an average attendance
of a hundred; and up to 1850 more than a thousand persons had been
brought into fellowship with this church.

The Foreign Missionary Board of the Southern Baptist Convention in
1845 turned its attention to this fruitful field. In 1855, ten years
after they began work, they had 19 religious and secular teachers, 11
day-schools, 400 pupils, and 484 members in their churches. There were
13 mission-stations, and all the teachers were colored men.

We have said, a few pages back in this chapter, that the Methodist
Church was first on the field when the colony of Liberia was founded.
We should have said _one_ of the first; because we find, in "Gammell's
History of the American Baptist Missions," that the Baptists were in
this colony as missionaries in 1822, that under the direction of the
Revs. Lot Carey and Collin Teage, two intelligent Colored Baptists, a
church was founded. Mr. Carey was a man of most exemplary character.
He had received an education in Virginia, where he had resided as a
freeman for some years, having purchased his freedom by his personal
efforts, and where also he was ordained in 1821.

"In September, 1826, he was unanimously elected vice-agent
of the colony; and on the return of Mr. Ashmun to the United
States, in 1828, he was appointed to discharge the duties of
governor in the interim,--a task which he performed during
the brief remnant of his life with wisdom, and with credit
to himself. His death took place in a manner that was
fearfully sudden and extraordinary. The natives of the
country had committed depredations upon the property of the
colony, and were threatening general hostilities. Mr. Carey,
in his capacity as acting governor, immediately called out
the military forces of the colony, and commenced vigorous
measures for repelling the assault and protecting the
settlements. He was at the magazine, engaged in
superintending the making of cartridges, when by the
oversetting of a lamp, a large mass of powder became
ignited, and produced and explosion which resulted in the
death of Mr. Carey, and seven others who were engaged with
him. In this sudden and awful manner perished and
extraordinary man,--one who in a higher sphere might have
developed many of the noblest energies of character and who,
even in the humble capacity of a missionary among his own
benight