Vicissitudes have occurred during the eight years passed, but all tend, in our onward march to the fore-front of battle, to bring nearer that which overcoming faith and labor are sure to win—victory!
An agency thereto which should here be recognized is the election, in 1879, at Indianapolis, of Frances E. Willard as President of the Woman’s National Christian Temperance Union. She leads to glorious struggle the hosts of Miriam and of Deborah in a new crusade for God and home and native land.
Our present officers are capable and faithful. Our borders are extended until now forty-four States and Territories are each represented by a Vice-President. We have within this area three thousand auxiliaries. The work is divided into thirty-three departments superintended by practical women.
The novices in parliamentary usage of the Cleveland Convention are now experienced and intelligent leaders in the grand reform.
Independent, organizations, with large membership, have multiplied on both sides of the ocean until a score are in active operation as the outgrowth of the great awakening.
More than all, better than all, the “Rock of Ages” women are proving themselves worthy of the title, and are praying to-day even more earnestly than when with sublime faith they went out into the streets and saloons of Ohio, believing that ere long our Lord will say to us, “O, woman, great is thy faith; be it unto thee even as thou wilt.”
