Page:Malabari, Behramji M. - Gujarat and the Gujaratis (1882).djvu/227

211 teacher and guide of youth, preacher of a grand idea, as general leavener of society, the Christian Missionary will always occupy a high and beneficent prominence in India.

One standing complaint against the Missionary is that he reaches the soul through the body. But is that his fault? The Aryan "Gentoo," of the lower order especially, has so much of body, and so little of soul, that it is impossible to reach the latter before oiling every nook and corner of the "tabernacle of flesh." The Gentoo is of the flesh, fleshy; and as curry chowal has a very soothing effect on the flesh and, through it, on what little of soul he may have in him, the padre is justified in his tactics.

To write of the Missionary and omit his good wife would be a sin. She is his right hand, his real helpmete. A simple, unselfish, devoted woman, of even gentler sympathies than his, she often tames him, when under sudden provocation he forgets the obligations of his sacred office. To the sick and the starving she is an angel of