o transfer money which was
to enable us to erect those longed-for buildings in Hwochow. Whilst I
was transacting my business, a voice behind me addressed Miss French by
name, and the cashier looked up quickly. Immediately upon the conclusion
of my business he asked: "Is that Miss French of Taiyueanfu? Fifty pounds
have been lying to her account for three years, and we have been
unsuccessful in tracing her whereabouts." Identity having been fully
established the money with interest was paid to us, and with our L500
complete and some extra, we journeyed homewards. A strange coincidence
you say! Yea, verily, unless "we take our courage in both hands, and
call it God."

After a train journey for the next two days, came slow travelling from
Taiyueanfu to Hwochow. Long and weary days, in which one takes many hours
to accomplish thirty miles, turning in at night to a Shansi inn. A
wonderful place it is, carried on with the minimum of expense and
trouble to the owner, whose responsibility ends when he has provided you
with a kettle of boiling water in an absolutely empty room, the walls
and ceiling of which are dirty beyond description. In the courtyard are
a few sheds where your mules are stalled for the night, while horses and
donkeys, kicking and braying, vie with _insecta_ in enlivening for you
the hours of darkness. Meanwhile your landlord has sent to ask whether
you are requiring food. The bill of fare offers _mien_,[7] with
accompanying condiments of salt, vinegar, and red pepper. Should you be
a _bon vivant_ you will ask for onion and a few bean sprouts, though
this entail the reckless expenditure of the further sum of one penny.
You lodge a protest at such extortionate charges, for, as your servant
remarks, "at such a price we cannot afford to eat." Two sticks cut from
a tree serve for table cutlery. "I hate luxury," said Goethe, "it kills
the imagination." Here imagination flourishes. Through the dirt and
grime of the wall I can decipher a poem which tells me that when I come
to reckon with my landlord, my account will be as flowing river. Other
scrawls eulogise him, and assure me: "Whoever sleeps upon this _kang_,
sleeps in peace." (I must have been an exception!) An idol, half-torn,
hangs in one corner of the room, and in another I discover a Christian
tract. Who has passed this way before me? I am aroused from my reverie
by the sound of a voice, which utters, without seeing the humour and
pathos of the remark: "The