Days and weeks of terrible experiences followed, during which Mrs. Cheng proved herself a blessing to the sorely tried mother. Again and again she was tested as few have ever been; how she stood the tests we shall see.
The story of that journey has already been written, and only what specially concerns Mrs. Cheng will here be mentioned.
On the eleventh day of the journey a band of armed men came down upon our party like an avalanche, and in the melee Mrs. Cheng and our little daughter, Ruth, became separated from us. Can we ever forget, how, when men stood over the faithful nurse demanding the child, she refused to give her up, but lay upon the little one, and took blow after blow upon her own body? Only the greed for loot saved them, for the men seeing others getting our things left them to get their share.
That same night when again our party was facing what seemed almost certain massacre, several Chinese came to Mrs. Cheng urging her to leave us, promising to see that she would be taken safely back to her home if she would, but she refused.
About 2 o'clock that morning I heard the sound of weeping in the courtyard; going out I found Mrs. Cheng sitting by the steps weeping bitterly, and moaning aloud:
"I must go, I must go; they need me, even if they kill me I will go." Sitting down beside her we clung in our distress to each other. Then a strange thing happened. Two Chinese women came creeping towards us through the dark court, and kneeling down at our feet took our hands in theirs. Almost too surprised for words I said:
"Are you Christians?"
"We don't understand," they replied.
"Then why have you come to us now?"
"Because our hearts feel sorrow for you." These words but imperfectly convey the beautiful and touching sympathy of these heathen women, for as they spoke, tears were in their eyes, and their look and manner meant more than words. Before I had time to say more than a few words to them the call came to get into our carts.