ified with the whole country since
1620, and have assisted in producing peace, prosperity. We have helped
to clear the forests, till the soil, level the mountains, fill the
valleys, bridge rivers, build railroads, factories, schoolhouses,
churches, towns, and cities. We have labored assiduously to make this
country bloom as a rose. This fact is admitted by multiplied thousands
of the best white people in the whole South. We are not ashamed of our
record in the history of our State, neither do we wish it to be
ashamed of us.

[Illustration: OFFICERS OF THE WOMAN'S BOARD.--1. Mrs J. C. Thompson,
President; 2. Mrs. J. S. Lovell, Fifth Vice President; 3. Mrs. W. H.
Key, Treasurer; 4. Mrs. Lizzie E. Robinson, Seventh Vice President;
5. Miss Nannie E. Perkins, Recording Secretary; 6. Mrs J. Ira Watson,
Sixth Vice President; 7. Mrs. J. C. Tate, First Vice President; 8.
Miss Laura B. Hobson, Corresponding Secretary.]

We have done well, but we can do better. A thousand years shall not
erase from the pages of history the part that we have played upon the
American stage of action. Do not falter now, my brethren, but rush to
the help of the Negro Department with your banners floating in the
breeze. We are pronounced an unsolved problem. We are quoted as a
vexatious question, and the eyes of the world are upon us. We can
solve this problem, we can answer this question, and we can charm the
gaze of the world. When? May 1, 1897. Where? In the Negro Building.
How? By filling it with suitable exhibits.

We are making history. The historian may neglect us, but there is a
hand that is writing upon the wall--not our destruction, neither does
it require a Daniel to read it. With the golden pen of time it dips
into the crystal fluid of sympathy, and writes us as a nation, making
rapid strides

Out of darkness into light,
Out of weakness into might.

It writes us as a nation upon the ocean of time, landing without
anchor, oar, or sail. Thirty-three years ago, when we started out from
the bonds of slavery with a legacy of poverty and ignorance, the
canopy of heaven for our shelter, we were in a miserable, helpless
condition. To-day we are a great nation, nearly 10,000,000 strong,
with nearly $1,000,000,000 wealth. When the products of our hands are
seen in the Tennessee Centennial, our government may be constrained to
pay not only the debt of gratitude, but the debt of money that she
owes us for the two hundred and forty-four y