Much has been done, much remains to be done. In the country places, in the towns and villages of the South, are hundreds of young men and women growing up in the densest ignorance—in ignorance of the commonest decencies and proprieties of life—with minds capable of greatest effort, but darkened and obscured; with immortal souls clouded with superstition and the teachings of ignorant preachers. They reach out their hands to us with the cry: "Come over and help us!" What can we do for them?
In our schoolrooms they receive thorough training in the branches of a common-school education. In the boarding department they may receive industrial instruction which will fit them to take up the duties of everyday life. Daily contact and association with refined, cultured teachers will develop latent possibilities, will arouse new ambitions and longings for a higher, purer life. Even a few months' sojourn at the institution leaves an indelible mark on the character. When a student comes back year after year until he has completed the required course of study, his growth is more rapid, the results of incalculable value. Not until one realizes the narrowness, the poverty of the environment from which such a student comes, can one fully estimate the benefit of such an institution. Nor does the good stop with the one directly benefited. As the scholars go out into their homes to be teachers and workers, they carry the knowledge gained, and the light in their own hearts, and thus reach multitudes with whom we never, directly, come in contact.
There are those whose lives are consecrated to this work, whose daily time and strength are spent among these people for their uplifting. There are constant calls on their sympathy, constant appeals for help, but unless the help and support comes from the North they cannot respond.
Their greatest need is a larger Endowment Fund to meet the current expenses, that the labor and care connected with the raising of money may be rendered unnecessary, when there would be more time and strength to meet the demands of the work at their doors.
Can there be a greater privilege than to use the money the Lord has sent them than bringing into the fold some of His stray lambs? "For I was an hungered and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty and ye gave me drink; I was a stranger and ye took me in; I was naked and ye clothed me; I was sick and ye visited me; I was in prison and ye came unto me."
Who will open the door of knowledge to these minds, held in the bondage of ignorance; who will help to feed the souls hungering and thirsting for the bread of life; who will aid them in their attempt to clothe these rude, untrained spirits in the garments of refinement and culture, in which even they may stand arrayed? "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done unto me."
THE REED ORPHAN HOME.
The Reed Orphan Home, at Covington, Ga., was founded by Mrs. Dinah P. Pace, who was graduated from Atlanta University, Atlanta, Ga., in 1883. During this year (1883) Mrs. Pace went to Covington to teach for a few months only, but while there she became greatly interested in the work of uplifting her race. Her labors did not end with the routine of ordinary school duties, for she visited the homes and assisted in caring for the little ones of the families, very few of which did not greatly need her services. Her interest in both mother and children soon caused her to take under her roof several children who were left orphans.