The new focus of the Queensland Kanaka Mission was to reach every possible Kanaka man before he returned to his island, and Florence redoubled her efforts to convert and train the young men.
In February 1890 Florence learned that one of her heroes, the famous missionary Hudson Taylor, of the China Inland Mission, was visiting Australia. Florence desperately wanted to hear him speak, so she attended a conference in Brisbane where he was scheduled to preach. Regrettably, the steamer carrying Taylor ran aground on a sandbank near Rockhampton, farther down the coast, delaying his appearance at the conference. Florence was disappointed. She assumed that she had missed her opportunity to hear Taylor, but much to her surprise, right in the middle of one of the conference meetings, the preacher brought a stranger up onto the platform.
The stranger was a short man, rather shabbily dressed in a dusty coat. Surely, Florence thought, this cannot be the great Hudson Taylor everyone talks about. But it was, and with a single sentence of introduction, Taylor launched into a sermon that was to change Florence’s life. As Taylor spoke of the millions of unreached people in China, a thought flashed through Florence’s mind. This is dreadful. Why don’t Christians go to them? Instantly she heard a voice in her head: Why don’t you go?
Me! Florence countered. I could never leave my Kanaka boys.
As Hudson Taylor preached on, Florence tried to get the notion of going to China out of her head, but it would not budge.
If I want you in China, she felt God say to her, do you think you will be any use in Queensland?
Florence surrendered. Lord, I’m Yours, she said. If You want me to go to China, I am prepared to leave my work here and go.
The following day Florence spoke privately with Hudson Taylor. She explained to him about the work of the Queensland Kanaka Mission and told him that she felt called to work in China.
“You must be very sure it is God’s leading, since you are doing such a fruitful work in Queensland,” he cautioned. “You would be faced with many new trials in China. But if God does send you, we will give you a warm welcome.”
The following day Florence received a sad telegram from Fairymead. Her sister Constance had died in Ireland of heart failure at the age of thirty-two. Florence was glad to be in the company of so many Christians who could pray for and encourage her and help her through her grief.
When Florence got back to Fairymead, she could not shake the idea that she was supposed to go to China with the China Inland Mission (CIM). With no more Kanakas coming to Queensland and the numbers of those working on the plantations diminishing, Florence conceded that it was possible for her to leave the ongoing work in the hands of her sister-in-law Ellen.
By January 1891 Florence was convinced that her future lay in China. She sent off an application to the CIM office in Sydney and waited eagerly for a response. A group of new missionaries was due to leave in March for China, and Florence hoped to be a part of the group.
Through each passing week, Florence waited eagerly for the mail to arrive. But she received no news from the China Inland Mission. March came, and still there was no news.
During March Florence traveled to Sydney to attend the marriage of her brother Ernest to Margaret Adam. While there, she had the opportunity to attend the farewell service for the CIM missionaries heading to China. When the service was over, she asked the leader of the mission why she had heard nothing from the CIM council. Much to Florence’s dismay, she learned that her application had never reached the office in Sydney. Before she left to return home, she filled out another application and handed it in personally.
Within days word came back that Florence had been accepted for the work in China. The China Inland Mission gave her six weeks to wind up her affairs and be ready to depart.
Florence was kept busy during this time packing, saying good-bye to her family and friends, and handing over leadership of the Queensland Kanaka Mission to Ellen.
Finally May 26, 1891, arrived, and Florence Young stood at the railing of the SS Airlie, watching as the city of Brisbane faded from view. She felt like Abraham in the Old Testament, leaving everything she knew behind her.
Chapter 7
China
The SS Airlie reached the port of Hong Kong on the afternoon of June 18, 1891. Florence peered over the railing at the junks and houseboats that quickly surrounded the ship. As soon as they dropped anchor, the noise on board rose to a crescendo as Chinese men scrambled aboard shouting and screaming at the passengers. Florence’s heart dropped. Were these the people she had come to serve? They acted nothing like Australians, or Pacific islanders, for that matter. She began to wonder whether she could ever relate to them. Had she made a terrible mistake?
Just before dinner Florence and several other passengers went ashore and walked around the dock area, and Florence found herself again asking the same question. This time the question arose as a result of what she read in an English-language newspaper. The paper carried a lurid report of a riot in Wu-Su, China, recounting how a mob had attacked a mission compound. The women and children at the compound had escaped in their pajamas, but the two male missionaries had been murdered. The article went on to conclude that war between China and the foreign powers that occupied many of her port cities was imminent and that all Europeans should leave China immediately.
Florence imagined Hudson Taylor in Shanghai offering refuge to the four hundred or so China Inland Mission missionaries who would be forced to evacuate the inland areas. That night she wrote to Emily, trying to describe her feelings:
To-day’s paper is full of the serious riots in various places, and of the possibility of further troubles. It has been rather a testing time for me. Do you remember our walk at Wooloomooloo, when I told you how easily frightened I am? Well, I am a coward, and I confess my heart and my flesh have felt very much like shrinking from what might lie in store for us. Only “God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.”
The following day Captain Ellis took Florence and two other women sightseeing around Hong Kong. Florence was intrigued by Hong Kong Island. It was densely populated, and the narrow streets were barely wide enough for rickshaws to pass along. The island was dominated by Victoria Peak, which rose to a height of 1,825 feet. On the lower slopes of the peak was the European quarter, tucked behind the markets and commercial center of Hong Kong that occupied the narrow strip of flat land between the base of the peak and the sea. Captain Ellis walked the women through the quarter on tree-lined streets, along which sat bungalows with neat English gardens.
They rode to the top of Victoria Peak on a cable car. Florence drank in the magnificent view from the summit. Ships bobbed on the harbor’s azure water like toy boats. Beyond lay Kowloon peninsula, and beyond that the mainland of China itself. Florence noted that the air at the top of the peak was much cooler and crisper than the stifling, humid atmosphere of the city below.
Florence was to transfer to a steamer in Hong Kong that would take her on to Shanghai. Captain Ellis kindly allowed her to stay on the Airlie until the steamer for Shanghai was ready for her to board. The following day the Airlie was to take on coal for its onward journey. Florence and another woman and her five small children, who were to catch a steamer on to Japan, went ashore for the day, where they went by rickshaw to visit “Happy Valley,” supposedly one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world. By the time Florence arrived at the cemetery, she was feeling chilled and her hands were shaking. She did not improve as the day went on, and when she returned to the ship, Captain Ellis was very concerned about her. He checked in on Florence first thing in the morning, and when he found her no better, he summoned a doctor.
Dr. Thompson examined Florence and pronounced that she had Hong Kong fever and could not travel any farther until she was better. Regrettably, the SS Airlie would be leaving port in the next day or two, leaving Florence with nowhere to go to recover.
The problem was solved when Dr. Thompson invited Florence to stay at a missionary sanatorium on Victoria Peak. The doctor agreed to make the necessary arrangements and gave Florence some quinine to bring her fever down. Later that day Captain Ellis accompanied Florence to the sanatorium. Florence was groggy and barely remembered the trip there.
For the first few days, Florence hardly knew where she was. She looked out the sanatorium window occasionally, but all she could see was a thick fog. Every joint and muscle in her body ached, and she hated to think that this was her missionary debut.
Florence remained under Dr. Thompson’s care for eight days before he pronounced her strong enough to continue her journey to Shanghai. He warned Florence that she would suffer relapses of the fever and gave her some more medicines to take whenever she did so.
Florence had no adequate words to thank the doctor when she left. He had cared for her, a complete stranger, and probably saved her life.
Finally, on July 3, 1891, Florence Young arrived at the China Inland Mission home in Shanghai. Hudson Taylor and his wife greeted her warmly and made sure that she had everything she needed. Florence was grateful to learn that the local disturbances against foreigners had died down during the time she had been ill and that the work of the mission inland continued.
Florence suffered a relapse of Hong Kong fever while she was at the mission home, and it was twelve days before she could travel on to the language training school located at Yang-chau.
The day before she was due to travel, Hudson Taylor’s wife presented Florence with an outfit of women’s clothing. Florence already knew that Hudson Taylor had very definite views about how a missionary should present him or herself, and this included dressing like the local people. It had shocked the English establishment when Taylor first grew his hair long and wore it in a queue—a single braid down his back. But over the years his policy had proved wise.
Now it was time for Florence to don a long dress, covered by a tunic with wide sleeves, and put on embroidered cloth shoes. She was surprised at how comfortable the clothing was and how much less attention she attracted to herself wearing it. In fact, with her black hair slicked back into a bun, Florence imagined that from behind she looked just like any other Chinese woman.
Florence was still feeling sickly when she left for Yang-chau. Five other missionary recruits were journeying with her, and a seasoned missionary named John McCarthy acted as their escort. The first leg of the journey was a two-hundred-mile voyage up the Yangtze River to the treaty port of Chin-kiang. Because the missionaries were dressed in native garb rather than in European clothing, the steamship owner allowed them to travel steerage with the Chinese passengers, paying a fare of half a dollar instead of the twenty dollars for an above-deck cabin. The food, when Florence had the strength to eat it, was excellent. The steamer supplied hot rice, boiling water for tea, and chopsticks. For a few pennies, one of the stewards produced vegetables and seafood to accompany the rice.
Florence was amazed at how muddy the water became as the ship steamed upriver. It reminded her of pea soup, and she understood why Hudson Taylor had warned her to make sure all of her drinking water was boiled first.
It took two days to reach Chin-kiang, where John hired a riverboat to cross the Yangtze River and head up the Grand Canal. Finally the riverboat deposited the group on the side of the Grand Canal, from where it was a twenty-minute wheelbarrow ride to Yang-chau.
Florence had never experienced anything like her first wheelbarrow ride, and she never wanted to repeat it. In relating the story of the ride she wrote to Emily:
They are simply instruments of torture. There is a big wooden wheel in the center, protected by a framework. On each side of the wheel is a shelf of wooden bars upon which you sit. With one arm you cling to the center frame and with the other you try to keep an umbrella over your head, a difficult matter in the crowded narrow alleys. And words will not describe the bumping. The alleys, I can’t call them streets, are paved with lumps of stone, you go bump, bump, bump all the way. After two or three minutes you are thankful to get off and walk a few steps to relieve your back; but not having a Chinese woman with us, this was not proper.
The grueling trip ended at Yang-chau, the location of the China Inland Mission’s women’s language school. Here Florence would embark upon six months of intensive study of the Mandarin language.
