METHODISTS. 



495 



METHODISTS. I. Methodist Episcopal Church. 



The following is a summary of the statistics of 

 this church as compiled from the minutes of 

 the conferences for 1887: Number of travel- 

 ing preachers, 12,554; of preachers on trial, 

 1,581 ; of local preachers, 14,032 ; of members, 

 1,860,591 ; of probationers, 233,344 ; of mem- 

 bers and probationers, 2,093,935 ; of baptisms, 

 74,638 of children, and 101,520 of adults ; of 

 churches, 20,755, having a probable value of 

 $80,812,792; of parsonages, 7,532, having a 

 probable value of $11,908,047; of Sunday- 

 schools, 24,080, returning 267,447 officers and 

 teachers and 2,016,181 pupils. Amount of col- 

 lections: for missions, $916,924; for church 

 extension, $127,251 ; for the Sunday-school 

 Union, $20,348; for the Tract Society, $19,125 ; 

 for the Freedmen's Aid Society, $83,657; for 

 education, $109,643; for the American Bible 

 Society, $33,589; for the Women's Foreign 

 Missionary Society, $159,344; for the Women's 

 Home Missionary Society, $63,395 ; for pastors, 

 presiding elders, and bishops, $8,312,052 ; for 

 conference claimants, $205,128; for building 

 and improvements, $4,381,868. 



Church Extension. The General Committee 

 of Church Extension met in Philadelphia, Pa., 

 November 17. The receipts for the general 

 fund had been, including a balance of $39,965 

 from the previous year, $198,590; the ex- 

 penditures to October 31 had been $157,374; 

 the loan fund had received $110,763, and had 

 applied, in loans to churches, $111,650; aid 

 had been afforded, in loans and gifts, to 522 

 churches, making the whole number of 

 churches aided from the beginning, 6,327 ; 

 grants had been provided, in loans and dona- 

 tions, to the amount of $69,015, and applica- 

 tions were on file from 112 churches for $62,- 

 764 ; 37 special gifts for frontier churches had 

 been received, representing an aggregate 

 amount of $9,250, of which 29 had been ap- 

 plied to as many churches, representing a valu- 

 ation of $65,650, with 1,056 members and 2,000 

 Sunday-school pupils ; loans of $8,000 had been 

 added to these gifts. The board fixed the amount 

 to be asked from the conferences for the ensu- 

 ing year at $236,150. 



Freedmen's Aid Society. The twentieth an- 

 nual meeting of the Freedmen's Aid Society was 

 held in Chicago, 111., December 5th. Bishop 

 J. M. Walden presided. The entire receipts 

 for the year had been $184,424, of which $20,- 

 957 had been paid by students ; the amount of 

 expenditures had been $183,690. The society 

 had since its foundation expended almost $2,- 

 000,000 in the work of education in the South, 

 and it now had school property to the value of 

 nearly $1,000,000. The 24 schools and colleges 

 for colored persons in the South were served 

 by 124 teachers, and returned an average at- 

 tendance of 4,500 pupils; the 15 schools for 

 white persons employed 83 teachers, and had an 

 average attendance of more than 2,000 pupils. 

 Since the institution of the society, more than 

 100,000 pupils had been taught in its schools, 



and more than a million persons had been in- 

 structed in other schools by its pupils who had 

 become teachers. Special attention was given 

 to industrial education at Clark University, 

 Atlanta, Ga., where carpentry, agriculture, 

 printing, wagon and carriage building, black- 

 smithing, and harness-making were taught; 

 Claflin University, Orangeburg, S. C., to which 

 a large farm is attached; Rush University, 

 Holly Springs, Miss. ; Central Tennessee Col- 

 lege, Nashville ; New Orleans University ; and 

 Philander Smith College, Little Rock, Ark. 

 At the Gammon School of Theology, Atlanta, 

 Ga., a full course of instruction iu that depart- 

 ment is given. 



Missionary Societies. The General Mission- 

 ary Committee met in New York city Novem- 

 ber 9. The bishops of the Church present pre- 

 sided in their turns at the several sessions. The 

 treasurer reported that the total receipts of the 

 society from all sources for the year ending 

 October 31 had been $1,044,796, being an in- 

 crease over the previous year's receipts of $52,- 

 677; of this sum the conference collections 

 amounted to $932,209, or $95,616 more than the 

 amount of the corresponding collections in the 

 preceding year; but the receipts from legacies 

 had decreased by $98,114. Among the especial 

 gifts was real estate in Indiana valued at $130,- 



000, to be held subject to annuities during the 

 lives of the donors. In addition to these 

 amounts received by the " parent society," the 

 Methodist Episcopal Church had contribut- 

 ed during the year to the Woman's Foreign 

 Missionary Society about $195,000; to the 

 Woman's Home Missionary Society, about $60,- 

 000 ; and to the Transit and Building Fund for 

 Bishop Taylor's missions, $63,079 ; making the 

 total amount of offerings to the cause of missions, 

 $1,362,875. 



The following table gives what an address 

 by the committee to the members of the church 

 describes as an "approximate but inadequate" 

 representation of the condition of the missions 

 in the foreign field : 



The number of missionaries, assistant missionaries, 



helpers, and native workers exceeds 1.800 



Members of the Church 42,000 



Probationers 14,000 



Adherents 40,000 



Sunday-schools 1,575 



Sunday-school officers and teachers 4,8S5 



Sunday-school scholars 2,800.000 



Value of church and school property $86,000 



Appropriations were made for carrying on 

 the missionary work during the ensuing year, 

 as follows : 



1. FOREIGN MISSIONS: 



Africa $16,000 



South America 5SWM1 



< 'hina 11 8,865 



Germany 85,060 



Switzerland 1 1.440 



Scandinavia H472 



India -. 138.4SK) 



Bulgaria and Turkey 21,OM 



Italy M.VW7 



Meiico M!..'.!'--' 



Japan 56,660 



Corea 1S.266 



