During my seven months' absence from home the church managed to take care of itself with credit both to its zeal and its ability. Three months of the time it was ministered to by the Rev. G. W. Moore, a young preacher pursuing his studies at Fisk. Brother Moore gave himself most heartily to the work while here, and displayed qualities of mind and heart that give promise of great usefulness to his race. The church raised for him by its own contributions $50 per month, besides contributing nearly $50 to aid yellow fever sufferers in other cities in the early stage of the epidemic. The total amount of their contributions during my absence was $211.42. I do not think many of our Northern churches can show a better record, considering their income. It amounts to about $3.50 from each resident member. The income of our membership will not average $150 a year. Let these figures be compared with those of some of our city churches, and we will not blush. I sometimes get a little tried with the people when I see them waste their money on tobacco and a thousand little extravagances; but I immediately feel rebuked when I compare their extravagance with that of white people. If white people gave according to their income as these poor black people do, our debt would not hang like a millstone around our neck, and the Home Missionary Society would not still groan over $30,000.
I have heard it stated that the colored people are dying out. This is not the case among our people. I have been here two years and a half, and have not been called to attend a funeral of any member of our church. There have been but three deaths in the families, and two of them were yellow fever cases during my absence. Some of our members were sick, but none of them died. There were many, many cases of yellow fever among the colored people that were not reported. They held, perhaps, a superstitious notion—the doctors would say so, at least—that if they went to the hospital they would surely die; so they doctored themselves with herbs, and so far as I can learn not one so treated died.
We are in the midst of the trying season for these poor people. The cold weather is coming on; but thanks to the kind women of Yarmouth, Mass., and Skowhegan, Me., we have a good stock of garments for the most needy. Two barrels have come and their contents been distributed in part. The Lord bless the generous hearts and fingers that filled them.
I want to say to the friends of Tennie that she is making a grand record in school. I have another girl named Rosa for whom I bespeak an interest. If any Sunday-school or any body wants to take her off my hands, I will find another to take care of. Work done for these girls is good work.
Freedom's Day.
The Band of Hope in Chattanooga observed the first day of January in celebrating the anniversary of the proclamation of Emancipation. The exercises were held in one of our largest halls, and were well attended. They consisted of speaking and singing, and the reading of the Proclamation. The principal address was given by Rev. Mr. Hurley, of the A. M. E. Church, and contained some excellent thoughts upon the situation of things in the South. After a brief introduction, in which he spoke of the propriety of the colored people's observing this day as the white people had been accustomed to observe the Fourth of July, as independence day, he proceeded to name some of the benefits that had come to the whole country, white and black, North and South—for we are one, and what really benefits one section, benefits all—from the emancipation of the slaves.
1. His first point related to the honor of the American name. For almost a century poets have sung and orators boasted of the national honor. The declaration of independence, "that all men are born free and equal," has been flaunted abroad as the pennant of the nation, while millions of our people were being born, living and dying in the worst form of slavery the world has ever known. In all those long years the nation lived a stupendous lie. Never was the declaration of independence true until Abraham Lincoln made it so the first day of January, 1863. It is a great benefit to the nation to be true to its professions; to have this great blot wiped out.
2. By the emancipation of the slaves, 5,000,000 pairs of hands were added to the wealth and defences of the nation—no small gift. We read of a time when a nation shall be born at once. It has come. What if the ex-slave has had to be nursed! All babes are nursed. Is not the babe a blessing to the household? Even its very helplessness is a blessing, educating the finest sensibilities of humanity. If the babe born January 1st, 1863, is nurtured aright, God alone can measure the benefits to the nation.
3. By the emancipation of the slave, a system of education was introduced to the South that insures a lasting blessing upon the whole people. The intelligence of a large portion of the white population before the war was not above that of the slave. If the slave had not been made free, there is no reason to suppose the condition of these poor whites would have been changed. Now a glance over the broad territory of these States, where school-houses have sprung up like magic, shows the immense advantage that has come to white and black alike; and with the increase of intelligence will come increase of prosperity and happiness to the whole nation. With the emancipation of the slave, the common-school system has been forced upon the South, until now, having tasted of its sweetness, we hope it is never to be abolished.