Rev. James H. Mcneill, _Secretary of the American Bible Society, New York_. My dear Brother: Herewith you have my annual report.... My duties the last year, as well as all the other years of my agency, have involved a great deal of labor and self-denial. The field assigned to my supervision is very large, and, in order to accomplish thoroughly the great work of "home supply," it has been necessary for me to visit every county on horseback. I have thus ridden many thousands of miles, exposed to all the extremes of heat and cold, traveling over the roughest of roads, fording rivers, penetrating the wildest regions, eating the coarsest food, and sleeping in the worst of beds. But I have everywhere received a cordial welcome, and I wish here to record my testimony that such service in such a cause is a blessed service. I weep tears of gratitude that God has permitted me thus to labor for the dissemination of his Word. And now that his Spirit is being poured out so copiously all over our land,[5] I rejoice exceedingly that I have been permitted to coöperate with others in sowing so much "good seed" against these times of refreshing from on high. I pray that all the seed thus sown may bear abundant fruit. Yours cordially, H.W. Pierson. Louisville, Kentucky, _May 28, 1858_. Rev. James H. McNeill, _Secretary of the American Bible Society_. My dear Brother: I reached the city on my return from the western part of the State on Wednesday morning, after an absence of more than six weeks. The tour was one of the most successful and gratifying I have ever made. I find here letters and papers that have been accumulating during my absence, and have been exceedingly busy in posting myself up, and getting square with the world. All your anniversary excitements have come off while I was in the Brush, and I have been trying to find out where you have left the world. I have read the "Christian Intelligencer's" full report of the meeting of the American Tract Society. I should have been delighted to be an eye-witness of the fight.[6] On my last tour I learned that, of nine hundred and twenty-five families visited in G---- County, one hundred and sixty had _no part_ of the Word of God in their houses--not a leaf or a letter! Oh, it is a burning shame to American Christianity, and especially to the American Bible Society, that such facts as these can be reported in the forty-third year of its history! But I am speaking warmly, nevertheless truly.