The religious teaching is evangelical. The school regards itself as representing the American Missionary Association, and is faithful to the trust. Nowhere can teachers be found more earnestly evangelical, laboring often beyond their strength to bring souls to Christ. To their honor be it said, however, that both Unitarians and Friends have not only contributed of their means in large proportion, but have also served in the work of education and Christian culture with the most unselfish devotion. They reap a far richer reward than that of theological proselytism. Their noble spirit, scorning all partisan ends, seeking only for an opportunity to do good, has greatly increased the humane and beneficent influence of the school; has caused it to be widely felt outside of its own walls, and to become every day more and more an instrument of peace and reconstruction. There is a world of kindly deeds and neighborly acts which cannot be enumerated, but which prove to the community the kinship of our Northern Christianity, and they meet with a _response_. When a petition was presented this winter for the purpose of subjecting the school to taxation, a large majority of the most influential citizens in Hampton entered their protest, and the petition fell to the ground. It was a sign of the times. The religious work of the school has been well directed, although not a thing that could be put in figures. It is largely an endeavor to counteract the tendencies of ignorance and prejudice in the colored churches and so give free play to the spirit of grace. A large proportion of the students are professors of religion when they come. The emotions and prejudices have been trained to excess by an ignorant but fervid system of religion which has exercised but slight control over immoral practices. The effort is to balance this by the cultivation of the conscience and understanding in Scriptural truth; especially to hold up before their minds the idea of an every-day religion and a practical Christian manhood. The interest this winter has not reached the revival point, but students have been led to Christ from time to time. Our hope is not in transports, but in that steadily increasing lump of leaven, a practical, self-denying piety. It shows itself in the _morale_ of the school. We have 316 students--214 boys and 102 girls; of these, 56 are Indian boys, and 9 Indian girls. In such a mass of human nature, fresh from uncivilization, one might expect serious disturbances and scandals, not to say rowdyism; yet Washington’s birthday was celebrated on the open green by Negroes, and Indians who had just taken off their blankets, with an Arcadian good behavior, while blacks and aborigines met together in the school parlors and played games together, boys as well as girls, without indecorum. It is a frequent comment how little trouble they make, for so miscellaneous a collection. There is a spirit, an atmosphere of Christianity that pervades everything.