f almost every Negro
child an attainable ideal. It brought the masses of the blacks in contact
with modern civilization, made black men the leaders of their communities
and trainers of the new generation. In this work college-bred Negroes were
first teachers, and then teachers of teachers. And here it is that the
broad culture of college work has been of peculiar value. Knowledge of
life and its wider meaning, has been the point of the Negro's deepest
ignorance, and the sending out of teachers whose training has not been
simply for bread winning, but also for human culture, has been of
inestimable value in the training of these men.

In earlier years the two occupations of preacher and teacher were
practically the only ones open to the black college graduate. Of later
years a larger diversity of life among his people, has opened new avenues
of employment. Nor have these college men been paupers and spendthrifts;
557 college-bred Negroes owned in 1899, $1,342,862.50 worth of real
estate, (assessed value) or $2,411 per family. The real value of the total
accumulations of the whole group is perhaps about $10,000,000, or $5,000 a
piece. Pitiful, is it not, beside the fortunes of oil kings and steel
trusts, but after all is the fortune of the millionaire the only stamp of
true and successful living? Alas! it is, with many, and there's the rub.

The problem of training the Negro is to-day immensely complicated by the
fact that the whole question of the efficiency and appropriateness of our
present systems of education, for any kind of child, is a matter of active
debate, in which final settlement seems still afar off. Consequently it
often happens that persons arguing for or against certain systems of
education for Negroes, have these controversies in mind and miss the real
question at issue. The main question, so far as the Southern Negro is
concerned, is: What under the present circumstance, must a system of
education do in order to raise the Negro as quickly as possible in the
scale of civilization? The answer to this question seems to me clear: It
must strengthen the Negro's character, increase his knowledge and teach
him to earn a living. Now it goes without saying, that it is hard to do
all these things simultaneously or suddenly, and that at the same time it
will not do to give all the attention to one and neglect the others; we
could give black boys trades, but that alone will not civilize a race of
ex-slaves; we migh