acrossasiaminoro00chiluoft

;
60 ACROSS ASIA MINOK ON FOOT
buildino^ a new one to contain 150 beds - is a rambling
old building and collection of sheds rudely adapted to
hospital needs. Its wards defy almost every canon of
hospital construction. Equipment is remarkable only
for its makeshifts. In the slack season that follows
harvesting, when men have time to think of the ills
from which their wives and children and themselves
suffer, and have time also to travel, the hospital is
packed to the utmost. Patients are found crowded
in low dark rooms that may have been used for storing
firewood, or tools, or fruit before the rush set in. They
are doing better thus, however, than if the hospital
had not received them. And in spite of all disadvantages
of building, equipment, and a grossly overworked
staff, the figure of hospital mortality is so
low that it would be called excellent under the best
conditions.
Watch the Mission hospital for a month, for even a
couple of weeks, and you get a better notion of Anatolian
life in its peculiarities than could be gained by half
a year of travelling. At the doctor's clinic gather
the most hopeless pitiable band of suffering mortals
that mind can picture. Some are of the town, but the
greater number have come long journeys. For days
on end these have jolted in araha or crawling bullockcart,
have ridden on asses, have walked from dawn to
evening, having heard that marvels of healing are
done here by " Marden Effendi," whose name is known
from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. Many
patients contrive to pay something for their treatment
but while there is room in the hospital no one whose
condition is not hopeless is turned away if payment
be impossible. Strange and pathetic cases appear
every week. One such was a blind woman who, led
by a young child, had walked above a hundred miles,
carrying her infant whom she had never seen. She
came in hope that was not misplaced, for an operation
restored her sig-ht. As an illustration of native
methods and endurance in dealing with the injuries
which so often overtake them, let the following ex-