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Title: The American Missionary — Volume 33, No. 10, October, 1879
Author: Various
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The American Missionary — Volume 33, No. 10, October, 1879" ***
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VOL. XXXIII. No. 10.
THE
AMERICAN MISSIONARY.
* * * * *
“To the Poor the Gospel is Preached.”
* * * * *
OCTOBER, 1879.
_CONTENTS_:
EDITORIAL.
THE ANNUAL MEETING—PARAGRAPHS 289
WORKER AT REST (MRS. PEEBLES)—DEATH OF FATHER JOCELYN 291
RANDOM SUGGESTIONS 293
A STRONG APPEAL 294
LANGUAGE OF EQUATORIAL AFRICA 296
STRANGE BUT TRUE STORY 297
ITEMS FROM THE FIELD 299
GENERAL NOTES 300
THE FREEDMEN.
NORTH AND SOUTH—SOME THINGS IN COMMON 304
REMINISCENCES—“IT’S THE COLOR THAT TELLS” 306
TENNESSEE, NASHVILLE—Remarkable Conversion and
Triumphant Death 309
GEORGIA, BYRON—First Impressions 310
THE CHINESE.
THE BEGINNING OF HARVEST—ONG LUNE 310
CHILDREN’S PAGE.
COUNTRY SCHOOL-HOUSES 313
RECEIPTS 314
CONSTITUTION 317
WORK, STATISTICS, WANTS &C. 318
* * * * *
NEW YORK.
Published by the American Missionary Association.
ROOMS, 56 READE STREET.
* * * * *
Price, 50 Cents a Year, in advance.
Entered at the Post Office at New York, N. Y. as second-class
matter.
AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION,
56 READE STREET, N. Y.
* * * * *
PRESIDENT.
HON. E. S. TOBEY, Boston.
VICE-PRESIDENTS.
Hon. F. D. PARISH, Ohio.
Hon. E. D. HOLTON, Wis.
Hon. WILLIAM CLAFLIN, Mass.
Rev. STEPHEN THURSTON, D. D., Me.
Rev. SAMUEL HARRIS, D. D., Ct.
WM. C. CHAPIN, Esq., R. I.
Rev. W. T. EUSTIS, D. D., Mass.
Hon. A. C. BARSTOW, R. I.
Rev. THATCHER THAYER, D. D., R. I.
Rev. RAY PALMER, D. D., N. Y.
Rev. J. M. STURTEVANT, D. D., Ill.
Rev. W. W. PATTON, D. D., D. C.
Hon. SEYMOUR STRAIGHT, La.
HORACE HALLOCK, Esq., Mich.
Rev. CYRUS W. WALLACE, D. D., N. H.
Rev. EDWARD HAWES, Ct.
DOUGLAS PUTNAM, Esq., Ohio.
Hon. THADDEUS FAIRBANKS, Vt.
SAMUEL D. PORTER, Esq., N. Y.
Rev. M. M. G. DANA, D. D., Minn.
Rev. H. W. BEECHER, N. Y.
Gen. O. O. HOWARD, Oregon.
Rev. G. F. MAGOUN, D. D., Iowa.
Col. C. G. HAMMOND, Ill.
EDWARD SPAULDING, M. D., N. H.
DAVID RIPLEY, Esq., N. J.
Rev. WM. M. BARBOUR, D. D., Ct.
Rev. W. L. GAGE, Ct.
A. S. HATCH, Esq., N. Y.
Rev. J. H. FAIRCHILD, D. D., Ohio
Rev. H. A. STIMSON, Minn.
Rev. J. W. STRONG, D. D., Minn.
Rev. GEORGE THACHER, LL. D., Iowa.
Rev. A. L. STONE, D. D., California.
Rev. G. H. ATKINSON, D. D., Oregon.
Rev. J. E. RANKIN, D. D., D. C.
Rev. A. L. CHAPIN, D. D., Wis.
S. D. SMITH, Esq., Mass.
PETER SMITH, Esq., Mass.
Dea. JOHN C. WHITIN, Mass.
Rev. WM. PATTON, D. D., Ct.
Hon. J. B. GRINNELL, Iowa.
Rev. WM. T. CARR, Ct.
Rev. HORACE WINSLOW, Ct.
Sir PETER COATS, Scotland.
Rev. HENRY ALLON, D. D., London, Eng.
WM. E. WHITING, Esq., N. Y.
J. M. PINKERTON, Esq., Mass.
Rev. F. A. NOBLE, D. D., Ct.
DANIEL HAND, Esq., Ct.
A. L. WILLISTON, Esq., Mass.
Rev. A. F. BEARD, D. D., N. Y.
FREDERICK BILLINGS, Esq., Vt.
JOSEPH CARPENTER, Esq., R. I.
CORRESPONDING SECRETARY.
REV. M. E. STRIEBY, D. D., _56 Reade Street, N. Y._
DISTRICT SECRETARIES.
REV. C. L. WOODWORTH, _Boston_.
REV. G. D. PIKE, _New York_.
REV. JAS. POWELL, _Chicago_.
EDGAR KETCHUM, ESQ., _Treasurer, N. Y._
H. W. HUBBARD, ESQ., _Assistant Treasurer, N. Y._
REV. M. E. STRIEBY, _Recording Secretary_.
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.
ALONZO S. BALL,
A. S. BARNES,
EDWARD BEECHER,
GEO. M. BOYNTON,
WM. B. BROWN,
CLINTON B. FISK,
ADDISON P. FOSTER,
E. A. GRAVES,
S. B. HALLIDAY,
SAM’L HOLMES,
S. S. JOCELYN,
ANDREW LESTER,
CHAS. L. MEAD,
JOHN H. WASHBURN,
G. B. WILLCOX.
COMMUNICATIONS
relating to the business of the Association may be addressed to
either of the Secretaries as above; letters for the Editor of the
“American Missionary” to Rev. Geo. M. Boynton, at the New York
Office.
DONATIONS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS
should be sent to H. W. Hubbard, Ass’t Treasurer, No. 56 Reade
Street, New York, or when mote convenient, to either of the Branch
Offices, 21 Congregational House, Boston, Mass., or 112 West
Washington Street, Chicago, Ill.
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. XXXIII. OCTOBER, 1879. No. 10.
* * * * *
American Missionary Association.
* * * * *
OUR ANNUAL MEETING.
The Thirty-third Annual Meeting of the American Missionary
Association will be held in the First Congregational Church (Rev.
Dr. Goodwin’s), Chicago, Illinois, commencing October 28th, at 3
p. m. The Annual Sermon will be preached by Rev. R. S. Storrs, D.
D., of Brooklyn, N. Y., service commencing at half-past seven in
the evening. A paper on the Chinese question will be presented by
Rev. J. H. Twichell, of Hartford, Connecticut; one on the Necessity
of the Protection of Law for the Indians, by Gen. J. H. Leake,
United States District Attorney, Chicago, Illinois. Other papers
and addresses on timely and important subjects will be presented by
able writers, the announcement of which will be given in the daily
press at an early date.
Parties desiring entertainment during the meeting will write, by
or before October 8th, to H. G. Billings, Esq., 242 South Water
Street, Chicago.
* * * * *
It will be seen that our communications from the Southern field are
very limited this month. It is, of course, the time of vacation in
all our Southern institutions, except a few of the public schools,
to the support of which we are contributing, and from which we
hear mainly through the larger schools of which their teachers are
pupils or graduates. Soon the wheels will begin to revolve again,
we trust, with greater effectiveness than ever before.
* * * * *
A confidential word from the Editor to the members of the
missionary and teaching force who occasionally write to the
MISSIONARY.—Your communications are always read in the most kindly
and interested spirit. Their contents are always noted, and if
they contain any incident or item which even perhaps may be of
general interest to our readers, we use it. Do not be too greatly
disappointed or grieved at us if we do not always use them in the
form in which they are sent. There are many things which must
be weighed in the make-up of a magazine which no one but those
who see it all can even know. The Editor’s basket is not a waste
basket, even when it receives MSS., for they do not go into it
unread, nor do we mean to let any wheat get lost among the chaff,
although doubtless we occasionally do. Sometimes an article must
be squeezed into an item or be squeezed out. Please keep writing,
then, not for your local audience, but for all; or, if you please,
as though it were meant for the Editor’s ear alone. Don’t be
disappointed—much more, don’t be angry, if all you write does not
get into print. And don’t promise anybody, that a certain thing you
send will appear in the MISSIONARY; for, after all, the Editor who
must decide is in the New York office.
* * * * *
Prof. A. K. Spence and wife arrived in August by steamer “Bolivia,”
from an absence of a year in their native Scotland. They have been
for ten years connected with Fisk University, and have resumed
their work in that institution. By their visit they have been
greatly refreshed in health. They have been constantly engaged in
private and public effort to interest their Scottish people yet
more in our work as related to the Christianization of Africa.
With their territorial and commercial interest in that dark
continent, British Christians are all the more disposed to care
for the religious welfare of the inhabitants of that country.
The many friends at the West who have heard the familiar talks
of Mrs. Spence, will be prepared to believe that her recital of
the Freedman’s story to the sisters of her motherland was greatly
acceptable.
Prof. Spence’s mother, who, at the age of eighty-five, recently
contributed to the _Independent_ a poem on George McDonald, whom
she had known from his childhood, sent on the fee for her article
to the treasury of the A. M. A.
* * * * *
_Revivals in Summer Time._—The people of the North, who are apt
to be under the respite of vacation at this season of the year,
and who are addicted to special efforts for the promotion of
revivals in the Winter time, are sometimes surprised to hear of
such movements at the South during the heat of Summer. At first it
seems quite creditable to the piety of our colored brethren that
they should warm up to such service in dog days. But the reason for
selecting this season for such service is the same as that which
at the North locates it in the Winter. That is the slack time of
the year. The corn and the cotton have been laid by, and now there
is leisure before the time comes for picking and harvesting. The
Association of South-west Texas meets at the middle of July, and
refuses to fix any other date for assembling, desiring to use that
“set time” for some revival effort, and expecting to bless the
entertaining church in that way. We are hearing that nearly all of
our churches in the South have been making more or less of special
effort.
* * * * *
_The Southern Sentinel_, a monthly, published at Talladega College,
under the new management of Prof. Geo. N. Ellis, editor, and P.
P. Green (one of the students), publisher, is taking on more of
freshness and of force. A department of agriculture has been added.
This will be of great value. In this we see the hand of the farm
superintendent, Mr. Atkinson, who went down from Olivet College to
help on in this part of the Talladega movement.
* * * * *
“_What is that to thee? Follow thou me._”—This response of the
Master to Peter’s inquiry about the lot of John indicates the
measure of consecration requisite on the part of those who are
called to this missionary work among despised classes. It is an
unquestioning, an unconditional obedience that is needed. One may
say: “Others are staying at home and having easy times.” What is
that to thee? “Down there we may be sneered at and treated like
pariahs.” What is that to thee? “It was easy up North to have been
an abolitionist, but to go and put yourself down by the side of and
underneath the outcast ex-slave to try to raise him up, that is
another thing.” What is _that_ to thee? Follow thou me. Follow my
call; follow my example in caring for “these my brethren.” Sympathy
with the Saviour in His love for souls, in His self-forgetfulness
while winning lost men to His Gospel, is the first qualification
for this Christly work. It was a rigid scrutiny that set aside the
few men that were to gain the victory of the Lord at the hand of
Gideon. A like carefulness of selection is necessary in this holy
war. It would enlist only those who give themselves to its cause
with such alacrity that they stop not for personal ease, but who
lap their drink.
But the reward of those who thus follow the Divine Leader in this
service is quick and ample. They are a happy set of folks. They
love their work; they love their people; they have joy in their
calling; in this they are like returned foreign missionaries.
* * * * *
_A Worker at Rest._—Mrs. Anna M. (Day) Peebles departed this life
at Dudley, N. C., on the 28th of August. Educated at Oberlin, she
had been one of our teachers in the Washington School at Raleigh,
N. C., serving also as teacher and leader of music. Something over
a year ago she was married to Rev. David Peebles, of Dudley, N. C.,
where she took charge of the school, becoming greatly successful
and beloved in the same. Excelling as a teacher, enthusiastic in
the missionary aspect of her work, and winsome among her associates
and pupils, her loss to our cause is greatly felt.
* * * * *
DEATH OF FATHER JOCELYN.
Another Christian hero has laid aside his armor and received his
crown. The Lord did not break the dies when He made the last of the
ancient Martyrs or of the Puritan heroes. In great emergencies he
reproduces them after their kind. The anti-slavery struggle needed
them and they came forth, and among them there was no braver man
than the gentle and amiable SIMEON S. JOCELYN. It is a mistake to
suppose that the bold and determined men who take front rank in
great moral conflicts are destitute of kindly impulses. Father
Jocelyn was utterly uncompromising where duty called, yet I have
seldom known a man of more tender sympathies, of quicker, almost
womanly sensibility to sorrow or suffering. Nor are all such men,
as is often imagined, so intent on pushing forward their great
reforms as to overlook the rights of others. Father Jocelyn was
most scrupulous in regard to the minutest claims of all men, even
of his opponents. Nor are all such seemingly rash and headlong
men lacking in caution. Father Jocelyn was the most cautious man
I ever knew. Indeed this trait was, in some sense, a hindrance to
his activity, for he instinctively saw the many adverse bearings
and possible misconstructions to the course contemplated or to the
document to be published. The marvel is that such a man could ever
have become an abolitionist—that he could have risked reputation,
property, and even life itself, in an enterprise so doubtful of
success and beset with so many dangers to the peace of the church
and the nation. The only explanation is in his clear perception,
through all glosses, of the path of duty, and the overwhelming
impulse of conscience to pursue it in spite of all dangers. Of such
stuff are moral heroes made.
The piety of Father Jocelyn was sincere, deep and all-pervading.
He was a man of prayer and of close communion with God, active
in Christian labors in public and private, and of a beautiful
simplicity and transparency of character—a saintly man. A Puritan
by birth and conscientious conviction, his religious life was after
the strictest model, yet his tender sympathies rendered him kind as
well as faithful in counsel or warning, while his broad Christian
charity made him liberal toward all who loved the Saviour.
Father Jocelyn was born in New Haven, Ct., in 1799, and was early
converted to Christ. He began active life as an engraver, but
relinquished a prosperous business to preach the Gospel to the
poor, devoting his ministry to a feeble colored church in New
Haven. The anti-slavery cause from the beginning had his warmest
sympathies and most earnest co-operation. The American Missionary
Association had no earlier or steadier friend. When the Amistad
captives were landed in New London, and prompt and persevering
efforts were made to re-enslave them, a committee of gentlemen was
organized in New York to watch over their interests, and at the
head of that committee stands the name of S. S. Jocelyn. Throughout
the long struggle that secured their liberties and their return
to their native land, accompanied by a missionary and teacher,
Mr. Jocelyn was constant in his active exertions; and when at
length that committee and other similar bodies were united in the
formation of this Association, he was forward in founding, and
constant thereafter in sustaining the new organization. He attended
the meeting in Albany when the Association was formed. He was its
Recording Secretary from 1846 to 1853, Corresponding Secretary with
charge of the Home Department from 1853 to 1863, and from that time
till his death was a member of the Executive Committee.
We extract from an article in the _Advance_, by Dr. Roy, the
following account of the funeral:
“The funeral was held in the New England Church of Brooklyn, E. D.,
where he had his membership. In the large congregation there was a
fine representation of colored people. The Executive Committee and
other officers of the American Missionary Association were present.
The pall-bearers were a squad of veterans of the old Liberty Guard.
The pastor, Rev. Mr. Hibbard, presided. A few words of affectionate
sympathy with the brothers and sisters who had been bereaved of
their father, were spoken by Rev. J. E. Roy, whose father, also at
the age of eighty, a few months before had been called away.
“Dr. Strieby spoke of the work of the departed in the American
Missionary Association, and especially with eloquent words depicted
the tremendous moral courage, the great cautiousness, the womanly
tenderness, the transparent simplicity which were blended in his
character. Strange that so sweet a man ever had the grit to take up
the battle against slavery. Rev. Mr. Ray, a colored minister, who
had known Mr. Jocelyn, and had been associated with him for forty
years, gave fitness to the occasion by his words of gratitude, and
by several telling reminiscences,—one of which was that, in 1839,
Mr. Jocelyn came down from New Haven to take up the gauntlet of
debate upon the colonization question with Mr. Robert Finley. The
discussion was in a hall in Nassau Street, and Mr. Jocelyn’s main
reliance was the word of God.
“Rev. Mr. Lockwood, a former pastor, bore loving testimony. Dr.
Edward Beecher went back to an acquaintance of fifty years ago,
when a student in Yale College, under concern of soul, he went to
Mr. Jocelyn. He was such a spiritual, faithful Christian as a young
man in passing that crisis would be apt to seek out. Dr. B. was
associated with him in his Sabbath-school and church work among the
colored people, and carried with him that same impulse when he went
to Illinois College, and stood by Elijah P. Lovejoy until they shot
him down. In closing, Dr. Beecher said that the words appropriate
to the character of the departed were: ‘In simplicity and godly
sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we
have had our conversation in the world.’”
M. E. STRIEBY.
* * * * *
RANDOM SUGGESTIONS.
Will the Exodus Affect the Work of the Association in the South?
I answer without hesitation, _it will not_. To the present time the
exodus movement has been confined very largely to the disturbed
parishes, or to certain exceptional cases where the conditions of
labor have been oppressive. In New Orleans, while conventions and
open-air meetings have been held, and the policy of emigration has
been discussed, but few of the Freedmen have decided to leave the
State and find a home in Kansas. There is a restless, dissatisfied
feeling among the masses of the negroes, especially the poorer
classes, induced by the glowing appeals made to them; but the
exodus has not assumed, and I believe will not assume, large
proportions. The masses will stay on Southern soil and abide in
Southern homes. My opinion is based upon the supposition that their
rights, social, educational and religious, and their rights also
as laborers, will not be invaded or denied beyond what they are at
present.
In New Orleans 45 per cent. of the population is colored, and
in the State at large 55 per cent. I do not believe that this
ratio will be materially changed by the exodus. And even if a
few thousands of Freedmen left the South in search of warmer
hospitality, an increased compensation for labor, and a more
equitable recognition of their rights as citizens, it would not
lessen the possibilities of good afforded to the Association.
Should a half million go away, there would still be four and a half
millions left to be instructed and helped in their race struggle
for higher intelligence and a purer religious life. Press forward,
then, the glorious work of education. Hasten the full equipment of
the normal schools and colleges for the wider, grander work before
them. Let new churches be planted, and the pure gospel of Christ be
preached all over the beautiful and fruitful South, wherever the
Freedman has his home. The work is not one of a generation, but of
a century.
Student Aid.
To secure, at the earliest day, one of the chief objects of the
Association—the thorough education of colored young men and women
as teachers and ministers, who shall be competent to lead the
masses of their race to a higher civilization—special aid must be
given to those whose minds and hearts give promise of usefulness.
A large number who propose to seek only an elementary education,
or those who reside in the city where a school of high grade is
located, do not require aid from abroad. The wise policy of the
instructors in our institutions is to search for young men and
women of promise, and encourage them to pursue a full course of
study, and to watch over them till the benefits they receive are
made a valued possession not only to themselves but to their race.
What are the facts in the case? The best material is often remote
from the college, and utterly lacking in pecuniary ability. Many
of the brightest, the most intellectual of the children of the
Freedmen, who are intensely anxious for an education, and have a
praiseworthy ambition to be fitted for positions of responsibility
and usefulness, are denied the privileges of the college by reason
of extreme poverty. Many others are able to meet a part of the cost
of an education, but without benevolent aid must stop short of a
full course of study. I am just now in receipt of a letter from a
worthy and talented young man near New Orleans. I quote a sentence
to show its import: “I have the same mind to work in the cause of
Christ and prepare to preach His word. I think I have been called
to engage in this work and cannot be satisfied unless I do. Dear
brother, I do now most solemnly appeal to you and the good brethren
in the North to aid me to an education.”
This is one instance of hundreds which could be cited. Another fact
deserves earnest consideration. We need to _conserve_ and utilize
for the general good the partial education which the graduates of
our colleges have secured. At the present time this is not done
as it should be, and as it might be, if _special_ student aid
were available. Many graduates go forth from the college who are
lost to view. After so much patient labor has been bestowed upon
them—and in some instances special pecuniary aid given—they should
be encouraged in every way to devote themselves to the greatest
good of their people. Take the last class in Straight University as
an illustration. We graduated eight students, all bright, talented
and promising, and, grandest of all, Christians. All are poor—some
of them extremely poor. Their education has cost them a hard,
patient struggle. They desire to become teachers of the highest
rank. The young men are looking to the learned professions. In
order to attain what they desire, and what we desire for them, they
should take a post-graduate course. The young men, if God calls
them to the work, should take a three years’ course of theological
instruction.
But left alone, without outside aid, they will be compelled to work
for their daily bread, and for them their school days will have
forever passed. Is it not worth while to say to these young men:
“Come back to the University, and the Christian benevolence of the
North will see you through one, two or three years more of study,
and then we shall claim you for the college, for the church, and
for the work of God. Henceforth you are not your own, but must go
wherever God shall call you, and stand in the forefront of every
great and good movement for the elevation of your race.”
To-day, if a worthy Christian young man or woman appeals to us,
“Can you not aid me to keep on in my studies?” our answer is a
sorrowful one, “There is no fund that can be appropriated to
that purpose.” Will not good men think of this and make a grand
possibility of good a fact gloriously realized?
W. S. ALEXANDER.
* * * * *
A STRONG APPEAL.
We present below a forcible appeal for student aid. Such aid is
essential, and the question of obtaining it in sufficient amount
to meet the demand lies at the bottom of the whole possibility
of educating the colored youth of the South. If scholarships and
educational funds are important to the white students of the
North, how much more to the colored students at the South, where
employment is so poorly paid, and the money so hard to be collected
when earned! This appeal is but a sample of the cry that comes from
all our institutions—Atlanta, Talladega, Tougaloo, New Orleans, and
the rest. An illustration may be seen in the foregoing article by
Rev. W. S. Alexander, President of Straight University.
But we must warn our patrons not to divert their contributions from
our ordinary work to this special object, for if this is done, we
might as well furnish this student help directly from our treasury.
Then where would be the money to sustain the teachers?—and _they
must be sustained_, or the schools closed. The only solution of
the problem is for the friends of the Freedmen to enlarge their
contributions to meet both wants. We most importunately urge our
patrons not to starve the teacher in order to aid the scholar, but
help both.
What Shall We Do?
Will a goodly number of the readers of the AMERICAN MISSIONARY tell
us?
The case can be best set forth by giving a single illustration. On
the Saturday evening preceding the Monday on which the new school
year of Fisk University was to begin, a young man was brought
to my room by one of our former students, who introduced him as
being from Montgomery, Alabama. I found on inquiry, and from a
letter which he brought from a prominent colored man of that city,
that he had determined to get an education, and having but little
money, had made up his mind to walk from Montgomery to Nashville,
a distance of three hundred miles, with the hope of finding some
way by which he might be admitted as a student in Fisk University.
Fortunately, a prominent citizen of Montgomery was able to secure
him a pass on the railroad, one hundred miles, to Birmingham, and
a student of Fisk University who happened to meet him at Columbia,
Tenn., used the little spare money he had in his pocket to help him
on his way twenty miles toward Nashville.
What do the friends of education among the colored people of the
South wish us to do with such cases? The University has no means
of its own with which to help such young people, and this instance
is but an illustration of very many similar cases which we are
compelled to decide every year.
From the correspondence of teachers, and through the cases known
personally by the comparatively few of our old students who have
already returned from their summer’s work, we could number up
to-day, which is only the fourth day after the opening of the
school, at least forty instances of young men and young women of
known character and ability who are eager and anxious to come to
Fisk University to fit themselves for teaching and other Christian
work among their people, who cannot come because they have not and
cannot get sufficient money. The number will be doubled by the time
this article reaches our friends through the AMERICAN MISSIONARY.
In many cases they can pay from five to seven dollars of the twelve
dollars a month required for their board and tuition. We find from
actual experience that an average of fifty dollars will help at
least one such struggling student to support for a year in Fisk
University. The balance and the money necessary to purchase books
they can generally provide for themselves. We ask the readers of
the AMERICAN MISSIONARY what we shall do with these cases. Any one
who will send us a thousand dollars will answer the question for
at least twenty. Every fifty dollars will give the answer in the
case of one. Our hearts ache when we are compelled to refuse, for
the want of money, these eager applications. Every one who has an
answer to give us can send it to H. W. Hubbard, Assistant Treasurer
of the American Missionary Association at New York—and we know the
answer will suffer no long delay in his hands—or to E. P. Gilbert,
Assistant Treasurer of Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn. All
students helped will in due time communicate by letter with those
who thus befriend them.
Will not every individual or Sabbath-school that contributed last
year to help aid students continue that help for the coming year,
and give us the earliest possible information of such intention?
E. M. CRAVATH, _Pres. Fisk University_.
THE LANGUAGE OF EQUATORIAL AFRICA.
Great interest has been awakened in the geographical discoveries
that have been made in Central Equatorial Africa during the last
twenty-five years. This vast and newly-explored country is no
doubt the choicest portion of the whole African continent. The
inhabitants, with the exception of a few mixed tribes along its
outer borders, all belong to one great family. A line starting
from the Cameroon Mountains on the western coast, second degree
north latitude, and drawn, with some slight variations, directly
across the continent to the same degree of latitude on the east
coast, divides the negro race into two distinct families, perhaps
of nearly equal size. The one, occupying the country north of this
line to the southern borders of the Great Desert, is known as the
Nigritian stock, from the fact that they are to be found mainly
in the valley of the Niger. The other, and the one to which our
article mainly refers, is known as the Ethiopian or Nilotic family,
from its supposed descent from the ancient Ethiopians, whose chief
residence was the banks of the Nile.
One general language, with great divergence as to dialects,
prevails over this whole region of country. There are not
only verbal resemblances, but there is a peculiar grammatical
structure, scarcely known to any other language, that pervades and
characterizes all the dialects of this one great family. A very
large number of words are common to the Mpongwe dialect on the west
coast, and the Swahili on the east, as may be seen from a grammar
of the Mpongwe, published by the missionaries at the Gaboon years
ago. If the words used by three or four tribes along the coast of
Southern Guinea could be fully collated, they would be found to
contain not less, perhaps, than four-fifths of all the words used
over the whole of this vast region.
But apart from these verbal resemblances, there are certain
features of orthography that establish the relationship between
these dialects quite as clearly. To mention no others, the use
of _m_ and _n_—as if they were preceded by a sort of half-vowel
sound—before certain other consonants, at the beginning of words,
is very peculiar. _M_ is constantly used before b, p, t, and w,
as in the words _mbolo_, _mpolu_, _mtesa_, and _mwera_. So _n_ is
constantly used before k, t, y, and gw, as in the words _nkala_,
_ntondo_, _nyassa_, and _ngwe_. The combination of _ny_ occurs in
the names of most of the great lakes, as _Nyassa_, _Nyanza_, and
_Tanganyika_. A still more striking feature of relationship between
these dialects may be found in the combinations by which proper
names are formed. The names of a large proportion of the tribes
encountered by Stanley and Cameron on their journeys across the
continent commence with the letter _u_, as _Uganda_, _Unyoro_, and
_Ujiji_, &c. Now, by prefixing _ma_, and dropping the initial _u_,
we have _Maganda_, a person or citizen of _Uganda_; _Manyoro_, a
person or citizen of _Unyoro_. So by prefixing _wa_ instead of
_ma_, we get _Waganda_, they, or the people of _Uganda_. Now, in
the Mpongwe dialect, _ma_ is simply a contraction of _oma_, person,
and _wa_ or _wao_ is the personal pronoun for _they_, showing how
these proper names are formed. Again, many of the names of these
tribes terminate in _ana_. _Ana_, in the Mpongwe dialect, is an
abbreviation of _awana_, children or descendants. If the names of
Bechuana and Wangana could be analyzed, they would be found to mean
the children or descendants of _Bechu_ or _Wanga_, this being the
way of giving names to any particular family that separates itself
from the parent stock.
But the peculiar character of this language is more remarkable
than its wide diffusion. Taking the Mpongwe dialect as a specimen,
we have no hesitation in saying that it will be difficult to
find any language, ancient or modern, that is more systematic
or philosophical in its general arrangements, more marked in
the classification of its different parts of speech or their
relationship to each other, or in the extent of its inflections,
especially those of the verb. The existence of such a language
among an uncultivated people is simply a marvel. As many as three
hundred oblique forms can be derived from the root of every regular
Mpongwe verb, each one of which will have a clear and distinct
shade of meaning of its own, and yet so regular and systematic in
all its inflections, that a practiced philologist could, after
a few hours’ study, trace up any of even its most remote forms
to the original root. It is not intended to convey the idea that
all these forms are habitually used, for that would indicate a
much more extended vocabulary than could reasonably be expected
among an uncultivated people. But there is no form of the verb,
notwithstanding its extensive ramifications, that would not be
distinctly understood by an audience, even if they had never heard
it used before.
It will be seen, therefore, that the vocabulary may be expanded
to an almost unlimited extent. It is not only expansible, but it
has a wonderful capacity for conveying new ideas. The missionaries
laboring among these people, after they had acquired a thorough
knowledge of the structure of this wonderful language, were
surprised to find with how much ease they could use it to convey
religious ideas. In their native state the people had no knowledge
of the Christian religion, and, of course, used no terms for
saviour or salvation, for redeemer or redemption, etc. They had,
however, the terms _sunga_, to save, and _danduna_, to redeem, or
pay a ransom. Now, according to a well established law of grammar,
_ozunge_ is a saviour, and _isungina_ is salvation; similarly
from _danduna_ comes _olandune_, the redeemer, and _ilanduna_,
redemption:—so that they could at once get a tolerably correct
idea of these terms, and there was no need (as there is in most
unwritten languages) to call in the aid of foreign words. Without
multiplying illustrations of a similar character, it will be seen
that the language is not only flexible and expansive to a very
remarkable degree, but is suitable beyond almost any other known
language to convey religious instruction to the minds of the
people. It has been preserved, no doubt, by a wise Providence for
this very purpose.
The providence of God towards this great family, therefore, seems
to be very marked and significant. They have been preserved for
centuries in great numbers and vigorous manhood, notwithstanding
their perpetual intestine strifes and the cruel desolations that
have been occasioned by the slave trade, along both their eastern
and western borders. They are in possession of a country that is
not only healthful and productive, but whose navigable streams seem
to have been traced out by the finger of Divine Providence for
the twofold purpose of facilitating intercommunication among the
people themselves, and of furthering the rapid diffusion of the
Gospel wherever it has once gained a footing. Then their language,
with all its wonderful characteristics, seems to have been kept
by the Divine hand as an easy channel through which the light and
blessings of the Gospel might, in God’s own good time, reach their
dark and benighted minds.
J. LEIGHTON WILSON, in _The Catholic Presbyterian_.
* * * * *
A STRANGE BUT TRUE STORY.
BY MRS. H. G. GUINESS.
A wealthy farmer who cultivated some thousands of acres, had,
by his benevolence, endeared himself greatly to his large staff
of laborers. He had occasion to leave the country in which his
property was situated, for some years; but, before doing so,
he gave his people clearly to understand that he wished the
whole of the cultivated land to be kept in hand, and all the
unclaimed marsh lands to be enclosed and drained, and brought into
cultivation—that even the hills were to be terraced, and the poor
mountain pastures manured—so that no single corner of the estate
should remain neglected and barren. Ample resources were left for
the execution of these works, and there were sufficient hands to
have accomplished the whole within the first few years of the
proprietor’s absence.
He was detained in the country to which he had been called very
many years. Those whom he left children were men and women when
he came back, and so the number of his tenantry and laborers
was vastly multiplied. Was the task he had given them to do
accomplished? Alas! no. Bog and moor and mountain waste were only
wilder and more desolate than ever. Fine rich virgin soil, by
thousands of acres, was bearing only briars and thistles. Meadow
after meadow was utterly barren for want of culture; nay, by far
the larger part of the farm seemed never to have been visited by
his servants.
Had they been idle? Some had, but large numbers had been
industrious enough. They had expended a vast amount of labor,
and skilled labor, too; but they had bestowed it all on the park
immediately around the house. This had been cultivated to such a
pitch of perfection that the workmen had scores of times quarreled
with each other, because the operations of one interfered with
his neighbor. And a vast amount of labor, too, had been lost in
sowing the same patch—for instance, with corn fifty times over in
one season, so that the seed never had time to germinate and grow
and bear fruit; in caring for the forest trees as if they had been
tender saplings; in manuring soils already too fat, and watering
pastures already too wet. The farmer was positively astonished
at the misplaced ingenuity with which labor and seed and manure,
skill and time and strength, had been wasted for no result. The
very same amount of toil and capital expended according to his
directions, would have brought the whole demesne into culture, and
yielded a noble revenue. But season after season had rolled away in
sad succession, leaving those unbounded areas of various but all
reclaimable soil, barren and useless; and, as to the park, it would
have been far more productive and perfect had it been relieved of
the extraordinary and unaccountable amount of energy expended on it.
Why did these laborers act so absurdly? Did they wish to labor
in vain? On the contrary, they were forever craving for fruit,
coveting good crops, longing for great results. Did they not wish
to carry out the farmer’s views about his property? Well, they
seemed to have that desire, for they were always reading the
directions he wrote, and said continually to each other, “You know
we have to bring the whole property into order;” but they did not
do it. Some few tried, and ploughed up a little plot here and
there, and sowed corn and other crops. Perhaps these failed, and
so the rest got discouraged. Oh no! the yield was magnificent;
far richer in proportion than they got themselves. They clearly
perceived that, but yet they failed to follow a good example. Nay,
when the labors of a few, in some distant valley, had resulted in
a crop they were all unable to gather in by themselves, the others
would not even go and help them to bring home the sheaves. They
preferred watching for weeds among the roses in the overcrowded
garden, and counting the blades of grass in the park and the leaves
on the trees.
Then they were fools, surely, not wise men?—traitors, not true
servants to their lord?
Oh! I can’t tell! You must ask him that. I only know that the
Master said, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to
every creature.” And eighteen hundred and seventy-seven years after
they had not even mentioned that there was a Gospel to one-half of
the world!—_China’s Millions_.
ITEMS FROM THE FIELD.
MEMPHIS, TENN.—Thus far, during the epidemic of this year, none of
the scholars of the Le Moyne Institute and none of the members of
the Second Congregational Church (colored) have suffered.
ATLANTA, GA.—The Storrs School was opened on the first of
September, with 250 scholars, under the continued principalship
of Miss Amy Williams, who is assisted by Misses Abby Clark, Julia
Goodwin, Amelia Ferris and F. J. Morris. Miss M. E. Stevenson
has been transferred from the position of a teacher to that of
lady missionary for the city, representing the ladies of the two
churches of Oberlin.
BRUNSWICK, GA.—Mr. Morse writes: “My school has been free the
entire year. We have averaged over ninety for the year of ten
months. I think many have been made wiser and better. Some have
connected themselves with the churches there. We are having a
season of great Christian interest in the Congregational Church of
this city, under Brother Clarke’s care. Two of our Sunday-school
scholars, and now supernumerary teachers, have given their hearts
to the Saviour. Our hope is the schools; take them away and I would
not give anything for Congregationalism among the colored people. I
had no idea of touching this matter when I began to write.”
MACON, GA.—Rev. S. E. Lathrop, who has been at Atlanta for three
months, running down to supply his church meantime, in a private
letter, describes a day of work as follows:
“Brother Young wrote me from Byron to come down there and baptize
some candidates for him. In the morning I went out from Macon
(seventeen miles by rail), rode three miles from the church to
the creek in a lumber wagon with fourteen _other_ colored folks,
getting caught in a shower on the way. Arrived at a grist-mill,
in which I changed clothes (preparing for immersion), with the
flour-dust half an inch deep everywhere. Waded into the creek and
immersed four candidates, three men and one woman, all of whom
behaved excellently well, without any shouting or gymnastics;
the seal of _sprinkling_ being set upon us by another sudden
shower just as we came out of the water. Rode back to the church,
preached, administered communion, received the four persons to
membership, and baptized an infant. Had just time for a good dinner
of ‘chicken fixins,’ and took the train back to Macon, arriving at
six p. m. of a close, sultry day. Walked one and a half miles and
back through the sweltering heat, to see a sick girl who wants to
join our church. Got back just in time for evening service, and
preached. Came back here yesterday, and have felt ‘bunged up’ ever
since.”
NO. 1 MILLER’S STATION, GA.—“On the 27th of August, one of the
members of this church died; or, perhaps, I should express it
better if I said he fell asleep—for it seemed more like sleep than
death. The brother had not been a member of the church for one year
yet; but all who saw him before his death felt sure that he was a
saved man. He was over 76 years of age, and was one of those who
had left off drinking since I came here. He was so determined on
leaving it off that he would not take the communion with us the
last time he was present at our services. He said he was afraid it
would lead him to rum drinking again. In his case was shown the
power of the Gospel. He had lived in sin for 75 years; yet, by the
grace of God, and the power of His word, he was set free from the
power of Satan. During his short Christian life he was kept from
the sin of strong drink, and when he died he went to live with
Jesus. A few hours before his death he said to me: ‘All I want now
is to see my dear Jesus; I have given up all for His sake; do,
blessed Jesus, come and take me when you are ready.’”
“THE FIRST COMMENCEMENT ON THE OGEECHEE” is the way in which Pastor
McLean, of Ga., announces the closing exercises of his parish
school. Never before had those rice swamps caught the echoes of
the children’s eloquence. In the twenty-eight orations and two
dialogues there was not a failure. And when the fathers and mothers
had a chance to express their gratitude, it was a burst of “God
bless you, brother.” Best of all, of the ninety-five who have been
connected with the school during the year, twenty-five have become
the disciples of the Great Master since the school was opened.
TALLADEGA, ALA.—The Catalogue of the College for the last year
reports 214 students in all the departments. This number includes
the dozen theological students who have been under the training of
Prof. G. W. Andrews. Their names are Andrew J. Headen, P. W. Young
and W. S. Williams, who were graduated this year; and also these,
who are to study one year more, though they have all been licensed,
J. B. Grant, Byron Gunner, John W. Strong, John R. Sims, Yancy B.
Sims, J. W. Roberts, H. W. Conley and Spencer Snell.
LAWSONVILLE, ALA.—While the people of this place are engaged in
building a church, they are enjoying a season of revival under
their Talladega minister, Rev. J. W. Strong.
MT. SPRING, ALA.—Rev. Alfred Jones, of Childersburg, having
preached a week at the out-station, Mt. Spring, was permitted to
rejoice in the conversion of fourteen persons. A half dozen have
also united with his church at home upon profession.
THE COVE, ALA.—Rev. J. B. Grant has been assisted at this place by
his fellow theologues, Y. B. Sim, T. T. Benson, J. R. Sims, and by
Rev. P. J. McEntosh, in a series of meetings which have resulted in
great good.
NEW ORLEANS, LA.—Rev. D. L. Mitchel, who is in charge of the
Presbyterian Book Depository in this city, is supplying the Central
Church (Rev. W. S. Alexander’s) during the summer vacation. He
writes thus under a recent date: “The congregation is quite regular
in attendance, about seventy, and the attention is excellent. The
prayer meetings are also well attended, and the spiritual condition
steadily improving. I think this one of the most important fields
in the South, and one of the most hopeful. May the blessing of our
heavenly Father abide with your corps of Christian workers and give
them abundant success in their self-denying labors.”
* * * * *
GENERAL NOTES.
The Freedmen.
—Of 142 cases of yellow fever reported at Memphis during the week,
August 18th to 24th, 79 were of colored people—about one-half.
About three-eighths of the total population are colored.
—Among the colored refugees in Kansas is an entire Baptist church
of 300 persons led by the pastor and deacons. They were from Delta,
La.
—Sojourner Truth, the famous colored woman, who is now 103 years
old, is at Chicago, en route to Kansas, to make a study of the
colored exodus.
—Governor St. John, of Kansas, believes that the colored exodus has
only begun; that it is not unlikely that it will soon re-open, and
reach to hundreds of thousands in its numbers.
—The current catalogue of Howard University reports a total of
236 students for the year. Of these, 21 are in the Theological
department, 64 in the Medical, 10 in the Law, 17 in the College,
16 in the Preparatory, and 87 in the Normal. This Association for
the third year sustains one-half the expense of the Theological
department. Rev. Dr. Craighead of this city, many years connected
with _The Evangelist_, has been appointed to the chair of Theology,
made vacant by the death of Prof. Lorenzo Westcott. Dr. Craighead
has accepted, and is to enter upon duty this fall. The Law and
Medical departments are under the instruction of resident lawyers
and doctors in Washington. Rev. Wm. W. Patton, D.D., is President
and Professor of Intellectual and Moral Philosophy, Natural
Theology, and Evidences of Revealed Religion, also Instructor in
Hebrew.
An appropriation of ten thousand dollars was made by the last
Congress exclusively for the benefit of the College; not a dollar
is to go to sustain the professional courses. It is fitting that
the Government, which, through the Freedmen’s Bureau, did so much
to found the institution, should help it along in its straits.
Prof. R. I. Greener, of the Law department, before the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, in session at Saratoga,
joined issue with Frederick Douglass in the discussion of the
exodus question. He is a man of platform popularity. It must
have been a touching scene when Col. Thos. J. Kirkpatrick, of
Virginia, and Frederick Douglass, in the meeting of the Howard
Board of Trust, joined hands in mutual expression of regard—the
ex-slaveholder and the ex-slave.
—The Marysville College in East Tennessee, founded before the
war by the New School Presbyterians, now under the presidency
of Rev. Peter Mason Bartlett, who has also a brother in one of
the professorships, received some of the funds of the Freedmen’s
Bureau, upon the condition that its doors should ever stand open to
colored as well as white students. This provision has been carried
out in spite of local prejudice, so that all along there have
been a few students of the African race among its numbers. This
institution is to be praised for fidelity to the bond. Some schools
that received from the same fund, on the same conditions, have not
stood to the contract.
—Aunt Kelly, now living at Troy, Missouri, at an advanced age, but
“bred, born, and raised in ole Virginny,” told the writer, that,
when a young woman, she sawed the lumber for the building of the
State University. For that matter, the labor in building the mass
of the literary institutions of the South was performed by the
colored people. It is, then, only a piece of reciprocity that the
several States of that region should now provide public schools
for that class of their citizens. Old Virginia appropriates ten
thousand dollars a year to the Hampton Institute; South Carolina
aids the Claflin University (Methodist), and other States are doing
a like generous thing.
* * * * *
Africa.
—Of the twenty-three new missionaries sent out by the Church
Missionary Society during the last year, three were for West
Africa and five for the Nyanza Mission. Of the eighteen new this
year, two are for West Africa and two for the Nyanza Mission, to
be stationed at Mpwapwa. Mr. Price is, for the present, the only
ordained missionary at the station. Mr. Cole is to devote himself
largely to the industrial interests of the Mission with a view to
its self-support at as early a day as may be found possible. Dr.
Baxter and Mr. Last have already occupied the field for a year. In
the instructions given them at a farewell meeting it was said: “Not
only is it made more and more clear that Mpwapwa is in a sense the
key to the Lake district, and likely to remain so for many years
to come, and hence important with a view to the work carried on in
the interior by other societies as well as the C. M. S., but there
is also no doubt that from it, as a centre, missionary work may be
carried on both among the natives inhabiting the Usagara Mountains
and amid the manly and numerous race inhabiting the Ugogo country.”
—The same Society reports that its work in behalf of the freed
slaves in East Africa is beginning to bear spiritual fruit. The
improved condition of the settlement at Frere Town, materially and
morally, has been reported from time to time; but the spiritual
results hitherto have been comparatively small. Until lately no
mention has been made of the gospel’s taking root among the poor
liberated slaves rescued by Her Majesty’s cruisers, and handed
over to the Mission in the Autumn of 1875, to the number of nearly
300, and perhaps another 100 in smaller detachments since. Mr.
Streeter now reports the baptism of thirty-two of them on their own
confession of faith, besides infants. The Rev. A. Menzies reached
Frere Town June 1st.
—The Free Church of Scotland reports the transfer of Miss Waterston
to the new field at Livingstonia. Miss W. has for seven years been
the successful superintendent of the female seminary at Lovedale.
She is fully qualified as a medical missionary, and carries the
confidence and good wishes of all who know her. Says the _Monthly
Record_: She means to go first to Lovedale, where she will halt
for a short time in order to select coadjutors from among her
former pupils. She hopes to induce some of them to accompany her
to the sphere of her future labors, where they will be employed as
teachers, and in other departments of the work. When Dr. Stewart
first started for Lake Nyassa, so many of the Lovedale young men
volunteered for service under their noble missionary’s banner, that
he found it impossible to accept of half the number. From what we
have heard of the young women, they are not likely to be behind in
courage and zeal, nor is Miss Waterston likely to be disappointed
in her hope of volunteers. Her aim will be now, as formerly, to
blend Christian teaching with efforts to civilize and elevate,
and, as opportunity offers, to gather the young into boarding and
industrial schools. She will also help Dr. Laws in his dispensary
and other medical work among the women.
The only other lady who has gone to Livingstonia is to be the wife
of the well-known missionary, Dr. Laws, who so ably conducts the
Free Church Mission there; and at Blantyre, the station of the
Established Church of Scotland, there already resides the wife of
one of the missionaries—Mrs. Duff McDonald.
—When the missionary steamer owned by the mission of the Free
Church of Scotland was to be placed on Lake Nyassa, the leader
of the expedition applied to the chief of the tribe for reliable
help to carry the craft around the Murchison Cataracts. The chief
responded by sending eight hundred women,—a compliment certainly
to the trustworthiness of the sex. “Some of them came fifty miles,
bringing their provisions with them. These women were intrusted
with the whole, when if a single portion of the steamer had been
lost, the whole scheme would have failed. They carried it in
two hundred and fifty loads in five days, under a tropical sun,
seventy-five miles, to an elevation of 1,800 feet, and not a
nail or screw was lost. They ‘trusted the Englishman,’ asking no
questions of wages, and receiving each six yards of calico; and for
the sake of being liberal, each was given an extra yard.”—_Heathen
Woman’s Friend_.
—The sudden death of Rev. Dr. Mullens, of peritonitis, at Aden,
is announced. He has been for some years a Christian leader
in Great Britain, and his opinions have had great weight with
intelligent Christians throughout the world. He has been the chief
Corresponding Secretary of the great London Missionary Society
during about twenty years—a position of great responsibility and
usefulness, and one of the most influential in the Church of
Christ. Before he was called to this service he had been for many
years a successful missionary in India. Two or three months ago, by
his own request—if memory serves us faithfully—he was appointed by
the Society to accompany a band of young missionaries to Zanzibar,
and to go on, if necessary, if his judgment so decided, to Lake
Tanganyika, in the heart of Southern Africa. It was expected
that his strong sense and remarkable executive ability would see
and organize some method to overcome the serious obstacles and
difficulties which lie in the path of missions to Central Africa.
On arriving at Zanzibar, Dr. Mullens decided, in the exercise
of the discretion given him by the Board, to proceed onward, in
company with Messrs. Griffith and Southon, to Lake Tanganyika. The
party left Zanzibar on the afternoon of Friday, June 13th, and
having landed at Saadani, started for the interior. Letters dated
Ndumi, June 16th, report that all the members of the expedition
were in excellent health, and were well on their way westward.
News of his death on the 10th of July has brought sadness to many
hearts outside of the circle who will most deeply miss his counsels
and mourn his loss. He was not yet fifty-nine years of age, and was
one of the foremost men of the present time in foreign missions,
having been, perhaps, the most prominent leader in the Basle
Missionary Conference held in October last.
—There is now an unbroken chain of communication by steam from
England to the northern end of Lake Nyassa in Central Africa,
excepting seventy miles of the Murchison Cataracts in the Shire
River; and it is ascertained that Lakes Nyassa and Tanganyika are
but 130 miles apart, instead of 250.
—The London _Daily Telegraph_ says: Among many interesting
particulars of discoveries brought from Africa by the gallant
Portuguese explorer, Major Serpa Pinto, none is more absorbing
than his story of the white people encountered between the rivers
Cubango and Cuando. Serpa Pinto found in these districts a tribe
absolutely European in tint, yet nowise of the Albino type, for
the hair was black and woolly. He described them as uglier than
the plainest negroes, and lower in civilization than any race met
with, having receding foreheads, slanting eyes like the Chinese,
prominent cheek-bones, and hanging lower lips. The appearance fails
to do much credit to the white men whom they resemble. Who, then,
and whence, are these people, so strangely recalling the tribe
spoken of by Mr. Stanley between the equatorial lakes?
—Late news from Bishop Crowther’s mission, on the Niger River,
Africa, states that one of the chiefs, Captain Hart, who had been
most active at Bonny in the persecution of Christian converts,
is dead. On his death-bed he commanded that all his idols be
destroyed, warning his followers to have nothing more to do with
idol worship. The next day after his death the heathen fell upon
the collection of idols with a will. Archdeacon Crowther writes:
“Early this morning they began to destroy the jujus. The work of
destruction is great. The poor gods and goddesses are having very
hard times in late Captain Hart’s quarters now. They are handled in
a most unceremonious and rough manner. Two canoe-loads, it is said,
have found their resting-place in the deepest part of the river,
and those that float and will not sink are broken into ever so many
pieces. Floating wrecks of idols made and worshiped since the days
of Captain Hart’s father are to be seen dotted all over the creek
to the river in the shipping. Imprecations and abuses have taken
the place of worship.”
Bishop Crowther reports that, after a long season at Bonny, in
which, owing to persecution, there were no converts, eight persons
have been baptized.
—Dr. John Kirk, the British Consul-General at Zanzibar, Africa,
writes that Keith Johnson, the leader of the expedition to explore
the head of Lake Nyassa, died of dysentery on the 27th of June,
at Berobero, 130 miles inland from Dar-es-Salaam. The expedition
will be continued by Mr. Thomson, the scientific assistant of Mr.
Johnson.
—Mr. John S. Hartland reports his arrival at Bonny, and Mr. W. H.
Bentley at Sierra Leone, on the West Coast of Africa. They are
both on their way to the English Baptist Mission on the Congo or
Livingstone River.
* * * * *
The Indians.
The following paragraph from the _Independent_ so fully expresses
our view of the matter of the Ponca Indians, that we both copy and
endorse it:
The story which Secretary Schurz tells about the Ponca Indians,
while it corrects some misapprehensions in regard to the case,
nevertheless confesses that the Government has treated the Indians
very unjustly. This the Secretary said in his first annual report.
After securing to the Poncas 96,000 acres of land in South-eastern
Dakota by the treaties of 1817, 1826 and 1858, the Government in
1868 granted this very land to the Sioux Indians, without any
reference to the rights held therein by the Poncas, both by treaty
and occupancy. The Sioux Indians were unfriendly to the Poncas,
and the collision between these tribes made it necessary for
the Government to seek the removal of the Poncas to the Indian
Territory. All this was done before the present Administration
came into power, and hence it has no responsibility for the wrong
done. Secretary Schurz says that “no effort has been spared by
the Executive branch of the Government to rectify all the wrongs
that the Poncas have suffered, so far as these wrongs can be
rectified.” He also says that “a bill for their relief, providing
for payment for their lands in Dakota, and also providing for
the payment for their new reservation, with an appropriation of
$58,000 to reimburse them for their losses, has been sent to
Congress by the Interior Department.” We are glad to learn from so
good an authority that the Executive Department of the Government
recognizes the wrong which has been done to these Indians, and
shows a disposition to make an honorable _amende_ therefor. It is
to be hoped that Congress will sustain and concur with its efforts.
* * * * *
THE FREEDMEN.
REV. JOS. E. ROY, D.D.,
FIELD SUPERINTENDENT, ATLANTA, GA.
* * * * *
NORTH AND SOUTH.
Some Things in Common.
In efforts to promote the spirit of Christian union, it is always
advised that we look for the things that we hold in common—the
things that make us Christians, rather than those which make us
of this or that church party. In seeking to advance national good
feeling, may we not wisely pursue something of the same course? If
any persons can take up this line of talk without being accused
of having been bulldozed by Southern blandishment, it may be those
who were the early abolitionists, and especially those who endeavor
to prove their faith by their works in going down among the lowly
and despised ex-slaves to try to raise them up by the appliances of
education and of the Gospel.
1. One such common possession is that of our English inheritance.
We are, characteristically, of the Anglo-Saxon stock. We speak
the English language from South to North. We have that glorious
speech that swallows up and overmasters the Babel of tongues that
fall upon our ears. We think that, led by our incomparable Webster
and Worcester, we use our English with even more of correctness
than does the mother country. We inherit the great principles of
constitutional government, of trial by jury, habeas corpus, and of
civil and religious liberty. We are joint heirs to the matchless
English literature, and to a history that has made England the
leading nation of Christendom.
2. We hold in common the glories of our Revolutionary period. We
share in the joys of the birth of a new nation. We have the same
traditions of patriotism. We are mutually proud of the memory of
Washington and Jefferson and the Adamses, and of the other fathers
of the Republic. Our National Centennial gave occasion for a
revival of our national feeling. Masses of our brethren who had
been estranged were glad of the opportunity thus afforded to share
in the thrill inspired by the world’s recognition of our national
greatness.
3. We share in the essentials of the Reformed Church life. The
Pilgrims and the Puritans settled in New England. Much of the blood
by which the Southern States were stocked was of the Reformed
quality. In the celebration, at Chicago, of the two hundred and
fiftieth anniversary of the Landing of the Pilgrims, Dr. Bacon said
that the Presbyterians were Puritans. The South has had a large
portion of this moral and theological leavening. The Scotch and
the Scotch-Irish element in that region has been large and largely
influential. Through them Puritan notions have been planted and
propagated. The Huguenots, who were the contribution of France to
the Reformation, have had a large representation in the South.
Sixty years before the Pilgrims landed, they made, on the Carolina
coast, two settlements, which were annihilated by the persecuting
power of Rome that followed them to the wilderness continent. They
tried again and made a lodgment where Charleston now stands, and to
this day “The Huguenot Church” abides in its integrity of language
and of character. From this same source that city has received a
large infiltration of blood and of principle. Out in the State,
and at other places in the South, the Huguenots have given names
to towns and tone and caste to society. The South has had but a
small portion of the foreign emigration, and so has felt less the
influence of the Continental views as to the Sabbath. One of our
professors, who has been many years in the South, says that the
Holy Day is more strictly observed in that part of the country
than at the North. The intellectual orthodoxy of the South is well
known. It may be because of the lack of activity in theological
discussion, but the fact is apparent to such a degree that a more
ethical and practical preaching is what the Christian people are
hungering for thereaway.
4. We have a common sympathy in Protestantism. The early Spanish
and French occupation in Louisiana and in Baltimore has made
those strong Catholic centres. But Romanism is not so generally a
prevailing power in the South as in the North. The drift of foreign
emigration has made this difference. Rome’s chance at the South is
now not with immigrants, but with natives, Africo-Americans; and
she is bound to make the most of it. But just here comes out our
unity in Protestant views. Southern Christians are anxious lest
the display and the mystery of the Roman system should captivate
these simple children of nature. They are as solicitous as we
that the same Providence which delivered our land from the early
domination of Romish nationalities, may save it from coming under
the supremacy of that spiritual despotism. When the Catholic bishop
at Richmond opened his cathedral, Sunday nights, to a free service
in behalf of the colored people, it made a tremendous stir among
white as well as colored Protestants.
5. Have we not had a common responsibility for the existence of
slavery? Striking in its upas roots at Jamestown, it was allowed
to spread over all the colonies. Samuel Hopkins, thundering at
the gates of the pens of the slave-trade in Newport, must yet
reverberate among those empty dens still standing. In 1872 I saw
in Connecticut an aged disciple who had once been a slave in that
State. My childish ears tingled with my father’s stories of slave
life as known to him in New Jersey. The system, by implication,
was recognized in the Federal Constitution. The Government allowed
it to sweep out over yet other empire areas at the South and West.
We had Federal laws, resting upon Northern public sentiment, to
protect the institution. We allowed our churches and our literary
institutions and our benevolent societies to come under the common
paralysis of conscience. Without any interest in slaves as personal
property, we allowed our great commercial affairs to be brought
under bondage to that system. Our measure of complicity in that
national wrong was indicated in part by the awful retribution meted
out in the sacrifice of half a million of precious lives and by the
offering of billions of treasure. We have had occasion to join our
brethren at the South and say, “We are verily guilty concerning our
brother.”
6. Have we not now a common obligation to make restitution to these
new-made citizens? We are not only by legislation to recognize
their rights of manhood and of citizenship, but to uphold them in
the same. We are to secure them in the enjoyment of the blessing
of our American educational system and of the best Christianizing
processes. As we have endowed them with the sacred elements of
citizenship, we must help them to the means of making them citizens
worthy of the nation. This common duty was indicated by Hon. John
Goode, of Virginia, when he said, in Congress, “Can the Government
bestow civil and political rights upon these wards of the nation,
and at the same time avoid the solemn obligation to provide for
their mental and moral improvement?” That is the responsibility
of citizens, North and South, as well as of the Government. And
so let the people join hands, irrespective of sectional lines, in
doing the just, the right thing by these native Americans, the
providential significance of whose existence in our country is a
problem calling for solution.
* * * * *
REMINISCENCES.
“It’s the color that tells”—“Jes hear dem niggers read”—Candle
and half-bushel—“Age up country,” &c.—Sad words making
glad—“Frosty arms.”
After the full accounts you have been giving your readers of late
of the Commencement Exercises, with their attendant essays and
orations, brief reminiscences of a few years ago, when the Freedmen
knew little of Greek and Latin, but were intent upon “blue-back”
spellers and the easy parts of the Bible, may not come amiss.
It happened once that in a dimly-lighted school-house, about nine
o’clock at night, filled with men and women of various hue, from
white through brown to black, there was one class of nine young
men spelling words of three syllables. They were very earnest, and
in real old-fashioned way were going “up and down” in the class.
At the head stood Joseph, very black; then three nearly as dark,
followed by four light ones, with the very darkest of the whole
class at the foot. All went well till the upper light one missed
and the word passed down; Joseph, seeing it likely to pass from the
light ones to the very dark face at the foot, in excitement and joy
burst forth with, “Spell it, Dave, and cut up here; _it’s the color
that tells_.” Dave spelt it, and the color did tell.
One man who made his appearance in night-school about the middle
of the winter, I shall never forget. His entrance was quite
overpowering—a big man, big cane, big hat, and a big shawl thrown
over his shoulder, Arab style. I happened to be at leisure, so I
went at once to ask him if he intended coming regularly to school.
Saying that he did, my next question was, “What’s your name?” “I’m
Lucy’s husband, over there.” As I didn’t know Lucy, I was not much
the wiser, and had to repeat the question with the emphasis on the
_your_. Wishing to classify him, I asked, “What book do you read
in?” “The Bible mostly, ma’am.” “Can you read in the First Reader?”
“Yes, first, second, third, fourth and all the other elementary
books.” Thinking I might gain some information where to assign him,
I looked at the books he had brought with him. There were four: a
large family Bible; another book of some size, but very fine print,
on “Presbyterian Ordination Refuted;” a “Child’s Scripture Question
Book,” and a small geography.
But if the night-schools were amusing, the afternoon schools for
the women were not less so. Old women and young women, many of them
in fantastic attire, with hats, caps and dresses that would have
been considered prizes by an antiquary; the dark faces peering
from under the white or speckled turban; old women wiping their
spectacles, vainly endeavoring to get “more light” on the subject,
while picking away at the letters in some old Primer, as if they
were to be transferred bodily to the head. Aunt Chloe Fisher
must have been seventy-five or eighty years old, but still she
was bright and original. She came into school one afternoon very
anxious to learn to read “de way, de troof, and de life.” Seeing
some women in another part of the room reading, she exclaimed, “Jes
hear dem niggers read! If dis nig can’t read, too, won’t she fight
’em?” and then she vigorously applied her finger to the pages of
the Gospel of John which she had with her, finding the words Lord
and God, which were about all she knew. She believed in both faith
and works, for she used to pray most earnestly that God would help
her know the words, and then get up in the middle of the night and
light a pine knot to see if she had a word right. Old Aunt Chloe
was always happy. I never saw her otherwise but once, and then she
was greatly troubled for fear she should lose her place in the
grave-yard. One special place she had chosen, and young people were
dying so fast she was afraid she should not die soon enough to lie
there. She would get happy over her wash-tub or anywhere else, and
her hands and her feet would keep time with some negro hymn in a
most amusing manner.
One old Aunty was reading the fifth chapter of Matthew,
when she came to a passage, which she read thus;
“Neither—do—men—light—a—half-bushel—and—put—it—under—a—candle-stick.”
On being stopped and told to look again, pointing with her finger
all along the lines of the page, with a look of half despair she
said, “Bress you, honey, I can’t find either candle or half-bushel
now.” Those simple words were quite a sermon for me, and I’ve
thought of them many a time since. Are not we, as Christians, in
danger of losing our candles? Our good Aunty’s candle was soon
found for her; but will ours, once lost, be as easily recovered?
In those days, even in the day-schools, there were many
difficulties that could hardly be encountered now. I remember
hearing one teacher say that it was almost impossible to get the
ages of her scholars. They would say, “My age is up country;” or
“Ole missis has my age in the Bible, and she’s gone away.” The
trick of giving one name to one teacher and another to the next
was practiced. On giving a second name once, one little fellow was
brought up with, “Why, I thought your name was George Johnson?” “I
done got tired of that name,” was his cool reply.
Perhaps the most interesting prayer-meeting that I ever attended
among the Freedmen was in Alabama, where the Ku Klux outrages
lasted so much longer than in other places, and where the
missionaries looked to their guns and their rifles before retiring.
I reached there just the evening of the weekly prayer-meeting at
the school-house. ’Twas a stormy night, but with waterproofs and
umbrellas we ventured. Wholly unused to bullets, I must confess
there was a little trembling under one waterproof, as we wended
our way along the little path through the woods, and across the
one plank bridge over the Branch; but once within the building all
fear vanished. The room was filled with the finest looking colored
people I had ever seen. They had, many of them, been house servants
in the best families in this aristocratic place. The pastor opened
the meeting, and they carried it on with a liveliness that was
truly refreshing. Two or three usually rose at once, with words
right on their lips. This church had only been organized a little
over a year, and then numbered about eighty. There had been much
to dishearten all along. They had no church building, and had been
striving hard to build; but no sooner would they begin to see
little light through the clouds than the white people, fearing that
the men with dark skins might acquire too great a hold on this
world’s goods, would remove work from the most prosperous, and
thus the clouds would gather again. Referring to this method of
_keeping down_, one of the members once said, “No ’count niggers
can rub along here well enough, but smart niggers had better look
out for other quarters.” Even at that time the danger of their
being obliged to disband from outside violence was hardly over, and
as they told of their love for their church, one could hardly help
thinking of the stories of the early Christians, when persecutions
only increased their zeal. There was an undertone of sadness
through the remarks of several, for they felt peculiarly uncertain
as to what a day might bring forth. But one suddenly rose and
changed the key. “I was sad,” he said, “when I first came in here,
but your words of sadness have made me glad, for they have shown me
how much we all love our church, and such love, with the love of
God for us, which is even much greater, will carry us through fiery
trials. I never felt as strong as I feel to-night. ’Tis true, I
don’t know what may come upon us, but I do feel that the Lord will
help us through.” Then he told what he hoped for the future, in
such cheerful words, that as he sat down, they burst forth almost
with one voice in a song of praise, and then one after another
kneeled down, and in the most simple words of faith asked their
Father to help His children in this their day of trouble, and I do
not think there was one present who had the slightest doubt of His
doing so.
Even before the Kansas fever, there were States in the North that
were synonyms for all good things to the colored people. I remember
a Thanksgiving Day, when a minister was addressing one of the
schools, and telling the children what they had to be thankful
for, that he burst forth with the question, “Is there any other
country so blessed as this?” “Yes, sir,” said a little urchin
before him. “Why, what one?” “Massachusetts,” was the reply.
I once heard a colored minister pray heartily for the teachers in
this wise, “May God throw around this institution His _frosty_
arms, and bear the teachers from this to another vale of tears.”
The good old days have gone; the better ones, _perhaps_, have come.
* * * * *
TENNESSEE.
A Remarkable Conversion and Triumphant Death.
MISS HENRIETTA MATSON, NASHVILLE.
How often have God’s dealings with His children seemed strange and
sad, when those who were just ready to do valiant service for Him,
here amid the need of a lost world, are called up higher—called to
rest, rather than toil—to wear the crown, rather than longer bear
the cross.
But God’s ways are not ours, and since we know that He ever cares
for His own cause, we may believe that He calls the loved one to
a higher usefulness. Such were some of the thoughts that came to
our hearts when, on a beautiful June morning during the summer
vacation, we read the words, “E. J. Park died yesterday afternoon,”
followed by an account of the triumphant death of a student of Fisk
University, who had gone to Texas to teach school.
Eugene Park came to Fisk University several years ago, a pleasant,
careless boy, who had never bestowed a thought upon his eternal
interests. For a long time he was but little moved; both the
warnings and the entreaties of the Gospel seemed to fall unheeded
upon his ear, and we often felt that he became only more careless
and indifferent.
At last, however, the Spirit strove with him, and he began to
ask, “What must I do to be saved?” though at first there was not
in him that fixed purpose which would lead him to arise and go to
his Father. And so he halted for months, wavering and undecided,
until a mighty conviction seized him that he must find God, and
that speedily. Sin, in all its enormity, was revealed to him, and
he seemed indeed to realize that he was lost, unless the Saviour
should interpose and deliver him.
He then gave himself entirely to seeking God. He could not study,
and there were many long hours in which he could neither eat nor
sleep, so powerfully was he wrought upon. One morning in Chapel,
at devotional exercises, while in this intense state of mind, the
reading of the Scriptures so affected him that he sobbed aloud.
Hoping to calm him, and at the same time point him to Christ, the
hymn was sung, “Oh, the blood, the precious blood!” but he was so
overcome that his friends were obliged to take him away, and a few
of us gathered and prayed with him. Still the light from the Sun of
Righteousness did not break in; the precious blood was not applied
to his soul until the next day, when Jesus Himself drew near, and
the Lord of Glory revealed Himself as the One altogether lovely,
and the Chief among ten thousand. His soul seemed in a rapture of
joy for days. He came to the school with his Bible always in his
hand, as though he could not be parted from it even for a moment.
Then followed years of ripening in the Christian life, with
frequent seasons of such blessing that he could not speak of Christ
without tears. He early gave himself to the ministry, feeling that
to preach the everlasting Gospel would be his highest joy, and
was pursuing his studies with this in view. He was not, however,
without temptations to a worldly life, though we are assured that
the dear Saviour kept His own, even unto the end. His death was a
beautiful illustration of the triumph of the Gospel of Christ. Far
from friends and home, yet he was not alone, for that Friend that
sticketh closer than a brother was near.
He had been ill for several days, and one morning he told those
about him that he should go home at three afternoon, and precisely
at the hour named the summons came. He had sent messages to his
mother and friends. “Tell them,” he said, “that Jesus is with me
and saves me. Oh, how sweet it is to die in the arms of Jesus.” He
then sung, “Washed in the blood of the Lamb,” “Safe in the arms of
Jesus,” and “Sweeping through the gates to the new Jerusalem.”
And now we, in our sorrow, think of him as thus “safe.” We hoped he
would labor long and successfully for the Master; but he has been
called up higher, and is now, we believe, among the ransomed in the
New Jerusalem, where he has learned the new song, even praise unto
our God.
* * * * *
GEORGIA.
First Impressions.
REV. P. W. YOUNG, BYRON
I feel the necessity of writing you this morning concerning my
work, though my time is much occupied. I am happy to say that I
found some very earnest members here, notwithstanding they were
like sheep without a shepherd when I came. There is an opportunity
for a great deal of Christian labor here, as in many other places.
I preach on the Sabbath at 11 o’clock and at 8 o’clock in the
evening. We have a very good Temperance Society also. Its members
manifest great interest in the cause. The people are beginning to
see that intemperance, if continually practiced, will bring them to
degradation. I delivered a lecture to the society last Sabbath in
the afternoon, having about 250 persons present. I told them in the
plainest words of the great harm that had been done by intemperance
among the colored people. When I closed my remarks they said they
wished I could speak an hour longer on the same subject, showing
their hearty approval of what I had said.
The religious interest seems to be good generally. There are four
converts to unite with the church.
* * * * *
THE CHINESE.
* * * * *
“CALIFORNIA CHINESE MISSION.”
Auxiliary to the American Missionary Association.
PRESIDENT: Rev. J. K. McLean, D. D. VICE-PRESIDENTS: Rev. A. L.
Stone, D. D., Thomas C. Wedderspoon, Esq., Rev. T. K. Noble, Hon.
F. F. Low, Rev. I. E. Dwinell, D. D., Hon. Samuel Cross, Rev. S.
H. Willey, D. D., Edward P. Flint, Esq., Rev. J. W. Hough, D. D.,
Jacob S. Taber, Esq.
DIRECTORS: Rev. George Mooar, D. D., Hon. E. D. Sawyer, Rev. E. P.
Baker, James M. Haven Esq., Rev. Joseph Rowell, Rev. John Kimball,
E. P. Sanford, Esq.
SECRETARY: Rev. W. C. Pond. TREASURER: E. Palache, Esq.
* * * * *
THE BEGINNING OF HARVEST—ONG LUNE.
REV. WM. C. POND, SAN FRANCISCO.
Our Lord has begun—sooner than we desired and very suddenly to
us—to gather from our harvest field His wheat into His garner. The
first-fruits went home on Sunday, Aug. 3d, at our Bethany church. I
was in the act of baptizing and welcoming to Christian fellowship
on earth _four_ of our more recently converted Chinese brethren,
when our brother Ong Lune was welcomed to the fellowship above. He
was a young man of 21 years, had been a Christian, as we hoped,
for nearly three years, and a church member since December, 1877.
His sickness was brief, and he was supposed to be recovering till
about twenty-four hours before his death. He had greatly desired
to become strong enough to be present at our August communion, but,
instead, he ate bread in the kingdom of God.
Modest and unassuming, but intelligent, earnest and thoroughly
consecrated to Christ, his absence from our mission work makes a
void not easily filled. A great majority of American Christians
might well have sat at the feet of this young Chinaman and learned
how to be co-workers with the Saviour. Approaching his countrymen
with a smile, seizing every opportunity to “speak a word in
season,” he sought to bring them to our schools, and then to lead
them to his Saviour. A house-servant, with little time that he
could call his own, he will wear no starless crown. I know not how
many times the question, “Who told you to come to school?” has been
answered by the utterance of his name. The last service he was able
to render was—in spite of pain and weariness from the disease which
afterwards proved fatal—to act as my interpreter in the examination
of three candidates for baptism, one of them, possibly, his own
child in the Gospel.
His teacher—Miss Florence N. Wooley—quotes him as saying that what
he wanted was “to bring more and more scholars, and watch them,
and when they know about Jesus, must make them to be our brethren
and try to keep them from temptation; and I wish to do the best I
can, but am afraid of temptation myself.” She adds: “He succeeded
in this; and the secret of his success, as told me by one of the
scholars, was this: ‘He talked so nice to the boys, and never got
cross nor angry; and so they all minded what he told them.’ He had
entered into the spirit of the word, ‘Go out into the highways and
hedges and compel them to come in.’ As soon as he came into school
he was wont to speak of some one who had promised him to come that
night. If this promise was not fulfilled, he went after the person
again and again and brought him in. He was getting on well in his
studies, especially in his study of the Bible. The last verses he
recited were Acts vii. 54, 55, now happily fulfilled in his own
experience.”
THE STORY OF LEE FOUN, BY LEE HAIM.
[Lee Haim, one of our helpers, had given me this account, and I
requested him to write it for the MISSIONARY. I give it as he wrote
it, word for word, correcting only a few expressions to make the
sense clear.—W. C. P.]
“I am going to tell you something of our Christian brethren
when they go back to China. Last year one of our Christian
Association went by the steamship with his own brother, and when
they both reached their old home, his elder brother said to his
wife: ‘Well, to-morrow I will go tell my mother that my younger
brother, Lee Foun, believes in Jesus, and was a member of the
American Association while he staid in California. He does not
want to worship our gods which sit in the temple, nor worship our
ancestors; neither to keep the traditions which our fathers have
handed down from generation to generation. If I go and tell these
things to my mother she will give him a good whipping.’
“So his elder brother agreed to tell his mother in the morning;
and when the morning came he brought the whole affair before her.
She was exceedingly grieved when she heard it, and she went and
told some of her son’s uncles. Then Lee Foun’s uncles said to her:
‘Never mind that now; your son now come back is like a stranger;
you need not to say any thing to him now; but wait for two days,
until the first day of June is come; then you may call him up and
offer some tea, and burn the incense in the morning, and see if he
do it or not.’ This custom was known to Lee Foun, for our Chinese
generally keep it twice each month—the first day of the month and
the fifteenth. It is considered a very important custom, as much so
as to serve their parents in their lifetime. It is like the Jews
keeping the Passover every year, or as we keep the Supper of the
Lord.
“So his mother said nothing to him till the first day of June; then
she tried to wake him up to burn the incense and offer the tea to
his great-grandfather; but Lee Foun did not get up as early that
morning as usual; and when the time of offering tea and burning
the incense had passed, then he got up. And when he met his mother
she burst into tears. He asked her presently, ‘What is the matter,
mother?’ and his mother gave no answer. Then he asked her the same
thing. His mother said to him: ‘My son, you ought to have got up
early this morning and offered some tea and burned the incense
before your ancestor; but you got up so late, and did not do it,
that makes me feel bad.’ Then Lee Foun said to his mother: ‘If we
go and offer tea and burn the incense before these stones, wood,
clay and paper, do you think they know it? I don’t believe that,
for they, having eyes, cannot see; having ears, cannot hear; having
noses, cannot smell; mouth, cannot speak; hands, cannot handle;
feet they have, but cannot walk; and bodies have they, but cannot
move. All these things are nothing but wood, stone, clay and paper.
What good have they done for men? Moreover, those who serve images,
or serve the dead instead of the living, sin against the living
and true God; for every thing is made by His own hands. And He has
commanded us not to worship images, neither to serve the dead;
but only to worship the true and living God, and to honor father
and mother while they are living. But those who take offerings
of paper to be burned up, and represent money, are foolish, and
deceive themselves; for the paper is nothing but paper, and cannot
represent money.’ Then his mother laughed when she heard that, and
Lee Foun’s brother was angry at him, because his mother was pleased
with his younger brother, Lee Foun. He felt as Joseph’s brethren
felt toward Joseph when they saw Jacob, their father, love him. Do
you think they could injure Joseph, and that Lee Foun’s brother can
injure Lee Foun? No. Why not? Because God is with them. As Paul
said: ‘If God be for us, who can be against us?’ Oh, how glorious
and powerful God is!
“After a while some of the Chinese missionaries heard that a
certain Christian brother had come back, so they went and inquired
for Lee Foun, and they entered into his village, to visit him;
and when he saw the missionaries, then he wept, because of the
persecution by his own brother, and because of the ignorance of
his relatives about God. Lee Foun’s mother was glad to receive
them, and invited them to come again to the feast of Lee Foun’s
marriage. After this the marriage of Lee Foun was at hand; so the
Chinese missionaries went to his village again to show him how
the Christian ceremony should be performed. So Lee Foun did as
Christians do. He did not bow his head before the idols, nor before
his ancestors, and neither did he keep the traditions of men, but
the commands of God.
“Not only he did so, but Chan Wen, Lee Sam, and also many of our
brethren, act in accordance with Christianity when they go back
to China. I believe you have no doubt of that; for if we are true
Christians here in California, we will be true Christians in China
and elsewhere. We will stand up for Jesus and suffer for Him, and
take up His cross in public.
“Dear friends, we entreat that you will mention our names to the
Lord when you pray, that we may have a faithful heart in our Lord
Jesus; that we may be strong in Him; and ask Him to open the great
door to us, that the nation of heathen Chinese soon may become
a Christian nation, and they may understand the word of God and
know Christ is the Creator and Saviour of the world, and all the
creatures should be bowed down before Him.”
* * * * *
CHILDREN’S PAGE.
* * * * *
COUNTRY SCHOOL-HOUSES.
TO THE CHILDREN:
I know you have heard much about the colored people, but did you
ever hear about their country school-houses? Let me tell you of two
in Alabama.
Sunday-schools as well as day-schools are held in these same
buildings. One Sunday, a minister who was going twelve miles out
into the country to visit one of these schools, invited me to go
with him. After inquiring many times where the school was, and
going half a mile out of our way, we at last spied, at the right
of the road, some saddled mules hitched to trees. We thought that
might be the place, and sure enough there, right in the woods, was
a nice new school-house.
After fastening our horse to a sweet-gum tree, we entered the
little unpainted building. The superintendent gave us seats at the
head of the school—not armchairs, but simply a board two feet from
the floor, answering for a bench. As soon as we were seated I began
to look about me to see what kind of a place I was in, while the
minister addressed the school. The house was built of pine logs,
placed an inch apart, consequently there were great cracks on all
sides of the room, which in summer must have been pleasant, as they
let in air, but in winter, think how cold they would be. The house
was full of old men, women and children, sitting on rude benches.
As I looked through the crack near me, I saw outside a row of men
seated on a log, who left their places when they heard a stranger’s
voice inside and crowded into the house. I saw them put their hats
up on a beam over their heads. Those who couldn’t find room inside
looked through the cracks. There was no window, only a square hole
cut over the door to let in light. Seeing the many cracks in the
roof, we asked, when we came out, if it never rained in upon them.
“Not much,” was the answer. You see these people don’t mind a bit
of a sprinkle now and then.
After the minister had finished telling them how he had been
in the very same land where Jesus had lived, the school sung,
“We’re going home to-morrow.” I wish you could have heard those
children. They sang at the top of their voices, their white teeth
showing more than ever in contrast with their black skin. After
the superintendent gave out the papers which we had brought, the
exercises closed, and I was glad to be relieved of the sixty pairs
of eyes which had been upon me.
Another time I went with some teachers to a Mission Sunday-school.
This was in a most lovely place, right in the thick woods, far away
from any houses or sounds of any kind, except the songs of the
birds. We found we were early that day, for neither the teacher nor
scholars had come. We went inside the school-house and waited.
Perhaps you ask how we got in. That was an easy thing to do, for
there was no locked door to keep us out, and no door of any kind,
only an opening in one side of the house. This was an old building,
built in the same way as the first one I visited. In some places
the logs were a foot apart. Here the benches were made of round
logs split in two, the flat part being the top, and in each end
of the rounded part were two legs. And such queer looking seats
as they were! Only one or two of them had backs. Before long the
teacher and a few scholars came. The school was small that day, as
there was a “big baptizing,” as they call it, not far away, which
always attracts crowds of colored people.
After the scholars had left, and as we were preparing to go, a
terrible thunder shower came up which detained us there. The rain
came in, drip, drip, at every crack, till after a while there was
only one dry corner in the house. The teacher told us that when
showers came in school time, the scholars had to sit on their books
to keep them dry. The shower continued for some time, and being
very tired, after a sixteen-mile drive over new-cut roads through
woods, we put on our water-proofs and lay down on the damp benches;
but finding the drops were falling into our faces, we were obliged
to put up umbrellas. This was resting under difficulties. There, in
that open building, far away from any one, with the rain coming in
and standing in pools on the floor, we fully realized what these
poor country people have to go through to learn their A, B, C; and
those who continue their schools in the winter must suffer greatly
from the cold, as they only have a fire-place in one end of the
room. One teacher told us that his fire-place was so poor, that in
winter he built a fire out of doors, while the children gathered
around it sitting on stumps and logs. There are not only these two
schools I have spoken of, but many such scattered all over the
Southern States.
Now, since I have been writing this, I have thought what a nice
plan it would be for you boys and girls to save some of your
pennies, and perhaps before long one of you would have enough to
buy a small, plain black-board, and another enough to buy a box of
crayons, or a pretty motto for one of these old bare school-rooms.
If you couldn’t send the things, you could send the money for them;
and how delighted any teacher would be with a few such comforts!
What do you think of my plan?—L. P. H.
* * * * *
RECEIPTS
FOR AUGUST, 1879.
MAINE, $1,031.89.
Bangor. First Cong. Ch. $29.17
Bath. Eliza Bowker 2.00
Castine. ESTATE of Samuel Adams, by L. G.
Philbrook, Ex. 800.00
Cumberland Mills. Rev. E. S. Tead 18.00
Dennysville. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 20.00
Falmouth. First Cong. Ch. 15.00
Gorham. First Cong. Ch. and Soc., to const.
MISS E. B. EMERY, L. M. 27.72
Vassalborough. ESTATE of Mary B. Buxton, by
Samuel Titcomb, Ex. 100.00
West Bath. Isaiah Percy, $3; Buelah B. Percy $2 5.00
Yarmouth. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.00
NEW HAMPSHIRE, $301.76.
Antrim. “A Friend.” _for Talladega C._ 5.00
Bath. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 7.70
Claremont. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 44.35
East Jaffrey. Eliza A. Parker 20.00
Goffstown. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 52.29
Haverhill. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 14.64
Henniker. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.00
Lebanon. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 16.00
Manchester. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 51.33
Meriden. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 13.80
Merrimack. Merrimack Aux. Soc. 11.15
Milford. Peter and Cynthia S. Burns, _for
Athens, Ala._ 50.00
Short Falls. J. W. C. 0.50
VERMONT, $195.95.
Berlin. Cong. Sab. Sch. 3.56
Brownington. Cong. Sab. Sch. (of which $5 from
Dea. S.) 8.45
Chester. E. S. 1.00
Essex Centre. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 4.50
Essex Junction. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 10.75
Ferrisburg. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 5.85
Georgia. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 13.84
Greensborough. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 5.00
Highgate. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 2.07
Ludlow. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 11.34
North Craftsbury. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 20.00
Pittsford. Mrs. E. H. Denison 5.00
Sheldon. Cong. Ch. 9.03
Springfield. Cong. Ch. 46.71
Swanton. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 14.85
Townshend. Mrs. N. B. Batchelder 2.00
Wesminster. Rev. A. B. D. 1.00
Westminster West. Rev. A. Stevens, D. D., $10;
Cong. Sab. Sch., $10 20.00
Windham. “A Friend,” $7; Cong. Sab. Sch., $4 11.00
Windham. Cong. Ch., $9.10, ack. in Sept.
Number, should read, Cong. Sab. Sch.
MASSACHUSETTS, $2,168.10.
Amherst. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 8.00
Andover. G. W. W. Dove. $100; “J. B. C.,” $5,
_for Athens, Ala._;—Ladies of Free Ch., $70,
_for Student Aid, Talladega C._;—J. L. S.,
50c 175.50
Ashburnham. M. W. 1.00
Boston. Rev. B. Southworth 5.00
Boston. Highland Cong. Ch. and Soc. 27.60
Boxford. S. B. S., 30c.; Mrs. C., 50c. 0.80
Bradford. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 28.70
Brookline. “M. and H. S. W.” 250.00
Buckland. —— by W. F. Root 2.12
Charlton. Clarissa W. Case 5.00
Chelsea. N. C. Tenny 5.00
Chicopee. Second Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.25
Conway. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 9.50
Dana. Cong. Ch. and Soc. (of which $12.48 _for
Athens, Ala._) 13.50
Easthampton. ESTATE of Samuel Hurlbut, by Mrs.
Sarah E. Pettis, Ex. 200.00
Erving. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 4.15
Gardner. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 10.00
Grantville. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 11.07
Great Barrington. Mrs. L. M. Chapin 5.00
Greenfield. Ladies’ Miss. Soc., $20, _for
Student Aid, Atlanta U._;—Miss Janette
Thompson, $5 25.00
Hadley. Russell Cong. Ch. 2.00
Holliston. Mrs. W. R. T. 0.50
Hopkinton. Mrs. J. P. Claflin, $150; Cong. Ch.
and Soc., $51.36 201.36
Ipswich. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 1.00
Lawrence. Lawrence St. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 60.00
Long Meadow. Gents’ Benev. Ass’n. 27.75
Medway. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 94.55
Monson. Mrs. C. C. Chapin and Class, to const.
MRS. JOHN PACKARD, L. M. 30.00
Monterey. Cong. Ch. 10.00
Milton. Cong. Sab. Sch. 31.34
Natick. Mrs. S. E. Hammond 10.00
Newton Centre. Ladies of Mrs. Furber’s Bible
Class, $60. _for Student Aid, Atlanta
U._;—Cong. Ch. and Soc., $55.64; Deacon
Benj. Burt, $2 117.64
North Reading. Rev. F. H. Foster 3.36
Norton. Wheaton Sem., _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 25.00
Orange. Mrs. E. W. M. 1.00
Palmer. Second Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.00
Petersham. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 5.37
Reading. Rev. W. H. Willcox, bbl. of C. and
books _for Talladega C._
Rehoboth. Cong. Ch. 14.00
Royalston. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 110.34
Shelburne. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 47.83
Shirley Village. L. Holbrook 5.00
South Royalston. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 20.00
Springfield. North Ch., $40, _for Miller
Station, Ga._;—Memorial Ch., $18.40;—Ira
Merrill, $5, _for Athens, Ala._ 63.40
Sunderland. Cong. Sab. Sch. 34.33
Templeton. Trin. Sab. Sch. 26.31
Uxbridge. Evan. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 33.00
Webster. First Cong. Ch. 50.00
Westfield. Mrs. J. F. 1.00
West Hampton. Cong. Sab. Sch. 23.00
Wellesley. Missionary Soc. of Wellesley College 4.00
Westminster. ESTATE of Mrs. S. A. Damon, by H.
G. Whitney, Ex. 208.00
West Springfield. Mittineague Cong. Ch. 12.05
Winchendon. Atlanta Soc., _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 40.00
Worcester. Union Ch. 37.73
RHODE ISLAND, $1,776.64.
Bristol. Mrs. M. De W. Rogers, $500; C. De
Wolf, $500 1000.00
East Providence. Cong. Ch. 14.00
Kingston. Cong. Ch. 28.77
Providence. Central Cong. Ch. 733.87
CONNECTICUT, $1,142.93.
Bantam Falls. Miss Cornelia Bradley, _for
Athens, Ala._ 5.00
Bolton. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 7.76
Bridgeport. Park St. Cong. Ch and Soc. 13.66
Brooklyn. First Trin. Ch. and Soc. 27.00
Canton Centre. “An Aged Friend” 2.00
Collinsville. Talladega Soc., $15.50, _for
Student Aid, Talladega C._;—“A Friend,” $1 16.50
Danbury. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 58.00
Durham. “A Friend.” to const. MRS. HENRY H.
NEWTON, L. M. 30.00
East Haven. Cong. Ch. (ad’l) 30.00
Ellington. Cong. Sab. Sch. 28.00
Farmington. A. F. Williams, to const. JENNETTE
COWLES VORCE, L. M. 30.00
Gilead. Mr. and Mrs. Thomas L. Brown, _for
Hampton N. and A. Inst._ 5.00
Greenfield. LEGACY of Dea. Wm. B. Morehouse,
by N. B. Hill 200.00
Greenfield. Cong. Ch. 11.55
Guilford. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 18.00
Hadlyme. R. E. and J. W. Hungerford, _for Fisk
U._, $100;—Cong. Ch., $12.58; J. H. V., 85c. 113.43
Hartford. “The Armour Bearers” of Talcott St.
Sab. Sch. 3.25
Kensington. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 18.00
Middletown. “A Friend” 10.00
Milford. First Cong. Ch. 25.00
Mount Carmel. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 12.75
North Branford. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 16.25
North Cornwall. Benev. Assn., by E. D. Pratt,
Treas. 15.15
New Britain. South Cong. Ch. 66.60
New Haven. Amos Townsend 40.00
North Stamford. Mrs. N. 1.00
Roxbury. “Mother and Daughter” 5.00
Salem. Cong. Ch. 4.00
South Britain. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 22.10
Southport. “A Friend of the Freedmen” 20.00
Thomaston. Cong. Ch. 22.83
Thompson. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 10.59
Union. Rev. Samuel I. Curtiss, $10; Union
Cong. Ch., $6 16.00
Wolcottville. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 30.69
Wauregan. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 7.30
Westfield. Cong. Ch. to const. WM. K. LOGEE
and MARY E. KING, L. M’s 65.00
Westford. Cong. Ch. 12.00
West Haven. Cong. Ch. 29.23
West Winsted. “A Friend,” _for Athens, Ala._ 6.00
Wethersfield. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 43.96
Windsor. Cong. Ch. 10.00
Woodstock. First Cong. Ch. 11.83
—— “Friends” 5.00
—— “A Friend” 17.50
NEW YORK, $25,133.99.
Albany. Vina S. Knowles 5.00
Black River. D. D. 1.00
Brooklyn. J. E. 1.00
Clifton Springs. Miss F., $1, _for Miller’s
Station, Ga._;—Mrs. M. M. C., 50c 1.50
Copenhagen. Lucian Clark 10.00
Eaton. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 14.50
Ellington. Mrs. E. Rice 5.00
Elmira. Clarissa Thurston 5.00
Granby Centre. J. C. Harrington, _for Athens,
Ala._ 10.00
Ilion. Mrs. S. M. 1.00
Lebanon. Thomas Hitchcock, $5; M. Day, $5;
Alfred Seymour, $5; Mr. and Mrs. J. A. Head,
$2; J. H. W., $1; Rev. S. M. D., 50c.; Sab.
Sch., $1.50, bal. to const. JARVIS A. HEAD,
L. M. 20.00
Lima. Mrs. Mary Sprague, _for Student Aid_ 5.00
Newburgh. Mrs. E. I. P., M. D. 0.50
New Lebanon. Presb. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 8.86
New York. Mrs. Magie, $10, _for Atlanta
U._;—J. S. Holt, $10 20.00
Rome. Sarah H. Mudge 10.00
Sidney Plains. Cong. Ch. 10.00
Victor. ESTATE of Melancton Lewis, by Mrs. E.
Lewis and S. S. Bushnell. Exs. 24,966.63
West Groton. Cong. Ch., $9; Miss A. T.
Cunningham, $5 14.00
—— —— 25.00
NEW JERSEY, $63.43.
Bound Brook. Ladies’ Miss. Soc., _for Student
Aid, Tougaloo U._ 8.00
Montclair. First Cong. Ch. 55.43
PENNSYLVANIA, $42.80.
Mercer. Cong. Ch. 37.80
West Alexander. —— 5.00
OHIO, $214.40.
Adams Mills. Mrs. M. A. Smith 10.00
Atwater. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 18.54
Beloit. J. S. 1.00
Castalia. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 7.00
Deerfield. I. J. 1.00
Huntsburgh. Miss E. L. Miller, _for Student
Aid, Talladega C._ 2.00
Mulberry Corners. Mrs. E. D. Lyman 2.00
Oberlin. Ladies of Second Cong. Ch., by Mrs.
Dr. Allen, Treas., $75, _for a Lady
Missionary, Atlanta, Ga._;—Second Cong. Ch.,
$37.46; First Cong. Ch., $16.40 128.86
Plymouth. Mrs. E. A. 1.00
Springfield. Mrs. M. G. 1.00
Thomastown. Welsh Cong. Ch. 20.00
Westerville. Mrs. M. E. H. K. 1.00
Windham. First Cong. Ch. 21.00
MICHIGAN, $142.33.
Adair. Henry Topping 5.00
Adrian. A. J. Hood 10.00
Ann Arbor. Cong. Ch. 36.00
Clinton. Woman’s Miss. Soc., by Mrs. Edward
Cook, Sec. 5.00
Grass Valley. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 19.12
Homer. Mrs. Mary D. Pease 10.00
Hopkins. First Cong. Ch., $8.60; Second Cong.
Ch., $4.40 13.00
Owosso. Union Meeting 9.30
Salem. First Cong. Ch. 4.13
Summit. Cong. Ch. 6.78
Three Oaks. Cong. Ch. 17.00
Union City. Cong. Sab. Sch., $6; bal. to
const. LILLIE V. MCCLELLAN, L. M.;—Mrs. E.
J. H. and Mrs. D. B. W., 50c. ea. 7.00
ILLINOIS, $636.56.
Broughton. Rev. S. Penfield 5.00
Chicago. E. W. Blatchford, _for Atlanta U._ 315.00
Farm Ridge. Rev. J. P. Hiester and family 2.00
Ivanhoe. Mrs. S. S. 1.00
Joy Prairie. Cong. Ch. 15.00
Maiden. Cong. Sab. Sch. 2.30
Maywood. Union Ch. 5.00
Moline. Cong. Ch. 45.00
Odell. Cong. Ch. 20.00
Peoria. Cong. Ch. 121.50
Princeton. Mrs. A. R. Clapp, $50; Mrs. P. B.
Corss, $15 65.00
Roseville. First Cong. Ch. $21; Rev. A. L.
Pennoyer, $5 26.00
Saint Charles. Ladies’ Missionary Soc. 5.00
Stillman Valley. Cong. Ch. 5.76
Tiskilwa. Rev. R. E. Cutler, $2; B. A. B., $1 3.00
IOWA, $170.15.
Alden. Cong. Ch. 8.50
Charles City. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 10.00
Clinton. Cong. Sab. Sch., $25;—Ladies of Cong.
Ch., $5., _for Lady Missionary, New Orleans_ 30.00
Davenport. Cong. Sab. Sch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 10.00
Durant. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 6.00
Grinnell. Mrs. Day, $5; Mrs. B., $1; Rev. S.
L. H., $1; Others, $1, _for Miller’s
Station, Ga._;—Mrs. Magoun’s Sab. Sch.
Class, $5.10 13.10
Hillsborough. John W. Hammond 5.00
Lyons. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 5.00
Marion. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 30.00
Mason City. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 3.00
Mitchell. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 5.25
Monticello. Miss N. P. S., _for Miller’s
Station, Ga._ 1.00
New Hampton. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 5.00
Orchard. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 4.60
Osage. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 10.00
Quasqueton. Cong. Ch., $5; I. H. D., $1 6.00
Rockford. Ladies Miss. Soc., $3.70; Mrs. E.
D., $1; Mrs. A. E. G., $1 5.70
Stacyville. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 3.00
Wayne. D. C. S. 1.00
Wentworth. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 3.00
Wilton. “Little Gleaners,” _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans_ 5.00
WISCONSIN, $62.84.
Arena. Cong. Sab. Sch. 5.00
Fort Atkinson. Mrs. Caroline Snell 5.00
Ripon. First Cong. Ch., $29.85; W. G. B., 50c. 30.35
River Falls. First Cong. Ch. 22.49
MINNESOTA, $55.44.
Excelsior. Cong. Ch. 10.00
Medford. Cong. Ch. 3.25
Minneapolis. Plymouth Ch. 16.19
Winona. Adna Tenney 20.00
Worthington. Union Cong. Ch. Sab. Sch. 6.00
KANSAS, $10.
Mariadahl. H. H. Griffin, _for Athens, Ala._ 10.00
NEBRASKA, $36.65.
Butler Co. Cong. Ch. 4.00
Crete. Cong. Ch. 11.65
Iowa Ridge. Cong. Ch. 3.00
Macon. Rev. S. N. Grout 12.00
Schuyler. Sumner & Free 6.00
MISSOURI, $1.50.
Cahoka. Moses Allen 1.50
TEXAS, $1.
Brenham. Mrs. I. H., _for Athens, Ala._ 1.00
CALIFORNIA, $109.50.
Oakland. S. Richards 100.00
Pescadero. Miss. Band of Cong. Sab. Sch. 4.50
Santa Cruz. Pliny Fay 5.00
MARYLAND, $10.
Federalsburgh. Miss Sarah A. Beals 10.00
TENNESSEE, $5.
Nashville. Mrs. E. Spence 5.00
SOUTH CAROLINA, $1.50.
Orangeburgh. Rev. W. L. Johnson 1.50
GEORGIA, $173.45.
Athens. J. G. Hutchins, _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 64.00
Atlanta. Atlanta U., $80;—By Mary E. Sand,
$5.50; Storrs School, $18.45; A. Simpson,
$5.50 109.45
ALABAMA, $104.92.
Selma. First Cong. Ch. (of which $3.45 _for
Mendi M._), $80.70; Rental, $2 82.70
Shelby Iron Works. Rev. J. D. S. 0.50
Talladega. Talladega C. 21.72
MISSISSIPPI, $1.15.
Tougaloo. Tougaloo U. 1.15
INCOME FUND, $552.16.
—— Avery Fund 549.70
—— —— 2.46
—————————
Total 34,146.04
Total from Oct. 1st to Aug. 31st $163,393.36
H. W. HUBBARD, _Asst. Treas._
* * * * *
FOR TILLOTSON COLLEGIATE AND NORMAL INSTITUTE, AUSTIN, TEXAS.
Gilead, Conn. Mr. and Mrs. Thomas L. Brown $5.00
New York, N. Y. “A Friend” 100.00
———————
Total 105.00
Previously acknowledged in June receipts 2,397.17
————————
Total $2,502.17
* * * * *
FOR NEGRO REFUGEES.
Marbletown, N. Y. John Hulme $2.85
Previously acknowledged in July receipts 346.39
——————
Total $349.24
Constitution of the American Missionary Association.
INCORPORATED JANUARY 30, 1849.
* * * * *
ART. I. This Society shall be called “THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY
ASSOCIATION.”
ART. II. The object of this Association shall be to conduct
Christian missionary and educational operations, and to diffuse a
knowledge of the Holy Scriptures in our own and other countries
which are destitute of them, or which present open and urgent
fields of effort.
ART. III. Any person of evangelical sentiments,[A] who professes
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is not a slaveholder, or in the
practice of other immoralities, and who contributes to the funds,
may become a member of the Society; and by the payment of thirty
dollars, a life member; provided that children and others who have
not professed their faith may be constituted life members without
the privilege of voting.
ART. IV. This Society shall meet annually, in the month of
September, October or November, for the election of officers and
the transaction of other business, at such time and place as shall
be designated by the Executive Committee.
ART. V. The annual meeting shall be constituted of the regular
officers and members of the Society at the time of such meeting,
and of delegates from churches, local missionary societies,
and other co-operating bodies, each body being entitled to one
representative.
ART. VI. The officers of the Society shall be a President,
Vice-Presidents, a Recording Secretary, Corresponding Secretaries,
Treasurer, two Auditors, and an Executive Committee of not less
than twelve, of which the Corresponding Secretaries shall be
advisory, and the Treasurer ex-officio, members.
ART. VII. To the Executive Committee shall belong the collecting
and disbursing of funds; the appointing, counselling, sustaining
and dismissing (for just and sufficient reasons) missionaries and
agents; the selection of missionary fields; and, in general, the
transaction of all such business as usually appertains to the
executive committees of missionary and other benevolent societies;
the Committee to exercise no ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the
missionaries; and its doings to be subject always to the revision
of the annual meeting, which shall, by a reference mutually
chosen, always entertain the complaints of any aggrieved agent or
missionary; and the decision of such reference shall be final.
The Executive Committee shall have authority to fill all vacancies
occurring among the officers between the regular annual meetings;
to apply, if they see fit, to any State Legislature for acts of
incorporation; to fix the compensation, where any is given, of all
officers, agents, missionaries, or others in the employment of the
Society; to make provision, if any, for disabled missionaries, and
for the widows and children of such as are deceased; and to call,
in all parts of the country, at their discretion, special and
general conventions of the friends of missions, with a view to the
diffusion of the missionary spirit, and the general and vigorous
promotion of the missionary work.
Five members of the Committee shall constitute a quorum for
transacting business.
ART. VIII. This society, in collecting funds, in appointing
officers, agents and missionaries, and in selecting fields
of labor, and conducting the missionary work, will endeavor
particularly to discountenance slavery, by refusing to receive the
known fruits of unrequited labor, or to welcome to its employment
those who hold their fellow-beings as slaves.
ART. IX. Missionary bodies, churches or individuals agreeing to
the principles of this society, and wishing to appoint and sustain
missionaries of their own, shall be entitled to do so through the
agency of the Executive Committee, on terms mutually agreed upon.
ART. X. No amendment shall be made in this Constitution without
the concurrence of two-thirds of the members present at a regular
annual meeting; nor unless the proposed amendment has been
submitted to a previous meeting, or to the Executive Committee in
season to be published by them (as it shall be their duty to do, if
so submitted) in the regular official notifications of the meeting.
FOOTNOTE:
[A] By evangelical sentiments, we understand, among others, a
belief in the guilty and lost condition of all men without a
Saviour; the Supreme Deity, Incarnation and Atoning Sacrifice
of Jesus Christ, the only Saviour of the world; the necessity
of regeneration by the Holy Spirit, repentance, faith and holy
obedience in order to salvation; the immortality of the soul; and
the retributions of the judgement in the eternal punishment of the
wicked, and salvation of the righteous.
The American Missionary Association.
* * * * *
AIM AND WORK.
To preach the Gospel to the poor. It originated in a sympathy with
the almost friendless slaves. Since Emancipation it has devoted its
main efforts to preparing the FREEDMEN for their duties as citizens
and Christians in America and as missionaries in Africa. As closely
related to this, it seeks to benefit the caste-persecuted CHINESE
in America, and to co-operate with the Government in its humane
and Christian policy towards the INDIANS. It has also a mission in
AFRICA.
STATISTICS.
CHURCHES: _In the South_—In Va., 1; N. C., 5; S. C., 2; Ga., 12;
Ky., 7; Tenn., 4; Ala., 13; La., 12; Miss., 1; Kansas, 2; Texas, 5.
_Africa_, 1. _Among the Indians_, 1. Total 66.
INSTITUTIONS FOUNDED, FOSTERED OR SUSTAINED IN THE
SOUTH.—_Chartered_: Hampton, Va.; Berea, Ky.; Talladega, Ala.;
Atlanta, Ga.; Nashville, Tenn.; Tougaloo, Miss.; New Orleans, La.;
and Austin, Texas, 8. _Graded or Normal Schools_: at Wilmington,
Raleigh, N. C.; Charleston, Greenwood, S. C.; Macon, Atlanta, Ga.;
Montgomery, Mobile, Athens, Selma, Ala.; Memphis, Tenn., 11. _Other
Schools_, 18. Total 37.
TEACHERS, MISSIONARIES AND ASSISTANTS.—Among the Freedmen, 231;
among the Chinese, 17; among the Indians, 17; in Africa, 14. Total,
279. STUDENTS—In Theology, 88; Law, 17; in College Course, 106;
in other studies, 7,018. Total, 7,229. Scholars, taught by former
pupils of our schools, estimated at 100,000. INDIANS under the care
of the Association, 13,000.
WANTS.
1. A steady INCREASE of regular income to keep pace with the
growing work in the South. This increase can only be reached by
_regular_ and _larger_ contributions from the churches—the feeble
as well as the strong.
2. ADDITIONAL BUILDINGS for our higher educational institutions, to
accommodate the increasing numbers of students; MEETING HOUSES, for
the new churches we are organizing; MORE MINISTERS, cultured and
pious, for these churches.
3. HELP FOR YOUNG MEN, to be educated as ministers here and
missionaries to Africa—a pressing want.
Before sending boxes, always correspond with the nearest A. M. A.
office, as below:
NEW YORK H. W. Hubbard, Esq., 56 Reade Street.
BOSTON Rev. C. L. Woodworth, Room 21 Congregational House.
CHICAGO Rev. Jas. Powell, 112 West Washington Street.
MAGAZINE.
This Magazine will be sent, gratuitously, if desired, to the
Missionaries of the Association; to Life Members; to all clergymen
who take up collections for the Association; to Superintendents of
Sabbath Schools; to College Libraries; to Theological Seminaries;
to Societies of Inquiry on Missions; and to every donor who does
not prefer to take it as a subscriber, and contributes in a year
not less than five dollars.
Those who wish to remember the AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION in
their last Will and Testament, are earnestly requested to use the
following
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 [in some States
three are required—in other States only two], who should write
against their names, their places of residence [if in cities,
their street and number]. The following form of attestation will
answer for every State in the Union: “Signed, sealed, published
and declared by the said [A. B.] as his last Will and Testament,
in presence of us, who, at the request of the said A. B., and in
his presence, and in the presence of each other, have hereunto
subscribed our names as witnesses.” In some States it is required
that the Will should be made at least two months before the death
of the testator.
* * * * *
ARCHITECTURAL DESIGNS.
[Illustration: OLD STYLE.]
[Illustration: NEW STYLE.]
PLANS
AND
SPECIFICATIONS,
WITH
Full Detail Drawings
FOR
CHURCHES,
SCHOOLS and
DWELLINGS.
Suburban Dwellings a Specialty.
Reference: Rev. Dr. Strieby, 56 Reade Street, N. Y.
B. J. SCHWEITZER,
Architect and Designer,
76 John Street, New York.
* * * * *
=A PRINTING PRESS= for 75 cents. With ink roller. =90= cents. Both
by mail =$1.60=. A complete Printing Office viz., press, roller,
font of type, type tray, ink, leads, furniture, gold bronze, and
50 cards. =$2.25=. All by mail for =$3.25=. Sample package of =40=
varieties of cards, =10= cents. Specimen Book of type, &c., =10=
cents. YOUNG AMERICA PRESS CO., =35= Murray Street. New York.
* * * * *
Brown Bros. & Co.
BANKERS,
59 & 61 Wall Street, New York,
211 Chestnut St., Philadelphia,
66 State Street, Boston.
Issue Commercial Credits, make Cable transfers of Money between
this Country and England, and buy and sell Bills of Exchange on
Great Britain and Ireland.
They also issue, against cash deposited, or satisfactory guarantee
of repayment,
Circular Credits for Travellers,
In DOLLARS for use in the United States and adjacent countries, and
in POUNDS STERLING, for use in any part of the world.
* * * * *
A. S. BARNES & CO.
PUBLISH THE ONLY
SONGS FOR THE SANCTUARY.
THE HYMN AND TUNE BOOK which stands the test. Revised and enlarged.
Prices greatly reduced. Editions for every want. For Samples
(loaned without charge) and Terms address the Publishers.
LYMAN ABBOTT’S
Commentary on the New Testament
Illustrated and Popular, giving the latest views of the best
Biblical Scholars on all disputed points.
A concise, strong and faithful Exposition in (8) =eight volumes=
octavo.
AGENTS WANTED IN EVERY LOCALITY.
Gospel Temperance Hymnal.
EDITED BY
Rev. J. E. RANKIN, D.D. and Rev. E. S. LORENZ.
Endorsed by =FRANCIS MURPHY=, and used exclusively in his meetings.
This is the first practicable Collection of Hymns and Tunes
abounding in vigorous Pieces adapted to the Gospel Temperance
Movement. =It is also the best Book for Church Prayer Meetings.=
Price 35 cts. post-paid. Special Rates by the quantity.
DON’T FAIL TO EXAMINE AT ONCE.
A. S. BARNES & CO., Publishers,
New York and Chicago.
* * * * *
73,620 MORE
Singer Sewing Machines Sold in ’78
THAN IN ANY PREVIOUS YEAR.
In 1870 we sold 127,833 Sewing Machines.
“ 1878 “ 356,432 “ “
Our sales have increased enormously every year through the whole
period of “hard times.”
We now Sell Three-Quarters of all the Sewing
Machines sold in the World.
For the accommodation of the Public we have 1,500 subordinate
offices in the United States and Canada, and 3,000 offices in the
Old World and South America.
PRICES GREATLY REDUCED.
Waste no money on “cheap” counterfeits. Send
for our handsomely Illustrated Price List.
THE SINGER MANUFACTURING COMPANY,
Principal Office, 34 Union Square, New York.
* * * * *
[Illustration: Abraham Bogardus
ART PHOTOGRAPHER
872 BROADWAY,
COR. 18th STREET.
NEW YORK.]
* * * * *
[Illustration]
UTILITY ADJUSTABLE TABLE,
Can be made =any height= and be =folded up=. For Cutting, Resting,
Study, Invalids, Children, etc. Send stamp for book of prices.
GEO. F. SARGENT,
Proprietor and Manufacturer,
816 Broadway, New York.
* * * * *
GET THE BEST.
The “OXFORD”
[Illustration]
TEACHERS’ BIBLES
IN SEVEN DIFFERENT SIZES,
At prices to suit everybody.
Apply to your Bookseller for Lists, or write to
THOS. NELSON & SONS,
42 Bleecker Street, New York.
* * * * *
Meneely & Kimberly,
BELL FOUNDERS, TROY, N. Y.
Manufacture a superior quality of BELLS.
Special attention given to =CHURCH BELLS=.
☞ Catalogues sent free to parties needing bells.
* * * * *
[Illustration]
Mason & Hamlin Cabinet Organs.
_Demonstrated best_ by HIGHEST HONORS AT ALL WORLD’S EXPOSITIONS
FOR TWELVE YEARS; viz: at PARIS, 1867; VIENNA, 1873; SANTIAGO,
1875; PHILADELPHIA, 1870; TWO HIGHEST MEDALS at PARIS 1878; and
GRAND SWEDISH GOLD MEDAL, 1878. Only American Organs ever awarded
highest honors at any. Sold for cash or installments. ILLUSTRATED
CATALOGUES with new styles and prices, free. MASON & HAMLIN ORGAN
CO., BOSTON, NEW YORK, or CHICAGO.
* * * * *
“IMPORTANT TO CLERGYMEN.”
Prince’s Improved Fountain Pen.
[Illustration]
As now improved, saves one-third the time.
“If I were bereft of it, I should feel myself bereft of my right
hand.”—REV. LYMAN ABBOTT, _Ed. Ch. Union_.
Can be sent by mail in a registered letter. Send for circulars.
Manufactured by
JOHN S. PURDY,
212 Broadway, Cor. Fulton St., New York.
* * * * *
CRAMPTON’S
PURE OLD
PALM SOAP.
[Illustration]
For the Laundry,
The Kitchen,
And for General Household Purposes.
MANUFACTURED BY
CRAMPTON BROTHERS,
_Cor. Monroe & Jefferson Sts., N. Y._
Send for Circular and Price List.
* * * * *
[Illustration:
BROOK’S
PRIZE MEDAL
TRADE MARK.
SPOOL COTTON]
FOR HAND AND MACHINE.
IT IS STRONG, EVEN, AND ELASTIC; REGULAR IN QUALITY,
UNIFORM IN COLOR, AND THE LENGTHS
ARE GUARANTEED.
Full assortments constantly on hand and for sale by the Sole Agents,
WM. HENRY SMITH & CO.,
_P. O. Box 502._ _82 & 84 Worth Street, NEW YORK._
* * * * *
Every Man His Own Printer.
Excelsior =$3= Printing Press.
[Illustration]
Prints cards, labels, envelopes, &c.; larger sizes for larger work.
For business or pleasure, young or old. Catalogue of Presses, Type,
Cards, &c., sent for two stamps.
KELSEY & CO., M’frs, Meriden, Conn.
* * * * *
CHURCH CUSHIONS
MADE OF THE
PATENT ELASTIC FELT.
For particulars, address H. D. OSTERMOOR,
P. O. Box 4004. 36 Broadway, New York.
* * * * *
[Illustration:
MARVIN’S
FIRE & BURGLAR
SAFES
COUNTER PLATFORM WAGON & TRACK
SCALES
_MARVIN SAFE & SCALE CO.
265 BROADWAY. N. Y.
627 CHESTNUT ST., PHILA._]
* * * * *
SAVE MONEY
BY ORDERING
Fashionable Custom
CLOTHING
FROM
NEW YORK.
[Illustration]
ELEGANT SUITS,
TO ORDER,
_$18, $20 and $25_.
DRESS SUITS,
_$20 to $35_.
TROUSERS,
_$5 to $8_.
SENT FREE.
Samples of Cloths and Suitings, and Fashion Plates, with full
directions for ordering Gents’ Clothing and Furnishing Goods, by
mail, with fit and satisfaction guaranteed. Send for samples and
give trial order to
FREEMAN & WOODRUFF,
_Fashionable Clothiers_,
176 BROADWAY, NEW YORK
(Formerly of 241 Broadway.)
* * * * *
OUR ANNUAL MEETING.
The Thirty-third Annual Meeting of the American Missionary
Association will be held in Chicago, Illinois, by invitation of
the Congregational churches of that city, commencing on Tuesday,
October 28th, at 3 P. M.
The local Committee of Arrangements, representing each
Congregational Church in the city, has already at a preliminary
meeting decided to hold the meetings in the First Congregational
Church (Rev. E. P. Goodwin, D. D., Pastor), which has been offered
with most cordial unanimity for the use of the Anniversary.
The sermon will be preached by the Rev. Richard S. Storrs, D.D., of
the Church of the Pilgrims, Brooklyn, N. Y.
Further announcements of arrangements and programme will be made
later.
* * * * *
YESTERDAY’S WORK.
We point to the record of results of our work among the Freedmen
during the last fifteen years, as indicating a degree of progress
and an amount of fruitage rarely equaled in the same length of
time. We base our claims for generous gifts, now and in the years
to come, upon this showing, confident that this is the best
argument we can make. Is it too much to claim to have been faithful
over a few things, or to ask that we be trusted with what may be
needful for the many which are at hand?
TO-MORROW’S WANT.
Looking ahead, we see that the coming claims upon us must be
greater than those of the past. The signs of the times indicate
that the Lord’s work is to be done upon a larger scale in the near
future; the progress, made and making, in our schools, and the call
for enlargement in our church work, will make increasing demands
upon us, until the time shall come when they shall be more largely
self-supporting than it is possible for them to be now. We have
done much—we are doing more—we must expect to do a still greater
work. Give us the means, and plan large things for us in the days
to come.
* * * * *
ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT.
We invite special attention to this department, of which our low
rates and large circulation make its pages specially valuable. Our
readers are among the best in the country, having an established
character for integrity and thrift that constitutes them valued
customers in all departments of business.
To Advertisers using display type and cuts, who are accustomed
to the “RULES” of the best Newspapers, requiring “DOUBLE RATES”
for these “LUXURIES,” our wide pages, fine paper, and superior
printing, with =no extra charge for cuts=, are advantages readily
appreciated, and which add greatly to the appearance and effect of
business announcements.
Gratified with the substantial success of this department, we
solicit orders from all who have unexceptionable wares to advertise.
Advertisements must be received by the TENTH of the month, in order
to secure insertion in the following number. All communications in
relation to advertising should be addressed to
J. H. DENISON, Adv’g Agent,
56 Reade Street, New York.
* * * * *
☞ Our friends who are interested in the Advertising Department of
the “American Missionary” can aid us in this respect by mentioning,
when ordering goods, that they saw them advertised in our Magazine.
DAVID H. GILDERSLEEVE, Printer, 101 Chambers Street, New York.
Transcriber’s Notes:
Obvious punctuation errors and omissions corrected. Inconsistent
hyphenation has been retained, as there are several authors.
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The American Missionary — Volume 33, No. 10, October, 1879" ***
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