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CHAPTER VI.
Marsovan Mission Hospital— Mission doctor and robbers— "Harden
Effeudi"— Hospital scenes—A case of self-amputation—Magic of the
"actual cautery" — The pensioned smuggler — Hospital shooting
season—Hard-worked medical staff—Surgeon and nurses on the run
—Running orderly and patient—In the foreign nurses' sitting-room.
More than college or school, more than any other
form of misionary enterprise, the Mission Hospital at
Marsovan reaches people of all races and faiths. It
alone—and like it other mission hospitals—attracts
the Moslems. Colleges and schools these leave to the
Christians, and keep the missionaries at arm's-length ;
but to the hospitals they come as readily as any,
and for the doctors have nothing but regard and
gratitude.
"Do not fear, effendi," replied a party of men
questioned by a mission doctor on the road as to the
recent doings of a well-known band of robbers. " Do
not fear : we are the robbers." They had recognised
the doctor, although unknown to him, and he, at least,
was free to come and go unharmed.
The medical staff of the hospital is considered at
full strength with two American and one native
doctor ; the nursing staff with one English, one
American, and six or eight natives ; but such an
establishment is not often maintained. To other
mission hospitals, each with a single overworked
doctor and nurse, the staff at Marsovan seems happy
superfluity. But when, as happens sometimes at