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Testimonies for the Church Volume 4
precious youth down into the water of the beautiful lake, and buried
them with their Lord in baptism. Several of those who presented them-
selves as subjects for baptism chose to receive this ordinance at their
homes. Thus closed the memorable services of this college year of our
beloved school.
Temperance Meetings
But my work was not yet done in Battle Creek. Immediately on our
return from the lake we were earnestly solicited to take part in a tem-
perance mass meeting, a very praise-worthy effort in progress among
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the better portion of the citizens of Battle Creek. This movement
embraced the Battle Creek Reform Club, six hundred strong, and the
Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, two hundred and sixty strong.
God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and the Bible were familiar words with
these earnest workers. Much good had already been accomplished,
and the activity of the workers, the system by which they labored, and
the spirit of their meetings, promised greater good in time to come.
It was on the occasion of the visit of Barnum’s great menagerie to
this city on the 28th of June that the ladies of the Woman’s Christian
Temperance Union struck a telling blow for temperance and reform
by organizing an immense temperance restaurant to accommodate
the crowds of people who gathered in from the country to visit the
menagerie, thus preventing them from visiting the saloons and grog-
geries, where they would be exposed to temptation. The mammoth
tent, capable of holding five thousand people, used by the Michigan
Conference for camp meeting purposes, was tendered for the occasion.
Beneath this immense canvas temple were erected fifteen or twenty
tables for the accommodation of guests.
By invitation the sanitarium set a large table in the center of the
great pavilion, bountifully supplied with delicious fruits, grains, and
vegetables. This table formed the chief attraction, and was more
largely patronized than any other. Although it was more than thirty
feet long, it became so crowded that it was necessary to set another
about two thirds as long, which was also thronged.
By invitation of the committee of arrangements, Mayor Austin, W.
H. Skinner, cashier of the First National Bank, and C. C. Peavey, I
spoke in the mammoth tent, Sunday evening, July 1, upon the subject