"The Chinese have a high regard for the skill and ability of these gifted young physicians. One sees this appreciation, not only in the commendatory tablets hanging in the entrance hall, but in their equally gracious and more serviceable gifts, which together with fees amounted this year to about $2,500. The doctors have had within the last twelve months, 7,854 patients and have made 531 out-visits. Their services have been requested by different official families of Kiukiang and Nan-chang, the capital of Kiangsi. Patients come to them from different provinces. The young physicians fearlessly make journeys far out in the surrounding country, crossing the mountains perhaps, but always in perfect safety, as they meet only with respect and courtesy. Sometimes after a successful visit their chairs will be draped with a red cloth and the physicians will be carried home in triumph through an admiring crowd, and accompanied all the way by fire-crackers. They hear only pleasant and complimentary remarks from passersby. 'We are afraid of foreigners, but you can understand our nature'—so the simple-minded country folk sometimes tell them."
Dr. Stone, describing the opening of the hospital to Dr. Danforth, wrote, "The Chinese were very much impressed with your way of commemorating your wife." Dr. Kahn added that one of the highest officials, who was being shown through the building, signified his approval by emphatically declaring, "It would make any one well merely to stay in such a pleasant place."
As a matter of fact, work had been carried on in the new building for some time before the formal opening. It had been ready for occupancy none too soon, for in the summer of 1901, the Yangtse River overflowed its banks, working great havoc among the crops and homes of the people living near it. Dr. Stone wrote Dr. Danforth: "Tens of thousands have been rendered homeless and destitute. Some of them are literally starved to death. The sick and hungry flock to our gates, and for several months we have had over a thousand visits each month to our dispensary." Some idea of the part which the hospital played in relieving the sufferings of the flood refugees is given by an article in Woman's Work in the Far East, written by Dr. Stone at about this time:
"Perhaps friends would like to know how we dispensed the clothes and quilts so kindly sent us. During the winter months very many needy refugees came to our dispensary daily for treatment. Of course we did not have enough clothes to distribute indiscriminately, but only for those who were the most helpless and miserable. We received them by hundreds, and not only had we to give out medicine, but rice, as well as clothing."
"One morning when it was raining outside, an old woman came into our dispensary all exhausted, carrying a child on her back, and another buttoned in front within her clothes. The older one was a boy three years old and the tiny baby in her bosom was only three months old. They proved to be her grandchildren, and the old woman said: 'Never in our lives have we gone out to beg before, and for the last three days we have not had a morsel to eat. Before the floods we were considered well-to-do people, and my son is forty years old and a literary man; so he is too ashamed to beg, but tries to help the family by gathering sticks for the fire. His wife is sick in bed with typhoid fever and now the baby has no one to nurse it, and the boy is sick, and I have to take care of them all and beg for a living.' The woman had on only a lined garment, so we gave her one of those wadded gowns that were sent us, and a tin of milk for the baby, and also sent a little rice to make gruel for the sick woman at home."
This was only one of many cases of need which the hospital sought to alleviate. A few days after Christmas of this year Dr. Stone wrote to a friend in America: "What a busy time we had getting ready to celebrate the joyful event! We gave a good square meal to the refugees, and let them take home what they could not finish here. It made me feel happy to see them so pleased, and gave us an opportunity to tell them of the greatest Gift to mankind. Although we were so rushed that we did not even sit together to eat our regular meals, yet we felt it was the happiest Christmas we have ever had."
In addition to the refugees larger numbers of regular patients than ever before were coming to the doctors for treatment. The new hospital had hardly been opened before Miss Howe wrote, "Patients who are able to bear their own expenses are being sent away, because the present accommodations are already overtaxed."
Just at this time, when the doctors' growing reputation, and the increased facilities which the new buildings afforded, were greatly enlarging both opportunity and responsibility, the question of Dr. Kahn's going to Nanchang to open medical work there arose. It is not surprising that at first Dr. Stone wondered how she could spare her friend and fellow-worker, now that the work was greater than ever before, and every indication pointed to large growth in the future. But when she became convinced that the opportunity at Nanchang was too great to be neglected, and that only Dr. Kahn could meet it, she bade her God-speed and cheerfully accepted the added burden thus laid upon her.
Left alone with the entire work in Kiukiang, Dr. Stone's hands were full indeed, as the answer which she gave to a request for a synopsis of her day's work shows: "We breakfast at half-past seven and then I go to the chapel in the hospital and conduct prayers for the inmates and patients able to attend. After prayers I make a general inspection of the hospital, and then I teach my class of nurses. I take young native girls in their teens and give them a thorough course of training such as they would get in America. I translate the English books into Chinese for them, and sometimes put the Chinese books into English too. Then I go to the dispensary and am busy there for hours.... In the afternoons I make calls, generally on women of rank who need my assistance and have been unable to get to the hospital. I return home only when here seems no further work for me that day."