branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic 

 arts." But the action of Congress in making this appropriation was 

 no more commendable or patriotic than that of Virginia in her dis- 

 position of it. I cannot speak in too laudatory terms 6f the wisdom 

 and foresight which enabled her, by an advantageous sale and a 

 more advantageous investment, to nearly double the principal of the 

 fund derived from this congressional appropriation, and to increase 

 the income therefrom in a corresponding degree. This annual in- 

 come will reach fully $30,000, two-thirds of which are set apart for 

 the maintenance of this College, and one-third to the Hampton 

 Normal and Agricultural Institute, a school founded upon the same 

 theory as this College, but devoted to the education of our colored 

 population; and right nobly is it performing this necessary and im- 

 portant duty. By this division of the fund between these two 

 institutions its benefits will be shared in by all the people of the 

 State, and the principle of separate schools for each race, which I 

 regard of vital importance to each and absolutely essential to success 

 in either, will be maintained and perpetuated. In addition to this 

 fund, the good county of Montgomery, in the plentitude of her 

 patriotism and liberality, has donated to this College the munificent 

 sum of $20,000. I would that her generous example might be fol- 

 lowed by every county in the State, that each might contribute a 

 monumental stone to the grand temple which is here to rise, so that 

 when their sons shall throng its lofty porticoes and crowd its stately 

 halls the conscious pride of benefactors may mingle with their 

 emotions of gratitude and zealous devotion. These funds, together 

 with those derived from the fees of students other than State, con- 

 stitute the resources of the Institution and its present means of 

 subsistence. 



While these may be sufficient to sustain its present being, they 

 are in no wise commensurate with the requirements of " the life to 

 come." The sustenance of the child is unequal to the demands of 

 developed manhood. The veil is lifting npon a future of un- 

 exampled physical and mental activity. The wonders of to-day will 

 become the common places of to-morrow, and the dreams of the 

 present the realizations of the future. As the accumulated know- 

 ledge and experience of the past aroused, invigoroted and augmented 

 the energies and capacities of the present, so the restless activitie& 

 and magnificent achievements of this generation will be increased 

 and multiplied many fold by the next. It matters not that the 

 anchorite mourns or the cynic derides "the degeneracy of our 

 times ; " it matters not that a Froude or a Kuskin should wield hia 



