The Energy of Maung Ngae
By Robert Bruce Thurber
A Mission Story of Real Life
OUR fellow missionaries brought us a boy who said he wanted to work. We have had many such boys come to us who had never put their hands to anything in the way of labor, and a few hours of ordinary work have banished the idea from their minds. But Maung Ngae was said to be exceptional — and we found him so. He was an orphan, and had attended a Catholic school in Mandalay; but he left it because he wanted to work. With most boys, this means to us that they want money; but we decided to try this one. We had a servant with whom we were very much dissatisfied. He stole from us, but we couldn't catch him doing it. The first night Maung Ngae was with us, the servant took my bicycle outside, saying he would clean it. It was unusual for him to do anything without being told, and especially at such a time; but we thought he was spurring up at the prospect of a rival. A few minutes later, my attention was called to the fact that both boys were gone. We hurried out, and found Maung Ngae returning. He said the servant was running away with the bicycle. I sent him racing down the road after the fellow, and I followed on. Soon I met both of them coming back, with our newcomer in possession of the wheel. Thereupon the servant was summarily dismissed. Maung Ngae had tried to prevent the theft, was strangled into silence, and beaten with the large air-pump till it was bent and broken. This rather dramatic entrance into our acquaintance made a place in our hearts for the boy. His energy soon marked him. He actually stumbled over his own feet in order to reach work in a hurry. He went at it as if it were something good to eat. Before we got through telling him what to do, he had begun to do it. His fault lay in his impetuosity, and he made many exasperating mistakes. He used the dish towel for a rope, and the water pitcher for a dipper; but we had a boy before who strained the soup through what might be called his handkerchief, and so were used to such blunders. What a refreshing it was to have a helper who was anxious to work! It was like getting a breeze from a cooler clime. Just before sunset on Sabbath afternoons, we gathered the boys into one of the schoolrooms and told the wonderful and fascinating story of God's dealings with men. Maung Ngae early wanted a Bible of his own, and carefully patched up with paper an old song-book that was given him. In these meetings, he sat on the edge of the seat, head bent forward and mouth and eyes wide open. The truth sank into his very soul, and he grew into a lover of Jesus. He was first in his testimony for God, and in the lead among the candidates for baptism. But Maung Ngae's impulsiveness might lead him as quickly out of the truth as into it. The Lord has sent him some severe setbacks to help harness his ardor. He was looking forward to the reopening of school, that he might learn — his overmastering ambition. But he was suddenly taken sick, and it was found that he must undergo a very painful operation. For many long weeks, he lay on his back at the hospital, with his Bible on the pillow by his head. Those were days of trial and triumph. It was in the midst of the hottest hot season we have had for years, but he always had a smile and a pleasant word for his friends, and talked his blessed hope to his fellow inmates in the ward of pain. At last he came out with his discretion increased and his energy not diminished. Then we found that his father was Chinese. This explains the energy, and does not detract from the prospect of Maung Ngae's becoming an efficient worker for the Burmese people.