Even So, Father (1895-1902)
It was hardly to be wondered at that Taylor’s physical powers, so long taxed to the utmost in the interests of the Mission, should begin to fail under the strain of periods such as this of his ninth visit to China. Little by little the scaffolding of his life was being taken down trom about the work he had prayed into being. Not that those nearest to him recognised it. He himself had it steadily in view, and rejoiced in the growing usefulness of others, and the way in which provision was being made for leadership in days to come.
The internal organisation slowly developed, and was working well throughout the Mission. More and more the C.I.M. was saving expense and caring for its workers through the business department, and in nothing was the practical value of its principles more evident than in the provision made in this and other ways for coming needs. Refusing none who seemed truly called of God, whatever their nationality, denomination, or previous training, the Mission had been given men and women with every sort of qualification for usefulness. If all had been theologians or members of learned professions, how could the practical working of so large and varied an organisation have been provided for? As it was, when need arose for the formation of a diocese in Western China, there was a Bishop to be found in the ranks of the Mission. There were Superintendents for great districts. There were financial experts for the management of complicated money matters; stenographers to help with the burden of correspondence; competent heads for postal, shipping, and business offices; an architect and land surveyor for building operations; doctors and nurses to care for their fellow-missionaries as well as for medical work among the people; and qualified teachers for posts at Chefoo. All these workers, each indispensable in their own department, were equally members of the Mission and called to spiritual service in China.
Of the appointment of Cassels to the diocese of West China, Dr. Eugene Stock wrote in his History of the Church Missionary Society:
The China Inland leaders heartily entered into the plan, and Archbishop Benson, who took a warm interest in it, appointed, at the suggestion of the C.M.S. Committee, and with all his usual graciousness, the head of the C.I.M. in Szechwan to be the new bishop. This was the Rev. W. W. Cassels, one of the Cambridge Seven of 1885, in whose goodness and wisdom all parties had learned to repose confidence. The first public announcement was made at the great Saturday missionary meeting at the Keswick Convention of 1895, and drew forth much prayerful interest and sympathy. The C.M.S. guaranteed the episcopal stipend, and Mr. Cassels came on to the Society’s roll of missionaries, while fully retaining his position in the C.I.M. He was consecrated on St. Luke’s Day, October 18th, 1895, together with Dr. Talbot, the present Bishop of Rochester; and he sailed on that day week for China.
When Bishop Cassels reached China to take up his new responsibilities, Taylor missed the expected pleasure of meeting him in Shanghai. Broken down after a visit to Wenchow, to which he had gone immediately upon hearing of the deaths through cholera, he had been obliged to take a few weeks’ rest. This gave opportunity for a boat journey to several of the Chekiang stations, and for refreshing intercourse with Henry Frost, who was again in China. They went to the beautiful district of Chuchow, occupied by the Barmen Associates of the Mission, and completed the arrangements for handing it over to these fellow-workers—an important step in the direction of division of the field. But Taylor was still so unfit for any pressure of work on his return to Shanghai that it was with thankfulness they looked forward to the visit to India he was to pay before long.
A former member of the Mission, Miss Annie Taylor, who had made a remarkable journey through Tibet, was urgently needing help with a band of inexperienced workers she had been the means of calling out. They were in northern India, hoping to gain an entrance from the Darjeeling district to that closed land, and Taylor was to speak at the first Christian Student Conference in Calcutta on his way to join them. An unexpected gift received for their own use made it possible for his wife to accompany him, which in his poor state of health was no little comfort. It would have enabled them also to travel second class by French mail, had they chosen to spend it all upon themselves. But there were fellow-workers to think of; and though third class meant separation in the cabins for men and women respectively, they were thankful for berths near the doors which were not far apart. Then at Hong Kong, Taylor was able to write the following letter, among others, to Shanghai:
After completing our arrangements here and making up our accounts, I find we have a margin that will allow of our providing the £10 we spoke of as desirable for your expenses beyond Melbourne. As the Mission funds were low when we left, we are very thankful to be able to send this. I had rather no one knew of the little gift.
I find the kind gift received in Wenchow more than covers my wife’s travelling expenses; and having come to Hong Kong cheaply, we have the joy of being able to enclose a cheque for 100 taels towards your journey. Please do not let any one know of this, but cash the cheque yourself at the bank.
Few things are more precious in the records that remain than the frequency of such acts of loving ministry, at a cost that no one knew of save the Lord Himself, to whom first and most of all their gifts were offered.
But though prospered in their visit to India, and much refreshed by intercourse with workers in that great field, Taylor was in no condition to face a summer in China, and an absence of more than two years from England made it desirable for him to be again in touch with the home work.
Great were the changes that had taken place with the _new headquarters of the Mission at Newington Green now completed. Knowing they would arrive from Paris during the Saturday prayer meeting, the Taylors avoided mentioning the train by which they were coming, so that no thought of giving them a welcome might disturb the meeting. Leaving their cab at the entrance they walked up the private road from the busy London thoroughfare to the open door of the hall for meetings, over which, carved in stone, stood out the words which meant so much in the history of the Mission—‘HAVE FAITH IN GOD.’ Entering quietly, they remained at the back of the room while prayer was going on, so that not until the meeting closed was it generally known that Mr. and Mrs. Taylor were present. The warmth of the welcome they then received was added to by some Continental delegates of the World’s Evangelical Alliance who were staying at the Mission house. The new premises were spacious enough to contribute to the realisation of one of Taylor’s cherished ambitions: that of being able, in measure, to discharge the debt of the Mission for hospitality in many lands, by receiving—whether in London, Shanghai, or elsewhere—those of the one great family to whom a home away from home might be a convenience.
Here then, in the summer of 1896, Taylor settled down for the last period, little as anyone realised it, of his active service in connection with the work in England. Their children being scattered, he and Jennie no longer needed a home of their own, and though they might have been glad of more privacy at times, they were thankful for the closeness of touch with their fellow-workers afforded by the daily life of the Mission house.
Effective leadership at the home end left Taylor free for the larger issues claiming thought and prayer, for conference with Stevenson and the Council, and for visits to Norway, Sweden, and Germany for personal intercourse with the representatives of affiliated Missions.
My aim is to get every part of the work into such a condition that it can be carried on without me, and with this in view I visit different branches of it in turn. We are specially asking God to give us an increased number of efficient leaders, and to preserve the lives and health of those we already have.
The Forward Movement, which had been for a time in abeyance, was still the chief burden on his heart. Wherever he went he kept it to the front, pleading for full consecration to Christ in view of His unconditional command ‘Preach the gospel to every creature’. Busy indeed was the winter (1896-1897) after his return from the Continent, when he was strong enough to travel constantly and address meetings in all parts of the country. Never had invitations been more cordial or the hearts of the Lord’s people more open to him. Many who remembered his missionary appeals in the days of their childhood had grown to maturity, and those who remained of his first friends and supporters were, like himself, far on in life’s pilgrimage. No voice had quite the ring for them of his voice; no one was more welcome in conference or among the churches of all denominations that had known him for so long. It was as always the need of others that occupied him most—the desire not to get but to give, to bring all whom he could influence into the rest and joy of abiding fellowship with Christ.
“There are many hearts, everywhere, wanting to know more of the fulness of Christ,’ he wrote before a visit to Germany in the spring of 1897. ‘Ask with us a fresh anointing for this service of love.’
Tired with the winter’s work, he was glad to accept Mr. Berger’s invitation to the south of France for a quiet week or two before proceeding to Germany for the months of March and April. In addition to the Barmen Mission, whose workers Taylor had recently visited in China, there was a newer movement at Kiel which he was glad to strengthen. Started as a branch of the C.I.M. and subsequently developed as the Liebenzell Mission, this work was destined to great usefulness, and both its leaders and those of the older Barmen Mission gave Taylor a cordial welcome and many opportunities for speaking about China.
In Berlin their meetings were chiefly under the auspices of the Y.M.C.A., which had invited them for a student conference. Generously entertained by Count Piickler, they were kept busy for ten days in the capital, some of the meetings doing much to deepen friendly relations. The C.I.M., as they discovered, was none too favourably regarded in certain quarters. Its interdenominational basis did not commend it to leaders of Societies connected with the State Church, and the accounts that had reached them of its growth and faith principles were hardly credited. It was, thus, in a somewhat uncertain frame of mind that prominent ministers and secretaries gathered in the drawing-room of Mrs. Palner Davies (née Baroness von Dungern) to meet the visitors, interested specially in seeing what sort of person “the renowned Hudson Taylor’ might be.
“The stranger who stood in our midst,’ wrote the Baroness, was not of an imposing appearance, and his fair curly hair made him look younger than he really was.’
The time was largely given to questions through interpretation, and as hostess she was naturally anxious. She was conscious, as Taylor could not be, of the critical attitude of not a few present, who regarded him as rather a free lance in the sphere of missions. That as leader of the C.I.M. he received workers from various denominations was the first point on which explanation was desired.
Only recently the Mission had accepted a number of highly educated and well-gifted young men who were members of the State Church. How, then, were they able to work together with Methodists and Baptists, etc.? Mr. Taylor replied that, in our chief aims, we are all one in Christ; and that the workers can be distributed so that each denomination is able to retain its particular order of Church government. ‘Only recently,’ he stated, ‘we have been glad to welcome an English bishop (one of our own number) for Western China, so that our missionaries from the State Church are not lacking the care of a spiritual guide and head. The great work of the mission field, which is a call to us all, overrides theological differences, and our motto remains, “All one in Christ...”.’
Just when the Director Be the Gossner Mission had shaken his silver-white head and remarked to his neighbour in an undertone, ‘Such a mixture of Church and Sectarians would be impossible with us,’ Mr. Taylor continued:
‘It is remarkable how the Lord Himself has chosen His instruments, so that even the most insignificant, in His hand, are able to be “to the praise of His glory”. Surely it goes as in creation: there are strong and beautiful oak trees, but there are also little flowers of the meadow; and both the oak and the flower have been placed there by His hand. I myself, for instance, am not specially gifted, and am shy by nature, but my gracious and merciful God and Father inclined Himself to me, and I who was weak in faith He strengthened while I was still young. He taught me in my helplessness to rest on Him, and to pray even about little things in which another might have felt able to help himself.’
Instances were mentioned from his early experiences—such as the giving away of his last half-crown, the only coin he possessed in the world, when he was living alone in lodgings and scarcely knew where the next meal was to come from. To know God for himself as the Hearer and Answerer of prayer had been the preparation, in view of his life-work, that he felt all-important.
Thus I experienced, quite early, how He is willing to help and strengthen and to fulfil the desire of those who fear Him. And so in later years, when I prayed the money came.
He then told how the passage, ‘Owe no man anything save to love one another,’ had raised the question in his mind, ‘Are we entitled to make exceptions in work for the Kingdom of God, and continuously to sigh under the oppression of debt?’ His own conclusion had been that the words meant just what they said: that God is rich enough to supply ‘all our need’ as it arises, and that He likes to do so before we run into debt much better than afterwards; and he gave instances to show how, trusting Him to fulfil His own Word, and neither spending money before it was received nor making appeals for help, the 700 missionaries of the C.I.M. were actually sustained.
“Will you please tell us,’ was then asked, “whether it is true that after you had moved a large audience by putting the need of missionary work to their hearts, and someone arose to make a collection, you went so far as to hinder it?’
‘I have done so more than once,’ replied Mr. Taylor. ‘It is not our way to take collections, because we desire to turn aside no gifts from other Societies. We receive free-will offerings, but without putting any pressure upon people. After such a meeting they can easily find opportunity, if they wish, to send their gifts—which so far has been done freely.’
‘We have heard,’ remarked a clergyman, ‘that in that way some quite large sums are sent in; but we aim at training our congregations to systematic giving.’
‘That is a very important matter,’ answered Mr. Taylor. ‘However, one is led so, while another is led otherwise. Each must act according to his light. As I said before, for my weakness’ sake the Lord has acknowledged my way of working
EVEN SO, FATHER D0
and praying, but I am far from advising anyone to copy me. You do well to train individuals, to train the whole Church to systematic giving.’;
Other questions were still raised, until I at length interposed, saying that Mr. Taylor had promised to be present at another meeting that same evening, and it might be well to spare his strength. He had been standing, by his own request, while for over an hour we had been sitting comfortably round him. Just then a sunbeam touched his face, so full of joy and peace, bringing a brightness as from above—and I could only think of Stephen, who saw Heaven opened and Jesus at the right hand of God. One present bowed his head, covering his eyes with his hand, and I heard him whisper: ‘We must all take shame before this man.’
“Yes,” the white-headed Professor replied to my suggestion, “you are quite right; we will not trouble our friend any further.’ And rising he crossed the room, put his arm round Mr. Taylor’s neck and kissed him.
Summer days in England, after Taylor’s return from the Continent, found him more than ever occupied with meetings. Not that he was equal to the strain, but funds were low for the general purposes of the Mission, and he was never one who could pray without working to the limit of his powers. That limit was reached before the Keswick Convention, however. Suffering severely from neuralgia _and headache, he was obliged to cancel his engagements and accept the doctor’s verdict—complete rest, and absence from the Mission for several months to come.
The wonderful air of Davos, in Switzerland, proved just the tonic he needed, and there in the early autumn he heard of an answer to prayer that helped to confirm his recovery. He had been much exercised about a financial difficulty that had arisen, due in part to the arrangements for special support in the new branches of the Mission.
To deal with it, he would have to visit America as well as China and perhaps Australia, and he was planning such a journey, when a gift of no less than £10,000 for the general fund relieved the situation and sent him rejoicing on his homeward way.
And there was more to follow. The generous donor had been in failing health for some time, but it was a shock to hear of his death within a few days of the abovementioned gift, and almost more so to learn that he had bequeathed to the C.I.M. a fourth part of his residuary estate for evangelistic and education work. £10,000 a year for ten years or longer—for the money was to be paid in instalments—what might it not accomplish? Articles under the title of ‘The Forward Movement’ began to appear in China's Millions and before the year 1897 was out he was on his way to Shanghai, full of longing to see the inauguration of an evangelistic effort that might spread throughout all the provinces.
He saw with perfect clearness, however, the dangers to which so large an accession of means exposed the Mission, and deeply felt the need for an increase of spiritual power. Not with silver and gold could precious souls be won, or men and women fitted to be messengers of the Cross of Christ. A fresh baptism of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Calvary and Pentecost, was the supreme need, and for this he prayed as never before. And he did more than pray. Knowing how much blessing had been given through ‘winter missions’ in India, he approached the leaders of the Keswick Convention about similar work among the Christians in China. It was not the C.I.M. only that was upon his heart. More and more it was to Chinese Christians that he looked for the evangelisation
EVEN SO, FATHER B57.
of China. He longed to see the 80,000 communicants of all Protestant churches quickened with new life and fired with zeal for the salvation of their fellow-countrymen.
“We are not immediately appealing for new workers,’ he continued with regard to the China Inland Mission, although the Forward Movement was the object most of all upon his heart, ‘our first need is to prepare for them in China, and the most important preparation of all is a spiritual one.’
One year and nine months now lay before Hudson Taylor ~ of this last period of his active service in China (January 1898 to September 1899). He as little as those about him realised it to be the last, though for several months after his arrival ill-health confined him more or less to his room. However one cannot but be conscious now of the finishing touches God was putting to the life labours of His servant. He was present at all the Council Meetings of this period, with one exception. Seven times the leaders of the Mission gathered to meet him, and he came in touch, through them, with a large part of the work. The important question of the Forward Movement was dealt with in ways that told of God’s own working.
Quite apart from previous planning, experienced: workers had met in Shanghai from England, America, the Continent of Europe, and the interior of China, and after the January and April Council Meetings all was arranged for a beginning to be made in the accessible province of Kiangsi, with its, ninety-nine governing cities, capitals of counties, in very few of which the Gospel was as yet being preached.
The tide of spiritual blessing, too, was rising, even before the arrival of the Keswick deputation. He who delights to use ‘the weak things’ had found a cleansed and empty vessel which He.was pleased to fill to overflowing with His own Spirit.
‘I go forth in conscious weakness,’ Miss Soltau in charge of the Women’s Department in London had written of her visit to China, ‘feeling my need of His abundant life for the untried way.’
Drawing on the promised fullness, she had begun the journeys which were to occupy thirteen consecutive months, taking her over 6,000 miles in all, to forty-four mission stations, in every one of which she was made a
blessing. Then came the Keswick deputation to China. The Rev. Charles Inwood, fresh from a wonderful time of blessing on the Continent, was accustomed to speaking through interpretation and was just the teacher needed. From autumn to early summer he and Mrs. Inwood laboured without intermission as Henrietta Soltau was doing, their united service covering es! the entire period of Taylor’s visit.
He meanwhile had improved in health and even before Inwood’s arrival had been able to take several journeys. While detained in Shanghai he had met over 200 members of the Mission, and subsequently in visits to Chefoo and the new hill-station at Kuling had had opportunity for ministry to a large circle. But his letters went further still, carrying much of the blessing that sustained him and which he thankfully realised to be accessible to all.
‘Go forward in the strength of the Lord, and in the sufficiency that comes from Him alone,’ he wrote to one who needed encouragement, ‘and thank Him for your conscious insufficiency, for when you are weak, then He can be strong in you.
‘Do not let any self-consciousness prévent your being at God’s disposal for any message He may want you to give at any time, to anyone. Never mind what people think about you.’*
No pains seemed too great if he could lead a soul into fuller blessing, and not least, his own children. To his daughter he wrote,
Now the heart can no more be filled with two things at the same time than a tumbler can be filled with both air and water at the same time. If you want a tumbler full of water to be filled with air, it has first to be emptied of the water. This shows us why prayer to be filled with the Spirit is often gradually answered. We have to be shown our sins, our faults, our pre-possessions, and to be delivered from them. Faith is the channel by which all grace and blessing are received; and that which is accepted by faith, God bestows in fact. Being filled does not always lead to exalted feeling or uniform manifestation, but God always keeps His word. We have to look to His promises or rest in them, expecting their literal fulfilment. Some put asking in the place of accepting; some wish it were so, instead of believing that it is so. We have never to wait for God’s giving, for God has already “blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.’ We may reverently say, He has nothing more to give; for He has given His all. Yet, just as the room is full of air, but none can get into the tumbler save as far as the water is emptied out, so we may be unable to receive all He has given, if the self-life is filling to some extent our hearts and lives.
Gradually, as 1898 wore on, the outlook with regard to social and political conditions became increasingly disquieting. While souls were being saved in larger numbers than ever before and spiritual blessing given, the political unrest and the bitterness of feeling due to the aggressions of foreign powers were hastening a crisis the nature of which was but too evident. ‘If the Spirit of God work mightily we may be sure that the spirit of evil will also be active,’ Taylor had written on his way out to China, and the counter-move he had anticipated was taking serious form. Too hasty attempts on the part of the young Emperor to introduce reforms had thrown the country into a ferment; a powerful rebellion had broken out in Western China in the spring of the year; local uprisings and riots were of frequent occurrence; and finally the Dowager Empress had resumed the reins of government, consigning the helpless Emperor to virtual imprisonment in ‘the inner apartments’. This had taken place in September, and now in quick succession drastic measures were being taken to reverse the policy of recent years and to curtail the pretensions of foreigners. Needless to say, this sudden change of front on the part of the Government encouraged anti-foreign feeling throughout the country; and as almost the only Europeans in the interior were missionaries, it was against them particularly that hostilities were directed. The situation was fraught with peril, and could not but give rise to serious apprehensions.
That for thirty-two years God had so watched over the Mission that no life had ever been lost through violence or accident or in travelling was a very real comfort to Taylor. Indeed there had grown up in his mind a restful confidence in God that He would thus protect His servants in the Mission, especially defenceless women, working alone in their stations, at a distance often from the nearest missionaries. He rejoiced in their faith and devotion no less than in the blessing that rested on their labours. At this very time (1898-99) despite persecution and threatened danger, 250 converts were received into church membership in the women’s stations on the Kwangsin River, while 1,000 enquirers were under instruction as candidates for baptism.
Such was the result from the labours of a few young women in a few brief years.
They are weak enough for God to use, and they believe in being filled with the Holy Ghost. They seek a blessing with fasting and prayer, and they do not seek in vain. The people feel that there is power in connection with their work.
To a woman also had been given success in the difficult and dangerous task of effecting a settled residence in Hunan, so long the most anti-foreign province in China. With a single native helper and a Chinese woman-companion she had walked quietly over the border from Kiangsi, under the very eyes of the soldiery sent to guard the frontier, but who never dreamed of connecting those dusty wayfarers with the dreaded foreigners they were to intercept! During his recent visit to England Taylor had received a letter from this brave Norwegian worker saying that the Lord Jesus had taken up His abode in the hearts of some of the people over the border, and that if she should be put out, He could not be—for hearts that have once received Him are not likely to give Him up. But a new day had dawned for Hunan. Miss Jacobsen was not put out. On the contrary, the Rev. George Hunter, Dr. Keller and others were so prospered in similar efforts that this very period of uneasiness and trouble witnessed the opening of centre after centre, until the C.I.M. alone had four settled stations in the province.
By this time Taylor was on his way up the Yangtze to the far west of China. Despite the rebellion in Szechwan which was still in progress, and the unquiet state of the country everywhere, Charles Inwood and his wife were to attend the conference of West China missionaries to be held at Chungking.in January 1899, and the Taylors had decided to accompany them.
Every possible arrangement was made for the comfort of the travellers at the various homes and business centres of the Mission; but not all the loving care of fellowworkers could keep from him the heavy tidings received at Hankow of the first martyrdom in the ranks of the C.I.M. Away in the distant province of Kweichow the tragedy had occurred, when William S. Fleming, from Australia, had been murdered with his friend and helper, P’an, a convert from the Black Meo tribe they were seeking to evangelise. In trying to protect the latter, Fleming’s own life had been sacrificed; and while thanking God for the spirit in which he had met his brief but terrible end, Taylor realised with a straitened heart something of what it meant that such an event should have happened.
‘How sad the tidings!’ he wrote to Stevenson November 22%; ‘blessed for the martyrs but sad for us, for China, for their friends. And not only sad, but ominous! It seems to show that God is about to test us with a new kind of trial: surely we need to gird on afresh “the whole armour of God”. Doubtless it means fuller blessing, but through deeper suffering.’
His own way now was increasingly hedged about with difficulty. The conference at Chungking, attended by seventy to eighty missionaries of various societies, was followed by serious illness again, and although on the return journey to Shanghai he regained a measure of strength, the summer had to be spent either on the hills or at Chefoo. He was concerned that men for the Forward Movement seemed to be volunteering so slowly. Some had been sent out and some had offered from the ranks of the Mission in China, including his own youngest son, but their number fell far short of even the first twenty, though the money to sustain them was waiting in abundance. Contrasted with former experiences, such as the answers to prayer in connection with the Seventy and the Hundred, this seemed the more remarkable and could not but confirm Taylor’s life-long conviction that in God’s work the silver and the gold, though very necessary, are of secondary importance. He was to some extent reconciled to patience by the disturbed state of the country, for things seemed to be going from bad to worse politically. The anti-foreign movement fostered by the Dowager Empress was growing in power, and it might be long before normal conditions were restored. Meanwhile a promised visit had to be paid to Australia and New Zealand, and then to New York for the Ecumenical Missionary Conference. This journey, Taylor hoped, would greatly help the Forward Movement, as well as call forth much prayer for China.
Events were moving with startling rapidity, however, to the dénouement of 1900. He was still in the midst of his campaign in Australia when the Dowager Empress put forth the inflammatory edict with which that fateful year opened. Posted up in every city of importance, those burning words lost nothing through the free translation given by scholars to the great mass of the illiterate. It was seen to be war to the death, and the secret society of patriotic ‘Boxers,’ pledged to the extermination of all foreigners, flourished under Imperial protection till the movement spread like wildfire throughout the land.
By this time Taylor and his party, which included his son and daughter-in-law, had crossed the Pacific to California, and were on their way to New York, where they were among the speakers expected at the Ecumenical Conference. From all parts of the world representative missionaries and others gathered for this great occasion, and much prayer was made for China, where the situation was becoming desperate. After the conference Taylor remained on for further work, but concern about the state of things in China and an overfull programme proved too much, and brought about a rather serious breakdown.
England was reached in June, and under a feeling of urgency that she hardly understood, Jennie Taylor arranged for the continuation of their journey to the quiet spot among Swiss mountains where her husband’s health had been so wonderfully restored some years previously. He was quite unfit for meetings or correspondence, and consented to the course that offered best prospect of recovery, thankful to leave the work in London, as in Shanghai, so well provided for. At Davos they had found warm friends in an English lady and her husband, Mr. and Mrs. Hofmann, who received visitors in a homelike pension at moderate charges. Simply writing to say they were coming, the travellers set out—a few days only before the prayer meeting at Newington Green, at which Mrs. Hofmann herself was present, when the first announcement was made of the terrible events even then transpiring in China. Had the Taylors delayed for that meeting or for a reply from the Villa Concordia, they probably would never have reached the shelter of that quiet home, for when the telegrams began to come they could not have left London. The Boxers had already entered Peking, and the work of destruction was begun. Hundreds of Christians were massacred, and war openly entered upon by the Chinese authorities. The Foreign Legations were in a state of siege, and Imperial decrees had gone out commanding viceroys and governors everywhere to support the rising.
Hearing that Taylor would already be at Davos, Mrs. Hofmann hastened back to do all in her power to help and comfort in that time of sore distress. And there it was the blow fell, and telegram after telegram was received telling of riots, massacres, and the hunting down of refugees in station after station of the Mission—until the heart that so long, in joy and sorrow, had upheld these beloved fellowworkers before the Lord could endure no more. ‘I cannot read,’ he said when things were at their worst; ‘I cannot think; I cannot even pray; but I can trust.’
With the relief of the Legations and the flight of the Court from Peking, the Boxer madness began to pass away, and Li Hung-chang was called again to the helm, to pilot his distracted country through the complications with foreign powers. But before that time the China Inland Mission had a martyr roll of over fifty of its members, while not a few who survived had suffered even more than those whose lives had been laid down. Fifty-eight in the C.I.M. alone perished in that terrible crisis, besides twenty-one children of the Mission, martyred with their parents or dying under _ sufferings the latter were enabled to survive. But in all the correspondence of the period not one bitter feeling can be traced against their persecutors, not one desire for vengeance or even for indemnification: The spirit of that tender mother who—dying after weeks of brave endurance on the journey to Hankow, having lost one little one by the way, and witnessed the prolonged sufferings of others—whispered to her husband, ‘I wish I could have lived, I wish I could have gone back there to tell the people more about Jesus,’ seemed'rather to animate all hearts.
When with returning strength Taylor was able to bear more detailed knowledge of what had taken place, not one page of journals or letters did he spare himself as these came to hand. Tears overflowed as he read last letters from two women missionaries written only the day before they met death alone in their distant station.
‘Oh, think what it must have been,’ he said when able to command his voice, ‘to exchange that murderous mob for the rapture of His presence, His bosom, His smile.
‘They do not regret it now,’ he continued rather brokenly. ‘“A crown... that fadeth not away.” “They shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy.”
“We thank God for the grace given to those who have suffered,’ he wrote in December replying to a letter of sympathy sent from Shanghai, and signed by 300 members of the Mission. ‘It is a wonderful honour He has put upon us as a Mission to be trusted with so great a trial, and to have among us so many counted worthy of a martyr’s crown. Some who have been spared have perhaps suffered more than some of those taken, and our Lord will not forget. How much it has meant to us to be so far from you in the hour of trial we cannot express, but the throne of grace has been as near to us as it would have been in China.’
Prevented from being himself in China and feeling that his own life might be cut short at any time, Taylor cabled out in August, appointing D. E. Hoste as Acting General Director of the Mission. This was no hasty step taken in an emergency. For years he had been looking to the Lord for guidance as to his successor, and had seen with thankfulness Hoste’s growing fitness for the position. There had been no uncertainty in Taylor’s mind, even before he left China, as to the answer to his prayers; and though the appointment of Hoste was not made public until some months later, when Stevenson’s approval and that of the London and China Councils had been cordially expressed, Taylor had the comfort of knowing that an important step had been taken to safeguard the interests of the whole work.
As to the difficult question of compensation, Taylor had from the first advised that no claim should be made by the Mission, and that even if offered, none should be accepted for injury to life or person. Later on when, besides a heavy indemnity and other punitive measures, retribution of a fearful character was inflicted by certain of the Powers, he went further, fully agreeing with the Councils that indemnification for Mission property also should be declined, though individuals were left free to accept compensation for personal losses if they so desired. This action, though criticised in certain quarters, was warmly approved at the British Foreign Office and by its Minister in Peking, who sent a private donation of £100 to the Mission in expression of his ‘admiration’ and sympathy.
It was not until the following summer (1901) that Taylor was obliged to abandon his cherished hope of returning to China. Even a visit to England proved too much of a _ strain, and just before his seventieth birthday he returned to Switzerland, thankful for the relief of the simple retired life which enabled him and Jennie to serve the Mission still by prayer and correspondence.
Glad to be near their friend Mrs. Berger, it was by the Lake of Geneva they made their home at length, in the hamlet of Chevalleyres above Vevey. No railway climbed the hillside then nearer than the village and castle of Blonay, whose grey old tower looked out on a scene of ever-changing beauty. Further up toward the wooded heights of the Pleiades an attractive though simple pension was found among meadows and orchards. Entering at the back, from the level of the road, the south rooms on the ground floor were raised a storey above the garden. This was just what Jennie was seeking. A
little sitting-room and bedroom, with a front balcony and a closed-in verandah toward the sun-rising, offered just the accommodation needed; while the moderate charge of four and a half francs a day included meals served in their own apartment.
Little by little, as their stay was prolonged, the pension became quite a resort for English guests, many friends coming for longer or shorter visits because the Hudson Taylors were there.
‘It was not so much what he said but what he was that proved a blessing to me,’ wrote one. ‘His strong faith, quietness, and constant industry, even in his weakness, touched me deeply. To see a man who had been so active compelled to live a retired life, unable to pray more than fifteen minutes at a time, and yet remaining bright and even joyous, greatly impressed me. Not one single complaint or murmur did we ever hear from his lips. He was always cheerful—trejoicing in the flowers by day and studying the stars at night.’
One reason for the quiet happiness of those days was that changes and partings were over, and the two who had known so much of separation could be together at last and have time to enjoy one another’s society. At first they were able to be out a good deal together, delighting in little excursions by rail and steamer and in the long, patient climbs that ended in a glorious outlook from some favourite height. By degrees it came to be others who accompanied Taylor in his longer walks, however, Jennie finding sufficient excuse for staying oftener at home. But always—writing at the table or knitting by the window—she was ready for their return with the welcome cup of tea and cheery news of visitors or letters. Then there were long hours in developing the photographs taken and studying the flowers gathered. The keenness of Taylor’s pleasure in these simple enjoyments as well as his delight in nature and the everyday intercourse of friendship were remarkable. His capacity for happiness was like that of an unspoilt child. Time never hung heavy on his hands; and while unable for any but easy reading, his love for the Word of God remained the same.
Until the autumn of 1902 Hudson Taylor retained his position as General Director of the Mission, but when Hoste arrived from China Taylor felt that the time had come for laying down responsibilities for which he was no longer equal. Many problems were pressing in connection with the reconstruction and rapid development of the work. The seed sown in tears and watered with blood was giving promise of an abundant harvest. The blessing of God had signally rested on the appointment made two years previously, and knowing he had the full concurrence of all the Directors and Councils, Taylor resigned to Hoste the full direction of the Mission.
The change had come about so gradually that to many it was hardly felt, but it was evident to thosé who saw below the surface that Taylor deeply and painfully felt his inability to labour as formerly. The true joy of life, he said once, was to do all for Jesus’ sake. Sacrifice and labour were alike sweet when it was for Him. Then he added after a pause, ‘But it’s hardest of all to do nothing for His sake.’