urers under his
charge was soon busily engaged in clearing the mill site and preparing
for the foundations of a new dam. When it was learned that the colonel
was paying his labourers a dollar and a half a day, there was
considerable criticism, on the ground that such lavishness would
demoralise the labour market, the usual daily wage of the Negro
labourer being from fifty to seventy-five cents. But since most of the
colonel's money soon found its way, through the channels of trade,
into the pockets of the white people, the criticism soon died a
natural death.

_Eighteen_

Once started in his career of active benevolence, the colonel's
natural love of thoroughness, combined with a philanthropic zeal as
pleasant as it was novel, sought out new reforms. They were easily
found. He had begun, with wise foresight, at the foundations of
prosperity, by planning an industry in which the people could find
employment. But there were subtler needs, mental and spiritual, to be
met. Education, for instance, so important to real development,
languished in Clarendon. There was a select private school for young
ladies, attended by the daughters of those who could not send their
children away to school. A few of the town boys went away to military
schools. The remainder of the white youth attended the academy, which
was a thoroughly democratic institution, deriving its support partly
from the public school fund and partly from private subscriptions.
There was a coloured public school taught by a Negro teacher. Neither
school had, so far as the colonel could learn, attained any very high
degree of efficiency. At one time the colonel had contemplated
building a schoolhouse for the children of the mill hands, but upon
second thought decided that the expenditure would be more widely
useful if made through the channels already established. If the old
academy building were repaired, and a wing constructed, for which
there was ample room upon the grounds, it would furnish any needed
additional accommodation for the children of the operatives, and avoid
the drawing of any line that might seem to put these in a class apart.
There were already lines enough in the town--the deep and distinct
colour line, theoretically all-pervasive, but with occasional curious
exceptions; the old line between the "rich white folks" or
aristocrats--no longer rich, most of them, but retaining some of their
former wealth and clinging tenaciously to a waning