MOUNTAIN WHITE WORK IN KENTUCKY.
BY MRS. A. A. MYERS.
There is an unnoticed class of people dwelling almost in the very centre of the settled portion of the United States. "Our brother in black" has been held up to the view of two continents for the last fifty years. And what is America going to do with him and for him, has been a question which has interested the whole civilized world. This same question for a still longer time has been propounded in regard to the red man of the forest, and in later years concerning the Chinese. And right nobly has the Christian brotherhood evidenced its purpose to make men of these degraded classes. But until recently it has escaped the notice of these Christian workers that we have another class as needy perhaps as any. No spice of romance is connected with them. No barbarous tale of cruelty could be told to awaken sympathy in them. They are simply poor people, who during slavery were unable to obtain large plantations and so were driven by the arrogant Bluegrass slaveholder on the one side, and the greedy cotton-planter on the other, back into the mountains, where they are shut away from the rest of the world by mountain barriers, and still more hopelessly by the haughty caste spirit of the slave-holding monarchs, who disdain to have anything to do with them except to seek their votes.
These people are not really poor. Most of them own farms of three or four hundred acres; and the soil, if properly tilled, would be quite productive. Their plowing is done in the most primitive manner. A single horse attached to a little shovel plow simply tears the sod a little, enough so the weeds spring up luxuriantly, and the women and children must work hard in the hot sun to destroy them, while the lord of the home saddles his horse and rides to town, to sit on store boxes and tell low stories. This people, especially the male portion, seem to have a natural distaste for labor. They would be aristocratic if they could. In days of slavery they had their household servants, and tried to imitate the more wealthy slave-owners by living in idleness, and they still look upon labor as degrading.
They make no effort to get themselves homes. The large majority live in log cabins, with no windows. The doors stand open winter and summer. The women in cool weather always sit with a little shawl around them and a sunbonnet on.
There are generally two rooms to each house, usually with a chimney or open hall between them, so you have to go out of doors to pass from one to the other. In the kitchen (which also serves as dining-room) is a large fireplace and a cook stove, if they are the happy possessors of one.
The other is the sitting and sleeping-room. You will often see three beds and one or two trundle-beds in a single room. Here the whole family and all the visitors sleep. We have sought to rest with thirteen of us in a room, perhaps 15 by 20 feet, and not a window in it and the doors shut. Fortunately the large-mouthed fireplace gave a pittance of ventilation. No carpets are used, and furniture is very limited. I believe nine-tenths of the people could put all their goods on a couple of loads and be ready to move at an hour's notice.
Families are large, numbering twelve, fifteen or even nineteen children. Girls marry young, and seem to be entirely satisfied with their condition. You seldom hear a desire expressed for anything they don't possess. Give them a box of snuff and a stick to chew it with and you never hear a murmur escape their lips. Tobacco is indispensable. Old and young, male and female, are wedded to it. I have known of an old gentleman working all day for fifty cents and spending forty cents at night for tobacco for himself and wife and nine children.
They seem to be without a standard in the land. They live so isolated, and have measured themselves by themselves until they have lost all idea of accurate judgment. Morality and sobriety are hardly looked for, even among church members and ministers. "Religion may be up to fever heat, while morality is down to zero." People "confess," as they call it, and join the church, and in their entire life thereafter you could never know any difference.
They are satisfied if their names are on the church book. I don't think they ever question their eternal salvation after they are once inside a church. If a person dies without having joined a church his friends frame some theory on which they rest their hope of his salvation. A young man was shot a little while ago in a drunken broil. As he fell mortally wounded he cried, "Oh, Lord!" His mother is sure he is safe because he called on the Lord. They have no conception of living religion. They have no prayer or conference meetings. Aside from our own I doubt if there is a prayer meeting nearer than Berea, seventy miles away. There is no family prayer in all the land. I asked my class of boys, twenty or more in number, how many had ever heard their mothers' voice in prayer. Not one of them could raise a hand. At another school I asked a still larger class the same question, and only one girl raised her hand. There is no gathering of the little home nestlings together and instructing them—no Bible instruction given in the family. It has ceased to be a wonder to me, to ask nearly grown boys some of the most simple Bible questions, and hear them answer, "I don't know."
An M. E. minister in one of his pastoral visits took occasion to dwell with some stress on the blessedness of walking in the light. The mother showed how she literalized by promptly remarking, "Yes; I've told John I wanted a hole sawed in this end of the house, but he won't do it." During the same call he asked a young lady if she was preparing to go to judgment. She replied, "No, I reckin I won't go. If I do I'll have to walk, for we hain't got but two nags, and Rachel and Becky always ride them."
The prevailing churches are the Reform or Campbellites, the Methodists, and the Missionary and Anti-Missionary Baptists. The latter church is strong all through the mountains. They are bigoted and ignorant, and boast that their knowledge comes direct from the throne, and they have nothing to do with man-made theories, as they call education. Their preaching is a sort of canting reiteration of the text and what few Scripture verses they chance to know and some hackneyed expressions. They are great on arguing, and it would be laughable if it was not so pitiful to hear the profound questions they discuss. Last season one of these preachers nearly broke up one of our mission Sunday-Schools, which we could attend only each alternate Sabbath. In the passage that reads "And anon they tell Him," he contended that A-non was an angel, and they referred to the angel A-non. Each Sunday when we were not there that important question had to be discussed.
One of these same preachers took his children from school because they were taught the heresy in geography that the world is round. They do all they can to prejudice the people against our work. They call our religion railroad religion. They are great barriers in our way. Still we have been cheered this year to see that their hold on the young people is loosening, and we are getting their hearts in spite of the protests of their parents. One of our mission Sunday-Schools, which has averaged this season one hundred, is composed almost entirely of young people and children, seldom ever a parent there.
The Smith American Organ Co. have honored God and themselves, and will ever be held by some hearts in grateful remembrance by their gift to that society of a new organ. I have some times thought, as I have heard the young voices ring out with such enthusiasm, that, though critics might smile at our endeavor, Heaven would not disdain our offering of praise. The dingy low walls, the glass-less windows, the tobacco besmeared floor, become transformed to a holy temple, where God deigned to make visible His presence, and it has been a sacred place. Our hope of this people centres largely in the young. If it were not for them, we could not feel it right to stay among them.
Another barrier to be overcome is their habits of worship. They have meetings but once a month during the summer and none at all during the winter. When they have service it is more for a visit than worship. Their churches are rough log houses, and so small that the greater part of the congregation remain out of doors. Four or more ministers are always in attendance, and all must preach. The congregation expect a tiresome time, and from the first are restless. They go out and come in, and they keep a constant march to and from the water pail, which usually sits on the desk in front of the speaker. Several grown people at a time will be standing waiting on each other at the pail. The speaker seems to be used to such things, and not at all disconcerted. Nearly all their services are funeral services for those who may have been dead for years. They bury their dead the same day or the day following death. They have no religious service, except a prayer at the grave, if there chance to be a minister present. Generally about a year after death, but often from five to fifteen years after, they have the funeral sermon preached.
In regard to healthfulness of our mountain home, we have felt somewhat disappointed. Up so high, with nice springs and spring streams, one would expect a healthy climate. On the contrary, almost every one is ailing. Coughs and colds are universal. It is no wonder the natives are unhealthy; their habits of living would seem to prohibit health. They eat corn bread or hoe cake and bacon; some have flour, but it is always made up into hot biscuit, shortened with lard. They have this, with little variation, three times a day, 365 days in a year. In summer, green beans cooked with bacon is added to the bill of fare. Of course the blood becomes impoverished, and almost every one has scrofula. Calomel and pills are the great panacea for all their bodily ills. Pills are brought on by the quart, and sold by the merchants like any other commodity. Cleanliness of the person is an unheard of luxury; I doubt whether they ever bathe. Children come to the table with unwashed faces. They are put to bed with the same clothes they wear during the day. Then add to all this the fact that tobacco is used almost from the cradle, and whiskies and toddies from the time the poor child opens its eyes to this world, and it's no great marvel that gray-haired men are exceedingly rare, and it's the "old man" and the "old woman" when one has reached the age of twenty-five.
Now comes the question, What are we doing for the people? We have been with them nearly two years, and this has been our effort from the first, to get them to see that religion is a life rather than a sectarian belief. We have sought to impress upon them that joining a church is not Christianity. We have succeeded in getting a few to take part in our prayer meetings, and we have the assurance that all the people are awaking to the fact that God has some demands upon them. We have from the first kept up regular Thursday night prayer meetings; have had good attendance, but often only Mr. Myers and myself to take part in them except as others read Scripture verses.
On the Sabbath we have Sunday-school at 9:30. Average attendance, 100; preaching at 11. I hasten home, saddle my horse, and ride six miles to the next railroad station (Pleasant View). Here I have met 100 or more young people. I have been surprised that in a land where a woman isn't expected to know anything, or be anything but a doll or a drudge that there has been so little prejudice against my school. Some, of course, have thought a woman entirely out of her sphere to undertake such work and have taken occasion to remark to my friends: "Why, Mrs. Myers opens the school by prayer, just as Mr. Myers would. I don't know but it's all right, but it don't seem just the proper thing for a woman to do."
Mr. M. has a mission in South Williamsburg or the mills, where numbers of children are growing up in the midst of gambling and shooting. Prof. W. has, about the same hour, a school two miles out in another direction. At night we have services again in Williamsburg. At these services we have more than can get into the house, and many are obliged to leave for lack of accommodation. Tuesday nights we go to Pleasant View and help them learn the Gospel Songs. Each alternate Wednesday evening, church socials; each alternate Friday afternoon, Band of Hope; Saturday evening, choir drill; Covenant Meeting once a month on Saturday afternoon.
Mr. Myers has preached during the year beginning with Oct. '82, one hundred and forty-two sermons. The services, together with the other public services just mentioned, have amounted to three hundred and forty. Have attended fifty or more meetings conducted by others. We spend all the remaining time our strength will permit in calling at the homes.
We have a neat modern church nearly finished, and so far without foreign help. But no one knows what an effort has been required. Mr. Myers would announce a working bee to draw stone or any such work; would try to enthuse the people as he has so often done in the North. But when the time would come he has worked all day alone. We have learned at last that this people don't enthuse.
We are hard at work in our high-school enterprise. We have Prof. and Mrs. W. and Miss G., all from the North, with us. We hope to get a school, the good influence of which will never die out of these mountains.
These are peculiar people. What I have said of them has reference to the general class of society. But there are some who seem of better stock, who are shrewd, keen, far-sighted people. You cannot find their superiors in native ability in any country. Though often lacking in culture and morality, they still hold a wide influence over the rest, so that something besides goodness is required in those who wish to come among them as helpers. There must be ability to adapt oneself to these widely diverse conditions. One needs wisdom and tact to get along with the shrewdest, and such a love for souls that he can come with a helping hand to the most degraded, nor be discouraged if, with a heart brimful of sympathy, he reaches the hand a long time only to see it rejected by those most in need.
The work is a work of time. The majority of the people are unstable, thriftless improvident and ignorant. Slavery left its blight of impotency and profligacy upon them. They come and go as did their fathers a hundred years ago. Their tools and utensils are the same their great-grandparents used, and they are content with them. We never worked harder and saw less result in the conversion of sinners than while in Kentucky, and yet never felt more satisfied that we were where God wants us, and doing an important work. Unless these people have help they will prove a fretting leprosy in our nation.