Chapter II: Part 2

That there is already Settled in the bounds of the aforedescribed
Tract near forty familys and many more ready to come on were it not
for the difficulties and hardships afores'd of getting to meeting.
These with many other disadvantages We find very troublesome to Us,
Our living so remote from the Towns We respectively belong to.

Wherefore your Petitioners most humbly pray Your Excellency and
Honours would take the premises into your Consideration and make an
Act for the Erecting the aforesaid Lands into a Seperate and
distinct Township with the powers priviledges and Immunities of a
distinct and Seperate Township under such restrictions and
Limitations, as you in your Great Wisdom shall see meet.

And Whereas it will be a great benefit and Advantage to the Non
resident proprietors owning Lands there by Increasing the Value of
their Lands or rendering easy Settleing the same, Your Pet'rs also
pray that they may be at their proportionable part according to
their respective Interest in Lands there, for the building a
Meeting-house and Settling a Minister, and so much towards Constant
preaching as in your wisdom shall be thought proper.

Settlers on the afore'sd Lands

Obadiah Parker Will'm Colburn
Josiah Blood Stephen Harris
Jerahmal Cumings Tho's Dinsmoor
Eben'r Pearce Peter Pawer
Abr'm Taylor Jun'r Benj'a Farley
Henry Barton Peter Wheeler
Robert Colburn David Vering
Philip Woolerick Nath'l Blood
William Adams Joseph Taylor
Moses Procter Will'm Shattuck
Tho's Navins

Non Resident Proprietors

Samuel Browne W Browne
Joseph Blanchard John Fowle Jun'r
Nath Saltonstall Joseph Eaton
Joseph Lemmon Jeremiah Baldwin
Sam'l Baldwin Daniel Remant
John Malven Jon'a Malven
James Cumings Isaac Farwell
Eben'r Procter

In the House of Representatives Dec'r 12th. 1738. Read and Ordered
that the Petitioners Serve the Towns of Grotton and Dunstable with
Coppys of the petition.

In Council January 4'th. 1738.

Read again and Ordered that the further Consideration of this
Petition be referred to the first tuesday of the next May Session
and that James Minot and John Hobson Esq'rs with Such as the
Honourable Board shall joine be a Committee at the Charge of the
Petitioners to repair to the Lands petitioned for to be Erected
into a Township first giving Seasonable notice as well to the
petitioners as to the Inhabitants and Non Resident Proprietors of
Lands within the s'd Towns of Dunstable and Groton of the time of
their going by Causing the same to be publish'd in the Boston
Gazette, that they carefully View the s'd Lands as well as the
other parts of the s'd Towns, so farr as may be desired by the
Partys or thought proper, that the Petitioners and all others
Concerned be fully heard in their pleas and Allegations for, as
well as against the prayer of the Petition; and that upon Mature
Consideration on the whole the Committee then report what in their
Opinion may be proper for the Court to do in Answer there to Sent
up for Concurrence.

J QUINCY Sp'kr.

In Council Jan'ry 9'th. 1738

Read and Concurred and Thomas Berry Esq'r is joined in the Affair

SIMON FROST Dep'ty. Sec'ry.

Consented to

J. BELCHER

A true Copy Exam'd per Simon Frost, Dep'y Sec'ry.

In the House of Rep'tives June 7'th: 1739

Read and Concurred

J QUINCY Sp'kr;

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 268-271.]

The Committee Appointed on the Petition of the Inhabitants and
Proprietors situated on the Westerly side of Dunstable and
Northerly side of Groton, Having after Notifying all parties,
Repaired to the Lands, Petitioned to be Erected into a Township,
Carefully Viewed the same, Find a very Good Tract of Land in
Dunstable Westward of Nashuway River between s'd River and Souhegan
River Extending from Groton New Grant and Townsend Line Six Miles
East, lying in a very Commodious Form for a Township, and on said
Lands there now is about Twenty Families, and many more settling,
that none of the Inhabitants live nearer to a Meeting House then
Seven miles and if they go to their own Town have to pass over a
ferry the greatest part of the Year. We also Find in Groton a
sufficient Quantity of Land accommodable for settlement, and a
considerable Number of Inhabitants thereon, that in Some Short Time
when they are well Agreed may be Erected into a Distinct Parish;
And that it will be very Form prayed for or to Break in upon
Either Town. The Committee are of Opinion that the Petitioners in
Dunstable are under such Circumstances as necessitates them to Ask
Relief which will be fully Obtained by their being made Township,
which if this Hon'ble. Court should Judge necessary to be done; The
Committee are Further of Opinion that it Will be greatly for the
Good and Interest of the Township that the Non Resident
Proprietors, have Liberty of Voting with the Inhabitants as to the
Building and Placing a Meeting House and that the Lands be Equally
Taxed, towards said House And that for the Support of the Gosple
Ministry among them the Lands of the Non Resident Proprietors be
Taxed at Two pence per Acre for the Space of Five Years.

All which is Humbly Submitted in the Name & by Order of the
Committee

THOMAS BERRY

In Council July 7 1739

Read and ordered that the further Consideration of this Report be
referred to the next Sitting, and that the Petitioners be in the
meantime freed from paying any thing toward the support of the
ministry in the Towns to which they respectively belong

Sent down for Concurrence

J WlLLARD Sec'ry

In the House of Rep'tives June 7: 1739 Read and Concurred

J QUINCY Sp'kr:

Consented to

J BELCHER

In Council Decem'r 27, 1739.

Read again and Ordered that this Report be so far accepted as that
the Lands mentioned and described therein, with the Inhabitants
there be erected into a Separate & distinct precinct, and the Said
Inhabitants are hereby vested with all Such Powers and Priviledges
that any other Precinct in this Province have or by Law ought to
enjoy and they are also impowered to assess & levy a Tax of Two
pence per Acre per Annum for the Space of Five years on all the
unimproved Lands belonging to the non residents Proprietors to be
applied for the Support of the Ministry according to the Said
Report.

Sent down for Concurrence

SIMON FROST Dep'y Sec'ry

In the House of Rep'tives Dec 28. 1739 Read and Concur'd.

J QUINCY Sp'kr:

Janu'. 1: Consented to,

J BELCHER

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 272, 273.]

While this petition was before the General Court, another one was presented praying for a new township to be made up from the same towns, but including a larger portion of Groton than was asked for in the first petition. This application met with bitter opposition on the part of both places, but it may have hastened the final action on the first petition. It resulted in setting off a precinct from Dunstable, under the name of the West Parish, which is now known as Hollis, New Hampshire. The papers relating to the second petition are as follows:--

To His Excellency Jonathan Belcher Esquire Captain General and
Governor in Chief in and over His Majesty's Province of the
Massachusetts Bay in New England, the Honourable the Council and
House of Representatives of said Province, in General Court
Assembled Dec. 12'th, 1739.

The Petition of Richard Warner and Others, Inhabitants of the Towns
of Groton and Dunstable.

Most Humbly Sheweth

That Your Petitioners dwell very far from the place of Public
Worship in either of the said Towns, Many of them Eight Miles
distant, some more, and none less than four miles, Whereby Your
Petitioners are put to great difficulties in Travelling on the
Lord's Days, with our Families.

Your Petitioners therefore Humbly Pray Your Excellency and Honours
to take their circumstances into your Wise and Compassionate
Consideration, And that a part of the Town of Groton, Beginning at
the line between Groton and Dunstable where inconvenient to Erect a
Township in the it crosses Lancaster [Nashua] River, and so up the
said River until it comes to a Place called and Known by the name
of Joseph Blood's Ford Way on said River, thence a West Point 'till
it comes to Townshend line &c. With such a part and so much of the
Town of Dunstable as this Honourable Court in their great Wisdom
shall think proper, with the Inhabitants Thereon, may be Erected
into a separate and distinct Township, that so they may attend the
Public Worship of God with more ease than at present they can, by
reason of the great distance they live from the Places thereof as
aforesaid.

And Your Petitioners, as in Duty bound, shall ever Pray &c.

Richard Warner
Benjamin Swallow
William Allin
Isaac Williams
Ebenezer Gilson
Ebenezer Peirce
Samuel Fisk
John Green
Josiah Tucker
Zachariah Lawrence Jun'r
William Blood
Jeremiah Lawrence
Stephen Eames

"[Inhabitants of Groton]"

Enoch Hunt
Eleazer Flegg
Samuel Cumings
William Blanchard
Gideon Howe
Josiah Blood
Samuel Parke
Samuel Farle
William Adams
Philip Wolrich

"[Inhabitants of Dunstable]"

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 274, 273.]

Province of the Massachusetts Bay

To His Excellency The Governour The Hon'ble Council & House of
Rep'tives in Generall Court Assembled Dec'r 1739

The Answer of y'e Subscribers agents for the Town of Groton to y'e
Petition of Richard Warner & others praying that part of Said Town
with part of Dunstable may be Erected into a Distinct & Seperate
Township.

May it please your Excellency & Hon'rs

The Town of Groton Duely Assembled and Taking into Consideration
y'e Reasonableness of said Petition have Voted their Willingness,
That the prayer of y'e Petition be Granted as per their Vote
herewith humbly presented appears, with this alteration namely That
they Include the River (viz't Nashua River) over w'ch is a Bridge,
built Intirely to accommodate said Petitioners heretofore, & your
Respondents therefore apprehend it is but Just & Reasonable the
same should for the future be by them maintain'd if they are Set of
from us.

Your Respondents Pursuant to y'e Vote Aforesaid, humbly move to
your Excellency & Hon'rs That no more of Dunstable be Laid to
Groton Then Groton have voted of, for one Great Reason that Induced
Sundry of y'e Inhabitants of Groton to come into Said Vote was This
Namely They owning a very Considerable part of the Lands Voted to
be set of as afores'd were willing to Condesent to y'e Desires of
their Neighbours apprehending that a meeting House being Erected on
or near y'e Groton Lands & a minister settled it would Raise their
Lands in Vallue but should considerable part of Dunstable be set of
more then of Groton it must of course draw the Meeting House
farther from y'e Groton Inhabitants which would be very hurtfull
both to the people petitioners & those that will be Non Resident
proprietors if the Township is made.

Wherefore they pray That Said New Township may be Incorporated
Agreeable to Groton Vote viz't Made Equally out of both Towns & as
in Duty bound Shall Ever pray

Nat'ell Sartell
William Lawrence

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 378, 279.]

At A Legall town Meeting of the Inhabitants & free holders of the
town of Groton assembled December y'e 24th: 1739 Voted & Chose
Cap't William Lawrance Madderator for said meeting &c:

In Answer to the Petion of Richard Warnor & others Voted that the
land with the Inhabitance mentioned in said Petion Including the
Riuer from Dunstable Line to o'r. ford way Called and Known by y'e.
Name of Joseph Bloods ford way: be Set of from the town of Groton
to Joyn with sum of the westerdly Part of the town of Dunstable to
make a Distinct and Sepprate town Ship Prouided that their be no:
More taken from Dunstable then from Groton in making of Said new
town. Also Voted that Nathaniel Sawtell Esq'r. and Cap't. William
Lawrance be Agiants In the affair or Either of them to wait upon
the Great and Generial. Cort: to Vse their Best in Deauer to set
off the Land as a fores'd so that the one half of y'e said New town
may be made out of Groton and no: more.

Abstract Examined & Compaird of the town book of Record for Groton
per

Iona't. Sheple Town Clark

Groton Decem'br: 24'th: A:D: 1739

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 281.]

Province of y'e Mass'tts Bay

To His Excellency Jonathan Belcher Esq'r Governour &c To The Hon'd.
His Majesty's Councill & House of Representatives in Gen'll Court
Assembled December 1739

Whereas some few of the Inhabitants of Groton & Dunstable have
Joyned in their Petition to this Hon'd. Court to be erected with
Certain Lands into a Township as per their Petition entered the
12'th: Curr. which prayer if granted will very much Effect y'e.
Quiet & Interest of the Inhabitants on the northerly part of Groton

Wherefore the Subscribers most Humbly begg leave To Remonstrate to
y'or Excellency & Hon'rs. the great & Numerous Damages that we and
many Others Shall Sustain if their Petition should be granted and
would Humbly Shew

That the Contents of Groton is ab't. forty Thousand Acres Good Land
Sufficient & happily Situated for Two Townships, and have on or
near Two Hundred & Sixty Familys Setled there with Large
Accomodations for many more

That the land pray'd for Out of Groton Could it be Spared is in a
very Incomodious place, & will render a Division of the remaining
part of the town Impracticable & no ways Shorten the travel of the
remotest Inhabit'nts.

That it will leave the town from the northeast and to the Southwest
end at least fourteen miles and no possibillity for those ends to
be Accomodated at any Other place which will render the
Difficulties we have long Laboured under without Remidy

That part of the lands Petitioned for (will when This Hon'd. Court
shall see meet to Divide us) be in & near the Middle of one of y'e.
Townships

And Althô the number of thirteen persons is there Sett forth to
Petition. it is wrong and Delusive Severall of them gave no Consent
to any Such thing And to compleat their Guile have entered the
names of four persons who has no Interest in that part of the town
viz Swallow Tucker Ames & Green

That there is near Double the number On the Lands Petit'd. for and
Setled amongst them who Declare Against their Proceedings, & here
Signifie the Same

That many of us now are at Least Seven miles from Our meeting And
the Only Encouragement to Settle there was the undeniable
Accomodations to make An Other town without w'ch. We Should by no
means have undertaken

That if this their Pet'n. Should Succed--Our hopes must
Perish--thay by no means benifitted--& we put to all the Hardships
Immaginable.

That the whole tract of Land thay pray may be Taken Out of groton
Contains about Six or Seven Thousand Acres, (the Quantity and
Situation may be Seen on y'e. plan herewith And but Ab't. four Or
five hundred Acres thereof Owned by the Petit'rs. and but very
Small Improvements On that. Under all w'ch. Circumstances wee
Humbly conceive it unreasonable for them to desire thus to Harrase
and perplex us. Nor is it by Any means for the Accomodation of
Dunstable thus to Joyn who have land of their Own Sufficient and
none to Spare without prejudicing their begun Settlement Wherefore
we most Humbly pray Y'or. Excellency & Hon'rs. to compassionate Our
Circumstances and that thay may not be set off and as in Duly bound
&c

Benj'a. Parker John Woods
Josiah Sartell Samuel Shattuck iu
Joseph Spoaldeng James Larwance
Juner Jonathan Shattuck
Nath'll. Parker James Shattuck
Jacob Lakin John Chambrlen
Thomas Fisk John Cumings
Isaac Lakin Henery Jefes
John Shattuck David Shattuck
John Scott Seth Phillips
Benj'n. Robines Samuel Wright
Isaac Woods John Swallow
Enoch larwance William Spoalding
John Blood Jonathan Woods
James Green Wiliam Cumings
Joseph Blood Nathaniel Lawrence iu

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 282-284.]

Wee the Sub'rs: Inhab'ts: of y'e Town of Dunstable & Resident in
that part of it Called Nissitisitt Do hereby authorize and Fully
Impower Abraham Taylor Jun'r. and Peter Power to Represent to
Gen'll. Court our unwillingness that any Part of Dunstable should
[be] sett off to Groton to make a Township or Parish and to Shew
forth our Earness Desire that a Township be maide intirely out out
[_sic_] off Dunstable Land, Extending Six mils North from Groton
Line which will Bring the on the Line on y'e Brake of Land and Just
Include the Present Setlers: or otherwise As y'e Ho'll. Commitee
Reported and Agreeable to the tenour thereoff as The Hon'rd Court
shall see meet and as Duly bound &c

Tho's: Dinmore, and 20 others.

Dunstable Dece'r; y'e 21'st; 1739

These may sertifie to y'e Hon'rd. Court that there is Nomber of
Eleven more y't has not signed this Nor y'e Petetion of Richard
Worner & others, that is now setled and About to setle

[Massachusetts Archives, cxiv, 277.]

* * * * *

TUBEROSES.

By LAURA GARLAND CARR.

In misty greenhouse aisles or garden walks,
In crowded halls or in the lonely room,
Where fair tuberoses, from their slender stalks,
Lade all the air with heavy, rich perfume,
My heart grows sick; my spirits sink like lead,--
The scene before me slips and fades away:
A small, still room uprising in its stead,
With softened light, and grief's dread, dark array.
Shrined in its midst, with folded hands, at rest,
Life's work all over ere 'twas well begun,
Lies a fair girl in snowy garments dressed,
And all the place with bud and bloom o'errun;
Pinks, roses, lilies, blend in odorous death,
But over all the tuberose sends its wealth,
Seeming to hold the lost one by its breath
While creeping o'er our living hearts in stealth.
O subtle blossoms, you are death's own flowers!
You have no part with love or festal hours.

* * * * *

YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATIONS.

BY RUSSELL STURGIS, JR.

There is an old French proverb which runs: "L'homme propose, et Dieu dispose," which is but the echo of the Scripture, "A man's heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps." In truth, God alone sees the end from the beginning.

From the beginning men have been constantly building better than they knew. No unprejudiced man who looks at history can fail to see from how small and apparently unimportant an event has sprung the greatest results to the individual, the nation, and the world. The Christian, at least, needs no other explanation of this than that his God, without whose knowledge no sparrow falleth to the ground, guides all the affairs of the world. Surely God did not make the world, and purchase the salvation of its tenants by the sacrifice of his Son, to take no further interest in it, but leave it subject either to fixed law or blind chance! Indeed the God who provided for the wants of his people in the wilderness is a God who changeth not. The principles which once guided him must guide him to-day and forever. There never has been a time when to the open eye it was not clear that he provides for every want of his creatures. Did chance or the unassisted powers of man discover coal, when wood was becoming scarce? and oil and gas from coal, when the whale was failing? Cowper's mind was clear when he said:--

"Deep in unfathomable mines
With never-failing skill,
He treasures up his bright designs,
And works his gracious will."

If in his temporal affairs God cares for man, much more will he do for his soul. Great multitudes of young men came to be congregated in the cities, and Satan spread his nets at every street-corner to entrap them.

In 1837, George Williams, then sixteen years of age, employed in a dry-goods establishment, in Bridgewater, England, gave himself to the service of the Lord Jesus Christ. He immediately began to influence the young men with him, and many of them were converted. In 1841, Williams came to London, and entered the dry-goods house of Hitchcock and Company. Here he found himself one of more than eighty young men, almost none of them Christians. He found, however, among them a few professed Christians, and these he gathered in his bedroom, to pray for the rest. The number increased--a larger room was necessary, which was readily obtained from Mr. Hitchcock. The work spread from one establishment to another, and on the sixth of June, 1844, in Mr. Williams's bedroom the first Young Men's Christian Association was formed.

In 1844, one association in the world: in November, 1851, one association in America, at Montreal; in December, one month after, with no knowledge on the part of either of the other's plan, one association in the United States, at Boston. Was it a mere hap that these two groups formed simultaneously the associations which were always to unite the young Christian men of the two countries, and to grow together, till to-day the little one has become a thousand?

Forty years ago, one little association in London: to-day Great Britain dotted all over with them; one hundred and ninety in England and Wales; one hundred and seventy-eight in Scotland, and twenty in Ireland. France has eight districts, or groups, containing sixty-four associations. Germany, divided into five _bunds_, has four hundred; Holland, its eleven provinces, with three hundred and thirty-five; Romansch Switzerland, eighty-seven; German Switzerland, one hundred and thirty-five; Belgium, eighteen; Spain, fourteen; Italy, ten Turkey in Europe, one, at Philippopolis; Sweden and Norway, seventy-one; Austria, two, at Vienna and Budapesth; Russia, eight, among them Moscow and St. Petersburg; Turkey in Asia, nine; Syria, five, at Beirût, Damascus, Jaffa, Jerusalem, and Nazareth; India, five; Japan, two; Sandwich Islands, one, at Honolulu; Australia, twenty-seven; South Africa, seven; Madagascar, two; West Indies, three; British Guiana, one, at Georgetown; South America (besides), three; Canada and British Provinces, fifty-one. In the United States, seven hundred and eighty-six.

In all, nearly twenty-seven hundred, scattered over the world, and all the outgrowth of forty years. It has been said that the sun never rises anywhere that it is not saluted by the British reveille. Look how quickly the organization of young men has stretched its cordon round the world, and dotted it all over with the tents of its conflict for them against the opposing forces of the evil one.

What are its characteristics?

1. It is the universal church of Christ, working through its young men for the salvation of young men. In the words of a paper, read at the last world's conference, at London:--

"The fundamental idea of the organization, on which all subsequent substantial development has been based, was simply this: that in the associated effort of young men connected with the various branches of the church of Christ lies a great power to promote their own development and help their fellows, thus prosecuting the work of the church among the most-important, most-tempted, and least-cared-for class in the community."

The distinct work for young men was thus emphasized at the Chicago convention in 1863, in the following resolutions presented by the Reverend Henry G. Potter, then of Troy, and now assistant bishop of the diocese of New York:--

"Resolved, That the interests and welfare of young men in our cities demand, as heretofore, the steadfast sympathies and efforts of the Young Men's Christian Associations of this country.

"Resolved, That the various means by which Christian associations can gain a hold upon young men, and preserve them from unhealthy companionship and the deteriorating influences of our large cities, ought to engage our most earnest and prayerful consideration."

2. It is a Christian work. It stands upon the basis of the faith of the church of all ages, which is thus set forth in the formula of this organization.

The convention in 1856 promptly accepted and ratified the Paris basis, adopted by the first world's conference of the associations, in the following language:--

"The Young Men's Christian Associations seek to unite those young men who, regarding Jesus Christ as their God and Saviour, according to the Holy Scriptures, desire to be his disciples in their doctrine and in their life, and to associate their efforts for the extension of his kingdom among young men."

This was reaffirmed in the convention of 1866 at Albany. In 1868, at the Detroit convention, was adopted what is known as the evangelical test, and at the Portland convention of 1869 the definition of the term evangelical; they are as follows:--

"As these associations bear the name of Christian, and profess to be engaged directly in the Saviour's service, so it is clearly their duty to maintain the control and management of all their affairs in the hands of those who love and publicly avow their faith in Jesus the Redeemer as divine, and who testify their faith by becoming and remaining members of churches held to be evangelical: and we hold those churches to be evangelical which, maintaining the Holy Scriptures to be the only infallible rule of faith and practice, do believe in the Lord Jesus Christ (the only begotten of the Father, King of kings and Lord of lords, in whom dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead, bodily, and who was made sin for us, though knowing no sin, bearing our sins in his own body on the tree) as the only name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved from everlasting punishment."

But while the management is thus rightly kept in the hands of those who stand together upon the platform of the church of Christ, the benefits and all other privileges are for all young men of good morals, whether Greek, Romanist, heretic, Jew, Moslem, heathen, or infidel. Its field, the world. Wherever there are young men, there is the association field, and an extended work must be organized. Already in August, 1855, the importance of the work made conference necessary, and thirty-five delegates met at Paris, of whom seven were from the United States, and the same number from Great Britain.

In 1858, a second conference was held at Geneva, with one hundred and fifty-eight delegates. In 1862, at London, were present ninety-seven delegates; in 1865, at Elberfeld, one hundred and forty; in 1867, at Paris, ninety-one; in 1872, at Amsterdam, one hundred and eighteen; in 1875, at Hamburg, one hundred and twenty-five; in 1878, at Geneva, two hundred and seven,--forty-one from the United States; in 1881, in London, three hundred and thirty-eight,--seventy-five from the United States.

At the conference of 1878, in Geneva, a man in the prime of life, and partner in a leading banking-house of that city, was chosen president. He spoke with almost equal ease the three languages of the conference--English, French, and German. Shortly after that convention Mr. Fermand gave up his business and became the general secretary of the world's committee of the Young Men's Christian Associations. He traveled over the whole continent of Europe, visiting the associations, and then came to America to make acquaintance with our plans of work. Now stationed at Geneva, with some resident members of the convention, he keeps up the intercourse of the associations through nine members representing the principal nations. I have spoken of the three languages of the conference. It is a wonderful inspiration to find one's self in a gathering of all nations, brought together by the love of one person, each speaking in his own tongue, praising the one name, so similar in each,--that name alone in each address needing no interpretation.

The conference meets this year, in August, at Berlin, when probably as many as one hundred delegates will be present from the United States.

But inter-association organization has gone much further in this country than elsewhere, and communication is exceedingly close between the nine hundred associations of America.

The first conception of uniting associations came to the Reverend William Chauncey Langdon, then a layman, and a member of the Washington Association, now rector of the Episcopal Church at Bedford, Pennsylvania. Mr. McBurney, in his fine Historical Sketch of Associations, says: "Many of the associations of America owe their individual existence to the organization effected through his wise foresight. The associations of our land, and in all lands, owe a debt of gratitude to Mr. Langdon far greater than has ever been recognized." Oscar Cobb, of Buffalo, and Mr. Langdon signed the call to the first convention, which assembled on June 7, 1854, at Buffalo. This was the first conference of associations held in the English-speaking world. Here was appointed a central committee, located at Washington, and six elsewhere.

In 1860, Philadelphia was made the headquarters. The confederation of associations and its committee came to an end in Chicago, June 4, 1863, and the present organization with its international executive committee was born, with members increasing in number. The committee now numbers thirty-three, two being resident in New York City.

In the year 1865, a committee was appointed by the convention at Philadelphia. The president of this convention became the chairman of the international executive committee, consisting of ten members resident in New York City, and twenty-three placed at different prominent points in the United States and British Provinces. There is also a corresponding member of the committee in each State and province, and means of constant communication between the committee and each association, and between the several associations, through the Young Men's Christian Association Watchman, a sixteen-paged paper, published each fortnight in Chicago.

On the sixteenth day of April, 1883, the international committee, which had been superintending the work since 1865, was incorporated in the State of New York. Cephas Brainerd, a lawyer of New York City, a direct descendant of the Brainerds of Connecticut, and present owner of the homestead, has always been chairman of the committee, and, from a very large practice, has managed to take an immense amount of time for this work, which has more and more taken hold on his heart,--and here let me say that I know no work, not even that of foreign missions, which takes such a grip upon those who enter upon it. Time, means, energy, strength, have been lavishly poured out by them. Mr. Brainerd and his committee work almost as though it were their only work, and yet each member of the committee is one seemingly fully occupied with his business or professional duties. See the members of the Massachusetts committee, so fired with love for this work that, in the gospel canvasses of the State, after working all day, many of them give from forty to fifty evenings, sometimes traveling all night to get back to their work in the morning. It is no common cause that thus draws men out of themselves for others. Then, too, I greatly doubt where there are such hard-worked men as the general secretaries,--days and evenings filled with work that never ends; the work the more engrossing and exacting because it combines physical and mental with spiritual responsibility. We who know this are not surprised to find the strength of these men failing. Those who employ them should carefully watch that relief is promptly given from time to time as needed. There are now more than three hundred and fifty of these paid secretaries. Now, look back over the whole history of the associations, and can you doubt that he who meets the wants of his creatures has raised up the organization for the express purpose of saving young men as a class? And to do this he employs the church itself--not the church in its separate organizations, but the church universal. A work for all young men should be by the young men of the whole church. First, because it is young manhood that furnishes the common ground of sympathy. Second, because the appliances are too expensive for the individual churches. Large well-situated buildings, with all possible right attractions, are simply necessary to success in this work. These things are so expensive that the united church only can procure them. That in Philadelphia cost $700,000; in New York, $500,000; in Boston, more than $300,000; in Baltimore, $250,000; in Chicago, $150,000; San Francisco, $76,000; Montreal, $67,000; Toronto, $48,000; Halifax, $36,000; West New Brighton, New York, $19,000; at the small town of Rockport, Massachusetts, about $4,000; and at Nahant, $2,000. In all these are eighty buildings, worth more than $3,000,000, while as many more have land or building-funds. Third, how blessedly this sets forth the vital unity of Christ's church, "that they may all be one," and also distinguishes them from all other religious bodies. "Come out from among them and be ye separate."

This association work is divided into local (the city or town), state or home mission, the international and foreign mission.

The local is purely a city or town work. The "state," which I have called the home mission, is thoroughly to canvass the State, learn where the association is needed, plant it there, strengthen all existing associations, and keep open communication between all. This is also the international work, but its field is the United States and British Provinces, under the efficient management of this committee.

As has been said, the convention of 1866 appointed the international committee, which was directed to call and arrange for state and provincial conventions. This is the result: in 1866, no state or provincial committee or conventions. Now, thirty-three such committees, thirty-one of which hold state or provincial conventions, together with a large number of district and local conferences.

In 1870, Mr. R.C. Morse, a graduate of Yale College, and a minister of the Presbyterian Church, became the general secretary of the committee and continues such to-day. Of the missionary work of the committee the most conspicuous has been that at the West and South. In 1868, the convention authorized the employment of a secretary for the West. This man, Robert Weidansall, a graduate of Pennsylvania College, Gettysburg, was found working in the shops of the Pacific Railroad Company at Omaha. He had intended entering the ministry, but his health failed him. To-day there is no question as to his health--he has a superb physique, travels constantly, works extremely hard, and has been wonderfully successful. When he began there were thirty-nine associations in the States of Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Kentucky, and Tennessee. There was only one secretary, and no building. Now there are nearly three hundred associations, spending more than one hundred and ten thousand dollars; twenty general secretaries, and five buildings. Nine States are organized, and five employ state secretaries. The following words from a recent Kansas report sound strangely, almost like a joke, to one who remembers the peculiar influence of Missouri upon the infant Kansas: "Kansas owes much of her standing to-day to the fostering care and efforts of the Missouri state executive committee." In 1870, two visitors were sent to the Southern States. There were then three associations only between Virginia and Texas. There are now one hundred and fifty-seven.

Previous to the Civil War the work was well under way, but had been almost entirely given up. Our visitors were not at once received as brethren, but Christian love did its work and gradually all differences were forgotten by these Christians in the wonderful tie which truly united them, and when, in 1877, the convention met at Richmond, not only harmony prevailed, but it seemed as though each were trying to prove to the other his intenser brotherly love. The cross truly conquered. No one who was present can ever forget those scenes, or cease to bless God for what I truly believe was the greatest step toward the uniting again of North and South. Mr. T.K. Cree has had charge of this work since the beginning. Not only has sectional spreading of associations been done by the committee, but, in the language of the report already quoted: "Special classes of young men, isolated in a measure from their fellows by virtue of occupation, training, or foreign birth, have from time to time so strongly appealed to the attention of the American associations as to elicit specific efforts in their behalf." Thus, in 1868, the first secretary of the committee was directed to devote his time to railroad employees. For one year he labored among them. The general call on his time then became so imperative that he was obliged to leave the railroad work. This work had been undertaken at St. Albans, Vermont, in 1854, and in Canada in 1855. The first really important step in this work was at Cleveland in 1872, when an employee of a railroad company, who had been a leader in every kind of dissipation, was converted. He immediately began to use his influence among his comrades, and such was the power of the Spirit that the Cleveland Association took up the work and began holding meetings especially for these men. In 1877, Mr. E.D. Ingersol was appointed by the international committee to superintend the work. There has been no rest for him in this. A leading railroad official says: "Ingersol is indeed a busy man. Night and day he travels. To-day a railroad president wants him here, to-morrow a manager summons him. He is going like a shuttle back and forth across the country, weaving the web of railroad associations." When he entered on the work there were but three railroad secretaries; now there are nearly seventy. There are now over sixty branches in operation; and the work is going on besides at twenty-five points; almost a hundred different places, therefore, where specific work is done for railroad men. They own seven buildings, valued at thirty-three thousand two hundred and fifty dollars. The expense of maintaining these reading-rooms is over eighty thousand dollars, and more than two thirds of this is paid by the corporations themselves; most of the secretaries are on the regular pay-rolls of the companies. How can this be done? Simply because the officers see such a return from this expenditure in the morals and efficiency of their men that they have no doubt as to the propriety of the investment.

Mr. William Thaw, vice-president of the Pennsylvania Company, writes: "This work is wholly good, both for the men and the roads which they serve." Mr. C. Vanderbilt, first vice-president of the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, writes: "Few things about railroad affairs afford more satisfactory returns than these reading-rooms." Mr. J.H. Devereux, of Cleveland, president of the Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, and Indianapolis Railway, writes: "The association work has from the beginning (now ten years ago) been prosecuted at Cleveland satisfactorily and with good results. The conviction of the board of superintendents is that the influence of the room and the work in connection with it has been of great value to both the employer and the employed, and that the instrumentalities in question should not only be encouraged but further strengthened." Mr. John W. Garrett, president of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, says: "A secretary of the Young Men's Christian Association, for the service of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, was appointed in 1879, and I am gratified to be able to say that the officers under whose observation his efforts have been conducted informed me that this work has been fruitful of good results." Mr. Thomas Dickson, president of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, writes: "This company takes an active interest in the prosperity of the association, and will cheerfully co-operate in all proper methods for the extension of its usefulness." Mr. H.B. Ledyard, general manager of the Michigan Central Railroad Company, writes: "I have taken a deep interest in the work of the Young Men's Christian Association among railroad men, and believe that, leaving out all other questions, it is a paying investment for a railroad company."

These are a few out of a great number of assurances from railroad men of the value of this organization. In Chicago, the president of one of the leading railroads, the general superintendent of another, and other officials, are serving on the railroad committee of the Young Men's Christian Association, and it is hoped that at every railway centre there may soon be an advisory committee of the work. Such a committee is now forming in Boston. This work should interest every individual, because it touches every one who ever journeys by train. Speak as some men may, faithlessly, concerning religion, where is the man who would not feel safer should he know that the engineer and conductor of his train were Christians? men not only caring for others, but themselves especially cared for.

Frederick von Schluembach, of noble birth, an officer in the Prussian army, was a leader there in infidelity and dissipation to such a degree as to drive him to this country at the time of our Civil War. He went into service and attained to the rank of captain. His conversion was remarkable and he brought to his Saviour's service all the intense earnestness and zeal that he had been giving to Satan. He joined the Methodists and became a minister among them. His heart went out to the multitudes of his countrymen here, and especially to the young; thus he came in contact with the central committee and was employed by them to visit German centres. This was in 1871, in Baltimore, where took place the first meeting of the national bund of German-speaking associations. At their request Mr. Von Schluembach took the field, which has resulted, after extreme opposition on the part of the German churches, in eight German Young Men's Christian Associations, besides an equal number of German committees in associations. When we remember that there are more than two million Germans in this country, and that New York is the fourth German city in the world, we can scarcely overestimate the greatness of this work. Mr. Von Schluembach was obliged on account of ill health to go to Germany for a while, and, recovering, formed associations there,--the one in Berlin being especially powerful, some of "Caesar's household" holding official positions in it. He has now returned, and with Claus Olandt, Jr., is again at work among his countrymen. His first work on returning was to assist in raising fifty thousand dollars for the German building in New York City.

Mr. Henry E. Brown has always since the war been intensely interested in the colored men of the South. Shortly after graduation at Oberlin College, Ohio, he founded, and was for two years president of, a college for colored men in Alabama. He is now secretary for the committee among this class at the South, and speaks most encouragingly of the future of this work.

In 1877, there was graduated a young man named L.D. Wishard, from Princeton College. To him seems to have been given a great desire for an inter-collegiate religious work. He, with his companions, issued a call to collegians to meet at the general convention of Young Men's Christian Associations at Louisville. Twenty-two colleges responded and sent delegates. Mr. Wishard was appointed international secretary. One hundred and seventy-five associations have now been formed, with nearly ten thousand members. These colleges report about ninety Bible-classes during the past year. Fifteen hundred students have professed conversion through the association; of these forty have decided to enter the ministry, and two of these are going to the foreign fields.

The work is among the men most likely to occupy the highest position in the country, hence its importance is very great. Mr. Wishard is quite overtaxed and help has been given him at times, but he needs, and so also does the railroad work, an assistant secretary.

There is a class of men in our community who are almost constantly traveling. Rarely at home, they go from city to city. The temptations to these men are peculiar and very great. In 1879, Mr. E.W. Watkins, himself one of this class of commercial travelers, was appointed secretary in their behalf. He has since visited all the principal associations, and has created an interest in these neglected men. Among the appliances which are productive of the most good is the traveler's ticket, which entitles him to all the privileges of membership in any place where an association may be. A second most valuable work is the hotel-visiting done by more than fifty associations each week. The hotel-registers are consulted on Saturday afternoon, and a personal note is sent to each young man, giving him the times of service at the several churches and inviting him to the rooms. Is it necessary to call the attention of business men to the importance to themselves of this work? Is it not patent? You cannot follow the young man whose honesty and clear-headedness is of such consequence to you. God has put it into the heart of this association to try and care for those men, upon whom your success largely depends. Can you be blind to its value? Every individual man who employs commercial travelers should aid the work. But how is all this great work for young men carried on? It requires now thirty thousand dollars a year to do it. Of this sum New York pays more than one half, Pennsylvania about one sixth, and Massachusetts less than one fifteenth. But to do this work properly,--this work of the universal church of Christ for young men,--at least one third more, or forty thousand dollars a year, is needed. There is another need, however, much harder to meet--the men to fill the places calling earnestly for general secretaries. There are nearly three hundred and fifty paid employees in the field, representing about two hundred associations. Since every association should have a secretary, and there are nearly, if not quite, nine hundred, the need will be clearly seen. This need it is proposed to meet by training men in schools established for the purpose. Something of this has already been done in New York State and at Peoria, Illinois, and there must soon be a regular training-school established to accommodate from fifty to one hundred men.

This is a very meagre sketch of a great work. How inadequately it portrays it, none know so well as those who are immediately connected with it. Could you have been present at a dinner given a few months ago to the secretaries of the international committee, and heard each man describe his field and its needs; could you have seen the intensity with which each endeavored to make us feel what he himself realized, that his special field was the most important,--you would have come to our conclusion: that each field was all-important, and that each man was in his proper place, peculiarly fitted for it and assigned to it by the Master.

A prominent divine has lately said: "I believe the Young Men's Christian Association to be the greatest religious fact of the nineteenth century."

What has been effected by this fact? Thousands of young men in all parts of the world have been brought to Jesus Christ. It has been the training-school for Moody, Whittle, and hosts of laymen who are to-day proclaiming the simple Gospel. It has organized great evangelistic movements both here and abroad. It formed the Christian Commission, which not only relieved the wants of the body during our war, but sent hundreds of Christ's missionaries to the hospitals and battle-fields. It has gloriously manifested the unity of Christ's true church. It stands to-day an organic body, instinct with one life, spreading its limbs through the world, active, alert, ready at any moment to respond to the call of the church, and enables it to present an unbroken front to superstition and infidelity, which already rear their brazen heads against Christ and his church, and will soon be in open rebellion and actual warfare, and which Christ at his coming will forever destroy.

[NOTE.--Through the kindness of Messrs. Harper and Brothers, of New York, we present to our readers the two portraits in this article. For the cuts of the buildings we are indebted to the Chicago Watchman, mention of which is made above.--R.S., Jr.]

* * * * *

GEORGE FULLER.

BY SIDNEY DICKINSON.

The death of George Fuller has removed a strong and original figure from the activity of American art, and added a weighty name to its history. To speak of him now, while his work is fresh in the public mind, is a labor of some peril; so easy is it, when the sense of loss is keen, to make mistakes in judgment, and to allow the friendly spirit to prevail over the judicial, in an estimation of him as a man and a painter. Yet he has gone in and out before us long enough to make a study of him profitable, and to give us, even now, some occasion for an opinion as to the place he is likely to occupy in the annals of our native art. Mr. Fuller held a peculiar position in American painting, and one which seems likely to remain hereafter unfilled. He followed no one, and had no followers; his art was the outgrowth of personal temperament and experience, rather than the result of teaching, and although he studied others, he was himself his only master. In other men whose names are prominent in our art, we seem to see the direction of an outside influence. Stuart and Copley confessed to the teaching of the English school of their day--a school brilliant but formal, and holding close guiding-reins over its disciples; Benjamin West became denationalized, so far as his art was concerned; Allston showed the impression of England, Italy, and Flanders, all at once, in his refined and thoughtful style, and Hunt manifested in every stroke of his brilliant brush the learned and facile methods that are in vogue in the leading ateliers of modern Paris. In these men, and in the followers whom their preëminent ability drew after them, we perceive the dominant impulse to be of alien origin; Fuller alone, of all the great ones in our art, was in thought and action purely and simply American. The influence that led others into the error of imitation, seems to have been exerted unavailingly upon his self-reliant mind. We shall search vainly if we look elsewhere than within himself for the suggestions upon which his art was established. Superficial resemblances to other painters are sometimes to be noted in his works, but in governing principle and habit of thought he was serenely and grandly alone.

We must regard him thus if we would study him understandingly, and gain from our observation a correct estimate of his power. We think of our other painters as in the crowd, and amid the affairs of men, and detect in their art a certain uneasiness which the bustle about them necessarily caused. We perceive this most in Hunt, who was emphatically a man of the world, and in Stuart, who shows in some of his later work that his position as the court painter of America, while it aided his purse and reputation, harmed his repose; least in Allston, whose tastes were literary, whose love was in retirement, and who would have been a poet had not circumstances first placed a brush and palette in his hands. Allston, however, enjoyed popularity, and was courted by the best society of his time, and was not permitted, although he doubtless longed for it, to indulge to its full extent his chaste and dreamy fancy. It may be said without disrespect to his undoubted powers, that he would have been less esteemed in his own day if his art had not been largely conventional, and thus easily understood by those who had studied the accepted masters of painting. He lacked positive force of idea, as his works clearly show,--that quality which was among the most characteristic traits of Fuller's method, and made him at once the greatest genius, and the man most misunderstood, among contemporary American painters.

Although men who have not had "advantages" in life are naturally prone to regret their deprivation, they frequently owe their success to this seeming bar against opportunity. We have often seen illustrated in our art the fact that favorable circumstances do not necessarily insure success, and now from the life of Fuller we gain the still more important truth, that power is never so well aroused as in the face of obstacles. Few men endured more for art than he; none have waited more uncomplainingly for a recognition that was sure to come by-and-by, or received with greater serenity the approbation which the dull world came at last to bestow. His history is most wholesome in its record of steadfast resting upon conviction, and teaches quite as strongly as his pictures do, the value of absorption in a lofty idea.