THE LITTLE MAN OF PAO-TING-FU AND THE GOSPEL.
By Albert P. Peck, M.D.
Years ago, while living at Pao-ting-fu, a little man made his appearance at my hospital with a large tumor on his neck. He had never seen a European before, but came with his mind fully made up for an operation, owing to reports he had heard of us in his country home from patients who had been at the hospital. Against the remonstrances of his friends and neighbors, he had sold his little property in order to get money to live on. His simple reply to these remonstrances was that his life was made a burden to him by his tumor, and he was going to try the foreign doctor, and, in the expressive idiom of his language, if he was “cured well” he could earn some more money, and if he was “cured dead” he wouldn’t need it. The foreign doctor tried to persuade him against so formidable and risky an operation, but without avail. Fortunately, he lived through it, and the healing of the wound went on normally until delayed by a rather severe attack of erysipelas. Before this danger had passed, he sent word by the gate keeper that he must go home, as his money was spent. I replied that he must on no account go then; that I would feed him myself; but the next morning he was missing. The gate keeper said he went with his little roll of bedding at daylight, saying that he was already greatly indebted to us for what we had done for him, and could not think of burdening our hospitality by eating our food. So he vanished into the unknown, from whence he came, and we concluded that he would probably die. Months afterward one of our colporters, reporting the incidents of a tour in a region seldom visited, asked me if I remembered such a man. I said I did, but supposed he was dead. He said no, he had found him alive and well, and preaching the Gospel at a fair. While in the hospital he had seemed very stupid; no one thought he had taken in much of the truth; but he had bought and paid for a little elementary book, and had learned to read it. The simple explanation had remained in his memory, and after his recovery at home he had taken his book with him when visiting the little fairs where all the business of neighboring villages is done; he had been notable as the man with the large tumor, and now when he came around without it he was naturally an object of curiosity. They said he kept a kerchief around his neck, and when the crowd gathered around, he would say: “My friends, when I was in the hospital they taught me of a religion there that is far more precious than the cure of my body. I have a little book here which tells about it, and if you will sit down and let me12read and explain it to you, then I’ll show you my neck.” And so, a self-appointed evangelist, he had been telling his little story. His cup was small, but it was just as full as though it were an ocean brimming over. That place is now one of the most encouraging of the outstations around Pao-ting-fu; a circle of believers is gathered there, and the little patient remains a humble and consistent Christian.—Missionary Herald.