07 BACK TO INDIA
Chapter 7
BACK TO INDIA THE voyage of Dr. and Mrs. Phillips to India opened boisterously enough. The sky was black with clouds as they went on board the Elcano, a new vessel laden with ice, bound for Calcutta. All next day the clouds grew darker, the wind blew a gale, and the vessel rolled and pitched in a most alarming fashion. On the second night, as Captain Pritchard was going through the main cabin, he remarked to the passengers, " A terrible night ; an awful storm." They never heard him speak again. All through the night the vessel tossed like a leaf on the waves, and the missionary and his party were too prostrate to leave their berths.
Just as the grey dawn broke, a tremendous sea struck the vessel, and the next instant Mrs. Pritchard’s heart-rending cry, " My husband’s overboard," was heard above the howling of the wind. Dr. Phillips sprang from his berth, but was too ill to do more than crawl back again. Before a boat could be lowered, they were miles away, flying before one of the fiercest hurricanes that had ever swept the eastern shores of America. All day long it lasted, while above the moaning and shrieking of the wind in the shrouds, and the dashing of the roaring waves against the vessel, rose Mrs. Pritchard’s wail for her lost husband. Without a captain, the vessel plunged on madly into the darkness of the awful night which followed. The passengers laid their heads upon their pillows, wondering if they would wake up in this world or the next. But on the following morning they were sailing under a cloudless sky. Outside the ship not a trace of the storm was to be seen. The first officer was proclaimed captain, and he undertook to land Mrs. Pritchard at some American port, so that she might return to her friends. Unfortunately he proved sadly incompetent to take the captain’s place. He lost his reckoning, crossed the Equator four times, and at last the vessel was becalmed forty days in the Indian Ocean, which seemed like a sea of glass. The marvelously beautiful sunsets which they witnessed every night were the one redeeming feature of this tedious time of waiting. The drinking water failed, and buckets were hung up to catch the rain, which was served out as a delicious beverage. Finally, Dr. Kelly found the right route, and the vessel reached Point de Galle, in Ceylon, after a five months’ voyage. Having sighted land but once, when they caught a distant glimpse of the Island of Trinidad, Ceylon seemed like a fairyland to their tired eyes.
Now Dr. Phillips wrote —
" One hundred and forty-nine days from Boston. A little boat came out, bringing the pilot, to take us into the Point de Galle, Ceylon. Our first eager questions were about the American War. Fancy our surprise and sadness on hearing from the pilot’s lips the words, ’ Lincoln shot — Peace! ’ The joy the last word brought us could not dispel the grief of the first announcement. Our crew were in grief, and with one exception all on board were overwhelmed with sorrow.
" The mate, who took command of the ship after the captain was swept overboard, was jubilant. I cannot speak for my shipmates, but I know one passenger, and he a missionary, had hard work to keep his hands off this creature, who deserved to be flung headlong into the Indian Ocean, and given a chance to cool his hot head."
Three pleasant weeks were spent in Ceylon, and the party reached the Mission House at Midnapore, Bengal, at eight o’clock in the morning on July 1st, 1865. The wild delight of the native Christians on seeing their " Jimmy baba " was not easily to be forgotten. The Bengali preacher, Mohesh, caught him up, and ran all round the room with him in his arms. Mrs. Phillips also came in for a vast amount of curiosity.
Dr. Phillips’ gratitude to God for bringing him back again to his native country as a missionary knew no bounds. On the following Sunday he took the afternoon prayer meeting, his first service in the Oriya language. He preached his first Bengali sermon on August 27th. He afterwards started on his first preaching tour, and reached Jellasore on November 1st. The following letter was written from this place to his father, who was now at Midnapore : —
"Jellasore -- My dear Pa, How natural it all seems about here. I could not call you anything but ’ Pa.’ In this house the childhood memories are too strong. I cannot tell you how much at home I feel. It seems but as yesterday that we children played about here. Everything I see revives childhood’s memories, and my heart overflows with praise to God for the mercies of those early days. All the love, all the instruction, all the joys, and all the pains of childhood awaken today the devoutest gratitude of my heart. In the room where you taught me to pray I am praying for you today to Him whose kind hand has led me safely thus far. Oh, for grace to hold fast to that divine hand, and to be led on even to the end ! " His old friend. Dr. Bacheler, now the senior missionary at Midnapore, welcomed him most cordially to every department of the work there. Dr. Phillips helped to build up the congregation and Sunday School with his wonted enthusiasm, and introduced the volunteer system into the latter, allowing none to teach but those who heartily offered themselves. This plan worked like a charm, and the Sunday School grew very rapidly. Prayer meetings, temperance lectures, singing classes, and special services occupied almost every evening. Only a few weeks after his arrival in India good tidings of bread cast upon the waters brought him great joy, and strengthened and deepened his faith.
One of the Inspectors, returning from his tour among the schools in the district, brought with him two Bengalis who were anxious to be taught. He reported that one morning he was awakened by a man who was in search of the " Jesus Christ man," and was taken to a neighbouring village, where he found four men who had abandoned their idols, and were in the habit of meeting at the side of a tank every Sunday to worship the unknown God by bowing to the sun. On inquiry he found that some twenty years previously Bangsi Mahanti, the leading man of the party, had obtained a small volume of tracts at a marketplace. He became so interested in them that he called together his friends, and read them aloud. The result was that all these men were ultimately led to abandon heathenism, and to accept Christianity. When Dr. Bacheler and Dr. Phillips visited the village in order to baptize these converts, the Hindus were greatly enraged, and threatened to kill the missionaries. One of them offered a price for Dr. Bacheler’s head ; but the Christians remained steadfast. Many years later Dr. Phillips was again visiting this district, and hearing that one of those who had formerly threatened him was now dangerously ill, he at once went to see him. This unexpected kindness greatly impressed the dying man. He afterwards remarked that it was a strange kind of religion that would lead the sahib to call on him after he had threatened to take his life.
Bazaar preaching brought him face to face with men he wished to meet, and his study and drawing room were always open to all who chose to call. Not a few of those for whose highest good he constantly laboured entered his ever-open door. Hindu gentlemen were especially drawn to him, and attended the English service at his house on Sunday evenings, he visiting them in the morning for the purpose of conversation on religious subjects. As a medical man he found abundant opportunities of speaking to them about the Great Physician. For the orphan girls on the mission station he deemed no sacrifice too great, and a large number of those whom he thus taught are today earnest Christian women. During the cold season he usually made long tours throughout the district, sometimes going still farther afield.
Some extracts from his letters written during these mission tours, provide us with a graphic description of the circumstances under which he worked.
" Moonbghur, Jan. 22nd -- This morning I was premeditating an attack on the Brahmins, and this evening I have had a chance to make it. Mahesh, our native preacher, and I went to a large village a mile away. The audience consisted almost entirely of Brahmins. It was a gloomy picture. Fat, lazy fellows grinning at each other as I exposed their trickery. Now and then, while I spoke of the awful judgment awaiting them for deceiving the people, I thought I could see seriousness settle upon their faces. Were our blessed Lord here, I doubt not that He would talk to these miserable Brahmins as He did to the Pharisees. It is our duty to expose them to the people whom they are deluding, and to shake their confidence in these blind guides. Poor dupes ! They laugh, and say all is true, and then go off and put the dust from the priest’s foot upon their heads. Little Rover [his dog] is amusingly curled up at my feet fast asleep. The men are cooking, and the oxen are eating straw, while I have just finished my Bengali chapter and cut my quill to write to you. I overtook the garriman six miles out. Rover was trotting along beautifully, but thinking that the fellow might have walked him too much, I took him on Don, and he almost went to sleep ; but when we reached the other bank of the river I put him down. After walking some distance he trotted up to my side, and looking up into my face, began to beg to be taken up again ; so I gave him a second ride of half a mile. On reaching camp the little fellow- seemed so disappointed at not finding any of his friends, that he set up a pitiful cry, but a bit of plantain and two mutton bones very soon soothed his heart and his stomach, and he thereupon went to sleep. Now, as I write, he lies close to my arm, on the table. He looked so lonesome after his supper that I let him jump into my lap and then on to the table, where he seemed entirely contented. After biting my pen a few times for fun, he laid himself out for a nap, but every few minutes he looked up to assure his little heart that ’ Massa is near.’ "
"Tumlook, Feb. 2nd -- When I woke yesterday the rain was pouring down in torrents. I feared we could not break camp. When it stopped a little I saw that the pilgrims and market women had started, and remarked to Mahesh that the Lord Jesus Christ’s work should not stand still when Satan’s and Mammon’s work went on. But the fellows had not had their rice; and I challenge any man to find a Hindu who will willingly budge before taking his invoice of rice for ballast ! I consented to wait another hour. At eleven o’clock I gave orders to break camp, and we went on to a market. I started for Dantoon, and a mile or two out a terrific thunderstorm broke upon us. The men could hardly walk against the violent wind and rain, much less carry me ; so I had to walk five miles. After struggling a while with the empty dooly, falling flat every minute or two, I ordered the men to drop the dooly (an inverted go-cart carried by men), and to look out for themselves. The rain was falling like hail against our faces, and I thought the wind would fairly blow us away. On and on we battled over the swampy ground, until all the Santals gave up, and crouched under a tree. While the lightning was so frequent and so sharp all around us, no place could have been more perilous than the foot of a green tree. After a time of pleading, ordering, and frightening, I got them up again, and having made them join hands, I led them on through the tempest, hoping soon to find a house. Long did we work our way through mud and darkness. One young fellow was so scared that he began crying aloud for his mother, which amused and heartened the rest of us. I can assure you it was no easy thing to pull four men along a flooded road, amid torrents of wind and rain. At last deliverance came. In a little room a ’ mudie ’ (petty shopkeeper) made us a little fire, and there I dried my coat, shirt, and blankets, shedding tears in the blinding smoke. Throwing myself down, I took a nap, and toasted my feet at the same time. Waking at midnight, we decided to press on. Taking with me the two stronger men, I walked on to Ranesarai, and there found Charlie, and trotted home on him." The rice crop of 1865 was a failure, and the opening months of the following year saw large portions of India desolated by one of those terrible famines which periodically visit the country with disastrous effect. Some hundreds of orphan children were brought in a state of destitution to the mission schools. In July 1866 Dr. Phillips reported as follows : —
" The rains having set in, sickness has increased fearfully among these thousands of poor, half-starved creatures. We have not even a shed in which to shelter them. Dr. Bacheler is feeding about 2000 now. A terrible famine is indeed upon us, and my work is fast increasing. I have secured the Dhurrumsella (a pilgrims’ rest-house) north of us for a temporary hospital. Patients, in all stages of starvation, are coming in fast. We opened the quarters yesterday and admitted six, three of whom died in the night. Starvation and cholera are making awful havoc among them. A dear little girl with the tiniest hands and feet followed me all around and carried my pill-box for me. I took her home with me, and we have named her Alice. She is our first orphan. Cholera has broken out now in the jail, and I do not know what we may have in the way of pestilence." At Balasore the distress was even greater, and Dr. Phillips hastened to help at the missionary station there.
" Balasore, Aug. 10th, 1866. -- The famine is raging fearfully. Many are dying Thousands of miserable starving ones are flocking in from every quarter. I never witnessed such a scene before. One case was on trial in the Court here, where a man had killed his little children, and the older members of the family had actually cooked and eaten them. Many are dying, and the vultures and jackals are growing fat on human flesh. The Government is providing cooked food for the suffering natives. I saw a mass of boiled rice thirty feet long and three feet deep. It lay on sacking on the verandah, and was shoveled into baskets for distribution. The people are kept from stealing this rice by a policeman stationed inside the railings." On his return to his own station, Dr. Phillips found himself faced by the necessity of providing for large numbers of children who had been orphaned by the famine and pestilence. He did not shrink from the heavy responsibility, but manfully faced the work which this involved. He welcomed every orphan as a child sent to him by the Great Father of all, to be led heavenwards.
" Opportunities to labour for young souls, by the pouring in of these hundreds of famine-orphans, are such as we have never enjoyed before since the founding of our mission, and I am ever welcoming these additional and weighty responsibilities. We are addressing ourselves right resolutely to the work of training these interesting children. I have found a sweet little girl, and have named her Minnie. I carried her most of the way from Balasore to Midnapore — about seventy miles — in my arms on the horse."
It was early one morning when Dr. Phillips galloped up to his door carrying the child thus referred to. He was drenched, and bespattered with mud from riding by night in the rain, holding the reins in one hand and Minnie in the other, while her bright little face shone out from under the dripping eaves of his great solar hat as her head rested on his shoulder. She was a child of rare beauty, and for two years was the pet of the household. But cholera broke out, and Minnie was one of its first victims. At nine in the morning she begged to lie on the mat, as she " felt so badly." At four o’clock in the afternoon she had passed to the land of peace where earth’s pains are no more known. At sunset the girls carried her little coffin along a shady path to the burial ground and laid her to rest.
About this time Dr. Jeremiah Phillips began to fail in health through overwork during the famine, and his son hastened to Santipore to relieve him for a few weeks. He thus describes his visit —
" This is father’s station, — Santipore, the city of peace, — and he has been taking me round showing me what to do in his absence. I am to build bridges, construct a canal, erect dykes, clear a jungle, put up a schoolhouse and a godown (a storehouse), and to generally improve the premises. Besides this I am to feed and doctor a number of Oriyas, and to superintend the work at Jellasore, seven miles off! I shall need more legs than my own pair to get over all this territory to inspect the work. Several girls at Jellasore have the smallpox. I have a number of interesting cases, among them being two men who have been terribly mauled by bears. I shall hold clinic regularly on Wednesday at noon. At 4 pm. we shall have a singing class, at 7 a lecture, and at 8 o’clock a teachers’ class. Yesterday I had a good game of ’ red, white and blue ’ with the girls. In the evening I lectured on the temperance pledge. How men professing Christianity can voluntarily degrade themselves and become the slaves of intemperance, so ruinous to the body and so blighting in its influence on the soul, I cannot tell. Let us do all we can to save the dear little boys and girls from the path of sinful indulgence. We must be ready for a regular campaign, and I am getting up a compendium to the Bible and a polyglot hymn-book." When Dr. Phillips was only seven years old, his father had become deeply interested in the Santals, one of the aboriginal tribes dwelling on the foot of the Himalayas. Some of them had found their way to the Balasore and Midnapore districts. He made the first dictionary and translated the Gospels. When he became too tired to go on with the work during the long hot days, he would say, " James, wake me in ten minutes," then dropping his head upon his folded arms on the table, he would sleep just ten minutes, when the boy spoke to him and he resumed his work with his Santal pundits. Thus early in his life Dr. Phillips became interested in the Santal tribe, and when in 1869 he found himself in a position to commence active missionary work amongst these neglected people, he felt that one of the great desires of his heart had been granted.
" Our Indian Committee have voted to let me devote myself to Santal work. If it is God’s will, I am more than willing ; I am anxious to do so. Still, I have my serious doubts about entirely quitting so important a Bengal field at present."
Every cold season seemed to him to bristle with golden opportunities for work. Thus we find in his diaries and letters periodical accounts of journeys many and long through dense jungles and along mountain paths in search of outlying villages where the good news needed to be proclaimed. Many of his letters contain most graphic descriptions of the strange scenes and adventures which he encountered in the course of these tours. We give some extracts without special reference to dates.
" I have left the preacher and the book-bag and wandered off alone to this clump of trees a quarter of a mile away. In the centre there is such a handsome little tank of sparkling water, and all around this stand tall majestic trees making a lovely shade, and reflecting their swaying branches in the smooth mirror of water. Along the edge of the tank several large birds are strolling, and many a beautiful pigeon is taking its sultry nooning. All these birds seem so completely at home and unafraid! I want to tell you here how thankful I am to God for giving me such liberty in preaching in these native languages. I used to think that my preaching in this country might become a tedious and tiresome task, and that I should never have such happy times in the pulpit as in America. Oh, how good God is to me! Now I know no difference, so far as freedom of expression and flow of soul are concerned, between speaking in English and in these Hindu tongues. I forget myself now quite as much in Bengali and Oriya, and am quite as lost in them as ever in English. All this is of God. To Him shall be all the praise! He has taught me these languages and given me this freedom, so that I am never at a loss to convey my thoughts even in the most rapid passages in our chapel and street preaching. The words that tell, the idioms that count, the emotion that makes my soul burn and my speech flame in view of God’s love and man’s sin — these are the elements which reach hard hearts and cause them to relent. All these infinite mercies it pleases God to give me, who am but an earthen vessel most weak and worthless, and unworthy of His slightest favour.
" Yesterday I went across country all day. It was very fatiguing. For one of the stages a friend lent me his mule that I had been told was hard to mount, but when once on she would go all right. I had a charming time. She kicked with her left leg to prevent my mounting, but by dint of strategy I managed to get on. Then the fun began. She reared and roared and romped and ’ raised Cain,’ and came within one of sending herself and me down an embankment, where one of us would undoubtedly have required no surgical aid. At midnight it poured so heavily that we were compelled to take shelter in a shed. My pony stood all night at the foot of my bed, while snoring men lay on every side. A party of drummers and fifers occupied one side of the shed, and felt it their delightful duty to set up such a bedlam every now and then that I got very little sleep. I have sold a few tracts here. The people must first make sure that we are positively in earnest about giving away no more tracts and books before they will buy even what they want. A year hence I think the plan of selling will have become sufficiently well understood to make our sales large enough to pay the cost of printing and paper. A while ago a lad came to my tent and asked for a book. On my inquiring why he wished for that particular book, he answered, ’ There is enough paper in it to make a first rate kite ! ’
" Another time I was preaching in a large market on our Orissa border. On my camp cot I had arranged our Christian books, and the native preacher had begun to address the crowd that stood around us. Presently a Brahmin came along, and I offered him one of our largest and best books. I shall not forget with what lofty disdain he turned away, saying, ’ I don’t care for your cheap trash that you give away. Our books cost money, and cannot be given away for nothing.’ Then and there I determined to fix a price to all our books, and to stop promiscuous giving. We sell our Scripture portions at a merely nominal fee, to be sure. Yet this commands respect, and our books are better received and more worthily treated.
" For several days we have been traveling about among Oriyas and Santals. The party consists of Father, two native preachers, and myself. Our main object is to visit as many Santal settlements as possible, and at the same time to make for as many Oriya markets as we can, where we never fail to secure large congregations and good attention. This is a little village. Our tents are pitched on the edge of a large market, and while I write hundreds of people are buying, selling, bantering, and blowing right beside us. For several hours we shall have a large audience, and we take turns, and shall keep up the preaching until the people leave. All around us are these Hindu markets, so that we can attend them daily by going from four to ten miles. Rarely do we fail to find people to hear our message.
" The other morning, however, we adopted a curious plan to get a congregation. After breakfast there was hardly a person at the tent door, and we were discussing where we should go for hearers. A couple of young men presently walked up, and very politely and urgently requested us to shoot some troublesome monkeys that were robbing their gardens. We needed no second invitation. Our guns were only loaded with bird shot, to be sure, but this would fetch the brutes. So out we started in quest of the plunderers. On some tamarind trees close by were well-nigh a score of monkeys of all sizes, from old paterfamilias to the little ones clinging to their mothers’ breasts. These animals when well grown are about the size of a small calf. They have strong slender legs, and tails from three to four feet long. They do the fields and gardens much harm, and the Hindus are glad to have them shot. In some places, however, the monkeys are worshiped, and not withstanding the mischief they do the people protect them. . . . The shooting occupied ten or fifteen minutes, and thus there was a good congregation to preach to. Only one of the men seemed at all displeased at our shooting the monkeys. He was an ignorant and very superstitious man, and as I afterwards learned had no crops to suffer from the wholesale pillage of these animals. We had a good audience, and one by one all of us spoke to them of the concerns of the soul, contrasting them with the worldly matters about which they had so much to say. So the monkeys helped us to a congregation.
" The Hindus, as I have told you before, hold singular views with regard to the lives of animals. They believe that a part of the divine life dwells in every living creature. They often blame us for shooting birds, and sometimes make a great fuss over a duck or a pigeon. Men of intelligence among them are getting over this, however, and many of them eat flesh as freely as we do. We shoot only what is required for the camp, except when we are asked to put an end to birds or beasts of prey that trouble and terrify the people. Every now and then men come to our tent, as they did one morning this week, to ask us to shoot an ugly bear or something else that is doing mischief. We never say No when we have time to help the poor villagers without interfering with our regular work.
" Speaking of mercy to beasts reminds me of the cruelty towards their own race so frequently witnessed among the Hindus. Some of these people will make grievous lamentation over a dead fowl, or the carcase of a monkey, but will pass proudly and coldly by a poor dying woman who has fallen on the dusty road. They feign pity for beasts, but they have no sighs or tears for suffering humanity. Oh the hardness of heart that this paganism begets ! "