During the Civil War in the United States the mission was not very seriously affected by the conditions of the home church. Except for the first injunction from the Board against enlargement of the work and for the exceeding high rate of bank exchange, Dr. House gives no indications of adverse results on the field. Although the missionaries then in Siam were from both sections of the divided fatherland, they continued to live in cordial relations. During this period several reinforcements reached Siam, showing that the church at home had not allowed the war to curtail their work entirely. These additions were: Rev. and Mrs. C. S. George (1862), Mrs. F. F. Odell (1863), Rev. and Mrs. P. L. Carden (1866). On the other hand, the mission suffered the serious loss of Rev. Mr. and Mrs. Mattoon, who were constrained to resign in 1865 on account of Mrs. Mattoon’s continued ill health. SECOND FURLOUGH Dr. House left Siam only twice during his twenty-nine years of service. After a second period of seven-and-a-half years of labour, he sailed for America on a furlough in February, 1864. Even then the leave was taken not so much on his own account as because of Mrs. House’s urgent need of recuperation. Since they left America, both of Dr. House’s parents had died. He made the second journey at his own expense. At this time the Civil War in America caused the rates of exchange to be very high; to avoid this high rate, Dr. House accepted a loan of one thousand dollars from the king’s private treasury, giving only his personal note as security; and of this sum the king authorised Dr. House to pay over to the widow of Rev. Jesse Caswell, in America, five hundred dollars as a further token of appreciation of his former tutor. The journey home was made by way of the Red Sea, Palestine, Egypt, Paris and England. Inclusive of the travel, their absence from Siam covered two years and ten months. The return trip was made by way of the Pacific, leaving San Francisco Sept. 9, 1866, thus for the first time completing for these two the circumnavigation of the globe. On the way out a stop was made at the Hawaiian Islands. The travelers reached Hong Kong Nov. 4, and while waiting for a vessel to continue their voyage they went up to Canton, where they were most friendly received and hospitably entertained by the family of Mr. S. E. Burrows, the head of a great commercial and shipping firm of that place. The Burrows extended to Dr. and Mrs. House a free passage in one of their own vessels which was sailing direct for Bangkok, and there they arrived Dec. 16, 1866. Again the returning missionaries received a warm welcome on the part of their many native friends. “We were warmly welcomed by the missionary circle and old friends out of it, native and foreign. Wish you could have seen the congratulatory presents our native friends and neighbours brought to shew their gladness at our return.