A Franciscan Friar

Evening Star, Issue 8478, 1 April 1891, Page 3

A Franciscan Friar

Rev. Father Athanasino Goette, a priest of the Franciscan Order who has been eight years a missionary in Northern China, next to the Chinese wall and Mongolia, recounts many interesting facts relative to his experiences in the province of Shensi, where he mainly labored. "To get there," said he, "I went by steamer 700 miles from Shanghai to Hankow, up the Yang-tse; then on a Chinese boat for fifty days on the Han River. Then we took mules and rode eight days over what are called the Southern Mountains, when we finally arrived at Singanfou, the old imperial city of China. This city is the capital of the province and has 800,000 inhabitants. There we have two churches, a college and a school of about eighty Chinese boys. We also have an orphan asylum there with about 1,500 Chinese children. These children we have picked up from the graveyards, where they were thrown to die. They are all girls. Lately, since the Chinese know we take care of them, when female children are born they are often brought to our doorsteps and left there. Bishop Pagnucci, of the province, which is as large as France, lives at Koolen, thirty miles from Singanfou. There is a seminary there. The bishop has been there twenty-six years. Neither he nor I have ever had any trouble with the Natives. Sometimes we have to look oat a little for the Chinese Btudents, bat that is all. The Chinese of the north are a much finer class of people than those of the south. There are now about 30,000 Christians in the province. Not far from the great Chinese Wall is a massive monument erected in the seventh c ntury a i>. On it is inscribed the whole history of the creation and the story of Christ. A good deal of the inscription yet remains. S x hundred and twenty yean after Christ there were missionaries where I have been laboring." Father Goette says the production and use of opium in Shensi are having an extremely demoralising effect on the people. The Emperor has forbidden the production of opium, but the mandarins permit it for the reason that they have secrotly laid a tax on it and arc growing very rich from it. Father Goette says he has seen as much as forty acres of opium in one field. Three-fifths of the people are absolute slaves to the drug.