The greatest difficulties are probably met in high-caste zenanas. There, in the midst of unhealthy surroundings, the friends and neighbours have grand opportunities of undoing any good that may have been accomplished. It is grievous to a medical missionary to find her fever patient dying from a douche of cold water, because the white woman has defiled her high caste by feeling her pulse. It is enough to make her give up a case in despair if, after she has explained that quiet is absolutely necessary, the friends and neighbours decide that the evil spirit supposed to be in possession must be driven out by the music of tom-toms. A Hindu man is said to "sin religiously," and a Hindu woman excels him in devotion to her creed. A fever patient in the Punjab refused to drink milk--the one thing of all others that her medical woman ordered her--because she said, if it were the last thing she swallowed, her soul would pass into the body of a cobra. One medical missionary found a woman, who was in a critical state, lying on a mat, whilst an old woman, supposed to be learned in sickness, stood on her body, or patrolled up and down like a sentinel, as far as the length would admit. This was kindly meant. Another found one suffering seriously from the effect of a linseed poultice. She had carefully explained the mysteries of making and applying it, but in her absence the patient's friends had spread dry linseed over her chest and poured boiling water over it. [Illustration: (_Photo: Baness Bros._) WAITING THEIR TURN. (_Patients outside the Tarn Taran Hospital Dispensary._)] Happily, all the women in India are not secluded in zenanas. By far the largest proportion live in the villages, but their notions of propriety are very strict. The hard-working field-women will hide themselves on the suspicion of a _sahib_ being within reach. When once they are satisfied that the visitor belongs to their own sex and is harmless, crowds beset the missionary encampments. Many tales of suffering are poured into sympathising ears. "I am blind from crying for my only son" is not an infrequent complaint. Nothing can be done in this case. "There is no god or goddess to love a Hindu woman. Whatever offerings we make her, the goddess of small-pox smites us, and then the men say the women have not offered enough, and are angry." This was the reply of a Punjabi woman, who spoke for her friends and neighbours. One Bengali woman told a missionary of the death of a precious baby boy. There did not seem much the matter, but the _hakim_ (a native quack) first gave him something burning to swallow, and then applied a red-hot iron to each side in turn; and the child only drew one or two breaths after this treatment. This also, one hopes, was kindly meant. The Hindus are by no means wanting in humanity, but ignorance is often as fatal as cruelty.