ABSTRACT
Adele Fielde’s departure from Swatow was a searing experience, an amalgam of anxiety, exhilaration, and pain. Confident and optimistic by nature, she looked forward to a bright future, but an income was no longer assured, and so much that she cherished was being left behind – a troubled world that had taught her how much humans can suffer. She was bringing to a close the defining period of her life – twenty-five vivid years – not a particularly good preparation for a 50-year-old single woman to make her way in America. This Orientalist would never again walk “heathen” streets bustling with potential Christians, nor would she see again her precious Bible-women who had been the major concern of her life for so many years.
