Calvin Wilson Mateer, forty-five years a missionary in Shantung, China

by D. W. Fisher

All of the graduates are men of excellent talents. They are really fine scholars both in their own language and literature and in western science. One of them goes to Hangchow to take charge of the mission school there,—a school which had flourished well-nigh twenty years before the school in Tengchow was born. Another of them goes to Chefoo, to teach a school for the Scottish Presbyterian mission. The third goes to assist Dr. Nevius in his extensive country work, where I am sure he will render the most valuable service. One of our former pupils, who has been teaching in the school during the last year, also goes to assist Dr. Nevius in the same way. This he does of his own free will, knowing that he will have harder work and less pay. We expect a large number of new pupils next year. More are anxious to come than we can take. We will try to do the best we can.

From May, 1879, to January, 1881, the Mateers were absent from China, on their first furlough home. During this period the school was in charge of other missionaries, and a part of the time was without a regular superintendent; yet it continued its work fairly well. The return of the Mateers was made the occasion of a reception that must have been exceedingly pleasant to them. In the Sunday-school letter for 1881 he described it:

From Chefoo to Tengchow we traveled in a shentza. The weather was cold and the ground covered with snow. We got along comfortably, however, and reached Tengchow in safety. The schoolboys had heard of our coming, and were all on the lookout to meet us. It was Saturday afternoon, and they had no school; so they all came out of the city to meet us on the road. They met us in companies, and their beaming faces and hearty expressions of delight made us feel that we were indeed welcome back to Tengchow. Their faces looked very familiar, though some of the smaller boys had grown very much during our absence. The next week the school closed for the year.

Late in 1881 they were gladdened by the arrival of Robert Mateer and Lillian as reënforcements to the mission. Robert has been one of the most efficient of the Presbyterian missionaries in Shantung, especially in evangelism, and is still doing most excellent work. Lillian was attractive in person and proved herself an accomplished and successful teacher. In the course of time she married Mr. Samuel Walker. The failure of his health compelled their return home.

The year 1882 seems to have been marked by a distinct advance all along the line. The average attendance rose to sixty-five. The new students were selected out of the possible admissions, and consisted of such as gave most promise as to work and character, some of them being already well advanced in their studies, and full-grown men. The secret of this was the enlargement of the constituency of the institution, through the reputation it had already won for itself among the Chinese in general, and through the increase of native Christians. Perhaps the most remarkable improvement was in the prosecution of their work by the students; a state of things due to such causes as the presence of a larger number of select and advanced pupils, with a fuller and higher and prescribed curriculum, with formal public graduation at its completion.

So straitened had their quarters become that in the following year another building was obtained, care being taken that its outfit should, as heretofore, be of so plain a character as not to lift the men who went out from the institution above their own people in their ideas and habits of living. Of course, the growth of the school and its differentiation according to the stages of the curriculum necessitated a considerable increase in the force of teachers. After graduates began to go out, several of these were employed. Lillian Mateer for a while helped in the school, but it was not long until her marriage to Mr. Walker terminated her connection with the Presbyterian work and her residence at Tengchow. In the autumn of 1882 very substantial and permanent help came by the arrival of Mr. and Mrs. W. M. Hayes, whose large services will require further notice as this biography proceeds. Were it not that the story of the life of Mrs. Julia Mateer is told fully in a suitable volume, much would be said here as to her remarkable achievements, especially in the school.

Mateer’s work in connection with the school lay only in part in the classroom; but whatever shape it took, it was always of such a character as to impress his own individuality in a remarkable degree. Both he and Julia regarded personal influence as of such vital importance that they were not quite prepared to welcome an increase of pupils so great as to hazard this element of training. Dr. Corbett says: “As a teacher he was enthusiastic and eminently successful. He was always wide-awake and never dull; so he was able to keep the attention of every student. Any attempt to deceive him was useless, and students found no comfort in going to a recitation unless they had been faithful in their preparation.” The truth is that, helpful as he gladly made himself to everybody who tried to conduct himself as he ought, he was a terror to all triflers and evildoers, old or young. Dr. Mateer’s surname in Chinese was Ti. The tiger is called Lao Hu. It is significant that among themselves his students sometimes spoke of him as Ti Lao Hu. One thing he believed with his whole heart, and endeavored to impress in every legitimate way on his pupils. This is that the highest office to which a Christian man can be called is the ministry of the gospel. In all his conduct of the school his dominating desire was to raise up faithful, able, well-educated men, filled with the Spirit, to go forth as ambassadors of Christ to win China for Him. As Dr. Corbett adds: “For this purpose he gave wise counsel, intellectual effort, unceasing toil and daily prayer. He gave of his own money freely to help the destitute, and make it possible for youths of promise to fit themselves for usefulness.”

Such, briefly told, is the story of the Tengchow school. In the two decades of its existence it had fully justified the consecrated wisdom of its founder and head. From the little elementary department with which it had opened, it had advanced so as to become also a high school, and at length to do work of full collegiate rank. At the time when it formally took the name of a college, there was an average attendance of seventy-five, including three day scholars. It had educated more or less completely perhaps two hundred pupils, who had come up from Chinese families, some of them Christian and many of them heathen. Of those who remained long enough to be molded by the influences of the institution and were mature enough, all made a public profession of their faith in Christ. They had been trained to live upright, godly, Christian lives; and they had seen one of their number die in peace through his faith in Christ. The character and the work of those who had gone out to do their part in the activities of the world were such as to command respect and confidence and influence. For the graduates who were beginning to be sent forth there was a demand to fill positions of high importance, much in excess of the supply, and by no means limited to Shantung. Besides all that had been achieved, the prospect of far greater things in the future was assured.