Their leave-taking was almost like laying down life itself, for their hearts had become intimately entwined with the lives of the Siamese people. In March, 1876, the two sailed for “home again.” But to return to America was not to abandon their zeal for Siam; they made themselves ambassadors at large to the Church in the United States in behalf of the Kingdom of Christ in that land. REARING TWO SIAMESE LADS Most notable and doubtless most valuable of their services for Siam after their retirement was the rearing and educating of two lads whom they had brought from that country, Boon Itt and Nai Kawn. These lads are still remembered by the people of Waterford who were associated with them in their earlier years in America. The story is told of the two boys having their first experience with snow. One autumn morning, finding that a light snow had fallen during the night, the two went out into the back yard, dropped down on their knees and began to feel the snow; and then getting down on all fours touched it with their tongues again and again. Among Mrs. House’s letters was a copy of a letter which Kawn wrote to a boy friend in Siam, in which he labours to explain how the water of the river had become hard so that he could walk on it with skates. Boon Itt was the son of Maa Tuan, the matron of the girls’ boarding school under Mrs. House. Dr. and Mrs. House chose him to be the subject of a Western education partly because he had shown himself to be a bright pupil in the boys’ school, and partly because he was one of the few children of second generation Christian Siamese. After the completion of his elementary education at Waterford, Boon was sent to Williston Academy, Williams College, and Auburn Theological Seminary. This long course of education occupied seventeen years. In 1893 he returned to Siam as a Christian missionary to his own people. His life and work, worthy of an extended account, will occupy a separate chapter. The other lad, known familiarly as Nai Kawn in America, was Kawn Amatyakul, born 1865, the son of a nobleman Pra Pre Chah; and the grandson of Kuhn Mote, one of the progressive nobles who early formed a lasting friendship with Dr. House because of their mutual interest in science. Before the boys’ boarding school had been fairly established, Kuhn Mote placed his son under the tutorship of Dr. House to learn English and chemistry. It was this son who, as Pra Pre Chah, learning that his former tutor was retiring to America, solicited Dr. House to take his son Nai Kawn along and supervise his education in Western science. To this Dr. House consented, with the understanding that the son of the nobleman was to be reared in a democratic fashion as a companion with the son of a plebeian, and that he would be subject to intensive religious training according to the Christian faith.