MRS. ALICIA S. (BLOOD) BROWN died at Leavenworth, Kansas, on the 26th of February. Mrs. Brown was for some years a teacher under this Association at Monticello, Florida, and her many friends there will remember the faithful instruction she gave and the kindnesses she bestowed. Her illness was long and severe, but when she did _not_ look for the Messenger, he came and took her away. In the midst of her sufferings, she could cheerfully say, that she wanted to “bear and suffer all His will.” * * * * * THE FREEDMEN. * * * * * TALLADEGA COLLEGE. REV. E. P. LORD, PRESIDENT. Almost in the very centre of Alabama, the great Allegheny range makes a last and only partially successful effort at rearing mountains, before losing itself in the low, flat _black belt_. Thus the pure and exhilarating atmosphere of more Northern latitudes is brought to the very border of the almost tropical country that belts the Gulf. Overlooking the rich, populous, and somewhat unwholesome low-lands, breathing the pure mountain air, is situated Talladega, seeming to have been Providentially placed as a city of refuge for the colored people of Alabama. The beauty of the surrounding landscape is a perpetual inspiration to teachers and students. The location of the college, in a quiet country village of two thousand inhabitants, invites the young people from the cities, and less favored localities, to an atmosphere as pure and healthful morally as it is physically. But one other Southern State, if any, has so large a colored population as Alabama. A half million are now in the State, and the number is continually increasing. Of these, three-fifths cannot read. There are about two hundred thousand children of school age, and only one in ten of these was in school last year. Eighty-three cents only was expended upon the education of each of those who did attend. One would hardly judge that this could afford a _liberal_ education. In a State needing moral and educational efforts so greatly, the A. M. A. has opened schools and organized churches in Mobile, Montgomery, Selma, Marion, Athens, and a few other places. In 1870 the Association established Talladega College, as the key-stone of the arch, or the centre of its system of educational and religious work in Alabama. The college is closely connected with the other points of the Association’s work in this State by means of the intimate social relations between the faculty of the college and the workers in those places. The various departments designated by the name _Talladega College_, are so closely interwoven that any distinct mention of the workings of one must contain facts closely related to the others. For convenience I will speak of (1) the Literary Department; (2) the Industrial Department; (3) the Theological Department; (4) the Church Work. The Literary Department.