the sum
of one million of dollars, to be by you and your successors held
in trust, and the income thereof used and applied in your
discretion for the promotion and encouragement of intellectual,
moral, or industrial education among the young of the more
destitute portions of the Southern and Southwestern States of our
Union; my purpose being that the benefits intended shall be
distributed among the entire population, without other
distinction than their needs and the opportunities of usefulness
to them.

Besides the income thus derived, I give to you permission to use
from the principal sum, within the next two years, an amount not
exceeding forty per cent.

In addition to this gift I place in your hands bonds of the State
of Mississippi, issued to the Planter's Bank, and commonly known
as Planter's Bank bonds, amounting, with interest, to about
eleven hundred thousand dollars, the amount realized by you from
which is to be added to and used for the purposes of this trust.

These bonds were originally issued in payment for stock in that
bank held by the State, and amounted in all to only two millions
of dollars. For many years the State received large dividends
from that bank over and above the interest on these bonds. The
State paid the interest without interruption till 1840, since
which no interest has been paid, except a payment of about one
hundred thousand dollars, which was found in the treasury
applicable to the payment of the coupons, and paid by a mandamus
of the Supreme Court. The validity of these bonds has never been
questioned, and they must not be confounded with another issue of
bonds made by the State to the Union Bank, the recognition of
which has been a subject of controversy with a portion of the
population of Mississippi.

Various acts of the Legislature, viz.: of February 28, 1842;
February 23, 1844; February 16, 1846; February 28, 1846; March 4,
1848, and the highest judicial tribunal of the State have
confirmed their validity, and I have no doubt that at an early
date such legislation will be had as to make these bonds
available in increasing the usefulness of the present trust.

Mississippi, though now depressed, is rich in agricultural (p. 425)
resources, and cannot long disregard the moral obligati