ver, learned how to work; so much
he brought out of slavery with him; and right royal service it has
rendered him. What is he to-day? From this humble beginning of a
generation ago when he had absolutely nothing he has begun to acquire
something of this world's goods. He has been getting for himself a
home, some land, some money in bank, and some interest in stocks and
bonds. His industry, thrift and economy are everywhere in evidence and
he is bravely and consciously struggling toward the plane where his
vindication as a man and a citizen is what he is and what he has
acquired. In Louisiana he pays taxes on twelve millions, in Georgia on
fourteen millions and in South Carolina on thirteen millions. A recent
statistician, writing for the New York Sun, estimates his wealth North
and South at four hundred millions. During the last few years much of
this accumulation of property is in farm land which everywhere is
rapidly increasing in value. In this matter of securing a home and
some land, the Negro's achievements are certainly commensurate with
his opportunities.

In education his progress is even more clearly manifest. There are
to-day 2,912,912 Negro children of school age in the United States. Of
these 1,511,618 are enrolled in the public schools and the average
attendance is sixty-seven per cent of the enrollment. In addition to
the 1,511,618 who are enrolled in the public schools 50,000 more are
attending schools under the care and maintenance of the church. In
this work all the leading denominations of the country are
represented. The Freedmen's Aid and Southern Educational Society of
the Methodist Episcopal Church among the first, if not the very first
to engage in this work, has under its care forty-seven institutions of
Christian learning, twenty of which are mainly for the education of
the colored people. These institutions are scattered all over the
sixteen former slave states and have possibly sent out more graduates
as teachers, preachers, physicians, dentists, pharmacists and
industrial workers than any other institution or set of institutions
doing work in the South. In addition to the work of the Freedmen's Aid
and Southern Educational Society there are the American Missionary
Association, under Congregational auspices, the Baptist Home
Missionary Society, the Presbyterian Home Missionary Society, the
Lutheran Evangelical Society--all of which support institutions for
Christian learning for the education