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You may think that I wish to dodge or retire from the promises of October, but I do not. I am willing to stand up to all of them but I ought not to be required to go beyond them. The Freedpeople promised to pay what the Bureau did not, for house expenses, and I told them if they would do so I would not charge one cent for teaching Sundays & Nights all the year. They have not done so as yet by One hundred dollars & the Churchpeople seem to wish to evade their subscription because there is a majority opposed to dismissing school at noon on Sunday, that they may have Religious exercises; but the most reliable say that I shall not lose what I have advanced & desire me to make a stipulated charge per month, until I am paid up. I have declined thus far to do so; but have promised to adopt that plan if I cannot hit upon any better plan, I do not think that I shall lose. I know I would not if at all, if these people were uninfluenced, but one thing is plain that in some quarters the opposition is unrelenting & leads to some little interruption among these people encourages some against others & even makes some temporarily think that "Education was not designed for niggers." 
You doubtless are familiar with the various attitudes assumed by our opponents. I try to kindly, firmly & truthfully combat the prejudices, and design to prove practically and plainly that the Freedpeople and the whites also are socially benefitted by the "Oak-Hill" Freedpeople's School. 
I remain
Very Respectfully Yours, 
J.N. Murdock