REPORT FROM THE FREE CHURCH PRESBYTERY
The Rev. Mr Forbes, Drumblade, gave many interesting details of a very remarkable work of grace in his own congregation and district. A noon-day and an evening prayer meeting were commenced in December last. but the attendance for the first week was, it was stated, only such as to reveal their spiritual poverty. From 6 to 12 was the range of the attendance at the outset. An all-day prayer meeting which was largely attended, was then held, and some impression seemed to be produced during the next fortnight. Those present at the noon-day meeting in Edinburgh often, by request, bore Drumblade on their hearts before God in prayer, and by and by the blessing came upon it in showers. Anxious ones, by forties and fifties, would remain night after night; for four weeks the church was crowded by eager and solemnised audiences; and many were ready to stand up in the meeting to request that they might be prayed for, and many also, equally publicly, to give thanks for peace found in believing.
"Times of Blessing," April 25th, 1874.
REPORT ON THE PROGRESS OF THE AWAKENING
Sadly I do not have a report for most of the places mentioned, but I think this article is enough to believe that they were in the Awakening.
THe work continues to spread and deepen on all hands. We publish today reports of its progress in parts of the country lying most widely separate, and we have received private intelligence of a similar kind from many other places. Edinburgh and Glasgow are of course the great centres, and probably the movement is most intense in and around them. At Leith, Dalkeith,
Portobello, Linlithgow, Musselburgh, Kirkcaldy, Dunfermline, Bathgate, West Calder, and at Greenock, Paisley, Chryston, Douglas, and many other places within their immediate influence, it has been strongly felt. But it is by no means confined to the central districts. The news of what has been doing in them hàs spread everywhere and awakened interest and expectation in the remotest places. The result of this has been united prayer on the part of God's people, and the putting forth of special efforts, which success seems everywhere to follow. From the Orkney and Shetland Islands, requests for prayer have been sent to Edinburgh, not unaccompanied with thanksgivings for blessings received; and the hymns, which have been in so many places the precursors of revival are already popular in these islands. Elgin is the centre of a work extending over all the southern coast of the Moray Firth, and specially remarkable at Gartly, Urquhart, Rothiemay, Drumblade, and Cornhill, of several of which we hope to give detailed accounts in future numbers. Similarly, Aberdeen is the focus of an extensive movement, embracing Ordiquhil, Ord, Torry, Footdee, Auchterless, Kinnethmont, Forgue, Garioch, New Deer, St. Combe's, Cairnbulg, Peterhead, and other places. The impulse given by the visit of Messrs Moody and Sankey to Dundee has continued to propagate itself both in that town and elsewhere in Forfar and Fife,-for example, at Brechin, Newport, St.
Andrews, Carnbee, and Elie,-and will doubtless be renewed when our American friends return to Dundee, as they are expected to do shortly. All through the central counties, in Perth, Crieff, Auchterarder, Pitlochry, Blair Athole, Blairgowrie, Callander, Gartmore, Stirling, Dollar, Falkirk, Dumbarton, Helensburgh, etc, special meetings have been held, and the anticipated results, while nowhere entirely wanting, have in many cases been of the most extraordinary kind. In the south-eastern counties the visits of Messrs. Moody and Sankey to Melrose and Berwick, as well as the constant news from Edinburgh, excited a spirit of awakening everywhere. Dr Cairns has published several most interesting accounts of the work in his own town; and Dunse, Hawick, Kelso, Coldstream, and the villages in their neighbourhood, have participated in the same season of refreshing. Our letter today from Dumfries indicating the state of matters in that county. Reports of blessing received at several places in Argyllshire were given in at the Free Synod of that county last week, and every day brings the most cheering news from new places in the west. From the other side of the Border, we publish good news from Liverpool, and hear that three of the deputies from the Young Men's Meetings in Edinburgh are addressing enormous gatherings in Sunderland and Newcastle, and reaping the fruit of what Messrs. Moody and Sankey sowed.
"Times of Blessing," April 30th, 1874.
We can now only trace its course in the neighbouring parishes, in order to give some idea of its breadth. Commencing at Portsoy (where a good work is at present being done), on the Moray Frith, not far from the mouth of the Deveron, and moving inland nearly along its course, there is, contiguous to Portsoy, Cornhill; to Cornhill, Marnoch; to Marnoch, Rothiemay. Following, then, the course of the Bogie upwards from its entrance into the Deveron, contiguous to Rothiemay, there is Drumblade; to Drumblade, Gartly; to Drumblade and Gartly eastward, Culsalmond; near the source of the Ury to Gartly southward (following the course of the Bogie), Kinnethmont; to Kinnethmont, Premnay; to Premnay, Oyne; to Oyne, Garioch; to Garioch, Old meldrum and Inverurie. And now we are on the banks of the Don, sixteen miles from Aberdeen. And thus in
thirteen contiguous parishes, which, following the course indicated above, extend at least fifty miles in length by many in breadth along the banks of these rivers, the God of our salvation has been graciously sending streams of blessing from that river of life the streams whereof make glad the city of our God.
26th June, 1874.
"Times of Blessing," July 9th, 1874.
The Free Church building is now a ruin and can just be seen from the road.