The surgeon said he wondered that people did not, from the moral and religious point of view, see the injury that the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts was doing, not only to the soldiers but to the whole country; "and," he added, "we can do nothing." We asked, "Is there, then, no form of regulation now?" He answered emphatically, "_None whatever._" He said, "We can do nothing about the women outside the Cantonment, and there is the trouble." He added, "Those inside go on as they used to, and go to the hospital for treatment when diseased. But," he continued in an aggrieved tone, "this is absolutely voluntary; we have no control."
He said there was a European physician in charge of the hospital, to whom he had just been talking regarding the matter when we came in. We said, "There is a European physician in charge, then, is there?" He answered, "Yes; but the hospital is not for these diseases only, but also for fevers, dysentery, cholera, and all diseases"; and that there were men there as well as women. We asked, "Is the Lock Hospital, then, entirely disused?" He replied, "Why, there is _no_ Lock Hospital." He added that many good people were getting their eyes opened now as to the condition of things, and that even some clergymen had the courage of their moral convictions, and had come out in favour of the Contagious Diseases Acts.
Previous to leaving England we had received information concerning this Cantonment and its Lock Hospital. Our information, compared with this official's inconsistent statements, convinced us that he was endeavouring to mislead us. After other and many futile efforts to reach the truth, we gave ourselves up wholly to prayer, remembering the promise, "They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them. I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble." We felt sure that any mistake at the outset of our work, such as giving confidence to the wrong person, or any indiscreet action that might betray our object in visiting India, would be fatal to our purpose; therefore we cried to God to preserve us from impatience and to keep our feet from stumbling.
We went next to Agra and remained there several days, wandering about the old fort and other places of interest. But surely never was sadder sight-seeing! The way seemed utterly closed against us. The work stretched, vast and difficult, before us, and those towering thick walls that surround the fort, with a deep moat at their foot, represented to our thoughts the pride, strength, and secrecy of the system which we sought to penetrate, and at other times the barriers that separated us from the enslaved women whom we had come to India in the hope of helping.