Oberlin, Ohio, Dec. 7th, 1848
Messrs. Editors:ーYou will pardon me for my intrusion. My only apology for so doing, is the publication of a letter from Rev. Hiram Wilson, in your paper of Nov. 8th, 1848. In reading this letter, I was reminded of certain resolutions, published in the Oberlin Evangelist of October 13th, 1847, over the signature of Hamilton Hill, untruer and blacker than which, no resolutions were ever concocted out of "Hades."
As the star after which your paper is named, has given light to the benighted and flying bondman, in his dark, uncertain and perilous path to British freedom, so may an answer to my inquiries, by his teacher and guide, give light to their friends, should they find a place in your sacredly-knit, four-cornered and heavenly-let-dawn sheet, in which I some times find four-footed beasts and creepings.
I am much pleased with brother Wilson's letter in the main, and think he is, on the whole, as near right as others who have written respecting our people in Canada. I truly sympathize with him in his necessities and want of friends, if I do not in his present position and efforts. I hope he may find a support, but in his own words, not in a "den of thieves." Ah, consistency, thou art a jewel, but truth is a pearl seldom found by the light of Dawn. I don't mean to be understood as accusing Br. Wilson of wilfully telling an untruth, but he does, in the letter referred to, misrepresent the doings at Dawn.
The Institution, hitherto, has been the curse of our people in Canada. This I say without the fear of contradiction from a respectable source; and what I say, four-fifths of the colored people there will say.
But I must come to the inquries. 1st.ーWill Br. Wilson tell us why he has united again with this Institution, after cutting his connection with it, because of its prodigality and mismanagement? 2d. How much money, clothing, bedding, &c., have been received at Dawn since its commencement? 3. How much of these things have been given to the teachers and missionaries in Canada? 4. How many neccesitous females and persons have been gratuitously supplied with clothing, bedding, &c, by the Executive Committee of the Dawn operation, in the last five years? 5. What kind of instructions are the ignorant receiving at Dawn, by whom is it, and how much of it, and how often is it given? 6. What winters were they when the Institution was "thronged" with scholars, and where did they come from? 7. How many students have boarded at the Institution each winter since its commencement, and how much money did they pay for it? 8. Were the scholars of Dawn compelled to leave in the summer, or did they "choose" to go off and go to work when there was a school opened for them?ー9. Has not the Institution been going down for nearly three years? 10. Is not all its cleared land now rented out to be cultivated, not to the benefit of the school? 11. Have the trustees taken any action on the subject of educating the poor orphans, or is it the mere suggestion which I made some three years ago to some of them to do so? 12. What is the proof that the work at Dawn "is under no sectarian auspices"? 13. How many colored settlements, churches and schools has Br. Wilson visited within the last three years in Canada? 14. How new is the Dawn settlement? 15. How many have moved in it within the last three years, and are they satisfied? 16. What evidence has Br. Wilson that the managers of the Dawn school will do better than they have done heretofore?ーThese things the publice have a right to know before it can consistently give further support. Can it know them? Shall it know them?ーDare the truth be told respecting them? We shall wait to see before we say any more.
W. P. NEWMANNewman, William P.

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P. S.ーSince writing the above, I have received a letter from sister Fidelia C. Brooks at the Queen's Bush, C. W., begging for help to pay for her school-house, and to save it from being sold on the 1st of January 1849, to pay the workmen.
There is not a more worthy missionary in the world than sister Brooks, and but few who are as useful, and whose present prospects for doing good are so fair as hers. Her school is large and flourishing, and her field of labor a settlement of poor colored people numbering 1500. She wants $400 to save her school-house. Shall she have it? Who will say, Lord, how much shall I give?
W. P. N.
Will the Ram's Horn, the Emancipator, the Contributor, the Oberlin Evangelist, and the American Missionary please publish this and the answer to it, and oblige the Christian public?