numbers 158,450, of whom 84,624 are enrolled in her 1,563 common
schools, which are taught by 1,621 teachers of the same nationality. A
county superintendent voluntarily adds: "I should do our colored
teachers an injustice not to speak of them. Most of them are earnest,
zealous workers, doing all in their power for their race."

Turning now to Texas we find that this State has nearly doubled its
enrollment of colored pupils in three years, which now number 62,040,
with 1,696 licensed colored teachers who receive on an average, $41.73
per month. Virginia has 111,114 out of a school population of 265,249
with 1,734 colored teachers who receive $28.65 per month.

That is, in eight representative States there are eight hundred
thousand colored pupils who are now being trained by over fifteen
thousand teachers of the same race. Now the simple but grave question
that every Christian patriot ought to ask himself is, "What kind of
teachers are these, and where are they to come from in the future?" I
asked that question of a gentleman who of all others ought to be able
to answer it correctly and he replied, "Nine-tenths of these teachers
come from the missionary schools, and of these nine-tenths, more than
one-half come from the institutions of the American Missionary
Association." Now we can understand the truthfulness of the testimony
of the Rev. J.L.M. Curry, D.D., the distinguished agent of the Peabody
Fund, who says: "The most that {99} has been done at the South for the
education of the negroes has been done by the Congregationalists. The
American Missionary Association and those allied to it have been the
chief agency, so far as benevolent effort is concerned, in diffusing
right notions of religion, and in carrying education to the darkened
mind of the negro."