growing. Several railroads running in different directions, and more in process of construction. Men have laid the rails on a new road-the third road passing through Sheldon-within the past week. Many thousands of acres of railroad lands have been sold in O'Brien County the last six months.

"What can be done for the Baptist cause? This is a question on my mind day and night. We have eight small Baptist churches in this field of five counties. Only the Sheldon Church has any ministerial labor, so far as I know, at present. I feel that something must be done to meet this crying want."

in washing-the last chance for the poor widow. My path has always been a thorny one, and it seems to grow darker all the while. May be it will be light in the morning."

If anybody desires to relieve the necessities of this bereaved missionary's wife we will cheerfully transmit to her all contributions received for this purpose.

WISCONSIN.-Rev. J. Staley, of Antigo, says that "the completion and dedication of our church building early last spring have proved a great advantage to the Baptist church of Antigo. The growth of this young city has been marked during the year now closing. About $200,000 have been expended in the erection of new buildings since last spring, and there has been a corresponding growth in population.

"The church has beheld its influence and

power for good increased many fold by the possession of a good building in which to gather its congregations and Sabbath-school classes.

KANSAS.-Rev. H. R. Williams, of Blue Rapids, reports an interesting work of grace in the place:

"We have had a gracious revival during the last month. Rev. W. H. Hurlbutt came to assist us the first Sunday in December, and labored with us four weeks. The results, so far, have

have been twenty baptisms, two more accepted and one by letter; and if we secure what rightfully belongs to us, there will be from fifteen to twenty more to come into the Church.

"The loss of the crop by drouth makes times very close, and salary is not paid up now; but think it will be soon. We have laid the foundation for a parsonage of six rooms, and hope to complete it during the next quarter. The work on the same will be pretty much all donated."

-The widow of one ofour German missionaries, recently deceased, writes: "I am here, unprovided for with my children. The older ones are able to do a little for our support. My oldest son, a noble lad of fifteen, is willing to stay out of school for a while and help mother if he can get work. We are in a small village of the far West. We cannot stay here, so I will have to go to some city where I formerly lived, and take

"Four persons, adults, have given evidence of conversion, and others are manifesting an interest in their salvation. I have been going on a

village on the railroad, twenty-two miles north of here, called Elcho. It may be truly said of all this region that the harvest is great while the laborers are few.

There are scores of neighborhoods where fruitful work could be done if we only had the laborers."

ILLINOIS. The first Bohemian mission work undertaken by the Society is in Chicago, where large numbers of this nationality are found. The Baptists of Chicago are deeply interested, and become responsible for the larger part, if not the whole, of the expense of this mission the first year.

The Bohemians are almost wholly Catholics. Brave John Huss, the reformer, was a Bohehemian. God prosper the work.

WASHINGTON TERRITORY.-Rev. Knut Nelson, of Seattle, writing in December, says:

Since my last report my work among the Scandinavian people in Seattle has been greatly blessed. For six weeks we have been holding extra meetings. About thirty-five have found Christ, and many others are deeply interested. As a result of our meetings, sixteen have been baptized, and eleven have been received by letter and experience. From twenty-four our membership has increased to fifty-one. It is all from our dear Lord Jesus. Praise be to His name.

Baptisms.

Missionaries who report five or more baptisms during the quarter ending December 31, 1887, are as follows:

W. H. Adams, Raven's Eye, W. Va., 5; J. M. Haskell, Gresham, Oregon, 13; O. A. Weenolsen, Tabernacle Mission, Minneapolis, 16; C. R. Sargent, North East Church, Minneapolis, 20; F. M. Archer, Albert Lea, Minn., 5; R. R. Sadler, Wayne C. H. and Cerede, W. Va., 5; Manuel P. Flores, Apodaca, Mexico, 7; J. D. Matthews, Belleville, Kans., 10; J. M. Shulene, Swedish Church, Princeton, Ill., 6; H. R. Williams, Blue Rapids, Kans., 23; M. P. Hunt, Ellsworth, Kans., 23; E. J. Bronson, Brainerd, Minn., 7; P. S. Sommers, Ocala, Fla., 6; Knut Nelson, Seattle, Wash., 16; A. P. Hanson, Swedish Church, Joliet, Ills., 6. S. J. Winegar, Mitchell, Dak., 5.

CHURCH EDIFICE DEPT.

THE RESPONSES.

We requested all the churches that had received aid from our Gift Fund to make a thank offering during the month of December to aid us in helping other churches. The result is extremely gratifying. Of course, many of these churches are small and weak, and the amounts contributed is necessarily small; but they have shown a willing mind, and that they appreciate the aid given them. The largest contributions were from Sioux Falls, Dakota, and Pueblo, Colorado, both churches sending the same amount; and the next largest was from Monterey, Mexico. The Swedish churches aided have almost all of them responded. The following is the list by States of those whose contributions have reached us up to date:

Horne, Sheldon, Davenport, Burlington. Arizona-Prescott. Michigan-Berrien Springs, Whitehall, Bad Axe. Nebraska-Huntingdon, York, Weeping Water, Creighton. MexicoMonterey. Idaho-Caldwell. Indian Territory-Weber's Falls. California-Gonzales, Wheatland, Chico. Colorado-Pueblo, South Pueblo, Grand Junction. Oregon-Albany. Washington Territory-Dayton, Whatcom, Tacoma, Seattle. North Carolina-Graham. Edgar, Neb.; Milwaukie, Wis.; Augusta, Ark.; Salida, Col.; Stevensville, Mont.; Still

water, Minn.

That $10,000 Fund.

Many of the brethren and sisters have sent in their names to become One of the Hundred, and we have now about half the amount secured, and only about two months from the time this

will reach our readers to the time when the whole amount must be secured. With this $10,000 we shall be well equipped for our spring work, but will we obtain it? Not without the help of our pastors. It would be an easy matter for the pastors to bring this matter before their benevolent committees, and arrange either to raise by special collection, or to designate from the general collection, $100 to this fund, and thus secure the whole amount. If they will do this and let us know, so that we can consider them as subscribers to the fund, the money might be paid in at such times as they thought best. In this way we could know just what information to give to our missionaries who are on fields suffering for a house of worship. Brother pastors, help us in this. Our General Missionary for Oregon writes: "When I see the many fields white unto the harvest and no reapers for them, then I think we most need money to sustain missionaries; and when I see churches with no place in which to meet or gather a Sunday-school, with the missionaries preaching in private houses, school houses, and rooms in storehouses, then I think we need money most for chapels." The truth is that these two works supplement each other. To sow the seeds of Gospel truth in the new communities of the West we must have the Gospel minister, with his heart of zeal and tongue of love, moving among the people. To give permanency to his work and to build up a working church we must have a church home. To think that with $10,000 twenty chapels can be secured before the summer ends is enough to move the heart

annual report shows $1,800.95 paid. So in two years there has been $3,440. 14 gathered. During this time a membership of fifty-three has been registered, twenty-four having been added the last year. This might be duplicated all over the Northwest. Baptists coming West may well come this way."

EDUCATIONAL DEPARTMENT

A SAD STATE OF THINGS.

There lies before us a circular entitled, "A BLAST FROM THE YOUTH. The Young Men of Jackson Utter Their Ultimatum." The production emanates from Jackson, Miss. It is printed in red ink. At the top is a picture of muskets, pistols and a powder flask. The occasion of this proclamation was the killing of a white man by a colored man, the latter also receiving a mortal wound. This occurred in a street melée on Christmas Eve. Election was approaching. "The Young White Men's League" thereupon met and prepared this manifesto, ordering "a thousand copies to be printed and distributed so soon as a nomination was made."

In it they say: "Driven by no sudden passion or blind impulse, but actuated by a firm and deliberate sense of the duty we owe to ourselves and to our race, we hereby warn the negroes that if any one of their race attempts to run for office in the approaching election he does so at his supremest peril; and we further warn any and all negroes of this city against attempting, at their utmost hazard, by vote or influence, to foist on us again this black and damnable machine miscalled government of our city." The "ultimatum" further declares that the present "government of our city should, must and shall be wiped out, cost what it may."

The effect was to intimidate the colored people, so that none went to the polls on election day. They say, "The Government can't protect us."

Sad as are the political features of this case, sadder still is it when viewed in its religious aspects. Jackson is, nominally at least, a Christian community. This "ultimatum " states that "The Young White Men's League of Jackson com

So, then, it is to be presumed that not a few members of Christian churches voted for this "ultimatum," which asserts, under the pictorial flourish of shot-guns and revolvers, that their object must and shall be accomplished,

66

cost what it may," and which “ warns the negroes," at their " supremest peril," and at their "utmost hazard," against voting or influencing men to vote against the white candidates! Is it surprising that Christian men should be found in such company, uttering threats of violence to person, even to the point of taking human life? Yet only about a year ago the editor of the Baptist Record, at Jackson, Miss., himself a Doctor of Divinity, published an article from his own pen in which he declared, in capital letters: "There is one point settled in the nature of thinge--NEGRO RULE CANNOT BE BORNE ! Let that be written large, and who will may read."

If Christian teachers utter such sentiments, is it very strange that members of churches in the common walks of life join in these unchristian utterances of this "ultimatum”?

And, after all, the Mayor of Jackson was not, as one would infer from this document, a black, but a white man, though elected by the aid of colored voters.

Blind men are they who pursue a course like this. Can they not see that they are preparing the colored people for retaliation as soon as they can organize their forces? Can they not see that they are sowing the seeds of a "war of the races"? Have they nothing to fear for themselves and for their children when the black

man's patience shall have been exhausted? If white men draw the "white line," will it be strange if black men draw the "black line"? The editor of the Record, in the article referred to, says: "A country banded together by race ties, or any other way, is doomed." Yet here are white men avowedly banded together by white race ties making political war in the most unchristian and un-American manner against the negro race. Is Jackson, then, doomed "?

In such a condition of things, how much the pure Gospel is needed to lay its heavenly hand of peace on the head alike of white and black, saying: "Ye are brethren. Live in

peace. Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them."

The work of Christian education and evangelization must be prosecuted with unabated vigor among the colored people of the South, so that in these bitter experiences they may exercise the virtues of Christian self-restraint and patience, and by increased intelligence and ability may better discharge their duties as citizens and secure the just recognition of their rights.

News and Notes.

INDIAN UNIVERSITY.-The first term closed very successfully. Miss Anna Moore writes that the public exercises were very interesting. The public examinations of the past week were try. ing, yet satisfying to teachers and students, for the results show that thorough work has been done. This institution is becoming a power for good in the Territory. Our wish is that the friends at home may remember us at the throne of grace, and give support to carry on the work.

Our President, Prof. Bacone, is overworked, but may our heavenly Father give him additional strength. He seems just the man for the place.

Its

"I have never known more earnestness in study or better progress made since I have been here than during the three last months of the year. The tone of the school is excellent. discipline we make paternal, and the spirit shown by the pupils is in the main, and I may say, with hardly an exception, filial.

"The prayer meetings are well attended, nearly all the students being present and no time is lost; a freedom and an earnestness and a fervor mark them which is refreshing and in

spiring. Little excitement, but a tender thoughtfulness is often manifested which results in from half a dozen to a score rising for prayers. They are slow, however, in finding their way into the light. One has given gratifying evidence of a true faith and others, we hope, are not far behind him.

"Professors Andrews and Freeman are working with brains and heart, and getting a strong hold of their pupils.

"We have eighteen beneficiaries, nine of whom are supported by Sunday schools, churches or associations.

"I am supplying three Sunday schools with photographs, cabinet size, with recipitants of their benefactions, and have received gratifying expressions of satisfaction from the schools.

"I wish especially to thank the Circles in many churches for the aid they have rendered us in timely boxes and barrels of clothing."

BENEDICT INSTITUTE.-Mrs. M. C. Becker writes: "I have sixty young women in Colby Hall. Every room in this building is occupied. I have furnished the two rooms over the students' dining hall for dormitories; twelve girls there, and two girls have a room at the mansion. They are learning to do well many kinds of work that will make them more useful in the world, and many of them are taking a fine standing in their classes; the sewing room is flourishing, but we need more machines.

"We continued our school in session during the holidays; it was much better for all concerned. In other years money badly needed for other purposes has been wasted in car fares, and a week's visiting, feasting and exposure left them in no condition for study. It has taken three weeks to get the sick cured and the school in as good condition as when it broke up for holiday. This loss, too, at our best time of year for work, in cool winter air. Most of the school assented to our proposition to work through the holidays willingly, and all saw the reasonableness of it.

"Our chapel is full. Some sit in the right hand recitation room, in sight of the chapel platform, there not being seats enough to seat them all in the chapel. Our religious meetings are excellent. All my young women profess religion but three; those asked for prayers at our Colby Hall Bible Class last Sabbath morning. But the great need of all is the knowledge of what it means to be a Christian. They have been taught that a blind belief and baptism is