Vol. XXXII.

No. 10.

THE
AMERICAN MISSIONARY.

“To the Poor the Gospel is Preached.”

OCTOBER, 1878.

CONTENTS:

NEW YORK:
Published by the American Missionary Association,
Rooms, 56 Reade Street.

Price, 50 Cents a Year, in advance.

A. Anderson, Printer, 23 to 27 Vandewater St.

American Missionary Association,

56 READE STREET, N. Y.

PRESIDENT.

Hon. E. S. TOBEY, Boston.

VICE PRESIDENTS.

CORRESPONDING SECRETARY.

Rev. M. E. STRIEBY, 56 Reade Street, N. Y.

DISTRICT SECRETARIES.

Rev. C. L. WOODWORTH, Boston.
Rev. G. D. PIKE, New York.
Rev. JAS. POWELL, Chicago, Ill.
EDGAR KETCHUM, Esq., Treasurer, N. Y.
H. W. HUBBARD, Esq., Assistant Treasurer, N. Y.
Rev. M. E. STRIEBY, Recording Secretary.

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.

COMMUNICATIONS

relating to the business of the Association may be addressed to either of the Secretaries as above.

DONATIONS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS

may be sent to H. W. Hubbard, 56 Reade Street, New York, or, when more convenient, to either of the branch offices, 21 Congregational House, Boston, Mass., 112 West Washington Street, Chicago, Ill. Drafts or checks sent to Mr. Hubbard should be made payable to his order as Assistant Treasurer.

A payment of thirty dollars at one time constitutes a Life Member.

Correspondents are specially requested to place at the head of each letter the name of their Post Office, and the County and State in which it is located.

THE

AMERICAN MISSIONARY.

Vol. XXXII.

OCTOBER, 1878.

No. 10.

American Missionary Association.

FINANCIAL.

When this number of the Missionary reaches our readers, our fiscal year (closing Sept. 30) will be nearly ended. By careful economy for two years past, we kept our current expenses within our receipts, and we hope that the receipts of this month will make this the third year in which our expenditures will not add a dollar to our debt.

Our debt is now our great solicitude. Last year it was reduced, by the sale of stocks, etc., from $93,232.99 to $62,816.90. This year we have received to September 1, in cash, $14,108.22, and in pledges (partly conditioned) $7,550, making $21,658.22, thus reducing the amount—if the pledges are paid—to $41,158.68. Shall not an effort, so nobly begun, be pushed forward to completion?

We feel called upon, as never before, to urge the wiping out of this debt. We have retrenched in office expenses, and have been very guarded in annual appropriations, that it might be paid. Generous doners have given liberally—some of their abundance—more of their poverty—and the amount is reduced within grasp. We have rejoiced that the liberality of the churches and individuals have, in one month, by special efforts, well-nigh relieved a sister society—the honored American Board—of a balance on its annual appropriation of $80,000. A little more than half that amount, if given to the A. M. A., will pay off the remainder of a debt that has hung upon it as an incubus for ten years. The payment of that debt will honor the cause of the Master; it will unfetter our hands; it will cheer us and our friends for future work; it will be a boon to the ignorant and needy masses for whom we labor. We appeal to the wealthy, the liberal, the self-denying, to all who love God and His poor, to make a final effort, by special gifts, to reach an object so near at hand and so important.

Our books will be closed promptly Sept. 30, for current receipts and expenditures, but for receipts for debt they will be kept open till after the Annual Meeting; and we trust that meeting will have the joy and glory of announcing the complete extinction of the debt.

OUR ANNUAL MEETING.

The Thirty-second Annual Meeting of the American Missionary Association will be held in the Broadway Congregational Church, Taunton, Mass., October 29–31. The meeting will be organized on Tuesday, at three o’clock P. M., and at half-past seven o’clock in the evening the annual sermon will be preached by Rev. S. E. Herrick, D. D., of Boston. On Wednesday, papers will be read by Rev. George Leon Walker, D. D., and others. Wednesday evening will be occupied with addresses and reminiscences by present and former missionaries of the A. M. A. Thursday will be devoted to reports of committees and discussions of the work.

The meeting will close Thursday evening, with addresses from able and distinguished speakers, to be named hereafter.

The people of Taunton will undertake to entertain all the friends who may attend the meetings. Those desiring hospitality can address Charles H. Atwood, Esq., until Sept. 20th. Return cards, assigning places, will be duly sent.

THE ROMAN CATHOLICS AMONG THE FREEDMEN.

The Independent closes a careful and, in the main, accurate summary of the work of Christian education among the negroes, with a view of what the Roman Catholics are doing. After speaking of the large estimates of money expended, and pupils taught by that church, it says:

“Nothing approaching a confirmation of these estimates has been brought to our notice. We have carefully examined the Roman Catholic papers with reference to this subject for a year past, and have been able to glean from them only the most barren record of facts and isolated movements.... We believe that, if the Roman Catholics really had facts to prove that they have made the progress they claim to have made, they would not hesitate to publish them conspicuously. As they fail to produce them, we are contented to believe, for the present, that they are doing no more than their fair share of the work, if so much, and receiving no more than their share of the conversions.”

In a later issue, the same paper says:

“We are glad to have been able to capture and expose the spectre which has been frightening Protestants so much. We mean the wholesale conversion of negroes to Catholicism. In a recent article in our ‘Religious Intelligence’ we gave all the information we could gather about the extent and results of Catholic missions among the freedmen, and there was nothing in it to alarm or annoy anybody. The Catholic Review quotes liberally from the article, and virtually concedes the accuracy of our statements in the following sentences:

“‘Like our contemporary, we have noticed the “extravagant estimates” to which it refers; but we never happened to notice their having been made by any Catholic authority whatever. They usually make their appearance in papers of the Christian Advocate stamp, and are employed as a stimulus to rouse missionary zeal in people who are much more readily moved to give money by their hatred of Popery than by their love for what they believe to be the truth taught by our Divine Lord. The Independent wants facts to substantiate these boastings. We suggest that it can always be accommodated with facts enough to substantiate the truth of whatever assertions are actually made by our missionaries. They can hardly be held responsible for any wild stories which other people may circulate at their expense.’

“Those who have been most troubled by reports of the gains of Catholicism among the negroes may give to the winds their fears.”

We, too, have been for more than a year making special inquiries. We have read the large estimates, which have been through the newspapers, of money expended, and pupils taught. The statement that $600,000 in gold (nearly one million dollars in our currency) was given to this work by the Propaganda at Rome, in 1867, and that, in the same year, sixty-six priests landed in New Orleans to undertake missionary work among the blacks, we trace to the Christian Intelligencer of that year.

The fact is, that it is extremely difficult to get at accurate and authorized statements in regard to all Roman Catholic missions. Their funds are not raised by appeals, based on special needs or special encouragements, or addressed to the general public; and their policy is one of quiet foundation-laying, rather than of demonstrative up-building. It is not an easy task, even, to secure reliable information of what they are doing here at our doors, or behind their own.

Recognizing this difficulty, we are not ready to agree with the Independent that, if the Roman Catholics had facts to prove, they would not hesitate to publish them conspicuously. Nor are we ready yet to congratulate ourselves that we “have been able to capture and expose the spectre,” while we are obliged to confess that we have not had it in our grasp sufficiently to take the measure of its outlines, or tell its height and girth.

A careful reading of the ‘virtual concession’ of the Catholic Review makes it amount to virtually nothing, except an ingenious evasion of responsibility for any statements which may have been made. It does not even say that the estimates have been extravagant, but uses that expression as a quotation from the Independent. It only suggests that assertions actually made by missionaries (who are careful not to make assertions) can always be substantiated.

We would merely caution the friend of the negro, and those who fear the influence of Romanism over him, that an argument based on ignorance is not very securely founded. And, while we would not have omne ignotum pro magnifico, or believe because the spectre is vague, it must be very large; on the other hand, we would not say of one whose wont is to hide itself, “Because we cannot dissect it, it is nothing.”

THE YELLOW FEVER.

The yellow fever, in its ravages in the South, pays no regard to race, color or previous condition. Whites and blacks alike have suffered from its sudden and malignant attacks. Death levels all distinctions. The statement which has been often made, that the negroes are proof against this pestilence, seems to have been ill-based, as intelligent observers of its ravages in former years utterly contradict it. At any rate, it is not true of this year’s scourge.

Quite opposite assertions have been made in regard to the conduct of the blacks during the panic which this deathly visitor has occasioned. So contradictory, in fact, that we suspect the truth to be that they have acted very much like white people of the same intelligence. Some have stood at their posts, and done noble work as nurses, as ministers, and in humbler stations. And some, doubtless, like those of other races, have been carried by their fears away from the most sacred of duties.

How has it affected our work? Of course, our schools in the South are closed during the hot months, and most of the teachers and white pastors are in the North. Straight University, at New Orleans, La., is closed, and Rev. Mr. Alexander, the pastor of the church, is at his New England home. At Grenada, Miss., which has been almost depopulated by the fever, we had a school. The two teachers, however, we believe went to the country before the pestilence reached that beautiful town. The only one of our workers whom we know to have been stricken down is Rev. W. W. Mallory, the colored pastor of the church at Memphis, Tenn., who was still sick at our last advices. We have reason to hope for his recovery and restoration to full health.

We have transmitted some sums of money which have been put into our hands for special relief to the suffering colored people of these infected districts, to which we have added what we felt justified in doing from the funds of the Association.

But the peril is not over yet. Many days must intervene before the thrice welcome frosts may be expected to kill the germs of this fell disease, and famine always comes in the train of continued pestilence. It is the Lord’s work to avert suffering and relieve physical want. May the fountains of charity, which have been opened so freely through the land, continue to flow increasingly until there shall be no more thirst.

A FOUL CHANCE AND A FAIR CHANCE.

A correspondent writes us upon the subject of how the freedman is getting on, as follows:

“On my way up the Mississippi, between the States of Arkansas and Mississippi, I fell into conversation with a planter living on the right bank of the river, and, after the manner of all Yankees, asked him how the negroes were getting on. He was a short, chunky, red-faced man, and his account was gloomy in the extreme. He said that he would not undertake to tell me all the trouble he had with his ‘help,’ for, if he did, I would not believe him at all. He said that he could not advance them anything at the beginning of the season, for fear of their running away and leaving him without hands in time of harvest; that they were so lazy that all they cared for was to get bread and meat for the least possible amount of work; that, although all his hands were deacons or preachers or ‘exalters,’ they stole so that he could not raise any pigs or chickens; that the members of the church were more licentious than the ‘world’s people’; that they got angry and burned his gin-house every year, etc., etc. He was the first man that I had met, during a residence of nine years at the South, who would admit that he was sorry the slaves had been made free.

“On my way down the river, at about the same point, I had a conversation upon the same subject with a man residing on the other bank. He was a tall gentleman of fine form, with an intellectual, genial, open face. In reply to my inquiries, he said the freedmen were doing first-rate; were industrious, honest, temperate and moral; were acquiring property in stock, tools and land; and he found free labor more easily managed and more profitable than slave labor. I referred to the conversation I had with his Mississippi neighbor on my way up, and asked him why their reports were so different. With a good deal of animation and emphasis, he replied: ‘I can tell you why it is: I just give my niggers a chance, and he doesn’t. He has always brought them out in debt to him at the end of every year, and has crushed out all their enterprise and ambition, so that, as he says, the problem with them is how to get a bare living with the least possible amount of work. All the nigger wants is a fair chance.’”

INDIAN AGENTS.

Under the Peace Policy, the Government has entrusted to the American Missionary Association the nomination of six Indian agents. Vacancies in these occur from time to time, and applications for nominations are desired. One vacancy now exists.

These Indian agencies afford an admirable opportunity for usefulness to the right persons; but they are not sinecures for incompetent men—whether laymen or ministers. It is desirable that the applicant have some knowledge of farming and the simpler mechanic arts, but it is essential that he present the best of credentials as to piety, integrity, business capacity and experience, and ability to influence masses of men.

The salary ranges from $1,000 to $2,000 per annum, according to the responsibilities and duties of the agencies. Bonds for the faithful performance of duty will be required by the government, varying from $15,000 to $20,000.

Applications or inquiries may be addressed to Rev. M. E. Strieby, 56 Reade Street, New York.

“INDIAN WARS.”

And so the latest Indian War is over! It is absurd to call such chases and skirmishes by so dignified a name. Small bands of ten, twenty, sometimes a hundred or two outlaws in revolt, are hunted to death or surrender in the wildernesses of the Far West. We call them nations, and this undignified pursuit a war. It is, in reality, only the same thing which is continually being done in our great cities by the police. Law-breakers, and men who avenge their own wrongs, must be chased to their dens, and either caught and chained, or shot like dogs. Only that, on the frontier, the facilities for the violence, and then for the escape, are so much greater than in the city; and that we have to send generals and colonels in the army after them, instead of sergeants of police.

We pity the “braves” of the Territories more than we do the “roughs” of the bloody sixth ward, because they are more ignorant and more wronged, and because the hindrances to a better life are even greater for them. And we pity the gallant men of the army, who are compelled to do this police work, in dogging criminals to death.

Among the recent dispatches is one, telling of an encounter between six cow-boys and eight Indians on the Nueces River, in which four Indians were killed and one captured; one of the boys had a flesh-wound, and the others only wounds in their clothing. Generalship does not go for much in such guerrilla warfare. West Point tactics are not of much avail. Often, in the brooks of New England, the farmer’s boy, who goes fishing with a stick and a string, when it rains too hard to work out of doors, will bring home ten times as many trout as the city sportsman with eight-ounce rod, a Conroy reel and a choice assortment of flies. Perhaps a small army of cow-boys would serve us best on the frontier. It is not fit work for real soldiers. We do not mean a word of disrespect to them. They have our sympathy and admiration for their fidelity and obedience, and for not resigning when they are set to such work.

But how much better it would be if, by fair treatment and honestly-fulfilled pledges, we had made these Indians both friendly and law-abiding—or, even, if now, with patience and forbearance, we should be persistently kind and true, and see how long it would be before we and they should find each in the other, “a man and a brother.”

The difference between equal and identical rights is well illustrated by the action of the Georgia Central Railroad officials. Travel between Macon and Savannah is so light that only one passenger coach is run. By a partition this is divided into two parts, furnished exactly alike, one for white and the other for colored passengers. The colored end being nearly empty one day, a white man took a seat, or rather four seats, in it, upon which the conductor told him that he was in the wrong end of the car, and that the vice-president was very particular that no white persons be allowed to ride in the apartment for colored people.

A similar arrangement formerly prevailed on the street-cars in Mobile, and some of the old partitioned cars are still in use. It is to be hoped that, in the course of human events, identical rights on steam-cars will not be considered any worse than on horse cars by the constituents of Georgia’s good Governor Colquitt.

AN INDIAN HYMN-BOOK.

We have just received a copy of the Hymns in the Chinook Jargon Language, compiled by Rev. Mr. Eells, missionary of the American Missionary Association. It is not a ponderous volume like those in use in our American churches, with twelve or fifteen hundred hymns, but a modest pamphlet of thirty pages, containing both the Indian originals and the English translations. The tunes include, among others, “Happy Land,” “Greenville,” “Bounding Billow,” “John Brown,” and the “Hebrew Children.” The hymns are very simple, and often repeat all but the first line. The translations show the poverty of the language to convey religious ideas.

One hymn reads—

“Always Jesus is very strong,
So his Paper (the Bible) says.”

Another we give in full, and in both original and translation, as part of the words of the Jargon will be seen to be English:

HEAVEN.

Chorus—Jesus mitlite kopa Saghalie
Kunamoxt konoway tillikums kloshe.

2. Yahwa tillikums wake klahowya,
Wake sick tumtum, halo till,
Halo mimoluse, wake mesachie,
Wake polaklie, halo cole.—Chorus.

3. Yahwa tillikums mitlite kwanesum,
Hiyu houses, hiyu sing;
Papa, mama, pe kloshe tenas;
Ovacut yaka chicamin pil.—Chorus.

4. Jesus potlatch kopa siwash,
Spose mesika, hias kloshe,
Konoway iktas mesika tikegh,
Kopa Saghalie kwanesum.—Chorus.

Tune, “Greenville.”

1. In Heaven all the people
Are not hungry, are not sick;
They do not tell lies, do not become angry;
They do not become drunk, do not cry.

Jesus lives in Heaven,
Together with all good people.

2. There the people are not poor,
Have no sorrow, are not tired;
They do not die, are not wicked;
There is no darkness, no cold.

3. There the people live always;
There are many houses, and much singing;
There is father, mother and good children;
The street is of gold.

4. Jesus will give to the Indians,
If you are very good,
Everything you wish,
In Heaven, always.

We only extract, further, the literal translation of the Lord’s Prayer, some of the petitions of which seem to find admirable expression in this version, especially the “lead us not into temptation,” etc.:

“Our Father who lives in the Above, good thy name over everywhere. Good if thou become true Chief over all people. Good if thy mind is on the earth, as in the Above. Give to us during this day our food. Pity us for our wickedness, as we pity any man if he does evil to us. Not thou carry us to where evil is; but if evil find us, good thou help us conquer that evil. Truly all earth thy earth, and thou very strong, and thou truly very good, so we wish all this. Good so.”

It is no little task to make hymns for such a people out of such poor materials. Let it be understood that these are only hymns for the transition state, for Indians who can only remember a little, and who sing in English as soon as they have learned to read.

This little book is an interesting monument of missionary labor, and full of suggestion as to the manifold difficulties to be encountered in the attempt to Christianize the Indians of America.

INDIAN STUDENTS.

The fifteen Indian students who have been studying at Hampton remain there through the summer. Many of our readers will look with interest for some news of them, and be glad to hear of their continued progress and content. Like the other students who remain, they work through the summer, chiefly on the farm, thus earning money for their clothing and support. They are allowed a day and a half in school each week, and thus, under a regular teacher, their instruction is kept up in the English language, with object lessons, and phonetic practice, writing, arithmetic and geography. They also meet for an hour every evening, from eight to nine, with a few of the other students, under the care of a teacher, for conversation, and games that are exercises in talking. This conversation class is thus far a great success, enjoyed by the Indians and the other students who take pleasure in helping them.

They also have their Sunday-school class, and a prayer-meeting, in which most of them are very constant and devoted attendants. The devoutness of their simple prayers in Cheyenne and Kiowa cannot be doubted by a listener, though understood only by the Great Spirit to whom they are addressed.

At their first meeting, a gentleman present spelled out the question with the card letters for one of the young men to answer: Why do you like to learn? Letter by letter the startlingly impressive answer followed, “Because it makes me a man!”

THE WET SEASON ON THE WEST COAST.

It will be borne in mind by those who have special interest in our Mendi Mission that it is still the rainy season, to which all the peculiar perils of the West Coast of Africa are to be encountered, and with great risk to the health and life of those who are not fully acclimated. We have had weekly letters from our colored missionaries there, to as late a date as Aug. 13th, who have been passing the first test of their ability to endure the climate and resist the African fever. None of them have entirely escaped the touch of its hot breath and icy hand, and yet it seems to have for the most part passed them lightly by. Two of the female missionaries have been very sick. One, Mrs. Dr. James, died early in the season.

Thus far, then, we are encouraged to believe that, as we hoped it would prove, men and women of African descent endure the risks of transplanting and of naturalization far better than those who have neither themselves nor their ancestors been “to the manner born.” And, if these perils at the threshold can be encountered better by them than by others, we may surely hope that the less malignant influences which pervade the atmosphere will not undermine their strength, as it does with those who are foreigners by both blood and birth.

It behooves their friends on this side the ocean, who believe in the power of prayer, to keep these missionaries constantly in their minds and in their hearts, and to pray the Lord of the harvest, who has already raised up and sent forth these laborers into the field, that He will enable them to bear the heat and burden of the day.

They are doing well in their work. The schools are growing and gaining in every way. A lack of proper text-books has hampered the teachers, and an unfortunate delay has occurred by the loss of a box containing a supply, which, with the boat which was conveying it from Freetown to Good Hope, failed to reach its destination. The church has received valuable accessions since Mr. Snelson and his co-laborers reached the field. We hope to have more regular and full correspondence to lay before our readers in future, from month to month.

An honored New Hampshire pastor writes: “I should be glad to see the A. M. A’s debt removed, and I am in hearty sympathy with the Society. It seems to me to combine, in the persons of the freedmen—to say nothing of the Chinese, etc.—the claims of Home and Foreign Missions in a remarkable degree. Patriotism and philanthropy meet and blend in its work.”

The same friend says: “Communism, so much, and thus far, perhaps, so extravagantly dreaded, will find friends among the black race at a future day, to an extent unexpected now, if we are not prompt to enlighten and Christianize that vast army of ignorant and voting laborers.”

When, at the opening of the war, the life of the infant Berea College was sought, the Angel of Providence said: “Arise, and take the young child and flee into the Egypt of Safety, and be thou there until I bring thee word; for the Herod of Slavery will seek the young child, to destroy him.” But, when Herod was dead, behold, the angel appeared, saying: “Arise, and take the young child and go into the land of Israel, for they are dead which sought the young child’s life.” And they arose and took the young child Berea, and went back into their own land. And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit. And other children were born to this household of faith—Howard and Hampton, and Fisk and Atlanta, and Talladega and Straight and Tougaloo, and several more. These do not have to flee for their life; but they need to be nourished into maturity, that they may do the mighty work assigned them in this and in coming generations, here and in other lands.

Apropos—A judge from a Western city told us, the other day, that, having had a black man to testify in his court, he turned and complimented him from the bench as the most intelligent witness he had ever had in that box.

He had been a colonel in the war. Since the coming of peace he had remained in the South, to engage in the process of the social and political reconstruction. He felt the desperateness of the case, and yet was hopeful. In our office, he was setting forth the Southern status, and arguing for patient endurance and vigorous endeavor when, in his military phrase, he broke forth: “It is only one shot in five hundred that hits.” Fire away, then, ye soldiers of the Cross! Some of the shots will hit.

It was the Christmas of the year 1865. It was in a Southern city. The preacher, though black, had the frosts of seventy winters on his head. His text was the parable of the vine and the branches. In the sermon of singular unction, he said: “My brethren, we has the advantage of the vine and the branches. They get the sap only in the spring and thro’ the season, but the Christian has the sap all the year ’round.”

Old Whitey.—Lewis Tappan had nothing too good to be used for the benefit of the colored people. While our new Field Superintendent was in the last six months of his course at the Union Theological Seminary, with aid from the American Home Missionary Society, he preached back of Brooklyn for a Presbyterian church of “Americans, falsely called Africans,” as Mr. Tappan was fond of styling that people. His own family carriage and horse he furnished the young preacher all that time for riding out and back. Storms and mud did not prevent the cheerful bringing out of the rig. In later years, upon meeting the preacher, he would always speak with pleasure of the service of Old Whitey. In those days, or even now, how few men would furnish their family turnout for such a purpose!

ITEMS FROM CHURCHES AND SCHOOLS.

Hampton, Va.—The Trustees of the Normal Institute have decided to uniform the male students. A plain sack-coat, pantaloons and cap of bluish-gray cloth have been selected. The suit will cost about ten dollars.

—Seventy young men and twenty-two young women remain at Hampton Institute this summer—a larger number than in any previous year—finding employment on the school-farm, in the shops, knitting-room, laundry, and at housework. The young people are under watchful care and supervision; the family life of the school is kept up, and regular Bible-class instruction on Sundays.

Byron, Ga.—Two united with the church during the month of August; two infants baptised. Still, many are asking what must they do to be saved.

Talladega, Ala.—A professor writes: “Never before were our young ministers, as a body, so much in earnest as now, or more successful than this summer in their Christian work. They evince more tact in overcoming difficulties, and show more power in removing obstacles than I have ever seen in them before. The last two years have told powerfully on their mental and Christian development.”

—Rev. Mr. Hill writes; “At the church prayer-meeting in the chapel, September 3d, three girls, pupils in the college, rose and expressed a hope in Christ. Two of them are in the family at Foster Hall, for whom we have felt anxious, and have been praying all summer. They seem now very decided and very happy. I have been much impressed with the deep spiritual tone of the teachers here, and their entire consecration to the work.”

—The Talladega College Industrial Department will hold a State Industrial Fair at the grounds of the College, in Talladega, Ala., in November, 1878. This fair is intended as an exhibition of what the colored people are able to do, as farmers, carpenters, printers, manufacturers, musicians, housewives, etc. Any one who has produced, or made, or who owns anything he considers especially fine, is invited to exhibit. Three hundred dollars or more are promised, and it is hoped the sum may be increased to one thousand dollars, to be given as prizes.

Childersburg, Ala.—Rev. Mr. Jones was ordained here in June. Between twenty and thirty have recently come out on the Lord’s side.

Alabama Furnace, Ala.—A protracted meeting is now in progress, with decided indications of good results; and also at the “Cove,” there have been several marked conversions.

New Orleans, La.—A gentleman of high standing, in New Orleans, writes to Mr. Alexander, the pastor of the Central Congregational Church, who is now in the North: “Notwithstanding the intense heat, and the excitement that prevails because of the yellow-fever here, the congregation at Central Church have not abated their interest, and, both on Thursday evenings and on Sundays, they manifest by their presence that they will ‘not forsake the assembling of themselves together as the manner of some is.’ The good Lord is present to bless at every service, and the faithful people are, as far as I know, conscientiously discharging every known duty. They display a zeal that is truly commendable, and must certainly meet your approbation and esteem.”

GENERAL NOTES.

The Freedmen.

—The Trustees of the Peabody Fund have just sent $1,200 to aid schools in North Carolina. One thousand dollars of this amount is to be used in Raleigh alone—$600 for a white graded school, and $400 for the two colored graded schools. Dr. Sears, agent of the fund, said that the Trustees would have sent more money, but that the income from it had recently fallen off 40 per cent.

—The North Carolina Legislature of 1876–77 provided for two Normal schools—one for white persons and one for black persons. The latter offers continuous instruction throughout the year at Fayetteville. It is under the care of Mr. Harris, a colored man, who was prepared for the work, which he does well, in Ohio.

—The Board of Education at San José, Cal., has abolished the colored school, and the former pupils have been permitted to enter the other schools.

—At Memphis, a telegram says the colored population are acting well in the emergency, and heartily co-operating with the whites, and adds:

“A meeting has been called by prominent colored men for the purpose of organization, to assist the whites in relieving distress and guarding the property, which the people, in the panic of last week, left unguarded. Their action in the present emergency speaks volumes, and has greatly increased the confidence reposed in them by those who were their masters. Among the most efficient on the police force now are the negroes.”

—When the better people of the North come to be understood by the right-thinking people of the South, we shall have hearty co-operation in the education of the negro.—Rev. Robert West.

—To “remove the colored man from politics”—in the sense of taking him out of such an absorption in politics, and such a misuse of them as does injury to himself and to others—it is only necessary to put him into education and industry.—The Advance.

—No nation can possibly let twelve per cent. of its population grow up in ignorance, superstition and vice, without reaping a fearful harvest.

—Macaulay says: “The best remedy for the evils incident to newly-acquired freedom, is freedom.”

Africa.

From all the west coast of Africa, in 1874, there were imported 486,544 cwt. of palm oil and kernels, valued at £518,134, or over two-and-a-half million dollars; of India-rubber, 3,427 cwt. were imported, valued at £25,792; of coffee, 11,502 cwt., valued at £46,506; of spices and ginger, 8,803 cwt., valued at £20,908; and, noticeable fact to Americans, of raw cotton, 11,315 cwt., valued at £32,839.

The chief articles sent out to the islands and coasts were cottons, arms and ammunition, haberdashery, hardware and cutlery. Of these, cotton was king. The whole number of yards of cotton cloth, mostly prints, sold at these ports for that year, amounted to 47,217,966, or nearly forty-eight millions. Allowing thirty yards to a piece, and thirty pieces to a bale, there were over fifty thousand cases of calicoes, whose value was estimated at £745,179, or nearly four millions of dollars. Shall America utterly neglect so rich a field, with its hundreds of factories half idle, and not a few completely at rest?—African Repository.

—The colored Republic of Liberia has 3,500 voters, 116 officeholders, besides petty magistrates and constables, and taxes the people at the rate of twenty-nine dollars for every voter, besides the cost of maintaining schools and government buildings.

—Stanley is said to have agreed to make another exploring trip through the Continent of Africa, at the expense of the king of Belgium.

—Mr. Williams, who accompanied the Azor’s shipload of South Carolina negroes to Liberia, is unwilling to take the responsibility of advising the colored people of the United States to emigrate. It is a magnificent country, and money is to be made there; but the risks of fever and disease are great, and the climate is enervating. Thrift, patience and good management are essential to success. No emigrant should land at Monrovia without a six months’ stock of provisions, a supply of simple medicines, a little ready money, and all the bright calicoes, brass trinkets and notions he can lay his hands on. Salt is always valuable, too. In the interior, the natives lick visitors’ hands for the salty taste of the perspiration. Those who have from $200 to $300 over their passage-money will have a much better chance of becoming independent in Liberia than in America; but those who expect to find there a heaven on earth, where they will not have to work, and who are unprovided with means, will soon become disheartened, and be anxious to return to the United States.

The Indians.

—One fundamental principle in the management of the Indians should be, that they are not to be massed together, but separated in small communities, and as soon as may be, in homesteads. The more they mix with us the less they will disturb us.

—The solution of the Indian problem will be found whenever a policy founded upon justice shall be inaugurated, entrusted to a separate department of the Government, free from political or army interference, executed by men selected on account of fitness, who shall be exempt from the accursed political dogma, “that to the victors belong the spoils,” held to strictest accountability, and subject to removal only by impeachment. When this is done so that it cannot be undone, and the officers of the Department are clothed with power to protect the Indian under the civil law of the land, and the barriers to the citizenship of the Indian are removed, and he stands upon the same plane with every other man, alike responsible to law, and equally entitled to its protection, then, and not until then, may we hope for peace with our native tribes. When the army of the United States shall become what it ought ever to be, the executive servant of the people, called into requisition only when humane measures have failed, then it may fulfil its mission—never as a humane civilizing power.—Col. Meacham.

—The number of Roman Catholic missionaries and teachers among the Indian tribes in the United States is 117.

—Of the 8,000 youth of legal school age in the Indian Territory, over 5,000 are enrolled as attendants at the common schools, and an average daily attendance of over 3,000 is reported. There is a per capita expenditure upon the total school population of the Cherokees of twenty-five dollars, while New York State expends but six. The total expenditure in all the tribes is very nearly $200,000 a year. If money can make good schools, the Indians certainly ought to have them.

—The Bannock war is over, and the Snakes are scotched. If we may believe these last—though it was one of their tribe who deceived our first mother—in the division of labor, the Bannocks did the murdering, and the Snakes the stealing.

—The care of Spotted Tail agency was put into the hands of the Episcopal Church, under the administration of Secretary Delano, in the Interior Department. The present Commissioner of Indian Affairs decides that this means that no other missionary religious teachers shall go on this ground except Episcopalians. Consequently, three Catholic priests have just been banished from the Spotted Tail agency, against the wish and choice of that chief and his people. So says the Advance.

Chinese.

—The number of children in San Francisco between the ages of five and seventeen is 55,899, of whom 133 are negroes, and 4 Indians. The number under five years, of all classes, is 24,389, making a total under seventeen years, of 80,288, of whom 1,505 are Mongolians. Of the white children of school age, who have not attended any school during the past year, there are 16,147. The returns do not mention any Mongolian children as having attended school.

—The Chinese Consul, Lit-Mium Cook, who has recently arrived at the port of San Francisco, says that the Chinese Government has no desire to abrogate or modify the Burlingame Treaty, and also that it believes that the Government of the United States has both the power and the will to protect Chinamen in the enjoyment of their treaty rights in this country. Mr. Seward, United States Minister to China, who arrived at San Francisco in the same vessel, expresses himself as strongly opposed, on commercial and international grounds, to any change of the existing treaty with China. There is not the slightest danger, as he thinks, that Chinese immigration will ever be so great as to give that race any control in this country, or make it injurious to our industrial interests.

—Chinese labor is discountenanced by the Legislature of British Columbia. A resolution just passed declares that “Chinese laborers should not be employed upon the public works of the province, and that a clause should be inserted in specifications of all contracts awarded, to the effect that contractors will not be permitted to employ Chinese labor upon the works, and that, in event of their doing so, the government will not be responsible for payment of the contract.”

—Two Chinese young men are preparing themselves for the ministry of the Episcopal Church, in San Francisco, Cal.

—The Chinese Ambassador is credited with the statement that the Chinese will go to Ireland, as that is the only country that the Irish do not rule.

OUR QUERY COLUMN.

One of our most experienced and successful teachers writes to us: “Why not have a Query Column in the Missionary, which will bring us in contact oftener? Have questions practical, and answers concise, clear, and to the point.” To all which we say: Why not, indeed?

Answer: We will.

Here is, then, already the beginning—a query and an answer. The query practical, which is the only condition imposed by the writer. The answer, although our own, we are not afraid to measure by all the three conditions suggested. It is concise—not susceptible of any very great condensation; clear—no vagueness there; and to the point—indeed, a direct answer.

Our Query Column is, then, in its place. After the news and notes will be a place for the interrogation marks. Who will ask the questions? We suppose it will be he that wants to know. And who will answer them? We do not profess to know everything at the New York office; but we have a wise man in the East, at Boston, and one who may occidentally know a thing or two at Chicago, a royal correspondent in the South, who will be everywhere, and a whole corps of intelligent teachers and pastors on the field, who, best of all, can answer each other’s questions.

Seriously, then, we welcome the idea. We hereby open and inaugurate “Our Query Column,” for all our friends and co-workers. Let the questions be “practical,” germain to our distinctive work. Let them be the real questions on which you desire light for yourselves, and from some source we will try to secure you answers which shall be “concise, clear, and to the point.” Of course, we (for the editorial, like the kingly, “we” is a cover for much irresponsible authority) shall answer, or cause to be answered, only such queries as, in our judgment, will be helpful to the work we have in hand. Who asks first?

THE PRESS.

UNCLE REMUS’ REVIVAL HYMN.

O, whar’ shall we go when de great day comes,
Wid de blowin’ ob de trumpets an’ de bangin’ ob de drums?
How many po’ sinners ’ll be cotched out late,
An’ fin’ no latch ter de golden gate?
No use fer ter wait twel ter morrer,
De sun musn’t set on yo’ sorrer;
Sin’s ez sharp ez a bamboo brier—
O Lord, fetch de mo’ners up higher!

When de nations ob de earth are standin’ all aroun’
Who’s a gwine ter be chosen fer ter war de glory crown?
Who’s a gwine fer ter stan’, stiff-kneed an’ bol’,
An’ answer ter deir name at de callin’ ob de roll?
You’d better come now ef you’s comin’,
Ole Satan’s a loose an’ a bummin’,
De wheels ob destruction is a hummin’—
O, come along, sinner, ef you’s commin’.

De song ob salvation is a mighty sweet song,
An’ de Paradise wind blow fur an’ blow strong,
An’ Aberham’s buzzum is safe an’ its wide,
An’ dat’s de place whar de sinners orter hide.
No use ter be stoppin’ an’ a lookin’,
Ef yo’ fool wid Satan you’ll get took in;
You’ll hang on de edge an’ get shook in,
Ef yo’ keep on a stoppin’ an’ a lookin’.

Jes now is de time, an’ dis yer is de place,
Let de salvation sun shine squar’ in yo’ face;
Fight de battles ob de Lord, fight soon an’ fight late,
An’ you’ll always fin’ a latch ter de golden gate.
No use fer ter wait twel ter morrer,
De sun musn’t set on yo’ sorrer;
Sin’s ez sharp ez a bamboo brier—
Ax de Lord fer ter fetch yo’ up higher.—Exchange.

A BIT OF HISTORY.

There is nothing new under the sun—not even a Home Missionary Society for Illinois. The American Missionary Association had three auxiliaries—the Penobscot, in Maine; the Western Home and Foreign, at Cincinnati; and the North-western, at Chicago. In 1854, the North-western was modified to become the Illinois Home Missionary Association. As such it was operated for five or six years, when it was given up, and the whole work was transferred to the A. M. A., with a District Secretary to have supervision of the missionary churches and to push the collections. When that District Secretary and the missionary churches, in 1861, were transferred to the A. H. M. S., he retained in possession the record books of those two auxiliaries. But these, together with other precious journals, were consumed by the great fire, so that it will be difficult to reproduce that chapter in our State home evangelism. Rev. Epaphras Goodman was the Corresponding Secretary. Rev. S. G. Wright and Dr. Flavel Bascom both served as agents. Rev. A. L. Rankin, now of California, was a general missionary along the southern portion of the Illinois Central Railroad. Coming to one place in Egypt, and inquiring for the religious element there, he got this as an answer: “Religious element? You are the first man we have had making that inquiry. We thought you were looking for land.”

We find by the Annual Report of the A. M. A. for 1855 that, of its 104 missionaries in the home department, forty of them were under the Illinois Society. Among these were Revs. W. W. Blanchard, Nelson Cook, George Bent, William Beardsley, S. Dilley, George Gemmell, J. T. Marsh, M. N. Miles, Alfred Morse, W. A. Nichols, L. Parker, George Schlosser, David Todd, E. E. Wells and David Wirt. Among the fifty-four churches aided were the South, the Edwards, and the Welsh, of Chicago; and those of Amboy, Henry, Providence, Udina, Plymouth, of Ottawa; DeKalb, Lawn Ridge, Metamora, Roscoe, Sterling, Bloomington, Byron, Kankakee, Newark, Milburn, Albany, Urbana (now Champaign), Huntley, Victoria, Shirland, Dundee and Sandwich.

The State Society investigated the necessities of the field, and endorsed applications for aid, but did not make appropriations to the churches. This was done by the A. M. A. in New York, which issued the commissions. After a while the executive committee—Deacons Carpenter and Johnston, and Pastors Patton and Roy—finding that they were simply an additional committee for endorsing applications, and not having the responsibility and the stimulus of administration, made request to have the whole work resumed by the A. M. A., and the State Society voted to discontinue its operations. Herein is a confirmation of the wisdom of the new Society in making itself independent and auxiliary, and not simply co-operative. This piece of history, containing the argument of experience, was not brought out in the late series of discussions.

That there was no alienation of feeling attending this separate operation in home missions as a testimony against slavery, is evident from the fact that the churches and the missionary pastors of the A. M. A. were so readily turned over to the A. H. M. S., and by it so cheerfully received. That National Home Missionary Society had all along borne more or less of testimony against slave-holding; but when, in 1857, it passed a rule by which all of its fifty-five Southern Presbyterian missionaries were dropped from its list, then no one could question the soundness of its position. So, again, the readiness with which testifying churches returned to regular contributions in behalf of the American Board, as well as of this Society, revealed an abiding love for these very organizations with which for a time they had not walked in fellowship. The First and the Plymouth Churches of Chicago, which, from their organization, had taken each its two annual collections for the A. M. A., one for the home and one for the foreign department, fell in with the old Society and Board as naturally and heartily as though they had always been among the more conservative churches. On the other hand, the chief officers and supporters of the old organizations were glad that the organic testimony thus borne, along with other influences, had been able to tone up public sentiment so that the satisfactory action could be taken by them.

And now everybody sees that, out of that testifying process, God was bringing on another organization to be ready against the day when He should open to it the special field of the South and of Africa.

—Rev. Dr. Roy, in the Advance.

THE FREEDMEN.

GEORGIA.

Brunswick—Risley School Exhibition.

AS SEEN BY A SOUTHERNER.

This school is taught by S. B. Morse, a graduate of Atlanta University. The following account is from a local newspaper.

Mr. Editor: It has ever been a source of unfeigned pleasure to me to observe any efforts tending to the elevation and refinement of humanity. Hence, it was no less a pleasure than surprise last evening when I found so marvelously successful an effort in that direction, as evinced in the concert and exhibition—the closing exercises of the Risley School. Mr. Morse (a graduate of the University of Atlanta) may justly congratulate himself upon the proficiency attained by his pupils, considering the great difficulties and discouragements under which he has necessarily had to labor.

The colored people are born natural musicians; but the time, harmony and smooth rendering of the “part-songs” last night gave indubitable evidence of thorough culture and faithful practice. The declamation by the young scholars displayed good powers of memory and hard study. Their enunciation was distinct and perfect. The selections were excellent. With the single exception of an interruption by a few disagreeable, unmannerly boys, who evidently had as little respect for themselves as for propriety, the affair went off without a break. Quite a number of white persons were present. Just before closing the exercises, Mr. Morse made a short and pertinent address, stating the numerous difficulties under which he had labored, but offering “the fruits of his labors” as the test of his fidelity and capacity for filling the position he proudly claimed, of “teacher.” The Honorable President of the Board of Education and Mr. Kenrick, the county-school commissioner, were called upon for speeches, and expressed their hearty gratification at the degree of proficiency and the evidence of faithful study on the part of the school, and their satisfaction at the marked improvement in order, manner, and the advance in education, as clearly shown by their present exhibition.

We have to congratulate ourselves upon possessing a most quiet, respectable and law-abiding colored element. Their comfortable homes, with well-stocked gardens; their numerous churches, some quite pretentious in architecture, and, above all, their large and substantial free school, give proof that there is no question of their enjoyment of all “the rights, titles and emoluments” of a “free and independent citizen” in Brunswick.

ALABAMA.

Wanted—a Barn.

REV. E. P. LORD, TALLADEGA COLLEGE.

Meeting a lady recently who has long been interested in our work, she remarked: “Talladega does not seem to have so many wants as most new institutions—at least, we do not hear so much of them.” Imagine my surprise, when I had feared that the Association and all of our friends were wearied by our continual importunities.

What a list we have of not merely wants, but actual and pressing necessities, for which some of us pray as continually and earnestly as for daily bread. A dormitory, for the physical and moral good of the young men, now crowded six and more in a room, in a building intended and much needed for other purposes; a library, as necessary in a college as steam in a factory; money, without which none of the means of elevating a race or individuals can be made effective.

But I want now especially to urge one vital necessity, even to the continuance of one of our most important means of helping this people. Last year good friends in the North gave us $3,566.52, and some of the instructors advanced $2,000. With this amount property valued now at about $5,000 has been purchased, and an Industrial Department, including farming, carpentering, printing, and house-work of all kinds, has been carried on one year. By this outlay sixty scholars have earned a large sum in payment of their school expenses. They have also learned to do these various kinds of work in a systematic and intelligent manner. But in the growth of character the good has been greatest. The young people have acquired earnestness, self-dependence and enterprise. During the vacation they are disseminating this practical knowledge and their spirit through the whole State. The Southern Educational Society, composed of some of the foremost educators of the South, recently pronounced “industrial education the hope of the South.” It is certainly more necessary and more promising among the colored people than among the whites. Already we can see the benefits of the department in the improving material condition of the people in the country about, in better and larger crops, cultivated more skilfully with better implements, etc.

The Agricultural Department is one of the most useful, and it is, also, one of the most remunerative parts of our work. At present we are obliged to go three-fourths of a mile by the road to reach the farm; $1,000 would buy a piece of land connecting the farm directly with the college buildings. This would save annually a large percentage of the cost in time required to reach the farm, to say nothing of the use of the land. Who will make this very essential addition to “Winsted Farm”?

The most profitable part of the farm-work is the dairy, and raising beef for the College boarding department. We shall keep fifty or sixty cattle continually, but we have now no barn. The working stock, the implements and the feed must have a shelter. We have nothing but sheds made of old lumber, which we fear the autumn storms will destroy, with much property within. Besides, if the farm is to be, as it should be, a model to the colored people, we must not leave everything out in the rain and cold, as is universally the case in the South. There is to be held, in connection with the department, this fall, the first Industrial Fair ever held by the colored people. We expect it to be a means of education to 5,000 people. The barn should be ready for their inspection and information. Fifteen hundred dollars will give the farm the barn it needs, and furnish work to a number of young men, by which they will learn the use of tools, under our very skilful carpenter, and be able to pay their expenses in school. If friends could appreciate how necessary these things are, we certainly should have them at once.

TEXAS.

The Southwest Texas Congregational Association.

REV. B. C. CHURCH, GOLIAD.

The General Association of Congregational Churches, of Texas, at its seventh annual session, doffed its name, and hereafter will be known as the Southwest Texas Congregational Association.

Three churches were represented by their delegates and pastors. Rev. Geo. Whitefort, of Red River Association, and agent of the American Tract Society, added to the interest of the meeting, and found himself more interested than in any other association.

The Rev. A. J. Turner, member of West Texas General Conference, and pastor of the Congregational Church of Schulenburg, requested, with his church, to be received into the Association. The church, consisting of fifteen members, with Sabbath school of ninety-eight scholars, had been gathered by him since last January. They left former associations to find a church home of purity and morality, and a more simple and Scriptural government. After examination, conducted mostly by Rev. S. M. Coles, a graduate of Yale Divinity School, he and the church were received.

At our morning and night sessions of each day we had preaching and other devotional services. Sabbath morning, Rev. Messrs. Coles and Whitefort spoke most earnest and profitable words to parents and children. This was followed by a love-feast, in which we had forty-five talks, which, with singing, occupied about an hour and a half. If several rose at a time, each waited for his turn. When the people have been educated to speak of Christ and the joy of faith, rather than of themselves, and “these low grounds of sorrows” coming from their emotional nature, it is not strange that you see smiles and tears, or that sinners’ hearts get into their throats. When the opportunity was given, seventeen rose, saying, “Pray for us.” After the Association adjourned, religious meetings continued for a week, as a result of which, seven persons united with the church.

The Helena Church was organized four years ago with three members. Now there are fifty-four members, twenty-three of whom united within the last twelve months. During the same time they have raised seven hundred dollars, with which they have built a house and furnished it. The other churches have had but little growth in membership, but in Bible study and intelligent worship there has been commendable improvement.

A Christian Church, worshipping God according to Bible rules, is a light of untold worth in any country. This feature of our work is encouraging. Even those who hate and persecute us gradually adopt our views and modes of worship.

KENTUCKY.

A Vacant Church—The Seed Wafted—The National Problem.

REV. JOHN G. FEE, CABIN CREEK, LEWIS CO.

I am here, in the field of my early ministry, on my regular quarterly visit. Twenty-four years since, I left this for my present home in Berea, Ky.

Most of those who, as parents, heard me with trembling twenty-five years ago have passed away, and those who were then boys and girls are now fathers and mothers. These, by time, thought and observation, have had their early impressions ripened into convictions. The sympathies and convictions of these are for loyalty to the union, liberty to man, and a gospel of impartial love. They take no stock in the issues of mere denominationalism. They assent readily to the proposition that manifested faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, as a personal Saviour from sin, is the faith of the gospel. On this faith the church was organized in 1847, as it then separated from all slave-holding bodies. Some of the members are still there. They have been without a regular pastor ever since the year 1860. They still keep up a Sabbath-school, and part of the time a prayer-meeting.

What they now need is a regular pastor—one who can visit the families, and preach at least once in two weeks. I hope such an one may be speedily found. This, together with the congregation in Bracken County, would make a most interesting and promising field. The effort to plant churches here thirty years ago was not in any sense a failure. And the second temple can be made much more glorious than the first.

Emigrations from these fields have been useful also. Five families went more than a hundred miles into the interior to help build up Berea; eleven others, young men and young women, have gone out there as students in the college. Other families have gone to other States to exert there an influence for liberty, justice, and a gospel of impartial love. Many of these were “mere children,” and, having had their birth in times of trial, they were not mutes in the fields where, in the providence of God, they were cast.

In view of the debasing effect of slavery in the South, and the communistic element in the North, I am often asked, “What is to be the result of this effort to establish republican institutions on this continent?” I answer, there is no hope but in sanctifying the hearts of the people by the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This will direct aright the intellect, the wealth and the activities of the nation, make the people a law unto themselves, and for good. Let us pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth laborers into His harvest.

A Teacher’s Vacation Correspondence.

When tired teachers flee for rest to their own homes, they do not wholly escape from school duties or cares. Letters pursue them with unmerciful rapidity. From a pile of fresh ones, let us cull a few samples of requests that demand sympathy and aid.

“My school is to have an exhibition in a few weeks. Can you not send me some interesting declamations and fresh music?” A favor easily granted.

“The Sabbath-school has appointed me king of its celebration. Please send me a nice piece suitable to speak, and a few dialogues appropriate for the little folks.” An hour’s search through old files of the National Teacher provides material exactly suited for this occasion.

“There is to be a Sunday-school Convention at ——, the 24th of this month, and I am expected to speak. I never attended such a meeting. Please write me a nice speech, telling who introduced Sunday-schools, and how much good they have done.” A modest request! But, if there is really to be a Sunday-school Convention in the heart of Southern Georgia, and this shy boy is to help make it successful, ’tis worth while to look over Sunday magazines for facts which the speaker can arrange and use.

“I wish I could go to school the whole of this year. My wages for teaching public school three months will not carry me through. Could you help me in any way?”

A determined worker, who holds Sunday-schools on door-steps when no better place offers, seeks encouragement and papers. Here is part of his story: “I have some hard trials, and ups and downs, but I trusts in God, and tries to fight my way through. I have got no learning of account, but to the best of my knowledge I means to teach. God said where there is little known there is little required.” Perhaps the angels could tell us that poor Jacob’s crown will far outshine that of many a richly-endowed soul.

A “sweet-girl graduate,” folding away bouquets and compliments with her pretty muslin, wishes to know how she can make her school-room attractive. Speaking of future plans, she pens these words: “I mean to work for the Master to the best of my ability. I think a life not consecrated to God is no life.”

If sometimes burdensome, such letters do greatly add to the sweetness of vacation rest. They give assurance that the seed sown in weariness is yielding harvest, which, with the affection breathed from every page, inspires to future faithfulness and zeal.

L. A. P.

AFRICA.

THE MENDI MISSION.

Eight Added to the Church—A Refreshing Sunday.

Rev. Floyd Snelson writes:

Last Saturday was our day for preparatory meeting, the following Sabbath being the day of Communion. Ten persons presented themselves as candidates for membership. All were examined carefully, in open meeting; eight were received, as we believed from their evidence that they were hopefully converted, and two rejected on the ground that they were not married according to law (this is one of the greatest evils that exist here, both among the white and colored, there being no law to compel them to marry). Sunday was, indeed, a day of great refreshing, there being before us eight adults to be welcomed into the Church of Christ, and seven children, in the arms of parents and god-parents, to be consecrated to Him. And what increased the joy was, that the whole week had been a rainy one up to late on Saturday, when the good Master stopped the rain, and removed the clouds gradually, and let the light of the sun beam upon us. I would say more upon this precious subject, but the time for closing the mail has arrived, and I am compelled to stop. Pray for us.

Mr. E. White writes:

The thing I want to ask you about now is this—if you will help me to take care of a few boys? When I was here the first of the year, the people came almost daily to get me to take their children and keep them in the mission, but I told them that I was not allowed to do so; if I were, I would do it gladly. Their reason was that, if they sent their children to the mission-school, they would only be in the school a small portion of the day, and at home most of the day and all night, and, therefore, the evil influence which they would have over them in that time would overbalance what the teacher would teach them in the short time he would have them in the day; and they wanted their children to “Sabby-book,” and if they did, they must be taken away from them. They say that they don’t think their children can become like the white man while they are with them; the “pickin’” must be taken from the old people; and I agree with them on this point. The vices which the old people practice, the children will surely follow, if allowed to be where they are. There are no children in this station, and we said in our meeting that we would not take in any till we heard from you; but, as I am a single man, you might not think of my taking any mission children. Therefore, I write to ask you if you will allow me to take some of the boys offered me. Some of the people have promised to bring rice (which is the most they eat) for the children, if I would only take them.

One being with these people every day can clearly see that the redemption of Africa is in the little folks, and, therefore, I think, that a number of these boys and girls should be taken by somebody, and trained, as they are at Hampton.

This part of Africa is very little behind the South in 1866; and see what the A. M. A. has done in that dark place since that time? There are only two things that differ here from the South. First, the colored people in the South had been taught to work with more skill than these people have. Second, those at the South had more civilized people to deal with than these people have now. Take out these two, and Africa (this part), to-day, will compare with the South before the A. M. A. took it in hand. Now, if so much has been done in America, why not in Africa?

THE INDIANS.

S’KOKOMISH RESERVATION.

REV. G. H. ATKINSON, D. D., PORTLAND, OREGON,

Superintendent A. H. M. S., for Oregon and Washington Territories.

The best way to study the Indian problem is to study the Indians themselves. The agents and employees on the reservations have all the means to test every element of this question.

Safety of Life and Property.

The agent, Edwin Eells, Esq., with wife and children, has lived among the Indians here seven years. The employees and their families have lived here from one to six years each, all without harm or fear. At any moment the Indians could have killed them, stolen their property, burnt the dwellings, and fled to the rugged hills and mountains. The agent has traversed the country occupied by his bands, alone, or with Indians, by day and by night, without injury or alarm, leaving his wife and little ones at their mercy. Whisky is excluded from the reservation, but outsiders have sold it to the Indians, and exposed him and his household and company to danger from them, when excited by it, and the more when arresting them and arraigning and convicting the sellers in the courts. But in no case has he or one of the whites received a blow, or a stab, or a shot, or a threat from an Indian during all these seven years.

Like facts can be put on record of the safety of agents and employees, and their families, on most, if not all the reservations in Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

Their property has also been safe. Agent Eells affirms that clothes are left out day and night, tools are left in open sheds, doors are never locked, and yet they have never had an article stolen. He adds that they have had no occasion to use force, or show weapons, except in the arrest or retention of criminals. For this police service he commonly appoints Indian constables. What is true on these counts of the S’Kokomish Indians, is true of other bands or tribes placed on reservations in this region. Those who live near them, or who have observed them in all conditions, both off and on the reservations, for the last fifteen, and even for thirty years, can bear witness that they are usually quiet, peaceable hunters, fishermen, or workers on farms, or in mills, or lumber camps, or in kitchens and laundries for the whites, exciting no fear among families, and causing no danger to lone travellers on the prairies or in the forests.

The Nez Percé reservation has been traversed for thirty years by whites in safety. Prospectors have ranged alone among their mountains, and through the gulches in all directions, in search of gold and silver for twenty years, in entire safety. Miners have followed and pitched their camps in every sort of lonely spot, exposed to the attacks of these savages. Long caravans of goods, in mule or wagon trains, in the care of a few teamsters, have passed back and forth among these Indians, and most of the other tribes, transporting merchandise of all kinds during the last twenty years, unmolested by the Indians. Express-men have had no fear to go to any mining camp of the upper country in charge of millions of gold. The mail carriers, on horses, have crossed and recrossed the whole Indian country unharmed. Stages, loaded down with mails and passengers, have rolled along over many of the same routes, having no more fear of Indians than of the white settlers, for whose convenience the post routes were established by government. Flocks and herds, in care of a few scattered men, have multiplied in all those regions. The robberies and murders, as the records of the courts testify, have been committed by white men. Sheriffs trace nearly every crime and outrage to the white, not to the Indian race.

The charges of a thieving, savage, murderous spirit made against the Indian in the public press, on the street, in the halls of debate and legislation, are not borne out by the facts. It is like charging a whole community with the vices and outrages of a small number of its members. It is like putting the stigma upon the whole South for the atrocities of Libby prison and Andersonville. It is the charge of fraud upon the U. S. A. for the defalcations and embarrassments of a few of her citizens.

In war or peace the Indian is cruel in revenge; but we cannot forget the massacres of Memphis. The victim in his grasp is tortured; but we remember the Chisholm and Hamburg horrors, and those in the negro parishes outside of New Orleans. He destroys without mercy, and devastates without remorse; but the Pittsburgh riots, the New York mobs, and the Commune of San Francisco, belong to the white race. He has burnt a few of our hamlets and settlers’ cabins. We have swept him and his household and his camps,—the only houses and cities that he can call his own—with canister and grape, the hail of iron and lead and fire. Having no commissariat, he has starved his prisoners. Without transportation or fortress for their safe keeping, he often raises the black flag and slays them at sight. But again and again, at the outset of battle, the order has moved along our line, “Take no prisoners!” Cold as steel, we have made a jest of his life, and hailed him good only when dead. We have steadily driven him from one hunting ground to another, over the rivers and beyond the lakes, hemmed him in from the gulfs and the oceans, crowded him off the prairies into rugged mountains, compelled him to sell his native lands, and have let loose the dogs of war upon him, because, forsooth, he has had the manhood to resist our march of doom against his race. If he has counted us the aggressors and the outlaws, we have hurled back upon him the fiercest invective known to human speech. If he, in the wild delirium of madness, has outraged and mutilated his captive, we have, in fiercer and more fiery passion, counselled, if not plotted, his extermination.

Progress in Civilization.

Proofs press upon the eye and ear of agents and employees that he does more and better with the means in his hand for the support of himself and family than other men would. I visited ten Indian families at their homes on the S’Kokomish reservation, on the 15th of August, and saw twenty more of their frame-boarded houses enclosed within their small claims. About thirty of the Indians, having finished haying, were away from home, most of them hunting in the mountains, or fishing at the weirs. Those at home had neat, well swept rooms, usually a sitting-room, bed-room and kitchen. Almost every one had a cooking stove, with its furniture, and crockery on the table, or in the cupboard a few chairs or benches, a clock in every house (often two), occasionally a rocking-chair and bureau, always one or two bedsteads, with beds and blankets, and often covered with a neat quilt of the wife’s taste and make. Cards and pictures were hung on the walls, and some of their photographs, also. They were dressed in comfortable clothes, and were glad of a call and a kindly greeting. They are adopting the manners of their white teachers.

The school, in charge of Deacon G. A Boynton, has a list of thirty-one pupils, twenty-four of them pure Indians, six half-breeds, and one little white girl. In dress, order and studiousness, they rank with many of our common-schools. In reading, singing, writing, at the blackboard, or in mental arithmetic, they evince ability to learn what white children learn. It is done more slowly, partly because while reciting in English they probably think in their own more familiar language, or in the jargon, and thus fail to get or convey the meaning of words quickly, and probably from lack of such mental training in their parents. The laws of heredity hold in them as in other people. Better shaped heads and finer brain power may be expected of their children.

In church and Sabbath-school, Indian parents and children meet with white parents and children, join in singing, listen to a sermon in the morning, translated by the interpreter into the Twana Indian language, and in the evening, to one in English. They exhibit a desire to learn the word of truth, and are profiting by their instructions. Several of the pupils in the school have become Christians and united with the church.

The testimony of the agent, the missionary, the teacher, the physician, the farmer and the carpenter, is uniform as to their capacity, and desire to improve and live like the whites, and of their real progress in industry and manner of living. They are trusted more and more, and they honor the trust.

It is cowardly to despise them and cast them out like dogs. It is noble to respect them as men and women, who have the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. They have claims on us for sympathy and help to secure these things. It is a credit to lift up the lowest, if we count them so. Those who know them best have most hope of them, if given a fair chance.

A Neglected Treaty.

No man will clear land and make a farm unless he owns it, or has a lien upon it. The treaty pledges them an allotment for a homestead on the reservation. It was made by Gov. Stevens, in Jane 1855, at Point-no-Point, and ratified by the government in 1859. In private and public speeches, with one voice, they plead for their titles. They want the patents promised in the bond nineteen years ago. With these in hand, they will improve their homes still more. It is a reasonable demand. The plan to remove them from these lands, where they were born, excites their fears and their rebellion. We cannot expect them to rest in quiet and work with energy until we give them the motive of ownership in the soil they till and the timber they cut. This is the question of the hour for the Indian. Shall he own in law his garden and his field and his house, or hold it as a tenant at the will of another, liable to ejectment? If government grant the former, as it has promised, the largest factor of the problem will be found that will solve the rest of it.

GREEN BAY AGENCY, KESHENA, WIS.

JOS. C. BRIDGMAN, ESQ., AGENT.

The Stockbridge tribe take very little interest in education. The head men, not specially interested, voted to have only six months’ schooling, paying the teacher but $25 per month. As this tribe receive $3,800 a year, the same being the interest on their funds in the hands of the Government, this meagre sum is illiberal. Rev. J. Slingerland, who has been both preacher and teacher for this tribe for many years, is still retained. While the number of children of school age is twenty-five, with nearly as many of the “old citizen” party, who are not allowed privileges, the greatest number attending any one month is thirteen, and the average for the year is ten. The church membership is twenty-nine.

The Oneidas are making an unusually good record. Their crops are nearly or quite one-third larger than last year. The school attendance shows an increase of thirty-seven, and the church membership fifty-three over last year.

The Methodist Mission-school is unfortunately located for reaching even a fair number of scholars, and Rev. S. W. Ford, without additional compensation, has opened a school a mile and a half distant; his daughter, Miss Mary W. Ford, teaching the Mission school without pay. The records of the two schools are seventy-nine scholars enrolled, with an average attendance of forty-five, against an average of twenty-six for the one school of last year. I am urging upon the Department the wisdom of establishing this new school, which was started as an experiment, with the result as above. Unless thus sustained it will be abolished, as Mr. Ford cannot give his time without reward.