RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1980 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207 NOTES AND QUERIES 161 Ohio. Other legacies went to the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions, and the American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society, both in New York City. If we find any more information on this matter, we will let you know. cc: Robert G. Gennett Annex 1: Yours sincerely, Terry A. McNealy Library Director as extracted from a newspaper cutting from The Doyles-town Intelligencer of 1st September, 1910 sent by the Library Director of the Spruance Library. Dr William Edgar Geil, who has been engaged for a year in making political and literary investigations in China, returned to his home in Doylestown, Wednesday night, after completely circumnavigating the earth and getting material enough for three volumes which will be boiled down to one companion volume for the "Great Wall of China," which he published last year. "It has been my most successful journey," said Dr. Geil to an Intelligencer reporter, Thursday morning, at his home on West Court street. "I have visited all of the twenty capitals of the Chinese empire, investigated the political situation in each, the economical conditions and gathered a library of Chinese literature different from any in existence. There is really a ton of this literature which is now on its way over and is one of the most remarkable collections ever made. This was Dr. Geil's third visit to China. In 1902 he travelled from Shanghai to Bhamo, Burmah, and wrote "The Yankee on the Yangtse." In 1908 he explored the whole length of the Great Wall and wrote a book upon it which had a wonderful sale. It is a great compliment that he has already sold the English rights to his book on his last journey, although it is not yet written. Annex 2: as extracted from a newspaper cutting from The Doyles-town Intelligencer of 7th May, 1925 sent by the Library Director. The residue of the estate, including manuscripts and collections are given to Mrs. Geil. In the event Mrs. Geil did not survive it was provided the collection and rest of the estate be given to the... ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1980 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207 162 NOTES AND QUERIES American Baptist Foreign Mission Society and the Board of Missions of the Presbyterian Church in trust, to invest, reinvest, and keep invested for the upkeep of the rest home at "The Barrens." [the Geil property at Doylestown] The trustees are directed to sell any other real estate necessary for funds for the upkeep of the rest home and the inmates. MARYKNOLL IN CHINA Those readers who enjoyed reading the long extract from the unpublished history of the Maryknoll Mission which appeared in the last issue of the Journal may wish to know of three books which through the lives they record, provide more information on its work in China. The first, Bishop Walsh of Maryknoll, by Raymond Kerrison, published by Putnam's of New York in 1962, deals with one of the first six students to enroll in the Maryknoll Society in 1912, a newly founded order devoted to training foreign missionaries. From 1918 to 1936 he served in South China, returning to the United States to become superior-general of the Order for the next ten years. The second, entitled The Pagoda and the Cross, The Life of Bishop Ford of Maryknoll, is by a fellow Maryknoll priest, John F. Donovan, M.M., who served in China with Bishop Ford for ten years. Father Donovan, whose account of Bishop Ford was published by Scribner's, New York, in 1967, is also the author of the third book, a life of Father Bernard Meyer, M.M., under the title A Priest Named Horse (a reference to his Chinese surname of Ma) which was published for the Catholic Foreign Mission Society of America in 1977. All three men were among the party of five priests who arrived in Yeung Kong, Kwangtung, at midnight one week before Christmas, 1918. They came to this area because, the year before, the French Roman Catholic bishop of Canton had agreed to cut off the southern portion of his vast South China vicariate and give it to the new, untried American missionary society. In 1921 this mission area was extended to take in a large section of north-east Kwangsi, with the city of Wuchow as a centre, and in 1925 to include half the former Swatow vicariate of the Paris Foreign Missionary Society. This was the body which had decided in 1917, ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 187 soon the pet of the pious section of the San Francisco community. Everyone was impressed with this suave, intelligent and seemingly religious young Chinese gentleman. The Rev. Albert Williams, founder of the First Presbyterian Church in San Francisco, after meeting A-chick, reported that "his answers to questions touching matters of Christian doctrine are intelligent and satisfactory. He is associated with his uncle, accompanying him in a mercantile venture, and will remain in this city. I have much hope, that through his instrumentality we may bring the gospel more directly to bear upon his interesting country.” A-chick was viewed as a potential medium for missionary endeavour. Soon after A-chick's arrival, a Bible class for Chinese was organised by a Presbyterian Elder. Its first members were A-chick "and his companions.” Among these was Lee A-kan, a former classmate at the Morrison Education Society School in Hongkong. It was realised, however, that if the Chinese in San Francisco were to be reached by the church, it was not enough to have classes for them in English. The Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions was asked to send a Chinese-speaking missionary to San Francisco. The Board sent the Rev. William Speer. Mr. Speer had been in Canton for about three years, returning to the United States in 1849. His wife Cornelia Breckenridge and an infant daughter died within a few months of each other and are buried in the Protestant Cemetery at Macau near the grave of Dr. Robert Morrison. After his arrival in San Francisco, Mr. Speer began looking up the Chinese who had been connected with missionary churches or schools in China. He called on Tong A-chick. By then the young man was already in a position of leadership in the Chinese community and was recognised as a man of wealth. Of the meeting Mr. Speer remarks: “A-chick is regarded by the American community here as a man of more than common ability- ================================================================================