“A few nights later, during a terrific storm and a pouring rain, two native officials came with an urgent call to take me to the house of another official. I did not know him nor where he lived, but they told me his wife had been suffering intensely for several days, so my helper and I picked up the emergency bag and started off with them. On the way we were told that every native midwife available had tried to relieve the patient, but had failed. Large offerings had been made to the gods in their favorite temple. Even the river goddess had been implored to give help, by sacrifices thrown into her waters. As a last resort, they had come to seek help from the missionary doctor. “We were drenched and stiff, as we crawled out of the oxcart. It was very dark. The streets were flooded, but a flash of lightning revealed to us that we were in front of the little green door--and _it was open_. Outside, under umbrellas and blankets, were groups of men--friends of the husband--who had come to sympathize with him because his wife was giving him so much trouble. The sympathy was all for the husband. Probably, after all the trouble his wife was making, she would give him only a girl child! Inside was bedlam! A crowd of women were shrieking and crying. Little fires had been placed in pots all over the veranda. Smoking censers were swinging at windows and doorways, to prevent the evil spirits from entering the house. “The husband came to meet me with a lantern. He was much distressed, and besought me in beautiful English to grant him help in his great calamity. This was his third wife. The gods were against him. He had no _child_--only three daughters! Not one word of anxiety or sympathy did he have for his suffering wife. “I saw her lying on an old cot, with a coarse bamboo mat and gunny bag for bedding. She was a beautiful young Brahman girl. The cot was on the outside veranda, exposed to wind and rain. The patient had already been partially prepared for death. She was covered with burns and bruises, and was very weak, but she looked at me with her beautiful eyes, and implored me not to treat her as cruelly as the others had done. It was a weird scene, with the flickering little lamps, the beautiful ill-treated patient, and the curious faces of the women peering at us out of the darkness. “Under great protest the relatives finally allowed the patient to be moved into a small veranda room. By and by things calmed down, and the people left for their homes. All was quiet, and the patient’s confidence and strength revived. At dawn we left a smiling young mother holding her newborn son in her arms, and a father proud and happy, because now he had a _child_, an heir to his large estate. “The little green door opened to let us out. A little child had opened it, and never since that night has it been closed to us or to the Gospel message.”