Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1878-01-07
LETTER FROM CHICAGO.
Dear Monitor:

LEI TEX FkOM Ch1CA0O.
Dear Monitor:
Since my last letter, the "ltinerant
wheel has completed another revolu-
ton. This time it leaves me with Full
ton Street Church. Chicago. Here we
have a good earnest devoted people. a
beautiful church, and an immense
amount of work. Under such circum-
stances any minister of the Gospel ought
to be happy. and am happy. 10 come
from the mountains of Vermont, silent in
grandeur, immutable IN their steadfast-
ness, the same in the storm or the calm,1
faithful notwithstanding protection
to a people in many respects like
themselves to come from those grand
old mountains to the great rushing.
driving, restless city of Chicago. is in
deed change. To many the change
would be intolerable; to others. wild
enchantment which would soon drift
them off into society's fatal malstrom
to a few. it would prove the place for
their largest and best development to
me. it is an opportunity to preach the
gospel to the poor In the country we
have no poor, aud generally speaking
no rich. The best condition of life-an
almost literal answer to the prayer
Give me neither poverty nor riches. "
is found in the country If you would
have the comforts of home. the real en-
ioyment of life, the attachment of friends,
the beauties of nature, aud that content
ment which hallowed associations afford,
let your abiding place be the country.
But if you want rush and hurry and
money; if you insist on either riches
or poverty; if you are willing to live in
the mud, and care not for filth; if you
want peddler at your door every half
hour. and the old man with rags q la
small por between times; liquor sa-
loon at every tnrn, with q gambling
hole in the rear for your boys to see
the extreme of sin, and want and
wretchedness in contrast with the sham
and shoddy. simmer and futser Of high
life; if you want smoke and cinders,
and every stencil under heaven as
cending up forever and ever, take uE
your abode in the city. Yet, | was
never so happy in my work as here
rvD,or vvrvr0 utsA ss-ny .L<
worlds dying need of the gospel. or the
extreme wretchedness of those who re
ject it. In the country all come. to
some degree at least. within the light
and influence of the gospel. Blu. hers
great multltudes sit in utter darkness
morally. as far from the. light. as the
people of Africa, and far more Difficult
to reach. A few days since. Bishop
Andrews, who has just returned from {
years tour among our Foreign Missions
said in preachers meeting, al an
fully persuaded. there are no more i'm
pOrtant or needy mission fields in tn
world than these dark regions in ou
great cities
But did not intend to write thus
but to be commonplace, and speak o
the weather, which seems to be as IN
certain and unsettled. as many of on
politicians are in principles and inten
tions. Are things generally runnin
into o sort Of craze? The present mont
has been warmer with Us than tn
month of September usually is, ant
September was like July. We hav
had rain almost constantly for NOR
than two months. Water stands every
where; street crossings are almost i'm
E passlble. and even empty wagons Dc
come mired almost as soon as they leav
, the pavement. The sky is overcas
3 and only occasionally does q ray {
sunlight come struggling through. Ye
with all the theoretical conditions fc
disease, the death rate for the la:
month has been from SIS to 43 less pt
week than for the corresponding week
last year.
Politically the West is in a muddl
as Congress certainly is, and if | not
correctly the pulse, the whole nation .
sick. Doubtless this tumble mean
something. 1t may be our preparatlo
for something better than everlasrin
wrangle, to see who shall wear "pail
and feathers in the House and Sena
and apportlOn out the "spolls" anon
their tribe. Let me prophesy that it
the dark before the day,-the gloo
> Just before the dawn about to brea
upon the cause of Temperance! Ge
bless the day And strengthen Il
forces that are SO rapidly gaining pow
and influence among all classes, ar
when the uprising course.-as most a
suredly it will-sweep at a stroke th
bitter wrong from our beloved land.
W. H. Holmes.
Dec. 81, 1877.
g Mrs. Murat Halsted, the wife of Il
. editor of the Cincinnati Commerce.
a a. r -, 80,