Letter from Harriet to Father, July 10, 1884

Letter from Harriet to Father, July 10, 1884

Travel; Travel costs; Disease; Country life; China--Rural conditions

Hattie writes to her father about their arrival in Macao and the cost of their trip. They are traveling with Dr. Thomson and acquaintances. She likes Macao and Lin Chau very much and thinks it would be nicer to live in the country, but there are fewer people to evangelize. Harriet is hoping to have time to answer letters while away. She writes that Dr. Happer is sick.

Noyes, Harriet Newell

The College of Wooster, Special Collections, Noyes Collection, Box #3

Unpublished

1884-07-10

Council on Library and Information Resources Hidden Special Collections Grant

PDF

eng (English)

Text

noyes_c_cor_349

Canton - China
or rather [u]Macao[/u]
July 10th 1884
My dear Father,
You see we are
safely in Macao and as
there is still time to write
for the Arabic which leaves
on the 12th I will send
you a letter from here. We
came down yesterday had
a very nice day and a
pleasant trip down. We had
considerable trouble in getting
coolies to bring our baggage
over from the steamer. At
first they wanted $ 5.00 to
bring the baggage, and $2.40
for chairs for the numerous
people in our company but
finally we succeded in
getting transportation for all
for $ 1.85 which was quite
reasonable I suppose. I
felt sorry for Dr Thomson

with such a lot of people
and things to look after.
Let me enumeration our company
Dr Thomson and wife +
George Dornin and Avis Powliss.
They had two amahs for
the babies their cook and
ATai a man who was
formerly their cook but has
been studying in Dr Happer's
school and will soon be
employed as an assistant.
He is devoted to the Thomsons
They brought him down because
he is somewhat out of health
and they hoped the trip might
do him good , Then we had
our table boy AHoi, "the Professor"
[?APony?] who is AKwai's son, and
AKwai's wife who comes down
to cook for us and has brought
her [u]four little girls[/u]. We
wanted them all to come
to have a good time. Then
one of our teachers SanLok
wanted to come with us
and we brought her.

So all together Dr Thomson
had eight and we had
[u]eleven[/u]. It is delightful
down here we felt rather
reluctant to come as we had
set our hearts on going to
Lin Chau but now that we
are down here it is just as
nice as possible Miss Lewis
is quite in love with the place
and would like to stay all
summer. It is so much
nicer here than in Canton
that it seems a pity that any
one who is only studying the
language should not be here
Miss Lewis has property of her
own so that if she likes she
could easily do it. She is very
economical however - not at all
to much so. It is quite a
surprise to her that missionaries
dress so well and live in
so much style. I often wish
that we did not have to
mind so much what we
wear. It would be quite

different if we lived in the
country some place like Lin chau
but in Canton there are so
many foreigners. We are
hoping to get our letters from
home soon. I did not have any
thing from home by the last
mail and if begins to seem
long since I have heard.
I hope to have a good time
writing letters down here. I
have brought no other work
but I have one hundred + fifty
letters on hand to answer
and if I get to the end of
them there are others that I
would like to write. It seems
very restful down here and
I am quite tired enough to
thoroughly enjoy it. We hope soon
to hear from Dr Kerr we are
now occupying the same rooms
that they were in when they
were down here last spring.
Dr Happer is getting better
he has been quite sick -
and Mrs Happer is rather
worn out taking care of him
With much love Ever your aff daughter
Harriet



广州——中国，
或者更确切地说是澳门 1884 年 7 月 10 日 我亲爱的父亲，
您看我们在澳门很安全，
因为还有时间为 12 日离开的阿拉伯语写信，
我会从这里给您寄一封信。
我们昨天下来，
度过了愉快的一天，
愉快的旅程。
我们很难让苦力把我们的行李从轮船上运过来。
起初，
他们要 5.00 美元带行李，
2.40 美元为我们公司的许多人买椅子，
但最后我们以 1.85 美元的价格成功获得了所有人的交通费，
我想这是相当合理的。
我为汤姆森医生有这么多的人和事要照顾感到难过。
让我列举一下我们公司的汤姆森医生和妻子以及乔治·多宁和阿维斯·鲍利斯。
他们为他们的厨师和 ATai 的婴儿准备了两个 amah，
他以前是他们的厨师，
但一直在 Happer 医生的学校学习，
很快就会被聘为助理。
他忠于汤姆森他们把他带下来是因为他有点身体不好，
他们希望这次旅行对他有好处，
然后我们有我们的餐桌男孩 AHoi，
“教授”APony 是 AKwai 的儿子，
还有 AKwai 的妻子来了下来为我们做饭，
并带来了她的四个小女孩。
我们希望他们都来玩得开心。
然后我们的一位老师 SanLok 想和我们一起来，
我们带来了她。
所以汤姆森医生总共有 8 个，
我们有 11 个。
在这里很令人愉快，
我们很不情愿来，
因为我们一心想去林洲，
但现在我们在这里，
它尽可能好，
刘易斯小姐非常喜欢这个地方并想留下来整个夏天。
这里比广州好太多了，
可惜只学语言的人不应该在这里然而，
她非常经济——一点也不经济。
传教士穿得如此好，
生活如此有格调，
这让她感到非常惊讶。
我经常希望我们不必太在意我们穿什么。
如果我们住在像林州这样的地方，
但在广州有这么多外国人，
那就完全不同了。
我们希望尽快从家里收到我们的来信。
上次邮件时我没有从家里收到任何东西，
而且我似乎已经很久没有听到了。
我希望在这里写信过得愉快。
我没有带来其他工作，
但我手头有一百五十封信要回复，
如果我写完了，
还有其他的我想写。
这里看起来很安静，
我很累，
可以彻底享受它。
我们希望很快收到 Kerr 医生的消息，
我们现在住在他们去年春天来这里时所在的房间。
哈珀医生正在好转，
他病得很重——哈珀太太已经筋疲力尽地照顾他了

Letter