In New England
Rev. Stanley E. Lathrop, Sherwood, Tenn.
Secretary Roy of Chicago started an excellent thing when he arranged the Stereopticon pictures to illustrate the great work of our Association. After two months spent in traveling with these pictures and giving explanatory lectures concerning them, the writer desires to testify to their usefulness, and to express his thanks to the good people of New England for the interest they have shown, and the cordial reception they have given him in his travels. Evidently the work of the Association is "on a boom" in New England. Everywhere a great many questions were asked, and great many expressions of hearty interest manifested. During eight weeks, the audiences averaged over four hundred in number, in spite of "la grippe" and the rainy, sloppy weather that prevailed. In this time we traveled over five thousand miles, giving the Stereopticon lecture in forty-three different places, and making twenty-three other addresses upon the work, to audiences numbering in several cases nearly a thousand, and a total aggregate of over twenty-five thousand people. The descendants of the Pilgrims are thoroughly interested in our missionary work. The pictures of the people, buildings, etc., among the ten millions of people among whom our work is going on, in the West and South, were greatly enjoyed, with an evident increase of interest and of contribution. In view of all my past experiences, of four years of military service in the South, and my twelve years of missionary work in that region, this two months of travel and intercourse with so many intelligent friends and helpers of our Association has been a privilege and an enjoyment. God bless the good people of New England, and the grand work of our American Missionary Association!
Mrs. Jane Twichell Ware
The early and honored workers under the American Missionary Association in the South are passing away. But the sharp sorrow of parting from them is relieved by the memory of their self-denying and useful work, and especially where these dear friends threw over those dark days and trying experiences the halo of personal excellence, sweetness of disposition and a manner full of cheerful vivacity.
Such an one was Mrs. Ware. She entered the service among the Freedmen in the autumn of 1865, and in Norfolk, Virginia; Charleston, South Carolina; and Atlanta, Georgia, cast the radiance of her bright countenance and cheerful spirits over her serious and most successful work. She was a joy in the circle of her associates and an inspiration to her pupils.
In 1869, the year in which the Atlanta University was founded, she was united in marriage to Rev. E.A. Ware, its President, and they with others gave the moulding touch to the University, and won for it the confidence of the friends at the North, and an annual appropriation from the State of Georgia. In her own pleasant home and in various services to the institution, she made herself useful. In 1885 her husband died suddenly from heart failure, and from that time onward she was left to face alone the serious pulmonary trouble which two years before had fastened itself upon her. Bravely and in hope did she battle with the adversary, until at length in the home of her brother, Rev. Jos. H. Twichell, of Hartford, she passed away February 17, 1890, in the forty-sixth year of her age, and her remains were laid to rest among her kindred in the village burying ground at Plantsville, Connecticut. A bright light has faded out from earth, a brighter one has dawned in Heaven.
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The mention of the fact, in the last number of the MISSIONARY, that Dr. Patton was one of the members of the Convention in Albany that formed the American Missionary Association, suggests the inquiry as to how many of those then present are now alive? If those who know the facts, either by their personal presence on that occasion or otherwise, will send to us the names of such survivors, we will be greatly obliged.
An envelope containing a gift of five dollars was dropped into the contribution bag recently among others, after an address concerning our work. It was from a faithful colored woman who had spent her life in domestic service, and represented as true and earnest self-denial as money could. Not all the heroism and self-sacrifice are in the field work, among the missionaries of our great Association, as true and earnest as they are. There is the same spirit of devotion to the Master in the collecting field. We thank God for it, and take courage to go forward in this work of saving these destitute millions in our land.
"I enclose a draft for fifty dollars to be used by the American Missionary Association in such way as they think wilt do the most good. I am in my ninety-first year but when I read of the doings of the Association in Chicago, it made me feel almost young. My prayer to God is that he will continue his blessing on the Association."
In the February number of the MISSIONARY, mention is made of a beautiful box, the workmanship of a friend of the Association, fourscore and two years old. It was the wish of this venerable brother that the box should be sold and the proceeds devoted to our work. A gentleman in Boston offered twelve dollars for the box. We have since received an offer of twenty dollars from a friend, with permission, however, to hold the matter open a little longer for a still higher bid. Who speaks next?
"You will be interested to learn that E.A. Johnson, of Raleigh, N.C., has just been admitted to the bar here. He passed a very good examination, the only colored man among twenty-four whites. It made some of them quite vexed to have him promptly answer questions on which they failed, but when he received his license, the Judge commended him, and the young men all congratulated him."
It is said that the colored pupils fail when they reach mathematics. A scholar in one of our Southern institutions made an original demonstration of an intricate problem in geometry, in a method different from any known previously by his teacher, an accomplished scholar, and it was correct.
From Le Moyne Institute, Memphis, Tennessee: Not a week passes that we do not have to turn away earnest applicants from the school for want of room. Fully two hundred such applicants have gone sadly away from our door during the past months.
A colored minister in the South applying for a position as a preacher, says, "I feel to say woe be under me if I preach not."
Rev. A.W. Curtis writes from Raleigh, N.C.: "It is estimated that thirty thousand Negroes have gone South and West from North Carolina since the exodus from this State began. Most of them are crowded out because of repeated crop failures in the eastern counties. Many of them have joined in the movement, with the hope of doing better, who were doing passably well at home. Many have been discouraged by the attitude of the State toward the colored people."
Rev. J.W. Freeman, of Dudley, N.C., writes: "The emigration casts a great depression on all our spiritual work among the colored people now In this locality."
An Enterprising Woman
A letter from Louisiana says, "I visited a Negro family the other day in a settlement where there is no school, and found the following condition of things: A white lady was boarding with them and giving instruction for her board. She is teaching them how to live. Eight months ago no one in this family could read. The father only could speak English. Now all speak some English. All except the youngest can read a little in the Bible. They sang a gospel hymn for me and repeated quite a number of Bible verses and the Lord's prayer. The colored mother I believe to be one of the smartest women in America. With the help of her children—the father spends all he gets for whiskey—she has built her house, supports her family, makes her own furniture, spins and weaves cloth from cotton she has raised, and has engaged this white lady to educate her and her children, she herself leading the class. The children are all very quick to learn. The home was tidy and well-kept. The children were clean and neat. I shall look to see something grand come from that family."
"I am a Christian and I think I enjoy it better than being a sinner, and always doing something on earth to please myself and not trying to please my Saviour who died for me, that through him I might be saved. I am enjoying this week of prayer, and it seems to me we would have better
