church and rural prosperity. The Department of Church and Country Life is teaching that the country church is the thermometer of rural welfare.

The department is making sociological surveys in Pennsylvania, in Illinois, in Indiana and in Missouri. These surveys are in preparation and already the results of them have been exhibited at public gatherings such as the Corn Exposition, and at religious meeting such as the General Assembly. These surveys are so thorough that university professors recognize their authority, and so practical that synodical and presbyterial superintendents use them as a basis of their work.

Among the conspicuous social service institutions before which the Superintendent of the Department has presented its work in the past year, are Cornell University, Amherst Agricultural College, the University of Michigan, the New England Country Church Association, the various Silver Bay Assemblies, the National conference of Charities and Corrections, the American Sociological Society, the Conference of Education in the South, and other representative bodies. In the past summer the department has assembled in four summer schools over one hundred country ministers. These men were all selected because of the excellence and the leadership exhibited in their work. They studied together Rural Sociology and the relation of the economic life to the religious life among country people, with many other related topics, but the bulk of their preferences were for the economic and sociological studies. Their meetings were in connection with the Summer School of the South, Summer School of Theology at Auburn Theological Seminary, the University of

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Wisconsin Summer School and the Grove City Summer School of Religious Sociology. These meetings were exact responses to the need which the minister feels who has been ten or fifteen years in service; the need of a post-graduate course of training in the social and economic life of the people. Their value to the Board of Home Missions is in the increased efficiency of the ministers themselves who have attended these meetings.

In the country community the Church has a connection with the farmer's struggle to get a living. A living is more than bread and a house and a coat. It is the satisfaction of every want which enters a Christian home. Country people need the help and guidance of the Church in increasing their income, in making that income worth while, but the most important thing is that the Church should guide the people of the country community in promoting rural prosperity, as it is defined by Director L. H. Bailey, of Cornell. This definition means that the farmer who prospers is a religious man. Director Bailey says that prosperity for a farmer means a good income: an income sufficient for raising a family well; sufficient for contributions to the institutions of the community, the Church and the school, and sufficient for maintaining the soil so that it is better at the end of his tillage than it was when he got it.

Farming is a religious occupation. The people in the open country will not long stay there, if they are not sober and devout. Country life generates religious feeling. It is for the Church, which teaches the truth of holy Scripture, to refine and to train this naïve religion of the country and make it permanent, virile and spiritual in the Kingdom of God.

A

FTER teaching for a year in a remote portion of the Kentucky mountains, coming into daily contact with the mountain people, and, as far as possible studying mountain conditions, my friend and I were much interested in the work being carried on by the Rev. Harvey S. Murdoch and Mrs. Murdoch, at the Presbyterian school, "Witherspoon College," by name, at Buckhorn, Perry county, Kentucky.

We were particularly impressed with Mr. and Mrs. Murdoch and their fitness for the work which they are carrying on. They are well and favorably known, not only to their immediate neighbors, but to the mountain people living near the remote creeks and in little "hollers" of the surrounding country, and have won their hearty commendation and cooperation.

In a modest way they have incorporated into

the work at Buckhorn the best characteristics of the most progressive of the mountain schools, and furthermore, have added other features which place it among the best schools in the mountains. Beside the ordinary school work, they have

Domestic Science, Kindergarten, and a

Hospital, with clinics several times a year. also, various instrumentalities for getting into touch with the people and gradually getting them into touch with the outside world, not only in a social, but in a commercial way. "Socials," lectures and the stereopticon are some of the means which are used.

The special economic features which Mr. Murdoch has incorporated at Buckhorn, and which give it rank are his—

(a) Introduction of a superior breed of hogs.

(b) The rat-proof corn bin.

(c) The incorporating of Buckhorn as a town, allowing the passage of a stock law,

thereby requiring that cattle and hogs shall be kept out of the streets.

(d) Institution of a county fair, with prizes awarded for superior steers, mules, milch-cows, hogs, corn and vegetables, and— for the women-those who bring in the best bread, cake, preserves, coverlets, quilts, etc.

Mrs. Murdoch is a great help to Mr. Murdoch, and her tact and winning personality have been largely instrumental in winning the confidence and cooperation of the people they serve. The women are encouraged to preserve the old mountain arts of spinning, weaving and dyeing, and efforts are made to find a sale for their production outside the mountains.

Mr. Murdoch has his heart in this work, which he is making a life work. The mountains need more such men, strong in religious faith, skilled on the pedagogical side, broad in their general method and practical in their application of all these to the solution of the problem at hand.

I

WAS wiping the dishes-a restful diversion after a morning spent investigating conditions to see what might be done along religious lines to help the community. Mrs. John was washing and talking in her rapid, goodhumored way. The dishpan is a great place for confidences. Out through the open doorway could be seen the hills ablaze with autumn coloring, veiled with the haze of a warm October day. Directly in the center of the picture, outlined against the sky, were the tall shafts of the quarry derricks high up on the hills, while winding through the woods was the gray foot-path trodden hard by men. as they passed night and morning.

John's home was as straight and unadorned as the houses children draw on their slates at school. It was small, for John's philosophy scorned the superfluous. There were two rooms down-stairs and three up-stairs.

The dishes were finished. I was hanging up my apron when Mrs. John began: "There's something I want to tell you,-I've wanted to tell you most ever since you've been with us."

She hesitated a moment, watching the little daughter Helen as she romped with the dog out under the trees. "That," she said, "That ain't his kid." And she poured out her story, a plain, pathetic little tale; much of it could be duplicated many times, back in the New England hills. Her mother had borne a bad reputation, and though she had been carefully brought up by a good woman, her mother's record had followed her. She was bright and lively and ignorant; everyone said she would "go to the bad," and, she said with a sigh, "By and by I got desperate, and I did.” Several weeks before little Helen was born, hearing of a home in a neighboring city, where unfortunate cases like hers were cared for, she went there as an inmate. "I had lots of chances to give away the baby," she continued; "I could a done it and no one would have known, but I always said a woman that got herself in a fix like that, ought to stand by the kid. It was the hardest thing I ever did in my life, when I walked into the town of Harrison, carrying that baby in my arms." She found a situation near her old home and

went out to service, keeping the baby with her.

In February, John, the quarryman, came down to this little village to get a housekeeper. He had built his home, married a pretty-faced woman, who had turned out a "bad lot" and gone off with another man. John quietly secured his divorce and patiently tried to go it alone. However, the business of a quarryman does not fit one well for so feminine an occupation, and John decided he must have a housekeeper; on this quest he first met Baby Helen and her mother. John was big and solid and quiet and sure; he was used to great spaces, and the strength of the hills had been his inheritance. Perhaps it was the brave little woman fighting her battle so pluckily; it may have been John's own kind heart, or possibly it was "love at first sight." Whatever the reason, that very first day, he asked her to marry him. He said, "Now you've been up against it and so have I; if you'll marry me I'll treat you well; I hain't got no bad habits; I don't drink and I don't smoke; I swears sometimes when I gets awful mad. I'll be good to you; I'll bring up the kid as if she was my own; she'll never know no difference."

Of course the little woman said "Yes." No one could long resist John. He went out and bought her wedding clothes, and they were married on Saturday, and went back to the house by the woods to begin their new life.

I recalled my meeting with John a few weeks before when I first came to the quarry locality. It was slender, black-eyed Mrs. John, who had left her wash-tub in response to the minister's call, and had replied that she could take the lady to board, "if she ain't too particular."

Before John came from the quarry that night, she confided to her guest that "John don't never like to talk religion," and was plainly relieved when assured that John wouldn't have to.

Here the little wife's discernment failed, or there appeared a wholly undiscovered side of John's nature. After the first meal, during which I underwent as quiet and straight forward a "sizing up" as had ever been my portion, John decided to "talk religion." Sometimes it seemed as if the pent-up interrogations of a lifetime were poured forth.

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England hills. His father, and his father's father had wrung a living by hard toil from the very land where his own home now stood. His father, a slight, wiry, close-fisted Yankee, had raised six sons and three daughters, and still worked a part of the old farm. John's schooling had been a few terms in the district school. Being one of the oldest sons, most of the time he must work on the farm; books were an unnecessary luxury, and "learning" not sufficiently profitable in dollars and cents to appeal to the "old man." "I am glad I'm poor," said John one day, "and I'm glad I have to work for a living; I don't take much stock in holidays either, for I always loaf around and eat too much."

John was thoroughly and unconsciously Christian. His creed was so simple that he never knew he had one, and its fundamental doctrine was "Be square." The sedate white church on the hill three miles away, that was supposed to minister to the quarry community, had his veneration, but not his love, and the pastor, a dignified, scholarly old gentleman, who knew books but not men, was mildly criticised but never scorned by John.

"He don't know us men over here," he said; "when he comes to see us, all he wants to know is why we don't go to church. Now when I do go to church," continued John, “I can't seem to get nothing out of the sermon." I had a painfully vivid recollection that the two sermons heard by me in that same white church had been on “The Uprising in Turkey" and "Modern Proofs of the Immortality of the Soul"; I heartily sympathized with John!

"It don't seem to me," said John one evening, when we were driving out to a schoolhouse meeting, "that the minister's onto his job." And then he outlined simply and plainly his idea of what a church should be in a community. He was not the least disconcerted when I inquired why he did not join the church and help to make it what it should be. "I often thought about it," he replied, “but you see, I can't promise all that you have to. I always keep a promise, and I never could keep all that, I know I couldn't, and so I ain't never going to promise."

After all, it was John himself, not what he said, but what he was that was so worth while, the plain every-day religion he lived, the wholesome fundamental things that made

Prayer.

TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION.

(Note. These may be taken by the leader, but preferably each topic should be assigned to some member in advance, and a report given at the meeting, a general discussion following if time permits.)

I. Improved Country Schools.

1. The One Room Country School.

Failure to educate youth for life in the
Country.

Large proportion of exodus to city for
better schools.

Possibilities of Improvement.

(Article in this issue, by Florence M. Lane, page 427.)

2. The Consolidated Rural School. ("The American Rural School," H. W. Foght. "Country Schools in Ohio," A. B. Graham.)

3. The Folk Schools of Denmark. (Article in this issue by George Fernstrom, page 423.)

II. Citizenship and Community Building. 1. The Gospel of Cooperation.

III.

1.

In business. (Article in this issue by
Louis Hancock, page 430.)

Among Churches. (Articles on Federa

tion, Assembly Herald, August, 1911,
pages 389 and 395.)

Cooperation of Church and other Com-
munity Institutions. (“The Day of the
Country Church," J. O. Ashenhurst,
Chapter XI.)

The Church as a Community Center.
A Country Church Program.
(Article in this issue by Dr. Warren H.
Wilson. Leaflets Department of
Church and Country Life. Pres.
Board of Home Missions.)

2. Successful Country Churches.
(Church at Hanover, N. J. Illustration
and note in this issue. Leaflet "Mod-
ern Methods in the Country Church."
McNutt. Pres. Board of Home Mis-
sions.)

Closing:

Hymn: "O Master, let me walk with Thee."

Brief prayer or Benediction.

A

FEW questions answered. What is this Young People's Department? That part of the Board of Home Missions and Woman's Board from which home mission opportunities and obligations are presented to Presbyterian Sunday schools and young people's societies.

What methods are in operation? An extensive correspondence of an educational character with individuals representing all departments of Church work. On their initiative special salaries, stations, etc., are assigned for the home mission offerings of local societies or Sunday schools, and information furnished for same before and after the work is adopted. Through over three hundred synodical and presbyterial secretaries appointed by the women's organizations, general "ob

jects" (salaries or stations) are assigned to groups of societies, and followed up with the "Field Letter" three times a year. Seven of these letters are issued.

Samples of programs for the C. E. home mission meetings are furnished to a special mailing list one month in advance of the date, and supplies for the societies are sent as requested.

Summer conferences are promoted through the sending of printed announcements and personal letters, providing teachers for study classes and platform speakers.

Suggestions are given for rallies, the "Young People's Hour" at presbyterial meetings, etc. Books for missionary reading are recommended.

Chairmen of missionary committees in Sun

day schools and young people's societies are provided with letters, leaflets, and the two special Sunday school programs. Illustrations for the International Sunday School Lessons are prepared and "Kingdom Comments" issued quarterly. Home mission illustrations are also prepared for The Westminster Teacher, and one page each month of The Home Mission Monthly and ASSEMBLY HERALD are given for a presentation of our work. Study class leaders are sought and helps for home mission study provided. What can you do? Read the letters and the magazine articles. Use the programs. Send to the secretary of the department any good methods for young people's work. Hear the call of your country to give yourself for leadership in young people's societies, Sunday schools, Junior societies, Mission Bands, study classes, or as presbyterial or local secretaries. See that the missionary meetings are worth while; that attendance is worked up; that material is on hand, etc. Give of your means for the sending of workers and on the field;

to

keep them comfortable

for the scholarship fund-to help boys and girls to the Christian training of our mission schools; for new buildings, repairs, and necessary equipment. There are fully "fifty-seven

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varieties" of service in this world-wide work of missions. Pray-Give-Go with the Gospel message.

and

Own

A few gleanings from recent missionary convention conferences may be helpful: To brighten your meetings, "Put to work your Own 'gray matter,' adapt programs, etc., to suit your local conditions." Change the seating. Have programs with two sides, and divide the room accordingly. Group under flags, or seat at tables with the participants at an inner table. Use costumes for participants. For the Scripture have one to read each verse-all on the platform or near the front. Try the "Questionaire" or meeting on "Facts." Debates are attractive and educational. Have one meeting for which all the missionary material shall be from secular magazines and papers. An intermediate department of a Sunday school brought out a missionary magazine by the boys, and the girls issued a "newspaper." The spirit of rivalry was of

benefit to the whole school. Have an "every member canvass" to assure attendance. Some one said, "The five things the missionary meetings need are perspiration, agitation, education, inspiration, aspiration."