'I know all these, but feel, in reliance on God, like facing the thing as the best and proper thing to do. There are inns all about, and though for some time a private location may not be secured, we can still go about among the people. My main hope, though, is in settling down somewhere as a head centre, in close contact with the people, so that I earnestly desire that the doctor should come. If he is unmarried I would be glad to see him to-morrow. Could you not get a doctor who would be willing to remain single till a location could be secured? After a location has been secured let him marry if he likes. 'I think that the region I have in my mind would make a good centre for a doctor, and that he would have plenty of practice among Mongols and Chinese, especially if he could start a hospital for in-patients. 'I am very glad that the Mongolian region around Kalgan has shown signs of bearing fruit. It has strengthened my faith much. I am also glad that God has acknowledged in some degree my work here in Peking, and I feel more hopeful than ever I did. God, too, has cut me adrift from all my fixings, so that I feel quite ready to go anywhere if only He goes with me.' Mr. Gilmour entered upon this new departure on the understanding that a medical colleague should be sent to him at the earliest possible moment. This responsibility the London Board assumed and endeavoured to discharge. The result was a severe trial to the faith, not only of the solitary worker but to all interested--and they were many--in the fate of the new mission. As we shall see later on, when a congenial and competent medical colleague reached him, and was entering with vigour and hope upon the work, Dr. Mackenzie of Tientsin suddenly died, and before the immediate and urgent claims of Tientsin the claims of Mongolia had to give way. But in estimating the success of both missions, that on the Plain, and that in Eastern Mongolia, it must never be forgotten that what Gilmour considered _essential_, the presence and help of a medical colleague, was never in the Providence of God granted to him for any length of time. In the account he gives of his first visit to the region as its missionary--he had been twice before on visits of inspection--he dwells upon this necessity. 'I left Peking December 14, 1885, and re-entered Peking February 16, 1886, so that my absence from here was just two months. The part of Mongolia I went to is situated 800 li, or say 270 English miles, north-east by east of Peking, and, at the usual rate of 90 li (or 30 miles) a day, is nine days distant. This is not the part of Mongolia near Kalgan. Kalgan is north-north-west of Peking, five days' journey. [Illustration: MAP ILLUSTRATING JAMES GILMOUR'S LABOURS IN EASTERN MONGOLIA]