THE MISSIONARY'S AVOCATION 107 



our modern world. I had heard of them in the Old 

 Testament days and in the time of our Lord. I thought 

 they were something that the world had outgrown. So 

 to be told that caring for these people was to be part 

 of my work was somewhat of a shock. As I sat there in 

 the prayer meeting and thought the thing through, I 

 had to admit that there were lepers in this modern day, 

 that leprosy was an awful disease, that being lepers they 

 were sick, and as sick needed somebody to care for them. 

 If somebody must care for them why not I be that 

 somebody? So before the prayer meeting was over I 

 said, "All right, if you think I am fit for that job I am 

 willing to tackle it. ' ' 



I went to the blind asylum and saw fifty blind and 

 helpless cripples that were being cared for at the rate 

 of one dollar per month each. I looked after them for 

 four years but could do little for them. The blind 

 asylum has been turned over to the Mission. India has 

 a great many blind and no class of people in India is 

 having less done for them than these poor unfortunates. 

 There is urgent need that somebody or some organiza- 

 tion take up their cause. 



A few days after the prayer meeting Dr. Arthur H. 

 Ewing said to me, "Well, have you got your nerve with 

 you?" I said, "Yes, I think so, why?" He said, 

 "Well I think you will need it because we are going 

 over to the leper asylum. ' ' We jumped on our bicycles, 

 rode out of the college campus, across the Jumna bridge. 

 About a mile beyond the end of the bridge, upon that 

 sun-baked Indian plain, he pointed out a lot of ram- 

 shackle, tumble-down mud huts. He said, "That is the 

 leper asylum." As I caught my first view of it I 

 thought of all the unprepossessing institutions I had ever 



