ings look better than they really were.

'Natives of the place gave us numbers, which showed the population
was then estimated at not much, if any, more than half the former
population. It was expressly stated, however, that the missing half
were not regarded as all dead; very many were dead, had died in the
place, but many had gone elsewhere--in most cases no one knew
where. Of these some few would doubtless return; but it is to be
feared that the mortality in a hard year among famine refugees is
very large, and of those who left their homes and native places,
the few that may eventually return will be very few, I fear.

'Doesn't the Bible say that it is a harder fate to die of famine
than to die by the sword--to die stricken through for want of the
fruits of the earth? But of all those who died in the famine in
North China there is one class whose case is perhaps more
distressing than ordinary. A large number of people seem to have
died just as the harvest--a plentiful one--ripened. Through all
these hard dreary months, when, day after day, month after month,
they looked for and longed for rain, those I now speak of struggled
through, kept up hope, fared hard, hoped eagerly, and at last saw
the rain come, saw the crops flourishing, saw them beginning to
ripen, congratulated themselves and others on the prospect of
abundant food and better days. But they were to see it with their
eyes, but not to eat thereof. As far as could be gathered from the
natives themselves, the case would seem to be thus.

'The great mass of the population was much reduced in bodily
strength by the long period of half-starvation they went through;
summer and early autumn came with the rains and the attendant ague,
which last--the ague--still more reduced the strength of their
already emaciated frames. You can imagine them, with lean faces and
hungry eyes, tottering about the fields, and counting the days that
must yet elapse before the grain would ripen. The rage of hunger
was no longer to be borne; they anticipated by a few days the
ripening; took the grain, still a little green--perhaps sometimes
very green--and put it into the pot. But here again was another
difficulty. The fuel used is grain stalks, and the famine deprived
them at once of food and fuel. Green grain th