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December i, 1909. THE PRESBYTERIA] spending the winter in a house with walls of packed mud, whose lower floor had been ten inches under water during the summer, and whose mud walls were therefore marred with dampness for months afterward ; and we have seen the ill-health that followed this exposure. Wc saw another mission family living in a house (the best that their means would allow), whose walls varied from the perpendicular one foot in ten. It was sustained by poles set up diagonally to prop it from falling. Of course it is impossible to protect our. miccinnaripc ? mm A o f * 11 win mt uainaj^t <11 i?mg jrum sxrceis without a sewer, or from the effects of garbage left to rot in the hot sun. But with the increased resources coming from this bequest, the homes of the mission laborers of our sister church can at least be made more com fortable. This bequest does not directly aid our own Church or work. It all goes into the treasury of the Northern Assembly. And yet indirectly it may help our work. It may set some of our noble men and women to thinking whether they may not do something special for the mission work that is under our own care. As they witness the benefits that are to flow to our sister Church from this beneficence they will ask, when and how our own Church mav receive n nimilnr beln Mr. Kennedy postponed his giving till his death. Now the bequests will all have (we suppose) to be scaled by the government. We apprehend that the "collateral inheritance tax" will take perhaps ten per cent, from each of these contributions and put it into the government coffers. If our friends can see their way clear to make their donations while yet living, this expense will be saved. By all means let us do at once whatever our hearts bid us do. AMONG THE MEN. It is unquestionably true that there is a revival of interest in religious and mission work among the men of the churches. For this and for all that it signifies and all that it promises we may well be profoundly thankful to God. Felt and evident most in centers where great meetings have been held and appeals made, it is a fact also in many of the smaller commu nines ana in country churches. Bible class work for men has been almost universally established, and its fruits are appearing in intelligence, character, attachment to the Church of Christ and zeal for its progress. In many places brotherhoods are pattered, for the organization of Christian men in Christ's service, that shall at least begin to compare with the great work of Christian women. The Laymen's Missionary Movement is an expression of the religious interest of men, and it is the means of stirring and extending that interest. Undenominational and comprehensive as it is, it is thoroughly evanceliral nnrl malrpc ilc or>n?al <?/-.! 0 J - - ?-Q ?vw? MJ/J/VUi OVltlJf IUI LUC proclamation in all the world of the one everlasting gospel of redemption through a divine and crucified Redeemer. Wherever the appeal of this Movement has been heard it has again directed the faith and love of our church men to Christ our Lord and Saviour, and awakened anew their desire to serve Him and to exalt His name before the whole world. And it directs their zeal and newly consecrated energies not into any new 4 * y 4 N OF THE SOUTH. 3 church or agencies," but to the churches, local and denominational, to which they are now attached and where their vows are recorde^l. The results directly aimed at, and most immediately apparent, are in the large increase of offerings to missions and the world-conquest for Christ. And this is itself religious; it indicates and it works genuine religious revival, and of the best kind. To make these pledges and to keep them reciuires the faith and lnvp the self-denial and sacrifice of the true Christian life. And our men are richly blessed therein. But the value of all this movement among men, confessing the name of Christ, will not be only in the fuller treasuries of the House of God, and the extension of the Kingdom in other lands, nor yet in the deepening and enlargement of personal religious life. A farther result, we may hope, will be in the lessening the hold of the world with its rewards and pleasures upon the hearts and lives of a great body of Christian laymen. The greatest peril of our country today is probably in our material prosperity. We suppose history has not recorded such a rapid development of resources and accumulation of wealth as is seen today in America. Our own Southland is growing rich far beyond anything we ever knew. The prospect of wealth is everywhere before the eyes of the young men, and the desire is created, and the energies are directed, with in nvoaing muui dim growing speea. corner aims are belittled, other devices are cast aside. The numbers who enter the race increase daily, and the fever burns more fiercely. Wealth, and what it brings of pleasure and pride, of luxury and appetite, becomes a na- * tional passion. We can not blind our eyes to the peril. It is written many times in history. It is seen in our day in other lands and other sections. Is the curse of wealth to come upon our people? Covetousness and selfishness, and forgetfulness of better things, and absorption in gold, and demoralization and degeneracy. It is an old and oft-repeated story. It is written of individuals. It is written of nations. Shall it be written of our Southland? Of our Church communities? Of our sons? Rather than wealth at such cost; with corruption and vice and shame, and the rejection of morals i u_i? ?i ? < < ? - auu icngiuu, aim an awiui ruin, let us nave poverty, with virtue and the fear of God before our eyes. Among the men, will the Misisonary Movement, and any other movement, call them back from the peril, and keep them from blindness, and hold them up out of the sea of worldliness, and make them rich in faith and love, rich toward God, most happy in the service of another King? That is what we are hoping! One can hardly restrain a little smile when told of a Sunday-school "Home Department" organized on a penitentiary farm of Louisiana. Such is the fact, however, and it is a good fact, an example well worthy of imitation. Of course the members have to stav "at home," but none the less should they be cared for by those who love to tell of Jesus and his love, and to spread the knowledge of the Word of God. The New Orleans church, which is doing this work, is worthy of all praise.