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REV. MR. KRONE
about. By this hospitality to the dead they hope to avert the evils which the spirits of unburied corpses are believed to occasion. There is also a home for aged men, one or two hamlets for lepers, and a cluster of houses for the blind. In the "Samon-che" district record, it is laid down that 200 persons shall be admitted and provided for in these several institutions; and the amount of funds to be expended, and the fields and houses from which the charitable revenues are to be derived, are minutely detailed. But it is well known that the poor and destitute derive little or no benefit from these sources, except the shelter against the wind and rain afforded them by the dilapidated tenements which are provided for them, and in which they may, without annoyance or maltreatment, consume the food which they have been able to procure by begging throughout the day.
Lepers are not allowed to enter any village; when they arrive in its neighbourhood they have to stand on a hill, or some other conspicuous place, and call to the villagers, who thereupon come out and supply them with rice, tea, or whatever they may desire. But it sometimes happens that the villagers are rather deaf to the cry of the lepers, and then these unfortunates, who are very revengeful and consequently much feared, enter the village, defile the wells and water tanks, and use every means in their power to communicate the disease to their uncharitable countrymen.
The blind have a separate establishment allotted to them by the people of Sai-heong. During the day they go about begging, and in their refuge they have no one to care for them, except some homeless strangers with whom they share their daily alms. If one of them happens to die, the others go about collecting money for a coffin, and the necessary expenses of the interment. Whilst I was living at Sai-heong, one of these blind beggars came to me to beg my contribution towards the purchase of a coffin for one of his comrades who had died; the coffins being cheap, I gave him 200 cash. The next day another blind man came to me, and told me that his companion had also died, and requested my assistance; I gave him a similar donation, and the rest of them having learnt this, a third one came two days after the last, and even a fourth made his appearance. Being advised by the people of Sai-heong that the only way to put a stop to this deplorable mortality among the poor blind, was to refuse any pecuniary aid for their interment, I ceased giving this alms, and the deaths immediately ceased also.
120
REV. MR. KRONE
about. By this hospitality to the dead they hope to avert the evils which the spirits of unburied corpses are believed to occasion. There is also a home for aged men, one or two hamlets for lepers, and a cluster of houses for the blind. In the "Samon-che" district record, it is laid down that 200 persons shall be admitted and provided for in these several institutions; and the amount of funds to be expended, and the fields and houses from which the charitable revenues are to be derived, are minutely detailed. But it is well known that the poor and destitute derive little or no benefit from these sources, except the shelter against the wind and rain afforded them by the dilapidated tenements which are provided for them, and in which they may, without annoyance or maltreatment, consume the food which they have been able to procure by begging throughout the day.
Lepers are not allowed to enter any village; when they arrive in its neighbourhood they have to stand on a hill, or some other conspicuous place, and call to the villagers, who thereupon come out and supply them with rice, tea, or whatever they may desire. But it sometimes happens that the villagers are rather deaf to the cry of the lepers, and then these unfortunates, who are very re- vengeful and consequently much feared, enter the village, defile the wells and water tanks, and use every means in their power to communicate the discase to their uncharitable countrymen.
The blind have a separate establishment alloted to them by the people of Sai-heong. During the day they go about begging, and in their refuge they have no one to care for them, except some homeless strangers with whom they share their daily alms. If one of them happens to die, the others go about collecting money for a coffin, and the necessary expenses of the interment. Whilst I was living at Sai-heong, one of these blind beggars came to me to beg my contribution towards the purchase of a coffin for one of his comrades who had died; the coffins being cheap, I gave him 200 cash. The next day another blind man came to me, and told me that his companion had also died, and requested my assistance; I gave him a similar donation, and the rest of them having learnt this, a third one came two days after the last, and even a fourth made his appearance. Being advised by the people of Saiheong that the only way to put a stop to this deplorable mortality among the poor blind, was to refuse any pecuniary aid for their interment, I ceased giving this alms, and the deaths immediately ceased also.
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