The Kentucky Ranger | Page 3

her son, and exhorting him to look to
Christ for mercy. They prayed together a long time, and little sleep
came to them that night. Jasper resolved from that time to be a
Christian. He asked his father to sell the racehorse, and gave his pack of
cards to his mother, who threw them into the fire.
However, it was many days before Jasper really felt that he was
converted. Finally he found peace of mind at a camp meeting. We
quote from a record of his experience: "On the Saturday evening of said
meeting I went with weeping multitudes, bowed before the sand, and
earnestly prayed for mercy. In the midst of a solemn struggle of soul an
impression was made on my mind as though a voice said to me: 'Thy
sins are all forgiven thee.' Divine light flashed all around me,
unspeakable joy sprang up in my soul. I rose to my feet, opened my
eyes, and it really seemed as if I were in heaven; the trees, the leaves on
them, and every thing seemed to be, and I really thought were, praising
God. My mother raised a shout, my Christian friends crowded around
me and joined me in praising God--I have never doubted that the Lord
did then and there forgive my sins and gave me religion." He went on
his way rejoicing, and before he reached his majority became a
backwoods preacher. He had been ranging over the hills and valleys of
Kentucky for four years, preaching the gospel in many places, when he
is introduced to our readers.
Jasper Very was known early in his ministry as a great camp meeting
preacher. He was always partial to such gatherings, partly because at
one of them he had found religion. These meetings in the woods,

"God's first temples," are of enough importance to merit description in
another chapter.
CHAPTER II.
An Old Time Camp Meeting.
To Kentucky belongs the honor of originating the modern camp
meeting. This is no small distinction, when we consider how these
institutions have spread over the land and the great good they have
done. Camp meetings grew out of the needs of the times. When they
providentially sprang up in Kentucky, the frontier was sparsely settled,
most people living miles away from any church. Such churches as were
built were small and could accommodate only a few persons, and
preaching services were often weeks apart.
The revivals of genuine religion which usually attended these
gatherings were much needed in the backwoods. Most of the settlers
were honest, law-abiding persons, who had sought to improve their
means by emigrating to this western country; but many of the vicious
off-scouring of the older settlements also went west to hide their crimes
or to commit new ones. Rogues' Harbor was only an extreme type of
many law-defying places. Murderers, thieves, gamblers, defaulters and
their kind put life in peril, and threatened the moral and social order of
the state. These camp meetings strengthened and encouraged good
people, reformed many bad men and women, and thus became a saving
leaven of righteousness.
And what a place for a camp meeting was the Kentucky forest. What
nature poet can do justice to such sylvan loveliness as we find in the
"Blue Grass Region?" The pen must be dipped in the juices of that
Edenic vegetation and tinted with the blue of that arching sky to record
such beauty. What stately trees! They seemed like pillars in God's own
temple. The rich, warm limestone soil gave birth to trees in form and
variety scarce equaled in the world. Here grew in friendly fellowship
and rivalry the elm, ash, hickory, walnut, wild cherry, white, black and
read oak, black and honey locust, and many others. Their lofty

branches interlocking formed a verdant roof which did not entirely shut
out the sun's rays but caused a light subdued and impressive as the light
in a Saint Paul's Cathedral.
In such a forest was pitched the camp to which Jasper Very returned.
Let me describe this old-fashioned camp ground. A large, rough shed
was erected, capable of protecting five thousand persons from wind and
rain. It was covered with clapboards and furnished with puncheon seats.
At one end a large stand was built, from which sermons were preached.
A few feet in front of this stand a plain altar rail was set, extending the
full length of the preachers' stand. This altar was called the "mourners'
bench." All around the altar a liberal supply of fresh straw was placed
upon which the worshippers knelt. On three sides of the large shed
camps or cabins of logs were built for the use of the attendants. In the
rear of the preachers' stand was a large room which accommodated all
the ministers