almost as soon as mrs. yet was pronounced well, and was allowed to go among people again and before mr. yet had left the hospital, baby yet fell seriously ill—his teeth.

he grew worse, and worse. yick told me about it one day in a few concise chinese words, which he snatched an opportunity to drop to me in passing through the dining room. the wily celestial seems to understand, without being told, that no one is to know that he and i can exchange thoughts in our native tongue.

that afternoon i stole out again, and went down to the little yet home. it was just as yick had said, the baby was very ill.

he lay on his little pallet, white and still, almost unconscious, and his mother stood over him wringing her hands, and shedding bitter tears.

"oh, my baby! my baby! he die and leave me! my heart break!" she cried in chinese when she saw me. "precious treasure! precious treasure!" she continued, bending toward the almost inanimate form on the pallet.

the latter is the almost universal term of endearment in china, and no american mother ever agonised more bitterly than did that chinese mother over that atom of herself lying before her.

i had to do something to comfort her, so i began to tell her about heaven. i, who was not sure that i could get to that blessed place myself (stealing out on the sly in a grandmother's clothes is not a very heavenly trick), said that whoever missed it, babies would be there.

"will chinese babies be there? they do not want them in america," she asked rapidly and tremblingly in chinese.

"certainly," i replied; and at that moment i seemed to have a vision of all the babies of this wide world that had died—black babies, brown babies, yellow babies, red babies (probably the[pg 125] colour of their skin was only the earth garb); i saw the whole throng, for grandmother had read to me from the bible that of such was the kingdom of heaven.

"his tooth not bother him there?" she added.

"no," i returned, "there shall be no more pain there."

"he like it," she continued, almost smiling through her tears.

then she grew very, very still, and a glow stole over her yellow face which made it beautiful.

i stepped nearer, put my arm around her, and kissed her on the cheek.

she looked at me in a startled way, then drawing a tiny handkerchief from her bosom, she carefully wiped the spot on her cheek where my lips had touched. the practice of kissing is unknown in china.

on the way home, when but a few yards from the house of mrs. yet, i met professor ballington again, and told him the story about the sick baby.

he asked me to go back with him, and take him in to see it, which i did. he looked scrutinisingly at the little hard pallet on which the baby lay; and what did that dear man do but go out to one of the great stores not far away, and buy the prettiest little cot, and the softest and best mattress that could be found in the market, and order them sent home without delay to that little yellow baby.

was it the soft mattress that did it? i do not know; but almost immediately the baby seemed to rest easier, and by degrees came back to life and strength.

oh, this would be a glorious country to live in!—if the people were all like professor ballington.