were known to be available, Temple scouts appeared
mysteriously alert; and it is doubly difficult to get a little child
after negotiations have been opened with the subtle Temple scout. How
often old Dévai has come to us sick at heart after a long, fruitless
search and effort to save some little child who, perhaps, only an hour
before her arrival was carried off in triumph by the Temple people! "I
pursued after the bandy, and I saw it in the distance; but swiftly went
their bullocks, and I could not overtake it. At last they stopped to
rest, and I came to where they were. But they smiled at me and said:
'Did you ever hear of such a thing as you ask in foolishness? Is it the
custom to give up a child, once it is ours?'" Sometimes a new story is
invented on the spot. "Did you not know it was my sister's child; and I,
her only sister, having no child of my own, have adopted this one as my
own? Would you ask me to give up my own child, the apple of my eye?"
Oftener, however, the clue fails, and all Dévai knows is that the little
one is nowhere to be found. Once she traced it straight to a Temple
house, won her way in, and pleaded with tears, offering all compensation
for expenses incurred (travelling and other) if only the Temple woman
would let her take the child. But no: "If it dies, that matters little;
but disgrace is not to be contemplated." When all else fails, we
earnestly ask that the little one in danger may be taken quickly out of
that polluted atmosphere up into purer air; and it is startling to note
how solemnly the answer to that prayer has come in very many instances.
The clue for which we are always on the watch is often like a fine silk
thread leading down into dark places where we cannot see it, can hardly
feel it; it is so thin a thread. Sometimes, when we thought we held it
securely, we have lost it in the dark.
Sometimes it seems as if the Evil One, whose interest in these little
ones may be greater than we know, lays a false clue across our path, and
bewilders us by causing us to spend time and strength in what appears to
be a wholly useless fashion. Once old Dévai was lured far out of our own
district in search of two children who did not even exist. She had taken
all precautions to verify the information given, but a false address had
baffled her; and we can only conclude that, for some reason unknown to
us, but well known to those whom we oppose, they were permitted on that
occasion to gain an advantage over us. We made it a rule, after that
will-of-the-wisp experience, that any address out of our own district
must be verified; and that the nearest missionary thereto, or
responsible Indian Christian, must be approached, before further steps
are taken. This rule has saved many a fruitless journey; but also we
cannot help knowing it has sometimes occasioned delays which have had
sad results. For distances are great in India. Dévai herself lives two
days' journey from us, and her address is uncertain, as she sets off at
a moment's notice for any place where she has reason to think a child in
danger may be saved. Then, too, missionaries and responsible Indian
Christians are not everywhere. So that sometimes it is a case of
choosing the lesser of two evils, and choosing immediately.
[Illustration: LATHA (FIREFLY) BLOWING BUBBLES.]
Once in the night a knock came to Dévai's door. A man stood outside, a
Hindu known to her. "A little girl has just been taken to the Temple of
A., where the great festival is being held. If you go at once you may
perhaps get her." The place named was out of our jurisdiction; but in
such cases Dévai knows rules are only made to be broken. Off she went on
foot, got a bandy _en route_, reached the town before the festival was
over, found the house to which she had been directed--a little shut-up
house, doors and windows all closed--managed, how we never knew, to get
in, found a young woman, a Temple woman from Travancore, with a little
child asleep on the mat beside her, persuaded her to slip out of the
house with the child without wakening anyone, crept out of the town and
fled away into the night, thankful for the blessed covering darkness.
The child was being kept in that house till the Temple woman to whom she
was to be given produced the stipulated "Joy-gift," after which she
would become Temple property. Some delay in its being given had caused
that night's retention in the little shut-up house. The child, a most
lovable little girl, had been kidnapped and disguised; and the matter
was so skilfully managed, that we have never been able to discover even
the name of her own town. We only know she must have been well brought
up, for she was from the first a refined little thing with very dainty
ways. She and her little special friend are sitting on the steps looking
at Latha (Firefly), who is blowing bubbles. The other little one has a
similar but different history. Her father brought her to us himself,
fearing lest she should be kidnapped by one related to her who much
wanted to have her. "I, being a man, cannot be always with the child,"
he said, "and I fear for her."
On another occasion the clue was found through Dévai's happening to
overhear the conversation of two men in a wood in the early morning. One
said to the other something about someone having taken "It" somewhere;
and Dévai, whose scent is keen where little "Its" are concerned, made
friends with the men, and got the information she wanted from them.
Careful work resulted in a little child's salvation; but Dévai hardly
dared believe it safe until she reached Dohnavur. When that occurred we
were all at church; for special services were being held in week-day
evenings, and old Dévai had to possess her soul in patience till we came
out of church. Then there was a rush round to the nursery, and an eager
showing of the "It." I shall never forget the pang of disappointment and
apprehension. Several little ones had been sent to us who could not
possibly live; and the nurses had got overborne, and we dreaded another
strain for them. It was a tiny thing, three pounds and three-quarters of
pale brown skin and bone. Its face was a criss-cross of wrinkles, and it
looked any age. But "Man looketh upon the outward appearance" would have
been assuredly quoted to us, regardless of context, had we ventured upon
a remark to old Dévai, who poured forth the story of its salvation in
vivid sentences. Next evening the old grannie of the compound told us
the baby could not live till morning. She laid it on a mat and regarded
it critically, felt its pulses (both wrists), examined minutely its eyes
and the bridge of its nose: "No, not till morning. Better have the grave
prepared, for early morning will be an inconvenient hour for digging."
Others confirmed her diagnosis, and sorrowfully the order was given and
the grave was dug.
But the baby lived till morning; and though for two years it needed a
nurse to itself, and over and over again all but left us, this baby has
grown one of our healthiest; and now when old Dévai comes to see us she
looks at it, and then to Heaven, and sighs with gratitude.
CHAPTER X
Failures?
BUT sometimes old Dévai brings us little ones who do not come to stay.
Failures, the world would call them. Twice lately this has happened, and
each time unexpectedly; for the babies had stories which seemed to imply
a promise of future usefulness. Surely such a deliverance must have been
wrought for something special, we say to ourselves, and refuse to fear.
One dear little fat "fair" baby was brought to us as a surprise, for we
had not heard of her. It had seemed so improbable that Dévai could get
her, that she had not written to us to ask us to pray her through the
battle, as she usually does. The sound of the bullock-bells' jingle one
moonlight night woke us to welcome the baby. She had travelled fifty
miles in the shaky bullock-cart, and she was only a few days old; but
she seemed healthy, and we had no fears. "Ah, the Lord our God gave her
to me, or never could I have got her! Her mother had determined to give
her to the Temple; and when I went to persuade her, she hid the baby in
an earthen vessel lest my eyes should see her. But earthen pots cannot
hide from the eyes of the Lord. And here she is!" The details, fished
out of Dévai by dint of many questions, made it clear that in very
truth the Lord, to whom all souls belong, had worked on behalf of this
little one; moving even Hindu hearts, as His brave old servant pleaded,
making it possible to break through caste and custom, those prison walls
of most cruel convention, till even the Hindus said: "Let the Christian
have the babe!" We do not know why she was taken. She never seemed to
sicken, but just left us; perhaps she was needed somewhere else, and
Dohnavur was the way there.
The other meant even more to us, for she was our first from Benares, the
heart of this great Hinduism; and her very presence seemed such a
splendid pledge of ultimate victory.
This little one was saved through a friend, a Wesleyan missionary, who
had interested her Indian workers in the children. The baby's mother was
a pilgrim from Benares, and her baby had been born in the South. A
Temple woman had seen it and was eager to get it, for it was a child of
promise. Our friend's worker heard of this, and interposed. The mother
consented to give her baby to us. It was not a case in which we dare
have persuaded her to keep it; for such babies are greatly coveted, and
the mother was already predisposed to give her child to the gods.
When we heard of this little one, old Dévai was with us. She had only
just arrived after a journey of two days with a little girl, but she
knew the perils of delay too well to risk them now. "Let me go! I will
have some coffee, and immediately start!" So off she went for five more
days of wearisome bullock-cart and train. But her face beamed when she
returned and laid a six-weeks-old baby in our arms--a baby fair to look
upon. We gathered round her at once, and she lay and smiled at us all.
Hardly ever have we had so sweet a babe. But the smiling little mouth
was too pale a pink, and the beautiful eyes were too bright. She had
only been with us a month when we were startled by the other-world look
on the baby's face. We had seen it before; we recognised it, and our
hearts sank within us. That evening, as she lay in her white cradle, the
waxy hands folded in an unchildlike calm, she looked as if the angel of
Death had passed her as she slept, and touched her as he passed.
She stayed with us for another month, and was nursed day and night till
more and more she became endeared to us; and then once more we heard the
word that cannot be refused, and we let her go. We laid passion-flowers
about her as she lay asleep. The smile that had left her little face had
come back now. "She came with a smile, and she went with a smile," said
one who loved her dearly; and the flowers of mystery and glory spoke to
us, as we stood and looked. "Who for the joy that was set before Him
. . . endured." The scent of the violet passion-flower will always carry
its message to us. "Let us be worthy of the grief God sends."
And oh that such experiences may make us more earnest, more self-less in
our service for these little ones! Someone has expressed this thought
very tenderly and simply:--
Because of one small low-laid head, all crowned
With golden hair,
For evermore all fair young brows to me
A halo wear.
I kiss them reverently. Alas, I know
The pain I bear!
Because of dear but close-shut holy eyes
Of heaven's own blue,
All little eyes do fill my own with tears,
Whate'er their hue.
And, motherly, I gaze their innocent,
Clear depths into.
Because of little pallid lips, which once
My name did call,
No childish voice in vain appeal upon
My ears doth fall.
I count it all my joy their joys to share,
And sorrows small.
Because of little dimpled hands
Which folded lie,
All little hands henceforth to me do have
A pleading cry.
I clasp them, as they were small wandering birds,
Lured home to fly.
Because of little death-cold feet, for earth's
Rough roads unmeet,
I'd journey leagues to save from sin and harm
Such little feet.
And count the lowliest service done for them
So sacred--sweet.
But grief is almost too poignant a word for what is so stingless as this.
And yet God the Father, who gives the love, understands and knows how
much may lie behind two words and two dates. "Given . . . Taken . . ."
Only indeed we do bless Him when the cup holds no bitterness of fear or
of regret. There is nothing ever to fear for the little folded lambs. If
only the veil of blinding sense might drop from our eyes when the door
opens to our cherished little children, should we have the heart to toil
so hard to keep that bright door shut? Would it not seem almost selfish
to try? But the case is different when the child is not lifted lovingly
to fair lands out of sight, but snatched back, dragged back down into
the darkness from which we had hoped it had escaped. This work for the
children, which seems so strangely full of trial of its own (as it is
surely still more full of its own particular joy), has held this
bitterness for us, and yet the bitter has changed to sweet; and even now
in our "twilight of short knowledge" we can understand a little, and
where we cannot we are content to wait.
Four years ago, after much correspondence and effort, a little girl was
saved from Temple service in connection with a famous Temple of the
South from which few have ever been saved. She had been dedicated by her
father, and her mother had consented. Dévai got a paper signed by them
giving her up to us instead. But shortly after she left the town, the
father regretted the step he had taken, and followed Dévai, unknown to
her. Alas, the child had not been with us an hour before she was carried
off.
For two years we heard nothing of her. Old Dévai, who was broken-hearted
about the matter, tried to find what had been done with her, but it was
kept secret. She almost gave up in despair.
At last information reached her that the child was in the same town; and
that her father having died of cholera, the mother and another little
daughter were in a certain house well known to her. She went immediately
and found the older child had not been given to the gods. Something of
her pleadings had lingered in the father's memory, and he had refused to
give her up. But the mother was otherwise minded, and intended to give
both children to the Temple. Dévai had been guided to go at the critical
time of decision. The mother was persuaded, and Dévai returned with two
sheaves instead of one--and even that one she had hardly dared to
expect. Once more we were called to hold our gifts with light hands. The
younger of the welcome little two was one of ten who died during an
epidemic at Neyoor. The elder one is with us still--a bright,
intelligent child.
The only other one whom we have been compelled to give up in this most
hurting way was saved through friends on the hills, who, before they
sent the little child to us, believed all safe as to claims upon her
afterwards. She was a pretty child of five, and we grew to love her very
much; for her ways were sweet and gentle and very affectionate. Lala,
Lola, and Leela were a dear little trio, all about the same age, and all
rather specially interesting children.
But the father gave trouble. He was not a good man, and we knew it was
not love for his little daughter which prompted his action. He demanded
her back, and our friends had to telegraph to us to send her home. It
was not an easy thing to do; and we packed her little belongings feeling
as if we were moving blindly in a grievous dream, out of which we must
surely awaken.
There was some delay about a bandy, but at last it was ready and
standing at the door. We lifted the little girl into it, put a doll and
a packet of sweets in her hands, and gave our last charges to those who
were taking her up to the hills, workers upon whom we could depend to do
anything that could yet be done to win her back again. Then the bandy
drove away.
But we went back to our room and asked for a great and good thing to be
done. We thought of little Lala, with her gentle nature which had so
soon responded to loving influence, and we knew her very gentleness
would be her danger now; for how could such a little child, naturally so
yielding in disposition, withstand the call that would come, and the
pressure that had broken far stronger wills? So we asked that she might
either be returned to us soon or taken away from the evil to come. A
week passed and our workers returned without her; they evidently felt
the case quite hopeless. But the next letter we had from our friends
told us the child was safe.
She had left us in perfect health, but pneumonia set in upon her return
to the colder air of the hills. She had been only a few days ill, and
died very suddenly--died without anyone near her to comfort her with
soothing words about the One to whom she was going. Even in the gladness
that she was safe now, there was the pitiful thought of her loneliness
through the dark valley; and we seemed to see the little wistful face,
and felt she would be so frightened and shy and bewildered; and we
longed to know something about those last hours. But one of the heathen
women who had been about her at the last told what she knew, and our
friends wrote what they heard. "She said she was Jesus' child, and did
not seem afraid. And she said that she saw three Shining Ones come into
the room where she was lying, and she was comforted." Oh, need we ever
fear? Little Lala had been with us for so short a time that we had not
been able to teach her much; and so far as any of us know, she had heard
nothing of the ministry of angels. We had hardly dared to hope she
understood enough about our Lord Himself to rest her little heart upon
Him. But we do not know everything. Little innocent child that she was,
she was carried by the angels from the evil to come.
Old Dévai keeps a brave heart. When she comes to see us, she cheers
herself by nursing the cheerful little people she brought to us, small
and wailing and not very hopeful. She is full of reminiscences on these
occasions. "Ah," she will say, addressing an astonished two-year-old,
"the devil and all his imps fought for you, my child!" This is
unfamiliar language to the baby; but Dévai knows nothing of our modern
ideas of education, and considers crude fact advisable at any age. "Yes,
he fought for you, my child. I was sitting on the verandah of the house
wherein you lay, and I was preaching the Gospel of the grace of God to
the women, when five devils appeared. Yea, five were they, one older and
four younger. Men were they in outward shape, but within them were the
devils. I had nearly persuaded the women to let me have you, my child;
and till they fully consented, I was filling up the interval with
speech, for no man shall shut my mouth. And the women listened well, and
my heart burned within me--for it was life to me to see them
listening--when lo! those devils came--yea, five, one older and four
younger--sent by their master to confound me. And they rose up against
me and turned me out, and told the women folk not to listen; and you--I
should never get you, said they; and so it appeared, for with such is
might, and their master waxes furious when he knows his time is short.
But the Lord on high is mightier than a million million devils, and what
are five to Him? He rose up for me against them and discomfited
them"--Dévai does not go into secular particulars--"and so you were
delivered from the mouth of the lion, my child!"
We are not anxious that our babies should know too much ancient history.
Enough for them that they are in the fold--
I am Jesus' little lamb,
Happy all day long I am;
He will keep me safe from harm,
For I'm His lamb--
is enough theology for two-year-olds; but Dévai's visits are not so
frequent as to make a deep impression, and the baby thus addressed,
after a long and unsympathetic stare, usually scrambles off her knee and
returns unscathed to her own world.
CHAPTER XI
God Heard: God Answered
OLD Dévai, with her vivid conversation about the one old devil and four
younger, does not suggest a conciliatory attitude towards the people of
her land. And it may be possible so to misinterpret the spirit of this
book as to see in it only something unappreciative and therefore unkind.
So it shall now be written down in sincerity and earnestness that
nothing of the sort is intended. The thing we fight is not India or
Indian, in essence or development. It is something alien to the old life
of the people. It is not allowed in the Védas (ancient sacred books). It
is like a parasite which has settled upon the bough of some noble
forest-tree--on it, but not of it. The parasite has gripped the bough
with strong and interlacing roots; but it is not the bough.
We think of the real India as we see it in the thinker--the seeker after
the unknown God, with his wistful eyes. "The Lord beholding him loved
him," and we cannot help loving as we look. And there is the Indian
woman hidden away from the noise of crowds, patient in her motherhood,
loyal to the light she has. We see the spirit of the old land there;
and it wins us and holds us, and makes it a joy to be here to live for
India.
The true India is sensitive and very gentle. There is a wisdom in its
ways, none the less wise because it is not the wisdom of the West. This
spirit which traffics in children is callous and fierce as a ravening
beast; and its wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly,
sensual, devilish. . . . And this spirit, alien to the land, has settled
upon it, and made itself at home in it, and so become a part of it that
nothing but the touch of God will ever get it out. We want that touch of
God: "Touch the mountains, and they shall smoke." That is why we write.
For we write for those who believe in prayer--not in the emasculated
modern sense, but in the old Hebrew sense, deep as the other is shallow.
We believe there is some connection between knowing and caring and
praying, and what happens afterwards. Otherwise we should leave the
darkness to cover the things that belong to the dark. We should be for
ever dumb about them, if it were not that we know an evil covered up is
not an evil conquered. So we do the thing from which we shrink with
strong recoil; we stand on the edge of the pit, and look down and tell
what we have seen, urged by the longing within us that the Christians of
England should pray.
"Only pray?" does someone ask? Prayer of the sort we mean never stops
with praying. "Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it," is the prayer's
solemn afterword; but the prayer we ask is no trifle. Lines from an
American poet upon what it costs to make true poetry, come with
suggestion here:--
Deem not the framing of a deathless lay
The pastime of a drowsy summer day.
But gather all thy powers, and wreck them on the verse
That thou dost weave. . . .
The secret wouldst thou know
To touch the heart or fire the blood at will?
Let thine eyes overflow,
Let thy lips quiver with the passionate thrill.
"Arise, cry out in the night; in the beginning of the night watches pour
out thine heart like water before the Lord; lift up thine hands towards
Him for the life of thy young children!"
The story of the children is the story of answered prayer. If any of us
were tempted to doubt whether, after all, prayer is a genuine
transaction, and answers to prayer no figment of the imagination--but
something as real as the tangible things about us--we have only to look
at some of our children. It would require more faith to believe that
what we call the Answer came by chance or by the action of some
unintelligible combination of controlling influences, than to accept the
statement in its simplicity--God heard: God answered.
In October, 1908, we were told of two children whose mother had recently
died. They were with their father in a town some distance from Dohnavur;
but the source from which our information came was so unreliable that we
hardly knew whether to believe it, and we prayed rather a tentative
prayer: "If the children exist, save them." For three months we heard
nothing; then a rumour drifted across to us that the elder of the two
had died in a Temple house. The younger, six months old, was still with
her father. On Christmas Eve our informant arrived in the compound with
his usual unexpectedness. The father was near, but would not come nearer
because the following day being Friday (a day of ill-omen), he did not
wish to discuss matters concerning the child; he would come on Saturday.
On Saturday he came, carrying a dear little babe with brilliant eyes.
She almost sprang from him into our arms, and we saw she was mad with
thirst. She was fed and put to sleep, and hardly daring yet to rejoice
(for the matter was not settled with the father), we took him aside and
discussed the case with him. There were difficulties. A Temple woman had
offered a large sum for the child, and had also promised to bequeath
her property to her. He had heard, however, that we had little children
who had all but been given to Temples, and he had come to reconnoitre
rather than to decide.
The position was explained to him. But the Temple meant to him
everything that was worshipful. How could anything that was wrong be
sanctioned by the gods? The child's mother had been a devout Hindu; and
as we went deeper and deeper into things with him, it was evident he
became more and more reluctant to leave the little one with us. "Her
mother would have felt it shame and eternal dishonour." We were in the
little prayer-room, a flowery little summer-house in the garden, when
this talk took place. On either side are the nurseries, and playing on
the wide verandahs were happy, healthy babes; their merry shouts filled
the spaces in the conversation. Sometimes a little toddling thing would
find her way across to the prayer-room, and break in upon the talk with
affectionate caresses. To our eyes everything looked so happy, so
incomparably better than anything the Temple house could offer, that it
was difficult to adjust one's mental vision so as to understand that of
the Hindu beside us, to whose thought all the happiness was as nothing,
because these babes would be brought up without caste. In the Temple
house caste is kept most carefully. If a Temple woman breaks the rules
of her community she is out-casted, excommunicated. "You do not keep
caste! you do not keep caste!" the father repeated over and over again
in utter dismay. It was nothing to him that the babes were well and
strong, and as happy as the day was long; nothing to him that
cleanliness reigned, so far as constant supervision could ensure it,
through every corner of the compound. We did not profess to keep caste;
we welcomed every little child in danger of being given to Temples,
irrespective altogether of her caste. All castes were welcome to us, for
all were dear to our Lord. This was beyond him; and he declared he would
never have brought his child to us, had he understood it before. "Let
her die rather! There is no disgrace in death." As he talked and
expounded his views, he argued himself further and further away from us
in spirit, until he became disgusted with himself for ever having
considered giving the baby to us. All this time the baby lay asleep; and
as we looked at the little face and noted the "mother-want," the
appealing expression of pitiful weariness even in sleep, it was all we
could do to turn away and face the almost inevitable result of the
conversation. Once the father, a splendid looking man, tall and
dignified, rose and stood erect in sudden indignation. "Where is the
babe? I will take her away and do as I will with her. She is my child!"
We persuaded him to wait awhile as she was asleep, and we went away to
pray. Together we waited upon God, whose touch turns hard rocks into
standing water, and flint-stone into a springing well, beseeching Him to
deal with that father's heart, and make it melt and yield. And as we
waited it seemed as if an answer of peace were distinctly given to us,
and we rose from our knees at rest. But just at that moment the father
went to where his baby slept in her cradle, and he took her up and
walked away in a white heat of wrath.
The little one was in an exhausted condition, for she had not had
suitable food for at least three days. It was the time of our
land-winds, which are raw and cold to South Indian people; and it seemed
that the answer of peace must mean peace after death of cold and
starvation. It would soon be over, we knew; twenty-four hours, more or
less, and those great wistful eyes would close, and the last cry would
be cried. But even twenty-four hours seemed long to think of a child in
distress, and her being so little did not make it easier to think of her
dying like that. So on Sunday morning I shut myself up in my room asking
for quick relief for her, or--but this seemed almost asking too
much--that she might be given back to us. And as I prayed, a knock came
at the door, and a voice called joyously, "Oh, Amma! Amma! Come! The
father stands outside the church; he has brought the baby back!"
But the child was almost in collapse. Without a word he dropped the
cold, limp little body into our arms, and prostrated himself till his
forehead touched the dust. We had not time to think of him, we hardly
noted his extraordinary submission, for all our thought was for the
babe. There was no pulse to be felt, only those far too brilliant eyes
looked alive. We worked with restoratives for hours, and at last the
little limbs warmed and the pulse came back. But it was a bounding,
unnatural pulse, and the restlessness which supervened confirmed the
tale of the brilliant eyes--the little babe had been drugged.
From that day on till our Prayer-day, January 6th, it was one long,
unremitting fight with death. We wrote to our medical comrade in Neyoor,
and described the symptoms, which were all bad. He could give us little
hope. Gradually the brilliance passed from the eyes, and they became
what the Tamils call "dead." The film formed after which none of us had
ever seen recovery. Then we gathered round the little cot in the room we
call Tranquillity, and we gave the babe her Christian name Vimala, the
Spotless One; for we thought that very soon she would be without spot
and blameless, another little innocent in that happy band of innocents
who see His Face.
On the evening of the 5th, friends of our own Mission who were with us
seemed to lay hold for the life of the child with such fresh earnestness
and faith, that we ourselves were strengthened. Next morning we believed
we saw a change in the little deathlike face, and that evening we were
sure the child's life was coming back to her.
It was not till then we thought of the father, who, after signing a
paper made out for him by our pastor, who is always ready to help us,
had returned to his own town. When we heard all that had occurred we saw
how our God had worked for us. It was not fear of his baby's death that
had moved the man to return to us. "What is the death of a babe? Let her
die across my shoulders!" He was not afraid of the law. After all
persuasions had failed, we had tried threats: the thing he purposed to
do was illegal. The Collector (chief magistrate) would do justice. "What
care I for your Collector? How can he find me if I choose to lose
myself? How can you prove anything against me?" And in that he spoke the
truth. There are ways by which the intention of the law concerning
little children can be most easily and successfully circumvented. Our
pleadings had not touched him. "Is she not my child? Was her mother not
my wife? Who has the right to come between this child of mine and me her
father?" And so saying he had departed without the slightest intention
of coming back again. But a Power with which he did not reckon had him
in sight; and a Hand was laid upon him, and it bent him like a reed. We
hope some ray of a purer light than he had ever experienced found its
way into his darkened soul, and revealed to him the sin of his
intention. But we only know that he left his child and went back to his
own town. God had heard: God had answered.
CHAPTER XII
To what Purpose?
AMONG the closest of our little children's friends is one whose name I
may not give, lest her work should be hindered; for in this work of
saving the little ones, though we have the sympathy of many, we
naturally have to meet the covert opposition of very many more, and it
is not well to give too explicit information as to the centres of
supply. This dear friend's help has been invaluable. From the first she
has stood by us, interesting her friends, Indian and English, in the
children, and stirring them into practical co-operation. Then, when the
babies have been saved and had to be cared for and sent off, she made
nothing of the trouble, and above all she has never been discouraged.
Sometimes things have been difficult. Some have doubted, and many have
criticised, and even the kindest have lost heart. This friend has never
lost heart.
For not all the chapters of the Temple children's story can be written
down and printed for everyone to read. We think of the unwritten
chapters, and remember how often when the pressure was greatest the
thought of that undiscouraged comrade has been strength and inspiration.
No one except those who, in weakness and inexperience, have tried to do
something not attempted before can understand how the heart prizes
sympathy just at the difficult times, and how such brave and steadfast
comradeship is a thing that can never be forgotten.
Among the babies saved through this friend's influence was one with a
short but typical story.
The little mite was seen first in her mother's arms, and the mother was
standing by the wayside, as if waiting. Something in her attitude and
appearance drew the attention of an Indian Christian, whom our friend
had interested in the work, and she got into conversation with the
mother, who told her that her husband had died a fortnight before the
baby's birth, and she, being poor though of good caste, was much
exercised about the little one's future. How could she marry her
properly? She had come to the conclusion that her best plan would be to
give her to the Temple. So she was even then waiting till someone from a
Temple house would come and take her little girl.
The news that such a child is to be had soon becomes known to those who
are on the watch, and it is improbable that the mother would have had
long to wait. The Christian persuaded her to give up the idea, and the
little babe was saved and sent to us. On the journey to Dohnavur a
Temple woman chanced to get into the carriage where the little baby
slept in its basket. There was nothing to tell who she was; and like the
other women in the carriage, she was greatly interested in its story.
But presently it became evident that her interest was more than
superficial. She looked well at the baby and was quiet for a time; then
she said to the Christian who was bringing it to us: "I see it is going
to be an intelligent child. Let me have it; I will pay you." The
Christian of course refused, and asked her how she knew it was going to
be intelligent. "Look at its nose," said the Temple woman. "See, here is
money!" and she offered it. "Let me have the baby! You can tell your
Missie Ammal it died in the train!"
Sometimes our babies have to run greater risks than this in their
journeys south to us. The distances which have to be covered by train
and bullock-cart are great, and the travelling tedious. And there are
many delays and opportunities for difficulties to arise; so that when we
know a baby is on its way to us we feel we want to wrap it round in
prayer, so that, thus invisibly enveloped, it will be protected and
carried safely all the way. Once a little child, travelling to us from a
place as distant, counting by time, as Rome is from London, was observed
by some Brahman men, who happened to be at the far end of the long
third-class carriage. Our worker, who was alone with the child, noticed
the whispering and glances toward her little charge, and wrapped it
closer in its shawl, and, as she said, "looked out of the window as if
she were not at all afraid, and prayed much in her heart." Presently a
station was reached. The language spoken there was not her vernacular,
but she understood enough to know something was being said about the
baby. Then an official appeared, and there was a cry quite
understandable to her: "A Brahman baby! That Christian there is
kidnapping a Brahman baby!" The official stopped at the carriage door.
She was pushed towards him amidst a confused chatter, a crowd gathered
at the door in a moment, and someone shouted in Tamil, above the excited
clamour on the platform: "Pull her out! A Christian with a Brahman
baby!"
"Then did my heart tremble! I held the baby tight in my arms. The man in
clothes said, 'Show it to me!' And he looked at its hands and he looked
at its feet, and he said: 'This is no child of yours!' But as I began to
explain to him, the train moved, and he banged the door; and I praised
God!"
India is a land where strange things can be accomplished with the
greatest ease. As all went well it is idle to imagine what might have
been; but we knew enough to be thankful.
Among the unwritten chapters is one which touches a problem. There are
some little children--often the most valuable to the Temple women--who
cannot live with us, but can live with them, because the baby in the
Temple house is nursed by a foster-mother for the sake of merit, and
thus it is given its best chance of life; whereas with us it is
impossible to get foster-mothers. Indian children of the castes approved
for the service are not, as a class, as robust as others; the secluded
lives of their mothers, and the rigid rules pertaining to widows
(girl-children born after the mother becomes a widow are, as has been
seen, in special danger), partly account for this; and in other cases
there are other reasons. Whatever the cause, however, the effect is
manifest. The baby is seldom the little bundle of content of our English
nurseries. It may become so later on, if all goes well. Often it lives
upon its birth-strength for four months, or less, and then slips away.
We have often hesitated about taking such babies; and then we have found
that by refusing one who is likely to die we have discouraged those who
were willing to help us, and the next baby in danger has been taken
straight to the house where its welcome was assured. So we have hardly
ever dared to refuse, and we have taken little fragile things whose days
we knew were numbered unless a foster-mother could be found, for it
seemed to us that death with us was better than life with the Temple
people; and also we have not dared to risk losing the next, who might be
healthy. "One dies, one lives," say the Temple women in their wisdom,
and take all who are suitable in caste and in appearance. "She will be
'fair,'" or, "She will be intelligent," settles the matter for them.
They give the baby a chance: should we do less?
One night I woke suddenly with the feeling of someone near, and saw,
standing beside my bed out on the verandah, the friend who has sent us
so many little ones. She had something wrapped in a shawl in her arms,
and as she moved the shawl a thin cry smote me with a fear, for a baby
who has come to stay does not cry like that.
It was a dear little baby, one of the type the Temple women prize, and
will take so much trouble to rear. The little head was finely formed,
and the tiny face, in its minute perfection of feature, looked as if
some fairy had shaped it out of a cream rose-petal. Alas, there was that
look we know so well and fear so much--that look of not belonging to us,
the elsewhere, other-world look. But we could not do this work at all,
we would not have the heart to do it, if we did not hope. So we go on
hoping.
The baby filled the next half-hour, for a thing so small can be hungry
and say so; and together we heated the water and made the food, till,
satisfied at length that her little charge was comfortable, our friend
lay down to rest. "Jesus therefore being weary with His journey, sat
thus on the well." There is something in the utter weariness after a
long, hot journey, ending with seven hours in a bullock-cart over rough
tracks by night, which always recalls that word of human tiredness. How
I wished that the morning were not so near as I saw my friend asleep at
last! A few hours later she was on her homeward way, and we were left
with our hopes and our fears, and the baby.
For three weeks we hoped against fear, till there was no room left for
any more hope, or for anything but prayer that the child might cease to
suffer. And after a month of struggle for life, the tiny, tossing thing
lay still.
"To what purpose is this waste?" Was it strange that the question came
again to ourselves, and to others too? Our dear friend's toilsome
travelling--a journey equal in expenditure of time to one from London
to Vienna and back again, and very much more exhausting, the faithful
nurse's patience, the little baby's pain! And all the love that had
grown through the weeks, and all the efforts that had failed, the very
train ticket and bandy fare--was it all as water spilt on the ground?
Was it waste?
We knew in our hearts it was not. The dear little babe was safe; and it
might be that our having taken her, though she was so very delicate,
would result in another, a healthy child, being saved, who, if she had
been refused, would never have been brought. This hope comforted us; and
we prayed definitely for its fulfilment, and it was fulfilled. For
shortly after that little seed had been sown in death, information came
from the same source through which she had been saved, that another
child was in danger of being adopted by Temple women; and this
information would not have been given to our friend had the first child
been refused. Nundinie we called this little gift: the name means
Happiness.
Sometimes in moments of depression and disappointment we go for change
of air and scene to the Prémalia nursery; and the baby Nundinie,
otherwise Dimples, of whom more afterwards, comes running up to us with
her welcoming smile and outstretched arms; while others, with stories as
full of comfort, tumble about us, and cuddle, and nestle, and pat us
into shape. Then we take courage again, and ask forgiveness for our
fears. It is true our problems are not always solved, and perhaps more
difficult days are before; but we will not be afraid. Sometimes a sudden
light falls on the way, and we look up and still it shines: and what can
we do but "follow the Gleam"?
CHAPTER XIII
A Story of Comfort
[Illustration: SEELA IS THE BABY IN THE MIDDLE.
She slipped into the picture at the last moment, and so was caught
unawares. Mala is to the right; Nullinie to the left. (This little one's
left hand and foot are partially paralyzed through drugging in
infancy.)]
AMONG the stories of comfort is one that belongs to our merry little
Seela. She is bigger now than when the despairing photographer broke
thirteen plates in the vain attempt to catch her; but she is still most
elusive and alluring, a veritable baby, though over two years old. Some
months ago, the Iyer measured her, and told her she was thirty-two
inches of mischief. For weeks afterwards, when asked her name, she
always replied with gravity, "Terty-two inses of mistef."
All who have to do with babies know how different they can be in
disposition and habits. There is the shop-window baby, who shows all her
innocent wares at once to everyone kind enough to look. She is a
charming baby. And there is the little wild bird of the wood, who will
answer your whistle politely, if you know how to whistle her note; but
she will not trust herself near you till she is sure of you. Seela is
that sort of baby. We have watched her when she has been approached by
some unfamiliar presence, and seen her summon all her baby dignity to
keep her from breaking into tears of overwhelming shyness. Give her time
to observe you from under long, drooping lashes; give her time to make
sure--then the mischief will sparkle out, and something of the real
child. But only something, never all, till you become a relation; with
those who are only acquaintances Seela, like Bala, has many reserves.
Seela's joy is to be considered old and allowed to go to the
kindergarten. She takes her place with the bigger babies, and tries to
do all she sees them do. Sometimes a visitor looks in, and then Seela,
naturally, will do nothing; but if the visitor is wise and takes no
notice, she will presently be rewarded by seeing the eager little face
light up again, and the fat hands busily at work. Seela is not supposed
to be learning very seriously; but she seems to know nearly as much as
some of the older children, and her quaint attempts at English are much
appreciated. Seela has her faults. She likes to have her own way, and
once was observed to slap severely an offender almost twice her own
size; but on the whole she is a peaceful little person, beloved by all
the other babies, both senior and junior. Her great ambition is to
follow Chellalu into all possible places of mischief. Anything Chellalu
can do Seela will attempt; and as she is more brave than steady on her
little feet, she has many a narrow escape. Her latest escapade was to
follow her reckless leader in an attempt to walk round the top of the
back of a large armchair, the cane rim of which is a slippery slant, two
inches wide.
On the morning of her arrival, not liking to leave her even for a few
minutes, I carried her to the early tea-table, when she saw the Iyer and
smiled her first smile to him. From that day on she has been his loyal
little friend. At first his various absences from home perplexed her.
She would toddle off to his room and hunt everywhere for him, even under
his desk and behind his waste-paper basket, and then she returned to the
dining-room with a puzzled little face. "Iyer is not!" "Where is he,
Seela?" "Gone to Heaven!" was her invariable reply. When he returned
from that distant sphere she never displayed the least surprise. That is
not our babies' way. She calmly accepted him as a returned possession;
stood by his chair waiting for the invitation, "Climb up"; climbed up as
if he had never been away--and settled down to bliss.
Part of this bliss consists in being supplied with morsels of toast and
biscuit and occasional sips of tea. Sometimes there is that delicious
luxury, a spoonful of the unmelted sugar at the bottom of the cup. For
Seela is a baby after all, and does not profess to be like grown-up
people who do not appreciate nice things to eat, being, of course,
entirely superior to food; but, excitable little damsel as she is in all
other matters, her table manners are most correct, and she shows her
appreciation of kind attentions in characteristic fashion. A smile, so
quick under the black lashes that only one on the look-out for it would
see it, a sudden confiding little nestle closer to the giver--these are
her only signs of pleasure; and if no notice is taken of her, she sits
in silent patience. Sometimes, if politeness be mistaken for
indifference, a shadow creeps into her eyes, a sort of pained surprise
at the obtuseness of the great; but she rarely makes any remark, and
never points or asks, as the irrepressible Chellalu does in spite of all
our admonitions. If, however, Seela is being attended to and fed at
judicious intervals, and she knows the intention is to feed her
comfortably, then her attitude is different. She feels a reminder will
be acceptable; and as soon as she has disposed of a piece of biscuit,
she quietly holds up an empty little hand, and glances fearlessly up to
the face that looks down with a smile upon her. This little silent,
empty hand, held up so quietly, has often spoken to us of things
unknown to our little girl; and as if to enforce the lesson, the other
babies, to our amusement, apparently noticing the gratifying result of
Seela's upturned hand, began to hold up their little hands with the same
silent expectancy, till all round the table small hands were raised in
perfect silence, by hopeful infants of observant habits and strong
faith.
[Illustration: THE COTTAGE NURSERY.]
Mala, the rather stolid-looking little girl to the right of the
photograph, is Seela's elder sister. She is not so square-faced as the
photograph shows her, and she is much more interesting. This little one
seems to us to have in some special sense the grace of God upon her; for
her nursery life is so happy and blameless and unselfish, that we rarely
have to wish her different in anything. Her coming, with little Seela's,
is one of the very gladdest of our Overweights of Joy.
We heard of the little sisters through a mission schoolmaster,
who--knowing that they had been left motherless, and that a Hindu of
good position had obtained something equivalent to powers of
guardianship, and thus empowered had placed them with a Temple
woman--was most anxious to save them, and wrote to us; and, as he
expressed it, "also earnestly and importunately prayed the benign
British Government to intervene."
The Collector to whom the petition was sent was a friend of ours. He
knew about the nursery work, and was ready to do all he could; but he
did not want a disturbance with the Caste and Temple people, and so
advised us to try to get the children privately. We sent our wisest
woman-worker, Ponnamal, to the town, and she saw the principal people
concerned; but they entirely refused to give up the children. The man
who had adopted them had got his authority from the local Indian
sub-magistrate; and contended that as the Government had given them to
him, no one had any right to take them from him; "and even if the
Government itself ordered me to give them up, I never will. I will never
let them go." This in Tamil is even more explicit: "The hold by which I
hold them I will never let go." Ponnamal returned, weary in mind and in
body, after three days of travelling and effort; she had caught a
glimpse of the baby, and the little face haunted her. The elder child
was reported very miserable, and she had seen nothing of her. The
guardian, of course, had not dealt with her direct; but she heard he had
taken legal advice, and was sure of his position. There was nothing
hopeful to report. Once again we tried, but in vain. By this time a new
bond had been formed, for the guardian had become attached to little
Seela, and spent his time, so we heard, in playing with her. He let it
be known that nothing would ever make him give her up. "She is in my
hand, and my hand will never let go."
Then suddenly news came that he was dead. The baby had sickened with
cholera. He had nursed her and contracted the disease. In two days he
had died. He had been compelled to let go.
Then the feeling of all concerned changed completely. It hardly needed
the Collector's order, given with the utmost promptitude, to cause the
Temple woman to give the children up. To the Indian mind, quick to see
the finger of God in such an event, the thing was self-evident. An
unseen Power was at work here. Who were they that they should withstand
it? A telegram told us the children were safe, and next day we had them
here.
The baby was happy at once; but the elder little one, then a child of
about three and a half, was very sorrowful. She was so pitifully
frightened, too, that at first we could do nothing with her; and there
was a look in her eyes that alarmed us, it was so distraught and
unchildlike. "My mother did her best for them," wrote the kind
schoolmaster to whose house the children had been taken when the Temple
woman gave them up; "but the elder one has fever. She is always
muttering to herself, and can neither stand nor sit." She could stand
and sit now, only there was the "muttering," and the terrible look of
bewilderment worse than pain. For days it was a question with us as to
whether she would ever recover perfectly. That first night we had to
give her bromide, and she woke very miserable. Next day she stood by the
door waiting for her mother, as it seemed; for under her breath she was
constantly whispering, "Amma! Amma!" ("Mother! Mother!") She never cried
aloud, only sobbed quietly every now and then. She would not let us
touch her, but shrank away terrified if we tried to pet her. All through
the third day she sat by the door. This was better than the weary
standing, but pitiful enough. On the morning of the fourth day she sat
down again for a long watch; but once when her little hand went up to
brush away a tear, we saw there was a toy in it, and that gave us hope.
That night she went to bed with a doll, an empty tin, and a ball in her
arms; and the next day she let us play with her in a quiet, reserved
fashion. Next morning she woke happy.
The babies teach us much, and sometimes their unconscious lessons
illuminate the deeper experiences of life. One such illumination is
connected in my mind with the little trellised verandah, shown in the
photograph, of the cottage used as a nursery when Mala and Seela came to
us.
It was the hour between lights, and five babies under two years old were
waiting for their supper--Seela, Tara, and Evu (always a hungry baby),
Ruhinie, usually irrepressible, but now in very low spirits, and a tiny
thing with a face like a pansy--all five thinking longingly of supper.
These five had to wait till the fresh milk came in, as their food was
special; that evening the cows had wandered home with more than their
usual leisureliness from their pasture out in the jungle, and so the
milk was late.
The babies, who do not understand the weary ways of cows, disapproved of
having to wait, and were fractious. To add to their depression, the boy
whose duty it was to light the lamps and lanterns had been detained, and
the trellised verandah was dark. So the five fretful babies made remarks
to each other, and threw their toys about in that exasperated fashion
which tells you the limits of patience have been passed; and the most
distressed began to whimper.
At this point a lantern was brought and set behind me, so that its light
fell upon the discarded toys, miscellaneous but beloved--a china head
long parted from its body, one whole new doll, a tin with little stones
in it, a matchbox, and other sundries. If anything will comfort them,
their toys will, I thought, as I directed their attention to the tin
with its pleasant rattling pebbles, and the other scattered treasures on
the mat. But the babies looked disgusted. Toys were a mockery at that
moment. Evu seized the china head and flung it as far as ever she could.
Tara sat stolid, with two fingers in her mouth. Seela turned away,
evidently deeply hurt in her feelings, and the other two cried. Not one
of them would find consolation in toys.
Then the pansy-faced baby, Prâsie, pointed out to the bushes, where
something dangerous, she was quite sure, was moving; and she wailed a
wail of such infectious misery that all the babies howled. And one
rolled over near the lantern which was on the floor behind me, and for
safety's sake I moved it, and its light fell on my face. In a moment all
five babies were tumbling over me with little exclamations of delight,
and they nestled on my lap, caressing and content.
Are there not evenings when our toys have no power to please or soothe?
There is not any rest in them or any comfort. Then the One whom we love
better than all His dearest gifts comes and moves the lantern for us, so
that our toys are in the shadow but His face is in the light. And He
makes His face to shine upon us and gives us peace.
"For Thou, O Lord my God, art above all things best; . . . Thou alone
most sufficient and most full; Thou alone most sweet and most
comfortable.
"Thou alone most fair and most loving; Thou alone most noble and most
glorious above all things; in whom all things are at once and perfectly
good, and ever have been and shall be.
"And therefore whatever Thou bestowest upon me beside Thyself, or
whatever Thou revealest or promisest concerning Thyself, so long as I do
not see or fully enjoy Thee, is too little, and fails to satisfy me.
"Because, indeed, my heart cannot truly rest nor be entirely contented
unless it rest in Thee, and rise above all Thy gifts and all things
created.
"When shall I fully recollect myself in Thee, that through the love of
Thee I may not feel myself but Thee alone, above all feeling and measure
in a manner not known to all?"
CHAPTER XIV
Pickles and Puck
[Illustration: "PICKLES" AND HER FRIENDS.
"Pickles" sits with her thumb in her mouth, distrustful of
photographers.]
"AMMA! Amma!" then in baby Tamil, "Salala has come!" And one of the most
enticing of the little interruptions to a steady hour's work scrambles
over the raised doorstep, tripping and tumbling in her eagerness to get
in. Now she is staggering happily about the room on fat, uncertain feet.
Upsets are nothing to Sarala. She shakes herself, rubs a bumped head,
smiles if you smile down at her, and picks herself up with a sturdy
independence that promises something for her future. She has travelled
to-day, stopping only to visit her Préma Sittie, a long way across the
field all by herself. She has braved tumbles and captures, for her nurse
may any minute discover her flight; and even now, safe in port, she
keeps a wary eye on the door which opens on the nursery side of the
compound. If she thinks I am about to suggest her departure, she
immediately engages me in some interest of her own. She has ways and
wiles unknown to any baby but herself; and if all seems likely to fail,
she sits down on the floor, and first puts out her lower lip as far as
it will go, and then springs up, climbs over you, clings with all four
limbs at once, and buries her curly tangle deep into your neck. But if
the case is hopeless, she sits down on the floor again and digs her
small fists into her eyes, in silent indignation and despair. Then
comes a howl impossible to smother, and at last such bitter bursts of
woe as nothing short of dire necessity can force you to provoke. This is
Sarala, one of the most affectionate, most wilful, most winsome of all
the babies. She is truthful. She has just this moment pulled a
drawing-pin out of its place, which happened to be within reach, and her
solemn "Aiyo!" (Alas!) "Look, Amma!" shows she feels she has sinned, but
wants to confess. Life will have many a battle for this baby; but surely
if she is truthful and loving, and we are loving and wise, the Lord who
has redeemed her will carry her through.
Her first great battle royal was with the new Sittie,[B] who immediately
upon arrival loved the babies. The battle was about Sarala's evening
meal, which she refused to take from the new Sittie because she had
offended her small majesty a few minutes before by allowing another baby
to share the lap of which Sarala wished to have complete possession; and
the baby had crawled off disgusted with the ways of such a Sittie.
As a rule we avoid collisions at bedtime. The day should end peacefully
for babies; but the contest once begun had to be carried through, for
Sarala is not a baby to whom it is wise to give in where a conflict of
wills is concerned. Next morning it was evident she remembered all about
it. When the new Sittie (now called Préma Sittie by the children)[C]
came to the nursery, Sarala hurried off and would have nothing to do
with her. From the distance of the garden she would catch sight of her
advancing form, and retreat round a corner. Sometimes if Préma Sittie
sat down on the floor and fondled another baby, Sarala would crawl up
from behind, put her arms round her neck, and even begin to sit down on
her knee; but if her Sittie made the first advance, she was instantly
repelled. This continued for a fortnight; and as Sarala was only a year
and eight months old at the time, a fortnight's memory rather astonished
us. In the end she forgot, and now there are no more devoted friends
than Préma Sittie and Sarala.
But it was the other Sittie, Piria Sittie by name,[D] who first made
Sarala's acquaintance. She and I went to Neyoor together when the branch
nursery was there; and as the new nursery was almost ready for the
babies, we lightened the immense undertaking of removal by carting off
whatever we could of furniture and infants. Sarala has eyes which can
smile bewitchingly, and a voice which can coo with delicious affection;
but those sweet eyes can look stormy, and cooing is a sound remote from
Sarala's powers in opposite directions; so we wondered, as we packed her
into the bandy, what would happen that night. If we had known Sarala
better we should not have wondered. All this child wants to make her
good is someone to hold on to. She woke frequently during the night, for
we were not entirely comfortable, wedged sideways and close as herrings
in a barrel. But all she did when she awoke was to push a soft little
arm round either one or other of us, and cuddle as close as she possibly
could; the least movement on our part, however, she deeply resented and
feared. A limpet on a rock is nothing to this baby. Her very toes can
cling.
Sarala's private name is Pickles. Her twin in mischief is Puck, and she,
too, is fond of paying visits to the bungalow. But she always comes as a
surprise; she never announces herself. You are busy with your back to
the door when that curious feeling, a sense of not being quite alone,
comes over you, and you turn and see an elfish thing, very still and
small and shy, but with eyes so comical that Puck is the only possible
name by which she could be called. Seen unexpectedly, playing among the
flowers in a fragment of green garment washed to the softness of a
tulip leaf, you feel she only needs a pair of small wings and a wand to
be entirely in character.
Puck has none of Pickles' faults, and a good many of her virtues. She is
a most good-tempered little person, loving to be loved, but equally
delighted that others should share the petting. She gives up to
everybody, and smiles her way through life; such a comical little mouth
it is, to match the comical eyes. All she ever asks with insistence is
somewhere to play. Bereft of room to play, Puck might become
disagreeable, though a disagreeable Puck is something unimaginable.
Yesterday it was needful to keep her in the shade; and as a special
policeman-nurse could not be told off to keep watch over her, she was
tied by a long string to the nursery door. At first she was sorely
distressed; but presently the comic side struck her, and she sat down
and began to tie herself up more securely. If they do such things at all
they should do them better, she seemed to think. And this is Puck all
through. She will find the laugh hidden in things, if she can. Sometimes
in her eagerness to make everybody as happy as she is herself she gets
into serious trouble. She was hardly able to walk when she was
discovered comforting a crying infant by taking a bottle of milk from an
older babe (who, according to her thinking, had had enough) and giving
it to the younger one who seemed to need it more. What the older baby
said is not recorded.
Puck in trouble is a pitiful sight. She tries not to give in to feelings
of depression. She screws her smiling lips tight, twists her face into a
pucker, and shuts her eyes till you only see two slits marked by the
curly eyelashes. But if her emotions are too much for her she gives
herself up to them thoroughly. There is no whining or whimpering or
sulking; she wails with a wail that rivals Pickles' howl. "What an awful
child!" remarked a visitor one morning, in a very shocked tone, as she
went the round of the nurseries and came upon Puck on the floor
abandoned to grief. We wondered if our friend knew how much more awful
most babies are, and we wished the usually charming Puck had chosen some
other moment to disgrace herself and us. But no, there she sat, her two
small fists crushed over her mouth--for we insist that when the babes
feel obliged to cry, they shall smother the sound thereof as much as may
be--and the visitor retired, feeling, doubtless, thankful the awful
child was not hers. But Puck's griefs are of short duration. Ten minutes
later she was climbing the chain from which the swing hangs, trying to
fit her little toes into the links, and laughing, with the tears still
wet on her cheeks, because the chain shook so that she could not climb
it properly, though she tried it valiantly, hand over head, like a
dancing bear on a pole. Puck's Guardian Angel, like Chellalu's, must be
ever in attendance.
FOOTNOTES:
[B] Miss Lucy Ross.
[C] "Préma" means _Beloved_.
[D] Miss Mabel Wade, who joined us November 15, 1907. "Piria," like
"Préma," means _Beloved_.
CHAPTER XV
The Howler
PICKLES and Puck at their worst and both together are nothing to the
Howler in her separate capacity. We called her the Howler because she
howled.
We heard of her first through our good Pakium, who, during a pilgrimage
round the district, paid a visit to the family of which she was the
youngest member. "She lay in her cradle asleep"--Pakium kindled over
it--"like an innocent little flower, and she once opened her eyes--such
eyes!--and smiled up in my face. Oh, like a flower is the babe!" And
much speech followed, till we pictured a tender, flower-like baby, all
sweetness and smiles.
Her story was such as to suggest fears, though on the surface things
looked safe. Her grandfather, a fine old man, head of the house, was
sheltering the baby and her mother and three other children; for the
son-in-law had "gone to Colombo," which in this case meant he desired to
be free from the responsibilities of wife and family. He had left no
address, and had not written after his departure. So the old man had the
five on his hands. A Temple woman belonging to a famous South-country
Temple, knowing the circumstances, had made a flattering offer for the
baby, then just three months old. The grandfather had refused; but the
grandmother was religious, and she felt the pinch of the extra five, and
secretly influenced her daughter, so that it was probable the Temple
woman would win if she waited long enough. And Temple women know how to
wait.
[Illustration: THE DOHNAVUR COUNTRY IN FLOOD.]
A year passed quietly. We had friends on the watch, and they kept us
informed of what was going on. The idea of dedication was becoming
gradually familiar to the grandfather, and he was ill and times were
hard. But still we could do nothing, for to himself and his whole clan
adoption by Christians was a far more unpleasant alternative than
Temple-dedication. After all, the Temple people never break caste.
Once a message reached us: "Send at once, for the Temple women are about
to get the baby"; and we sent, but in vain. A few weeks later a similar
message reached us; and again the long journey was made, and again there
was the disappointing return empty-handed. It seemed useless to try any
more.
About that time a comrade in North Africa, Miss Lilias Trotter, sent us
her new little booklet, "The Glory of the Impossible." As we read the
first few paragraphs and roughly translated them for our Tamil
fellow-workers, such a hope was created within us that we laid hold with
fresh faith and a sort of quiet, confident joy. And yet, when we wrote
to our friends who were watching, their answer was most discouraging.
The only bright word in the letter was the word "Impossible."
"Far up in the Alpine hollows, year by year, God works one of His
marvels. The snow-patches lie there, frozen into ice at their edges from
the strife of sunny days and frosty nights; and through that ice-crust
come, unscathed, flowers in full bloom.
"Back in the days of the bygone summer the little soldanella plant
spread its leaves wide and flat on the ground to drink in the
sun-rays; and it kept them stored in the root through the winter. Then
spring came and stirred its pulses even below the snow-shroud. And as it
sprouted, warmth was given out in such strange measure that it thawed a
little dome of the snow above its head. Higher and higher it grew, and
always above it rose the bell of air till the flower-bud formed safely
within it; and at last the icy covering of the air-bell gave way and let
the blossom through into the sunshine, the crystalline texture of its
mauve petals sparkling like the snow itself, as if it bore the traces of
the fight through which it had come.
"And the fragile things ring an echo in our hearts that none of the
jewel-like flowers nestled in the warm turf on the slopes below could
waken. We love to see the impossible done, and so does God."
These were the sentences which we read together. To the South Indian
imagination Alpine snow is something quite inconceivable; but the
picture on the cover and snow-scene photographs helped, and the Indian
mind is ever quick to apprehend the spiritual, so the booklet did its
work.
We have two seasons here, the wet and the dry. The dry is subdivided
into hot, hotter, and hottest; but the wet stands alone. It is a time
when the country round Dohnavur is swamp or lake according to the level
of the ground; and we do not expect visitors--the heavy bullock-carts
sink in the mud and make the way too difficult. If a letter had come
just then asking us to send for the baby, we should certainly have tried
to go; but no letter came, and it was then, when everything said,
"Impossible," that suddenly all resistance gave way and the grandfather
said: "Let her go to the Christians."
[Illustration: PAKIUM AND NAVEENA.]
We were sitting round the dinner-table one wet evening, thinking of
nothing more exciting than the flying and creeping creatures which
insisted upon drowning themselves in our soup, when the jingle of
bullock-bells made us look at each other incredulously; and then,
without waiting to wonder who it was, we all ran out and met Rukma
running in from the wet darkness. "It's it! it's it!" she cried, and
danced into the dining-room, decorum thrown to the pools in the
compound. "Look at it!" and we saw a bundle in her arms. And it howled.
From that day on for nearly a week it continued consistently to howl. We
called the little thing Naveena, for the name means "new"; and it was
our nearest approach to Soldanella, which we should have called her if
we did not keep to Indian names for our babies. New and fresh as that
little flower of joy, so was our new little gift to us, a new token for
good. But flowers and howlers--the words draw their little skirts aside
and refuse to touch each other. From certain points of view, in this
case as so often, the sublime and the ridiculous were much too close
together. The very crows made remarks about the baby when she wakened
the morning with her howls. Mercifully for the family's nerves she fell
asleep at noon; but as soon as she woke she began again, and went on
till both she and we were exhausted. There were no tears, the big dark
eyes were only entirely defiant; and the baby stood straight up with her
hands behind her back and her mouth open--that was all. But we knew it
meant pure misery, though expressed so very aggressively; and we coaxed
and petted when she would allow us, and won her confidence at last, and
then she stopped.
It took months to tame the little thing. She had been allowed to do
exactly as she liked; for she was her grandfather's pet, and no one
might cross her will. We had to go very gently; but eventually she
understood and became a dear little girl, reserved but very
affectionate, and scampish to such a degree that Chellalu, discerning a
congenial spirit, decided to adopt her as "her friend."
This fact was announced to us at the babies' Bible-class, when the word
"friend," which was new to the babies, was being explained. It has four
syllables in Tamil, and the babies love four-syllabled words. They were
rolling this juicy morsel under their tongues with sounds of
appreciation, when Chellalu pointed across to Naveena, and with an air
of possession remarked, "_She_ is my friend." The other babies nodded
their heads, "Yes, Naveena is Chellalu's friend!" Naveena looked
flattered and very pleased.
These friends in a kindergarten class are rather terrible. They are
always separated--as the Tamil would say, if one sits north the other
sits south--but even so there are means of communication. This morning,
passing the door of the kindergarten room, I looked in and saw something
not included in the time-table. We have a little yellow bellflower here
which grows in great profusion; and some vandal taught the babies to
blow it up like a little balloon, and then snap it on the forehead. The
crack it makes is delightful. We do not like this game, and try to teach
the babies to respect the pretty flowers; but there are so many sins in
the world, that we do not make another by actually forbidding it; we
trust to time and sense and good feeling to help us. So it comes to pass
that the worst scamps indulge in this game without feeling too guilty;
and now I saw Chellalu with a handful of the flowers, cracking them at
intervals, to the distraction of the teacher and the delight of all the
class. One other was cracking flowers too. It was Naveena, and there was
a method in her cracks. When Rukma turned to Chellalu, Naveena cracked
her flower. When she turned to Naveena, then Chellalu cracked hers. How
they had eluded the search which precedes admission to the kindergarten
nobody knew; but there they were, each with a goodly handful of bells.
At a word from Rukma, however, they handed them over to her with an
indulgent smile, and even offered to search the other babies in case
they had secreted any; and as I left the room the lesson continued as
before, but the friends' intention was evident: they had hoped to be
turned out together.
CHAPTER XVI
The Neyoor Nursery
"The roads are rugged, the precipices steep; there
may be feelings of dizziness on the heights, gusts
of wind, peals of thunder, nights of awful gloom.
Fear them not!
"There are also the joys of sunlight, flowers such
as are not in the plain, the purest of air,
restful nooks, and the stars smile thence like the
eyes of God."--PÈRE DIDON (_translated by Rev.
Arthur G. Nash_).
[Illustration: ON THE ROAD TO NEYOOR.]
AND now for a chapter of history. We had not been long at the new work
before we discovered difficulties unimagined before, and impossible to
describe in detail. Some of these concerned the health of the younger
children; and eventually it seemed best to move the infants' nursery to
within reach of medical help, and keep the bigger babies and elder
children, whose protection was another grave anxiety, with us at
Dohnavur.
Shortly before that time we had been brought into touch with the medical
missionaries at Neyoor, in South Travancore. The senior missionary, Dr.
Fells, was about to retire; but his successor, Dr. Bentall, cordially
agreed to let us rent a little house in the village and fill it with
babies, though he knew such a houseful might materially add to the
fulness of his already overflowing day. He, and afterwards Dr. Davidson
(now the only survivor at Neyoor of that kind trio of doctors), seemed
to think nothing a trouble if only it helped a friend. So the little
house was taken and the babies installed.
[Illustration: ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF NAGERCOIL, WHERE WE STOPPED TO REST.]
The first day, September 25, 1905, is a day to be remembered. I had gone
on before to prepare the house, and for a day and a half waited in
uncertainty as to what had happened to the little party which was to
have followed close behind. I had left one baby ill. She was the first
child sent to us from the Canarese country; and I thought of the friends
who had sent her, newly interested and stirred to seek these little
ones, and of what it would mean of discouragement to them if she were
taken, and my heart held on for her.
At last the carts appeared in sight. It was the windy season, and six
carts had been overturned on the road, so they had travelled slowly.
Then a wheel came off one of their carts and an accident was narrowly
averted. This had caused the delay. The baby about whom I had feared had
recovered in time to be sent on. She was soon quite well, and has
continued well from that day to this.
How familiar the road between Dohnavur and Neyoor became to us, as the
months passed and frequent journeys were made with little new babies!
Sometimes those journeys were very wearisome. There was great heat, or a
dust-laden wind filled the bandy to suffocation and blew out the
spirit-lamp when we stopped to prepare the babies' food. How glad we
used to be when, in the early evening, the white gleam of the stretch of
water outside Nagercoil appeared in sight! We used to stop and bathe the
babies, and feed them under some convenient trees, and then go on to our
friends with whom we were to spend the night, trusting that the soothing
effect of the bathe and food would not pass off until after our arrival.
Those friends, our comrades of the L.M.S., like the Medicals at
Neyoor, seemed made of kindness. How often their welcome has rested us
after the long day!
Next morning we tried to start early, so as to arrive at Neyoor before
the sun shone in fever-threatening strength straight in through the open
end of the cart. This plan, however, proved too difficult, so we found
it better to travel slowly straight on from Dohnavur to Neyoor. In this
way we missed the blazing sun; but we also missed the refreshment of our
friends at Nagercoil, and arrived more or less tired out, after a
journey which, because of slow progress and frequent stops, was equal in
time to one from London to Marseilles. But the welcome at the nursery
made up for everything.
How vividly the photograph recalls it! The house opened upon the main
street of the village, and there was nearly always a watcher on the
look-out for us. Sometimes it was Isaac, our good man-of-all-work, who
never failed Ponnamal through the two years he was with us. Then we
would hear a call, and Ponnamal (we used to call her the Princess, but
dignity gives place to something more human at such moments) would come
flying down the path with a face which made words superfluous. Then
there was the scramble out of the bandy, and the handing down of babies
and exclamations about them; and all the nurses seemed to be kissing us
at once and making their amazed babies kiss us, and everything was for
one happy moment bewilderingly delightful.
Then there was the run round the cradles in which smaller babies were
sleeping, and an eager comparing of notes as to the improvement of each.
And if there were no improvement, how well one remembers the smothered
sense of disappointment--smothered in public at least, lest the nurses
should be discouraged. Then came a cup of tea on the mat in the little
front room, where four white hammock-cradles hung, one in each corner;
while Ponnamal sat beside me with three babies on her knee and two or
three more somewhere near her. The babies used to study me in their wise
and serious fashion, and then make careful advances. And so we would
make friends.
Ponnamal had always much to tell about the exhaustless kindness of the
doctors and their wives and the lady superintendent of the hospital. And
the chief Tamil medical Evangelist had been true to his name, which
means Blessedness. Once, in much distress of mind, we sent a little babe
to the nursery, hardly daring to hope for her. When she arrived, the
doctors were both away on tour, and the medical Evangelist was in
charge. He attended to her at once, and by God's grace upon his work was
able to relieve the little child, who has prospered ever since.
But I must leave unrecorded many acts of helpfulness. In those early
days of doubt and difficulty, almost forgotten by us now, we beckoned to
our "partners which were in the other ship," and their Master and ours
will not forget how they held out willing hands and helped us.
It was not always plain sailing, even at Neyoor. "You are fighting Satan
at a point upon which he is very sensitive; he will not leave you long
in peace," wrote an experienced friend. On Palm Sunday, 1907, our first
little band of young girls, fruit of this special work, confessed Christ
in baptism, and we stood by the shining reach of water, and tasted of a
joy so pure and thrilling that nothing of earth may be likened to it. A
fortnight later we were ordered to the hills, and then the trouble came.
The immediate cause was overcrowding. Why did we overcrowd?
Friends at home to whom the facts about Temple service were new, were
stirred to earnest prayer. Out here fellow-missionaries helped us to
save the children. God heard the prayer and blessed the work, and
children began to come. Soon our one little room became too full. We had
babies in the bungalow and on our verandah, babies everywhere. Then
money came to build two more rooms, but they were soon too full. At
Neyoor the pressure was worse, for we could only rent two small houses;
and though we put up mat shelters, and the children lived as much as
possible in the open air, it was difficult to manage. But how could we
refuse the little children? The Temple women were ready to take them if
we had refused. Their houses are never too full. There was no other
nursery to which they could be sent. Little children who had passed the
troublesome infant stage could sometimes find a home elsewhere; but only
the Temple houses were open at all times to babies. Could we have
written to the friend who had saved a little child: "Hand her back to
the Temple. It is the will of our Father that this little one should
perish"? Should we have done it? We dare not do it. We prayed that help
would be sent to build new nurseries, and we went on and did our best;
but it was difficult.
We had just reached the hills in early April, and were forbidden to
return, when news reached us of a fatal epidemic of dysentery which had
broken out in the Neyoor nursery. Unseasonable rains had fallen and
driven the babies indoors; this increased the overcrowding. The doctors
were away. Letters telling us about the disaster had been lost--how, we
never knew--so that the second which reached us, taking it for granted
we had the first, gave no details, only the names of the smitten
babes--nineteen of them, and five dead. Then trouble followed trouble.
"While he was yet speaking, there came also another." Some evil men who
had sought to injure us before, caused us infinite anxiety. And for a
time that cannot be counted in days or in weeks it was like living
through a nightmare, when everything happens in painful confusion and
the sense of oppression is complete.
[Illustration: THE NEYOOR NURSERY.]
Out of the maelstrom came a letter from Ponnamal. "We are being
comforted," she wrote. "You will be longing to come to us, but oh, do
not come! If you were here all your strength would be given to fighting
this battle with death, and you would have no strength left for prayer.
God wanted to have one of us free to pray; and so He has taken you up to
the mountain, as He took Moses when the people were fighting down in the
plain." This was the true inward meaning of it all, and I knew it. But
Ponnamal is far from strong, and I feared for her; and to stay away with
the babies ill--it was the very hardest thing I had ever been asked to
do.
When the trouble passed there were ten in heaven. One, a little child of
two, had been saved so wonderfully from Temple dedication that we had
looked forward to a future of special blessing for her; and another was
a very lovely babe, dear to the missionary who, after much toil and many
disappointments, had been comforted by saving her. Each of the ten had
cost someone much. But this is an earthly point of view. They had cost
Him most who had taken them, and he is only an owner in name who has no
right to do as he will with his own.
The other side, the purely human side, pressed heavily just then. The
doctors had most kindly at once ordered a mission room, vacated at that
season, to be lent to the nursery, and another little house was taken
for the month. How Ponnamal kept all four houses going in an orderly
fashion, how she kept her nurses together through that time of almost
panic, and how she herself, frail and delicate as she is, kept up till
all was over, we cannot understand from any point of view but the
Divine. She only broke down once. It was when her dearest child, our
merry, beautiful little Heart's Joy, who, having more strength than
most, had battled longer and almost recovered, suddenly sank. The
visible cause was that a special nutrient, which, being costly, we
stocked in small quantities, ran short, and the fresh supply reached the
nursery just too late. "If only it had come yesterday!" moaned Ponnamal,
and we with her when we heard of the series of contretemps which had
delayed its arrival. The torture of second causes is as the blackness of
darkness, but the Lord gave deliverance from it; for just as she had to
part with all that was left her of our little Heart's Joy, a letter came
from Dr. Davidson which was God's own blessed comfort to a heart almost
broken. She never refers to that letter without the quick tears
starting. "I could let my little treasure go after I read that letter.
It strengthened me."
While all this was going on in Neyoor, Chellalu, then just two years
old, was very ill in Dohnavur. Mr. and Mrs. Walker were still there, and
they nursed her night and day; but at last a letter came, evidently
meant to prepare me for fresh sorrow. "Every little lamb belongs to the
Good Shepherd, not to us," the letter said, and told of a temperature
106° and rising. The child, all spirit and frolic, had little reserve
strength, and there was not much cause for hope. But we were spared this
parting. Chellalu is with us still.
The sky was clearing again and we were beginning to breathe freely, when
the worst that had ever touched us in all our years of work came
suddenly upon us. How small things that affect the body appear when the
point of attack wheels round to the soul! The death of all the babies
seemed as nothing compared with the falling away of one soul. But God is
the God of the waves and the billows, and they are still His when they
come over us; and again and again we have proved that the overwhelming
thing does not overwhelm. Once more by His interposition deliverance
came. We were cast down, but not destroyed.
A time of calm succeeded this storm. Money came to build nurseries at
Dohnavur, and buy more of the special nutrients we so much required. The
Neyoor remnant picked up, and the nurses took heart again. I went out to
them as soon as I could after our return from the hills, and found those
who were left well and strong. "They shall see His face" had been the
text in _Daily Light_, the evening the news reached me of the little
procession heavenwards. I looked at the ten names written in the margin
of my book; and, recalling the story of each, could be glad they have
seen the face of the One who loves them best. Lower down on the page
come the words, "We shall be satisfied." We thought of our babies
satisfied so soon; and then we knelt together and said, "Even so,
Father: for so it seemeth good in Thy sight."
Pretty pictures all in colours and bright sunshine tempt one to linger
over that visit. I can see the white hammocks slung from the trees in
the nursery compound, and happy baby-faces looking out of them. And
another shows me one who had been like a sister to Ponnamal, lightening
her load whenever she could; sitting with two dear babies in her arms,
and another clinging round her neck. "She comes and helps us often in
the mornings when we are very busy," said Ponnamal about the doctor's
wife, as I noticed the babies' affection for her and her sweet, kind
ways with them. "Sometimes when I am feeling down and home-sick, she
comes in like this and plays with the babies, and cheers us all up." The
Indian woman is very home-loving. Only devotion to the children could
have kept the nurses and Ponnamal so long in exile for their sake; and
there were times when even Ponnamal's brave heart sank. Then these
love-touches helped.
When the time came for the nursery party to leave Neyoor and return to
Dohnavur, after two and a half years in that hospitable mission, we were
sorry to part. Days like the days we had passed through test the stuff
of which souls are made, and they prove what we call friendship. After
the fire has spent itself, the fine gold shines out purified, and there
is something solemn in its light. We had grown close to our friends in
Neyoor; but the cloud had moved, so far as we could read the sign, and
it seemed right to return. The missionaries were away when the day came,
but the Christians surrounded Ponnamal with tokens of goodwill. "The
nursery has been like a little light in our midst," they said; and this
word cheered her more than all other words. And so farewelled, they
arrived home, all glad and warm with the glow that comes when hearts
meet each other and each finds the other kind.
CHAPTER XVII
In the Compound and Near it
[Illustration: THE OLD NURSERY. THE "ROOM OF JOY."]
"NOW I know why God put you in Dohnavur when He wanted this work done.
He hid you from the eyes of the world for the little children's sake. He
knew this work could never have been done by the road-side, so He hid
you."
The speaker was a Christian friend from Palamcottah, an Indian lawyer
who, for the first time, had come out to see us. He had found our
approaches appalling, and had wondered at first why we lived in such an
out-of-the-way place, three or four miles from the nearest road, and
twenty-four from civilisation. When he saw the children he understood.
Later, he helped us in an attempt to save two little ones in danger, and
insisted not only upon paying his own and our worker's expenses, but in
sending us a gift for the nurseries. With the gift came a letter full of
loving, Indian sympathy; and again he added as before: "The Lord hid you
in that quiet place for the little children's sake." Sometimes when the
inconveniences of jungle life press upon us, we remember our friend's
words: "This work could never have been done by the road-side, so He hid
you."
We have children with us who would not have been safe for a day had we
lived near a large town or near a railway. The stretch of open country
between us and Palamcottah (the Church Missionary Society centre of the
Tinnevelly district), to cover which, by bullock-cart, takes as long as
to travel from London to Brussels, is not considered very safe for
solitary Indian travellers, as the robber clan frequent it, and this is
an added protection for the children. Several times, to our knowledge,
unwelcome visitors have been deterred from making a raid upon us, by the
rumour of the robbers on the road. We are also most mercifully quite out
of the beat of the ordinary exploiter of missions; few except the really
keen care for such a journey; so that we get on with our work
uninterrupted by anything but the occasional arrival of welcome friends
and comrades. These, when they visit us for the first time, are usually
much astonished to find something almost civilised out in the wilds, and
they walk round with an air of surprise, and quite inspiring
appreciation, being kindly pleased with little, because they had looked
for less.
[Illustration: THE COURTYARD.]
The compound in which the nurseries are built is a field, bounded on
three sides by fields, and on the fourth by the bungalow compound. The
Western Ghauts with their foothills make it a beautiful place.
The buildings are not beautiful. With us, as elsewhere, doubtless, even
the break of a gable in the straight, barn-like roof makes a difference
in the estimate, and we have never had a margin for luxuries. But the
walls are coloured a soft terra-cotta, the roofs are a dull red; while
the porches (hidden by the palm trunks in the photograph) are a mass of
greenery and bloom; and the garden at the moment of writing is rejoicing
in over a hundred lilies, brilliant yellow and flame colour, each head
with its many flowers rising separate and radiant in the sunshine. Then
we have oleanders, crimson and pink and white, and little young hibiscus
trees, crimson and rose and cream. The arches in the new nursery
garden are covered with the lilac of morning-glory; and the Prayer-room
in the middle of the garden is a mass of violet passion-flower, the
pretty pink antigone, and starry jessamine. The very hedges at this
season are out in yellow flower, and a trellis round the nursery kitchen
is a delight of colour; so though our buildings are simple, we think the
lines have fallen unto us in pleasant places.
The first picture shows the old nursery, used now for the kindergarten.
It opens off the courtyard shown in the second photo. This courtyard
serves as an open-air room, a bright little place which is filled with
merrier children than the sober photograph shows. Tamils old and young
move when they laugh or even smile; in fact they wriggle. Being still,
with them, meant being seriously subdued; and so, where time-exposures
were required, we had to choose between solemn photos, or no photos at
all.
Opening off the courtyard on the opposite side to the kindergarten is a
room used as a store-room and Bible-class room combined. It was so very
uncomfortable that last Christmas, as a surprise for the children, we
divided the room into two halves with a curtain between. Their half is
made pretty with pictures and texts, painted in blue on pale brown wood.
The children call this part of the room the Tabernacle. The part beyond
the curtain is the court of the Gentiles.
The Coming-Day Feasts are a feature of Dohnavur life. Now that there are
so many feasts to celebrate, we find it more convenient to combine; and
the photograph overleaf shows as much as it can of one such happy feast.
The children who are being fêted are distinguished from the others by
having flowers in their hair. No Indian feast is complete without
flowers. Jessamine is the favourite, but the prettiest wreaths are made
of pink oleander; and sometimes a girl will surprise us with a new and
lovely combination, as of brown flowering grasses and yellow Tecoma
bells.
[Illustration: A COMING-DAY FEAST.]
Opposite the kindergarten room is the first of the two new
nurseries--the lively Parrot-house. This nursery, really the Taraha
(Star, called after its English giver, whose name means "star") is the
abode of the middle-aged babies, aged between two years and four. Most
of these attend the kindergarten, and are very proud of the fact.
The Prémalia nursery (Abode of Love), given by two friends in memory of
a mother translated, lies beyond the Taraha. Here the tiny infants live,
and we call it the Menagerie. This nursery, like the other, looks out on
the glorious mountains. If beautiful things can make babies good, ours
should be very good.
On the eastern side of the field we have lately built two small
sick-rooms, used oftener as overflow nurseries. These little rooms have
names meaning "peace" and "tranquillity"; and those of us who have lived
in them with our babies, sick or well, find the names appropriate. In
the foreground there is a garden, in the background the mountain; and to
give purpose to it all, the foreground is full of life. A new nursery
now being built is a welcome gift from Australia; and a new field with a
noble tree, in whose shade a hundred children could play, is the gift of
a friend who stayed with us for one bright week last year.
All this is a later development, unthought of when our artist friend was
with us. We have often wished for him since the nurseries filled. When
he was with us our choice of subject was very limited: now, wherever we
look we see pictures, which to be properly caught ask for colour
photography.
The story of these buildings is the story of the Ravens, so old and yet
so new. When first the work began, we had only one mud-floored room for
nursery, kitchen, bedroom, and everything else that was needed. We
hardly knew ourselves whereunto things would grow, and feared to run
before the Lord by even a prayer for buildings. And yet we could not go
on as we were. The birds were soon too many for the nest, and we needed
more nests. No one knew of our need; for visitors at that time were few
at Dohnavur, and we told no one. But money began to come. We ventured on
a single room without a verandah or even foundations--built of sun-dried
bricks as inexpensively as possible. But it was a palace to us. While we
were building it, more little children came. We felt we should need more
room, but had not more money; so we told the builders to wait for a day
while we gave ourselves to prayer about the matter. Was the work going
to grow much more? We were fearful of making mistakes. Were we right to
incur fresh responsibility?--for buildings need to be kept in condition,
and the cheaper they are the more care they need. No one at home was
responsible for us. No one had authorised this new work. It would not be
fair to saddle those on whom the burden might eventually fall with
responsibilities for which they were not responsible. And yet surely the
work of saving these little children had been given to us to do? Someone
was responsible. Surely, unless we were utterly wrong and had mistaken
the Shepherd's Voice, surely He was responsible! He could not mean us to
search for the lambs for whom only the wolves had been searching, and
then leave them out in the open, found but unfolded, or packed so close
in the little fold that they could not grow as little lambs should?
We rolled the burden off that day as to the ultimate responsibility, and
we asked definitely for all that was needed to build another room.
Three days later a registered letter came from a bank in Madras. It
contained an anonymous gift of one hundred rupees, and was marked, "For
a new nursery." The date showed that it had been posted in Madras on the
day of our waiting upon God for guidance as to His wishes. A few days
later, the same amount, with the same direction as to its use, was sent
to us from the same bank. The giver, as we knew long afterwards, was a
fellow-missionary in Tinnevelly, whose order to send these sums to us
was given before even we ourselves had fully understood the meaning of
the leading. The second room was built on to the first, and the children
called it the Room of Joy.
[Illustration: THE RED LAKE.
Water Palms, with Mountains in the background.]
There are no secrets in India. The Hindu masons were amazed at what they
at once recognised as the hand of the Lord upon the work, and they
spread the story everywhere. Later, when they built the nursery where
poor little Mala stood and mourned, they understood why they had to stop
before the verandah was built. Only enough was in hand to build the bare
room; but to their eyes, as to ours, a verandah was much needed, and
they were content to wait till what was required for one came. In this
land of blazing sunshine and drenching monsoon a house without a
verandah is hardly habitable, and a small square room without one has a
Manx-cat appearance.
The story of the rooms has been repeated in the story of the work ever
since. "Do not thank us. It is only a belated tenth," wrote a
fellow-missionary not long ago, as she sent a gift for the nurseries.
Belated tenths have reached us sometimes when they have been like
visible ravens flying straight from the blue above. All the long
journeys in search of the children, all the expenses connected with
their salvation, all that has been required to provide nurses and food
(including the special nourishment without which the more delicate could
not live at all), all that is now being needed for their education--all
has come and is coming as the ravens came to Elijah. The work has
been a revelation of how many hearts are sensitive and obedient to
the touch of the Spirit; for sometimes help has reached us in such a way
and in such form that we could not but stand and worship, awestruck by
the token of the nearness of our God. There is many a spot marked in
garden or in field or in the busy nursery or our own quiet room, where,
with the open letter in our hand--the letter of relief from a pressure
unknown even to the nearest fellow-worker--we have knelt in spirit with
Jacob and said: "Surely the Lord is in this place!" and almost added, so
dense are we in unilluminated moments, "and I knew it not."
Framed between red roofs and foliage, there are far blue glimpses of
mountains shown in this lakeside photograph. We do not see the water
from the compound. It lies on the other side of the boundary fields and
hedges; but we see the mountains with perfect distinctness of outline,
scarped with bare crags, which in the early morning are sometimes pink,
and in the evening, purple. But the time to see the mountains in their
glory is when the south-west monsoon is flinging its masses of cloud
across to us. Then the mountains, waking from the lazy sleep of the
long, hot months, catch the clouds on their pointed fangs, toss them
back and harry them, wrap themselves up in robes of them, and go to
sleep again.
The road that skirts the Red Lake leads through two ancient Hindu towns,
from both of which we have children saved, in each case as by a miracle.
In the first of these old towns there is a Temple surrounded by a mighty
wall.
There are two large gates and one small side door in the wall; and,
passing in through the small side door, one sees another wall almost as
strong as the first, and realises something of the power that built it.
The Temple is in the centre of the large enclosure. It is a single tower
opening off the inner court. In the outer court a pillared hall is used
as stable for the Temple elephant, and two camels lounge in the roughly
kept garden in front. This Temple, with its double walls, its massive,
splendidly-carved doors and expensive animal life, is somewhat of a
surprise to the visitor, who hardly expects to see so much in a little
old country town on the borders of the wilds. But Hinduism has not lost
hold of this old remote India yet. There are some who think that the
country town is the place to see it in strength.
[Illustration: AT THE DOOR OF THE TEMPLE.]
It was early in August, three years ago, that we heard of a baby girl in
that town, devoted from birth to the god. We set wheels in motion, and
waited. A month passed and nothing was done. We could not go ourselves
and attempt to persuade the mother to change the vow she had made, as
any movement on our part would only have riveted the links that fettered
the child to the god. We had to be quiet and wait. At last, one evening
in September, a Hindu arrived in the town with whom our friends who were
on the watch had intimate connection. He, too, knew about the child; and
he knew a way unknown to our friends by which the mother might be
influenced, and he consented to try. His arrival just at that juncture
appeared to us, who were waiting in daily expectation of an answer of
deliverance, as the evident beginning of that answer; thus our faith was
quickened and we waited in keen hope. Two days later, after dark, there
was a rush from the nursery to the bungalow. "The baby has come!"
Another moment, and we were in the nursery. A woman--one of our
friends--was standing with what looked like a parcel wrapped in a cloth
hidden under her arm. Even then, though all was safe, she was trembling;
and outside, two men, her relations, stood on guard. She opened the
white cloth, and inside was the baby.
The men assured us that all was right. The mother had been convinced
of the wrongness of dedicating the little babe, and would give us no
trouble. But a day or two later, she came and demanded it back. She
could not stand the derision of her friends, who told her she had sinned
far more in giving her child to those who would break its caste than she
ever could have done had she given it to the Temple. We pacified her
with difficulty, and were thankful when the little thing was safe in the
Neyoor nursery. For in those days, before we learned how best to protect
our children, we were often glad to have some place even more out of
reach than Dohnavur.
The second of these old towns is famous for its rock, and its Temple
built into the rock. Looking down from above one can see inside the
courtyard as into an open well. Connected with this Temple, some years
ago, there was a beautiful young Temple woman, who had been given as a
child--as all Temple women must be--to the service of the gods. She had
no choice as regarded herself--probably the idea of choice never entered
her mind--but for her babe she determined to choose; and yet she knew of
no way of deliverance.
But there was a way of deliverance, and if it had only been for this one
child's sake, and for the sake of the relief it must have been to that
fear-haunted mother, we are glad with a gladness too deep for words that
the nursery was here. For the mother heard of it. There were lions in
the path. She quietly avoided them, and through others who were willing
to help she sent her child to us. She herself would not come. She waited
a mile or so from the bungalow till the matter was concluded, then
returned to her home alone.
A week later she appeared suddenly at the bungalow. It was only to make
sure the little one was safe and well, and in order to sign a paper
saying she was wholly given to us. This done she disappeared again,
refusing speech with anyone, and for months we heard nothing of her.
Then cholera swept our countryside, and we heard she had taken it and
died. We leave her to God her Creator, who alone knows all the story of
her life: we only know enough to make us very silent. And through the
quiet we hear as it were a voice that chants a fragment from an old
hymn: "We believe that THOU shalt come to be our Judge."
CHAPTER XVIII
From the Temple of the Rock
ANOTHER little girl who came from that same Temple of the Rock has a
story very different from the other, and far more typical.
It was on a blazing day in June, when the very air, tired of being hot,
leaned heavily upon us, and we felt unequal to contest, that a cough
outside my open door announced a visitor. "Come in!" Another cough, and
I looked out and saw a shuffling form disappear round the corner of the
house. I called again, and the figure turned. It was a man who had
helped us before, but about whose _bonâ-fides_ we had doubts; so we
asked without much hopefulness what he had to tell us. He said he had
reason to believe a certain Temple woman known to him had a child she
meant to dedicate to the god of a Temple a day's journey distant. Then
he paused. "Do you know where she is now?" "She is on her way to the
Temple." "It would be well if she came here instead." "If that is the
Animal's desire it may be possible to bring her." "Has she gone far?
Could you overtake her?" "She is waiting outside your gate."
At such a moment it is wise to show no surprise and no anxiety. All the
burning eagerness must be covered up with coolness. But in the hour that
intervened before the woman "at the gate" could be persuaded to come
further, we quieted ourselves in the Lord our God and held on for the
little child.
At last the shuffling step and the sound of voices told us they had
come--two women, the man, and a child. The child was a baby of something
under two, a sad-looking little thing, with great, dark, pathetic eyes
looking out from under limp brown curls. She was very pale and fragile;
and when the woman who carried her set her down upon the floor and
propped her against the wall, she leaned against it listlessly, with her
little chin in her tiny hand, in a sorrowful, grown-up fashion. I longed
to take her and nestle her comfortably; but, of course, took no notice
of her. Any sign of pity or sympathy would have been misunderstood by
the women. All through the interminable talk upon whi
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