It was either after this illness, or after another of the same type that she said, ‘I have felt that a beautiful Wing has been spread over me, which is lined with down and stitched with gold; and I am quite safe. Nothing can harm me so long as I remain under it!’ Somebody rather unnecessarily remarked, ‘But it is our own fault if we do not remain under it.’ ‘No,’ Miss Tucker replied, ‘we can’t say that. Satan does give us a pull sometimes.’ She was reminded that God’s ‘favour is always towards us’; but again she asserted the undeniable truth that God does sometimes permit His servants to be thus tried.
A long letter from herself to Mrs. Hamilton is dated December 21st, or two days before that written by Mr. Bateman, and apparently the very day on which Dr. Clark was summoned by telegram to Batala. This must have been a slip. The handwriting is shaky, but she speaks of her illness as past. With reference to the beginning of the latter, she says:—
‘When in the afternoon (of the 16th) it was evident that I was seriously ill, the effect was magical. Up went my spirits like a balloon,—the curious effect which severe illness seems to have naturally upon me.... To be bright and cheerful in sickness and suffering costs me nothing, for it seems to come naturally; but I dare say that I get credit for a great deal of grace. It is so difficult for others, so difficult for ourselves, to distinguish between Nature and Grace.’
One may perhaps add that it is also unnecessary to do so,—unnecessary as regards ourselves, and utterly impossible as regards others. Better to leave such questions in the Hands of Him with Whom alone ‘all things are naked and opened.’ But evidently the subject had been much in Miss Tucker’s mind. The long letter is half full of it.
On January 4 she wrote:—
‘Now I dare say that you will want to hear how I am. Wonderfully well, though, of course, not strong. I went a short distance in my duli to-day. My late illness has quite convinced me that God has given me a capital constitution. I had, apparently, so much against steady recovery. Yet—there is no doubt of it—I am recovering. Except rather more weakness of the eyes and slight loss of flesh, no dregs seem left.’
‘Batala, Jan. 24, 1889.—Many thanks for the printed extract from good Mr. Clifford’s letter about the cure for leprosy.... I dare say that it is a valuable medicine when properly used; but probably the secret of its great success in the Andamans is that it was tried on convicts, who dared not refuse to rub themselves properly. Mr. Clifford writes that the exercise is part of the remedy; but I think that it would be wellnigh impossible to persuade free lepers to rub themselves for four hours daily. They would greatly prefer leprosy and begging. Do you not know of the Indian mother who, when one of the Mission ladies told her to rub oil over her poor sick child’s body, refused to take such trouble? “I have another!” said she. With dear good Father Damien it would be different.’
TO MISS ‘LEILA’ HAMILTON.
‘Feb. 16.—The wood-pigeons are cooing, the little peach-trees displaying pink blossoms, the fields are green with young corn. Perhaps you will half envy us when you read this; but you would hardly envy us six weeks hence....