Here in these mountains live over two million people, two-thirds of whom have never written nor received a letter, could not read one if printed and sent them.  They take no newspapers, and the great events of nations or discoveries of science have been nothing to them.  Questions of vital importance to our country have never troubled them.  They knew there was a war, for contending armies met on their grounds.  With few exceptions their sympathies were with the Union.  Too poor to own slaves to any extent, they had no motive for seceding, and many of them joined our army and were faithful soldiers.

At the close of the war, they went back to their secluded homes, and between them and the world the curtain fell again.  We very well know that mortals cannot rise above their surroundings only within defined limits.  Alas! for the defeated manhood and blasted womanhood in our land, held down to earth by unfortunate surroundings.  They are looking to you for help.  You have done nobly in sustaining a work in their midst.  Besides what you have done at Pleasant Hill, Grand View and other points, you have enabled us to organize eight churches and build one academy and eight houses of worship.  You have sent among us most efficient teachers.  Besides their school duties they have taken upon themselves to visit the homes, to pray with the sick, to distribute clothing among the needy, to go to the homes of the students, to share their humble fare and sleep in their crowded rooms.  They have spared neither time nor strength to carry the uplifting word to those needy souls.  From the better classes we have been fortunate enough to draw a nucleus for each of our churches.  We have some Sunday-school superintendents that for zeal and tact are models in their work and many a Northern school might rejoice in the possession of such officers.  They are not so well versed in Scripture as we could wish, but they spare neither time nor expense to prepare themselves for their work.

This class of people responds quickly to the new life that comes to them by the school, the railroad or the business man.  If we could find as ready response in the masses as we find in the individuals, our work in the mountains would be quickly done.  But, alas! what of these hundreds of thousands who seemingly have no more aspiration than the brute in their field?  They are wedded to the customs of their ancestors, and they rebel at any innovation.  Give them tobacco, and whiskey, and pistols, a little meal and bacon and coffee, a crude bed and a roof, and that, to them, is living.  Oh, those purposeless lives!  They exist simply because they are in the world and cannot help it.  With the girls especially, marriage is the chief aim, and what should be the holy relation is entered upon almost in childhood.  As soon as they begin to lisp they are talking of their lovers.  A little wee girl came to a teacher’s home, and after answering in monosyllables the common questions