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towns and counties [[cutoff]] time of harvest came, that from one half to nine-tenths of the expected increase has utterly failed. 

A gentleman from Mississippi, the Rev. J.R. Graves, who knows what he affirms, from personal observation and careful inquiry, assures me that his State did not gather more than one-fifth of the expected crop of corn, and that untold suffering must come upon the people before the end of February, unless deliverance reaches them from more favored sections.  He referrs [[refers]] to large plantations, in his own neighborhood, from which corn enough has not been husbanded to make good seed that was put into the ground. And when asked him why more had not been said about it——why their appeals had not been sent to the North, he asked me if I could understand what a proud people would not rather do than to beg, and to beg of those whom they had accounted as their enemies. But, said I, would you people receive help should it now be offered them? Would they? he answered. What would not a father or a mother do, rather than to see ghastly want sitting morn, and noon and night, in what had once been homes of abundance? If you help us, said he, the blessings of thousands of Southern men and women will be yours forever.

I saw another Southern man, Rev. Mr. Reed from Georgia. He told me that the drought had been so ruinous in the northern half of Alabama and Georgia, that they had not provisions enough there to feed the population through January. Hon. J. L. M. Curry once a distinguished Member of Congress from Alabama, and now President of Howard College, at Marion, telegraphed me last week that he knew of only a very few counties of Alabama in which there were bread-stuffs sufficient for the population, and that the scarcity is appalling. Governor Patton, of the same State, telegraphed me six days ago, that the destitution was so great that donations of food and clothing from the North would be thankfully acknowledged The Rev. R. M. Nott a Northern man of the highest integrity, now living at Atlanta, Ga., tells me, in a message received a few days since, that the destitution is great distressing, and that help is needed from the North in large measures. And the Rev. Mr. Hornday, of the same city, a gentleman worthy of all confidence, has resigned the care of his church, the present, to devote himself to receiving and distributing supplies. He tells me that the destitution is so great that no one is in danger of overstating it. A clergyman of North Carolina, who consented to distribute a few hundred dollars' worth of supplies, sent him from this city, says that he has found families that had eaten nothing for nearly two days, and that he had never before seen such anguish, arising for scarcity of food.

The destitution of the means of life extends over hundreds of square miles-in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South and North Carolina-and the famine-smitten people are to be numbered by hundreds of thousands. The hep needed is that which can come only from organized effort, reaching throughout the North, embracing supplies to be estimated by millions of money.

I have had as little sympathy with the prevailing spirit and principles of the South, before and during and since the war, as any other man. But, sir, I remember that God has said, "Vengeance is MINE;" and that the same supreme authority has also said, "If thine enemy hunger FEED him-for us so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head"-a law, the import and scope and beneficence of which will, I doubt not, be mad luminous-radiant-by the eloquence we shall this evening hear from one of its great masters.

Somebody's money put one of those coals on head of Southern wife and mother whom the war had bereaved and impoverished; and that coal so warmed and melted her heart that it filled her eyes with tears, "My God," she exclaimed, "has it come to this, the the people whom I have hated are trying to keep me and my children from death?" And a colonel of the Confederate army, on hearing of what had been done, and how it had transformed the woman's feelings, said to the friend who put coal on her head. "If you keep on this business, there won't be a man or woman left in all the South to curse the "Yankees."

Ah, sir, who knows that the same hand flooded and scorched so many Southern fields, is not now opening God's own policy of Reconstruction? and that this new "Valley of Achor" is not to be our "door of hope"- through which we shall pass to reconciliations and a brotherhood worth a thousandfold more than all that the most munificent giving can bestow.

Rev. Henry Ward Beecher spoke with eloquent power of the changes wrought in the opinions of men and the character of the country, in the last few
ent races different [[  ]] [[  ]]
and they are all alike suffering throughout all the States which were formerly in the rebellion, except perhaps Texas. From Mississippi up to the Potomac there is one universal cry of distress. There is not to-day in the hands of the poor the seed which they need very soon to begin to plant the little ground they have non of the materials, the means whereby labor, especially in our day, is rendered efficient.
 Now, then. if the Northern people could look at this, if it were possible to look at in the light of narrow self-interest, I say ten millions of dollars diffused through and the South immediately in the form of food, and seed, and implements, would return a hundred millions in the amount of the crop of the present year, and thereby largely contribute to the wealth and prosperity of Northern industry and Northern commerce, as well as that of the South. It has pleased God to make us one people for all these purposes, not only politically but commercially and socially; and it is not possible that there should be prosperity-while there is prostration, and want, and suffering, and incapacity at the South. We are bound for our own sake, if for nothing else, to take hold to-day and so aid the South that she may be encouraged to produce at least as large a crop as possible in the year 1867. It will be small enough at best. You cannot replace the animals they need there, and cannot seasonably replace even the implements the poor need - and some who were rich a few years ago are as poor as the poorest. 

You cannot any more than just help them make a little more that half a crop this year. They did not make half a crop of food last year. They made nearly half a crop of cotton by turning their energies to that one thing; but there needs to be complete reconstruction of the society, manufacturing, mechanical, as well as agricultural, to my mind, very much more than any political reconstruction. If it is only said that the North will try to help the South, tens of thousands will be encouraged to help themselves and to help each other, by the mere fact that we here are putting forth exertions to help them. A few bushels of corn in a neighborhood, and of useful seed, is what they need to plant and need now and at once- a few dollars will give to the poor the implements they need, Let the North say to the South, "Try to help yourselves, and we will give what help we can," and there will be a revival of national prosperity and brotherhood which will be twenty times the value of all it will cost us. I do believe then that, apart from all questions that I would sink as subordinate; all politics all past differences, it is the present pressing necessity of the North to say to the South. "Do your very best make a crop this year, and trust to us to help."

Soon, I trust, the manufactories will be rebuilt that the war destroyed, and hundreds and thousands of women and children will be employed in cultivating the soil. Friends of New-York, I beseech men, without any thought of party or past differences, to give their energies to this work. I believe that New-York city can well afford to commence with subscription of $1,000,000 for this purpose. I am sure she hoes this, she will estimate Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Chicago, Cincinnati, and all the Western cities and the smaller towns, to imitate her example. Let us say to the South, Be of good cheer; the dark hours have passed away- and the very fact of saying that word to her, will give assurance that those hours shall pass away. She needs to be cheered, she needs to be encouraged, she needs to feel that suffering is not her eternal inheritance, that there are better days come, and that there are cheerful words spoken to her by the people of the North.

W.T. Coleman, Esq., moved the appointment of James M. Brown, of the house of Brown Brothers & Co., as temporary Treasurer of the Commission, which was cordially accepted, the mover accompany-ing his resolution with an earnest and effectual plea for generous contributions. Major General Anderson, of Fort Sumter memory his heartiest good will. After a resolution from Mr. Greeley, inviting the cooperation of the clergy, Rev. Dr. Kendrick, of the Tabernacle Baptist church, was brought to his feet, and gave instances of personal suffering, the knowledge of which had come to him through private letters, that affected all hearts.

The Commission held a meeting on Monday at the Merchants' Bank, and elected as Executive.