Among the Lepers

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LII, Issue 51, 23 December 1925, Page 25

Among the Lepers

(By E. Dugoan.) '■:'-"., .■",::... ';".:■ ,■.....■-. : :..".:; K f'tSt ; '

4 xn tneir quaint JTrencn habits or black and ight blue two little Sisters have come to >■ - . » * . *„ . L ' '--■-••i.,'-, ; ."•;"< our country from the island of Makogai. They are here on a health trip, ordered away for a short rest from their great toils. - They . .^ £ ; have brought with them many photographs and New Zealand has taken a keen interest in their coming. Before their arrival in Wellington reporters interviewed Rev. Dean Regnault, S.M.; of the Mission House.'? Dean Regnault is the chaplain of the Third Order : / , .of Mary here and these are Marist Nuns. - ■-,, . They are from, Switzerland and from V : ;{/ France. From those far countries they have . , come -to a little island called Makogai to tend the lepers. 1 ' Everyone has heard of r . Damien and Molokai Makogai is another Molokai in the south.' It is under the British Government. " Our own Government in courteous recognition of an heroic Order has granted passes {to - these—our guests. : - - ■ ;> . They have brought photographs of Makogai and of their-work. Those photographs are the .most pitiful things in the world. Sores, ; warps, decay, dirt, stench, these are their - daily life. One • sees lepers : in; all stages of - decay. Some have mere stumps for limbs. . Some h .aye a ; limb cut off, The Sisters tissist at these operations and give the anaes- : thetic. _ ■ \ > : "Have you many Europeans a listener asked them. "We have all* nationalities. We • have Hindoos, Chinese, Europeans, and : >fjFijians." ' .....,_U,...,.,, ..:]■- And what language v do you - speak?" ? {.' "We speak English, French, Hindustanee, Fijian, and sometimes a salad of them" an. \ - ■ Concerning theft own deeds they are re- r---ticent, but ' - one gets the general nature of ':' the work. Their organisation is so good that -the . visiting American Doctors who had seen similar leper settlements all over the world declared that Makogai is one of the best of ...its kind in the world. One of the Sisters . rides each morning round the island on her ■ errands of mercy. - , : ' I "Are they grateful and happy ?" one asked - them. "They are very happy—but grateful ? % .they just do not think -about it—they take / it for granted. But they are so happy; altogether that they do not wish to leave. v One man was told that he was discharged • and K9^*i- the Government boat . was coming to ; take him/away, and; he hid in the - bush ■ till it was gone. He felt his own township could not forget that he had been a leper, and in - Makogai, no one could reproach him with' j that." ;-. "They are very happy," one of them went on. "You see they have their own ducks :.\ and fowls and they trade among themselves. {-They have picnics and they love the cinema. {/They are not troublesome to manage, except as regards cleanliness. They find it hard 4to be clean, and it is very hard to make them try to be clean." V " a little of the lepers from Quail Island, in whom the New Zealand Health > Department here takes still a kindly inters

est. There is one white man amongst them, and he bears his cross with the greatest fortitude. He is now almost' blind and is a bad case. . I < . They are a township in themselves, a -township of the lost and the unclean. ' ; The Sis: ters still use, the old "word to express it. They speak of a man untouched . by the: disease as a "clean" man-. .They spoke a little,', on being . questioned, of ; the chances of infection. They made no secret of the fact that the : disease is one to be feared. "The more T one sees •of it theless one would like to catch it. Father Nicouleau? 'Yes, he sang'the Magnificat when he learned he had it. He felt his work was among the lepers and he did not want to . leave them- when' he was old." "And you have all nationalities and denominations '; "Yes. We have a great many Wesleyans. Their clergyman visits them. ';-: The friends and .relations come at times .and give thepatients gifts." • One of ' the photos they brought showed the little chapel r with its garden of Mowing ' lilies. ' "Eucharist lilies. : They grow on the island." - There are flowers everywhere; thank God, even intainted air. 7 But the next "picture was not so pleasing. It was a dilapidated looking little resthouse where the Sisters -who are on leave from their dreadful duties go to rest. They have :* to take a month's leave. The most'ardent could not stand unbroken service. '. '■••<■"- Only two at present can retire at a time, so small/ so poor. i s that rest-house.' The v lepers are ; housed well in "their compounds, but /the/ nuns, their helpers ~have f but this / old house for rest. , •_ ■ ""-. They have ' a sure faith that New Zealand will help them to build a rest-house for their sick or weary nuns. There are wide hearts' in this country that will not read these things unmoved. Leprosy is not a mere story out of the Bible. It- is a. living/plague..- And these, in their serried ranks; are the simple. soldiers of a valiant host who fight it in the, name of pity. Rev. Mother of the Sisters of Mercy, Hill : Street, Wellington; and Very Rev. Dean Regnault, S.M., Marist Mission House, Thorndon, ;, Wellington, r will receive donations on their behalf. In such "a cause" there 'is no need to beg. Everyone with a'{ coin to spare or many coins will realise that v it is a. privilege to be able to help in this work of love and pity. T - "