Part 2

TALLADEGA, ALA.—The Southern Industrial Association held its second annual fair at Talladega, Ala., November 11-14. This Association is officered in part and largely helped by Talladega College, and its object is to promote the industry and physical good of the Freedmen. The weather was favorable, the attendance was large, many coming quite a distance, and the display of articles was unusually good. In agricultural and garden products, in fancy articles, in needlework, both plain and ornamental, and in the culinary department, especial excellence was shown. The exhibition of stock was meagre, with the exception of fowls, which were numerous and remarkably fine. Some blacksmith’s hammers, tables, and an upholstered chair, would compare well with similar productions from the best Northern workmen. More than seven hundred entries were made, and the premiums awarded were worth about three hundred dollars. The fair stimulates industry, and marks a real advance in the condition of the people. Many of our white friends paid well-deserved praise, and one late slaveholder, said to have owned nearly a hundred negroes, was so pleased as to make a cash contribution to the treasury, and offered to double it should there be a deficit. On the last evening, the College chapel was full to overflowing, while Rev. C. L. Harris, of Selma, gave a very bold and moving and powerful address of more than an hour in length, on the African in America. The address showed what an African can do, and it pointed out what an African should become. Take it all in all, the Fair marks a good step upward and gives fresh hope for the future.

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MCLEANSVILLE, N. C.—Our school is growing larger—double what it was at the corresponding time last year. Many expect to come after Christmas from abroad. Must enlarge our accommodations.

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TOUGALOO, MISS.—We now have seventy-nine boarders, and have had to go into the barracks again. A prospect of increased attendance, and what to do with the students we can none of us imagine. We ought to enlarge our accommodations immediately.

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MOBILE, ALA.—School overflowing. If we have room and teaching force enough, we shall have three hundred in attendance by February 1st. Without increased room and help we shall be obliged to turn away many that would enter the intermediate and normal departments. We have already begun this at the primary door.

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ATLANTA, GA.—Mr. A. W. Farnham, late principal of Avery Institute, has become principal of the Normal department of the University, to assist in making the best teachers possible for that region.

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FISK UNIVERSITY.—The number of pupils is rapidly increasing, and there is a prospect that the students will be too many or the accommodations too few.

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WOODVILLE, GA.—Our school is crowded. If you had not built the parsonage, the pupils could not have been accommodated. You have done a great deal of good for the people at this place. Almost every day, children are refused admittance, because we are so full. The only hope of our church, so far as I can see, is in the children educated in our schools.

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NEW ORLEANS, LA.—“I wish you could have heard some of the expressions of gratitude to the A. M. A. in our services during your Annual Meeting in Chicago. The church observed the day by remembering the Association in their Tuesday evening prayer meeting.”

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MARION, ALA.—In one envelope yesterday, the collection being for the A. M. A., was $5 from a hard-working man, this being one-tenth of the man’s crop—one bale of cotton, which brought $30—showing that your work for this people is not wholly unappreciated. We made the A. M. A. a special subject of prayer at our church meeting last week. Sixty-three at Sunday-school yesterday. Boys’ meeting at the Home fully attended. We have had a “reception” at the Home—all our people, men, women and children, including babies. We only want the special influences of the Holy Spirit.

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FLORENCE, ALA.—On the Sabbath, November 23d, a new church edifice was dedicated at this place. Pastor Wm. H. Ash was assisted by Field Superintendent Roy; by student Anderson, from Fisk University, who had preached for the church the year before Mr. Ash came; by the Presbyterian pastor, who offered the prayer of dedication; and by the M. E. South Presiding Elder. Fifty of the best white citizens of the place were present; among them, besides the ministers named, two other Methodist preachers, ex-Governor Patton and four lawyers. These friends contributed freely to the balance needed ($70) to put in the pulpit and pews, which had not yet been secured. It was all raised in a few minutes after the sermon. The house is spoken of by the citizens as the only modern church in the place. It is indeed a gem. It is twenty-five by forty feet, with a brick foundation, a steep roof and a little belfry. It is well painted on the outside, and on the inside ceiled in varnished yellow pine. The total cost was $950. It was built with great economy under the supervision of Mr. Ash. “Howard,” of Boston, is a man who knows how to make fine investments in this line, as several of his ventures of this kind have proved. To his $300, the Central Congregational Church, of Providence, R. I., to which Mr. Ash belongs, added $100. One year ago, more than twenty of the influential and well-to-do members of this church removed to Kansas, else so much of aid would not have been needed. We learn that those people are highly respected in the communities where they have settled. Pastor Ash and his educated wife are greatly devoted to their people. They are also teaching a parish school, which is much approved.

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GENERAL NOTES.

Africa.

—Quite full accounts of the Nyanza Mission are given in the last two numbers of the _Church Missionary Intelligencer_. Mr. Wilson set out August 23, 1878, from Kagei, at the south end of the lake, for Mtesa’a capital, at its northern extremity, in the Daisy, but was wrecked on the way, and compelled to take out a section of the boat with which to repair the rest of it. Eight weeks were thus occupied, during which they received great kindness from the chief and people of Uzongora, a tribe which met Stanley with great violence. They arrived November sixth at Uganda. Mtesa continued to treat them well, despite the efforts of the Arabs to prejudice him against them. Mr. Wilson had gone to meet the three missionaries who were coming to reinforce them by way of the Nile. Mr. Mackay was teaching reading by charts to a large number of old and young. Some valuable conclusions have been reached by their experience—that they do not need ordained men yet so much as those experienced in practical work. “Unless we succeed in elevating labor, we shall get hearers, but no doers. Hence slavery—domestic, at least—cannot cease; and if slavery does not cease, polygamy will remain.” The need of English traders to take the place of the Arabs, who want slaves, is emphasized. The cost of maintenance is very trifling: small presents secure an abundance of goats, coffee, plantains, sugar-cane, etc. It is hoped that long ere this, seven missionaries are together in Uganda, viz.: the Revs. O. T. Wilson and G. Litchfield; Messrs. Mackay, Pearson, Felkin, Stokes and Copplestone. Sixteen in all have been sent, of whom six have died and three have returned sick.

—The _English Independent_ of October 30 says: “It would seem, from communications which have just been received, that the wiles of French Jesuits have already brought trouble to these missionaries. A letter of introduction, written by Lord Salisbury to King Mtesa, was read, and gave great satisfaction. Soon after the arrival of the Jesuits the aspect of affairs was changed. The king accused the missionaries of playing him false, an untruthful report having reached him that the Egyptians were advancing their posts more to the south. Some months passed in a very unsatisfactory manner, and at length one of the missionaries was allowed to go to Egypt to prepare the way for the king’s messengers, who were to be accompanied by Mr. Wilson; two more were permitted to return to the south side of the lake, ‘on condition that they would thence send on to Mtesa some mission stores left there.’ At the end of June, three remained at Uganda, without the necessary facilities either to carry on their mission work or to withdraw. With such troubles they are beset, through the combined intrigues of the enemies of corporeal and spiritual freedom.”

—The same paper says that no direct tidings have been received from the London Missionary Society’s agents at Ujiji on the Tanganika, and ascribes this break in communication to the Arab slave traders, and only hopes that their hostility has been limited to intercepting letters. Dr. Kirk, the consul at Zanzibar, has been instructed to institute inquiries. Dr. Laws, of the mission at Livingstonia (Scotch), has been requested to send messengers to Ujiji to learn the condition. Great solicitude is felt, and a day of special prayer for Divine guidance and help has been appointed. The last accounts in the _Chronicle_ of the London Missionary Society report the death of Rev. A. W. Dodgshun seven days after his arrival at Ujiji, on the way to which place he lost nearly all the goods belonging to that part of the expedition, and the successful progress through Ugogo of Messrs. Southon and Griffith: they were in good health, and confident of reaching their destination shortly.

—The _London Telegraph_, of Oct. 22, says: “All alike will be interested in the following extract from a letter which has just been received from Mr. Stanley, the famous African explorer, by an intimate friend. The letter is dated from Banana Point, at the mouth of the Congo River, Sept. 13, and says: ‘All this year I have been very busy, and have worked hard. I have equipped one expedition on the East Coast; have reconstructed another—namely, the International—of whose misfortune we have heard so often, and have explored personally several new districts on the East Coast. Having finished my work satisfactorily to myself, my friends and those who sent me, I came through the Mediterranean and round to this spot, where I arrived two years and four months ago, on that glorious day on which we sighted old ocean after our rash descent of the Livingstone. * * * And now I begin another mission seriously and deliberately, with a grand object in view. I am charged to open—and keep open, if possible—all such districts and countries as I may explore for the commercial world. The mission is supported by a philanthropic society which numbers noble-minded men of several nations. It is not a religious society, but my instructions are entirely of that spirit. No violence must be used, and wherever rejected, the mission must withdraw to seek another field. We have abundant means, and, therefore, we are to purchase the very atmosphere, if any demands be made upon us, rather than violently oppose them. In fact, we must freely buy of all and every, rather than resent, and you know the sailor’s commandment—‘Obey orders if it breaks owners’—is easier to keep than to stand upon one’s rights.’”

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THE FREEDMEN.

REV. JOS. E. ROY, D.D.,

FIELD SUPERINTENDENT, ATLANTA, GA.

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VACATION REPORTS.

PROF. T.N. CHASE, ATLANTA.

A stranger could hardly obtain a more vivid and correct idea of the far-reaching influence for good that one of the higher institutions of the American Missionary Association is exerting, than by listening to the reports of the students as they return from their summer’s work of teaching. At Atlanta University the first Sunday afternoon of the fall term is devoted to these reports, and to the teachers it is one of the happiest and most inspiring occasions of the whole year. We wish that many of the readers of the MISSIONARY could have been with us on last Sunday, and seen with their own eyes and heard with their own ears, since the full rich tones of voice, dignified composure and simple earnestness of these student-teachers cannot be transferred to paper. But I did not see you present, and so will give you the benefit of some notes I took down, departing from my original plan of arranging and classifying the “testimony,” omitting quotation marks, and introducing the successive speakers simply by beginning on a new line.

I taught in Tatnal. Other pupils were afraid to go there because it was a democratic county. People did not want a teacher from outside of the county, because they did not want the money to go out of the county. They liked me very much. Colored people have from one acre to 2500 acres of land, and are about as well educated as the whites. Children are compelled by their parents to come to Sunday-school. I kept up a Sunday evening prayer-meeting. Several of the children acknowledged Jesus and _turned over_ to the church. I made two or three speeches on temperance.

My Commissioner is well disposed toward this Institution. I made two or three lectures against intemperance, and encouraged the people to educate themselves and accumulate property. At my exhibition three lawyers were present and forty or fifty other whites.

The Commissioner did not examine me, saying that this school was the best in the world and he never intended to examine a pupil from it. He was a Saturday-Sunday man and did not do any business on Saturday. I tramped a week and a half for a school and found one on Col. ——’s place. Parents want their children whipped, and do not think they are taught any thing unless they are whipped.

Some of us had a convention on temperance, tobacco and morals. The colored people own a good deal of land and make lots of cotton. One man made twenty-one bales, but saved only eighty dollars.

Col. —— said Atlanta University must be the best disciplined school in the State. The poor whites do not want to go to school, and are more intemperate and degraded than the blacks. If the colored man would only stand up for his rights, he would not be _hacked_.

I taught in a district called “Dark Corner.” I think I gave them a right start. Had a prayer meeting which was largely attended. Poor whites use more whiskey than the colored people. Whites seem kind to blacks, lend them money and horses, and help them in every way.

I had an average attendance of thirty-three and a night-school of fifteen. Taught on an old plantation, on which there used to be five hundred slaves. Ignorance has great sway there. People have good stock, but cannot buy land. There is a temperance lodge in Camden of one hundred and forty members.

It was a bad county where I taught. I was _careful_ about teaching there. They never had a school before. No land is owned by colored people. There is much opposition to their education. The immorality of the place is explained by the fact that they formerly had stills there. Preachers are not moral men. They are opposed to “foreign” teachers. Poor whites create a good deal of disturbance. Land is owned by those who owned it during slavery times, and they will not sell it to white or colored.

I was the first lady teacher that taught in the county and was quite a novelty. They had bad teachers. One white one was intemperate. White people were friendly. Three whites raised their hats to me, which was quite a new thing. I had a very good Sunday-school; white people attended my exhibition. They like this University very much, and the Commissioner wanted me to encourage the boys and girls to come up.

Most everybody uses whiskey and tobacco. I talked on temperance, distributed temperance papers and read to them. Took the New York _Witness_ and read it to the people. I think I did some good among the children. The children of the poor whites are _knocking about_ on the road all the time. They had a school one month, then gave it up. Young men spend Sunday in gambling; guess they are doing it right now. Some said I was not teaching them anything because I did not use the blue-back speller. The houses of poor whites are just like the colored, but their clothes are not so good.

The people where I taught are intelligent and well-to-do. Most of them own their own homes. The whites want the colored people educated. A speaker at an exhibition of a female seminary said that the colored people were leaving them in the dark, and if they did not look out, the bottom rail would be on the top. Six or eight colored people own from one hundred to five hundred acres and stock. The Commissioner’s wife asked me into the parlor and gave me a rocking-chair.

Where I was last winter, the people kept Thanksgiving. Of course I enjoyed that, because I knew you were keeping it here. I had a Sunday-school that was quite large at first, but when big meetings came on it grew small.

I had seventy-five pupils. I cannot see that I did much good, but I hope some good will come out of my summer’s work. Public sentiment seems to sanction the worst things there are.

The people where I taught said they must have a man, that females could not teach, and they could not stand ladies. The whites, on the whole, are better to the teachers than the colored people are. I succeeded in getting six men to stop using tobacco while attending school, and then they said if they could stop fifty-five days they could all their life-time.

Somehow they looked at me like they looked at Columbus when he first came to America. Preachers are all intemperate men, and some of them said they could not preach well unless they had some whiskey in them. I taught four times in the same place, and have had a larger school each time. The morals of the colored people depend on the morals of the whites. I opened school at eight and closed at six. I saw no intemperance, because it was the wrong time of the year. I talked temperance and acted it. There is but little difference between the whites and colored; they eat together, sleep together, and have the same kind of houses.

Now to these reports, only a small part of which I have copied, I will add a few comments:

1. There is no diminution of the desire of colored children to learn, and of their parents to have their children educated. Parents want teachers to teach from early dawn to candle-light, and even to _beat_ knowledge into the pupils.

2. Intemperance and licentiousness abound to a fearful extent, not only among the laity, but also among the clergy.

3. The poor whites need education and moral and religious instruction as much as the colored people, and our students are reaching some of them in their influence.

4. Public school privileges in the South are limited, and it will be a long time before suitable buildings are provided and efficient teaching secured.

5. The whites are, in the main, well disposed toward the colored people, and in favor of their being educated.

6. Many of the colored people are acquiring homes and other property, although in some places the owners of land will not sell it.

7. In some instances the colored people are cheated out of the benefits of their labor, and ill-treated in various ways.

8. Atlanta University stands high in the estimation of the people, and needs liberal pecuniary support from its friends to keep up its reputation and do the great work that lies before it.

9. Social prejudice seems to be yielding somewhat, although the fact that a white lady invited a colored girl to sit in a rocking-chair in her parlor, is not so common an occurrence as to make it unworthy of mention. Tidiness, gentility, intelligence and morality will yet be considered superior to a light complexion.

10. The hope of this race, as well as of any other, lies in the training of children, and hence the value of good schools, both day and Sunday.

11. The American Missionary Association is doing a valuable work among the _whites_, by showing them what education will do for poor people, and stimulating them to try to keep the “top-rail” where it is.

12. No one can estimate the influence our school is exerting in favor of education, industry, economy, temperance, Sabbath observance, chastity, social order, and, in short, morality and religion.

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WOMAN’S WORK FOR WOMAN.

MISS LAURA A. PARMELEE, MEMPHIS, TENN.

We give the closing portion of a paper read at the Woman’s Meeting, held in connection with the Annual Meeting at Chicago. In the opening portions of it, Miss Parmelee describes with frank truthfulness the perils which encircle the colored girls of the South by reason of the family habits, the laxity of the marriage relation, the ignorance of the laws of health, the late hours of their religious and social gatherings, &c. We print her statements and suggestions as to the remedy and protection.

Of special agencies for training colored girls to better habits, boarding schools claim the first place. If there had been seventy, instead of seven homes of this kind, we could to-day report a fairer record of virtue and purity. Under the constant supervision of faithful teachers, who regulate the hours, walks and visits of those in their charge, there is opportunity to acquire a love for systematic ways and a pure home life. With the instinctive imitation of their race they adopt the manners and sentiments of the ladies living under the same roof and sitting at the same table. Yet with this help, there has been frequent occasion for teachers to ponder the story of the young crabs that went from the sea-side to a seminary among the mountains, where they became ashamed of their own gait and diligently tried to learn the new way of walking, succeeding to the entire satisfaction of their teachers as well as themselves, and seeming to have forgotten the old ways, but, upon returning to parents and friends at the shore, relinquished the accomplishment and walked backwards as in other days.

In two or three schools—possibly more, but I speak only from personal knowledge—it is the duty of one of the lady teachers to give the girls instruction in dress, manners, morals and health, particularly in matters relating to their peculiar physical organization. Once a week the regular lessons are postponed or laid aside, that the pupils may have a half hour for listening to the lecture that has been thoughtfully prepared for their exclusive benefit. Commencing with points of etiquette, dress, sketches of lives of famous women, announcing the latest fashion items when they happen to be suitable, and so winning the confidence and arousing the interest of the class, it is comparatively easy to come to graver counsels concerning morals, health, danger of association with people of loose principles, the lowering of standards of personal honor, and finally the teaching properly due a daughter from her mother’s lips.