THE PRESIDENCY OF THE REPUBLIC.THE CHURCH AT HOME AND ABROAD has no connection with partisan politics. But it rejoices in every indication that political parties, in shaping their issues and directing their movements, are influenced by righteous principles, and with respect to the wishes of righteous men. It is now generally affirmed that in each of the two principal parties a candidate has been nominated for the presidency who represents the better moral elements of his party, and that in each the nomination actually made was strenuously opposed by those in whose

have, not "a campaign of detraction, " but "a campaign of education," in which honest and able advocates of differing policies will instruct the people concerning them, appealing to their intelligence, their patriotism, and their conscience. This will be excellent "education," but, why should it be a "campaign"? Is education war? Do such terms as (6 enemy, victor, fight," etc., best describe the parties and processes of reasonable, educational debate?

How much less suitable are such terms and figures of belligerency to the discussions of brethren in Christ, seeking to help each other to more perfect knowledge of his word and to more wise prosecution of his work! Cannot we drop out such words and tropes from our Church literature?

"OUR COMMUNION "-"OTHER COMMUNIONS."-These are forms of expression which are found in our church literature, it seems to us, with increasing frequency.

They also seem to us of questionable propriety, "We believe in the communion of saints. We read in the New Testament of "the communion of the Holy

and in the character of its water to Lake Oroomiah in Persia, The water of both is much more salt and more heavy than the water of the ocean. By easy processes of evaporation salt for domestic uses is obtained from it. It is singular that both these bodies of salt water, a hundred miles or more in length, are commonly called lakes, while the lovely little fresh-water Genessaret is often called a sea.

We returned from Garfield Beach early enough to make leisurely purchase of baskets or bags of luncheon to be used on the remainder of our journey, for we were warned that all of so large a company might not otherwise be sufficently fed. From this point our three cars from Missouri were to form part of the large train the most of which had come from New York, Chicago, etc. The whole contained twenty-six Pullman cars, and was divided into three sections prudently running at safe distance from one another.

We left Salt Lake City in the evening of May 16, and took our way directly northward through Ogden to Pocatello, from which point our course was but little north of west to Portland. For several hours we were running along the south shore of the Columbia, but at length swinging away from it and curving across the intervening land, struck the eastern shore of the Willamette flowing northward to the Columbia, and crossing that river near where the war vessels, Baltimore and Charleston, lay at anchor, we were in Portland before sunset-forty-six hours from Salt Lake

City.

[August,

God be with you till we meet again,

Socially this journey was a delightful and memorable one. We had daily seasons of worship, mornings and evenings; sometimes the occupants of two other cars came together in one of them for these pleasant services. Reading of Scripture, prayer and abundance of sacred song were greatly enjoyed. Wherever we stopped for a few minutes a group of our singers usually stood upon the rear platform of the car and sang to the evident delight of friends who gathered at such points to wave their greetings to the company of pilgrims, the largest crossed the mountains together; in what number of persons, it was said, that ever contrast to the weary passage through the roadless wilderness of that first band of colonists led by the dauntless Whitman!

A VISIT TO IDAHO.

Leaving Portland on Friday evening May 27, in the company and under the guidance of Dr. Wishard, I found opportunity to see something of what a synodical superintendent of home missions has to do, and how he does it. We had indeed a long distance to travel from Portland before coming into Dr. Wishard's proper field, the synod of Utah, but that synod covers Utah, Idaho and Montana. His official journeyings within it amount annually to more than 10,000 miles. Boise City in Idaho was the place at which he had invited me to spend the Sabbath with him. A continuous railroad journey of about 21 hours brought us there on Saturday, when the family whose hospitality we were to enjoy were seated at their evening meal.

Genuine and generous hospitality indeed it was to which they heartily welcomed us. Across the street from his pleasant home is continually revolving a water-wheel, like that lately described in our pages by a missionary in northern Syria. Each spoke or wing of the wheel carries a bucket which it dips full of water each time it descends into the stream that propels it; then empties it into a trough at the top of its circuit, whence it flows down and spreads abroad through a system of pipes leading to lawns and gardens. A number of such wheels send the water all over the city, a city of five thousand people, spreading verdure and freshness about all their homes, and making all their gardens bountiful to their

.

table. I ate at that missionary's table as fine cherries, peaches and even prunes as I have eaten anywhere. They were preserved, of course, at this season of the year, but they grew on the missionary's own grounds.

The stream which turns all those wheels is led in an artificial channel from the Boise river. Other similar channels carry its waters more widely and distribute them, through ramifying ditches over the fields. This artificial irrigation has transformed many considerable tracts of desert into fertile farms, and I am assured that its sufficient extension is all that is needed to replace the worthless sage-brush, now the only vegetable growing on hundreds, per