arn a quarter by patching it up. Then I drove
on to the house, where are only a Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair left in
charge. Mrs. S. was very polite, and asked me up into our old parlor,
which did not look as pleasant as in the old time. Garibaldi was out
at pasture, so I could not have the ride I coveted while my horse was
eating his dinner. As I had never been into the schoolhouse since it
was finished, I borrowed the key and walked down to it. As I pulled
the rope to hear the sound of the unused bell, Robert came in, quiet
as ever, but greatly pleased, and asking many questions about Mass'
Charlie and Mr. and Mrs. Soule. I found the people were coming up to
be paid, so I went back to the yard and stood there as they came up to
the schoolroom door, across which was the old school table, with
Primus behind it, and Mr. Sinclair, looking over his list. Then I
walked on the beach, and Robert put my horse in and I drove off.

Mike had followed me up the road, loud in his regrets for the "good
ole times when Mass' Charlie and de fust gang white people been here."
"Mr. Philbrick de fustest man in de worl'. General Bennett[205]
couldn't--couldn't--fetch de fust feathers round his heart!" whatever
that may be.

CONCLUSION

When the end of this record is reached, undoubtedly the feeling
uppermost in the mind of the reader is one of disappointment. At first
blush one is ready to believe that the members of the little colony,
in proving the free negro capable of raising cotton to good advantage,
had still more completely proved him unfit for freedom. Yet the more
one reflects on the story, the more plainly one sees that the
discouraging state of things described in the later letters was merely
the inevitable result of Emancipation, and would have been the same
had any other race been concerned, whatever its characteristics. The
ferment of Freedom worked slowly in the negroes, but it worked
mightily, and the very sign of its working was, as a matter of course,
unreasonableness, insubordination, untrustworthiness. This result
might have been foreseen, and probably was foreseen. It was not a
pleasant thing to contemplate, nor is it pleasant to read of, but it
proved nothing as to the powers and possibilities of the negro people.
It is not probable that any of the "missionaries," however
discouraged, came to think that the black man was too stupid or too
dishonest to become a self-respecting member of society. Nor does it
appear