Broadly speaking, the patients only recognise two categories of illness--one described as "fire," and the other as "chill." Their chief desire is for a diagnosis which shall clearly state under which heading their particular ailment should be classified, and we often receive a message to the effect that "inward fire" is causing trouble, and the sufferer would like medicine such as was given to her on the tenth day of the third moon, three years previously, which had wonderful fire-extinguishing properties. Having been accustomed to the Chinese doctor and his methods, our patients, begging that the best may be done for them, assure the helpers that merit will be accumulated by those who work towards this end. All are surprised to find that a uniform fee is charged and that there is no opportunity for bargaining, as the regular physician writes prescriptions for first, second, or third-rate medicine, according to the purse. [Illustration: THE TEACHING STAFF. (_See page 233._) _To face page 228._] The male and female principle in nature, by which all things are produced and which has been called the "warp and woof of Chinese thought," forms the basis of Chinese medical science, and every line of treatment must be in accordance with the laws laid down by this dualistic principle. Unfortunately, many of the more nutritive articles of diet, such as the fowl and the egg, are frequently denied to the sick woman as falling under that principle which makes them unsuited to many of her illnesses, and while it is admitted that sleep is essential to a sick man, the female patient must not be allowed to indulge in it except at night. Milk is renowned for its heating properties, and is most unwillingly consumed by the tubercular patient, who believes her disease to fall under the heading of "fire" and knows that anything so heating will only feed the flame. Had pears, cooked or uncooked, been ordered she would fully have appreciated the wisdom which prescribed them. All these startling innovations are carefully and intelligently explained by the dispensary helpers and normal students who take the practical side of their course in First Aid, Home Nursing, and Invalid Cookery, in the dispensary. Their labours have not been in vain, and the presence of the Great Physician has often been manifest in the midst, as weary, heart-sick women whose ills were beyond our help have found healing and, touching the hem of His garment, been made perfectly whole. As the patients scatter, the students impress afresh upon their memory how, and in what quantity, the medicine should be taken. Only too often the printed directions are entirely disobeyed, and the week's supply swallowed in one dose, on the strength of that unanswerable argument with which we wrestled in the days of childhood: If one dose = improvement, Twenty doses = x, _i.e._ complete cure. FOOTNOTE: [11] Sewing-machine. A CASKET OF JEWELS