“Transmigration endless! He told me that Buddha taught that if any one took a needle and thrust it into the earth anywhere in the wide world, and was to ask his teacher if he had ever been there,—Yes, he had some time or other been buried there! So of any given place on the earth’s surface. (This beats geology for stupendous periods of time.) “Buddha taught that time passed very slowly in hell; and he illustrated it thus: Now 2,395 years since Gotama Buddha died—all that time but as half an hour to those in hell. “‘Let me see your god and I will believe,’ said some onlooker. I asked him if he could see his own god? ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Stop,’ said my host, ‘you had better say nothing of that.’ But I went on to ask him if he worshipped brick and mortar which could not lift its hand, nor see nor hear. “They all thought Nippant (nirvana) preferable to heaven—till I told of the assurance we had that ‘they go no more out.’” VISIONS OF THE REGIONS BEYOND During this systematic visitation, Dr. House obtained glimpses of “the regions beyond.” Medical work had already brought him into contact with the aliens in Bangkok. As he became acquainted with these groups by his travels throughout the city he became deeply interested in their home lands. Small as the mission force in Bangkok was, he began to meditate whether their efforts should be confined to the Siamese to the exclusion of all these other peoples. At that time it was estimated that the strangers within the gates were equal to the native population of Bangkok. Chief among these immigrants were the Chinese. The Chinese held nearly all the trading in Bangkok. The semi-annual trade winds brought numerous junks from China laded with Chinese products; and each of these junks had its cargo of human freight also. Sometimes a single junk would bring as many as three hundred; and the average annual immigration was estimated at one thousand. These people came largely from the Island of Hainan, and nine-tenths of those who sent their boys to the mission school were from this province. There were but few Burmese in Bangkok; but of their old enemies, the Peguans, there was a large village on the west bank of the river. These people had originally sought refuge from the Burmese by taking service under the king of Siam, but in time had practically become his serfs. It was in their village that Mrs. Mattoon began her class of children which later was transferred to the mission compound. The Malays, few in number, could not be reached for want of acquaintance with their language. Dr. House records an anecdote which had come to his ears showing the shrewdness of these people in their native country: