by Linda Banks
3.6 Some early students at the Blind Boys School in Deng Doi, c. 1899.
Letter to Isabel, 16 February 1900:
Of course now the [Boer] War is going on we long to hear all we can about it. I do not have much time for reading but odd half hours I do like to know what is going on in the world. And another thing I think often missionaries’ nerves give way so that they never think of anything but their especial little corner and little worries …
The boys, 12 now, all did so well at their examinations. Nin Kai … can now play 27 hymns beautifully. He has written the whole of St Luke’s and part of St John’s Gospel, the New Testament Picture Bible and many other things. He … has one great sin, and that is pride. He is naturally very upright and often judges others wrongfully without really finding out the whole story. But he knows his fault and is I believe really praying about it …
I am expecting 3 more boys and now this house is full I do not know what God is going to do for us …There was a thief at the Blind School last night, stole a few clothes and a neighbour’s fowl. Fortunately someone awoke and found the thief but could not catch him.
Letter to Isabel, 30 April 1900:
Last week I had great trouble about the Blind School. A young fellow and some women came in the evening and knocked on the door. Ning Kai opened it and was dragged out and hit in the side with a bamboo. There was a tremendous row and it took such a time enquiring into it. Then the thing was supposed to be settled and I went off for the day to a village … While I was away the [blind] boys went off to beat the boy. Oh dear, it was such work to settle it all again.
Two more of the boys want to be baptised and one of them has given me great joy. I think he is truly converted. Seventeen boys now, we do need your prayers.
Report in a country newspaper, 16 May 1900:
It is a difficult thing to set each blind boy to really work. Each one is supposed to work at some trade half the day, and learn to read and write (Braille System) the remainder. I have set them to work at matting, making string and rope, knitting, and straw shoes.18
院書光靈
Before Amy was due to leave on her first furlough, events in China dramatically intervened. The so-called ‘Boxer Rebellion’, which had its roots in anti-Western movements going back half a century, and of which the Vegetarian attack on Hwasang was a precursor, broke out in northern China. This latest uprising sought to overthrow the Qing dynasty, attack foreign influence and religions, and kill or at least expel all foreigners. In early 1900, mobs attacked mission stations, several missionaries were killed and thousands of Chinese converts skinned, hacked or torched to death. The situation was further inflamed by the dowager empress’ proclamation supporting the uprising. A third of a million Boxers, with support from elements in the Chinese Army, besieged more than 1,000 Westerners and 3,000 Chinese Christians for 55 days in Peking.19
Although there was little sign of unrest in the district of Lieng Kong, in late June the viceroy and British consul ordered all missionaries from the interior into Foochow. On 1 July there was a further edict from Peking ordering the expulsion of all foreigners from China and the persecution of native Christians. News came from other parts of Fukien Province about property being plundered, people beaten and one person killed. A few days later there were fears of protesters marching from the old city across the Min River to the foreign concession on Nantai Island, but providentially heavy rain flooded approaches to the bridge.20
Australians waited for news about ‘Imperilled Australian Missionaries in China’, with photos of Amy and others in Fukien, and on 23 July the British Consul in Foochow was able to guarantee their safety. Two weeks later, a 20,000-strong international force finally reached the foreign legations in Peking and by 14 August the siege was over. It was later estimated that the Boxers had killed more than 240 missionaries, three-quarters of them Protestants, and around 8,000 Chinese Christians, the majority of them Catholics.
During this time, Amy had a lot of loose ends to tie up in preparation for her furlough. While a replacement was coming to the dispensary, no one was able to carry on her work with the blind boys. As a result, the Blind School did not open in the second half of 1900 and she had to find and cover the cost of appropriate lodging for the students during her absence. This caused her considerable anxiety and sleepless nights.21 In the midst of this, she was already planning the next stage of her work.
These hopes are captured in Amy’s final letter to Isabel on 16 May 1900:
It is decided that on my return from Furlough I [will] take up this work among the Blind and devote all my time to it. A school large enough to accommodate 100 boys and a dwelling house for myself and fellow-worker, if one offers for this work, are to be erected in Foochow and one of the married men missionaries will help us in any way we need. An account of the work is to be written and sent to friends asking them to help in collecting money for the building and supporting the boys. In the meantime we ask you to pray definitely that God will guide us in all our plans for the future, and that every detail may be done in a way that will glorify Him.
CHAPTER 4
Surprises of the Heart (1901–1906)
Amy’s sea voyage to Sydney helped her begin the process of unwinding from six years of exhausting work in China. Readjusting to life in Australia, made her increasingly aware of how much she had changed. Culture shock, as we would say today, soon hit her hard. Despite regular letters, to her surprise even her own family could only relate to her experiences in a limited way, especially at wider occasions such as weddings and Christmas festivities.1 On deputations, she found churches were more interested in ‘exotic stories’, especially anything connected to the Boxer Uprising, than the daily challenges of missionary life. Alongside this, she was also missing her colleagues and Chinese friends.
On New Year’s Day 1901, halfway through her furlough, Amy took part in celebrations marking Australia’s Federation, which united six separate self-governing British colonies into a Commonwealth. However, for Amy, this was tempered by the introduction on the same day of the White Australia Policy, which sought to preference Anglo-Celtic or European immigrants over ‘non-white’ people. Its insistence on a dictation test in any language meant that applicants who didn’t look white, such as Chinese, Japanese and South Sea Islanders, were easily excluded. This policy reflected many of the negative perceptions Australians had of Asians and of the Chinese in particular. The latter were suspected of various vices, rare diseases, sexual deviation and inveterate gambling, and were feared because of their huge population and relative proximity to Australia.2 Though these attitudes were not shared by everyone, and were challenged by some, their existence motivated Amy to talk up interesting aspects of Chinese people and culture whenever she had opportunity.
Amy felt a certain irony in Australia’s wanting to exclude foreigners just like the Boxers had attempted more violently to do in China. It made her wonder how much her being in China brought with it practices that imposed Western rather than Christian values. Amy realised she was a product of her own culture and that it was all too easy to equate Christianity with Western civilisation, as well as assume the latter’s superiority. Missionaries could easily fall into this trap as well as other expatriates.3 However, she and her colleagues did understand that some aspects of their own culture were value-neutral, for example, how people ate, dressed and socialised. They also criticised some of their government’s policies, such as the opium trade and other money-making enterprises. As an Australian, Amy had her own criticisms of certain British attitudes towards, and treatment of, colonials. In any case, living and working alongside poorer, rural Chinese helped missionaries to be more sensitive to the difference between things that mattered and things that were simply cultural.
On furlough, though, her main desire was to present the great need of missionary work in China. She did this in many different meetings around New South Wales – in churches, schools, public halls, YWCA meetings and homes. Snapshots of thes
e occasions were often reported in the newspapers.
Miss Oxley, in Chinese dress, and exhibiting a number of Chinese curios and photographs, gave a very interesting and stimulating address on Chinese life and the missionary work in her district, explaining the rescue work among the blind and abandoned children … All the collecting cards for the building of a house for blind children … were taken up4 …
A most interesting address … dealt with three different features of the work – the educational, the evangelical and the medical. Miss Oxley expressed herself as thoroughly charmed with the work, despite its almost insuperable difficulties. One of the greatest of these, she explained, was that connected with the mastery which had to be gained over the peculiarities of the language … [She] exhibited during the evening a number of idols. Other curios (including the small shoes worn by the women of China) were shown to those present as were also photographs of the different schools conducted by the missionaries … During the evening, musical selections were rendered, and a collection was taken up. Miss Oxley is a ready and captivating speaker, and she treats her subject in a homely style5
The meeting was held under the auspices of the Gleaner’s Union. The Gleaners present appeared to take very deep interest in the charming account given by Miss Oxley of her experiences in the mission fields of China … A deeply interesting part of the evening’s address was that referring more particularly to the efforts being made to uplift education and cheer the blind in China.6
Perhaps the most moving piece of writing from Amy’s time on furlough was a poem written by Rev. W.H. H. Yarrington, who was also a lawyer, scholar and recognised poet.7 He wrote the following after hearing a lecture Amy gave at St Luke’s Anglican Church, Burwood. The poem, The Blind Chinese Boy, captures both her head and heart and also raised funds for the Blind School.
I am a lonely Chinese Boy:
I have no happiness or joy,
But full of misery and pain
I often cry and weep in vain,
For I have none to love or care
For all my sorrow, or to share
My burden, and to give relief,
And comfort in my childhood grief.
I am not beautiful, ’tis true,
And have no charm, perhaps, for you,
I am ill-shapen and uncouth,
And yet I tell you what is truth:
I have a heart – a human heart –
A soul to feel, and tears which start
Whene’er I feel the bitter smart
Of cruel words and unkind deeds,
And sore neglect of all my needs,
And so I weep by day and night.
My greatest grief is loss of sight:
I never see the cheerful light,
Or ne’er behold the lovely world,
Whose beauty lies around and unfurled –
The loveliness of flowers and trees,
Whose bright leaves rustle in the breeze;
I cannot see the light of love
Which shines upon me from above;
I am alone – yes, all alone,
In this dark world; so oft I moan
And wonder why I e’er was born,
To live a life in grief forlorn
I scarcely have enough to eat,
My hands are cold, my naked feet
Are shrivelled, for I cannot walk;
But why should I thus sadly talk
Of all my sadness and distress?
Alas, I know not love’s caress;
There is no hand my face to soothe,
No one my pillow hard to smooth.
What do I hear – a loving word?
Is it the singing of a bird?
What is that note that sounds so sweet?
A gentle hand, so soft and kind,
Touching my eyelids dark and blind;
As if they would my sight restore!
The tears start from them more and more
I feel a sense ne’er felt before –
A sense of gratitude and love,
As if an angel from above
Had touched me with the gentle wing
And made my heart within me sing?
And as the petals of a flower
Open whene’er a gentle shower
Falls on them and the warming ray
Of sunshine touches them, and they
Are beautiful once more, and bright
Rejoicing in the heavenly light,
So doth my heart expand with joy –
The heart of this poor Chinese boy!
They teach me how to read and pray,
That God may bless me every way –
They tell me of a Father’s love,
Who dwells in Heaven and Light above
Who gave His only Son to die
That I may live with Him on high;
That all my sins may be forgiven
So I may go to Him in Heaven!
And so they teach me what is good,
And give me warming clothes and food
And thus they make my life a joy,
Because they love their Chinese boy!
They tell me that though I cannot see
There yet is joy awaiting me:
That one day, through God’s loving grace
I shall have sight and see the face
Of Jesus Christ, the Saviour dear
Who suffered so much sorrow here
Who often spake, with accent kind,
To soothe the sick, and heal the blind,
And give them sight that they may see,
His loving face – and so shall I
One day behold Him, very high,
And then my pains will all be past
And I shall dwell with him at last!
And so I bless the loving voice
Of those who bid me once rejoice!
God bless all those whose gentle care:
Has brought an answer to my prayers
And who shall now the peace destroy
Of this once lonely Chinese boy.
One of the highlights of Amy’s time at home was catching up with her family and especially in Victoria with Isabel and Marianne at ‘Darriwill’. Their strong interest in overseas mission and other cultures meant that they were able to enter more deeply into her experiences in China and appreciate the special gifts – sterling silver letter openers engraved with Chinese characters, a beautifully embroidered tea cloth and tiny lotus slippers used for foot-binding – that she had purchased in Foochow. With the Hope family she didn’t have to ‘be’ the missionary; she could just be herself and talk realistically about the lows as well as highs of what had happened to her. These weeks in Geelong brought refreshment and refocus for her return to China.
院書光靈
After more than a year away in Australia, on 19 October 1901 a Valedictory Service for Amy was held at St Andrew’s Cathedral in Sydney.8 The next day she sailed on the Eastern for Foochow, along with fellow missionary Minna Searle and several New Zealand recruits of the China Inland Mission. On the voyage she wondered what lay ahead. Shortly before leaving Sydney, Amy learned that, alongside working with blind boys, she would replace the head nurse, Miss Massey, who was on furlough from the dispensary near the North Gate.9 This was on the understanding that the 17 blind boys from Deng Doi would be accommodated nearby.10 She looked forward to this and was grateful that during her furlough enough money had been promised to build a new Blind School.
Meanwhile, the dispensary had just gained its first full-time doctor, George Wilkinson. Though Amy was as yet unaware of it, he was to play an important part in her future. Until his arrival in early 1901, the only CMS medical missionary in Fukien was Dr van Someren Taylor. He was responsible for itinerating around the whole province and needed a colleague based permanently in Foochow. After struggling with illness on arrival, the shock of his father’s death shortly afterwards and an extended time in language study, George took charge of the dispensary and developed plans to turn it i
nto a hospital to serve the needs of the Old City. He had grown up in Sturton le Steeple, not far from Lincoln in England where his family farmed cattle. The village was chiefly known for being the birthplace of John Robinson, leader of the Pilgrim Fathers who sailed on the Mayflower to North America in the 16th century. George’s father John and mother Catherine had strong hopes that, because of the education they received, their sons would leave the farm and take up a profession.
After finishing school, George was offered a place at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, with a view to ultimately studying medicine. He started in Michaelmas term, 1885, just a few months after the actions of several graduates of the university had hit the headlines in national newspapers. Following a revival of interest in Christianity in Cambridge, these gifted young men scandalised the educated elite by offering themselves for missionary service in China. The best known of the so-called ‘Cambridge Seven’ was C.T. Studd, the most celebrated cricketer in the country, who had recently played in the first Ashes Tests against Australia.11 Intrigued by their story, George began to attend both mid-week meetings of the Cambridge Inter-Collegiate Christian Union (CICCU) and on Sundays Holy Trinity Anglican Church, the main student church. At the end of his first year, he went with other CICCU members to the Keswick Convention in the Lake District, where he heard Dr Hudson Taylor, founder of the China Inland Mission with whom the Cambridge Seven had volunteered. This experience gave George a growing interest in overseas mission and in serving among the poor, perhaps in China.12
4.1 George Wilkinson (second row, second from left) at Cambridge, 1886.