co-labourers in the anti-slavery cause, Job Hadley and his wife, who impelled by the interest they felt in the coloured people, were going to Cairo with the hope that they might open a school among the Contrabands there. They were favoured in their good purposes and were the pioneers in the work of education. At this time there were above three thousand souls in the camp at Cairo, among whom there was great destitution. On the return of Levi Coffin to Cincinnati, his home, he laid the wants of the sufferers before a number of philanthropic persons, and as one result the Contraband's Relief Commission was organized. He continued his labours, and by correspondence and personal application, enlisted the sympathies of many persons in behalf of the sufferers, and in a short time, contributions of money and stores for their relief, were daily received. About the same time, the Western Sanitary Commission at St. Louis, organized to supply sanitary stores to the Western armies, became aware of the suffering that existed among the coloured people at Helena, Ark., and took measures for their relief. About four thousand Contrabands had collected there; a large proportion of them had come with the army of Gen. Curtis; the others from the neighbouring districts on both sides of the Mississippi. The following from the pen of Rev. J. G. Forman, Secretary of the Commission, gives the experience of these people at Helena, less than four years ago:-'Many of them were put to work upon the fortifications, and were employed by the quartermasters to load and unload steamboats and coal barges, and as teamsters, with the promise of wages at ten dollars a month. In these labours they were industrious and faithful, and their temperate habits and good conduct were worthy of the highest praise. All of them who could give any evidence of having been employed by their masters to aid the rebellion, received free papers from Major-General Curtis, who was always just and friendly to them, and willing to listen to their complaints. Unfortunately for these people, General Curtis was transferred to St. Louis, the latter part of the next month, to command the Department of Missouri, and was followed by a succession of brigadier-generals, who passed military orders withholding the payment of their wages, expelling them from their lines, and otherwise persecuting them, under which rule many were returned to their masters, and those who remained suffered untold hardships. With the indifference of the commanders to their welfare, the quartermasters neglected to keep full and correct pay rolls, and press-gangs of mounted orderlies were sent through the streets of Helena, who brought them to the levee and compelled them to work without wages or food till they sometimes fell down with exhaustion. Murders, rapes, and robberies, were committed upon them by the worst class of the soldiers with impunity, and the military commanders took no notice of these things. As winter came, these people, being poorly sheltered in huts, worn-out tents, and the most uninhabitable buildings, and very miserably clad, unpaid for their labour, and destitute, suffered incredible hardships, and died in large numbers. The hospital building assigned them was a miserable one-story house, surrounded by mud, where they were put under the charge of a contract-physician, who utterly neglected them, and in which they had no better accommodation than a straw bed on the floor, being without chairs, tables, stoves, cooking utensils, or any of the usual furniture either of a dwelling house or a hospital. The mortality in this hospital in December and January, 1862-63, was fifty per cent. of all who entered; so that the sick freed people often preferred death in any other place to going there.'-This truthful representation of the sufferings at Helena, which an American cannot now read without a blush of shame mantling his cheek, is but too true of every other point where the despised Contrabands were then forced or permitted to congregate. The Contraband Relief Commission began operations late in November, 1862. In January 1863, the Western Sanitary Commission sent Miss Maria R. Mann, a most excellent lady, to Helena, with all the furniture and outfit of a good hospital, with sanitary stores and clothing also for the sick, the poor and the neglected. Before the close of January, 1863, the Western Freed-Mon's Aid Commission was organized at Cincinnati, by a number of Christian men-several of them well-known ministers-for the purpose of combining with physical relief, meatal

elevation. Levi Coffin became its General Agent, and by his efforts and the co-operation of others, it was enabled to do much during February and the early spring months, to relieve the wants of the suffering thousands then to be found in the several Contraband camps in the West. In April, 1863, the Cleveland Freed-men's Aid Commission was organized, and during the first three months of its existence, Chaplain J. R. Locke, detailed by Gen. Grant for the purpose, canvassed for supplies under its auspices. The stores thus collected were chiefly sent to the needy at Helena and vicinity. With the return of the mild season, attention was directed to the subject of education. The Freed-men were everywhere found anxious to have teachers and books; an intense desire to learn to read was all pervading among them. The Western Freed-men's Aid Commission sent three or four teachers to the camps on the Mississippi early in the summer; the Western Sanitary Commission sent three to Helena, Ark. ; the United Presbyterian Society sent a like number to Nashville, Tenn.; the American Missionary Association sent a small corps to Corinth and Memphis. We cannot now give the chronological order in which these schools were established under these societies, nor does it matter. During the year ending Aug. 1st, 1863, comparatively little was done for the education of the Freed-men beyond inaugurating this important part of the benevolent movement in their behalf, though the experiments fully demonstrated their eagerness to learn and the practicability of a combined effort for their relief and elevation.

"SCHOOL YEAR, 1863-61.-The Indiana Freed-men's Aid Commission was organized in September, 1863, with its office at Indianapolis, and the North Western Freed-men's Aid, January 1st, 1864, with its office at Chicago. At the General Assembly of the Old School Presbyterian Church in May, 1861, a Commission was raised to institute a denominational work in behalf of the Freed-men. About the close of this school year, a convention of Freedmen's Societies was held (July 19th and 20th, 1864) at Indianapolis. Reports were made of their operations severally from the time of their organization. As by far the larger proportion of the collections and distributions reported were made during the year of which we now write, we present the following summary:

With this table before us we may estimate that the contributions of cash and stores to these societies for the year ending August 1st, 1861, amounted to not less than a quarter of a million of dollars. During this year the Western Sanitary Commission had six teachers and agents in the field; the Western F. A. Commission, fifty-six; the Indiana F. A. Commission, ten; the Indiana Friends' Committee, twenty; the North Western F. A. Commission, thirtyseven; total, one hundred and twenty-nine. Many of the schools in which these taught were at the Freed-men's camps and hence subject to the same changes. During the year the teachers laboured at Cairo, Ill., Columbus, Ky., Island No. 10, Memphis, President's Island, Camp Holly Springs, Fort Donelson, Clarksville, Providence, Gallatin, Nashville, Murfreesboro, Tenn., Helena and Little Rock, Ark., Goodrich's Landing, Milliken's Bend, Baton Rouge and New Orleans, La, Pawpaw Island, Vicksburg, Island 102 and Natchez, Miss., and in several coloured regiments and on a few plantations. The American Missionary Association had teachers at Vicksburg, Natchez and New Orleans; the United Presbyterian Society at Nashville; the National Freed-men's Relief Association of New York at New

Orleans and Vicksburg. Above one hundred and fifty teachers in all were sent, during this year, to the Freed-men of the Mississippi Valley. The scholars were constantly changing, because of one and another necessity, but the large proportion of them were taught to read-say from ten to twelve thousand. It should be noted that stores for the relief of the needy were sent to all of the above-named points, and distributed mainly through the instrumentality of the teachers. A large number of farm implements and garden seeds were forwarded to the more permanent camps, to encourage the people to efforts for their own support. Industrial schools were also organized in which the women were taught to sew and mend, and make garments. The numbers congregated in the camps were far greater, but the sufferings were proportionately less than during the first year.

SCHOOL YEAR, 1864-65.-The societies named above continued their labours during the year ending August, 1865, except the Contraband Relief Commission, which, towards the close of the winter, turned its work over to the Committee of Indiana Yearly Meeting of Friends. The Western Yearly Meeting of Friends created a Committee in September, 1864, and took part in the work in Tennessee. The United Brethren, with an office at Dayton, Ohio, projected a work at Vicksburg. The Pennsylvania Freed-men's Relief Commission directed their efforts in part to the growing wants of the West, locating their work in Tennessee. The whole movement was greatly strengthened this year by the co-operation of the friends of the Freed-men's cause in Great Britain, which was secured in a large measure by the visit of Levi Coffin to that country. He presented the necessities of the Freed-men, and not the claims of any one society labouring in their behalf, yet the friends, understanding his official relation to the Western F. A. Commission, made it the almoner of a large proportion of their contributions during his stay among them. The system instituted in Louisiana by Gen. Banks, relieved the benevolent societies of most of the work which otherwise would have been required in that state. The western work for the year, therefore, was located in Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi, with points in Louisiana opposite Vicksburg and Natchez. A few of the camps, where there were schools in 1863-4, had been broken up-otherwise the teachers were located at the places previously occupied and enumerated above. The Western Commission had eighty teachers in the field; the North Western Commission, eighty-one; the Indiana Commission, eight; the Western Friend's Committee, eight. The National F. R. Association, the Pennsylvania F. R. Commission, the United Presbyterian, the O. S. Presbyterian, the Baptist and the United Brethren Societies, the Indiana Friend's Committee, and the American Missionary Association, had together about seventy-five teachers in the West. (We have not the exact figures.) It is certain that more than two hundred and fifty teachers were in the five slave states named, during the school year, 1864-5, and most probably gave instruction to twenty thousand different persons, children and adults. Orphan Asylums were established at President's Island and Columbus, Ky., by the Western Commission; at Natchez, by the North Western; at Nashville, by the Pennsylvania, and at Helena, by the Indiana Friends Committee. The cash receipts of the Western and North Western Commissions during the year amounted to 137,687 74 dollars, and their expenditures about 130,000 dollars, for all purposes. It is probable that the cash expenditures of the other societies would make the total amount in the West over 200,000 dollars; the estimated value of stores would approximate the same amount; in all about 400,000 dollars.

SCHOOL YEAR, 1865-66.-During the latter part of the previous school year, the Freed-men's Bureau was organized. One of its first measures in the West was to discontinue the "Freedmen's camps." As a result before the close of the school year, the work of the societies was confined mainly to the cities and larger towns, the centres of population and influence. On the first of August, 1865, the issuance of rations to teachers and agents was discontinued; then followed the surrender, to rebel owners, of the buildings previously used as school-houses and teachers' quarters; and before the close of the necessary summer vacation, all facilities of

transportation for teachers were revoked. In a few instances, Governmnent buildings were set apart for school purposes, but at most points they were sold at auction, and the societies forced to rent houses at exorbitant rates. The expense of supporting teachers and schools was almost doubled, and of maintaining asylums largely increased. These changes will account in great measure for the diminished proportions of the work in the Mississippi Valley, during the year just closed, of which we now write. Last fall, the National F. R. Association, of New York, turned over its interests at Vicksburg to the North Western Commission, and except the retention of two teachers at New Orleans, withdrew from the Valley. The following societies have been labouring in the West during the past year, viz., the Western, North Western, Indiana, Cleveland, Pittsburg and Pennsylvania Commissions; the Friends, United Presbyterian, Old School Presbyterian, Baptist societies and Congrega. tionalists, through the American Missionary Association."

It must not be forgotten that the work in America has reference to four millions of emancipated people. Dr. Rust says, "the hour is full of peril to the interests of the Freedmen; dark clouds gather around and warn us of the approach of the storm." We must not therefore be "weary in well-doing."-W.

RETURNING REASON.

MR.

The extreme bad taste of MR. EYRE's appeal from his official superiors, representing, as it happened, both of the great political parties, to a coterie of personal admirers, confirms the impression, that in judgment and temper he was extraordinarily ill-qualified for a high and responsible position. In a year remarkable for empty and mischievous declamation, the speeches at the Southampton dinner are entitled to the prize of unequalled want of wisdom. KINGSLEY'S doctrine, that a man's acts should be judged in a spirit of confidence, is the converse of the intentionally paradoxical phrase of gratitude for future favours. In ordinary life the past is subjected to judgment, while faith and hope may sometimes form a provisional substitute for a certainty which can only be realized hereafter. LORD HARDWICKE and LORD CARDIGAN are not the best witnesses to character on a charge of extreme severity and violence; nor could any after-dinner enthusiasm remove or mitigate the censure which had been unwillingly and authoritatively pronounced by MR. CARDWELL and LORD CARNARVON. Even if MR. EYRE had not been disavowed and recalled by the Government, the perpetration of bloodshed, however necessary and unavoidable, was not a proper occasion for festive triumph. As far as MR. KINGSLEY and his associates have any intelligible purpose, they must desire to vindicate the principle that human life and positive law, however sacred, are less inviolable than the duty of repressing anarchy and preserving the order of society. It might, in certain conceivable circumstances, which have assuredly not occurred, have been necessary to shoot, to hang, and to flog large numbers of insurgents, and to put their ringleaders to death without regard to the rules of evidence. Judicious and impartial Englishmen would have approved of salutary vigour, but only excited partisans could have thought that wholesale executions were an event of rejoicing. When a general burns a village to prevent its covering the enemy's riflemen, the measure may be consistent with his duty, but it is not customary to erect his statue on the spot.—Saturday Review.

least and most despised of his Master's brethren, shall not go unrewarded in

NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS.

GEO. M. WARE. All trace of the articles we the great day of decision and recom

want seems to be lost.

pense. In Canada many thousands of black and coloured people have settled

The Freed-Man. down in that country under the protec

NOVEMBER, 1866.

QUEEN VICTORIA.

"I have observed with satisfaction that the United States, after terminating successfully the severe struggle in which they were so long engaged, are wisely repairing the ravages of civil war. The abolition of slavery is an event calling forth the cordial sympathies and congratulations of this country, which has always been foremost in showing its abhorence of an institution repugnant to every feeling of justice and humanity."

SPECIAL CLAIMS OF THE

FREED-MEN.

tion, at least what they hope to find the protection, of our beloved Queen. The Rev. W. H. Jones, our agent, is the representative of 100,000 of these black men, women, and children.

There is one marked feature in the great mission work undertaken by the Freed-men's Aid Society. It renders its aid to people anxious to receive and grateful to obtain its assistance. Dr. Judson said "it was a hard thing to convert a heathen." Why is this? Because the heathen in his darkness is unwilling to receive the proffered boon There are three distinct fields of la- of civilization and the Gospel. It is bour requiring aid at the present mo- just the reverse with the black man. ment: the southern States of America, He everywhere hails the benefactor Jamaica, and Canada. Each sphere who bears him material, educational has its peculiar claims, and, we may and religious help as the needy and the add, its peculiar attractions. In the perishing welcomed the gracious aid of southern States of America the Chris- the Saviour of mankind. It is sometian educator is at the present moment times asked what are the practical obdoing the greatest work, as far as edu-jects contemplated by the British and cation is concerned, that the world has Foreign Freed Men's Aid Society? It ever witnessed. Hundreds of thousands, is a question we are ever glad—yes, not only of children but of adults, are most anxious to answer. We ask for being taught to read the word of God, teachers and material help for the and to drink in for the first time the southern States, education for the freeddraughts of a new life at the recently men of Canada, restitution, help and unsealed founts of knowledge. In Ja- education for Jamaica. We call spemaica the Christian missionary, un- cial attention to the appeal on the cover daunted and undismayed by the recent of this Number. We ask the noble "reign of terror," is at his work again, women of England, whose hearts are leaning on a support which has never ever open to the appeals of the ignorant yet failed any true minister of Christ, and the wretched, for their kind coand feeling that to give a cup of cold operation. We are preparing for a Bawater, though it be but to one of the zaar, and earnestly solicit aid in any