Yes, sir, I lost a good
home." Then his voice sinks to a confidential whisper as he says,
"Say, Boss, can't I go back? Can't you fix it for me so as I can go
back?"
He had lived nine years on Molokai, and he had had a better time
there than he has ever had, before and after, on the outside.
As regards the fear of leprosy itself, nowhere in the Settlement
among lepers, or non-lepers, did I see any sign of it. The chief
horror of leprosy obtains in the minds of those who have never seen
a leper and who do not know anything about the disease. At the
hotel at Waikiki a lady expressed shuddering amazement at my having
the hardihood to pay a visit to the Settlement. On talking with her
I learned that she had been born in Honolulu, had lived there all
her life, and had never laid eyes on a leper. That was more than I
could say of myself in the United States, where the segregation of
lepers is loosely enforced and where I have repeatedly seen lepers
on the streets of large cities.
Leprosy is terrible, there is no getting away from that; but from
what little I know of the disease and its degree of contagiousness,
I would by far prefer to spend the rest of my days in Molokai than
in any tuberculosis sanatorium.
