In the 487 country villages whose inhabitants number from 201 to 500 persons, 360, or 74 per cent, have one or more ministers and 527 ministers in all, while there are 127, or 26 per cent, without resident ministers. Of the 317 villages whose inhabitants number more than 500 persons, 308, or 97 per cent, have one or more resident pastors and altogether 896 ministers--(which is 53 per cent of the whole number of ministers living in villages), while only 9, or 3 per cent, are without any ministers at all. Of the 1,477 country villages of all sizes, 901, or 61 per cent, have one or more resident ministers and in all 1,693 ministers, while 576, or 39 per cent, of the villages have no minister living in them. These 1,477 villages have only 3,253, or 54 per cent, of the churches, but they have 1,693, or 82 per cent, of the ministers; while the open country, with 2,807, or 46 per cent, of the churches, has only 360, or 18 per cent, of the resident ministers. More than 87 per cent of the open country churches, or 2,447 of them, are without a resident minister. In addition to the ministers here included, there are about 350 who do not live near any one of their churches, but for the most part in the cities and towns. This number includes many student preachers. On Map 26, page 117, the distribution of the villages is represented graphically. [Illustration: MAP 26 VILLAGES AND CITIES] TABLE V RESIDENT MINISTERS IN STRICTLY RURAL TOWNSHIPS, IN THE OPEN COUNTRY, AND IN VILLAGES Key: 1 _Villages of 51-2500 persons_ 2 _Per cent_ 3 _Villages of 51-200 persons_ 4 _Per cent_ 5 _Villages of 201-500 persons_ 6 _Per cent_ 7 _Villages of 501-2500 persons_ 8 _Per cent_ 9 _Villages of 201-2500 persons_ 10 _Per cent_ 11 _Open country_ 12 _Per cent_ 1 2 3 4 5 6 No. of villages 1,476.5 100 673 46 487 33 No. of villages with ministers 901 61 233.5 35 360 74 No. of ministers 1,693 (31) 270 16 527 31 No. of villages without ministers 575.5 39 439.5 65 127 26 No. of churches 3,253 54 984 16 1,062 18 7 8 9 10 11 12 No. of villages 316.5 21 803.5 54 No. of villages with ministers 307.5 97 667.5 83 No. of ministers 896 53 1,423 (69) 360 8 No. of villages without ministers 9 3 136 9 No. of churches 1,207 20 2,269 37 2,807 46 It has not been possible to collect full data as to the length of the rural minister's service. But the Conference Records give these data for the ministers of the Methodist Episcopal churches. The terms of service of these ministers are not more brief than those in most of the other denominations.