The American Missionary

CONTENTS

• EDITORIAL
  • DEATH OF REV. JAMES POWELL, D.D.
  • A WORD TO OUR WORKERS
  • APPEAL
  • NEW ENGLAND OFFICE—DEATH OF REV. W.H. ELLIS
• THE FIELD.
  • LIST OF MISSIONARIES AND TEACHERS
• THE SOUTH.
  • NOTES IN THE SADDLE. Supt. Ryder
• THE INDIANS.
  • WHAT AN INDIAN THINKS OF IT
• BUREAU OF WOMAN’S WORK.
  • PARAGRAPHS
• FOR THE CHILDREN
  • HOW SUSY WENT TO TOUGALOO
• RECEIPTS

American Missionary Association.

COMMUNICATIONS

Relating to the work of the Association may be addressed to the Corresponding
Secretaries; those relating to the collecting fields, to the Corresponding
Secretaries, or to the District Secretaries; letters for “THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY,”
to the Editor, at the New York Office.

DONATIONS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS

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

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.

Very cordially yours

James Powell

THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY.

American Missionary Association.

DEATH OF REV. JAMES POWELL, D.D.

“He whom thou lovest is dead,” were the sorrowful words of the stricken sisters
concerning their brother; we repeat them to our many friends who enjoyed the personal
friendship of our beloved brother Powell. These friends cannot restore him to us, as
the Friend restored Lazarus to his family; but they can sympathize with us in
our great bereavement. It is scarcely three months since our honored president, Gov.
Washburn, was suddenly taken away, and we have not yet found his successor; and now,
Dr. Powell has been removed almost as suddenly, and we can scarcely hope to find one
to take his place. Our only consolation is, that God makes no mistakes, and that,
while men die, His work goes on.

The death of Dr. Powell was unexpected, but its cause lay far back. When only
nineteen years of age, he entered the service of the Christian Commission, and in the
malarial regions of the South, the germs of disease were planted in his system. They
were the cause of frequent and distressing turns of illness, while his irrepressible
energy never allowed him to take the rest necessary for recovery. The physicians
pronounced the immediate cause of his death to be apoplexy, but most men carrying his
burden of ill-health would have yielded long before; only his immeasurable
hopefulness and activity sustained him to the end.

Rev. James Powell, D.D., was born in Wales, December 25, 1842. At an early age he
came to this country, and partly by his own exertions and partly by the help of
friends whom he had won to himself by his genial nature and evident indications of
future usefulness, he obtained an education, graduating from Dartmouth College in
1866, and from Andover Theological Seminary in 1869. He was installed as pastor of
the church at Newburyport in November, 1869, his only pastorate, and remained there
till February, 1873. His health being impaired by his incessant labors as pastor, he
was persuaded by his friend, Rev. Mr. Pike, to aid in introducing the Jubilee Singers
to the English public, with the further purpose of either remaining abroad to manage
the affairs of the Singers in Great Britain, or of returning and temporarily taking
Mr. Pike’s place in {30} Connecticut and New York, as District Secretary of the
Association. The latter alternative was finally decided upon, and Mr. Powell assumed
these duties in the latter part of the year 1873. A year afterwards, on the
resignation of Rev. Dr. Patton from our Chicago office, Mr. Powell, who had shown
remarkable gifts as a speaker, was at once selected as District Secretary of our
Western department. Here he remained for nearly ten years, when some changes were
required in our district offices and he was called to New York as Assistant
Corresponding Secretary, and entrusted with the supervision of the entire collecting
field. The work he had done so acceptably and efficiently at the West was followed by
equally effective services in his wider field at the East. In the three years of the
recent burden of debt upon the Association, the energies of Dr. Powell were called
into full play, and when, at our last Annual Meeting, we rejoiced in deliverance from
debt, it was felt that the gratifying result was due in a large measure to his
eloquence by voice and pen. At that meeting Dr. Powell was elected Corresponding
Secretary of the Association.

Bro. Powell was an orator born, not made. His eloquence was not of the Websterian
sort, massive and logical, but rather of that magnetic kind which wins and sways an
audience at will, sometimes to smiles and then to tears, but always with definite
persuasion. He was a brilliant writer as well as speaker. His pen glowed with a
special inspiration, and was prolific as well. The pages of the AMERICAN MISSIONARY,
the columns of the weekly religious press, the numerous circulars issued from this
office and his abundant correspondence, all bear witness to this. He was a wise man
in counsel. The impassioned and imaginative speaker is not usually characterized by a
cautious judgment or administrative gifts; but we have found in this office that when
grave questions arose for consideration, Dr. Powell was remarkably conservative and
judicious. But the crowning glory of the man was his bright and genial nature, and
his warm and devoted Christian character. It was this that won all hearts, that made
him welcome on every platform and in every pulpit, that bound his friends to him in
warmest attachment, that opened the doors of all homes to him and that leaves the
memory of brightness behind him in the offices where he toiled and in his own dear
home. His life went out not as the lightning’s flash, that leaves the deeper darkness
behind, nor as the setting sun, that has the night before and after, but his
departure from life was only the entrance into eternal brightness, and leaves a
radiance behind that will be a perpetual joy and consolation to his friends. He was
born on Christmas day, and the festivities of another Christmas day were not wholly
past when he died. His birth was a Christmas gift to earth, and, be it said with
reverence, his death was a Christmas gift to Heaven, for through the grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ, and the sanctifying influence of the blessed spirit, we believe he
was made meet to be presented to the Father, in whose hands we leave him.

A WORD TO OUR WORKERS

To lead a people long crushed by oppression away from the degradations of slavery
into a true and intelligent freedom, to teach those who have no inheritance of steady
purpose to rise into new habits of thought and feeling, and away from the heredity of
superstitions which were unrelated with morality, into a faith which really purifies
the heart and the life, is not the work of a year, nor of fifty years. It means
patient continuance in well doing. It means consecration, responsibility and
self-sacrifice on the part of those who take upon themselves and into themselves, the
sins and the sorrows, and the struggles and failures of those who are to be
saved.

Nothing but a consecration that becomes a passion of the soul in Christ’s love and
for Christ’s sake, and an abiding faith in the triumph of his kingdom of love and
righteousness, will explain the earnestness and labor of the devoted souls in our
mission work, who are God’s kings and priests ministering to the lowly, and crowding
their days with service for those who have been the victims of the strong, and who,
now weak and poor, are despised in their poverty and weakness.

All honor to those who are giving themselves to break down the injustices of a
cruel and unchristian caste, all honor to the noble men and women who are working to
rescue millions from the woeful inheritance of centuries, as well as to save them from
the dominion of the sin which is common to man.

Others may honor Kings and Queens and Princes who have had their greatness thrust
upon them, but we will stand with those who accentuate their reverence for lives
consecrated to the good of humanity, who are afflicted with the sorrows of God’s
poor, and oppressed with their burdens, and whose prayers and songs are God save
the people, Their lives may not be chronicled in the pages which tell of those
who lived to make others serve them, but they are shining names upon God’s Book of
Life, and in the day of the coronation of the nobility which God sees and records,
their names will stand out like radiant stars in the heavens. One of such was JAMES
POWELL, whose life was a grand sacrifice of undeviating love for those whose
necessities made him feel that he was debtor to them, until he gave them the price of
his life which Christ had redeemed.

Subordinating himself to this consecration with incessant desire, he has left his
example which may well be inspiration and strength to all who are working and praying
for those who have been trodden under the feet of the strong, and he has left his
influence for tens of thousands.

In the prophecy which foretold Christ, centuries before he came it was written,
“He shall not fail, nor be discouraged.” Fellow workers, it is {32} not the consecration of
a year, nor of a generation, that is to restore the millions for whom we work to the
places where God would bring them. The pitiless centuries cannot be redeemed in one
day. Doubtless the work may seem slow and the time may seem long, but every good deed
counts, and no prayer is unheard. The good work is not in vain. The progress already
made is wonderful. The workers who have consecrated themselves may die in their
unfinished work, but God has pledged himself that the work shall go on. His promises
and his providences will work together like cogs in a wheel. We shall not fail, and
we need not be discouraged. Such lives as that of JAMES POWELL are not too common in
human history, but they show us how the divine can endue the human with its own
power, and how God can make souls great witnesses for God. Some tell us that the
heroic ages have passed away, but they have not. No! They will last until the world
shall be saved, for the inspirations which come from the spirit of God and from the
cross of Christ will live in hearts which will burn to save those who need to be
saved.

Since the death of Dr. Powell, we have received numerous letters from all parts of
the country expressing sympathy in our great bereavement, which the writers shared
profoundly with us. The admiration and love entertained by the writers, and uttered
in these letters, toward our beloved brother, is gratifying to us, as it is also to
his family. In the pressure of duties consequent upon his death and burial, we have
not found time to reply to these letters, and take this occasion to acknowledge their
receipt and to express our heartfelt thankfulness to the writers.

We shall not be able to make the stirring appeals to provide for the exigent
demands of our great work which our readers have been wont to recognize as coming
from the heart of Dr. Powell, who had the oversight and burden of the collecting
fields.

Never was our work more critical, never more urgent and never more hopeful.

The winter months, on which we must chiefly rely, are here, and are fast moving
into the past. The work has been laid upon us and it would seem faithless to our
sacred trust to sacrifice any part of it. But we must not take on a debt. We can only
be saved from putting the knife to our work or of trying to do what we cannot pay
for, if the faithful pastors of the churches will give their very present help. If
the pastors who believe in the work, which includes the education and salvation of
the needy among four races, will give their churches and Christian stewards a good
chance to know how great the cause is and what its honest appeals are, we are
confident that the Lord will deliver us from impending trouble.

We will gladly furnish every pastor, and others who will send to us for them, such
facts and figures as may be helpful in representing the work. Surely we can depend
upon those who love God and their country for thoughtful remembrance and ready
response.

The Rev. C.J. Ryder who has been assigned to the District Secretaryship of the
Eastern district for the collecting field in New England, will, upon his return from
a supervisory tour in the extreme South, succeed our friend, Dr. Woodworth, in the
Boston office.

It is well known to our readers that Superintendent Ryder, two and a half years
ago, was induced to assume the laborious work then demitted by Rev. Dr. Roy upon a
similar transfer of Dr. Roy from the Field Superintendency to the District
Secretaryship of the West, with his office in Chicago. To those who have read the
“Notes in the Saddle” from the South, in our magazine, written by Supt. Ryder, we
need add no word of introduction. Nor need we say that he will carry into his new
department of our common work the same energy, zeal and interest which has
characterized the past. With his presentations of the work, and with his personal
knowledge and experience of the field, and of every part of it, we anticipate for the
new District Secretary a hearty welcome and co-operation on the part of our pastors
and churches. The work in the South will be temporarily supervised, and arrangements
have been made for this by the New York office.

In retiring from his long-time trust, the Rev. Dr. Woodworth bears with him the
thanks of multitudes of God’s poor in the South, and the high regard of all who have
been associated in co-operative work with him. It is not impossible that he may yet
see his way to add to his record of many years, still further service in another
department of this varied work.

DEATH OF REV. WM. H. ELLIS.

Rev. William H. Ellis died Nov. 28th, at Troy, N.C., aged thirty-five years and
six months. He entered the work of the A.M.A. in North Carolina in 1878 and continued
in that field. At the time of his death he was pastor of the Congregational Church
and teacher of the Association’s school, at Troy, N.C. He was a graduate of Williams
College and continued his habits of study during the years of his arduous labor as a
missionary.

He had been for a long time in feeble health, but was unwilling to leave his post
of duty even temporarily to secure his recovery. His services in this field of the
A.M.A. have been characterized by self-denial, patience and faithfulness. He was
intensely loyal to his convictions and died having fought the good fight, a Christian
hero.

THE FIELD.

1887-1888.

The following list presents the names and post-office addresses of those who are
employed in the Churches, Institutions and Schools aided by the American Missionary
Association.

THE SOUTH.

NOTES IN THE SADDLE

BY FIELD-SUPERINTENDENT C.J. RYDER.

I write these notes under the shadow of the great affliction that has fallen upon
the A.M.A. in the death of Dr. Powell. Although he was at the head of another
department of A.M.A. work, we always knew that we had in him a kind and thoughtful
friend, and one who would cordially co-operate with the other officers in their
far-reaching plans for the development of the work, even though it added to his cares
and burdens in gathering the funds necessary to carry out these plans. We who have
our work and responsibilities in the field, no less than those who were in {44} the office with Dr.
Powell, would bear our tribute of love, and scatter the blossoms of holy memories
upon this new-made grave.

Two State Associations of unusual interest were held during the month of November.
The Central South Association met with the Trinity Church, in Athens, Ala., Nov. 3d.
This Association includes the churches of Tennessee and two or three of those in
Alabama. The reports from the churches were very complete. Only one church in the
Association was without regular ministerial services, and that church had recently
lost its pastor by death. They are now supplied by a competent and faithful minister.
The temperance question was discussed with great enthusiasm. The influence of Fisk
University on the right side, during the recent prohibition battle in Tennessee, can
scarcely be over-estimated. Many expressed the judgment that the argument of the
Southern whites, that the colored people defeated prohibition, was not true. One
pastor reported that his county went almost solidly against prohibition, and there
was only one colored man in the county, so far as he knew, and he was a staunch
prohibitionist. Some argued that while so many churches and Women’s Christian
Temperance Unions and Young Men’s Christian Associations shut out respectable colored
people, and saloons welcomed those who were not respectable, it would be a difficult
task for the better class to induce the more ignorant to vote against those who
welcomed them and in favor of those who shut them out. Is there not considerable
force in their arguments?

A young colored man, who had been a preacher in one of the old churches of the
South and had become disgusted with its ignorance, superstition and immorality,
presented his credentials and applied for admission into the Congregational
Association of the State. This action of his is a straw which shows which way the
wind of religious thought blows among the intelligent colored people of the South.
The weather-vane points toward Congregationalism. An aged pastor, who had endured
ostracism and violence in New York State in the early times, on account of his
anti-slavery opinions, was present during the meetings of the Association, and added
greatly to their interest. It was a thrilling sight to him to look upon these colored
brethren during their earnest and often eloquent discussions, and to remember how
much he had suffered in their behalf in other days. Trinity School opened its doors
wide and offered generous hospitality to the pastors and delegates. On the whole, it
was one of the best meetings the Association has ever enjoyed.

The Congregational Association of the State of Georgia met with the church at
Macon, November 9th-14th. The church and its new pastor, a son of Connecticut, did
their utmost to make the meetings pleasant and helpful. The band of earnest Christian
teachers of Lewis Normal Institute, {45} the A.M.A. school at Macon, joined hands with the church
and pastor in helping to make the sessions of the Association profitable. Here, too,
as in the Central South Association, the temperance question held a prominent place
in the discussions. There was not a member of the Association but was heartily in
favor of prohibition. The Atlanta campaign was on in all its heat and passion, and
beseeching requests were made by the delegates from that city that prayer might be
offered for them as they passed through the heat of this battle against legalizing
crime. Almost every church in the Association was represented in this meeting and one
new church applied for admission. This church stands near the old prison pen of
Andersonville and so the blood of the martyrs proves the seed of the church, whether
they wear the monk’s cowl of a Huss or the ragged blue of our country. The church at
Charleston, S.C., reported two missions just established in the destitute parts of
that city. All the churches in this Association assisted by the A.M.A. are struggling
towards self-support under helpful pressure from that Society. I am glad to report
that the church at Savannah has taken upon itself the support of its pastor and local
expenses for the next year. The churches in this Association, although poor and often
in serious financial straits themselves, showed their appreciation of other lines of
Christian work by passing the following resolution:

Resolved, That in view of the financial embarrassments of the Home
Missionary Society, the pastors of the churches urge upon their people the duty of
taking up a collection for the benefit of that Society.

As illustrating the need of intelligent and decent church services in the South, I
record the following facts, which were related to me by those who knew of them
personally. A colored preacher of the “old-time” sort preached on the Judgment Day.
He held the meeting from evening till well into the night. He arranged with a
worthless fellow to hide himself in the woods just outside the church, with a
tremendously big dinner-horn, with instructions to blow upon it at a certain signal.
At the awful hour of midnight, when, by entreaty and appeal and frightful figures of
speech, the preacher had worked the people up into a frenzy of excitement and terror,
he exclaimed, “Listen, I reckon I hear Gabriel getting ready to blow now. De last day
am on us, de judgment am right here, whar you sinners now? Listen.” And with bated
breath they listened. Just then there came a fearful blast on the stillness of the
midnight air, and the scene that followed can better be imagined than described.
Helter-skelter over the benches and over each other, the terrified people scrambled
for the mourners’ bench. The preacher boastfully told afterward, that “dar want
scarsely one sinner but what wah effected.”

The quiet forms of worship in our Congregational churches, and the intelligent
preaching of the A.M.A. ministers, are fast bringing about a {46} state of things which will drive out such
church circuses, with their ministerial clowns. God speed the day!

During a considerable portion of the last month I have been “riding double,” as
our honored Secretary, Dr. Beard, has been in the saddle with me. His knowledge of
the field, gained through these frequent personal visits, is of great advantage to
the work and highly appreciated by the workers. We jogged together over many miles of
country, comparing notes, discussing plans and expressing our mutual surprise at the
wonderful and far-reaching work which is being accomplished, and the prophetic
glories of the future.

An account of the mountain campaign, through which Secretary Beard went with me,
will be the subject of future notes.

The following churches have been organized in our Southern field during the past
few weeks:

Deer Lodge Congregational Church, Deer Lodge, Tenn., organized Nov. 16, 1887, with
thirteen members; Calvary Congregational Church, Pine Mountain, Tenn., organized Nov.
26, 1887, with thirteen members; Second Congregational Church, Decatur, Ala.,
organized Nov. 30, 1887, with fifteen members.

THE INDIANS.

WHAT AN INDIAN THINKS OF IT.

The writer of this letter is Loafer Redhorse, a son-in-law of the Titon Chief,
Swift Bear, whose band have colonized as homesteaders along the Niobrara River near
the mouth of Keya Paha River. Their colony is one hundred and thirty miles from
Rosebud Agency, to which they belong. Their settlement we call Burrell Station in
honor of Dea. Burrell, of Oberlin, Ohio, who gave the money to build the school-house
and home for the teacher. Mr. Francis Frazier, son of Pastor Ehnamani of Santee, has
now been their teacher two years.

Loafer Redhorse is anything but a loafer. He is one of the most industrious men.
He is one who would naturally be first in war, as he says, and now also is first in
following the plow, and learning the ways of the white man. Among other things it is
interesting to know what he thinks of prohibiting the use of the Dakota language.

MY FRIENDS: Let me speak now. I am sad because of one thing which I will now speak
of. Since our school-house (the Burrell station school) was built, I, with my
children, have attended with a glad heart just as if it were my own. And now I hear
that it is likely to be closed, and I will speak about that. And this is why I have
something to say. The scholars {47} who go out from the Brules to go to school, come back
without knowing anything, for the reason that they don’t teach them anything except
to work. That is the reason they don’t know anything, I think.

And I will tell how it was with us under Indian customs since the time I had
understanding. Then the Indian tribes were happy. Into whatever country was good they
roamed just as they pleased. At that time, although there were many Indians on all
sides, there was a great country in between full of buffalo. It seemed to be the
buffalo’s country. And the Indian people were made happy because of the buffalo. The
people would move their camps and pitch their tents again and the buffalo would come
right in among their tents with a great noise. Then it was that the people had great
joy.

And there was another thing that the people rejoiced in greatly. I will speak of
that also. That was in war. When they went to war and came near the enemies’
dwellings and saw the enemy there they would choose out about ten of the bravest
young men and dispatch them to kill some of the enemy. Then they would draw near to
the houses, and soon though there might be five whose hearts were not able for it,
the others would go on and kill a man at his house. And the great joy that I spoke of
was thus: of the five who had killed an enemy but only four of them could take the
glory, but their names would be praised throughout the whole Indian nation; they
would be glorified and considered as chiefs. But most of all, he who first killed the
enemy he would be the chief. And then when they had returned home even the women
would rejoice greatly. They would dance night and day, all of them. And as I, myself,
was chief, I considered this the very greatest joy. Such were our customs.

But now from the place I now occupy, I look back and remember these things. And
though the Indian people had all of these customs, I know not one of them that made
the people prosper or brought life to them. I have not seen that brought life to the
people. And thus from where I am now, I am always looking to the future. On this
account I am looking forward. The Indians have been told the words of the
Grandfather, (the President). And they tell us that by these words the people will
prosper.

“Plant; by that you shall live,” the Grandfather told them. And now I know a
little that the Grandfather spoke the truth. The Grandfather gives me food for six
days, but even though I eat a very little each day, in three days I have eaten it all
up. But now I have raised corn and though I abide here eating nothing else, by it I
live. And also to go from my place to where the Grandfather gives me rations takes
one week to go and the same to come back and I stay over a few days to rest when
there, and so it altogether covers over three weeks or more. Therefore, though I have
settled here and desire to busy myself in all the white man’s ways that I am able, I
have not yet become independent. And therefore, I earnestly wish, if it were
possible, that the Grandfather would enable us to receive {48} a year’s rations at a time, and then we
would make speedy progress in the white man’s way.

And because of this also, the children do not advance much in their learning. For
when we go after the food they also go along. If they should stay behind, food is
scarce, therefore they go along.

And now I hear it said that schooling in the Dakota language is to be altogether
stopped, and on this account I am sad. For in the school-house here they learn well
and also they pray. It is because they do these things in the Dakota language that we
have been brought to understand them and to love them, and gladly live in accordance
with them. Then also if it was all done (the teaching and praying) by a white man we
would understand nothing about it, and so I do not think it would be well.

And now this is the last thing I want to say. The Grandfather has for his own the
Indians all over the land, and he always helps them according to what may be for
their welfare. Now he is measuring off the land for them, but I hear it said that he
measures it very, very small, and I am sad about that. If only he would have mercy
and measure it off for them largely, that is what I think. A good while ago the
Grandfather made a treaty with the Indians and promised to give them three hundred
and twenty acres, and according to that I have chosen my homestead and that suits me.
Therefore I prize the Grandfather’s word and measure myself by it. And thus I possess
myself and my children.

Although we are not many people here, yet I always command them to give heed to
the words of the Grandfather. And I bear witness to their constant attendance at the
house (the school and church) that stands here. Although I am wholly an Indian, yet
these are my judgments and so I tell them. And I write them in order that some may
think about the Indians. My friends, I wish you to hear these words and so I write
them. I shake hands with a good heart.

LOAFER REDHORSE.

Burrell Station, Rosebud Agency, D.T.

BUREAU OF WOMAN’S WORK.

MISS D.E. EMERSON, SECRETARY.

WOMAN’S STATE ORGANIZATIONS.

Co-operating with the American Missionary
Association.

ME.—Woman’s Aid to A.M.A., Chairman of Committee, Mrs. C.A. Woodbury,
Woodfords, Me.

VT.—Woman’s Aid to A.M.A., Chairman of Committee, Mrs. Henry Fairbanks, St.
Johnsbury, Vt.

CONN.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. S.M. Hotchkiss, 171 Capitol
Ave., Hartford, Conn.

N.Y.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. C.C. Creegan, Syracuse,
N.Y.

OHIO.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. Flora K. Regal, Oberlin,
Ohio.

ILL.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. C.H. Taintor, 151 Washington
St., Chicago, Ill.

MICH.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. Mary B. Warren, Lansing,
Mich.

WIS.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. C. Matter, Brodhead, Wis.

MINN.—Woman’s Home Miss. Society, Secretary, Mrs. H.L. Chase, 2,750 Second
Ave., South, Minneapolis, Minn.

IOWA.—Woman’s Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Miss Ella E. Marsh, Grinnell,
Iowa.

KANSAS.—Woman’s Home Miss. Society, Secretary, Mrs. Addison Blanchard,
Topeka, Kan.

SOUTH DAKOTA—Woman’s Home Miss. Union Secretary, Mrs. W.H. Thrall, Amour,
Dak.

Miss Bertha Robertson, missionary of the A.M.A. from McIntosh, Ga., will spend a
few months in presenting our work in the North. She has just completed a missionary
tour in Maine, which has been most fruitful of good, and will now give a few weeks to
the churches of New Hampshire, speaking to meetings of ladies, or to mixed audiences,
as may be desired. Applications for her services can be made to Miss Emerson, of the
Woman’s Bureau, 56 Reade St., New York, or to Rev. Cyrus Richardson, Nashua, N.
H.

A teacher in the South writes:—”We have had a Merry Christmas trying to make
others happy. The people have never done so much for others before. We found an old
couple in very destitute circumstances, and asked the school children if they would
not like to do something for them. It was very interesting to see them bring their
gifts of a little sugar, meal, flour, or an armful of wood, a potato, a little salt,
whatever they could get. It did them good. After our Christmas exercises at the
church, we took quite a number of the children around to see the old people, and they
sang their Christmas songs. I don’t know which enjoyed it most, the children or the
old people.

Some young men of the Sunday-school paid a month’s rent for a poor woman. We are
doing more than ever this year in getting the young people to go and hold prayer
meetings, or read to those who cannot get out to church.”

FOR THE CHILDREN.

HOW SUSY WENT TO TOUGALOO.

You never could guess just how she went, if you should try from now until your
next birthday, so I’ll tell you first how she came to go to Tougaloo at all.

To begin with, Mamma Bradley had been rummaging about in the attic a long time,
when little Fay set out to find her.

“What are you doing up here, mamma?” said Fay. “I’ve been hunting for you ever so
long.”

“Oh, I’m looking for some things to put in the barrel that is going to Tougaloo
for the poor people that the missionaries are working for.”

“Clothes?” said Fay.

“Yes, clothes, and I suppose they would be glad of almost anything that would help
to make their lives more comfortable,” said her mother.

Fay sat down in an old basket and watched her mother fold and unfold the contents
of trunks and boxes so quietly, that Mrs. Bradley finally looked up and said:

“Why don’t you go to your play, dear? What are you thinking about?”

“I was thinking,” said Fay, “do you s’pose the Tougaloo folks have any little
girls?”

“Oh, yes, plenty of them.”

“Big’s me?”

“Yes, all sizes, I suppose,” said Mrs. Bradley, going on with her work.

“Well,” said Fay, “I was thinking, how d’you s’pose they’d like Susy?”

“What! the new dolly that Auntie gave you for keeping your elbows off the
table?”

“Yes’m,” said Fay. “Do you s’pose she’d make a little Tougaloo girl’s life any
more comfor’ble?”

“Why, yes, dear, anything that gives you so much pleasure would please them, of
course,” said her mother, “but are you quite sure you want to give Susy away?”

“Well, when Auntie gave us our missionary boxes in the Sunday-school class, she
told us to be sure and remember what was printed on them, and she read on one side
something about people giving their first fruits, and she said it meant their best
things, and on top it said, ‘Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of
these, ye have done it unto me.’ Now Susy is my best doll—any way I love her
best, and there couldn’t be anybody much leaster than a little girl like me way down
in Tougaloo, could there, mamma?”

“Well, you must think it all over, and if you are quite sure that you want to do
it, we will take Susy down to the church this afternoon with the other things,” said
her mother.

Fay said no more, and in a few minutes she tripped down stairs, and when her mamma
followed soon after, she heard the creak of Fay’s little rocking chair, and the
words, “Sleep, baby, sleep,” which told her as she peeped through a crack in the
door, that Susy was getting her last lullaby from the fond little mother, who at the
proper time presented Susy all dressed for her journey to Tougaloo.

“When Fay and her mother arrived at the church, sure enough right there in the
parlor stood two or three barrels, while dear old Mrs. Rogers and half a dozen other
ladies were filling them with useful articles.

“Here is a package of clothing,” said Mrs. Bradley, ” and I have another bundle,
which Dennis will bring from the carriage in a few minutes.”

“And Susy’s going to Tougaloo,” said Fay, reaching out her treasure to Grandma
Rogers as she spoke.

“Well now, the dear,” said Grandma Rogers, “don’t you want her yourself,
blossom?”

“No’m, not now,” said Fay, “if you’ll find a little girl who’ll take real good
care of her—her name’s ‘ Susy.'”

“Well, did you ever!” said Grandma Rogers. ” Here’s jest the place for Susy, she
can set right here in Miss Blout’s bunnit as snug as a bug.”

“Wait a minute, Mrs. Rogers,” said Miss Bliss, and taking a pencil she wrote on a
little slip of paper, “My name is Susy, and I should like to go to some little girl
who will take good care of me.” This she read and pinned the slip on Susy’s pretty
dress when she was safely seated in “Miss Blout’s bunnit,” in which odd carriage,
made of roses and ribbons, Susy started on her long journey to Tougaloo. Her little
mother, Fay, would like some day to get a letter from Susy’s new mother, though she
has not yet heard from her.

FROM N.Y. OBSERVER

RECEIPTS FOR DECEMBER, 1887.

MAINE, $566.12.

Footnote 1:(return)

Deceased.