154 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



I am not aware, however, that there is any existing association which 

 includes such questions in its field of inquiry. 



It will be observed that the suggestions I have made concerning the 

 immediate needs of the negro do not include any mention of the higher 

 scholastic education. This is not because I disbelieve in such training 

 for those blacks who, by their evident capacity, show that it fits them; 

 but because it seems futile at the present time to waste efforts in giving 

 these people an education for which they are in general by no means 

 ready — which, if attained, does not afford them a way to a suitable sta- 

 tion. The few youths of the race who really desire what is commonly 

 called a college education, are reasonably certain to receive it in some 

 one of the many schools where they- are sure of a welcome and of all 

 due help. Even in the case of those blacks who, by some rare chance, 

 have inherited the proper foundations of the higher mental training, and 

 are made ready for the so-called professions, I see but a very poor chance 

 of advancement to any fit positions in this country. Even in the 

 part of the North where one would expect these well-trained, negroes 

 would have a fair chance in life, it does hot avail them. As physicians, 

 lawyers, clergymen or engineers they can look forward, to no future 

 having a definite relation to their capacities. They can not expect to 

 have any range of social opportunities, and their employment will have 

 to be essentially with their own people. 



The youth of negro blood might naturally expect to find in a com- 

 munity devoted to the maintenance of his rights at least a welcome to 

 the external business society. He will, however, find that the people 

 who would willingly sacrifice much to ensure him an equal place in 

 matters political, allow their race prejudices or those of their associates 

 to deny him fair play. It is a lamentable fact that this dislike to these 

 men of the other aspect is far stronger in the North than in the South. 

 In the parts of the North where negroes are rare, there is, it is true, 

 a sense of duty by them that ensures their place before the law; but not 

 enough personal contact with them to wear away the first offence of 

 their diverse aspect. In most parts of the Southern States the black 

 man is so constantly in view that the instinctive prejudice is worn away 

 — he is perhaps, in a somewhat contemptuous way, personally liked. 

 The race prejudice takes the form of certain rules of intercourse, ex- 

 pressing about the feeling that separates the commissioned officers and 

 the enlisted men of an army. There is an element of truth in the state- 

 ment, attributed to Thomas Carlyle, that the Northern man said, "God 

 d — d you, Sambo, be free;" and the Southerner, "God bless you, Sambo, 

 be slave." The result to Sambo is the same — a deprivation of oppor- 

 tunities in all the higher walks of life. 



The only safe way up for the negro appears to lie in the industrial 

 field, in mechanical employments, where his race may not weigh 



