XXX
Friends in Council
On the following Friday evening, Mr. Stillman’s pleasant, spacious parlors were filled to overflowing with a select company of earnest men and women deeply interested in the welfare of the race.
Bishop Tunster had prepared a paper on “Negro Emigration.” Dr. Latimer opened the discussion by speaking favorably of some of the salient points, but said:—
“I do not believe self-exilement is the true remedy for the wrongs of the negro. Where should he go if he left this country?”
“Go to Africa,” replied Bishop Tunster, in his bluff, hearty tones. “I believe that Africa is to be redeemed to civilization, and that the negro is to be gathered into the family of nations and recognized as a man and a brother.”
“Go to Africa?” repeated Professor Langhorne, of Georgia. “Does the United States own one foot of African soil? And have we not been investing our blood in the country for ages?”
“I am in favor of missionary efforts,” said Professor Gradnor, of North Carolina, “for the redemption of Africa, but I see no reason for expatriating ourselves because some persons do not admire the color of our skins.”
“I do not believe,” said Mr. Stillman, “in emptying on the shores of Africa a horde of ignorant, poverty-stricken people, as missionaries of civilization or Christianity. And while I am in favor of missionary efforts, there is need here for the best heart and brain to work in unison for justice and righteousness.”
“America,” said Miss Delany, “is the best field for human development. God has not heaped up our mountains with such grandeur, flooded our rivers with such majesty, crowned our valleys with such fertility, enriched our mines with such wealth, that they should only minister to grasping greed and sensuous enjoyment.”
“Climate, soil, and physical environments,” said Professor Gradnor, “have much to do with shaping national characteristics. If in Africa, under a tropical sun, the negro has lagged behind other races in the march of civilization, at least for once in his history he has, in this country, the privilege of using climatic advantages and developing under new conditions.”
“Yes,” replied Dr. Latimer, “and I do not wish our people to become restless and unsettled before they have tried one generation of freedom.”
“I am always glad,” said Mr. Forest, a tall, distinguished-looking gentleman from New York, “when I hear of people who are ill treated in one section of the country emigrating to another. Men who are deaf to the claims of mercy, and oblivious to the demands of justice, can feel when money is slipping from their pockets.”
“The negro,” said Hon. Dugdale, “does not present to my mind the picture of an effete and exhausted people, destined to die out before a stronger race. Gilbert Haven once saw a statue which suggested this thought, ‘I am black, but comely; the sun has looked down upon me, but I will teach you who despise me to feel that I am your superior.’ The men who are acquiring property and building up homes in the South show us what energy and determination may do even in that part of the country. I believe such men can do more to conquer prejudice than if they spent all their lives in shouting for their rights and ignoring their duties. No! as there are millions of us in this country, I think it best to settle down and work out our own salvation here.”
“How many of us today,” asked Professor Langhorne, “would be teaching in the South, if every field of labor in the North was as accessible to us as to the whites? It has been estimated that a million young white men have left the South since the war, and, had our chances been equal to theirs, would we have been any more willing to stay in the South with those who need us than they? But this prejudice, by impacting us together, gives us a common cause and brings our intellect in contact with the less favored of our race.”
“I do not believe,” said Miss Delany, “that the Southern white people themselves desire any wholesale exodus of the colored from their labor fields. It would be suicidal to attempt their expatriation.”
“History,” said Professor Langhorne, “tells that Spain was once the place where barbarian Europe came to light her lamp. Seven hundred years before there was a public lamp in London you might have gone through the streets of Cordova amid ten miles of lighted lamps, and stood there on solidly paved land, when hundreds of years afterwards, in Paris, on a rainy day you would have sunk to your ankles in the mud. But she who bore the name of the ‘Terror of Nations,’ and the ‘Queen of the Ocean,’ was not strong enough to dash herself against God’s law of retribution and escape unscathed. She inaugurated a crusade of horror against a million of her best laborers and artisans. Vainly she expected the blessing of God to crown her work of violence. Instead of seeing the fruition of her hopes in the increased prosperity of her land, depression and paralysis settled on her trade and business. A fearful blow was struck at her agriculture; decay settled on her manufactories; money became too scarce to pay the necessary expenses of the king’s exchequer; and that once mighty empire became a fallen kingdom, pierced by her crimes and dragged down by her transgressions.”
“We did not,” said Iola, “place the bounds of our habitation. And I believe we are to be fixtures in this country. But beyond the shadows I see the coruscation of a brighter day; and we can help usher it in, not by answering hate with hate, or giving scorn for scorn, but by striving to be more generous, noble, and just. It seems as if all creation travels to respond to the song of the Herald angels, ‘Peace on earth, goodwill toward men.’ ”
The next paper was on “Patriotism,” by Rev. Cantnor. It was a paper in which the white man was extolled as the master race, and spoke as if it were a privilege for the colored man to be linked to his destiny and to live beneath the shadow of his power. He asserted that the white race of this country is the broadest, most Christian, and humane of that branch of the human family.
Dr. Latimer took exception to his position. “Law,” he said, “is the pivot on which the whole universe turns; and obedience to law is the gauge by which a nation’s strength or weakness is tried. We have had two evils by which our obedience to law has been tested—slavery and the liquor traffic. How have we dealt with them both? We have been weighed in the balance and found wanting. Millions of slaves and serfs have been liberated during this century, but not even in semi-barbaric Russia, heathen Japan, or Catholic Spain has slavery been abolished through such a fearful conflict as it was in the United States. The liquor traffic still sends its floods of ruin and shame to the habitations of men, and no political party has been found with enough moral power and numerical strength to stay the tide of death.”
“I think,” said Professor Gradnor, “that what our country needs is truth more than flattery. I do not think that our moral life keeps pace with our mental development and material progress. I know of no civilized country on the globe, Catholic, Protestant, or Mohammedan, where life is less secure than it is in the South. Nearly eighteen hundred years ago the life of a Roman citizen in Palestine was in danger from mob violence. That pagan government threw around him a wall of living clay, consisting of four hundred and seventy men, when more than forty Jews had bound themselves with an oath that they would neither eat nor drink until they had taken the life of the Apostle Paul. Does not true patriotism demand that citizenship should be as much protected in Christian America as it was in heathen Rome?”
“I would have our people,” said Miss Delany, “more interested in politics. Instead of forgetting the past, I would have them hold in everlasting remembrance our great deliverance. Hitherto we have never had a country with tender, precious memories to fill our eyes with tears, or glad reminiscences to thrill our hearts with pride and joy. We have been aliens and outcasts in the land of our birth. But I want my pupils to do all in their power to make this country worthy of their deepest devotion and loftiest patriotism. I want them to feel that its glory is their glory, its dishonor their shame.”
“Our esteemed friend, Mrs. Watson,” said Iola, “sends regrets that she cannot come, but has kindly favored us with a poem, called the ‘Rallying Cry.’ In her letter she says that, although she is no longer young, she feels that in the conflict for the right there’s room for young as well as old. She hopes that we will here unite the enthusiasm of youth with the experience of age, and that we will have a pleasant and profitable conference. Is it your pleasure that the poem be read at this stage of our proceedings, or later on?”
“Let us have it now,” answered Harry, “and I move that Miss Delany be chosen to lend to the poem the charm of her voice.”
“I second the motion,” said Iola, smiling, and handing the poem to Miss Delany.
Miss Delany took the poem and read it with fine effect. The spirit of the poem had entered her soul.
A Rallying Cry
Oh, children of the tropics,
Amid our pain and wrong
Have you no other mission
Than music, dance, and song?When through the weary ages
Our dripping tears still fall,
Is this a time to dally
With pleasure’s silken thrall?Go, muffle all your viols;
As heroes learn to stand,
With faith in God’s great justice
Nerve every heart and hand.Dream not of ease nor pleasure,
Nor honor, wealth, nor fame,
Till from the dust you’ve lifted
Our long-dishonored name;And crowned that name with glory
By deeds of holy worth,
To shine with light emblazoned,
The noblest name on earth.Count life a dismal failure,
Unblessing and unblest,
That seeks ’mid ease inglorious
For pleasure or for rest.With courage, strength, and valor
Your lives and actions brace;
Shrink not from toil or hardship,
And dangers bravely face.Engrave upon your banners,
In words of golden light,
That honor, truth, and justice
Are more than godless might.Above earth’s pain and sorrow
Christ’s dying face I see;
I hear the cry of anguish:—
“Why hast thou forsaken me?”In the pallor of that anguish
I see the only light,
To flood with peace and gladness
Earth’s sorrow, pain, and night.Arrayed in Christly armor
’Gainst error, crime, and sin,
The victory can’t be doubtful,
For God is sure to win.
The next paper was by Miss Iola Leroy, on the “Education of Mothers.”
“I agree,” said Rev. Eustace, of St. Mary’s parish, “with the paper. The great need of the race is enlightened mothers.”
“And enlightened fathers, too,” added Miss Delany, quickly. “If there is anything I chafe to see it is a strong, hearty man shirking his burdens, putting them on the shoulders of his wife, and taking life easy for himself.”
“I always pity such mothers,” interposed Iola, tenderly.
“I think,” said Miss Delany, with a flash in her eye and a ring of decision in her voice, “that such men ought to be drummed out of town!” As she spoke, there was an expression which seemed to say, “And I would like to help do it!”
Harry smiled, and gave her a quick glance of admiration.
“I do not think,” said Mrs. Stillman, “that we can begin too early to teach our boys to be manly and self-respecting, and our girls to be useful and self-reliant.”
“You know,” said Mrs. Leroy, “that after the war we were thrown upon the nation a homeless race to be gathered into homes, and a legally unmarried race to be taught the sacredness of the marriage relation. We must instill into our young people that the true strength of a race means purity in women and uprightness in men; who can say, with Sir Galahad:—
‘My strength is the strength of ten,
Because my heart is pure.’
And where this is wanting neither wealth nor culture can make up the deficiency.”
“There is a field of Christian endeavor which lies between the schoolhouse and the pulpit, which needs the hand of a woman more in private than in public,” said Miss Delany.
“Yes, I have often felt the need of such work in my own parish. We need a union of women with the warmest hearts and clearest brains to help in the moral education of the race,” said Rev. Eustace.
“Yes,” said Iola, “if we would have the prisons empty we must make the homes more attractive.”
“In civilized society,” replied Dr. Latimer, “there must be restraint either within or without. If parents fail to teach restraint within, society has her checkreins without in the form of chain-gangs, prisons, and the gallows.”
The closing paper was on the “Moral Progress of the Race,” by Hon. Dugdale. He said: “The moral progress of the race was not all he could desire, yet he could not help feeling that, compared with other races, the outlook was not hopeless. I am so sorry to see, however, that in some States there is an undue proportion of colored people in prisons.”
“I think,” answered Professor Langhorne, of Georgia, “that this is owing to a partial administration of law in meting out punishment to colored offenders. I know red-handed murderers who walk in this Republic unwhipped of justice, and I have seen a colored woman sentenced to prison for weeks for stealing twenty-five cents. I knew a colored girl who was executed for murder when only a child in years. And it was through the intervention of a friend of mine, one of the bravest young men of the South, that a boy of fifteen was saved from the gallows.”
“When I look,” said Mr. Forest, “at the slow growth of modern civilization—the ages which have been consumed in reaching our present altitude, and see how we have outgrown slavery, feudalism, and religious persecutions, I cannot despair of the future of the race.”
“Just now,” said Dr. Latimer, “we have the fearful grinding and friction which comes in the course of an adjustment of the new machinery of freedom in the old ruts of slavery. But I am optimistic enough to believe that there will yet be a far higher and better Christian civilization than our country has ever known.”
“And in that civilization I believe the negro is to be an important factor,” said Rev. Cantnor.
“I believe it also,” said Miss Delany, hopefully, “and this thought has been a blessed inspiration to my life. When I come in contact with Christless prejudices, I feel that my life is too much a part of the Divine plan, and invested with too much intrinsic worth, for me to be the least humiliated by indignities that beggarly souls can inflict. I feel more pitiful than resentful to those who do not know how much they miss by living mean, ignoble lives.”
“My heart,” said Iola, “is full of hope for the future. Pain and suffering are the crucibles out of which come gold more fine than the pavements of heaven, and gems more precious than the foundations of the Holy City.”
“If,” said Mrs. Leroy, “pain and suffering are factors in human development, surely we have not been counted too worthless to suffer.”
“And is there,” continued Iola, “a path which we have trodden in this country, unless it be the path of sin, into which Jesus Christ has not put His feet and left it luminous with the light of His steps? Has the negro been poor and homeless? The birds of the air had nests and the foxes had holes, but the Son of man had not where to lay His head. Has our name been a synonym for contempt? ‘He shall be called a Nazarene.’ Have we been despised and trodden under foot? Christ was despised and rejected of men. Have we been ignorant and unlearned? It was said of Jesus Christ, ‘How knoweth this man letters, never having learned?’ Have we been beaten and bruised in the prison-house of bondage? ‘They took Jesus and scourged Him.’ Have we been slaughtered, our bones scattered at the graves’ mouth? He was spit upon by the mob, smitten and mocked by the rabble, and died as died Rome’s meanest criminal slave. Today that cross of shame is a throne of power. Those robes of scorn have changed to habiliments of light, and that crown of mockery to a diadem of glory. And never, while the agony of Gethsemane and the sufferings of Calvary have their hold upon my heart, will I recognize any religion as His which despises the least of His brethren.”
As Iola finished, there was a ring of triumph in her voice, as if she were reviewing a path she had trodden with bleeding feet, and seen it change to lines of living light. Her soul seemed to be flashing through the rare loveliness of her face and etherealizing its beauty.
Everyone was spellbound. Dr. Latimer was entranced, and, turning to Hon. Dugdale, said, in a low voice and with deep-drawn breath, “She is angelic!”
Hon. Dugdale turned, gave a questioning look, then replied, “She is strangely beautiful! Do you know her?”
“Yes; I have met her several times. I accompanied her here tonight. The tones of her voice are like benedictions of peace; her words a call to higher service and nobler life.”
Just then Rev. Carmicle was announced. He had been on a Southern tour, and had just returned.
“Oh, Doctor,” exclaimed Mrs. Stillman, “I am delighted to see you. We were about to adjourn, but we will postpone action to hear from you.”
“Thank you,” replied Rev. Carmicle. “I have not the cue to the meeting, and will listen while I take breath.”
“Pardon me,” answered Mrs. Stillman. “I should have been more thoughtful than to press so welcome a guest into service before I had given him time for rest and refreshment; but if the courtesy failed on my lips it did not fail in my heart. I wanted our young folks to see one of our thinkers who had won distinction before the war.”
“My dear friend,” said Rev. Carmicle, smiling, “some of these young folks will look on me as a back number. You know the cry has already gone forth, ‘Young men to the front.’ ”
“But we need old men for counsel,” interposed Mr. Forest, of New York.
“Of course,” said Rev. Carmicle, “we older men would rather retire gracefully than be relegated or hustled to a back seat. But I am pleased to see doors open to you which were closed to us, and opportunities which were denied us embraced by you.”
“How,” asked Hon. Dugdale, “do you feel in reference to our people’s condition in the South?”
“Very hopeful, although at times I cannot help feeling anxious about their future. I was delighted with my visits to various institutions of learning, and surprised at the desire manifested among the young people to obtain an education. Where toil-worn mothers bent beneath their heavy burdens their more favored daughters are enjoying the privileges of education. Young people are making recitations in Greek and Latin where it was once a crime to teach their parents to read. I also became acquainted with colored professors and presidents of colleges. Saw young ladies who had graduated as doctors. Comfortable homes have succeeded old cabins of slavery. Vast crops have been raised by free labor. I read with interest and pleasure a number of papers edited by colored men. I saw it estimated that two millions of our people had learned to read, and I feel deeply grateful to the people who have supplied us with teachers who have stood their ground so nobly among our people.”
“But,” asked Mr. Forest, “you expressed fears about the future of our race. From whence do your fears arise?”
“From the unfortunate conditions which slavery has entailed upon that section of our country. I dread the results of that racial feeling which ever and anon breaks out into restlessness and crime. Also, I am concerned about the lack of home training for those for whom the discipline of the plantation has been exchanged for the penalties of prisons and chain-gangs. I am sorry to see numbers of our young men growing away from the influence of the church and drifting into prisons. I also fear that in some sections, as colored men increase in wealth and intelligence, there will be an increase of race rivalry and jealousy. It is said that savages, by putting their ears to the ground, can hear a far-off tread. So, today, I fear that there are savage elements in our civilization which hear the advancing tread of the negro and would retard his coming. It is the incarnation of these elements that I dread. It is their elimination I do so earnestly desire. Whether it be outgrown or not is our unsolved problem. Time alone will tell whether or not the virus of slavery and injustice has too fully permeated our Southern civilization for a complete recovery. Nations, honeycombed by vice, have fallen beneath the weight of their iniquities. Justice is always uncompromising in its claims and inexorable in its demands. The laws of the universe are never repealed to accommodate our follies.”
“Surely,” said Bishop Tunster, “the negro has a higher mission than that of aimlessly drifting through life and patiently waiting for death.”
“We may not,” answered Rev. Carmicle, “have the same dash, courage, and aggressiveness of other races, accustomed to struggle, achievement, and dominion, but surely the world needs something better than the results of arrogance, aggressiveness, and indomitable power. For the evils of society there are no solvents as potent as love and justice, and our greatest need is not more wealth and learning, but a religion replete with life and glowing with love. Let this be the impelling force in the race and it cannot fail to rise in the scale of character and condition.”
“And,” said Dr. Latimer, “instead of narrowing our sympathies to mere racial questions, let us broaden them to humanity’s wider issues.”
“Let us,” replied Rev. Carmicle, “pass it along the lines, that to be willfully ignorant is to be shamefully criminal. Let us teach our people not to love pleasure or to fear death, but to learn the true value of life, and to do their part to eliminate the paganism of caste from our holy religion and the lawlessness of savagery from our civilization.”
“How did you enjoy the evening, Marie?” asked Robert, as they walked homeward.
“I was interested and deeply pleased,” answered Marie.
“I,” said Robert, “was thinking of the wonderful changes that have come to us since the war. When I sat in those well-lighted, beautifully-furnished rooms, I was thinking of the meetings we used to have in bygone days. How we used to go by stealth into lonely woods and gloomy swamps, to tell of our hopes and fears, sorrows and trials. I hope that we will have many more of these gatherings. Let us have the next one here.”
“I am sure,” said Marie, “I would gladly welcome such a conference at any time. I think such meetings would be so helpful to our young people.”