Various

“ Those who mourn his loss have consolation, not only in the remembrance of those sterling virtues which gave him professional dignity and power, but in that great, tender and noble nature which made those virtues subservient to the familiar every-day enjoyments in a Christian life. ”

“ I hope your voices are heralding the great liberation which education will bring to your lately enslaved brethren. You are fighting for light and for the freedom it brings, and in that contest I would rather be defeated with you than to be victorious against you. ”

“ Many of the poorest pupils are busily picking cotton, to earn something for school expenses, and will arrive within a month. Ten or twelve of the older scholars of last year have now gone to Atlanta University, so that there are not yet as many grown pupils as there will be after cotton picking is over. Among the new students is a young Methodist preacher, in charge of a circuit in an adjoining county. He seems quite in earnest to learn. Another of our excellent young men was converted while teaching during the summer, and has done good work in Sunday-school, temperance and revival meetings. ”

“ Swayne School opened last year with 300 pupils, this year with 400, showing an encouraging increase of 100.
We are securing student aid from friends at the North for several students who have gone from here to the higher institutions. Most of our best students are quite young and can do as well here at present, except that it is better for them to be in an institution where they can be under proper control twenty-four hours in the day. The social and church life of these people is so bad that we advise all to leave for boarding-schools and colleges as soon as they can. ”

“ How slow I have been learning the hard lesson, that God passes by the learned, the brilliant and the talented until they are thoroughly humbled, and, to our surprise, honors some lowly one who is willing to give God the glory and not beg back any share of it. ”

“ He knew too well the value of education to one who was compelled to struggle up from the depths of poverty for place and power not to emphasize the duty of putting the opportunity and facilities for education within reach of all the ignorant. ”

“ It is felt by all of the faculty that if the crops had not been cut short by the drought we should have had a rush of students altogether unprecedented in the history of the University.
It is felt by those who have known the students for a number of years that those of this year are a superior class. The quality of the students improves with every year, showing that others are at work elsewhere. ”

“ It is accepted by all here as an important truth, that the longer we can keep a student the better it will be for him and the institution and the work. The students in the collegiate department give tone to the whole institution. Every department is lifted to a higher standard by the high standard of the college department. As the college graduates go out into the world, they have, without an exception, taken advanced positions as teachers or other professional men. ”

“ The school opens more favorably than for several years before, with an increase in the corps of teachers, and general prospects for extended usefulness. There is a growing number of those who desire advanced education, whose purpose it is to fit themselves to enter some of the higher institutions. Their greatest hindrance is their poverty; but the pay for school teaching is improving somewhat, although most have to wait six or eight months before receiving what they earn. ”

“ The American Missionary Association. AIM AND WORK.
To preach the Gospel to the poor. It originated in a sympathy with the almost friendless slaves. Since Emancipation it has devoted its main efforts to preparing the Freedmen for their duties as citizens and Christians in America, and as missionaries in Africa. As closely related to this, it seeks to benefit the caste-persecuted Chinese in America, and to co-operate with the Government in its humane and Christian policy toward the Indians. It has also a mission in Africa. ”

“ The moral and religious development of his pupils was of first importance. He regarded our schools as a place, not so much of learning, as of preparation for learning; a course of discipline to draw out and sharpen faculties; a means to bring the student up to manhood with ability to perform thenceforth the hard work of a man in his allotted sphere. ”

“ Washington is trying to put his school on a manual labor basis.
The Hampton School Mission Association, organized last year, will continue its work by helping in the Sunday-schools in the town, Bible reading in the jail and poor-house, and among the aged poor, and aiding them in other ways within their power. Our young men have taken a great pleasure in giving a day’s work now and then to patch up some poor old cabin against the severity of the winter, or to supply some poor old aunty with food and fire. ”

“ Several colored men were elected to the last Legislature, and as members had the right to appoint cadets to the East Tennessee University, of course they all appointed colored cadets. Some other republican members also appointed colored cadets. This threw the trustees of the East Tennessee University into great perplexity. It is against the law of the State to educate white and colored pupils in the same institution: it is also very much against the traditional prejudices not only of the trustees of the University, but also of the people of the State. ”

“ Several of his teachers advised him to learn a trade, judging that from all human appearances he could never teach or control a school. Others who knew more of his Bible knowledge and sublime faith thought that, perhaps, God could find a place for him somewhere; and He has.
Every summer vacation now he goes out into some obscure corner to teach, and reports come back to us that our best students are not so successful as he in leading their pupils to that beginning of all wisdom, the fear of the Lord. ”

“ It seems probable that the appeals for assistance on the part of worthy pupils will be greater than usual on account of the smaller returns their best endeavors to help themselves have secured.
A severe and protracted drought has affected all this region, so that the cotton crop was small and required early attention, and pupils were taken out of school and attendance and pay were rendered small. We meet under the shadow of sorrow, having lost five students by death during the vacation, one of them a beloved member of the senior class. ”

“ The others were in the rural district of Southern Virginia, dark with ignorance, where they established day-schools as well as Sunday-schools, aided in a very interesting Sunday-school convention of that region, visited the families and preached the Gospel. It is thought that several new churches will soon result from these efforts, and one such was organized last month. They gave special attention to encouraging young men to prepare for usefulness as teachers and ministers, but hardly any proper facilities exist there, and poverty prevents them from going elsewhere to obtain education. ”

“ Almost all those who teach are Christians and engage in Christian work, as a matter of course, when they begin their day schools. As a general thing, they enter at once into the Sabbath-school if there is one, and start one if there is not, and generally get the entire neighborhood enlisted.
There are two interesting features in relation to the students, the like of which we have never had before. During the past few years the trustees of the Peabody fund have sustained a Normal school for white pupils. ”

“ G. W. Walker, formerly a teacher at Atlanta University, aged 46 years. He was a graduate of Oberlin College and Theological Seminary. Of Mr. Walker it may be said, without biographical exaggeration, “A good man has fallen in Israel.” As a man, he was quiet, modest, unostentatious, affable and gentlemanly. Sustaining to him the close relation of class-mate for three years, the writer cannot remember a harsh or unkind word as ever having fallen from his lips. As a Christian, he was always calm, serene, happy. ”

“ In reply to an address by a delegation of colored men who visited him in Mentor, just before he left home to assume the duties of his high office, he said, in effect, that it was not within the power of the President by appointments and official recognitions to raise the colored people to the level of social recognition and honor. The path to this leads through education and thrift. The negro, like every one else, must be the architect of his own fortunes, and compel by worth the respect he seeks. ”

“ Art. VIII. This society, in collecting funds, in appointing officers, agents and missionaries, and in selecting fields of labor and conducting the missionary work, will endeavor particularly to discountenance slavery, by refusing to receive the known fruits of unrequited labor, or to welcome to its employment those who hold their fellow-beings as slaves. ”

“ THE CHINESE.
—The Japanese colony in Paris are about to erect a pagoda for their religious devotions.
—The Governor of Foo Chow has issued a proclamation calling upon the people not to molest the missionaries or the converts who follow them, either at their chapels or school-houses.
—Out of one party of twenty-five Chinese students, who are returning to their homes, it is said that nine have changed their religious faith since they came to this country. ”

“ It would be unjust to the memory of this great and good man to leave at least this much unsaid of his interest in the race whose wrongs appealed so strongly to his sympathies, and whose fate he saw to be so intimately and indissolubly linked with that of the nation ”

“ With unquestioning devotion to the Union, with a patience and gentleness not born of fear, they have ‘followed the light as God has given them to see light.’ They are rapidly laying the material foundations of self-support, widening the circle of intelligence, and beginning to enjoy the blessings that gather around the homes of the industrious poor. ”

“ Most of the old students have been engaged in teaching during the summer vacation. It is estimated that of 85 in the collegiate department, 60 or 65 taught school during the summer. Wherever these teachers go, they secure a good name for industry, conscientiousness, ability and energy. We are constantly getting good words from white people, directors, superintendents and private citizens in regard to the faithfulness and acceptance with which our students discharge their duties. ”

“ The Board of Education for the State, to whom the disbursement of this fund was left, decided that the fund for the colored students should be divided among 50 pupils, and that they should have the privilege of choosing between five schools to which they should go. Each pupil would thus be entitled to $50, and each school would receive on an average 10 students. Up to the present time Fisk has received 18 out of the 50, and it is well known that many of the Senators who had the power of appointment had not taken action. We have no doubt that others will come as the year passes by. ”

“ This mode of recruiting has always been effective, and as our accommodations have been used to their utmost capacity every season, we have never ventured to employ any other means to secure attendance lest we be overwhelmed. A most hopeful feature in the case of the incoming students is the large preponderance of girls who come without any special solicitation, which indicates a greatly improved sentiment in regard to their education and position in the community, and gives it abundant material for the most effective work in behalf of the elevation of the people. ”

“ The law students this year will number twenty or more.
The University students, through poverty, are compelled to spend the vacation in earning money (for which they find many opportunities to the north of us) , and have been acting as waiters at the springs and the seaside resorts, where their good behavior makes many friends and often secures benefactors. Eight of the theological students gave themselves to missionary work with great success during the summer. One received twenty converts to the church, the Sabbath before he came back to resume study. ”

“ Hamilton W. Pierson, D.D., formerly missionary of this Association at Andersonville, Ga., has written a very readable book on the old time social, political and religious life in the South-west. In it he has garnered up many valuable remembrances of the condition of both whites and blacks before the war, special reference being made to their religious experiences, which he had the privilege of observing during many years of service as agent of the American Bible Society. He calls his book “In the Brush.” It is published by D. Appleton & Company, New York. ”