Chapter C: T. COLLINS, Chairman (2)

This gives you a little idea of the inevitable difficulties of African exploration. As to the encouragements, the first one I think of (and it is a great one) is that our Lord, who leads us to victory, has made Africa and told us to go there. The next is the testimony of our latest travelers to the grand success of mission work. Thompson says that while the Belgian expeditions have failed, while the stations of the International Association have failed because of the lack of character in the men who have led them, the Livingstonian mission, the Free Church of Scotland mission, the London Missionary Society’s mission, and various other missions have all proved solid civilizing centres. Desolating wars have ceased; the slave trade in their region is ended; the moral tone of the natives has been evidently already lifted up.

But we must have in this missionary work more regard to a physical basis. It is wrong, brethren, to send such men as Henry M. Ladd and Edward P. Smith, and let them travel in open boats, exposed with their native boatmen to almost certain death. The fact is that the sentinel of death stands five miles out from the coast of Africa to warn almost every traveler not to sleep on its shores in such a region as that. If we send out these noble men who hazard their lives for this work, we must give them these steamers—the “John Brown” steamer at the Mendi mission, and the “Charles Sumner” steamer at the Nile Basin station.

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FROM ADDRESS OF REV. GEO. S. DICKERMAN.

As we review the past, we delight to see how the various movements, which, at the time, seem to be wholly disconnected, move on in converging lines, and how, finally, those movements come together to produce some sublime result. During this centennial period we have been looking back over the past history of our nation, and at the same time over the past history of Europe, and we have found these two histories blended all the way through. From the time of the Crusades, and the awakening of the spirit of enterprise, and the creating of that great restlessness throughout Europe which led to the spirit of exploration and discovery, down through the subsequent periods, during which our country was colonized, we see everywhere how movements on this side of the water and movements on the other side were playing together. * * * * * * * * * And now we stand at another period, and we see two continents, lying side by side across the same ocean. We have heard God’s voice saying, “Let my people go,” and this has been followed by God’s providence breaking off the fetters of an oppressed race and bidding them go forth into a land of freedom. And we have seen, in connection with this, God calling His people to labor and lift up these brethren to a higher intelligence, to a purer, faith, to a nobler aspiration, and to a grander enterprise; and we have seen these efforts fruiting most wonderfully. And all the time that this has been going on, away off there across the ocean, in that new continent hitherto unexplored, Baker, Livingstone and Stanley, with untiring industry, have been prosecuting their work; and “the great dark continent” is being made a light continent in one respect—light to our knowledge, only that something greater and grander may follow. Are these lines parallel—the lines of God’s movements in America and the lines of God’s movements in Africa? They _converge_; and, in the distance, these lines on which God is moving will come to their focus, and we shall see there on African soil sublime results, of which these here on American soil give to us but the prophecy.

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THE UPPER NILE BASIN.

COL. H. G. PROUT, LATE OF THE KEHDIVE’S STAFF, EGYPT.

In what I have to say I shall not try to give any large picture of African travel or life; I shall try only to give some accurate notions of a limited area.

The Soudan is not a definite geographical term. Bellad es Soudan is the country of the blacks, and is merely a general term like Central Africa. An Egyptian Governor-General of the Soudan rules a vast territory, extending in Gordon’s time from the Tropic of Cancer on the north to near the equator on the south, about 1,640 miles; and from the Red Sea on the east to the western boundary of Darfour, averaging about 660 miles in width. This territory includes Upper and Lower Nubia, the fertile and little known Sennaar, the wastes north of Abyssinia, the provinces of Darfour and Kordofan, and the mysterious regions of the White Nile and its affluents.

Nowhere else in the explored world is there an equal area so uniform in climate and surface. The sad result of this uniformity you see in the condition of the people. In your effort to help the people, you must fight against these facts of nature. A monotony of savage tribes live in a bad climate, uniform in its badness; they inhabit a land which throughout great regions gives no variety of surface. From these conditions they have no escape. I do not say that no great improvement of people so situated is possible; but I do say that man has seldom found himself in a worse position.

In the northern zone of the Soudan, down to about the twelfth degree of latitude, the climate has admitted of a feeble development of Mohammedan civilization; further south the conditions are desperate.

The Arab officers of the Khedive, the Nubian slave hunters, the few European traders and travelers who have gone as far as Gondokoro, the handful of American and English officers who, in late years, have tried to carry law and light into that unhappy country—every man of them would tell you the same story of more or less rapid failure of his own vital powers, and of the terrible mortality among his comrades. We, at this distance, only hear of those who go up the Nile and come back. One has but to spend a few weeks in Khartoum to learn a long list of names of men who have gone as far as Khartoum or Fashoda, or the Sobat or Lado, only to come back, broken in health, often to die before getting to the sea.

Let us now glance briefly at the physical geography of the Nile basin south of Khartoum. Below the tenth degree of latitude, the steppe country is no longer seen. Vast marshes stretch away on either hand, broken by peninsulas and islands of dry land. For 790 miles this is the character of the immediate valley of the White Nile. Between latitudes 5 and 6 the swamps end and the face of the country becomes more like our own land. From this latitude to the equator is a charmingly diversified country, with mountains, valleys, creeks, meadows, and not an extraordinary proportion of swamps. Of course, this region is more healthy than the marshes of the White Nile, but even it has a trying climate.

Here the Nile is a rapid stream, with numerous wooded and rocky islands and long stretches of rapids and cataracts. The forests are neither so vast nor so dense as we imagine tropical forests to be; nor do we find here the majestic trees and the luxuriant vegetation of the Central American forests. The herbage grows with wonderful rapidity, and during the summer months much of the country is covered with grass of amazing height and strength.

On the west and south the great swamp basin seems to end at a crest of high land running northwesterly from the Nile at about latitude 5, crossing the eighth degree of latitude at 150 or 200 miles west of the Nile, and keeping something the same general direction to the steppes of Darfour and Wadai.

The eastern limit of the swamp region is even more conjectural than the western, but we may expect that it will be found within 100 miles of the Nile, and that it is a line running south by west from near the mouth of the Sobat. The total area of the swamp basin may be 25,000 square miles.

Khartoum is the point of rendezvous and departure for all routes into the Soudan. It may be reached from Cairo by two principal routes; one up the Nile valley, the other by the Red Sea and by caravan to Berber on the Nile, 250 miles north of Khartoum. The quicker and probably the cheaper route is by the Red Sea, Suakim and Berber. The journey by this route, allowing three days each at Suakim and Berber, may be made in 32 days. By this route there are but two days of hard marching necessary. The rest of the journey can be made at a comfortable pace. Both of these routes into the Soudan are much frequented. Special difficulties in getting transportation may operate against one or the other of them at different times. This is something to be decided at Cairo.

Khartoum, the capital of the Soudan, is a town of about 30,000 people, with many and fairly good shops, at which the traveler can procure anything really necessary, except arms, ammunition and medicines. At this great African city all lines of traffic converge. Here boats can be procured, manned, provisioned and stored to go up the White or Blue Nile, the Sobat or the Bahr el Ghazalle. Here camels may be hired and caravans fitted out to go to the East or the West.

From Khartoum to Fashoda, in the tenth degree of latitude, about 450 miles, the White Nile is practically Mohammedan. Though the Shillooks rove considerably north of that point, they are continually harassed by their enemies, the Bagarra Arabs from Kordofan and the government tax-gatherers from the Nile, and lead a very unsettled life. On the eastern bank of the Nile, also, the Mohammedan tribes have driven the negroes south of the tenth parallel.

South of Fashoda, however, for more than 100 miles along the west bank of the Nile, past the mouth of the Sobat, and extending back many miles into the interior, is the country held by the great tribe of the Shillooks. Their huts in this region are like one vast village. They are a powerful and spirited tribe, numbering over a million souls, it is estimated. They have resisted the Egyptian Government with tenacity and considerable success. Indeed, I cannot say how much of their territory is actually subjugated to-day; but it is probable the Egyptian power is not acknowledged far from Fashoda.

The Shillooks are one of the finest negro tribes of which we know anything. They are prosperous cultivators of the soil and great hunters. Although they are greatly exasperated by the wars of the government and the plundering of the passing slave-traders, it is likely that they could soon be led to feel confidence in men whom they found to be neither officials nor slavers. With their light canoes they cross the river constantly, hunting, fishing and raiding on the neighboring Dinkas and Nouers. Although they have been so badly treated by the government and the traders, yet they have learned to discriminate among white men, and it is quite possible that they might be found more open to the influence of Christian missionaries than the tribes farther away from the route of travel.

On the west bank of the Nile, north of the Sobat, is a branch of the great Dinka tribe. These people have fared even worse than the Shillooks at the hands of the slavers, and have almost abandoned the banks of the streams. They will probably return with the decline of slave-hunting, if indeed they are not already occupying again their old lands. These are docile and intelligent negroes, and are favorite slaves. The black regiments of the Soudan were mostly recruited from the Dinkas. Like the Shillooks, the Dinkas are pure heathen and great cattle-breeders. The immediate southern bank of the Sobat is now occupied by the Nouer tribe, who have also pushed over to the north of that stream and are found far up its course. They go to the west as far as the Gazelle River and their southern limit is ill-defined. They are a very numerous tribe, but perhaps inferior in intelligence to either the Shillooks or the Dinkas, although Poncet speaks of them as clean, well-housed, and valiant warriors and hunters.

The little that we know of the country and people up the Sobat is not encouraging. The land is flat, and in the rainy season marshy. On the banks of the streams are forests of the talch acacia. The people have been hostile, and Col. Gordon withdrew his station from that region before I went to the provinces of the Equator.

The mouth of the Sobat, and the great east and west reach of the Nile which flows here east by south for about 100 miles, mark the southern limit of the steppe country. South of this one should not rest till he reaches the high lands of the Bahr el Gebel, below latitude 5. The characteristic features of that region are truly charming to one who has crossed the deserts, steppes and marshes on his way from the Mediterranean.

Here are found various tribes of negroes, the Bohr, the Shir, the Madi, and finally, to the south, the great Wanyoro and Waganda tribes, who are thought by Speke not to be negroes. On the east are the Latookas and the Lungo; on the west the Niambara. For our purposes it is not necessary to discriminate very closely between them. They are all naked heathen, given to warfare and pillage, detesting work, and certainly not spiritually minded.

All of these people had been greatly exasperated by the slave-traders and by the garrison left at Gondokoro by Baker. The policy of the slave-traders had been to keep one tribe at war with another, and by allying themselves with one and the other to get much of the fighting done for them and to carry off the spoils in slaves, cattle and ivory. The Egyptian garrison had imitated the traders, and when Gordon went up it was practically besieged at Gondokoro. In two years and a half Gordon had reduced the garrison at Gondokoro to a sergeant and ten men, and his strongest garrison, that at Moogi, was but 90 men. He had established stations for 300 miles at a day’s march, or less, apart, and over much of this distance one courier could pass unharmed. The chiefs about the stations paid tribute of corn and furnished porters readily. On the Albert Lake he put a steamer and two large iron life-boats, which traversed without danger or difficulty the 125 miles of river south of Dufli. The Moogi family, for some distance on the east bank of the river, was still hostile, but all the other river people had great confidence in the wonderful white man who had been just and truthful with them. How much of this condition still exists I do not know, but the fact that it did exist in 1877 shows what missionaries might hope to do there.

The negroes of the far Nile country, like the Shillooks, the Dinkas, and the Nouers below, breed cattle, raise their poor breadstuffs and a few vegetables, and hunt but little. Were it not for the tribal wars, they would seldom suffer for food, although local famines from drought do occur. Like the negroes farther down the Nile, they are, too, a simple and happy people, only asking to be let alone. They want nothing that our civilization can give them except bright beads and wire. Therefore, to establish relations of trade with them is not easy.

I began by promising to give you somewhat accurate notions of certain limited regions. I find that I have been able to skim but hastily over even the area to which I have confined myself.

I will conclude with a few words about that area as a missionary field. I need not tell you that the poor people are densely ignorant of Christianity, as they are of all religion. I need not tell you again that like all savages they make each other as miserable as they can with their poor knowledge of the art and means of war; or that the slave-traders and the Khedive’s troops are adding daily to their capacity in that way. I hardly need tell you that I believe them to be human beings whose happiness might be increased by teaching them peaceful industries and by inducing them to give up idleness and fighting. In short, there is no doubt that the condition of the people of Central Africa and the Soudan is deplorable, and there is a possibility that Christian missionaries might make it better. The question is how and where you can do the most with the means at your command. Probably the most can be done by working steadily up the Nile, and to moderate distances east and west of the water-way, with a base in the more healthful regions of the north, and a steamer to carry people back and forth. I believe it would be a mistake to plant an isolated mission anywhere south of the swamp region. The essential thing is to be able to take a man away as soon as you find that he can no longer resist the fevers, recruit him in the desert air, and then hurry him back before he and his people have forgotten each other. If you plant a colony in the heart of Africa and leave it for three years, at the end of that time there will probably not be a man of it living—almost certainly he will not be living and working there. But it will take an ordinary man at least three years to fit himself for really good work amongst a people whose language and ways are so new to him.

A valuable lesson may be drawn from the experiences of Gordon and Baker in the same country. Baker isolated himself in Unyoro, with no base and no line of communications. He was obliged to burn his baggage and retreat, with great courage and skill it is true, but with the absolute waste of his expedition. Gordon kept up fortnightly steamers to Khartoum, established his little garrisons step by step, and when he left the Provinces the power of the government was firmly fixed there.

The idea of the Roman Catholic mission is excellent so far as it goes. They have built comfortable houses at Khartoum and El Obeid; have established schools, gardens and hospitals; have a corps of people trained in Arabic and some of the negro dialects, and somewhat acclimated, and—there they stop and sit in their gardens. They are capital financiers, and their mission will not be apt to break up for want of money or recruits; but as a means of practical good in Africa, it is nearly worthless without a chief of heroic fibre.

The scheme that I should strongly advise is a sanitarium and school in the north, with your own steamer on the Nile; a mission near the Sobat; and if the White Nile is found to keep open, another at the head of navigation. In the course of years such a scheme would probably make a mark in the countries it reached; but to succeed it must have at its head a man of courage and brains, a man of sleepless energy, a man hungry and thirsty for work, and he must be a diplomat as well, for he will be terribly worried on all sides. I have suggested a point near the Sobat for a mission, because at that point relations could be established with some of the largest tribes—the Shillooks, Dinkas and Nouers—and because it is the last point at which a colony could be planted north of the great swamp basin. A colony south of that is liable to be cut off for months and even years, by the formation of the “sud” or grass barrier in the Nile. Undoubtedly the Sobat region is inferior in land and climate to the high lands south of Gondokoro; but, as I have pointed out, to isolate your mission so that it cannot be rapidly recruited and supplied will be fatal. Of this I am positive. When you find that the Soudan authorities are sure or even likely to keep communications open up the Nile, _then_ a mission should be sent up to Gondokoro or farther south. All the dangers in and obstacles to this noble work should be measured and faced, and the work so organized that a real retreat need never be made. True progress must be very slow, and you must not look for quick results. When you have done your best you must not be disappointed if you seem to have done very little. To plant a mission on a solid foundation, with the right chief at its head and the right material at his hand, will be a great work.

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THE INDIANS.

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REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE.

Your Committee on work for the Indians recognize with gratitude the greatly increased general interest in the welfare of the red race, a change to more encouraging ideas in respect to its future, and a disposition to make increased efforts for its redemption.

They point to the fact that to Christianize the aborigines was a deep-seated purpose of the Pilgrim Fathers, and that the duty is greater now than ever from the wrongs they have suffered at our hands; and to the fact that the destruction of buffalo and other game has compelled a large class of Indians to seek white men’s means of support, thus bringing thousands of their children within reach, and creating conditions of successful evangelizing work among them far more favorable than they have ever been in the past three centuries.

They urge action because civilization is rapidly surrounding them; many tribes are increasing in numbers, and the alternative is either Christian education or a terrible, bloody, costly struggle with a powerful race. Education or extermination is the issue. They point to the success already achieved in Indian education at Fort Berthold, Lake Superior and S’kokomish Agencies, by the American Missionary Association; to the grand results of missionary effort during the past forty years at the West; and to the hopeful work at Carlisle and at Hampton, as affording every encouragement.

They recognize the great need of legislation that shall encourage citizenship among the Indians and afford means of attaining the conditions of citizenship.

Your Committee would therefore recommend for adoption the following resolutions:

Res. I. That the Association shall do all in its power for the education of Indian youth at their own homes, and in its colored schools at the South.

Res. II. That the Executive Committee of this Association be charged with the duty of pressing upon the general public and the Government their responsibility for the Indian race, and by co-operation with other societies, and by direct effort, exert its influence at the seat of government in behalf of legislation that shall secure citizenship to the Indian; to that end a legal status and education to fit him for it.

S. C. ARMSTRONG, _Chairman_.

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ADDRESS OF GEN. S. C. ARMSTRONG

The Indian question is this: education in its broadest sense or extermination. But at least one white man must fall for every Indian who is shot, and it takes as much money to kill one red man as it would to train a hundred of their children in civilized ways. To educate is economy.

Fifty thousand Indians receive every day from the Government a pound and a half of fresh beef, with flour and coffee and sugar and tobacco to match, and a fair outfit for all purposes of decent living and good farming, and the number will increase. An agency warehouse is a huge store filled with utensils of every kind, from which the ex-warrior draws gratuitously at the agent’s discretion. There is no treatment like this in any other country on the globe—a stupendous wholesale charity to a people, of whom a large portion are thus hired to keep the peace.

When first fed they are modest and satisfied, gradually they get importunate, and finally become most grievous beggars. There is an unevenness of treatment in this matter, based chiefly on the varying difficulties of settlement; the strong and wicked Sioux getting the maximum in return for their good behavior. The quiet and thrifty Fort Berthold Indians, who are doing as much, if not more _per capita_ than any others, complain; for Indians visit much and discuss things; they have not yet discovered that virtue is its own reward.

Yet I have seen and heard of agencies where, notwithstanding gratuities, there has been steady improvement in houses, crops and herds. Good management on the one hand and the good sense of the better class of Indians on the other hand, at certain points led to remarkable results; but a forward move along the whole line of the Indian population is not to be looked for till they shall have the same motives to industry that other men have and that all men need. Agencies, reservations and rationing are and long will be a necessity, lessening only as by wise use of public bounty, and by proper legislation and care, the Indians shall approach self-support and citizenship. The persistently indolent should not remain as they are now, unless the nation has pledged itself, by solemn treaty, to feed forever the savage who squats on his haunches and refuses to work.

First-class men, and no others, can settle the Indian question. The want of them is the bottom fact in our Indian troubles. Government pays the market price for good beef and sugar and tobacco, but will not pay for good men. There is only one answer to the question, “Can a superior man afford to be an Indian agent?” No! There are excellent Indian agents, thanks to their noble impulses, but Government should buy and not beg what it is bound to get. Salaries are from $900 to $2,200, depending principally upon the number of Indians under the agent’s care. Hence, the more liberally he feeds, the more the roving bands of the plains seek his care and swell his income. Pressing self-support upon them may scatter them and lessen his salary.

Congress will appropriate hundreds of thousands of dollars to feed Indians, millions to fight them, but will not give the nominal additional sum necessary to induce men who can make a living in any other way to become Indian agents. We tell the Indians to take the white man’s road and refuse to open it. He needs ideas; he is capable of citizenship, but is unfit to hold lands or manage property till he can read and write, and knows something of our language.

Of the forty thousand wild children of the plains who are looking to the nation for education, not over eight thousand are enrolled at school. The average is far less. We are rich and paying all our debts but those to the illiterate of the land, whose ignorance is not their fault. The little children will one day lead. Honor and interest demand a care for their welfare. The point of sending children to Carlisle and Hampton should not be that they may learn trades so much as to acquire our language and habits, and see and comprehend civilization—a temporary sojourn away from their people, that all interested in them declare to be most desirable. Settling Indians on homesteads, encouraging mechanic arts, agriculture, and especially cattle-raising, for which this race is peculiarly adapted, and has, at the beginning, in its fitness for it, an advantage over white men, turns more than anything else on the wisdom, skill and perseverance of the agent.

It should be said that there has been for the past ten years a steady improvement in the morals of the agencies, the ideas and habits of Indians, and in the character and efficiency of Government employees. The chief who once said, “We can’t eat schools and teachers, and don’t want them,” and afterward sent his son to Hampton, illustrates the change in Indian thought that is steadily going on. Progressive Indians have suffered persecutions. To abandon the dance, put away wild costumes, and rub the paint off his face, has cost many an Indian suffering and loss. The “white man way” is not even more fashionable or comfortable, ridicule being one penalty, which, to an Indian is hard to bear.

The quiet missionary work done for the red race during the past forty years is the seed sowing, of which it and the nation will reap a harvest of good results. The Indian is a worshiper; “the blue sky and high bluffs are their church edifice, the medicine man being their minister.” With selfishness and vindictiveness running through their religion, it contains a recognition of one God, a Spirit which may be readily expounded by Christian teaching into an adequate conception of the true God. No heathen in the world offer so little to obstruct and so much to encourage the work of the missionary. Four years’ experience at Hampton has shown them to be remarkably open to truth, and not to be in any marked degree revengeful. They are like other people, their special weakness being physical. Christians of America have a duty to the Indian that they have not done. Their work in the West should be doubled at once. United effort by the great religious societies would do much for the welfare of this race, through persistent pressure upon Congress for a proper legal status.

In citizenship is the salvation of the Indian; wardship tends to emasculate him. The effect of the ballot would be to make a man of him as it did of the negro. To be brought out of his present condition into fitness to vote is a work of the utmost delicacy and difficulty, but it can be done. They are not dying out—at any rate, the 50,000 Sioux are not. Twenty-eight Sioux Indian youth, who had spent three years at Hampton, have just been returned to their Dakota home. Of these young men six are farmers and assist in general work, getting from fifteen to twenty dollars per month; two are employed in offices at the same wages; six are teachers, getting twenty dollars a month; two are blacksmiths, two are shoemakers, and seven are carpenters, getting a dollar a day apiece; all have rations besides. All refused to go to camp life, and have been provided by the Government agents with separate buildings, which they have cleaned and fitted up as best they could. The Indian Department has seconded their efforts very heartily. The next twelve months will decide their success. Their course will be watched with interest, as a test of the methods at Carlisle and Hampton schools, and indeed of the Indian’s ability to make good use of our education.

The “General Survey” for the year suggests suitable accommodations for Indians in some other of our institutions. This would be wise. The 370 negro youth at Hampton are a wonderful help to their 90 Indian schoolmates both directly and indirectly. The mingling of the races has proved a success, reacting happily on both. Increase the good work of your institutions and they will grow in favor with God and man.

* * * * *

FROM ADDRESS OF CAPT. R. H. PRATT.

Last summer, at Carlisle, during the vacation period, we put out in good families among the farmers, 109 of our children. They all came back (except 29 who are to stay during the winter) immensely advantaged by it, speaking better English, with the Indian diffidence rooted out to a degree that it would have been impossible for us to have accomplished in the same time even at Carlisle, which, from its advantages of contact with civilization, is immensely superior to any agency school. But we went farther. We found that the boys and girls had made such good impressions among the citizens that many desired them to stay, and so the Department was asked to allow a few to remain out for the winter, and go to the public schools with the white children and live in families. The Department gave its consent provided it would cost nothing. So arrangements were made, and we have out for this winter six girls and twenty-three boys.

To make the completest success of Eastern education for the Indians, I would use Carlisle as a sort of cleanser, a bath-tub or something of that kind, where we could wash them, clean them up, get a little understanding of our ways into them, and some understanding of English, and then scatter them out over the country to come in contact with our life. In that way they would learn best how to become citizens of the United States.

But we can rest it here. Whenever Congress gets ready to educate the Indian children as a whole, it will be no difficult matter to determine upon the best methods. Three to five thousand scattered around through the East would still leave forty-five to forty-seven thousand for the agency schools to work upon. That number in schools through the East, just as your Association proposes, sending them into your mission schools, where they may learn right from our life by comparison with theirs, by daily contact, will be found to be the most rapid plan. Make them work, and do not forget to make them fill their places, which they will gladly do when they find they must.

* * * * *

THE CHINESE.

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REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE.

Although in the Report of your Committee very brief mention is made of the work among the Chinese of this country, it is not therefore to be inferred that that work is being neglected, nor that it is failing in the ends for which it was undertaken. Rather is there a deepened conviction of its importance and increased encouragement in the prosecution of it; but in estimating the importance of the work we are not to consider alone the Chinese in this country, though they are a body of men of sufficient number to call for all, and more than all, that has been done for them. But we look beyond the 75,000 Chinese in California to the 400,000,000 in their own land. The Christian world through their missionaries, and by personal intercourse, are coming to understand this people better than they once did. Instead of the race of barbarians, stupid and immovable, which they were once thought to be, those who are well-informed accept the assertion of the Rev. John Ross, who says, “They are beyond comparison the most intelligent of non-Christian peoples; if any race surpasses them in industry, it is only the Anglo-Saxon.” * * * * *

But how is the Christian church to have a part in remodeling the institutions and customs of that vast nation? Not by any one method alone, but one of those which Providence has opened, is doubtless to be through the agency of Chinamen converted here and returning to their homes to preach the Gospel to their countrymen. It cannot be questioned that there will be a place and need for those trained under the institutions of the Gospel to go to China and plant the same institutions there; yet the converted Chinamen can do some things and exert an influence in some directions not open to others.

The career of Yung Wing furnishes a striking illustration of this. Of humble parentage, converted while at school in this country, he conceived the plan of bringing Chinese youth of promise to this country to be educated. He returned to China in 1855, without money, without influential friends, having almost forgotten his own language. For sixteen years he studied, taught, served the government, worked his way upward, and won to his views officers high in authority. In 1871 his plan was adopted by the government, $1,500,000 placed at his disposal, and more than 100 selected Chinese youth were brought to this country. Though his experiment has now received a check, and perhaps will not be carried on further, even its success so far is a standing proof of influence exerted by a Christianized native such as no other could hope to exert. And not only so, it has by no means been a failure even in itself considered. The young men who have gone back to China from our colleges and schools and Christian families have gone back far other than they came.

It is even a question whether they may not be more to be feared by the Chinese government as revolutionists than as though they had returned thoroughly converted Christians. But all will have received new ideas. Even those who have been chased through the streets by the hoodlums of San Francisco have learned some new ideas. They can distinguish between a Christian and a politician and know who are their friends and what makes them so.

If in a generation we could send back to China a score of Yung Wings we should do more for the conversion of China than by any other method open to us.

The Report speaks of a plan for establishing a new mission in Southern China as being under consideration. To your Committee it would seem the part of wisdom to move slowly in this matter so long as the present facilities are offered for labor in this country, especially as it is uncertain how long these facilities may continue to be enjoyed.

Thirty different Mission Boards are already occupying points in China, and though their 1200 laborers are wholly inadequate for the work of evangelizing China, yet they furnish in their various stations, points from which laborers may go out, so that the call would seem to be for men to recruit the missions already established, rather than for forming new ones. Especially will a separate movement of this kind be unnecessary if the converted Chinese of this country are able to carry out their purpose of establishing a mission of their own in the country back of Canton. The very fact that they are entertaining such an idea, and earnestly pressing it, speaks volumes for the work which this Society has already accomplished, and opens a glorious vista for its ever expanding career in the future.

Your Committee would propose the following resolution:

_Resolved_, That in view of the small demands made upon the treasury of the A. M. A. by the work among the Chinese, and the great returns which that work promises, the constituency of this Society are under the most solemn obligations to furnish for this branch of its work all the means that can be employed consistently with a wise economy and with due regard for the encouragement of self-help by the converted Chinese themselves.—_Rev. A. E. P. Perkins, Chairman._

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THE CHINESE TO EVANGELIZE CHINA.

BY REV. C. H. POPE

Great good has been done in China by missionaries, but against what odds! Now in the free United States, the country whose government has been his nation’s _most_ generous friend, and whose people have shown him most personal attention, the Chinaman can examine Christians with a criticism no less keen, but far surer to be correct. He has had no difficulty in seeing the difference between a “hoodlum” and a Sunday-school teacher. He has even been able to distinguish one reverend from another, and neither trusted “brother” Kalloch nor distrusted “brother” Pond. The international lesson he here learns as he could not at his home—that a line between the children of light and the children of darkness runs through many families, through all communities.

Now let him go back to China, _if he must—that is, if he will!_ He goes tenfold more potent than any of us to find the way to his countrymen’s hearts. I once doubted Chinese interpreters of our teaching and preaching. On examination I came to believe that the English language is the best medium for us to tell the Gospel in—a language born of Christian civilization, enlarged by Christian teaching, ornamented by Christian poetry, matured by the translation of the Bible, developed in Christian education, carrying in its common phrases less of grossness or corruption, and more of plain goodness, than any other tongue. In the day and evening schools, and in the Sunday-schools and prayer meetings which this Association maintains, the Chinese interpreter plays a prominent part only for a short time. Soon he becomes little needed; the pupils rapidly gain knowledge of our words: from step to step they catch gleams of new ideas and find new words not numerous in comparison with their language, but wonderfully clear and helpful. Daily observation is their best interpreter; the winning tones of ladies and children gain their ear and reach their perception easily; they get broad, practical ideas of Christianity; and they can be trusted to preach the Gospel in Chinese to Chinese. No process has ever gone so healthfully and hopefully into the Mongolian heart.

We are not concerned to explain the presence of any race in our land, nor can we parley over the motives which brought them to it. Enough for us to see that these Sauls of Tarsus come into the “straight” way before they _leave_ Damascus; and that when their eyes have been opened, and our forgiving Saviour has accepted them, we call them “brethren,” and kindly protect them from enemies. Enough for us to train them in all Christian truth and service, until they and we together get an adequate notion of the part they are fitted to take in their nation’s conversion. Then, unless our sister society, the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, shall take them into the far-off field for that grand work, we must formally equip and send them; for the Holy Ghost has said, “Separate me Paul and Barnabas for the work whereunto I have called them.”

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REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON FINANCE.

Your Committee on Finance beg leave to report that they have examined the accounts and have found them duly audited. Attached to the auditor’s report there is a statement that all the funds which represent permanent property of the Society have also been examined, and everything is found in order. There is a balance in the treasury, Sept. 30th, 1881, of $518.80. The management asked last year for an increase of 25 per cent. in the contributions; the churches gave them an increase of 30 per cent. During the year there have been large improvements made, and some enlargements of the different educational institutions, so that they are now able to accommodate a much greater number of students than before; and if that opportunity is to be embraced, and these students who are clamoring for an education are to be instructed, it will require a larger outlay of money than that of the preceding year.

On the basis of the heartiness with which the churches complied with the request of last year, your Committee recommend that the management ask of the churches this year a little more still; and that, as against the $246,000 last year, the endeavor shall be made to raise $300,000 the present year.

The Committee desire reference to be made to some departments of the work where the need is special, notably the Chinese work, where there is ample room for a hundred-fold more of service. The Indian work also claims a special contribution, and the work among the Africans is always enlarging more and more.

I am requested to call attention also, in this informal way, to two provisions of the by-laws, that you may understand how financially secure this Society is, and how well-nigh impossible it is that there should, in any event, be any loss of its funds, or that they should be diverted from the use to which they are devoted.

On the sixth page of the report, concerning the Committee on Finance, it says:

It shall be the duty of the Committee on Finance to examine the
accounts of the Treasurer for the month preceding each regular
meeting of the Executive Committee, before such meeting, taking
the books of account kept by him, and comparing them with
his statement of the month’s receipts and disbursements and
with the vouchers, and to certify to the correctness of such
statement when approved by them. They shall also cause to be
kept a book, wherein shall be set forth in detail, (1,) all
stocks and bonds owned by the Association at par, with a note
of the original cost of the same to the Association; (2,) all
real estate (both land and buildings) and other property of
the Association, with the full cost of the same; and (3,) all
property held on special deposit or in trust. This book shall
be at all times open to the inspection of the members of the
Executive Committee, and the record shall be so added to and
amended, from time to time, under the direction of the Finance
Committee, as to show at all times a correct statement of the
property of the Association, and of any special trusts in its
hands.

The Committee desire to say on this point that they doubt whether any other benevolent organization can show a more careful guarding of the munificence of the churches; and on the basis of increased want and of larger opportunities and perfect safety, they ask that the churches this year put into the hands of the management the sum of $300,000.—_E. S. Atwood, Chairman._

* * * * *

FROM THE ADDRESS OF REV. GEO. F. STANTON.

* * * It seems to me, sir, that, looking back over the days that we have been gathered here, we have been lifted up, and I seem to see to-day the prophecy of a grand increase and acquisition of interest and helpfulness for this work. We have been inspired by these grand addresses; we have been thrilled by them; we have been, as it were, lifted above our ordinary thought and feeling; and the work stretches before us in grand and inspiring invitations. But what, sir, shall be the return we are to make for all we have here enjoyed? What is to be the result of all this inspiration and uplifting? What is to be the outcome of this anniversary? If we are to go away simply rejoicing that we have been so richly blessed in this fellowship and instruction, if we are to go away feeling simply glad and grateful, have we met the claims of the hour?

I remember the story of a brother in the African Methodist church, who, whenever the contribution box was passed, was accustomed to shut his eyes and throw his head back and join in with all his zeal and all his lungs in singing the song which was usually sung on that occasion, “Fly abroad, thou mighty Gospel.” This went on for several contributions, and then the deacon who passed the box thought he detected an error in all that praising and singing, and so he punched the brother quite pointedly with the box and said, “Just you give something to make it fly!” If we merely have the inspiration of this hour and it does not culminate in enlarged gifts for the work, if there is not a vast enlargement of the work upon the hands of this Association, this meeting will have been a failure. It is to redeem it from that failure that this report and these calls are now made.

You remember how it was when the war closed—you remember what an inspiration swept over the land, and what enthusiasm there was at the very mention of the freed slave. You remember how many associations and philanthropic societies, and even the Government itself, were enlisted in the work, and how their appeals thrilled the multitudes. The picture held before us then was that of a slave, from whose cramped limbs the broken manacles were falling. We were enthusiastic then. But to-day the same picture of the freed and suffering slave, and the same appeals, though with all the worth they had in them then, are to us only the embellishments of rhetoric. They have lost their force, and I am surprised at this when I look upon the vastness of the work; for, with all these years of our labor, the work has outgrown and overmatched our efforts, and the demands upon us to-day are greater than at the first. Every appeal made to justice then is as strong to-day; every appeal made to philanthropy then is of equal force to-day; every appeal to our enthusiasm then has in it just as much of power, even if it is not felt, to-day.

* * * * *

VOTE OF THANKS.

Resolved, that the hearty thanks of this Association be extended to the pastors and members of the Congregational churches, and to the people of Worcester, for their cordial welcome and generous hospitality to the many attendants on this the thirty-fifth annual meeting; in particular to the Plymouth Church and Society for the use of this elegant house of worship and the convenient rooms connected with it, and to the pastor, Rev. George W. Phillips, for his many courteous attentions. This Association also desires to express its sincere thanks to the large choir, for its aid in the service of song; to the press, for its full reports of the exercises, and for the liberality of the railroads which have reduced the rates of fare over their lines. While deeply grateful to the various Committees for their great work in making and executing wise plans for this large gathering, it wishes to recognize specially the efficient services of the Rev. Chas. W. Lamson and Samuel R. Heywood, Esq., whose wisdom and executive ability have greatly contributed to the success of this meeting.

Rev. Geo. W. Phillips, pastor of the church in which the meetings were held, responded to this resolution in a very felicitous speech. Among other things he said:

It is evident from the numbers which have been entertained here, it is evident from the interest which has prevailed in all these assemblies, that this cause, represented by the American Missionary Association, has taken its place already fairly side by side with all the other great missionary organizations and operations that are under the patronage and direction of our churches. The Worcester which you visit at this present time is not the Worcester that was here when this Society was organized. It is not the city that it was when this Association held its meeting here something like a score of years ago. From scarcely more than thirty thousand it has grown to be a city of more than sixty thousand people; and side by side with its growth in population we are happy to assure you—and I think you have seen some visible evidence of it—that we have kept pace with our Christianity, with our church extension.

The best meetings on earth, all meetings on earth, must have their end; and we are come to the last hour of the last great day of this American Missionary Association feast. We say our good-byes; we go hence, each to his church, his community, his home. We shall not all of us meet on earth again; but it is grateful to think that by and by there is to be another meeting—a meeting in which we shall no more plan for the salvation and for the moral purification of this lost world, in which we shall no more seek to bring men to acknowledge Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour, because those great words shall have been realized, “Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

* * * * *

ECHOES OF THE ANNUAL MEETING.

_Dr. Hartranft’s Sermon._—“Christ stood not for any one race, but for every race and every nationality, and whenever we take this cup we pledge ourselves to put aside all barriers of race, all barriers of nationality.”

_Capt. Pratt._—“If you wish Indians to live like citizens, you must let them see how citizens live, must put them for a time in well-bred communities. The kind of citizens that make free use of the revolver, they know too much of.”

“I have seen a Western village with eighty-four graves in the grave-yard, and only one man died a natural death.”

_Dr. Brastow._—“Diogenes with his lantern has been 250 years hunting among the blacks for a man. Let this Association do its work in one-fifth of that time, and Diogenes will put out his lantern and find his man without it.”

_Prof. Cyrus Northrop._—“Your uneducated bad man can be no worse than a brute. Your educated bad man is a demon. Hence, the education we give the colored man must be Christian.”

“Votes are the impulses that every man gives to the ship of state in the direction of safety or of danger.”