were bringing for him from Leavenworth to Lawrence, he was left to fight his battle as best he might.  It was at this conjuncture that he made the acquaintance of the brethren at Big Springs, and became impressed with the simplicity and scriptural authority of our plea.  It is well known that there never was more than a paper wall between ourselves and “The Old Christian Order,” and there seemed nothing in the way of Bro.  Hutchison.  He had in his heart no theory of a regeneration wrought by a miracle, and which gives to a convert a supernatural evidence of pardon before baptism, and that should, therefore, compel him to reject the words of Jesus:  “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.”

The Christian Brethren have been supposed to have some leaning to Unitarianism, but he betrayed no such leaning.  But while he had no love for the barbarous language in which Trinitarians have sometimes spoken of the divine relation subsisting between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, yet he was willing to ascribe to our Lord all that is ascribed to him in the Holy Scriptures.  Thus joyfully he accepted this new brotherhood he had found in Kansas, and our churches just as joyfully set him to preaching.  We needed preachers, and here was one already made to our hand.

Early in the spring of 1860 the weather came off exquisitely fine.  It was like a hectic flush—­the deceptive seeming of health on the cheek of the consumptive.  It was a spring without rain, in which the sun was shining beautiful and bright, in which the evenings were balmy and pleasant, and the road good; but to be followed by a summer of scorching heat, of hot winds that burned the vegetation like the breath of a furnace, leaving the people to starve.  The inhabitants of Kansas will never forget the year 1860, the drought and the famine.

It was in the springtime, in the midst of this beautiful weather, we called Bro.  Hutchinson to come to Pardee and help us.  This protracted meeting resulted in a great ingathering.  It was largely made up of young men, who, for the time being, were located on the eastern border of Kansas, but that in the stirring and stormy times that were to follow were to be scattered over every part of the Great West.  And now Bro.  Hutchinson’s fame as a revivalist began to spread abroad, and many neighborhoods where there were a few Disciples, and who were anxious to build themselves into a congregation, sent for him to come and help them; and thus our churches rapidly grew in number, and our acquaintance with the brethren was greatly extended.  As a result, there came to be a common feeling among them that we ought to come together in a State, or rather a Territorial, meeting.  Pursuant to such a purpose, a general meeting was called at Big Springs, Aug. 9, 1860, C. M. Mock having been called to the chair, and W. O. Ferguson, of Emporia, having been made secretary.

The following churches reported themselves as having been organized in the Territory: