THIRD CLASS MISSIONS.

Commenced in 1864.

THE missions of this class are neither foreign nor domestic in the sense of these terms as usually understood and employed by us. They are described in the Constitution of the Missionary Society as

MISSIONS IN THE UNITED STATES AND TERRITORIES, NOT INCLUDED IN ANY OF THE ANNUAL CONFERENCES.

For convenience of administration, the missions during the past year were arranged in five departments, as follows:

1. MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT, including Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas; under the episcopal supervision of BISHOP THOMSON.

2. MIDDLE DEPARTMENT, including so much of Tennessee as is not comprised within the Holston Conference, Alabama, and Western Georgia; under the episcopal supervision of BISHOP CLARK.

3. SOUTHERN DEPARTMENT, including South Carolina, Eastern Georgia, and Florida; under the episcopal supervision of BISHOP BAKER.

4. NORTHERN DEPARTMENT, including Eastern North Carolina, and so much of Virginia as is not included in the Baltimore Conference; under the episcopal supervision of BISHOP SCOTT.

5. INTERIOR DEPARTMENT, including all interior territories not included in any Annual Conference; under the episcopal supervision of BISHOP KINGSLEY.

1. MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT.

This department was organized into the Mississippi Mission Conference, by Bishop Thomson, on Christmas day, 1865, a full account of which is given in the Annual Report of last year; but the whole field being so clearly and exclusively missionary ground, and the missions themselves having been administered during the past year according to the rules and

usages governing in Third Class Missions, it is deemed fitting to give to the Church a more extended report of the condition and prospects of the work within its bounds than is usually done in relation to domestic missions in an Annual Conference.

The following report from Rev. Dr. Newman relates to so much of this department as is included in Louisiana and Mississippi. Texas, having been constituted a Conference of itself, is not included:

MISSISSIPPI MISSION CONFERENCE.

One year ago last Christmas the Mississippi Mission Conference was organized in New Orleans by the Rev. Bishop Thomson. The beginning was small; the field immense; the laborers few; the embarrassments many; the prospects not bright. We were in an enemy's land; a majority of the white population watched us with a jealous eye, the old-established Churches refused to recognize us as co-laborers in a common cause, the Northern resident citizens were afraid to worship with us, and the press, both secular and religious, denounced us as intruders. In addition to these embarrassments, we had but five church edifices in the three states, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, all of which were for our colored members, while there was not one for our white congregations. Thus we commenced the Conference year of 1866. Such trying circumstances demanded brave hearts, clear heads, faith in the future, and sweet communion with God.

At the close of the first session of our Conference, and after much prayer, our brethren separated to enter upon their untried fields of labor. As they went forth, our itinerants felt that the days of the fathers had returned. One presiding elder had the whole state of Texas for his district; another, the entire state of Mississippi; while a single preacher was sent to a circuit two hundred miles long. With but sixteen preachers, we took possession, in the name of the Lord, of the whole Southwest. The prosecution of the work has been laborious and perilous, and our ministers have been subjected to insults and violence; some of them have been threatened to be shot or hung, while one was so brutally wounded that he has been compelled to abandon his post. Such treatment we expected from the ungodly whites of the South, who for four years had fought against our benign government; but we had not anticipated open violence from Christian Churches. We did not look for co-operation, but we had reason to expect non-interference. Yet the M. E. Church, South, and the

African M. E. Church, have not ceased to misrepresent our motives, to prophesy evil of our work, to mob our preachers, and break up our services. Without social affinities to unite them, with a quarter of a century of mutual antagonisms to separate them, with no common end to attain, except to oppose our Church in the South, these Churches-one white and the other black, one proslavery and the other antislavery, one loyal and the other disloyal-have combined against us. But we rejoice to record it, that in every instance of collision our preachers have triumphed in the name of the Lord.

Next to this ecclesiastical opposition, our chief embarrassment has arisen from the unsettled condition of the country. The repeal of martial law has left the interior of our department without law; with state governments unrecognized by Congress, the officers of the civil law are lax in the discharge of their duties, or weak to protect the citizen against violence, where there is a disposition to extend such protection; not unfrequently a question of jurisdiction arises between the civil and military authorities, and the rights of the citizen are sacrificed by the prolonged controversy which follows. In many instances our people have sought protection from the Freedmen's Bureau; but in too many cases the agents of the bureau are powerless to afford redress, or have been corrupted with bribes from the guilty party. What we most need in the Southwest to-day is, a strong, wise, just government, whether civil or military. For want of this, every branch of industry suf fers; trade is paralyzed, commerce is interrupted, agriculture is crippled, and a general feeling of unsafety and alarm pervades the community. Such a state of society is not favorable to the advancement and efficiency of the Church.

For the most part our missionaries have labored among the people of color. By a traditional faith, cherished since their forced separation from us in '44, they await our coming and receive us gladly. As a whole, their condition excites our pity. Poor, ignorant, superstitious, and debased, they are a sad commentary on the institution of domestic slavery. Yet we rejoice in their apparent improvement within a year. Taught to be honest, truthtelling, chaste, industrious, and pious, they have illustrated these virtues in every-day life. Thrown upon their own resources by the fortunes of war, they have proved their capacity for selfsupport; not a few of them have purchased land, while a larger number cultivate the soil on shares. Taking advantage of the provisions of the Homestead Bill, many families have pre-empted eighty acres, at the small cost of $28, and are now masters of their

own plantations. Judging from the signs of the times, the blacks are to be the farmers of the South; the whites, the merchants. As an illustration of their frugality, the Freedmen of New Orleans deposited in our Freedmen's Savings Bank, from June to December, 1866, over $26,000. They are a rising power; let us control it for God!

Wherever they have the opportunity, the children of the freedmen attend school, and they learn rapidly and thoroughly, so far as they go. They excel in those studies which tax the perceptive rather than the reflective faculties. They manifest great delight in attending school, and their parents seem proud when their children can read to them the Bible. In view of these facts, it is to be regretted that at present there is no general and well-organized system of education for the children of the freedmen. The Church should look to this. For the present, the state cannot provide for this great need; the blacks, themselves, cannot; the Church can and should.

The great religious want of colored people of the South is educated pastors. They desire men of their own race to be their spiritual teachers, and in this they are wise, at least for the present; but this exclusiveness should be allowed only from necessity, and not from prejudice; we should expect the day when all shall be "one in Christ." For the time being, it is impossible to supply our southern work with white pastors; nor is this desirable, all things considered; the Church, therefore, should educate, as rapidly as possible, her colored youth, that they may be prepared for the Christian ministry. The whole race is being educated, and is daily increasing in knowledge. The average intelligence of the people will be greater than that of their present pastors. A new generation will demand a new ministry. Will the Church provide for such a demand?

The year 1866 is memorable for the conversion of precious souls. On nearly every charge in the Conference the Lord revived his work. And now, after a twelvemonth of labor, we exclaim, "What hath God wrought!" A year ago we had sixteen preachers, now thirty-one; then two thousand five hundred members, now eight thousand; then five churches worth $47,000, now twenty-three churches worth $120,000; and during the year our people have contributed not less than $26,000 for Church purposes. Texas district having been formed into an Annual Conference, its statistics are not included in the following table.