Hated and oppressed by the combined wisdom, wealth, and statesmanship of a mighty confederacy; watched and criticised, their mistakes strongly magnified by those who fain would write destruction upon the emancipation, they were expected to rise from this condition. The idea of giving to the newly enfranchised a sound, practical educacation was considered at the dawn of freedom, an easy solution of what, as an unsolved problem, threatened the perpetuity of Republican institutions. Within a year from the firing on Sumter, the benevolent and far-sighted northern friends had established schools from Washington to the Gulf of Mexico, which became centres of light, penetrating the darkness and scattering the blessings of an enlightened manhood far and wide. The history of the world cannot produce a more affecting spectacle than the growth of this mighty Christian philanthropy which, beginning amid the din of battle, has steadily marched on through every opposing influence, and lifted a race from weakness to strength, from poverty to wealth, from moral and intellectual nonentity to place and power among the nations of the earth. From the awful depths out of which we have emerged to the promised land of perfect race development, we are asked to look, and by all the rapid and healthful progress of the past, by an unwavering faith in that Divinity that shapes our ends, forecast the future.

IMPROVEMENT.

The prospect shows improvement religiously. The emotional as opposed to the rational element in the negroes' religion is fast becoming a thing of the past. The pew is loud, continuous, and universal in its demand for an educated pulpit-one that unites to deep piety a mind well trained; that makes Christ the centre of all its preaching; that shirks no responsibility; that aims to awaken in the people holy aspirations and untiring zeal, to the end that the kingdoms of this world may become the kingdoms of our Lord and His Christ. Denominationally our progress is partly seen in the organization of the 800,000 Baptists of the South, for the prosecution of Mission work in Africa. We

have raised $10,000, sent out six missionaries, all of whom have been trained in "Home Mission schools," planted schools and mission stations in Africa, and awakened an interest in the work in this country both in the ministry and laity, that is simply unparalleled. We regard the African Mission work as pre-eminently ours, since it develops in us that spirit of self help, without which nations nor individuals can rise to worth and power. There is a growing tendency among the churches of the South to assume the conduct and support of their own educational institutions, but the more conservative and far-sighted leaders see in this a present impossibility, though all believe the forces are gathering themselves, that will in time not only conduct and support, but build and endow colleges and universities all over the Southland.

Morally we are improving. This element. of progress is necessarily slow; its opposition is mighty and deep-rooted; it must eliminate the evil habits of generations. No one who knows the southern negro and compares the low moral status in which freedom found him, with his present morality, can deny that his progress has been stupendous. Go to his home and there you will find a pure, moral atmosphere, supplemented by that taste and refinement which is an outgrowth of right living. Go to the schools, look into the bright, intelligent faces of the pupils, and see the marks of refinement, in dress and decorum, which are the consequences of proper home training. Mankind is imitative, the negro is pre-eminently so. Throw him in a healthy, moral atmosphere, and he will imbibe its salutary influence and reproduce it in his home. Since emancipation, under the most dispiriting circumstances the negro has made rapid and unparalleled improvement in morals; and if this state has been attained against countless and multiform adversities, to what moral heights may he not ascend in the next twenty years, with the refining and elevating. influences of the church, the home, and the schools as agencies in promoting this great end.

Educationally his progress is amazing. For

OVERLAND TO SAN FRANCISCO.

Constitutionally disinclined to "a home on the rolling wave," and desiring to obtain an idea of the country, the towns and the industries be. tween Puget Sound and San Francisco, we decided to take the overland trip by rail and stage. Southward from Portland is the Willamette Valley, the garden of Oregon. In this wheat growing region the surplus straw, after threshing, is commonly burned, so that in the early evening the skies are lurid with these flashing fires. Southern Oregon and northern California are hilly and mountainous, apparently well adapted for grazing purposes. Railroad construction through the rugged Siskyu range is no easy task. One of the features will be a tunnel about 3,000 feet long. Continuous railroad communication will probably be effected within a year.

The stage ride of ninety-eight miles between the southern terminus of the Oregon railroad and the northern terminus of the California road, which was made in about twenty-one hours, between 4:30 in the morning and 1:30 the next morning, without stopping except for meals and changing teams, was fatiguing indeed, but full of enjoyment and novelty as we wound up to the top of the Siskyu Mountains, then down their southern slope, out into a broad valley, with bleak mountain ranges on either side, and at night plunging through the moonlit woods at a rattling pace, with clouds of dust so dense that only the wheel horses of our six-horse team could be seen. Grandest spectacle of all, and amply compensating for the discomforts of the trip, was Mt. Shasta, whose entire outline, with its snow-crowned summit 14,400 feet above the sea, and about 11,600 feet above the adjacent plain. It came into view directly before us at ten o'clock in the forenoon, apparently twenty miles distant, but really more than twice as far, so that it was before us all day, and at sunset presented a never-to-be-forgotton scene of mingled beauty and grandeur as its broad base was wrapped in the deepening shadows, while midway up the gigantic slopes the dark green verdure appeared in the waning light, and, above all, a mile of its summit enswathed in snow glistening in the sunshine and suffused by an inexpressibly beautiful pink tint that deepened with the departing rays until the sun went down, when under the light of the crescent moon it loomed up in ghostly grandeur as we entered the great pine woods of the Shasta Valley, and reluctantly bade it farewell.

Proceeding toward San Francisco we pass through the broad Sacramento Valley, famous for its wheat, stock, and in its lower portions for its vineyards. Sheep are sheared twice a year, and yield about eight pounds of wool apiece. It was just after harvest when we traversed this section. The great combined heading and threshing machines, drawn by twelve to sixteen horses, gathering from six hundred to one thousand bushels of wheat each day, which is delivered into bags that are sowed and dumped off as the machine progresses, had done their work. Piles of filled sacks, uncovered during this rainless season, greeted our eyes along the route. They lie exposed for weeks, until farmers are ready to market them. Large barns and granaries are unnecessary.

one

We passed Leland Stanford's vineyard of ten thousand acres. Elsewhere we saw the process of converting the grapes into raisins, by exposure on boards inclined to the sun that shines from a cloudless sky for weeks together. By the way, this monotonous, brilliant glare for weeks and months would seem to be almost distracting to who is accustomed to the changing views of cloud-swept skies. After about three weeks of this, it was a positive delight, in the Colorado Mountains, to see storm clouds, with flashes of lightning. Of the grapes of California much has been said, so we need say but little. We tried to do our duty by them. At the Mechanics' Fair, in San Francisco, we saw single bunches weighing six pounds, and one cluster of bunches solidly massed that weighed twenty-eight pounds. Eating a bunch of grapes is not usually regarded as much of a feat, but bunches like these would rather tax one's capacity. The grape crop of California for 1886

was enormous.

YOSEMITE AND THE BIG TREES.

Everybody advised us to go to the Yosemite Valley while in California. As this advice coincided with our inclination, we went. A hot and fearfully dusty ride it was, especially the nearly two days' staging between the railroad terminus at Raymond and the entrance to the Valley. Before entering the Valley we made a detour of about eight miles to visit the big trees of the Mariposa Grove. These are named Sequoia Gigantea, in honor of Sequoyah, the Cherokee Indian who invented the Cherokee alphabet and gave his people a written lan| guage.

These trees are monsters, but in symmetry

and grace cannot compare with the firs and cedars of Puget Sound, which are nearly as high, though not of so great diameter as these. The road runs through one of these trees, "Wawona," the base of which is twenty-seven feet in diameter, the arch or roadway tunnel being ten feet high, nine feet six inches wide at the bottom, and six feet six inches at the top. Our long, four-seated stage coach and two teams of horses were within the diameter of this tree! Venerable patriarchs of the forest are these trees, whose ages, as shown by careful computations of their rings, are from three thousand to four thousand years-as old as to the days of Solomon !

The Yosemite Valley has been so frequently written up that we give it but brief mention. Imagine yourself passing over a rocky range of mountains many miles in width, and from six thousand to seven thousand feet above sea level, when suddenly your progress is arrested by a wonderful depression about half a mile wide, four or five miles long, and about twothirds of a mile deep, enclosed in precipitous walls of rock of this height-this is Yosemite Valley.

It is undoubtedly the grandest scenery, within the same compass, on the globe. What waterfalls of seven hundred, nine hundred, one thousand six hundred feet! What sheer rocky faces, three thousand three hundred feet high! What a ride on mule-back was that up to Glacier Point, as we zigzagged up the steep shelf of the mountain side, turning often every forty feet, and clambering along the narrow path whose outer edges were the verge of steep descents for hundreds of feet! How provokingly careless the mules and horses seemed to be with their hind legs as they swung around these sharp curves, always keeping to the outer edge, over which their hinder parts threatened to go! Magnificent, unparalleled, was the view from Glacier Point, as we gazed straight down three thousand three hundred feet, our vision taking in the whole Valley, with "El Capitan" near the western gateway, and the "South Dome" near the eastern, and the distant, snowy peaks of the "Heart of the Sierras " enticing us to new explorations!

(To be continued.)

THE EDUCATIONAL WORK OF THE AMERICAN BAPTIST HOME MISSION SOCIETY.

An Exercise for the Monthly Missionary Concert.

[NOTE-It is suggested that the leader of the meeting assign the sections of this article to different persons, who shall be called upon to read them consecutively, each reading to be followed by brief comments by the leader. Sing after every second reading.]

IN THE DAYS OF SLAVERY.

The Society, which was organized in 1832, and included the Baptists of the whole country, for several

years

had missionaries in the Southern States, who devoted their attention to the evangelization of both the white and the black population. Discussions on the question of slavery ran so high that in 1845 the Baptists of the slave States withdrew and organized a separate Convention. From the first the Society made no attempt to educate the slaves, either preachers or people. Indeed, most of the slave States made it a misdemeanor, to be visited by severe pen

alties, to teach slaves how to read.

After the organization of the Southern Convention, and the increasing sensitiveness on the subject of slavery, the Home Mission Society was practically excluded from work for the colored people of the slave States. Hence, from 1832 to 1862, a period of thirty years, but little comparatively could be done for them by the Society.

THE REBELLION: AN OPPORTUNITY. Soon after the outbreak of the rebeliion in 1861, multitudes of negroes who had escaped from slavery in Maryland and Virginia flocked into Washington, Alexandria, and to Fortress Monroe. Most deplorable and pitiable was their condition. They were huddled and herded together in sheds, barns, tents, and shelters of rudest construction as closely as they could be packed, half-starved, half-clad, homeless, helpless, penniless, ignorant "contrabands" of war. The compassion of Northern Christians was quickly aroused for these unfortunate beings. Individuals volunteered their services in their behalf. It was felt that here was a great opportunity and a great

need. The Board of the Home Mission Society, quick to feel the missionary pulse of the denomination, in January, 1862, nine months after the first gun was fired on Fort Sumter, appointed one of its members to visit Fortress Monroe for the purpose of ascertaining the facts, in order that a wise course of action might be adopted. The Board recommended the Society to enter this great and needy field. The Society, animated by a high and almost prophetic spirit, as shown in the resolutions adopted