In Northern China by W. A. Westworth

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Mar 9, 1911

In Northern China

By W. A. Westworth

W. A. WESTWORTH

ACCOMPANIED by Elder I. H. Evans and Dr. M. M. Kay and wife, I left Shanghai, December 1, bound for the northern part of this great empire. Journeying west for seven hundred miles, we came to Hankow, where work has recently been begun. Here is a city of about one and one-half million population, the center of a vast territory reached mainly by waterways, with which China abounds.

Brethren F. A. Allum and Esta Miller have procured a good location for work here, and evidences of God's leading are seen. Many interested ones are coming continually to the public services, and daily the inquirers fill the time of the brethren. Sister Allum is carrying on a good work for the women. We hope that in a short time we shall have a church in this so-called “Chicago of China” to witness to the truth of God.

Turning northward, after two days' journey we came to the river, down which we sailed for twenty-four hours, and arrived at our headquarters for Honan, the Cheo Chia K'o station. Here we were welcomed heartily by Dr. and Mrs. H. W. Miller, Elder and Mrs. O. A. Hall, and Sister Pauline Schilberg, and by a large number of our Chinese evangelists and workers who were here assembled in the workers' school being conducted by Dr. Miller. We thoroughly enjoyed our three days' stop with these earnest workers, whose zeal to carry forward the message can not but bring good results. Here we saw old men and women who, inspired by a desire to know more of the message, had come overland four hundred li [about 134 miles] to attend. Here was a boy who wheeled his mother over thirty miles on a wheelbarrow. Her poor bound feet had so crippled her that it would have been impossible for her to walk. And here I would say, for the benefit of many who wonder about the matter, that after a woman has gone thirty or forty years with her feet bound, and perhaps with several small bones of the feet broken in the process, it is impossible for her to unbind them, or, without the binding, to walk at all on the poor stumps which remain.

At this point of our trip, Dr. and Mrs. Kay left us to go down the river eastward to their allotted station at Ying-shang, to join Brother Fred Lee and wife, who for the past year have been the only foreign workers for many miles around in that section of China.

Our evangelist, Brother Han, who has done such noble work for the cause at Ying-shang, was at Cheo Chia K'o, waiting for this additional help. He conducted them to their new station, which meant a seven days' journey on a small Chinese house-boat down the river.

Here Dr. Miller joined us in a prospective expedition to try to find a suitable location for the Mandarin School, which he is carrying on temporarily at Cheo Chia K'o. I wish the brethren of the educational circles in the home land could see this “advanced” school for workers,—a small room about fifteen feet square, with a dirt floor; no heat in winter, and no possible place to put in heat, because of the crowded condition of the room; and with no equipment save Bibles, and the few books belonging to the teacher. We can not begin to care for all who both want to come and who should come; nor can we supply students any work in this small place in a large city; therefore we must pay all their expenses. We pray for the time to come when we can have a small farm, and give the students an opportunity to work and thus meet expenses. In spite of the present unfavorable conditions, we have many willing hearts, and with a consecrated teacher, much good is being accomplished. We believe God will soon give us better facilities for carrying on this important work.

After traveling eighteen hours in a cart, we reached the one inland railroad of China, and started north again. City after city was passed, and hundreds of miles of country traversed, representing scores of millions of people. Our hearts were saddened as we thought that in all this great region there is not one worker for the message. We journeyed to the Yellow River district, bounded on the south by numerous hills of a peculiar formation, which are inhabited by thousands of cliff-dwellers, as many as five tiers of homes being seen in some places, and soon came to our first view of “China's Sorrow,” as the river is called. Crossing this river on a wonderful cantilever bridge, with one hundred two spans, each span about one hundred twenty feet long, we rode for several hours, when we came to a branch railway line recently completed by a Belgian company, but taken over by the Chinese government. Seven hours' ride farther west brought us to Tai-yuan, the capital city of Shan-si. We were obliged to show our cards no fewer than four times to satisfy various officials, and thus had vividly brought to our minds that here it was that the terrible Boxer movement of 1900 had its worst development. Here scores of missionaries were slaughtered, many after they had been gathered by the mandarin into his yamen, or official residence, under pretense of protection. We saw the monument that was erected at the demand of the foreign powers to the memory of those who thus died.

Tai-yuan is a vast and thriving city, far in advance of most Chinese cities I have seen. It is the center of a dense population, the capital of a prosperous province, and the ancient capital of the country. Here again the same desolate and heart-rending story,—not one worker to tell of the glory and power of the message of the third angel.

Returning to the main line after two more days of travel, we reached Peking, that mighty city of the Middle Kingdom. As we saw this great center, with its hundreds of thousands, yea, millions, of people; as we gazed upon its shrines and temples; as we entered the sacred precincts of the headquarters of Buddhism, and there saw the largest idol in all the world, fully seventy-five feet high, and heard the chants of the many priests or the weird monotony of a lama instructor, in solemn repetition reciting the words of their sages and philosophers; as we saw the poverty and degradation which abound everywhere in a Chinese town,—all these things filled us with an indescribable longing to see the word of life here preached, and honest souls told of the soon-coming Saviour to end all this hollow mockery, this blasphemy of heathenism, this woe and sadness which make life a burden to so many created in the image of God.

Shanghai.

(Concluded next week)