Читать книгу: «The American Missionary. Volume 49, No. 04, April, 1895», страница 5

FIELD ITEMS

The organization of Young People's Societies of Christian Endeavor among the young people in the mountains is being carried on very successfully by the missionaries and superintendents of the American Missionary Association in that region. A recent report from one of the superintendents gives a list of nine places at which Endeavor Societies have been recently organized. The American Missionary Association has been especially active in this work of spreading the Endeavor movement among our young Highlanders of the South. The Endeavor Society meets just their need, and furnishes opportunities for development and growth which are greatly appreciated.

Extract from a letter, Andersonville, Ga.: It is pitiful to see the children come so regularly four or five miles to school, their feet protruding from their broken shoes, bringing their baskets of tuition in the way of chickens, eggs, etc., to pay their school bills. One longs to cook up the things brought and give food to the poor children and wrap them in warm clothing, but I know the only way to make them self-reliant and keep them from the spirit of mendicancy is to require them to pay.

New Orleans, La.—Rev. Geo. W. Moore writes: About thirty of the boarding students and fifty of the day students have avowed their faith in Christ since Friday evening, when I first began the Gospel exercises in their behalf. All of the boarders of Straight University are now in the Christian household of faith.

MISS AMY WILLIAMS

On Sunday, February 24, at Rochester, N. Y., another of our valued missionaries passed on beyond the work and opportunities of this life to her blessed reward.

Miss Amy Williams entered the service of the Association in 1868 as missionary teacher at Augusta, Ga. The next year she was transferred to Atlanta, Ga., where she was for many years the principal of the Storrs School. Retiring from this principalship in 1885, she spent a few years North, but her heart continually turned to her loved people, and in 1893 she accepted appointment as principal of the Slater Normal School, at Knoxville, Tenn., where her work was characterized by the same thoroughness and ability as that at Atlanta. Finding that her health would not permit her to return the second year, she wrote in December: "My heart just aches to go back South. Every other work seems insignificant."

Mrs. T. N. Chase, of Atlanta, Ga., writes as follows:

"Nearly twenty-five years ago, in the beauty of her young womanhood, she took charge of Storrs School, shaping it through those plastic years, and leaving the impress of her grand life upon it. At supper table to-night I ventured to ask one of the older girls who sits beside me if she remembered Miss Williams. How her face lighted up as she said: "Oh yes; she gave me my first Bible." Hundreds of boys and girls have entered the college preparatory class at Atlanta University who, but for her, would never have gone beyond the grammar school. In the early days, before electric cars, she often walked out here, nearly two miles, to see how her Storrs children were getting on. One day I wanted to walk back with her a little way, but she said: "I must go on a mile further to the home of a poor boy who ran away and has been sleeping in my schoolroom two nights, because his father beats him so he does not dare to go home." That boy is now Rev. John W. Whittaker, class of '84, and pastor of First Congregational Church, New Orleans, La. I think of hosts of others who will rise up to call her blessed. So, as much as I loved her, I cannot grieve for her, but only sit and wonder how that one crown can contain all the stars that must be circling round her brow."

THE INDIANS

COLLECTION FOR THE DEBT AT SANTEE AGENCY

The response of an Indian church to the appeal for help in view of the financial distress upon the Association, is certainly worthy of any Christian church anywhere. In reporting their collection, Dr. A. L. Riggs writes as follows:

"On February 10, our mission people and Pilgrim Church responded to the call of the American Missionary Association, and made a subscription of two hundred and sixteen dollars. This subscription will be paid in before the first of April, and it will likely be increased some. Of course the larger part is the gift of the missionaries, but the Indians did well, a number contributing five dollars apiece."

In giving an account of a service the day this large collection was taken at this Indian church, Mr. F. B. Riggs writes:

"Two of the mission people started the pledge with twenty dollars each. That rather startled the people, but several soon ventured ten dollars each. Then one pledged ten dollars on condition that nine others pledged the same. The nine were found. One Indian woman pledged ten dollars. Several Indians put down four, five, six and seven dollars each. We would sing and then call for pledges; speak and sing again, and then pledges again. The committee was instructed to canvass the matter farther immediately. The work is now going on outside. In the meanwhile the pledges are being paid very fast, and I expect to be able to remit to you soon. This contribution from Pilgrim Church means much from the hearts of our members. They have gone right down to the suffering point in this giving. The pupils in the school have done well in helping, too. I have been astonished that many members of America's great churches think that missionaries and people in our mission fields are only recipients. I wonder if the good people in all our large churches did as much to lift the debt of the American Missionary Association on Lincoln Memorial Sabbath as did the members of this Indian Mission Church on the prairie. If so, the debt is wiped out."