LINCOLN MEMORIAL DAY.

Two years ago the American Missionary Association introduced a new day in the church calendars. The pastors of our Congregational fellowship were asked to observe the Lincoln Memorial Day on the Sabbath nearest to the birthday of our greatest President. This request was generally responded to and sermons and responsive services were held in commemoration of Abraham Lincoln's birth. A Concert Exercise was prepared by the Association which was used very largely.

This year Lincoln Memorial Day comes on Sunday, February 16, and we trust will prove a day of wide observance among the Congregational churches. It is, as our readers all know, the Jubilee Year of the American Missionary Association. Special collections are most appropriate this year and are being pledged by many of the churches in behalf of the great work of the American Missionary Association among the neglected millions of our own land and to roll up this Jubilee offering on the Jubilee Year.

Special envelopes have been printed and will be furnished any of the pastors who desire to celebrate Lincoln Memorial Day in taking this special collection for the Association. The Concert Exercise will be sent to the pastor or superintendent in any Sunday-school who may desire to add their gift to awaken a wider interest in this work. Abraham Lincoln was born on the edge of the great region occupied by the mountaineers of the South, or "American Highlanders" as we like to call them. Among these people the American Missionary Association has established its churches, schools and missions, and they have loyally responded in coöperation in the spread of an intelligent gospel among the two and a half million people.

The work among the Negroes must always be associated with the name of Abraham Lincoln, who lifted them from slavery into freedom and gave his life a willing sacrifice to the cause of their liberation and the salvation of our country.

The work of no other society gathers so immediately about the name of Abraham Lincoln as does that of the American Missionary Association, and we trust that Lincoln Memorial Day will be celebrated by the churches throughout the land, and that large special offerings will pour into the Association's treasury to bring emancipation from debt and furnish the means for larger labor this glad Jubilee Year.