e would be welcomed to an
inhospitable grave.

It is true that a great many Negroes died during the first years of
their new life. The joy of emancipation and the excitement that
disturbed business swept the Negroes into the large cities. Like the
shepherds who left their flocks on the plains and went into Bethlehem
to see the promised redemption, these people sought the centres of
excitement. The large cities were overrun with them. The demand for
unskilled labor was not great. From mere spectators they became
idlers, helpless and offensive to industrious society. Ignorant of
sanitary laws, imprudent in their daily living, changing from the pure
air and plain diet of farm life to the poisonous atmosphere and rich,
fateful food of the city, many fell victims to the sudden change from
bondage to freedom, from darkness to light, and from the fleshpots,
garlic, and onions of their Egyptian bondage to the milk and honey of
the Canaan of their deliverance.

But this was in accordance with an immutable law of nature. Every year
a large number of birds perish in an attempt to change their home;
every spring-time many flowers die at their birth. The law of the
survival of the fittest is impartial and inexorable. The Creator said
centuries ago "the soul that sinneth shall surely die," and the law
has remained until the present time. Those who sinned ignorantly or
knowingly died the death; but those who obeyed the laws of health, of
man, and of God, lived to be useful members of society.

But this was the exception to the rule. The Negro race in America is
not dying out. The charge is false. The wish was father to the
thought, while no doubt many honest people have been misled by false
figures. Nearly all white communities at the South had more than
enough of physicians; and science and culture were summoned to the aid
of the white mother in the hour of childbirth. The record of births
was preserved with pride and official accuracy; and thus there was a
record upon which to calculate the increase. But, on the contary,
among the Negroes there were no physicians and no record of births.
The venerable system of midwifery prevailed. In burying their dead,
however, this people were compelled to obtain a burial permit from the
Board of Health. Thus the statistics were all on one side--all deaths
and no births. Looking at these statistics it did seem that the race
was dying out. But the Government steps in and takes the census every