The Muslim city of Gaza (in Arabic Chazzeh) was visited by the late Rev. F. A. Klein during a tour of investigation in 1862.

Later on a pressing invitation was received from the inhabitants to open a school in their midst.

A catechist was sent to make inquiries, but nothing more was then done.

In 1878, however, the C.M.S. took over the four schools, two for boys and two for girls, containing some 250 to 300 children, and other work which had been started and carried on for several years by Mr. Pritchard, a gentleman of independent means, who had settled in Gaza. Shortly afterwards the Rev. A. W. Schapira entered into residence. He opened a reading-room, which attracted even higher-class Muslims.

Notwithstanding a temporary opposition, the Kaimakam, on Christmas Eve, 1880, addressed the gathering, and encouraged the school.

Medical work was started about 1882, and was the first C.M.S. work of the kind in Palestine.

The dispensary received a gift from the late Rev. John Venn, of Hereford, and a fund was raised in Salisbury Square for establishing a permanent medical mission.

In 1886 the late Rev. Dr. R. Elliot took charge.

Dr. H. J. Bailey was also temporarily at this post in 1890, in order to assist in the medical work.

During this period Dr. Elliot had the joy of baptising, on October 12, 1890, Moorjan and Mehbruki, two of his own servants, man and wife, natives of the Sudan.

Some years before they had been sold in Gaza as slaves, the man for ten pounds, and the woman for twice that sum. The slave market has been abolished for about twenty years.

All this time the medical work was confined to the treatment of out-patients, but in March 1891 a hospital adapted from a native house was opened.

Medical itineration now began to be undertaken at Mejdel and Ashdod. The fame of the hospital spread far and wide.

The Rev. Dr. Sterling (the author of A Grammar of the Arabic Language, and Arabic and English Idiom—Conversational and Literary) arrived in 1893, and his predecessor, the Rev. J. Huber, of German nationality, who built the ladies' house and church room, entered into rest on July 18, and his body was buried in the cemetery in the mission compound.

Other branches of the work have prospered. In 1902 the numbers in the girls' school rose from sixty-eight to three hundred, and have now increased to four hundred. The Sunday school has increased proportionately with the day school. It would be difficult to find more interesting schools in Palestine, so efficiently superintended by Miss Smithies, who is ably assisted by her own trained staff of native teachers.

In 1906 the Muslims presented Dr. Sterling, on behalf of the building fund of the hospital, with £100, which they had subscribed in token of their gratitude for his work among them.

The leavening influence of Christian teaching is unquestionably having far-reaching effects.

Dr. Percy W. Brigstocke was appointed, in 1907, to act as colleague with Dr. Sterling, but he was transferred to Es Salt at the end of 1911.

The old hospital and out-patient hall were insanitary, and much too small for the work, therefore it was with thankfulness that the Bishop in Jerusalem dedicated the new hospital, containing forty-six beds, on April 1, 1908.

The opening of the spacious out-patient block took place on February 22, 1911.

The patients are drawn from all classes, Muslims, Orthodox Syrians and Jews. They may be seen sitting side by side in the out-patient hall waiting for the doctor, who is an accomplished Arabic scholar.

During 1912 there were 29,581 attendances of out-patients, 701 in-patients, 452 visits in town, and 411 major operations.

The fees from the in-patients and out-patients during 1912 amounted to £326 18s. 10d., which goes to assist in the upkeep of the hospital.

There is an out-station, for the expenses of which Dr. Sterling is responsible, at El Arîsh, the ancient Rhinocolura, "the River of Egypt" (Numbers xxxiv. 5; Isaiah xxvii. 12), a town of twelve hours' ride from Gaza, where the C.M.S. school has had an average attendance of fifty pupils. The population is entirely Muslim.

Mr. W. Watson, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, has done heroic service not only by inspiring others to give and help the completion of the hospital and out-buildings, but also in attending personally to the purchasing of much building and furnishing material.

How much Gaza owes to him and his Northumbrian helpers will only appear when the great audit of all things takes place.[48]

Canon Sterling is largely his own clerk of the works. He is to be congratulated that after twenty years of missionary and medical work in Southern Palestine, he has been enabled to complete the group of medical and educational buildings which now adorn the C.M.S. Gaza compound.

CHAPTER XXII
EL ARÎSH AND C.M.S. MISSION

The border town of Egypt, El Arîsh, seventy miles south of Gaza, is generally identified as the "River of Egypt," which was the most southern boundary of the Holy Land in patriarchal times. At present the actual boundary between Palestine and Egypt is a line running from Rafah, the ancient Rhaphia, some thirty miles to the north of El Arîsh, to Akaba.[49]

The country between Rafah and El Arîsh is desolate. The large sand dunes, the dust of ages, have encroached upon the land, whereas the Land of Promise may be recognised by its fertility. Around the villages which lie between Gaza and Rafah are orchards which produce an abundance of fruit; the fig, vine, pomegranate, almond, olive, apricot, date, mulberry, palm, apple, orange, and banana, are all grown, besides vegetables of all kinds, of a size rarely met with in Great Britain.

El Arîsh, the ancient Rhinocolura, the chief town of the Sinai Peninsula, possesses some eight thousand inhabitants. The "River of Egypt," so called, is conspicuous by its absence, except in the rainy season, when a large portion of the water from the peninsula courses through its bed to the sea. The river-bed is very wide, and many hundreds of poplar trees are scattered over it, with numerous wells for irrigation.

The most striking building is the Government Fort. It is some five hundred years old, and bears evidence of attacks made by invaders.

Owing to the barrenness of the land the people are exempted from all taxation. Some five thousand camels are owned by these Sawârikeh Beduins, and these "ships of the desert" do much of the carrying trade between Egypt and Syria, and in Egypt itself during the cotton season.

The people are exclusively Muslims, with the exception of two Coptic officials. The town is beautifully clean.

There is here a magnificent field for missionary enterprise. No mission work of any kind had ever been attempted in the town until Dr. Sterling opened a boys' school in 1906.

The people are friendly, and come to the hospital at Gaza in goodly numbers.

In 1908 Dr. Sterling was able to purchase a beautiful site of four and a half acres. A native master from Gaza, M. Nasri, and pupil teacher, are now at work in a school attended by sixty or seventy scholars. This school is dependent upon voluntary help, and Mr. W. Watson and Dr. Sterling are responsible for its maintenance.

Not only is Holy Scripture taught, but the master has many opportunities of bearing witness to the truths of Christianity.

This station ought to be properly supported, and can be more easily worked from Gaza than from Egypt.

Dr. Sterling has the plans for building schools for boys and girls, a teachers' house, a house for dispensary attached for two English ladies, preferably one an educationalist and the other a nurse. At present there is only money in hand for the proposed girls' school.

I am indebted to three numbers of Jottings and Snapshots from Gaza, Southern Palestine, for some of the above information.

Note.—On Feb. 20, 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte took El Arîsh. At the capitulation of the town the French were permitted to evacuate Egypt with all the honours of war.