teeoee lit*'-, \q sang jo} fully;
Pcho;-:! W h'lt wondrous works
iTave, b- the Lord, b'-en wrought; Behold ! What precious souls
Have, by His blood, been bought.
.'s ibc hades of evening 'Ire', on, liie different bard* ii'.'kl their farewell meetings in their teepees. There were sounds of sweet music—jovous ones—ech-
oing and re-echoing over the prairies—'He leadeth me, r^h i-rcv^ions thought/' 'Nearer, nv/ God to thee,' 'Blessed Assurance, Jesus hath given'—until the wlicle ^ii- blended in one gran.I retrain:— 'Blest be the tii* that l.'nds
Oiu- hearts .n Cliristiin love; The fellowship of Christian minds Is like to that above.' The Council Tent was in darkness! The lights were out in the teepees. The whole camp was wrapped in solid slumber. And as we sunk to rest in our bed of new-mown hay, we breathed a pra3^er for the slumbering Sioux around us; May the Cloud, by day, and the Pillar of Fire, by night, guide the Sioux Nation through the Red Sea of Savagery, superstition and sin to the Promised Land of Christian Civiliza-tic'U.
The Native Missionary Society. It is well worth a journey to the land of the Dako-tas to witness an anniversary gathering of their Woman's Misssionary Society. You enter the great Council Tent. It is thronged with these nut- brown women of the plains. A matronly woman welcomes you, and presides with grace and dignity. A bright and beautiful young maiden—a graduate of Santee or Good Will—controls the organ and sweetly leads the service of song. And oh how they do sing! You cannot understand the words, but the airs are familiar. Now it is Bishop Coxe's 'Latter Day' sung with vim in the Indian tongue;
• ''We are living, we are dwelling,
In a grand and awful time;
In an age on ages telling,
To be living is sublime.' And now some sedate matron rises and reads a carefully written paper, contrasting their past, vile teepee life of ignoble servitude to Satan, with their present, pure life of glorious liberty in the. Lord Jesus Christ. And then they sing, so earnestly for they are thinking of their pagan sisters of the wild tribes, sitting in darkness and the shadow of death, in the reeions bevond. The hymn is Draper's ''Missionary Chant.'
'Ye Christian heralds, go proclaim
Salvation through Emmanuel's name;
To distant lands the tidings bear
And plant the Rose of Sharon there.' And now a lively young lass, neatly attired, comes forward and with a fine, clear accent, recites a poem 01 hope, touching the bright future of their tribe, when tbe present generation of young men and maidens, nourished in Christian homes, educated in Christian schools and trained in the Young People's societies for efficient service, shall control their tribe, and move the great masses of their people upward and God-ward, and elevate the Sioux Nation to a lofty plane of Christian civilization and culture; and enable them to display to the world the rich fruition of Christian service. And, by request, their voices ring out in song these thrilling words;
aC among the SIOUX.
'Watchman, tell us of the night, For the morning seems to dawn; Traveller, darkness takes its flight, Doubt and terror are withdrawn. Watchman, let thy wanderings cease; Hie thee, to thy quiet home; Traveller, lo, the Prince of Peace, Lo, the Son of God is come!'
Fervent prayers are frequently interspersed in these exercises. And oh, what wondrous liberality these dark- skinned sisters of the Dakota plains display!
How full their hands are with rich gifts, gleaned out of their poverty for the treasury of their Saviour-ving. For many years, the average annual contribu-icns per capita to missoins, by these Sioux sisters, nave fully measured up to the standard of tlieir more lighly favored Anglo-Saxon sisters of the wealthy Presbyterian and Congregational denominations,of which they form a humble part.
Chapter VI.
It was 1905. From the heights of Sisseton, South Dakota, another striking scene met the eye. The great triajigiilar Sisseton reserve of one million acres no longer exists. Three hundred thousand of its choicest acres are now held in severalty by the fifteen hundred members of the Sisseton and Wahpetou Band of the Dakotas—the ''Leaf Dwellers' of the plains. Their homes, their schools, their churches cover the prairies. That spire pointing heavenward rises from Good Will Church, a commodious, well-furnished edifice, with windows of stained glass. Within its walls, there worship on the Sabbath, scores of dusky Presbyterian Christians. The pastor, the Rev. Charles Crawford, in whose veins there flows the mingled blood of the shrewd Scotch fur trader and the savage Sioux, lives in that comfortable farm house a few rods distant. He has a pastorate that many a white minister might covet. Miles to the west, still stands in its grassy cove on the coteaux of the prairie, the Church of the Ascension, referring not to the ascension of our Lord, but to 'the going up' of the prairies. On the hill a-bovc it, is the cozy home of the pastor emeritus, the the Rev. John Raptiste Renville, whose pastorate, in point of continuous service, has been the longest in the two Dakotas. After a long lifetime of faithful ministrations to the people of his own charge, enfeebled by age and disease, he sweetly fell asleep in Jesus, Dec.
19, 1904. Doubtless his is a starry crown, richly gemmed, in token of the multitude of the souls of his fellow tribesmen, led to the Savior by his tender, faithful ministry of a life-time in their midst. Round about these two churches cluster half a dozen other congregations, worshipping in comfortable church homes. These form only a part of the
PRESBYTERY OF DAKOTA.
The original Presbytery of Dakota was organized September 30, 1844, at the mission Home of Dr. Williamson, at L.ac-qui-Parle, Minnesota. It was organized, by the missionaries, among the Dakotas, for the furtherance of their peculiar work. The charter members were three ministers, the Rev. Samuel W. Pond, Rev. Thomas S. Williamson, M.D., and Rev. Stephen R. Riggs and one elder Alexander G. Huggins. It was an independent presbytery, and, for fourteen years, was not connected wdth any Synod. It was a lone presbytery, in a vast region, now covered by a dozen Synods and scores of presbyteries. For many years, the white and Indian churches that were organized in Minnesota, were united in this presbytery and wrought harmoniously together. In 1858, the General Assembly of Presbyterian churches (N. S.) invited this independent presbytery to unite with her two Minnesota Presbyteries and form the Synod of Minnesota which was accomplished.
