The school has been blessed with a long line of able and devoted superintendents, a list of whose names is given in the Supplement. The most notable, probably, among them all, one whose name can be mentioned without exciting the least envy, was Robert K. Remington, that ardent worker in righteousness, whose love, life, and enthusiasm has been an inspiration to multitudes of young lives. Confined at first to Sabbath schools in his own town, his efforts later broadened to state work through the State Association, and still later, to Young Men's Christian Association work in our own and neighboring states.

Sunday-school concerts were given in the auditorium of the Church, enlisting the coöperation of all the classes, as well as the Primary Department, and securing and interesting large audiences. Picnics were occasionally given in the summer. New lesson books were introduced; and brighter, livelier music was provided and sung, under the direction of Mr. Lyman W. Deane as organist and Messrs. Charles Durfee and Newton R. Earl, the assistant superintendents.

Many men and women of the Church have, as teachers, impressed themselves deeply upon the young life of the community.

The name of Mrs. Jesse Eddy should have especial mention, as one who, in the early years of the church life, served long as assistant superintendent.

On October 30, 1898, a "Testimonial" to the present (1905) superintendent was given by vote of the Church, when he resigned his position, to which he was later reëlected. It is as follows:

TO CLINTON V. S. REMINGTON:

Our dear Brother, Not many now among us recall the beginning of your life work in our Sunday school, but many are they who cherish the assurance that the close of your loving activities here is still in the unknown future. As you now resign the superintendency of our home school into the hands of one whom you have desired to

receive it, we ask you, on behalf of the Church, to accept this testimonial as a tribute of love, and a token of appreciation of the service so faithfully performed. Your devotion has been as manifest and as unfailing as the presence of your flowers in the rooms of our church and chapel. The flowers must fade, but the memory of your devotion here cannot fade while we, who have worked at your side, shall live; and when our lives together in this church are ended, we believe your "work of faith and labor of love " shall be told as a memorial of you and "be had in remembrance in the sight of God." We bestow this tribute, as upon one midway in a course well run, believing that you are of those who shall receive, when at last the course is finished, not the chaplet of fading leaves, but "the crown of glory that fadeth not away."

There have been seasons when the interest of the congregation in the Sabbath school has flagged, and it has been difficult to secure enough teachers; but always the work has revived and the workers have rallied to its support. At present (1905) the school is fully organized, well-equipped, and supplied with a full corps of officers and teachers. It deserves now, as ever, the name of "The Nursery of the Church."

The Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor

The Pastoral Aid Society, A.D. 1883-1887

THE first Christian Endeavor society had been formed in Portland, Me., by Rev. Francis E. Clark, in February, 1881. An article by Dr. Clark, entitled, "How One Church Cares for Its Young People," printed in The Congregationalist in August, 1881, was read by many pastors, anxious to find some method better than they had known before, of reaching and training their young people for christian service; but the movement which has since become world-wide had but just got fairly under way, so that when our Pastoral Aid Society was organized, less than sixty Endeavor societies were on record.

On a Sunday in February, 1883, the young people of our parish were invited to meet in the south parlor at the close of the session of the Sunday school, to consider the subject of forming a society to aid the pastor in his work with and for young people. The need and the design of the society was explained by Dr. Mix. A constitution was presented and adopted at this or at a subsequent meeting. The question as to why such an organization was needed was answered in this document as follows:

The need of some agency to deepen the early, serious impressions of children and youth, and to cultivate a positive and strong christian character in the younger membership of our churches, has led to the formation of "The Pastoral Aid Society "or the Society of Christian Endeavor.

Two classes of members were provided for, and four committees. The membership of the society when fully organized was one hundred and eight, sixty active and fortyeight associate members, of whom sixty-two were members of the Church.

The first officers of the society were Alphonso S. Covel, president; Rufus W. Bassett, vice-president; George S. Brigham, secretary and treasurer; and the first "heads of committees " were Henry H. Earl of the Lookout; Charles E. Fisher of the Devotional, and James F. Jackson of the Social Committee. The officers and the heads of committees formed the Executive Committee. A year later the officers chosen were: Henry H. Earl, president; James A. Kinghorn, vicepresident; and Hervey Burnham, secretary and treasurer; while the membership of committees was as follows: Lookout, Geo. S. Brigham, Charles E. Fisher, Anna C. Holmes, Ella Sheen, Annie C. Bush, and N. Evelyn Buck. Devotional, Albert J. Martin, Alphonso S. Covel, Earl F. Pearce, Mary L. Holmes, Sarah A. Emerson, and Bessie A. Armstrong. Social, Anna H. Borden, Annie E. Sheen, Isabel J. Fraser, Rufus W. Bassett and Nathan Durfee.

The time appointed for the weekly devotional meeting was Tuesday evening, at 7.30 o'clock. That the society fully met the expectations of the pastor is shown in the following extracts from his annual reports to the Church. In that of April, 1883, he said:

It is with pleasure we note the organization of a Young People's Pastoral Aid Society. It has had a promising beginning, and bids fair to be very serviceable in developing and training the young people of our Church for activity and usefulness in the future.

A year later he reported "a manifest deepening of interest in religious things on the part of the younger members of the Church." In April, 1885, he said:

The Pastoral Aid Society has indeed been what its name implies in many ways. In bringing the young people of our congregation into closer acquaintance with each other, concentrating their interests and affection around the Church, making those who are strangers among us feel at home with us, and most of all in training themselves for future service in the Church, they have accomplished much.

The social gatherings of the society, to which all of the young people of the congregation (especially any strangers) were usually publicly invited, are still remembered with pleasure, and were of value in attracting young people to our church and in promoting the mutual acquaintance of those attending. The occasional entertainments to which an admission fee was charged, and at which articles were on sale, were always liberally patronized, and provided a goodly sum of money for benevolent and missionary objects. The weekly devotional meeting was well sustained, and exerted a continual influence for good upon all who entered into the spirit of the gathering for prayer and testimony.

The society sent delegates to the annual conventions of the Christian Endeavor societies: being represented at the Old Orchard Beach convention by Mr. Henry H. Earl, and at Saratoga by Miss Elizabeth M. Johnston. As reports of these conventions and subsequent state conventions were brought back by the delegates, a feeling that their society, so similar in its aims and methods to the Endeavor society, should become more closely affiliated by adopting the name and the characteristic prayer-meeting pledge of that organization, grew upon some of the members of the Pastoral Aid Society, and at the annual meeting of the society in October, 1887, the matter having been brought to the attention of the meeting by the report of a delegate strongly recommending such action, it was voted, after a friendly discussion, to change the name of the society to the "YOUNG PEOPLE'S SOCIETY OF CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOR"; to prepare a new constitution, and to make a fresh start, by having as members of the new society those willing to sign the new constitution as a pledge of their willingness to live up to its requirements. A good-sized committee, representing, as far as possible, the various opinions expressed in the meeting, was appointed to act with the pastor, in preparing a constitution and by-laws. The meetings of this committee at the home of one of the members of the society,