Samuel Reynolds House of Siam, pioneer medical missionary, 1847-1876

XII
HOME AGAIN, AND “HOME AT LAST”

The living pageant, “The Big Mountain and the Little Chisel,” had not ended, but some of the actors had to retire. Dr. House, who had been in the leading rôle for twenty-nine years, and Mrs. House, who had been his loyal understudy for twenty, handed their lines to other willing players and took their seats on the dais of time to watch the Divine plot unfold. Repeated efforts on the part of Mrs. House to recuperate her health only confirmed the physician’s surmise that the immediate cause of her suffering was the tropical climate. There was no alternative of wisdom but to return to her native clime. So it came about that Dr. and Mrs. House resigned.

Their leave-taking was almost like laying down life itself, for their hearts had become intimately entwined with the lives of the Siamese people. In March, 1876, the two sailed for “home again.” But to return to America was not to abandon their zeal for Siam; they made themselves ambassadors at large to the Church in the United States in behalf of the Kingdom of Christ in that land.

REARING TWO SIAMESE LADS

Most notable and doubtless most valuable of their services for Siam after their retirement was the rearing and educating of two lads whom they had brought from that country, Boon Itt and Nai Kawn. These lads are still remembered by the people of Waterford who were associated with them in their earlier years in America. The story is told of the two boys having their first experience with snow. One autumn morning, finding that a light snow had fallen during the night, the two went out into the back yard, dropped down on their knees and began to feel the snow; and then getting down on all fours touched it with their tongues again and again. Among Mrs. House’s letters was a copy of a letter which Kawn wrote to a boy friend in Siam, in which he labours to explain how the water of the river had become hard so that he could walk on it with skates.

Boon Itt was the son of Maa Tuan, the matron of the girls’ boarding school under Mrs. House. Dr. and Mrs. House chose him to be the subject of a Western education partly because he had shown himself to be a bright pupil in the boys’ school, and partly because he was one of the few children of second generation Christian Siamese. After the completion of his elementary education at Waterford, Boon was sent to Williston Academy, Williams College, and Auburn Theological Seminary. This long course of education occupied seventeen years. In 1893 he returned to Siam as a Christian missionary to his own people. His life and work, worthy of an extended account, will occupy a separate chapter.

The other lad, known familiarly as Nai Kawn in America, was Kawn Amatyakul, born 1865, the son of a nobleman Pra Pre Chah; and the grandson of Kuhn Mote, one of the progressive nobles who early formed a lasting friendship with Dr. House because of their mutual interest in science. Before the boys’ boarding school had been fairly established, Kuhn Mote placed his son under the tutorship of Dr. House to learn English and chemistry. It was this son who, as Pra Pre Chah, learning that his former tutor was retiring to America, solicited Dr. House to take his son Nai Kawn along and supervise his education in Western science. To this Dr. House consented, with the understanding that the son of the nobleman was to be reared in a democratic fashion as a companion with the son of a plebeian, and that he would be subject to intensive religious training according to the Christian faith.

After his preparatory education, Kawn entered Lafayette College for a four years’ course in mining engineering, though not as a candidate for a degree. Finishing there in 1888, he returned to Siam early the next year. His life work was devoted to the educational program of the government, his professorial labours being chiefly in chemistry and physics in various schools and colleges of the government. At length he became chief of the examination division of the department of education. He was given the title of Luang Vinich Vidyakarn in 1902; and some years later was elevated to a higher rank with the title Phya Vinich Vidyakarn.

Kawn united with the Presbyterian Church of Waterford upon profession of faith in 1879. Although he gave evidence of sincerity in making this profession and in other ways manifested an earnest purpose to live according to the teaching of Jesus, yet it must be acknowledged that upon return to his native land he did not identify himself with the native church and eventually held himself altogether aloof from fellowship with the Christians. No doubt one cause for this course was the barrier of social rank. His education and culture led him to prefer his own class. On the other hand, it must be recorded that he never made open repudiation of his profession, at least in any formal manner, neither did he manifest any antipathy to the Christian faith. His death occurred April, 1922.

ABUNDANT IN LABOURS TO THE END

After her return to the United States, Mrs. House became the center of a strong influence in behalf of Siam among the women of the Church at home, especially as an advocate for female education. In 1878 she was elected president of the Woman’s Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions of the Synod of Albany and served five years in that capacity. When the several small synods within New York were united into the present Synod of New York, in 1883, Mrs. House was a member of the committee that planned for the consolidation of the several women’s societies into the Woman’s Presbyterian Foreign Missionary Society of New York Synod, and became the first president of the consolidated organisation. As a motto for the united society she proposed the ideal “Every Woman in Every Church Working for Jesus”—a motto that reads quite fresh to date. To Mrs. House is due the credit of originating the series of “Questions and Answers in Mission Fields,” beginning with a catechism on the work in Siam for children’s mission bands. This method of disseminating missionary information may possibly be the germ from which has developed the current system of mission study.

In the church at Waterford Mrs. House was accepted as the natural leader in the foreign missionary society of the women. She so developed interest in the work that the society maintained a very high standard of giving and of activities for many years. She was particularly interested in cultivating an interest in missions among the children and it was for her own mission band that the series of questions and answers were originally devised. Mrs. House had the joyous satisfaction of seeing Boon Itt ready for work in Siam. But before the time came for his departure she was called upon to take leave of him for eternity. On July 12, 1893, she passed to her rich reward in Heaven.

With return to America, Dr. House continued his activities in behalf of the Gospel at home and of missions abroad. He embraced frequent opportunities to preach, and especially responded with pleasure to invitations for addresses on Siam. He had accumulated a large collection of curios from Siam, China and Japan, which he used with good effect to illustrate his talks and interest his hearers. This collection he left to the people of Waterford, and it is in custody of the Presbyterian Church. In the home church he took an active part, serving for many years as trustee, and also as clerk and treasurer of the board of trustees. He was honoured by the community with election as President of the village, an office which he held at the time of his death.

“ALL THINGS RICHLY TO ENJOY”

When the two missionaries returned from their long period of heavy labours in Siam with impaired health it was with the expectation that the estate which the doctor had received from his father would provide sufficient income for a comfortable living. The salary while on the field had been so small that instead of being able to save from that income, the doctor had to supplement it from his private purse. But with economy, he expected that his patrimony would be ample for the needs of himself and wife. Not long after his return, however, it developed that the investment of his funds was unsound, and he suddenly found his reserves swept away. The two were left largely dependent, though still having their home.

Without a word of complaint they accepted the situation as one of the inexplicable dispensations of God. The many years of sublime but real trust in the care of Providence which they had cultivated in the mission field and which they had often proven to be an unfailing means of blessing, now stood them in good stead. Those who knew them intimately relate instances in which what seemed to be spontaneous gifts of friends and neighbours reached them at the moment when they knew not whence a supply for immediate needs was to come. In a letter to a friend telling of the timely provision of the Lord for his needs, Dr. House wrote that his old friend Kuhn Mote, having learned of his straitened circumstances, had sent him a gift of five hundred dollars. If the record of those later years could be written it would be a continuous testimony to the simple reliance upon the goodness and mercy of God, and to the marvellous justification of the faith of this godly couple.

THE JUBILEE YEAR

When, in 1897, the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of permanent work in Siam, the doctor was the only survivor of the group who met together in Bangkok half-a-century before. None of the workers in the field doubtless had greater rejoicing at that jubilee than Dr. House. The following letter of felicitation he wrote on that occasion to the daughter of his fellow missionary, herself born in Siam and from childhood knowing him as “Uncle Samuel”; it was a delicate tribute to the memory of his companions in labours.

Perhaps it was the celebration of this jubilee in Siam that reminded former pupils of the Bangkok boys’ school of how much they were indebted to Dr. House for the immeasurable difference between their Christian enlightenment and the paganism around them. At any rate in the following summer Dr. House received from a group of his former pupils a gift of one hundred and twenty-five dollars, accompanied by this letter:

But that birthday never arrived. Only a few days after the receipt of this affectionate token and grateful testimonial, Dr. House took leave forever from his friends of Siam and from his friends of all the world. On the thirteenth day of October, 1898, he reached Home At Last.

His affection for Siam outlived his days; for he had provided a small bequest for the Harriet House school in memory of his wife. Dr. House and his wife lie buried in the Waterford Rural Cemetery.