Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1879-01-16

temperance meeting and to the Sun
day >school Convention Of Morrison
County, which was to be held in anoth>
ier school-house eight miles Distant on
the two two following days, Saturday and
Sunday. AT the temperance meeting
the house was packed full, though the
night was dark. The exercises were in
charge of the president of the local
league, and were continued, with
every appearance of great and unabat>
ed interest, until eleven o'clock. Evil
IDENTIFY these frontier Christians, Call
vinists, Methodists and all, believe in,
as they there illustrated, the persever~
ance of the saints. The next morning
Mr. y Mason, who could not be happy if
he were not always doing good, arr
ranged to take our excellent hostess
and her baby with US to the Sunday
school Convention. We four went
very comfortably in the buggy, which
had seats for only two. With water
bucket for seat and with one leg
over the dashboard Mr.. Mason rode
in great comfort. Two or three miles
out we overlook a young girl and her
younger brother, who bad set forth to
walk ten miles to the convention.
"Christine, do you think you could
get up and ride behind ?" inquired
Mr.. Mason, with quick and sympa>
thetic admiration for the zeal the girl
was showing in coming out to the
meeting. She thought she could, and
so she and her brother mounted the
valises which we had slowed into the
back part of our expanding vehicle;
and thus We six jolted along, a happy
company, in the buggy which was
made to carry only two. When hearts
expand to meet every call of need. ard
every opportunity to do good, even
rigid and narrow bugg1es become elas~
tic and wonderfully capacious.
These facts present, perhaps, as fair
a picture as any which could well be
drawn, of much of the work which
successful and devoted Sunday>school
missionary. as Mr.. Mason is, has to do.
The meetings of the convention
we're marked by increased attendance
aud deepening interest from the be-
ginning to the close. We had with
US Revs. Stegner, Kinney and Rosen~
krans, pastors laboring In the region,
and Mr.. Henry Plant, layman from
Minneapolis, who is generally known
and beloved throughout the State, and
whose Bible readings were sound in
Interpretation, instructive, and we'll
adapted to quicken the believer and
to bring the impenitent to right de-
cision. We preach the gospel some~
times with heaviness of heart, but it
was great Joy to speak to those whose
eager faces and fixed and sometimes
fearful attention showed that their
souls chad Appetite" and that they
we're hungry for the Bread of life.
Of the meetings in which it was my
privilege to participate, I heed not
not speak further in detail. The diff
cu'ties which the laborer for Christ
has to confront in these frontier set>
Elements are often many and formida~
BILE. The country is sparsely settled,
and those who would attend religious
services have sometimes to 20 long
distances. 1ntemperancc in many quar>
ters prevails to an alarming extent.
An illustration of this may be found
! in the fact that in one district where
the people had expended all their pub
lie funds in building a school house,
they raised money to buy the furni>
ture by bringing to the new house fif>
teen kegs of beer, and with this they
had drunken carousal during which
one man was murdered. There is al
so much in6delity which takes the
form of active and sometimes of vio>
lent opposition to the truth. The peo-
pie are mostly poor, so that those who
would, cannot give much for the sup
port Of the gospel. Hence they have
preaching only at infrequent intervals.
But Notwithstanding these drawbacks,
there are many who witness by their
labors and sacrifices a touching devo>
ton in the service of Christ. One
man in Benton County, who was too
poor to buy horse, was so rich in
love that he willingly walked nine
miles each way every Sabbath, sum-