THE COMING OF THE ORGAN.
BY MRS. WALTER E. C. WRIGHT, BEREA, KY.
“Pine Grove College,” as it is called in Jackson County, needed an organ; there was no doubt about that. But the likelihood of obtaining it seemed small. Away up there in the mountains of Kentucky, there were few who had ever seen an organ, and only the teacher knew how much it would help in the day school, the Sunday-school and the preaching services. So Miss Barton sang herself hoarse trying to teach the children to sing by rote, and on Sunday the minister had to line the hymns for want of books. (Your grandmamma can tell you what I mean by “lining the hymn.”) In all the mountain churches, both colored and white, the people always sing in that way, and having no organ to keep them together, they come out at the end one behind the other, like the “rounds” you sing at school.
MOUNTAIN FAMILY SINGING PSALMS.
One day a teacher from Berea went up to visit the school, and when she saw the bright, eager faces of the children, and the effort the teacher was making to have them learn to sing, she said, “Why, how much you need an organ here. It would lift these children into a whole new world of ideas.” “Yes, I know it,” answered Miss Barton, “but where is it to come from?” Well, Miss D. went home and thought it over, and then wrote to Miss Barton that if the people there would raise thirty dollars, she would see that they had an organ. Miss Barton did not feel much encouraged, for the people in that region are not rich, and one dollar looks very large to them. However, she read Miss D.’s letter to them at Sabbath school, and explained what an advantage it would be to have the instrument to use. To her great surprise they pledged the amount at once, though many of them cannot afford sugar in their coffee, or butter on the corn bread, which, with bacon, is the staple of their living. I have not time to tell how Miss D. raised the rest of the money, how she found a dealer who had a very fine organ to sell at second hand, and who threw off fifteen dollars when he found for what she wanted it—nor how one friend in Tallmadge and another in Akron helped on, and at last the organ was ordered and sent. It was expected on a certain Saturday, and on Sunday morning you might have seen the people gathering in unusually large numbers. All who did not walk came on horseback. There a mother with her baby on her arm, and a little girl behind her on the family horse. Here the father, with a three-year-old boy behind him on the colt, and yonder three older children on another horse, all sitting with that easy security they express when they say “I was born on a horse,” and thinking no more about it than you do when you ride in a street car.
But when the people reached the school-house their faces fell as they came in one after another and saw there was no organ on the platform. The wagon had broken down bringing it over the almost impassable roads from the station twenty miles away, and at last Sunday-school was commenced with a feeling of disappointment in all hearts. Even brave Miss Barton felt a lump in her throat, for she had counted on it like the meeting of an old friend in a strange land. But just in the middle of the lesson the creaking of wheels was heard and some men came in with something still encased in the box in which it was packed. No more lesson that day. Every boy and girl, colored and white, was as eager and curious as if this was a stray cage from some menagerie. Finally, with some little trouble, the packing-case was removed, and there was a plain, quiet little walnut thing, looking some like a small cupboard, and now the question arose on which side was it made to stand? The teacher, seeing the dilemma, suggested the proper base, on which it was firmly placed. Then a chair was brought, some books piled on it—and then they found there was no key. But somebody produced a nail, the cover was lifted, and there was their organ smiling at them and showing every one of its pretty white teeth. And oh, when the wonderful thing began to sing, how pleased they were! The children forgot that they too could sing
“Praise God from whom all blessings flow,”
while listening to the beautiful, strange voice. Presently they gained courage and joined in the Gospel hymns (which the common people do sing gladly), and sang, and sang, and sang, all through the time for Sabbath school and all through the time for preaching.
I think the angels hearing the sounds must have rejoiced that day with great hope for the souls that might be won to repentance through the Coming of the Organ.