m allowed to organize, secretly, for mutual
protection and helpfulness, in some sections; and, when organized, he
is always looked upon with grave suspicions. That people should go so
far out of the way to circumvent the legitimate endeavors of the
undeserving, to my mind, is the most unnatural thing to be sure.
"Consistency, thou art a jewel!"

Fifth: What people regard as a most discouraging sign touching the
Negro of this country, I consider a most portentous and hopeful one. I
refer to it here, because it bears decidedly upon my answer, and is
strictly in line therewith. As shown by the census of 1890 and 1900,
the increase of the Negro has suffered a positive check, if not
back-set. In explanation of this, one theory and another has been
advanced. Some have seen that he, like the American Indian, is on the
road to a kindred fate--final and utter extinction. Others have
consigned him to this or that destiny, according as they have felt
kindly or unkindly towards him. True, he has increased less rapidly,
but more surely, because of his stricter observance and growing regard
for the proper and God-appointed channels to this end. His propagation
by marriage, in which case one man is the husband of one woman, and
one woman the wife of one man, would naturally lend to this.

I might record and add to what has already been said, a rich and
varied experience, growing out of actual contact with, and work for,
my people covering twenty-four years--a period in which no year has
passed without leaving something done or suffered. But time and space
will not permit.

Finally, out of the unfavorable moral conditions to which the Negro as
a child of Adam is heir; out of the most untoward circumstances,
surrounding him in the dark days of his enslavement; out of the
traductions to which he is exposed at the hands of a most cruel and
relentless foe--the printing press; out of the mock trials and false
convictions visited upon him by the courts, too often manned by his
oppressors; out of the barriers put in the way of his withdrawal from
the midst of those who pronounce him without moral worth; out of the
glaring inconsistency of all dissenters; out of the pure and spotless
lives of ten thousand women--the wives, mothers, sisters, and
lovers--of as high souled and moral men as the world ever saw or
produced, I here and now once again and forever record my most
unconditioned and emphatic _no_ to the query I have in some measure
tr