em like
honored guests and allowed them to carry off provisions enough to feed
large families for days. He would also introduce them to the officers
and teachers of the school and to any invited guests who might be
present.

Old man Harry Varner was the night watchman of the school in its early
days and a man upon whom Mr. Washington very much depended. He lived
in a cabin opposite the school grounds. After hearing many talks about
the importance of living in a real house instead of a one or two room
cabin, old Uncle Harry finally decided that he must have a real house.
Accordingly he came to his employer, told him his feeling in the
matter, and laid before him his meagre savings, which he had
determined to spend for a real house. Mr. Washington went with him to
select the lot and added enough out of his own pocket to the scant
savings to enable the old man to buy a cow and a pig and a garden plot
as well as the house. From then on for weeks he and old Uncle Harry
would have long and mysterious conferences over the planning of that
little four-room cottage. It is doubtful if Dr. Washington ever
devoted more time or thought to planning any of the great buildings of
the Institute. No potentate was ever half as proud of his palace as
Uncle Harry of his four-room cottage when it was finally finished and
painted and stood forth in all its glory to be admired of all men. And
Booker Washington was scarcely less proud of it than Uncle Harry.

With Uncle Harry Varner, Old Man Brannum, the original cook of the
school to whom reference has already been made, and Lewis Adams of the
town of Tuskegee, whom Mr. Washington mentions in "Up from Slavery" as
one of his chief advisers, all unlettered-before-the-war Negroes, his
relationship was always particularly intimate. These three old men
enjoyed the confidence of the white people of the town of Tuskegee to
an unusual extent and often acted as ambassadors of good-will between
the head of the school and his white neighbors when from time to time
the latter showed a disposition to look askance at the rapidly growing
institution on the hill beyond the town.

Another intimate friend of Mr. Washington's was Charles L. Diggs,
known affectionately on the school grounds as "Old Man Diggs." The old
man had been body servant to a Union officer in the Civil War and
after the war had been carried to Boston, where he became the butler
in a fashionable Back Bay family. When Mr. Washington first