His nationality made him a good deal of a stranger, and this, together with his extreme natural reserve and his poverty, kept him from mingling much with the social life of college. He had not many intimates, yet he so carried himself from first to last as to merit and win the entire respect of all his class. It was in certain long walks and talks he had with his classmate, Carrol Cutler, now president of Western Reserve College, that he opened and discussed the project then forming in his mind of this Chinese Educational Mission. The idea was born, the dream was taking shape, but the way was long to its realization.
His graduation in 1854 was the event of the Commencement of that year. There were many, at least, who so regarded it, and some of them came to the Commencement principally for the sake of seeing the Chinese graduate. Among the latter was Dr. Bushnell of Hartford. He had heard of him and being strongly interested, according to the size of his great mind and heart, in the Chinese race, he desired to meet Yung Wing. An incident of their meeting on that occasion, which the writer has heard Dr. Bushnell tell, will bear repeating: When they were introduced, the Doctor gave it as one of his reasons for seeking the introduction that he desired to ascertain who had written certain newspaper articles on the Chinese question, as it then stood, which had attracted his attention as evincing marks of statesmanship. He thought Wing might know. Whereupon, as the Doctor said, Wing hung his head, and blushing like a girl, with much confusion of manner, confessed that he was their author. It is only fair to add that Mr. Wing says that he does not remember this incident. But it is equally fair to add again that in a case of this kind Dr. Bushnell’s memory, or anybody else’s, were more worthy to be trusted than Yung Wing’s.
At the time of his graduation, Wing was as much tempted as it was possible for him to be, to change the plan of his life. He had been in this country long enough to become thoroughly naturalized here. He was, in fact, a citizen. All his tastes and feelings and affinities, intellectual and moral, made him at home here. Moreover, through the notice into which his graduation brought him, it came about that a very inviting opportunity was opened to him to remain and have his career here if he chose to. On the other hand, China was like a strange land to him. He had even almost entirely forgotten his native tongue. And there was nothing in China for him to go to. Except among his humble kindred, he had no friends there; nothing to give him any standing or consideration, no place, so to speak, to set his foot on. Not only so, but considering where he had been and what he had become, and the purpose he had in view, he could not fail to encounter, among his own people, prejudice, suspicion, hostility. A cheerless, forbidding prospect lay before him in that direction. The thought of going back was the thought of exile. He wanted immensely to stay. But there was one text of Holy Scripture that, all this while, he says, haunted him and followed him like the voice of God. It was this: “If any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.” And by the words “his own” and “his own house,” it meant to him the nation of which he was born. The text carried the day. The benefits which he had been, as it were, singled out from a whole people to receive, his sense of justice and gratitude alike would not let him appropriate to his own advantage. And so, though he knew not what should befall him, he set his face to return; and he went to do what he has done.
He sailed soon after his graduation for Hong Kong which, after a voyage of 151 days, he reached in the month of April, 1855. When the Chinese pilot came on board he found that he could, with some difficulty, understand what he said, though he could not make the pilot understand him, which shows the condition of his knowledge of Chinese on his arrival in the country. It took him all the time he was not otherwise employed for two years to acquire facility in the use of it.
Taking First Steps in Life
As for his grand scheme, he had settled it in his own mind that the first step to be taken toward carrying it out was to contrive a way of getting it before some influential public man or men—a thing itself of infinite difficulty. With this end in view, though, of course, to make his living also, he sought and obtained the position of private secretary to the Hon. Peter Parker, then Commissioner of the United States to China, hoping that it would be the means of affording him the access he desired. Becoming satisfied upon a sufficient trial that it was not likely to answer his expectations in this regard, he resigned the place after a few months. He now attempted another way of compassing the matter. There was at Hong Kong an English bar consisting of a dozen or so lawyers doing business for the foreign commercial houses of that City. Wing bethought him that the standing and acquaintance resulting from his becoming
