ketch:--

'My tent is not only my dwelling-house and dispensary, but also my
chapel. I always endeavour to instruct the visitors and patients as
far as I can. Preaching to Mongols is a little different from
preaching at home--a little different from preaching in China even.
You can get a congregation of heathen Chinese to listen for, say,
twenty minutes, or half an hour, or even longer; but begin to
preach to a lot of Mongols, and they begin to talk to each other,
or perhaps to ask you questions about your dress and your country.

'The nature of their own service is partly to blame for this. When
a Mongol sends for a lama or two to read prayers in his tent, the
inmates, though present, don't think it necessary to attend much to
what is going on. Though they did attend, they would not be able to
understand, so talking goes on among them pretty much as usual. If
I were to stick myself up and begin, and start off sermonising to
them, I would be treated much as they treat their own lamas; so I
confine my preaching to conversations and arguments--a style of
teaching which I find secures their attention'.

Many, too, are the sketches in his letters and diaries of the men he
met. They are all drawn with that remarkable and largely unconscious
power, which he possessed so fully, of being able to see very vividly
the striking points and details of passing events, and of enabling those
to whom he wrote, by his aptly chosen words, also to see exactly what
passed before his eyes. One or two out of many examples must suffice:--

'This season (1874) I met a deaf and dumb man. He was uneducated,
but of great quickness and intelligence. He could converse easily
and readily with his fellow-Mongols by signs, and I could ask many
simple questions and understand his answers without trouble. His
perception was remarkable. While sitting in the dusk outside my
tent, a messenger came from his father's tent to tell him that some
of the sheep were missing. A single turn of the hand followed by a
glance around, as if searching for something, was all that was
required. He had been sitting quietly in the circle, looking at us
talking; but the moment the communication was made he uttered an
inarticulate sound betraying great excitement, knocked the ashes
out of his pipe, stuck it into his boot, threw hims