churches. One soon loses sight of mispronunciation and wretched
grammar in listening to the sensible, meaty, forceful ideas which many
of these negroes can express. You cannot go to a prayer-meeting
without bringing something away.

One good old mother in Israel said to me lately, in regard to the
weekly prayer-meeting: "I begins in de mawnin' to lay my plans fur dat
meetin', an I don stop ter eat so's to get my work along froo de day.
And I tinks and prays a heap about dat meetin' all day, I does."

How many of you at home do as much for your prayer-meeting as this
poor old colored woman? No dull summer prayer-meetings when church
members go prepared like this. I have said that these people have
ideas and can express them. At my last prayer-meeting before departing
for my vacation, one good brother prayed that the "Lord would bless
the pastor in his absence and continue to fill him up with new things,
so he can give them out to us." The pastor is filling up as fast as
possible.

One of the questions most often asked is, "Are the colored people
improving?" One has to say, "Of course they are." But are they
progressing rapidly? Yes and no. Yes, considering their antecedents
and present advantages. No, if one were to measure their rate of
progress by our impatience. The surest progress is not the swiftest.
Slow and sure is the rule by which we work. Statistics but feebly tell
the story of the improvement of the Freedmen since the war.
They can best testify concerning the advance who have been in the
field since the beginning of the work.

But even if it is slow, it pays well. There came into my church one