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and then in Ningpo, mentions Ruth and her friend Christiana A-kit in the Annual Report of the London Tract Society for 1847:
I have two young women Indo-Chinese converts, who, fleeing from persecution, joined me in this country [Batavia]. They have applied themselves to the study of the English language since their arrival in the north, and one of them in particular is thirsty for the intelligence which that language opens out to her. Her desire for information has reference especially to religious subjects.
As we shall note A-tik's home after her marriage to Lai-sun was what nineteenth century missionaries called “pious", but piety was connected with a concern for a modern education for Chinese girls and for some years she taught in the missionary school in Shanghai.
A missionary educator visited their home at Shanghai, and her account published in 1857 in the American Episcopal Church journal, Spirit of Missions (v. 22, p. 350), gives evidence of the manner in which they combined their western type education and connections with the Chinese community in which they lived.
At the time of the visit Yung Wing, later the initiator of the Chinese Educational Mission in which Lai-sun participated, was a guest in the home. The missionary visitor noted that Yung Wing greeted her "with quite an American air”, though he had to admit he had forgotten her name. When Yung Wing, even then interested in education, asked if he could visit the girls' school under the missionary's charge, she politely turned him down as she felt that since the girls were so modest and unaccustomed to a male presence at the school, it would unduly upset them, but she turned to Mrs. Chan and her friend Christiana A-Kit, wife of Kew Teen-shang, and asked their opinion on the matter. They said they never objected to associating on social and friendly terms with Christian gentlemen. "But", said Kit, "when merchants or other heathen men call to see Attee's husband, she always retires."
Yung Wing remarked, "When I was in the United States as a student, I often visited young ladies' seminaries and they never objected, in fact, I think they rather liked it.”
The missionary lady took the occasion to probe a little deeper into the attitudes of American educated Chinese, posing the question,
CHAN LAI-SUN AND HIS FAMILY
113
and then in Ningpo, mentions Ruth and her friend Christiana A- kit in the Annual Report of the London Tract Society for 1847:
I have two young women Indo-Chinese converts, who, fleeing from persecution, joined me in this country [Batavia]. They have applied themselves to the study of the English language since their arrival in the north, and one of them in particular is thirsty for the intelligence which that language opens out to her. Her desire for information has reference especially to religious subjects.
As we shall note A-tik's home after her marriage to Lai-sun was what nineteenth century missionaries called “pious", but piety was connected with a concern for a modern education for Chinese girls and for some years she taught in the missionary school in Shanghai.
A missionary educator visited their home at Shanghai, and her account published in 1857 in the American Episcopal Church journal, Spirit of Missions (v. 22, p. 350), gives evidence of the manner in which they combined their western type education and connections with the Chinese community in which they lived.
At the time of the visit Yung Wing, later the initiator of the Chinese Educational Mission in which Lai-sun participated, was a guest in the home. The missionary visitor noted that Yung Wing greeted her "with quite an American air”, though he had to admit he had forgotten her name. When Yung Wing, even then interested in education, asked if he could visit the girls' school under the missionary's charge, she politely turned him down as she felt that since the girls were so modest and unaccustomed to a male pre- sence at the school, it would unduly upset them, but she turned to Mrs. Chan and her friend Christiana A-Kit, wife of Kew Teen- shang, and asked their opinion on the matter. They said they never objected to associating on social and friendly terms with Christian gentlemen. "But", said Kit, "when merchants or other heathen men call to see Attee's husband, she always retires."
Yung Wing remarked, "When I was in the United States as a student, I often visited young ladies' seminaries and they never objected, in fact, I think they rather liked it.”
The missionary lady took the occasion to probe a little deeper into the attitudes of American educated Chinese, posing the ques- tion,
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