The American Missionary. Volume 44, No. 02, February, 1890

Communications

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

Donations And Subscriptions

In drafts, checks, registered letters, or post-office orders, may be sent to H.W. Hubbard, Treasurer, 56 Reade Street, New York, or, when more convenient, to either of the Branch Offices, 21 Congregational House, Boston, Mass., 151 Washington Street, Chicago, Ill., or 64 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, Ohio. A payment of thirty dollars at one time constitutes a Life Member.

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

Form Of A Bequest.

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

THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY

Vol. XLIV.

February, 1890.

No. 2.

American Missionary Association.

Our Missions And Missionaries

It is our custom to publish in the second issue of the Magazine for each year a catalogue of the churches, institutions and schools into which we place the offerings devoted by those who send them, to the great work of the American Missionary Association.

If our readers will look carefully at this, and preserve it for future reference, they will come into sympathy more easily and truly with those who have gone from our Christian homes and churches in the name of Christ and for his sake.

These pages of names and places represent many things:

First.—The work. Our missionaries are among four races, the white, the black, the red and the yellow. These are children of a common Father; they are under the dominion of a common sinfulness; they are the possible heirs of a common Saviour. We go to them with the same gospel, which is able to save them to the same fellowship of faith and love on earth and to the same heaven.

Secondly.—The missionaries and the characteristics of their work. There are represented in this list, teachers of theology, teachers of language, of history, of philosophy and of science. There are teachers of "common branches" and "higher branches." There are teachers of industries for men and women, house-makers and home-makers. There are preachers to organized churches and preachers at large whose work is to gather churches. They are all alike missionaries.

Notice, also, what a large proportion of our missionary work is being done by Christian women. Well did Secretary Hiatt say, "The history of this Association is a grand and splendid eulogy of woman." "Our sisters who went South while the sky was yet heavy with the clouds of war from the homes of refinement and culture and religion," are many of them remaining until now, and they are continually re-enforced from our best institutions of learning in the East and in the West. There is a common fidelity on the shores of the Gulf, in the mountains of the South and among the tribes of the plains. These men and women in our churches and schools who have given themselves in consecration and sacrifice to this service are leading those who have been crushed by oppressions and wrongs of men, and who have been degraded in ignorance and in sin, to rise into a new life, and into new habits of thought and feeling.

They are working to rescue millions from the woful inheritances of the pitiless centuries. They are teaching those who are to be the teachers of their people. They are preparing those who shall lead their own peoples. It is not a work of a score of years, nor of half a century. It is a part of the work of Christianity, whatever time it may take, and we ask those who pray "Thy kingdom come" to remember these missionary teachers and preachers before God that they may be of good courage, faithful and patient in their ministering.

Thirdly.—These pages represent also the faith and sacrifices of Christians by which this service of Jesus Christ goes on. Brethren and sisters, you who contribute to this work, read in these names assurances to gladden your hearts and cheer your faith. See what solid regiments of the Master's army are in the land where slavery has perished, but where the problems which follow it are larger than ever before. Look up the locations of these missionaries on the map, and see where they are, in the valleys and on the mountains of the South, in plains of the far West, and on the shores of the Pacific sea. They report cheering tidings. Their schools are overflowing. Converts are being added to their churches. Our institutions are in harmony and zealous emulation. The year has opened auspiciously, "And the best of all is, God is with us."

The Rev. Frank E. Jenkins, who succeeded the Rev. C.J. Ryder as a Field Superintendent, and who has served the Association since that time with an untiring devotion and with signal ability, has at his own urgent request been transferred from this general work to a specific part of the field.

He has accepted the pastorate of the Congregational Church of New Decatur, Ala., with which we are in co-operation. Our consent to this change would have been the more reluctant but for the fact that we are in heartiest sympathy with the missionary purposes contemplated in this exchange of service.

We congratulate the New Decatur church upon its entrance into its tasteful edifice—recently dedicated,—with a pastor whom we relinquish from the relationships of Field Superintendent only upon his own repeated convictions of duty, and in view of his preference for this particular work.

Southern Notes

By Secretary A.F. Beard.

The "sleeper" had been transformed into a parlor car, which was used that day chiefly by the colored porter and myself. The "paper-boy" came through and offered me a New York Illustrated Weekly, adorned on the first page with the portrait of Jefferson Davis, for whom the South was then mourning with great abundance of white and black cotton cloth.

After I had declined with thanks to invest in this picture, I turned to the colored porter who was travelling in the white man's car in apparent "social equality" and casually remarked, "Your people should feel very grateful to Jefferson Davis for what he did for you. You ought to have that picture." With a surprise that he could not conceal, he intimated that he did not understand me. He "didn't care for it," and "didn't know what Jeff Davis had done for his people."

Time being at some discount, I undertook to tell him that "Jefferson Davis did more than any other person to take the South out of the Union. He was chief among the secessionists. Then, as President, he made so many mistakes, he did more than any other man to prevent the success of the Confederacy. He did more to bring about the freedom of the slave than any other man. Since the emancipation of your race came on as a consequence of secession, why should you not be grateful to Jefferson Davis and cherish his memory?"

The black man by this time had gathered himself up for his reply to my Q.E.D. Not knowing what my sympathies might be, he replied in a slow and careful way, "Well, sir, I can't see it as you do. The way it looks to me is this, you know. In these days there are a good many people who don't believe in God—not much—but I reckon it was God who set my people free. You see, he didn't want that condition of things any longer. It was God who did it, sir, that's what I think, and I don't believe it was Jeff Davis. That's my view."

I did not argue the question further. When one gets down solid upon the decrees, then I stop. But as the car rolled along with the speed usual on Southern railways, I pondered the text, "The wrath of man shall praise Him, and the remainder thereof shall he restrain."

He was a colored porter, and I may have transgressed the laws of "social equality" in asking him aught other than to make up the berth, and to call me early. With the judgment resting upon Geo. W. Cable—who is never to be forgotten or forgiven because he had conference with some colored people in Nashville, and did not insult them—one should be very careful of his social equality. Nevertheless, I ventured to talk with this colored porter. I asked him what he knew about his race, and what he thought of his people and their prospects.

He said, "I was raised in North Carolina, never had much chance myself, had only a country school to go to—kept by a colored man—not very good teacher—pretty good—better than none. But there's good many good schools now, and good many smart colored people by this time, sir. There's a good many risin' all the time. Old Fred. Douglass is a right smart man, you know; but then he sort o' left his race when he married a white woman. We don't think so much of him as a leader as we used to."

The car rolled on. It was two hours late at my station. The bus man who stood in the stage door and collected the fares was conversational. He was unaware that by my ride and conversation in the car, I had forfeited my "social equality" with him. Hence he did not ostracise me; but smiling, said, "Train very late to-day, sir." "Isn't it usually as late as this?" I asked. "Invariably, sir, except when it's later."

Paragraphs

Dr. Rankin, the newly-elected President of Howard University, writes:

"Everything at the University begins very promisingly. We had a crowded preaching service on Sunday night, and are observing the week of prayer at 12:30 noon. The meetings are full and impressive."

"If a donor should give a great material gift to the University, I am sure I ought to write you. But the great Giver is giving us the choicest of spiritual gifts. Eight of the students, one of them a senior, this noon expressed a desire for prayers. We continue the daily meeting at noon."

The immigration into the United States is steadily declining, as appears by the figures reported in the papers, while the blending of the foreigners here is steadily and rapidly going forward, rendering them speedily one people. On the other hand, the colored population in the Southern States is steadily augmenting, while the alienation between the black and white races in the South is becoming more pronounced. The Southern problem is the more difficult of solution.

A clergyman in a Southern town who is connected with families of great influence, and who ministers to a large white church, is accustomed to preach every afternoon in a colored church under the care of this Association. He usually repeats to the colored church the sermon preached in the forenoon to his own people, and finds that those who hear it in the afternoon appreciate it fully. The two remarkable facts in this incident are that the gentleman should consent to do this gratuitous labor for the colored church, and that the colored church should understand and appreciate the sermon prepared for the cultured white congregation.

A Beautiful Gift

Mr. Silas M. Rideout, of Cumberland, Maine, has presented to the American Missionary Association, through the Boston office, a most beautiful box for keepsakes. It is about 6 inches in width, 9 in length and 4 in depth, made of inlaid woods of different colors very tastefully arranged, "American Missionary" being set in the cover. The inside is lined with plush. On a card in the box the following was written by a friend: "This box was presented to the American Missionary Association by a good man living in a small town in Maine, who, like that good fisherman of whom we have heard, gives such as he had. This dear brother of four-score and two years, made this box and presented it to the American Missionary Association, with its contents $10.25, which was contributed by such of his friends as desired to have a look at the skill of their aged brother in his work of love for the cause of Christ." It was intended by our venerable friend that this box should draw other contributions and finally be sold, the proceeds to be devoted to the work of the American Missionary Association in which Mr. Rideout has been so deeply interested for many years. A gentleman in Boston offers $12 for the box. Will not some one make a better offer, and in this way recognize the remarkable skill of this aged friend in his effort to increase the income of the Association to help the needy millions among whom our missionaries labor?

The Southern Situation

Some Suggestive Facts

First Fact. The condition of the colored man In the South is becoming more pitiable and precarious. Mr. Grady, in his last speech, announced the unalterable purpose of the Southern whites never to submit to Negro rule, and we read not long since of a "quiet election" held in a Southern city, because the colored people, duly warned, kept away from the polls. We know something, also, of the struggles of that people against almost insuperable difficulties in trying to obtain food, homes and education. In addition to all this, the public press keeps us informed with sad frequency of the repeated murders inflicted upon the defenceless colored people.

Second Fact. We learn with gratification that Southern people of high standing denounce these outrages. Governor Richardson, of South Carolina, assured a colored delegation that called upon him, that he had offered a reward for the apprehension of the Barnwell murderers, and pledged his sacred word that nothing would be undone on his part to bring the lynchers to condign punishment. Senator Wade Hampton is said to have endorsed the sentiments of the Governor, and leading Southern papers have censured in unmeasured terms this outrage.

But as yet these murderers have not been arrested, and we presume that no one expects they will be. The murderers of Mr. Clayton, of Arkansas, who presumed to run as an independent candidate for Congress, were denounced by the authorities of the State, and rewards were offered for their apprehension. But, though many months have elapsed, they have not been arrested, and no one, North or South, imagines that they will be punished. Kind words from Southern officials will not solve the great problem.

Third Fact. The colored people bear up well under all these trying circumstances. We should suppose they would be utterly discouraged, for they see little prospect of securing their rights as men and citizens, and even life and property are not safe. They are allured to a change of location by flaming handbills, making tempting but deceptive offers of better wages and better homes. They are hunted down and massacred, and yet their wrongs are unredressed.

But in spite of all this, they struggle on, constantly gaining property and homes, some of them acquiring wealth. If they are deceived on reaching some new Eldorado, losing their all in making the change, they do not give up, but strike in again. If they are not safe in some rural districts, they go to the cities. But best of all, their educated men are showing great wisdom and moderation, as witness the calm and dispassionate action of the Convention of the most intelligent and influential colored men in Charleston, S.C., after the Barnwell massacre. They passed resolutions of dignified condemnation of the wrong, yet urged their people to remain quiet, and let the proper authorities vindicate the law. The forbearance of that meeting has won the commendations of leading white men in the South.

And here let us say, that the white people of the South make no greater mistake, than when they imagine that it is a dangerous thing to educate the colored people. On the contrary, we believe that the facts make it manifest that it is by these educated men that their race will be guided wisely and safely through this great crisis, and that if a war of races is to be avoided, these educated colored men will be a grand factor in averting it.