about shiftless and hopeless. When asked why they don't work they repli because it was nigger's work;' and when asked why they didn't send th children to school, they answered, because they were taught by Yankees.' "The great hope for the country lies in the fact that the coloured people år learned that they must work and save and study to make themselves Give them political position, civil position, social position, and they will w steadily on and rise higher and higher until they hold the position they fitted for; and we cannot decide to-day what that position is to be. The hope in regard to the negro is that he is so eager to study. The feeble hy helplessly groping in the darkness have touched God's hand and been lifted and strengthened. Go where you please among the coloured people and find schools. In the city of Nashville you continually hear of General Fi school. Meet a coloured child there and ask him if he goes to school, and says, 'I does.' Ask him where, and he says, 'Gen'l Fisk's school.' "Two little coloured boys were disputing in the streets of that city (wh they have two coloured schools) and one taunted the other with, 'You go d to the bone factory to school,' and the other replied, 'I don't care; Ise larni any how.' "I went to see an old woman in Grenada said to be one hundred and twe years old. I found her sitting down over a large Bible given her by minister, following along the page letter by letter, line by line, as she lo at it through her spectacles. I said, 'Do you know how to read?' "'No.' "What are you doing then?' "Well,' she said, 'I'se got so old I can't learn the letters. I am three four hundred years old. I tries to learn the letters, but I forgets them just fast as I learns them. I was only looking to see how they looks, for whe dies and goes home to heaven I hopes to be able to learn to read the bles Bible, and I thought I might remember how it looked to me here.' "The people want to learn to read because they want to be able to read themselves the promise and word of the Lord Jesus Christ. The men want be able to read the newspapers to find out what is going on in the country, to be better fitted to hold the ballot. They have a clear idea of the situation political affairs. I attended a love feast and listened to speeches from sever coloured men. One of them had attended a conservatiye meeting the Saturd night before, and in his speech he referred to it as follows: "There was a man that made a speech and said we niggers had wool in ( teeth. I don't know what he meant unless that we talk nigger talk. Ise nigger and I'se got wool in my teeth, but when the election comes we'll tal some big tooth-picks and pick the wool out of our teeth, and if that is not enou we'll take the wool off our heads and stuff a republican chair and we'll take t republican candidate in it and carry him into Nashville.' "We already see more than we dared to hope for: one child teaching another. 'o that this work is going forward rapidly. Where they are urging us to send hem teachers now, we shall soon find this work taken out of our hands into Fheir own, and they will be found abundantly able to carry it on, and instead of he poor wretches that we saw two years ago huddled together in Federal arracks dying like beasts, we shall find a strong earnest people able to assist In the affairs of government-a people which will have been born out of the vork done by the people of the North." HE FIRST AFRICAN CHURCH IN great that the mother did not know her; RICHMOND. Richmond, June 13th, 1867. Messrs. Editors,- We are often reminded hat here in old Virginia we are living under new dispensation. As we look around and witness the wonderful changes that have taken lace within the last three years, we are eady to exclaim, What hath God wrought! came to this city soon after the fall of the Confederacy, and have been engaged with the reed-men since that time, who number in the city some twenty thousand. The first African church is supposed to have a larger membership than any other on the continent, if not in Christendom. It has 30 deacons, and numbers on its records more than 4,000, with over 3,000 resident members. Many of the absent ones were sold to the cotton States before and during the war. When freedom came to them, many returned to their families and the church. Some cases of touching interest have come to my notice, one of which I will mention here. More than twenty years ago an aged mother had all her children sold away from her but one; that was a daughter on whom she leaned for help and comfort in old age. But her master decided to sell this daughter, then a young woman; and, said the slave mother, "I thought it would kill me." "Well, said I, aunty, what did you do then ?" "What did I do? why I prayed all night, and de Lord He promised me dat I should see my daughter again." and when she was told that this was her daughter, she exclaimed: "Well, I knew I should see her again, for de Lord He promise me dat my daughter should come back some time." The religious interest here among the colored people, since the war closed, has been great. In one church the additions by profession have been nearly 700. Last Sabbath 17 were received, by profession, in the presence of a large congregation, and several strangers. Of these one had been the slave and the wife of a slave trader lately deceased. She is an excellent woman, and, though never legally married to him, he left her with his property; and the premises used for the confinement of slaves will soon be converted into a school for the instruction of colored men preparing for the ministry. Another was a little boy, twelve years old, who gave a very intelligent account of his Christian experience, and of his interest in Christ. It does seem as though God is preparing this people, so long oppressed and wronged, for some good mission in the future. And is it not strange that the good people of the South do not more fully comprehend their duty to redress these wrongs, and to unite with the people of the North in every effort for their improvement? They are now free in the eyes of the law, and will claim their rights. Yours truly G. S. STOCK WELL. And sure enough when the war closed, this long-lost child came all the way from Mississippi in search of her aged mother, from whom she had been separated more than twenty THE FOOD CRISIS in what was termed the years, and of whom she had heard nothing. "burnt district" of Mississipi has passed But when she found her the change was so away by recent abundant crops. MEETING FOR THE RECEPTION OF MR. North than it was in the South, I think LLOYD GARRISON. A large and influential gathering was held (June 30th) at St. James's Hall, to recognize the eminent and unequalled services of Mr. Lloyd Garrison in the cause of emancipation in the United States. The sentiments expressed on the occasion were not only complimentary but worthy of permanent record for their intrinsic excellence. was in the year 1835 that riots of the m terrific character took place in some of u northern cities; during that time Mr. Gr2 rison's life was in the most imminent pe and he has never ascertained to this day it was that he was left alive on the earth. carry out his great work. Turning to t South, a State that has lately suffered fr the ravages of armies, the State of Ge MR. BRIGHT, M.P., in an eloquent address by its legislature of House, Senate sketched the course of the pioneers and Governor, if my memory does not deceivers martyrs of the cause. He said: "It is not passed a bill, offering 10,000 dols. rewardforty years ago, I believe about the year (Mr. Garrison here said 5,000)—well, tis 1829, that the guest whom we honour seemed to think there were people who w this morning was spending his solitary do it cheap-offered 5,000 dols., and days in a prison in the slave-owning city of doubtless, would make up the difference, it Baltimore. I will not say that he was the capture of Mr. Garrison, or for adequa languishing in prison, for that I do not believe; proof of his death. Now, these were mási he was sustained by a hope that did not yield and perils such as we have not in our to the persecution of those who thus mal- been accustomed to in this country in any treated him; and to show that the effect of our political movements-and we shall that imprisonment was of no avail to suppress a very poor measure indeed of the condu or extinguish his ardour, within two years the leaders of the emancipation party int after that he had the courage-the audacity United States if we measure them by any -I dare say many of his countrymen used those who have been concerned in polt even a stronger phrase than that he had the movements amongst us. But, notwithstands courage to commence the publication, in the all drawbacks, the cause was gather city of Boston, of a newspaper devoted mainly strength, and Mr. Garrison found himsel to the question of the abolition of slavery. and by surrounded by a small but incressTM The first number of that paper, published the band of men and women who were der 1st July, 1831, contained an address to the to this cause, as he himself was.” public, one passage of which I have often read with the greatest interest, and it is a key to the future life of Mr. Garrison. He had been complained of for having used hard language -but it is a very common complaint indeed -and he said in his first number:-"I am aware that many object to the severity of my language, but is there not cause for such severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. I am in earnest, I will not equivocate, I will not excuse, I will not retract a single inch, and I will be heard." And that, after all, expresses to a great extent the future course of his life. But what was at that time the temper of the people amongst whom he lived-of the people who are glorying now, as they well may glory, in the abolition of slavery throughout their country? At that time it was very little better in the In reference to the war and its results, BRIGHT said: "It becomes us not to rejoice, to be humbled, that a chastisement so terti should have fallen upon any of our race; t we may be thankful for this, that that ch tisement was at least not sent in vain. great triumph in the field was not all; th came after it another great triumpl triumph over passion, and there came before the world the spectacle, not of are and military commanders, but of the magnan mity and mercy of a powerful and victoria nation. The vanquished were treated vanquished, in the history of the world, bar never before been treated. There was universal feeling in the North that every ca should be taken of those who had so recent and marvellously been enfranchised. Im diately we found that the privileges of ind Dendence were open to them, schools were established, in which their sons might obtain in education that would raise them to an Intellectual position never reached by their athers, and at length full political rights were conferred upon those who a few short years, >r rather months, before had been called hattels and things to be bought and sold in ny market. Take for granted, we may feel issured, that those persons in the Northern States who befriended the negro in his bondage vill not now resist his struggles for a higher Dosition. May we not say, reviewing what as taken place—and I have only glanced in he briefest possible way at the chief aspects of this great question-that probably history as no sadder, and yet, if we take a different iew, I may say also probably no brighter age. To Mr. Garrison more than to any ther man this is due; his is the creation of hat opinion which has made slavery hateful ind which has made freedom possible in America. His name is venerated in his own country-venerated where not long ago it was name of obloquy and reproach. His name s venerated in this country and in Europe wheresoever Christianity softens the hearts nd lessens the sorrows of men; and I venture o say that in time to come, near or remote I know not, his name will become the herald ind the synonyme of good to millions of men who will dwell on the now almost unknown continent of Africa." After a graceful tribute to the English Anti-Slavery leaders and to "the most eloquent living champion of the slave, George Thompson,' Mr. Bright continued: "To William Lloyd Garrison it has been given in manner not often permitted to those who do great things of this kind, to see the ripe Fruit of his vast labours. Over a territory arge enough to make many realms, he has een hopeless toil supplanted by confederated ndustry; and where the bondman dragged is chain, there freedom is established for We now welcome him amongst us as friend whom some of us have known long, or I have watched his career with no common nterest, even when I was too young to take nuch part in public affairs, and I have kept within my heart his name and the names of ever. those who have been associated with him in every step which he has taken; and in public debate in the halls of peace, or even on the blood-soiled fields of war, my heart has always been with those who were the friends of freedom. We welcome him, then, with a cordiality which brooks no stint and knows no limit for him and for his noble associates, both men and women, and we venture to speak a verdict which, I believe, will be sanctioned by all mankind, not only those who live now, but those who shall come after, to whom their perseverance and their success shall be a lesson and a help in those future struggles which remain for men to make." THE DUKE OF ARGYLL, in moving an appropriate address prepared by Mr. Goldwin Smith said: "With regard to the cause, it was not too much to say that the cause of negro emancipation in the United States of America had been the greatest cause which, in ancient or in modern times, has been pleaded at the bar of the moral judgment of mankind. Не knew that to some this would sound as the language of exaggerated feeling, but he could only say that he had expressed himself in language which he believed conveyed the literal truth of the case. He had, indeed, often heard it said in deprecation of the amount of interest which was bestowed in this country on the cause of the negro emancipation in America, that they were apt to forget the forms of suffering which were immediately at their own doors, over which they had some control, and to express exaggerated feeling as to the forms of suffering with which they had nothing to do, and for which they were not responsible. He had never objected to that language in so far as it might tend to recall them to the duties which lay immediately around them, and in so far as it might tend to make them recollect the forgetfulness of which they were sometimes guilty, of the misery and poverty in their own country; but, on the other hand, he would never admit for he thought it would be confounding great moral distinctions-that the miseries which arose by way of natural consequence out of the poverty and the vices of mankind, were to be compared with those miseries which were the direct result of positive law had to encounter much opprobrium; t and of a positive institution, giving to man this country against slavery in their colza property in man. It was true, also, that they might recollect that Clarkson and there had been forms of servitude, meaning berforce were denounced as fanatics, thereby compulsory labour, against which they did not entertain the same feelings of hostility and horror with which they regarded slavery in America. Although they rejoiced at the cessation of serfdom in Russia, what person felt in regard to that condition of things as he felt in regard to negro slavery in America. Undoubtedly the condition of compulsory servitude had been a stage in the progress of mankind, and they rejoiced that that stage had been passed; but with regard to negro slavery in America, it was not one, but many circumstances which constituted its peculiar aggravation and horror. It was a system of which might be truly said it was twice cursed. It curseth him that serves, and it curseth him that owns the slave. When they recollected the inseparable temptations which that system held out to maintain in a state of degradation and ignorance a whole race of mankind; the horrors of the internal slave trade,more widely demoralising, in his opinion, than the foreign slave trade itself; the violence which was done to the sanctities of domestic life; the corrupting effect which it was having upon the very churches of Christianity when they recollected all these things, they could fully estimate the evil from which his distinguished friend and his coadjutors had at last redeemed their country. It was not only the Slave States which were concerned in the guilt of slavery; it had struck its root deep in the Free States of North America. And what were the Free States of North America? It might be said with truth that America was a country which seemed destined by Almighty God to test the question, what man can do best for himself. If such be the cause, what were they to say of the man and of the services which he had rendered to that cause? They honoured Mr. Garrison in the first place, for the immense pluck and courage which he displayed. The chairman had truly said that there was no comparison between the contest which Mr. Garrison had had to fight, and the most bitter contest of their own public life. In looking back to the contest which was maintained in almost in a one-oared boat. He stood a He could not help saying that in their rece tion that day of Mr. Garrison they *.* entitled to think of him as representing increased power and force which is exerte our own times by the moral opinions of kind. It was true that they had had la some of the most tremendous and bl wars which history recorded, and he, for must admit that the time had not yet con it was not even in sight-when they a turn their swords into ploughshares and t spears into pruning-hooks; but if they lo to the great events to which he had refer it would be seen that in our own time march of great battalions had generally in the wake of the march of great princ that in the freedom of Italy, in the conso tion of Germany, and still more in the rece triumph in America, they were to look to triumphs of opinion as, in the main, the umphs which had been won. He cu understand the joy which must be felt by great sovereign or by a great general wi standing even amidst the heaps of slain, could feel that he had won the independe of a country, or still better, had establi the independence of a race. They could however, understand still better the joy of |