The American Missionary

CONTENTS

• PICTURE OF MR. DANIEL HAND
• EDITORIAL.
  • NEW YEAR'S GREETINGS
  • FINANCIAL
  • LARGE GIFTS OF THE WEALTHY
  • THE SOUTHERN SITUATION
  • PARAGRAPHS
  • ITEMS FROM THE FIELD
  • DEATH OF MRS. GEO. A. WOODARD
  • SYSTEMATIC SPENDING. REV. C.J. RYDER
• THE CHINESE.
  • SCRAPS FROM CORRESPONDENCE
• BUREAU OF WOMAN'S WORK.
  • STATE ORGANIZATIONS
  • ANNUAL MEETING
  • MOUNTAIN WHITE WORK.MOUNTAIN WHITE WORK. MRS. A.A. MYERS
  • NEEDS OF COLORED WOMEN AND GIRLS. MRS. G.W. MOORE
• RECEIPTS

NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION,
Rooms, 56 Reade Street.

American Missionary Association

• PRESIDENT, Rev. WM. M. TAYLOR, D.D., LLD., N.Y.
• Vice-Presidents.
  • Rev. A.J.F. BEHRENDS, D.D., N.Y.
  • Rev. ALEX. MCKENZIE, D.D., Mass.
  • Rev. F.A. NOBLE, D.D., Ill.
  • Rev. D.O. MEARS, D.D., Mass.
  • Rev. HENRY HOPKINS, D.D., Mo.
• Corresponding Secretaries.
  • Rev. M.E. STRIEBY, D.D., 56 Reade Street, N.Y.
  • Rev. A.F. BEARD, D.D., 56 Reade Street, N.Y.
• Recording Secretary.
  • Rev. M.E. STRIEBY, D.D., 56 Reade Street, N.Y.
• Treasurer.
  • H.W. HUBBARD, Esq., 56 Reade Street, N.Y.
• Auditors.
  • PETER McCARTEE.
  • CHAS. P. PEIRCE.
• Executive Committee.
  • JOHN H. WASHBURN, Chairman.
  • ADDISON P. FOSTER, Secretary.
    
  • For Three Years.
    • J.E. RANKIN,
    • WM. H. WARD,
    • J.W. COOPER,
    • JOHN H. WASHBURN,
    • EDMUND L. CHAMPLIN.
  • For Two Years.
    • LYMAN ABBOTT,
    • CHAS. A. HULL,
    • J.R. DANFORTH,
    • CLINTON B. FISK,
    • ADDISON P. FOSTER.
  • For One Year.
    • S.B. HALLIDAY,
    • SAMUEL HOLMES,
    • SAMUEL S. MARPLES,
    • CHARLES L. MEAD,
    • ELBERT B. MONROE.
• District Secretaries.
  • Rev. C.J. RYDER, 21 Cong'l House, Boston.
  • Rev. J.E. ROY, D.D., 151 Washington Street, Chicago.
• Financial Secretary for Indian Missions.
  • Rev. CHAS. W. SHELTON
• Field Superintendents.
  • Rev. FRANK E. JENKINS.
  • Prof. EDWARD S. HALL.
• Secretary of Woman's Bureau.
  • Miss D.E. EMERSON, 56 Reade St., N.Y.

COMMUNICATIONS

Relating to the work of the Association may be addressed to the Corresponding Secretaries; letters for "THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY," to the Editor, at the New York Office.

DONATIONS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS

In drafts, checks, registered letters, or post-office orders, may be sent to H.W. Hubbard, Treasurer, 56 Reade Street, New York, or, when more convenient, to either of the Branch Offices, 21 Congregational House, Boston, Mass., or 151 Washington Street, Chicago, Ill. A payment of thirty dollars at one time constitutes a Life Member.

NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS.—The date on the "address label," indicates the time to which the subscription is paid. Changes are made in date on label to the 10th of each month. If payment of subscription be made afterward, the change on the label will appear a month later. Please send early notice of change in post-office address, giving the former address and the new address, in order that our periodicals and occasional papers may be correctly mailed.

FORM OF A BEQUEST.

"I bequeath to my executor (or executors) the sum of —— dollars, in trust, to pay the same in —— days after my decease to the person who, when the same is payable, shall act as Treasurer of the 'American Missionary Association,' of New York City, to be applied, under the direction of the Executive Committee of the Association, to its charitable uses and purposes." The Will should be attested by three witnesses.

Daniel Hand

THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY.

American Missionary Association.

We present to our readers, on the opposite page, a picture of Mr. Daniel Hand from a photograph taken some time ago. It presents the likeness of a man of fine physical proportions and with energy and intelligence impressed on the features. The signature at the bottom of the picture is copied from one of Mr. Hand's recent letters, and shows the remarkable physical vigor of a man in his 88th year.

NEW YEAR'S GREETINGS.

The New Year opens upon us auspiciously, and we send forth our joyous greetings to our patrons at home, and to our fellow workers in the field. Above all we thank God for putting us into this ministry for the poor and the ignorant, and for the success granted to us in prosecuting it. We have had sorrows and anxieties, but they have been followed by consolations and deliverances. The hand that penned the "Happy New Year" in our MISSIONARY for last January, is now silent in the grave, but the memory of Brother Powell's life and character is so precious that it mitigates our loss. The yellow fever prevented the opening of many of our schools, and awakened fears of widespread hindrance to our work throughout the South; but the scourge was restrained, and the work now goes on prosperously. Our last fiscal year drew towards its close with the cloud of a large debt looming up, but our friends responded so generously to our appeals, that the year ended with a debt so small as to be only a salutary warning.

But the crowning mercy of the year came at our Annual Meeting, when we were able to announce the gift of over a million of dollars from that generous friend of the poor Negro, Mr. Daniel Hand. It is a wonderful gift, and comes in a good way. The income only can be used, and that will do just [2]so much more for the Negro, and will not be applied to work now in progress. We are tempted to fear that our patrons will diminish their gifts because Mr. Hand has been so liberal. But we will have faith in God, who has entrusted us with this great work, and we will enter upon our new year with the full confidence that every friend of the Association who appreciates our responsibilities to Christ and the Nation, will decide that his gifts to us shall be increased and not diminished in this year of grace 1889.

Financial.

Emphasis is added to the closing words of the preceding article by the report of our Treasurer for the first two months of our fiscal year, October and November. The receipts for those two months were, from donations, $31,261.99; from estates, $3,961.29; from income, $1,822.72, making a total for current work of $37,046. The Association needs $62,500 for these two months. Let us remind our patrons that Mr. Hand's gift will do its own work and not theirs. We think they will feel that it is only honorable to let Mr. Hand's benefaction add so much new work, and that it should not be used simply to relieve others. The great, pressing, and stupendous work which rests upon this Association as the representative of the churches, must not stand still. Patriots and statesmen are becoming alarmed at the Southern situation, and while they will do what they can to meet the emergency, we believe that the grand solution of the problem is in the Christian enlightenment and the industrial progress of the Negro. May God grant that the Christians of this land may not fail to see their special responsibilities and to meet them in the spirit of Christian liberality and self-sacrifice.

Large Gifts of the Wealthy.

It is refreshing to find in this grasping, selfish and money-making world that there are wealthy men who amass fortunes and use them for noble purposes. It is said that growing wealth only tightens the grip on the money and hardens the heart against the calls of benevolence. But the examples are accumulating that give shining evidence that there are noble exceptions. Mr. Hand has added his name to the number. He knows the needs of the colored people, and he devotes a vast fortune to their benefit. But Mr. Hand has not exhausted the opportunities, even in the range of the work of this Association, for blessing needy races of men, or of aiding in the varied forms of effort for the colored people. The mountain regions of the South present an unique and promising field of effort. The inhabitants are a noble people, descendants of some of the best races that settled America. Their mountain isolation separated them from the people around them. The want of schools and churches left them ignorant, their thin mountain lands kept [3]them poor; but they never held slaves and they were loyal to the Union in the war. Railroads now penetrate their mountains and valleys, and the hitherto unused wealth of mines and timber is brought to light. A new future opens out to these people, and the question is, "Shall that future be one of prosperity and piety, or one of intemperance and infidelity?" Some other man wise and wealthy can do for these people what Daniel Hand has done for the primary and industrial education of the Negroes. But this does not exhaust the opening for large investments in the work of the Association. The Indians are fewer in number than the blacks or whites of the South, and their future will sooner be determined by their being incorporated into the national life as citizens, yet that problem is not settled, and a large fund could be wisely used for their benefit. Then, too, our higher schools and colleges need endowment, and our church work should be indefinitely expanded.

If this review does not succeed in drawing large gifts for these several objects, it may at least serve to show that our wants are not all provided for, and that smaller contributors have still the duty and the privilege of aiding by gifts and prayer this good work of patriotism and Christianity.

THE SOUTHERN SITUATION.

The position of the South is becoming once more clearly defined. Before the war, it was fully formulated thus: The Negroes are an inferior race, and slavery is their divinely ordained condition. To this was added: The Negro question is purely local, and with it no one outside of the South has any right to interfere. To these axioms agreed the press, the pulpit and the politician. But the war came as an earthquake, with the utter upheaval of these firm foundations.

During the years of reconstruction and political agitation, uncertainty prevailed, but now again the Southern position is becoming settled. It is the old position with a variation. It runs: The Negroes are an inferior race, and must be held as a peasant class in subjection to the superior white race. To this the warning is again added: This is purely a domestic affair, and all outsiders must keep tongues and hands off. This revised version of the old theory is proclaimed by Senator Eustis in his now somewhat famous article in the Forum. More recently it has been re-affirmed in the fervid eloquence of Mr. Grady, of Atlanta, in his address at Dallas, Texas.

This is the same orator (he is an orator) who a few years since electrified the whole country by his speech at the New England dinner, on the "New South." But the logic of Southern events has driven him down again to the platform of the "Old South." More recently still, the Governor of South Carolina, in his message to the Legislature, has taken the same position.

These three gentlemen, representing the press and the politician, are sustained [4]by the pulpit in the South. For example, the Presbyterian church South repels all overtures for re-union with the Presbyterian church North, because such a re-union would involve a practical recognition of the equal manhood of the inferior race. The Presbyterian church South does not stand alone on this platform. Other denominations are arrayed side by side with it, and we fear that even the Congregationalists in the South, with two Conferences in the same State, one white and the other black, are in danger of being numbered with them.

This is the Southern position. It portends the renewal of the old antagonism. It repels the North, denying its right to interfere, and thus draws again the sectional line; and above all, it sets up sharply the antagonism of races, consigning the Negro permanently to an inferior place. This implies, of course, that if the Negro will not quietly accept this place, he must be compelled to do so by force of arms, and in this struggle the North is notified that it has no right to interfere. We can only express our amazement at this theory! With the memory of the war so fresh, when the North broke over all warnings against interference, and stepped in to aid the helpless slave, can the South now hope to make these warnings any more efficacious? Can it hope that the North will acquiesce in a quasi slavery, that sets aside substantially all that it gained and established by the long war?

And if the struggle comes again, what hope of success can the South cherish? If in the last national struggle, it was overpowered when the slave, as Mr. Grady acknowledges, guarded the house while his master fought for his perpetual enslavement, what can it do when the Negroes have tasted freedom for a quarter of a century, and now number nearly as many as the whites in the South? It is for the white people of the South to say whether that struggle shall come. The North does not desire it, the Negro does not desire it, and we sincerely believe that a large share of the people of the South do not want it. Rev. Dr. Haygood, the efficient agent of the Slater Fund, in a recent article in The Independent, in reply to Senator Eustis, voices, as we hope, the sentiments of thoughtful and influential Southerners. But it remains to be seen whether these wise counselors will be heard. Such voices were uttered before the war, but they were drowned in the noise of sectional hatred and the imperious demands of slavery. God grant that the sad lesson of the past may be heeded.

In the meantime, the A.M.A. will continue its efforts at what it believes to be the true solution of the Southern problem—the Christian, educational and industrial advancement of the colored people. With the help of the great benefaction of Mr. Hand, whose money was made in the South, and is now consecrated to the South, we shall go forward with greater zeal and encouragement. We are not partizans; we are not sectionalists. We are working for the good of both whites and blacks, and for the peace and prosperity of our common country.

[5]The election of Benjamin Harrison as President of the United States, and the restoration of the Republican party to power, awakens special attention to the probable attitude of both towards the great Southern problem. We have no opinion to express on the subject, and we have no interest in it as a mere party question, but only as it may lead to the sober and earnest investigation of that transcendently important problem which requires the unbiased and honest consideration of the patriot, the statesman and the Christian.

The combination of the Christian powers of Europe for the suppression of the nefarious African slave-trade is a measure sanctioned by Christianity and humanity, and is in the interest of the world's commerce. The effort can be hopefully undertaken. The abolition of slavery in the Western Hemisphere—once the great slave mart—confines the outlet of the traffic to the eastern coast of Africa, and the blockade can be made more effective than when both sides of the great continent had to be guarded.

An esteemed Christian brother, who made his wife a Life Member of the Association in 1854, and who has added a member to the list each year since by his personal gift, speaks of the pleasure he finds in thus contributing to our treasury, and at the same time enlisting others in our work. We commend to our patrons this helpful and agreeable way of doing good. Try it.

ITEMS FROM THE FIELD.

From a teacher in one of our schools in the mountain country:

"As I go among the homes I continually see something new which shows me how great are the needs of the people here. The primitive ways and simplicity of the mountain people strike me and I sometimes imagine that I am in a country a century behind the times. Last week I made a call at the home of one of my pupils whose mother was sick. As I entered the room I could not distinguish the faces of those who sat about the fire, for the room had no windows. The only light that came in was through a door in an outer room, and it seemed to let in more cold than light. I wondered how much work or enjoyment could be got out of such dark, small quarters, while the sick woman told of her struggle with sickness and poverty. She also gave me some history of her early life, which showed a great lack of necessary instruction in what are the best things. The children of this home look like sickly plants which have always lived in the dark and which have never felt the invigorating influence of God's beautiful sunshine. We are praying that the sunshine of God's love may be felt in the hearts of this people, even if there are no windows in their homes to let it in."

[6]From a pastor in Kentucky:

"We are busily at work in this mountain country, and as we think of wider possibilities for the mountain boys, you cannot imagine our gratitude in view of our hopes that a new industrial department will be opened. It has been the subject of many a prayer in the closet and in teachers' meetings, and we feel that all that is needed will be supplied according to His riches who gave himself for us. He has heard our united petitions for a pastor to gather the straying flock and relieve our overworked missionaries. We held our weekly teachers' meeting on Friday. Last evening as we were sitting together as usual, one spoke of the coming pastor, when lo, he was ushered in. He has really come. We rejoice in our work, but we see so much just ahead. I long for the time to come when this interesting people shall be a 'peculiar' people in the better sense."

From a teacher at Jonesboro, Tenn.:

"Each week brings new accessions to the school: there are now nearly a hundred enrolled. All the seats in the primary room are in use, so that when Miss Smith has a full school she has to seat some of her scholars in chairs. The seats in Miss Page's room are also full. We have eight pupils who room here and board themselves. Four of them come from Scott Co., Va., coming ninety miles. They are young men and women, but they have had very little opportunity for education. They are anxious to learn and try to carefully obey the rules of the school. We hope they will gain much from church and Sunday-school and the influences thrown around them here, as well as the lessons from the school room. Yesterday we had applications from four others from the same region for accommodations—a young married man and his little daughter, seven years old—a young man and a young woman. We said, 'Come and we will do our best for you;' but if others apply we shall have to tell them we are full. These are just the kind of people we want; eager to learn and willing to do the best they can."

From a school in North Carolina:

"Your letter of the 28th, informing us that we can have assistance from the Hand Fund for a certain number of pupils, is received, and we have had a continual thanksgiving ever since. If I could tell you how the mothers looked when I told them, and if I could put down the tones of their voices as well as their words, you would be sure that the help is appreciated."

The pastor of the church and teacher of the Theological Department of Straight University writes us:

"The religious interest has so deepened that for several weeks I have been preaching three times a week. Four or five prayer meetings have been started by the students of their own accord in each other's rooms. Eleven united with us on profession of faith at our last communion, and as many [7]more have made a start at different meetings, and will unite with us at the next communion. A remarkable feature about the work is the fact that numbers of the older students who are most deeply interested are Roman Catholics. One young man who united with us is a Spaniard from Matamoras, Mexico, and has been educated as a Roman Catholic. I believe he may be counted on to do loyal service in his native city. In this way the A.M.A. is ever doing 'foreign work,' and work which I believe will tell in Mexico, Cuba, and the Central American States.

"If some benevolent friend in the North would send us twenty-five copies of Stalker's Life of Christ, it would be of great help in this work."

Information respecting a very interesting revival of religion comes to us from Sherwood, Tenn.

Increased religious interest is reported from Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn.

The teachers in the Normal School at Lexington are taking new courage in their work in view of their increasing facilities.

One of our young men who expects to take up missionary work this fall thus expresses himself: "I don't suppose that I know very much; but one thing I know, and that is the Dakota Bible. I can read that to the people and talk about it in my own language, and they can understand me, and that is what they need; they need the Bible."—Word Carrier.

A CHINAMAN'S VIEW OF A FAMILIAR TEXT.—The writer was for a time a pupil in the White Street Mission School in New York, but he is now a prosperous laundryman at Kingston, N.Y. In a recent letter to one of his former teachers, he gives the following bit of New Testament exegesis: "I led the Young Men's Christian Association meeting on the Sunday before January 11th. The subject which I gave out: 'The Christian must be born twice;' and also read the Scriptures in chapter iii of the Gospel St. John, and explain to them. I said if a man in this world born twice, he only die once, and if a man born once he die twice. I mean if a man born twice he must born again of the spirit; his soul shall save; that is, he only die once. If a man born once his body shall die and his soul also perish; that is, he die twice. After the meeting was pass one of the old gentleman came to me and said, 'Are you a missionary?' I answered him 'No.' I said 'I am a laundryman.' And good people thought I was missionary."—The Foreign Missionary.

[8]Full of encouragement to the workers for the Chinese here in America is the fact that most of the students entering the new Christian college in Canton were formerly Sunday-school scholars in America. Most of these converted Chinamen who return to their own country are said to take their part in various forms of Christian work. What an inspiration to the patient teacher, who spends an hour or more every Sunday in trying to Christianize a single Chinaman, to think that, in this indirect way, he, or more frequently she, may be helping on the conversion of China.—The Congregationalist.

These very just remarks are equally applicable to the work the American Missionary Association is doing so largely and effectively among the Chinese on the Pacific coast. A letter from Mr. Pond gives us this corroborative item:

"On Monday evening, November 26, we expect to hold a farewell meeting for Joe Jet, once one of our missionary helpers, who is going back to China to superintend missionary operations for our Chinese Missionary Society. He takes over $1,100 with him, contributed for this purpose by the Chinese connected with our mission. To this Missionary Society, our Christian Chinese contribute regularly each month, from twenty-five to fifty cents. They aim to do quite a large work, which they hope that the representatives of the Board will superintend, but the whole expense of which they mean to bear."

The American Missionary Association has been greatly afflicted in the death of Mrs. George A. Woodard, the wife of the Principal of Gregory Institute, Wilmington, N.C. She was a most devoted missionary, consecrating her earnestness and fidelity to the cause of Christ. She will be sadly missed by the colored people of Wilmington, and by those who are inmates of the Teachers' Home at Gregory Institute.

SYSTEMATIC SPENDING.

BY REV. C.J. RYDER.

The pastor of a Boston church recently handed to the District Secretary of the A.M.A. $1, saying as he did so: "That one dollar is really more than some hundreds of dollars. It is the gift of a poor woman in my congregation who depends upon her own labor for support. She gives this dollar to the A.M.A. from her hard economy." It may be that God's decimal pointing is not the same as ours in many cases.

On a table of the same district office of the A.M.A., there stands a little brown pasteboard box. In it are some tracts offered for sale. All the proceeds from their sale go into the treasury of the Association. These tracts [9]were printed at the expense of a poor woman who has spent a long and useful life in service for others. She comes into that office now and again to see if her gift is increasing. She is not fashionably dressed. No! She never drives to the Congregational House in a carriage. I doubt if she often enjoys the luxury of a street-car ride, although she is upward of seventy years of age; and yet she never comes through that office door but she brings with her the bright glory of spiritual sunshine, and the wealth of her Lord's own presence. She is pinching herself in almost painful economy that she may have $100 to give to this great mission work before she dies, and

Now let us turn a moment to the other side of the A.M.A. work. I hold in my hand a letter written upon this scrap of paper by a colored boy in the South and sent to one of our missionaries who had come North:

"Oct. 21. My Dear Friend, Mr. Brown—I wish you would if you please if you please send me three dollars and a half now if you please send it I want to buy a good little shot gun please send it."

These facts present the double responsibility which the A.M.A. sustains to its constituency in this vast and complex missionary work. None of these facts are exceptional in character. The Association must so present its work to the churches as to "constrain" them to give; drag them by the chains of Christian duty to give; those who can of their abundance abundantly; those who must of their penury, with this tremendous self-sacrifice.

An old colored preacher in Georgia, in my hearing, preached on "Pasteboard Christians." He said: "Brethren, did you neber see a pasteboard box? It's mighty nice; maybe all covered with gilt paper; looks right stiff and stout, but you just set it out in the rain and see it when it goes 'pooh,' and am all omnatiously busted. It am jest so with some Christians. They comes to meetin' with good clothes on; they looks drefful fine! But you just pass the contribution box 'round, da goes 'pooh!' and dar ain't nothin' left of 'em." It has not been my experience that there are many pasteboard Christians in the district of New England. Systematic giving, giving constantly, giving because the safety of our country requires it, and the kingdom of Christ demands it; this is the sort of giving which I have found to be the rule.

But there must be systematic spending as truly as systematic giving. The gifts of the churches must be husbanded, and the churches must be warned from time to time against wasteful and unwise efforts, by which others are seeking to do the work, which is being done systematically through your agent, the American Missionary Association.

My personal experience as Field Superintendent, has pressed upon me the imperative importance of this side of the responsibility which this [10]Association holds to the churches. One must pass back and forth often, and become personally familiar with this great field, before he can understand the importance of the systematic spending of this Association. Wrecks of schools and churches are not few in the Southland. Godly men and women and godless adventurers have experimented in many places. Money has been and is being wasted, that might be used to great and permanent advantage if contributed through the A.M.A. and disbursed according to the principles which long experience has proved to be sound.

It is the purpose of this paper to emphasize some of the facts concerning this great missionary field, and to point out the advantages of systematic spending, which you secure when you commit your funds to this society rather than to the hap-hazard efforts which you have no power to supervise and no control over.

An organized society controlled and directed by those who contribute is the surest possible way of securing this systematic spending. This method has both negative and positive advantages:

I. It prevents waste.

(a.) Waste in administration of funds. Its accounts are open to and audited by those whose money is being spent. Reports of the financial standing, receipts and expenditures to the half-penny are presented every year. Look them over and note how minutely your accounts are kept. Officers and missionaries are held by you to strictest responsibility. This is sound business sense applied to missionary work. But one naturally asks why, when such absolute safeguards are thrown around the administration of the funds committed to the A.M.A., some of those who established those safeguards give a considerable portion of their money to individuals over whose expenditure they have absolutely no control, and where funds may be, and often are, wasted? And in this way the percentage of the cost of administering the funds committed to the A.M.A. is also increased. This can scarcely be called sound business wisdom.

(b.) Waste in field work. It requires wide experience and knowledge of the whole field in order to adjust and direct, without waste of laborers, the force of missionaries. Those who know only one locality cannot do this. It is often remarked that each missionary thinks his particular field the most important, and the one especially needing help and enlargement. This is a grand tribute to their faithfulness and Christian enthusiasm. But the systematic investigation of the whole field, constantly and patiently carried on as it is by the A.M.A., determines with larger wisdom whether work should be strengthened and developed in Tennessee, or Georgia, or Texas. Gen. Grant was familiar with the whole field, and placed his men according to the varying exigencies of the campaign. Just so the systematic methods of this Association place these noble missionaries where there will be least waste of labor.

[11]But there are also positive advantages secured by the systematic methods of the A.M.A. in expending the money committed to its treasury.

II. It secures proportion in different parts of the work.

(a.) In appeal.—This Association, constituted, as it is, the immediate agent of the churches, ought to be your watchman on the tower.

Every pastor is crowded with parish duties. Few intelligent laymen can give time enough to study thoroughly the whole field covered by the missions of the A.M.A. It is now an enormous field. Representatives of five distinct races, Japanese, Chinese, Indians, Mountain Whites and Negroes wait for Christian instruction very largely upon the missionaries you are sending out.

Now, no one who is not compelled by official duties to do it can find time, nor has he the information at hand, to investigate thoroughly each department of this missionary work. The A.M.A. is your agent to discover, through careful and patient investigation, the exact facts, and so to direct its appeals to the churches that the department of work which is especially pressing may be given due prominence. Systematic spending involves this.

(b.) Greatest care is required and exercised in planting new work. Let us in fancy plant a new school in the South, as the Association does it. Exhaustive correspondence is of course, the first step. Then the Field Superintendent visits the field. He gathers every possible fact bearing upon the question: The population; schools, if any; the opinions of white and colored citizens; the religious complexion of the community, etc., etc., etc. Now this Field Superintendent has studied maps and statistics and school reports, and been back and forth until the whole field is in his mind, not simply this one locality. These facts in extenso are reported to the officers in New York. Conferences many and patient are held over them until finally it is settled that this place rather than some other shall be selected for the new school. Now such care as this would be impossible except as the A.M.A., through its officers and teachers, knew the whole field. By independent or individual effort this could not be done. It is not the absolute, but the comparative need and hopefulness that determine the wisdom of fixing upon a certain place for a school or church. This comparative need can only be known by an organized society which has frequent and abundant communication with the whole field, and has officers whose business it is to know that field. The experiments being tried in different places have already been made by the A.M.A., and proved to be either absolutely failures or relatively an uneconomic use of funds.

The saving to you who furnish the money is very great by this method of systematic spending. Let me illustrate by a single example which occurred only a few months ago. Two towns, only a few miles apart, were clamoring for help in school work. We opened a school tentatively in one of these places, as we had one missionary there already, and I visited the other place. This is what I found: A teacher independent of any society, [12]and consequently knowing only a small part of the South, had opened a school. She had labored very faithfully, but very unwisely, putting money and years of hard work into a field which, from its very conditions, could not be largely successful. She had a poor building for teachers' home, a rough school-house with no desks, a narrow strip of land, and an enrollment of about eighty pupils. She was anxious to have the A.M.A. take the work. She informed me that in order to secure it, it would be necessary to pay out from $2,500 to $3,000 in paying debts and putting the buildings in shape for advantageous use. This was the case then: A fairly good house, a rough school-house, a bit of land, and a school of less than one hundred pupils, costing at least $2,500. At the other point under discussion, there were five acres of land, five buildings, an enrollment of about 250 pupils, and the whole property could be secured for $600! $2,500 vs. $600.

These are not very exceptional cases. It is only fair to the generous constituency of this Association to know that their funds are being thus guarded, and that those who give through independent agencies may have their funds squandered because they cannot hold those doing this independent work to strict account as they do the Association, nor can these independent missionaries know the whole field as the A.M.A. knows it. Here are nearly 500 missionaries in constant correspondence with this office, besides the field officers appointed especially to gather information.

(c.) Again, this systematic method of disbursing funds secures a methodical arrangement of field work. Take the mountain field as an illustration of this. This field has been divided into two general districts; one having for its base the L.N.R.R., the other lying along the Cincinnati Southern Railroad. Each department has its general missionary, who goes back and forth in his district to lay out new work, and to superintend the old. The missionaries, pastors and teachers are all busy in their own places. Here then is systematic development of this whole work. These noble missionaries in this way form a well-organized army, and are not guerrillas fighting behind trees and stones, and scattered hap-hazard over the mountains. We shall hold these lines of railroad in the name of the Lord. Churches and missions and Sunday-schools will supplant the saloons and gambling hells if you as churches generously support this painfully urgent work. But when school-houses shall stand in all their fertile coves and church bells shall call to intelligent Christian worship on all those mountain sides, and the people shall be lifted up into spiritual citizenship, it will simply be the victory under God of the systematic planning and execution possible only when funds are disbursed on the sound principles of this Association.

III. This systematic spending of benevolent funds also secures permanency. How few deaths there are in the family of A.M.A. schools and churches! Why? Because these missions are born through wisdom and sound judgment. These schools and churches are not only permanent [13]but they will also perpetuate the great fundamental principles of the churches whose prayers and money have gone into their establishment.

These missions cannot become Roman Catholic or infidel. They cannot drift away from the safe moorings of evangelical truth, unless the churches to which they are tied up give way. The churches control these missions forever. Local management in this work often means mismanagement, on account of the peculiar surroundings in which these schools are placed. They differ radically from schools and colleges planted among the new settlers in the West. Here in the South there is no considerable intelligent Christian constituency to direct their work, manage their affairs and keep them in close connection with Congregational conferences and councils.

IV. Lastly. By means of this systematic spending you keep step with the grand onward movement of God's providence in the marvelous openings of this great missionary field. How wonderfully this work develops! The primary schools of the early period have grown into normal and preparatory institutes and colleges and theological seminaries, although the primary work is still being done and well done! New schools are being planted. "Enter the mountains with your mission host," came the command, and it was done. Industrial training became necessary to the best furnishing of these young people for their life-work and their largest intellectual development, and now thorough training in these departments is furnished by the schools of the American Missionary Association. The grand work has kept step with the developing needs.

I asked one of the most experienced teachers and missionaries in the South what feature of the A.M.A. especially impressed him. He replied at once, "The wonderful and consummate statesmanship displayed in its management. The wisdom manifested in planting schools and churches, and in keeping pace with the new and constantly changing conditions of this great and perplexing field, absolutely astounds me." This is no tribute to those of us who have recently entered this service.

To sum up this argument, then: By the systematic method of spending through the A.M.A., you avoid—

I. Waste, (1.) In administration. (2.) In field work.

II. You secure the wisest apportionment of the work, (1.) Appeals are systematic. (2.) The work is developed proportionately. (3.) And each department is systematically conducted.

III. You can secure permanency in the work, (b.) And perpetuate the principles you believe to be of fundamental importance in uplifting these races.

IV. You keep step with God's providence in the development of these fields.

It is told us that during the days that immediately preceded the capture of Richmond, Sheridan was in hot pursuit of Lee's retreating troops. He telegraphed to Grant, "I think if the thing is pushed Lee will surrender." [14]There came flashing back this laconic message from that silent soldier, "Push things." They were pushed, and within a few weeks Lee's army was annihilated, and the sword of the haughty rebel was in the hands of the loyal Grant. The Union army had pushed through the broken fortifications around Richmond and planted the grand old stars and stripes, battle-stained and bullet-torn, above the dome of the rebel capitol, never, never, never to be pulled down again by disloyal hands.

My brethren, there comes flashing to us to-day from this army of Christ-like men and women away out yonder in front of us, from out the heat of battle against ignorance, and prejudice, and misery, and sin, these stirring words: "We can take these lowlands and mountains and prairies and ocean coasts for our Lord, and for his Christ, now if the thing be pushed."

What message shall we send back to them, O people of God?

Shall it not be this? "We pledge you our prayers, our sympathy, our best sons and daughters and five hundred thousand dollars in consecrated money this year; and in the great name of the Lord our God let the thing be pushed."

THE CHINESE.

SCRAPS FROM MY CORRESPONDENCE.

BY REV. W.C. POND.

Our limited space forbids the publication of extended correspondence; and yet, often, in the familiar and unstudied letters which I receive from our workers, there are paragraphs or sentences which I greatly desire that our Eastern friends and helpers might share with me. The following are a few of these.

Mrs. Carrington, our very faithful and efficient teacher at Sacramento, writes as follows: "Our school seems in better condition than for many months. Chin Toy [missionary helper] is true and watchful. Two joined the church at the last communion, one has given his name to join the Association, and others seem almost ready."

Our school at Oroville has been for a year past in the hands of two quite young, but true hearted and enthusiastic teachers, from one of whom I hear in this way: "We have had a very good school this month. The attendance has been very good; the scholars seem to feel better, and I think the teachers do too. We had quite a re-union one evening last month. There was one brother who had just returned from China, and another from away out in the country. The former had not been here for years, nor the latter for more than twelve months. It would have done any one good to see how glad they were to meet each other. I never saw so much hand-shaking, and talking, and laughing. Both these are good scholars and will help us much. We have the Bible lessons twice a week, and they are very interesting to us [15]both. We have nearly finished the Gospel of Mark, and it gets more interesting towards the last."

Other extracts shall be from letters of our Chinese brethren. Here is one who has evidently gotten over into an American way of thinking. He is so much in earnest that his English is badly wrenched in the effort to convey his views, but I give his words very nearly as he wrote them. "What I think and what often I observed is that the Chinese very meanness and sordidness, just exactly what were the Jews. Scatter all round the world, and still they feel very proud of their country, despise the foreigners, close all their sea-ports, would not allow the poor celestial to go out or have civilized men to enter the happy country. On account of their ignorance of Christ, unhappy, miserable, wretched. Some of them think good deal of their improvement, national, naval, but if the Government will not adopt the Christianity and put behind their ancestor and evil ways and the wicked custom, they will not be very flourishing what they look for." For himself he says, "I hope I will have a good opportunity while I am working for the Lord and looking for some souls to bring to the Lord, as His will be done."

Another writes: "I speak in Chinatown yesterday. Then we had very good singers of American Christian young men (they were five) and Chinese brethren (they were eight.). All go on to sing with me. Then I have a good chance. I pray God to help and hope our countrymen immediately come to repent and follow Christ and worship Him." And again, "I thank God for His blessing. This school now is increasing. Last evening we had twenty-three scholars. Six new ones came in this month. I like stay here two or three months more and talk this gospel of Christ."

Another translated for me a letter just received from his father-in-law in China—a letter which gives him great joy. "Dear Son-in-law:—Your letter was reached me some ten days ago, and glad to read it and that you are all right in California, doing Jesus work. But there was a fellow named —— —— who had come back from San Francisco last year. This fellow came to me with some news to tell me, so he said. So I asked him to sit down and gave him a cup of tea. Then he commenced his false story about you being poisoned by the Jesus doctors, and that your heart had been poisoned so that you don't want to come back any more. After the length of his false talks, I commenced to ask him questions which he cannot answer. I told him that I had known my son-in-law too much about his faith in Jesus. People with the same report came to me from time to time, before you [i.e., the son-in-law addressed in the letter,—W.C.P.] came back the last time. At first I have faith in their talks, but since you came home, I have found you all right. Now a mission is near my house, and I have time to talk and to read the Jesus books, and have found that Jesus is like our Confucius, and I believed Jesus words all right and so my son-in-law all-right too. Thus I have told the dog, [i.e., the tale-bearer] to get off from my door and not call on me again."

[16]I hope there may yet be space for this extract from a letter from Jee Gam, who took a vacation of two weeks, spending it not far from a Chinese fishing village near Monterey. "Sunday morning, accompanied by about ten American friends, I went to Chinatown to hold a preaching service. After singing several times and offering prayer, I took the stand and preached to a large crowd of my countrymen, of both sexes and all ages, drawn by our loud invitation and our songs. Before I began my sermon I told them what we had been singing about, also what we prayed for, and to whom we prayed, and asked them to see the difference between these Christian Americans who sang and prayed for us, and those who would crowd us out Then I preached on Gal. 6:7, for nearly an hour, and all listened attentively. Not one of the hearers said anything against us. I was told that two years ago a Chinaman had tried to preach there, but the people drowned his voice by beating their tin cans, and drove him off with various missiles. When I heard this I said, 'I am not afraid, God will go with us; with his help I will preach Christ to them.' And he did help, and oh, may he bless the seed sown! On Sunday evening one of the Chinese came out decided as a Christian, and one other seemed almost persuaded."

BUREAU OF WOMAN'S WORK.

MISS D.E. EMERSON, SECRETARY.

WOMAN'S STATE ORGANIZATIONS.

CO-OPERATING WITH THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION.

• ME—Woman's Aid to A.M.A.,
  • Chairman of Committee, Mrs. C.A. Woodbury, Woodfords, Me.
• VT.—Woman's Aid to A.M.A.,
  • Chairman of Committee, Mrs. Henry Fairbanks, St. Johnsbury, Vt.
• VT.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. Ellen Osgood, Montpelier, Vt.
• CONN.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. S.M. Hotchkiss, 171 Capitol Ave., Hartford, Conn.
• N.Y.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. William Spalding, Salmon Block, Syracuse, N.Y.
• ALA.—Woman's Missionary Association,
  • Secretary, Mrs. G.W. Andrews, Talladega, Ala.
• OHIO.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. Flora K. Regal, Oberlin, Ohio.
• IND.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. W.E. Mossman, Fort Wayne, Ind.
• ILL.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. C.H. Taintor, 151 Washington St., Chicago, Ill.
• MINN.—Woman's Home Miss. Society,
  • Secretary, Miss Katharine Plant, 2651 Portland Avenue, Minneapolis, Minn.
• IOWA.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Miss Ella E. Marsh, Grinnell, Iowa.
• KANSAS.—Woman's Home Miss. Society,
  • Secretary, Mrs. G.L. Epps, Topeka, Kan.
• MICH.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. Mary B. Warren, Lansing, Mich.
• WIS.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. C. Matter, Brodhead, Wis.
• NEB.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. L.F. Berry, 724 N Broad St., Fremont, Neb.
• COLORADO.—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • Secretary, Mrs. S.M. Packard, Pueblo, Colo.
• DAKOTA,—Woman's Home Miss. Union,
  • President, Mrs. T.M. Hills, Sioux Falls;
  • Secretary, Mrs. W.R. Dawes, Redfield;
  • Treasurer, Mrs. S.E. Fifield, Lake Preston.

We would suggest to all ladies connected with the auxiliaries of State Missionary Unions, that funds for the American Missionary Association be sent to us through the treasurers of the Union. Care, however, should be taken to designate the money as for the American Missionary Association, since undesignated funds will not reach us.

ANNUAL MEETING.

The public meeting of the Woman's Bureau was held Thursday afternoon, simultaneously with the business meeting of the A.M.A. in Providence, and was conducted by Mrs. C.A. Woodbury, of Portland, Me. The report of the Secretary, Miss D.E. Emerson, of New York, was presented, and then missionary addresses were delivered by Mrs. A.A. Myers on "Mountain Work;" by Mrs. Geo. W. Moore on the "Colored People;" and by Miss Collins on "Indians," all of which were listened to with deep interest.

Mrs. Woodbury, on taking the chair, said:

The object of this meeting is well understood. It is to decide what the women of the Congregational Churches shall do in connection with woman's work—that part of the Association's work which is designed to be among women. It is woman's work among women. It is designed at this time to hear from those fields in which the speakers are especially interested. We shall hear from the Mountain Work, from the Negroes in the South, and from the work among the Indians in the West. Like a very close man who, to the surprise of those who approached him, gave money enough to purchase a town clock, who explained by saying he liked to hear his money tick, so it is meant here this afternoon that the women shall hear the tick of their work from all these fields to which I have referred, and may the sound of it reverberate all down through the ages.

A special meeting for ladies was held on Thursday morning, at which there was a full attendance. Brief remarks, interspersed with song and prayer, made the occasion an enjoyable one. Miss Plimpton, of McIntosh, Ga., gave bits of her experience among the colored people, and Miss Haynes described her work for the Indians at Santee Agency, Neb.

The annual report made by the Secretary was given in full in our November Magazine, and is also published in leaflet form for free distribution to those desiring it.

We give below extracts from the addresses of the missionaries.

MOUNTAIN WHITE WORK.

BY MRS. A.A. MYERS.

In my younger days I never remember looking at the forests that skirt the horizon without an indefinable questioning as to what lay beyond. It was easy to picture stretches of landscape and quiet homes like our own, but the query was ever the same, what is still beyond?

[18]The first Sabbath I attended church in the mountains of Kentucky, having listened to the quaint singing before entering the rough-board building, seating myself on one of the slab benches near a box stove, which had but one length of pipe, out of which the smoke was pouring towards an opening in the roof, glancing around on the women in their sun bonnets, the babies in their little calico caps and the men in homespun, then out of the open door into a ravine where the tops of the tall trees were beneath us, I said to myself, I've reached "that beyond." The undefined has taken shape and I have reached the place of which I could never formulate a picture. Seven years' acquaintance in this mountain country has not changed my opinion. We are in another world, and if I could describe that world so you could see it as it is, could feel its needs as we feel them day by day, it is all I could ask.

Philosophers might describe it as the dead centre of motion; at least it has remained seemingly unmoved, while all the world around it has been moving forward.

Here in these mountains live over two million people, two-thirds of whom have never written nor received a letter, could not read one if printed and sent them. They take no newspapers, and the great events of nations or discoveries of science have been nothing to them. Questions of vital importance to our country have never troubled them. They knew there was a war, for contending armies met on their grounds. With few exceptions their sympathies were with the Union. Too poor to own slaves to any extent, they had no motive for seceding, and many of them joined our army and were faithful soldiers.

At the close of the war, they went back to their secluded homes, and between them and the world the curtain fell again. We very well know that mortals cannot rise above their surroundings only within defined limits. Alas! for the defeated manhood and blasted womanhood in our land, held down to earth by unfortunate surroundings. They are looking to you for help. You have done nobly in sustaining a work in their midst. Besides what you have done at Pleasant Hill, Grand View and other points, you have enabled us to organize eight churches and build one academy and eight houses of worship. You have sent among us most efficient teachers. Besides their school duties they have taken upon themselves to visit the homes, to pray with the sick, to distribute clothing among the needy, to go to the homes of the students, to share their humble fare and sleep in their crowded rooms. They have spared neither time nor strength to carry the uplifting word to those needy souls. From the better classes we have been fortunate enough to draw a nucleus for each of our churches. We have some Sunday-school superintendents that for zeal and tact are models in their work and many a Northern school might rejoice in the possession of such officers. They are not so well versed in Scripture as we could wish, but they spare neither time nor expense to prepare themselves for their work.

This class of people responds quickly to the new life that comes to them [19]by the school, the railroad or the business man. If we could find as ready response in the masses as we find in the individuals, our work in the mountains would be quickly done. But, alas! what of these hundreds of thousands who seemingly have no more aspiration than the brute in their field? They are wedded to the customs of their ancestors, and they rebel at any innovation. Give them tobacco, and whiskey, and pistols, a little meal and bacon and coffee, a crude bed and a roof, and that, to them, is living. Oh, those purposeless lives! They exist simply because they are in the world and cannot help it. With the girls especially, marriage is the chief aim, and what should be the holy relation is entered upon almost in childhood. As soon as they begin to lisp they are talking of their lovers. A little wee girl came to a teacher's home, and after answering in monosyllables the common questions as to schools and Sunday-schools, there was a lull in the conversation, when she spoke up: "I hain't got no sweetheart." For all marriage is the chief aim, it is surprising how little preparation they make for it. No bridal trousseau is ever thought of; not even a new dress is made for the occasion. I have seen many a bride in calf-skin shoes, old calico dress, long apron, with no cuffs nor collar, and her hair falling from her comb, while the groom appeared with uncombed hair, stogy shoes, jean pants and in shirt sleeves.

We have no rollicking girls or boisterous boys; we never see a crowing, cooing baby. The children are born old. The babies have a sad and dejected look, as if this world were a "dreary wilderness of woe," and they grieve they were ever born. Poor little ones in the Southland! how many are gathered home ere a twelve months' stay on earth. Besides this weary, aged look of the children, we frequently find those who look like walking corpses. A little inquiry reveals the fact that they are clay eaters. We have them in our schools. In our Jellico school, we have children whose elder sisters had to sprinkle pepper around the hearthstones to keep them from digging out the clay and eating it. The habit once formed, it seems to last them during life; where it ever originated I don't know, but have no doubt it was from lack of proper nourishment.

Our women! how shall I describe them? I wish I might picture them before you as they ride into town with their babies in their arms and a child or two on their horses with them, or as they walk in with heavy, dragging gait, loaded with some produce for sale, or as they stand for hours open-eyed and open-mouthed around the counters of some country store. I wish you could see them in their cabin homes, as bare of comfort as a wild desert waste, or at work in the field with the family, but always and everywhere with a chew of tobacco or a snuff stick in their mouths. They never express a desire for what they have not, nor a murmur at what they have, but their very movements are a complaint—a wail. On their face is ever seen that weary, resigned, passionless look. They never lighten with joy or surprise. If you could manage to fire a Vesuvius before their eyes you would [20]never know by any outward expression but that they had seen volcanoes every day of their lives. There is no imagery, no ideality. The world to them is a humdrum routine, a common-place affair. They have no heroes, and they look upon all men, not as protectors, but seducers, not as beings formed in the image of a pure and holy God, but in the image of a God of lust and debauchery.

When first going among these people, the ludicrous or comical keeps presenting itself, but as you stay year by year the terrible reality of their lives presses sore upon you. You are cramped by their narrowness; you are depressed by their lack of buoyancy; you grow distrustful because of their perfidy; you become sharer of their woes, but they have no joys to share.

Our work among them was begun none too soon. The eye of the speculator is being turned to our mineral and timber resources, and with unscrupulous money-makers for a centre and a demoralized people to gather round them, and no Christ in their midst, what strongholds of Satan would be formed. When we commenced our work seven years ago the field was open to the Congregationalists. If we could have had means to have secured helpers we could have planted ourselves largely, for we had continuous calls to come and organize churches. The people of better minds are sick and tired of the church life around them; they cannot indorse it and so are called infidels. But we have found no infidels there; still it takes no prophet to see that the reaction from this demoralized church life all through the mountains is going to create a great wave of infidelity unless real Christians come to the rescue very soon.

How these things nerve us to increased efforts to save the children and youth from these ways of death. Our hope for the land is in saving them, and our work is largely for them. We have many Sunday-schools connected with our churches and many others where we furnish some helps and where our students teach. Our Bands of Hope are encouraging. Our Christian Endeavor Society has a large membership, and is a power for good. But while we rejoice over these places that have these helps we think of the hundreds of counties along this mountain range that have no such helps. Senator Plumb has stated that the assessment in Alabama for pistols, guns and dirks is four times that on farming implements, and Kentucky's record of crime is far worse than Alabama's. Who of us can say that he is innocent of this shed blood, unless he is doing something toward sending the only cure—a Christian civilization? Because the work has many discouragements, are we excused? Because the people are prejudiced against us and our principles, shall we withdraw, and let them sink lower and lower?

But the question is asked: "Have you no public schools or churches in this large section of the country?" Yes, schools for a few months in the year, taught in little log school houses, some with floors and some with none; some with a tiny window and some without; some have doors and some [21]haven't. Very few have desks; in most there are but slab benches. But worse than the school house and its surroundings is the illiterate, immoral teacher who attempts to teach the children. As for church organizations they are numerous, and a large majority are church members; but alas for the Christianity taught and practiced. Religion and morality are divorced. With most of them, religion is the thing of a moment and not of a life. Meetings once a month during the summer, and that is all the Christian institution the people have, and we call it instruction. We are inclined to smile at the thought of a preacher prefacing his sermon with the boast that he has no learning; that his "jeens" coat has never brushed the chalk off college walls, and what he has to say is "no fixup" of his own, but direct from "sac-rid writ" or an "inspiration of the Speret." But our smiles end with a sigh when we see that there is not only ignorance, but "the poison of asps is under their lips." Their hatred for all other churches than their own is intense. They have no charity for any religion outside of their own church. The excitement and strife for membership is unequalled even in the craze of their political wars. They are bigoted and intolerant, they have no idea of practical Christianity. They have no prayer-meeting, no family prayers, no Sunday-schools. One minister living near where we have recently planted some Sunday-schools gave a whole sermon to talking against them, and said if any one would show him from the Bible where Sunday-schools were taught he'd believe they were right; but a few weeks later, pressed by seeing our schools drawing so largely from the community, he thought something must be done, so with a few of his leading members they announced the organization of a school near ours. They sent to Jellico on Saturday and bought two gallons of whiskey in order to draw the crowd. Of course, such a school lasted but a few days, but their hatred doesn't die so easily. We could help many churches if it were not for this jealousy among their ministers. The people are our friends, and our growing churches are a stimulant to them. Paul said: "What matter if Christ were preached through envy, only so he were preached," and if we can provoke them to good works, will not the children be blessed? Whatever cause prompts them to church building, to prayer or outward Christian living, they must be bettered by it.

And so, slowly, but steadily, this great mass is going to be leavened. It may not come in your day or mine, but come it will, and happy will we be in that far-off time to know that we had something to do in bringing about such needed results. We are confident of success. Right must win "since God is God," and the day is coming when the great "I Am" will dwell in all these churches. Then the bigot will say, "my brother;" the intolerant will grasp hands in loyal fellowship, and Christian hearts will pulsate in one common rhythm. Then will our mountains and hills break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

NEEDS OF THE COLORED WOMEN AND GIRLS.

BY MRS. G.W. MOORE.

I have been asked to speak to you on the needs of four millions of women and girls. The time allotted for this paper is far too limited for me to give more than a glimpse of their real condition.

In considering the needs of the colored women and girls of the South, you must bear in mind their past condition, present status and future prospects, together with the forces that have contributed to each, before you can know and feel the heart yearnings and struggles of my sisters.

No human lips can tell the story of that dark night that has left its impress upon the habits, customs and life of a whole race of people. The crudest results of that iniquitous system fell heaviest upon the colored woman. From childhood, no matter how favorably situated, she was liable to become the doomed victim of the grossest outrages. There was no assurance that she would not be a constant associate in the field with the coarsest and most ignorant men of both races, or at any moment, at the caprice of the master, be sold. Swayed, body, mind and spirit, by a master class who found it necessary to close every avenue of intelligence in order to accomplish his fiendish purposes, this creature, made in the image of God, was often taught that there was no God of justice for her. Her body, instead of being a fit temple for the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, was subject to the foulest demands of sensuality. No wonder they sang,

These slave songs, born of agony, might well be called "The Passion Flowers" of the slave cabin. Thank God that all of my sisters were not thus brutalized, and even to those who were, God was merciful. Deep down underneath the lacerated and bruised heart, rested the "Shekinah of the Lord," preventing the wholesale transmission of vice. Two hundred and fifty years of such tuition gave her but little chance to develop her womanhood.

Intuitively she knew that there was a living God, and she sought Him in visions, and listened for His voice, and looked forward and persevered for that home not made with hands, and from her heart were wrung these words:

And then comforted, she cried out triumphantly—

Many have told me their struggles, and I know of others who even suffered death rather than submit to the outrage of chastity. One poor mother with three beautiful baby girls, driven to despair by realizing their probable [23]doom if allowed to live, sent them back to the God who gave them and then took her own life.

Thus the colored women and girls lived before the war.

How have they fared since Freedom?

Have they had a fair chance in the race of life? No. They have met caste-prejudice, the ghost of slavery, at every step of their journey during these years of freedom. They have been made to feel that they are a separate species of the human family. The phrases "Your people" and "Your place," do not so much designate their race identity, as the fixed status in the sisterhood of races. This idea, as harmless as it may appear, or as much as it is used, with varied phrases of meaning, according to the attitude of the speaker, has been one of the greatest barriers to the progress of the Negro, especially of the women and girls. It has colored everything they have to do. Their place, like the ebony of their skin, is a dark place. In the home, and in social life, "their place" is confined to colored society, colored schools and colored churches. Be it understood, I am not reflecting upon colored society, but am pointing out the limitations that no other race in this country has to contend with, in its efforts to rise.

The higher the plane of culture the colored women and girls reach, the more sensitive they become, and the more keenly the effects of ostracism are felt. In wages it does not matter how capable she may be, she must not aspire. I have asked several persons, "What is the greatest need of the colored woman and girl?" and many have replied, "To be good servants." Assuming that this is her highest need, can good servants be had without good wages?

In education, her place is the colored school, if there is one far or near, and if there is no school for colored youth, (as is sometimes the case) the no-school is her place. In religious life, her place is the colored church. No matter how her soul may long for a more intelligent Gospel than perchance surrounds her, she must find it there.

Her place in the work of reform, if she has fallen or desires to reform, is the public street. I could relate many incidents which have come under my personal observation in Washington, (and Washington is far ahead of many places in the South) to illustrate how our fallen sisters have suffered worse than death, because doors have been shut against them. Several cases have been brought to me this year, one since writing this paper, but my sisters, the sad fact is like the advent of our blessed Lord, there is no room in the inn for her.

What is the true place of our women and girls? It is that place which is not circumscribed by the mere accident of birth and race, where she can rise just as high as she has the ability to reach and sustain. My five years' experience in Europe as a Jubilee Singer gave me a taste of the sweets of true womanhood, unfettered by caste-prejudice and by a low estimate of my position. There my complexion was not a target for insult and ostracism. [24]Our needs are not only those common to other races, but are in a vast measure greater, because of the past and present difficulties. The masses furnish the most difficult problem to solve. How can we rescue them from poverty and illiteracy, and not pauperize them? How can we prevent crime, check immorality and decrease mortality? The answer lies in giving to them better home life, more elevating social surroundings, better educational advantages in school and industries, and a higher type of Christian life and worship.

My first introduction into an intelligent idea of practical Christianity was at Fisk University. There, and at many similar institutions under the A.M.A., may be found the epitome of a Christian home. Such schools furnish potent object lessons; such are the factors of the problem in answer to the question of how to meet the needs of the colored women and girls, who are to preside over the homes of eight millions of people, who had no home twenty-three years ago. Washington, alone, has a population of eighty thousand colored people, and more than forty thousand of these are women and girls.

It is said that the "hand that rocks the cradle, rules the world." It matters not whether that hand be black or white, but it does matter whether that hand be intelligent or ignorant. They not only need the education of the schools to develop their minds, and industrial training to prepare their hands for the practical duties of life, but Christian education, such as is given in the schools of the Association.

More than three thousand women and thousands of men have gone out under the A.M.A., in school, home and church, for the uplifting, Christianizing and elevating of our people.

Eternity alone will reveal the work that these Christian heroines and heroes have done in the Master's name. The eleventh chapter of Hebrews would need be extended to give to them their rightful place in the role of achievements of faith. We need not wait for eternity, we now see some of the grand results; their memory is already engraven upon the hearts, and their spirit infused into the life of thousands of educated colored young men and women, who have gone out among their people, carrying educated minds, trained hands and warm hearts, as an outgrowth of that labor which has not been in vain. This magnificent record of Christian endeavor and conquest has largely been made possible by the foresight, energy and fidelity of the many who have been and are at the head of the different departments of the A.M.A.

How can the Association more fully meet these needs? By continuing woman's work for woman, through their Woman's Bureau. Through this agency, ladies of the churches can furnish volunteers for the work and the base of supply. While we at the front are in the heat of the battle, you at home, through your missionary societies, young people's meetings, and Sunday-schools, can aid us with your prayers, your sympathy, your gifts and [25]service. Those in the larger churches can sustain a missionary in the field, and may it be said of all, both large and small, "They have done what they could." Then we can sing,

My sisters, we must first be touched by the Spirit of the Master, and through him touch them. This work cannot be done perfunctorily or professionally.

And now in conclusion allow me to thank you in behalf of the millions whom I represent, for the faithful work and practical sympathy already given, and appeal to you in his name, and through you to the thousands whom you represent, for a continuation of your Christian efforts and support, also for greater supplies and larger gifts to the treasury of the A.M.A., that it may be able to furnish the laborers according to the demands of the growing needs of more than four millions of colored women and girls, who are trying to help themselves. Our lamented President Garfield said to the Jubilee Singers during their visit to Mentor: "Ethiopia is not only stretching out her hand unto God, but God is stretching out his hand unto Ethiopia." We believe this, and that the time is coming when all races shall sing:

RECEIPTS FOR NOVEMBER, 1888.