OUR INDIAN BOYS AT HAMPTON.
The Association has, after conference with General Armstrong, decided to make appropriations to aid the Indian work at Hampton as follows: (1.) It agrees to pay the salary of a teacher, whose time is wholly devoted to this work, and whose enthusiasm and success in it no one who attended the last commencement can have failed to remember. (2.) It will support these three boys: James Murie, a Pawnee from the Indian Territory, a bright boy, who is now in the Preparatory Department, and will be able to enter the Junior Class next year; Jonathan Heustice, a Pawnee with some colored blood, apparently a very good boy; and Alexander Peters, a Menomonee from Wisconsin, who comes well recommended by his teachers, and is proving an interesting scholar. (3.) It will clothe the eight boys from Fort Berthold Agency, sent by the Government last year, and for whose support it is mainly responsible. The total expense will be $1,450. We shall be very glad to receive contributions to this work, or for any of these boys in particular, from those who are specially interested in this new work of educating Indian boys in our colored schools. The success of the effort has been so marked, that we no longer look on it as an experiment. It is the application to this class of the same principle on which we believe the solution of the great problem of negro citizenship depends. Let us educate the teachers and the leaders for these races, keeping them constantly surrounded by the most elevating Christian influences, and they will have great power in lifting up the masses, who must be taught and Christianized at home.
The news of the destruction of Academic Hall at Hampton, has reached the friends of that Institution long ere this. The origin of the fire is unknown; it was discovered in the attic, and was already beyond control. In a couple of hours all was over. An insurance amounting to about three-quarters of the expense incurred in building will, in the lower prices now prevailing, replace it to a great extent. Still it is a severe loss.
The value of the excellent organization of the school was made apparent in the perfect order which prevailed. The honesty and loyalty of the students were thoroughly tested and triumphantly proved. Only a single day of school work was lost. About $3,000 will replace the loss on apparatus, furniture, library, &c. The students lost about $1,200 of personal property. We trust that the friends of Hampton—and they are many—will come generously and promptly to its relief.
Our Sunday-schools are in great need of special helps for their work, and that of all sorts: books for the library and for the service of song; Sunday-school banners, maps and every thing of the kind. Are there not Sunday-schools who have such material they have outgrown or laid aside, and which they can send to us for the dark-skinned children of the South?