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قراءة كتاب The American Missionary — Volume 43, No. 08, August, 1889
تنويه: تعرض هنا نبذة من اول ١٠ صفحات فقط من الكتاب الالكتروني، لقراءة الكتاب كاملا اضغط على الزر “اشتر الآن"

The American Missionary — Volume 43, No. 08, August, 1889
Chicago has just given him a verdict of $125 damages. The defence asked for a new trial on the ground that the judge had prejudiced the jury by his instructions; the judge denied the motion, stating that if he had been on the jury he would have made the fine $500. The defence is seeking a compromise, with the threatened alternative of an appeal. Mr. Smith, standing for the principle, will abide the final act of the court.
TIMHAKA TA IVANGELI.
We are very proud of this book as being the first literary production in an African language of one of our graduates at the South, the Rev. B.F. Ousley, now of the East Central Africa Mission. The missionaries there have already reduced the language to writing, having formed a vocabulary of over three thousand words, and from it have printed a few books. Among them, is the one whose title appears above. It is a translation of "The Story of the Gospel," in a little volume of two hundred and six pages. We have read it with great interest so far as we have been able to understand its dialect. Within our comprehension we find Jesu, the one word in all languages for all people, Simone Petro, Johane, Marta, Maria, and Lazaru and many other such proper names. We congratulate our young people at the South that so soon they have a representative performing such literary work for the people of Africa. Much of such work seems drudgery, but it is necessary to opening the light of life to the people who sit in darkness. A booklet in the same language gives a catechism and some of the songs of the gospel, ten of which are translations by Mr. Ousley of some of the dearest of the gospel songs.
THE SOUTH.
WHAT I FOUND IN THE CUMBERLAND MOUNTAINS.
BY REV. C.W. SHELTON.
First. There are living in this mountain country two millions of white people, until recently isolated from, and untouched by, the civilization of which we are so proud. No centennial anniversary commemorates their growth in wealth and intellect. As their fathers lived, so until recently, have they. One hundred years have witnessed but little progress, almost no change, in their condition. The open fire-place, the spinning-wheel and the home-spun jeans are familiar sights. Forgotten by the rest of the world, they, in turn, forget that beyond these mountain peaks, marking the limit of view and generally the limit of interest, a nation has pressed forward to take its place among the foremost of the earth. And yet no color line has excluded, no reservation boundary separated, this people from their fellow countrymen. Their lack of energy and the stagnation of their minds, is the explanation of this condition of things.
Secondly. I found this mountain people naturally American; in deepest sympathy with our free government; loyal to the old flag in the hour of its greatest danger; fighting, suffering, dying, that the Union might be preserved. To one who has spent any length of time on our western prairies settled so largely with an emigrant people, the great difference between the American born and educated people of the mountains, and the naturalized American of the prairie, constantly emphasizes itself. Here no new language has to be acquired, no new form of government understood. A common interest, a common sympathy, a mother country, binds one at once to this people as it never can to the American importation which is found at the West.
Thirdly. I found homes and a home life, or rather the want of it, which one would hardly believe possible among a white population in this country.
The following illustrations are correct representations of what I found to be average mountain cabins. Seldom do they contain more than two, often only one, room. A single window, an open fire-place, and a few home-made articles of furniture, comprise the whole. The home is begun when its founders are yet children. Ignorant and poor, the boy has "took up" with the girl, and it may be they are legally married. A building-bee is announced, a little cabin erected, a few pigs bought or given, a few trees girdled, some corn planted, in so crude and shiftless a way that even an Indian, in his first attempts at farming, would be ashamed to own it, and home life is begun. Into this home of poverty and ignorance come the children. The families are large—eight, ten, twelve, and sometimes more. The mother is too ignorant herself to instruct, and had she the ability, neither time nor strength to accomplish it are at her command. Life to her is a struggle. At twenty she looks thirty-five, at thirty-five she is old. Always she has a tired, hopeless expression, which simply to look at almost starts the tears. The children have something of the same expression; the babies even seem to realize that it is a sober, sad world they have come into. I do not remember seeing a laughing, cooing baby in all the cabins I visited.


Educationally, I found this people far below the emigrant on the prairie. Seventy per cent. of the whole two millions cannot read or write. The schools are the poorest. The school houses are built of logs; a hole is cut for the window; the ground serves for a floor, slabs for seats, and the teacher is strictly in keeping with all. Bare-footed, hair unkempt, snuff stick in her mouth, scarcely able to read herself, she is the example—the ideal toward which her pupils are to strive.
Religiously, I found that these people, almost without exception, were "professors," and "had jined" not a Christian church, but some one of these native mountain pastors. The accompanying illustration gives a good idea of the mountain church; it is built of logs, and is without windows; the pulpit is an unpainted board; the seats slabs from the nearest saw mill, turned flat side up, with pegs driven in for legs. The ministry is in strict keeping with the church, and intellectually little in advance of the people. They take pride in the fact that "These yer home-spun jeans have never brushed no dust from off no college walls," and exultantly declare that "The Lord taught me how to preach: and when the Lord teaches a man how to preach, you may just reckon he don't make no mistakes."

On every hand, I found indications that the day of isolation for this people is rapidly passing away. Yankee inquisitiveness has discovered that these mountains are full of the best coal and iron—Northern capital has already begun to strip them of their rich forests of black walnut, oak and pine. The rivers are carrying these logs by the thousands to the immense mills, which in turn are making the large towns, toward which already the railroad is hastening.
Engineering skill is bridging streams, crossing valleys, climbing mountains or piercing them through. On every hand we see the change. From their long sleep of a century, these valleys, these homes, this whole people are awakening. A new life is beginning, a new future, opening.
And as a result of all this, I found