The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-09-29

penters and surveyor and laid out this
ground wherein the building was to
stand. 1T is to be so feet long and 40
feet wide," he wrote. 1.-THE foundation
Is to be OF brick, and is to be sunk
feet within and raised feet above the
ground. The house is to be two stories
high, with a hip roof; the first ten,
the second nine feet high. In all there
will be nearly 20 commodious rooms.
Behind are to be two small houses, the
one for an infirmary, the other for q
work house. There is also to be still
house for an apothecary." The plan for
the main building was drawn by Mr..
Day, who received 2 pounds, 10 shill-
ings for the work.
On Feb. 4 Whitefield met the magis-
trates and heard the recorder read the
grant and their appreciation of the
same. When the work on the buildings
began Whitefeld, from his own state
ment, had only about $50 pounds in
cash. But we have Omnipotence for
our support" said he. In the following
March, while in Charleston, the first
collection in America for the orphan
age was made at the church OF Rev.
Joseph Smith, 20 pounds being secured,
Whitefield having been requested to
speak in behalf of the proposed home.
MANY thought he spoke as never man
spoke" said the Charleston clergyman
of his visitor. $50 charmed were the
people with his manner of address that
they shut up their shops. forgot their
secular business, and laid aside their
schemes for the world; and the oftener
he preached the keener edge he SEEM
ed to put upon their desires
to hear him again." a testimony that
was strikingly sustained many years
later by Benjamin Franklin, who, look
ing back to Whitefield's visits to Phil
adelphia, said of those days: ''It was
wonderful to see the change soon made
in the manners of our inhabitants.
From being thoughtless and Indifferent
about religion it seemed as If all the
world was growing religious, so that
one could not walk through the town in
an evening without hearing psalms
sung in different families in every
street"
A few days after his visit to Charles
ton, Whitefield, on Tuesday, March Is,
1740, with full assurance of faith"
laid the first brick of the home, at the
same time naming IL Bethesda" with
the hope that IL would be a house OF
mercy to many souls" References are
occasionally found to 1T as white
fields House Of Mercy" ''rhe workmen
attended" wrote Whiteheld in his
JOuTHhtb anu WIN hHeeleu uOWn
and prayed. After we had sung
hymn suitable to the occasion, gave
word of exhortation to the laborers
and bid them remember TO work heart
lily, knowing that they worked for
God" BY the time the building was
under way forty children, girls as we'll
as boys, had been placed under White
f1eld's care. They represented English.
Scotch. Dutch, French and American
nativity. Counting the workmen there
were nearly one hundred to feed. The
available funds were rapidly dimin-
lshing, the needs were pressing. IN
daunted by the burden, and the COM
parative poverty of the territory before
him. Whitefield set of I'm the orphan
house sloop, THE Savannah" prob
ably the first craft TO bear the name.
for Newcastle, in Pennsylvania, and
there resumed the double work OF
bringing sinners TO repentance and
procuring money and supplies for the
sustenance OF the orphans. Large col
Continued on fifteenth Page.