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which has been called Christianity in the plantation churches of the
South. The testimony which comes to us of the moral and religious
condition of many communities in the Black Belt, is startling. One negro
witness who has been in direct association for many years with ministers
in this part of the South, says, "three-fourths of those who are now
acting as preachers in all this region, are absolutely unfit to preach the
gospel. It is rare that one can find in the country districts where the
masses of the people dwell, a minister who is both intelligent and morally
upright."

It is not long since the "Wilderness-Worshiper" excitement swept through a
region of the South like a prairie fire. The excitement of expectancy for
the immediate coming of Christ added fire to the hearts of the people.
Hugh pyres of pine logs were rolled together and lit into flame as the
darkness of night came on. These great fires were to light the way for the
Saviour when He should come. Men rolled their bodies through the forests
in a kind of pagan ecstasy of self-sacrifice to meet Him. So credulous are
the negroes of the Black Belt, says a resident white lawyer, that if a
fellow with a wig of long hair and a glib tongue should appear among them
and say he is the Christ, inside of a week the turmoil of the
Wilderness-Worship would be outdone.

Now, a great awakening is beginning among these dark masses of people. Dr.
Curry has well said: "Freedom itself is educatory. The energy of
representative institutions is a valuable school-master. To control one's
labor, to enjoy the earnings of it, to make contracts freely, to have the
right of locomotion, and change of residence and business, have a helpful
influence on mankind." Many of these people are calling for better
preachers; preachers who are earnest and virtuous men and know their
Bibles. "We used to listen," said a negro man at a recent meeting, "to
these whooping and hollering preachers who snort so you could hear them
over three hundred yards, and we would come home and say, 'That's the
greatest sermon I ever heard.' But now we want men who can teach us
something." "Our preachers are not what they ought to be," said one woman.
"We have got too many gripsack preachers--men who go around from church to
church with a gripsack, not full of sermons, but of bottles of whisky,
which they sell to the members of their congregation." Great masses of
negro people are beginning to feel that what th