TWENTY YEARS' SERVICE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22356, 29 February 1936, Page 23

TWENTY YEARS' SERVICE

LIFE ON MISSION FIELD Few have answered the call of the mission more faithfully than Mrs. Horder, who for the past 20 years has worked as a medical missionary and teacher, together with her husband, Dr. Horder, at- Pakhoi, in the southern portion of China. Owing to health reasons Mrs. Horder has been forced to give up her work abroad and is visiting Rotorua. As a young English bride, Mrs. Horder went out to join her husband and assist him in his work, giving up the comforts of an English home to do so. ♦

" It is now 50 years since my husband went out to commence his mission," said Mrs. Horder, " and from a small mat hut has sprung our now flourishing settlement at Pakhoi." Mrs. Horder said that a number of years ago they were impressed with the need for securing relief for the lepers. Through the kindness, of English friends they were supplied with sufficient funds to build a compound for the sufferers near the brick hospital that had replaced the mat, hut. There the lepers were treated and given occupations. They learned to wait on each other, and those who were more physically fit were given industrial work to do.

" Some oi; our patients have been with us for over 40 years, while there are many whose residence dates back to 20 years," Mrs. Horder said. " The number of< lepers in China is enormous, and I am sorry to say that our limited space at Pakhoi can cater for only a very few of the great number who are afflicted." Another interesting part of the mission work carried on at Pakhoi, said Mrs. Horder, was a maternity branch which had grown tremendously in the last few years. Mothers were taught to take care of their babies under proper hygienic conditions, and were invited to seejj advice from the hospital. As many as 600 babies passed through the hospital last year.