T

216 THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.

to one of gratitude when I touched her and told her I had come to befriend her in Christ’s name. I found another woman, who had been living with a mad leper, com­pelled to do so because they both belonged to the same community. I found mothers separated from their children, husbands from their wives. In some cases the leper huts wjgre crowded, and in this crowded condition they had had small-pox among them, and only filthy sheepskins, the cast-off sheepskins of the Yakout, for clothing. The ground in this northeastern part of Yakutsk is perpetually frozen, and only thaws during the summer to a depth of three feet. During this time, by the help of fires, the lepers have to make a number of graves sufficient for those whom they think will die during the winter, and outside the leper hut you see the big crosses that mark the graves, or holes prepared for graves. Where a Yakout dies the body has, by law, to remain unburied for three days, so when a leper dies in these crowded huts the body has to remain for three days among the living. I saw altogether seventy-three lepers, but the official report records about two hundred. I returned to the town of Yakutsk after a trip of two thousand miles, not having undressed or washed for two months. I had found the herb, but it is not a cure for leprosy, it only alleviates the suffering. On my return to St. Petersburg I was graciously permitted to have another interview with Her Imperial Majesty, the Empress. I appealed in Christ’s name for help, and five devoted Russian Sisters from the hospital of the Princess Shahovsky, in Moscow, have already gone to Yakutsk. I asked that a collection might be made onte a year in the churches for the help of lepers on the Sunday when the Gospel of the healing of the leper is read, and this has been granted, and by that means the village to be erected will be maintained. I believe that improper food and bad sanitary surround- ings greatly predispose the people to leprosy, and by improving these I believe it would be possible to stamp out the disease. I wish to establish a settlement of ten small houses, a couple of hospital wards, a school and church. The lepers cannot come here to plead for themselves, and I come as their substitute to plead for them; to ask you to help me to build this colony, and to helj^me to return to them, to dress their wounds and teach them proper sanitary conditions.

In my book “ On Sledge and Horseback to Outcast Siberian Lepers ” you will find official documents that vouch for the truth of all I have told you as to the mis­ery and helplessness of these poor outcast lepers. Before concluding I wish to give Mrs. Eagle my heartfelt thanks for her unfailing help to me during my stay at the Exposition in Chicago.