argains in the open
market. A sum of 3000 dollars in gold was once offered for the ex-slave
friend to whom reference has been made, and was at once refused by his
owner. It can well be believed that one who has developed such a gift
for organisation as Booker Washington would have commanded a much higher
figure, although such prices were, of course, far in advance of the
average.

It might also be said that the planters were not responsible for slavery
having become an institution of the Republic, and that they had to do
with things as they found them. But while this may be true, it has also
to be admitted that the Southern States retained that institution longer
than their neighbours. At the end of the century in which the Republic
secured its independence there were under 900,000 slaves in the whole of
the United States; but the total was nearly 4,000,000 in the year of
emancipation. The Northern States had already liberated their slaves in
a gradual way about a quarter of a century before that crisis. For
generations slavery had been denounced as a wrong, amounting to a great
evil, by a number of chief men among the Republican leaders, such as
Franklin and Washington, Madison and Jefferson, and others. These men
were sufficiently outspoken to regard the thing as being quite out of
keeping with the principles of the Declaration of Independence.
Nevertheless, differences of opinion over this matter not only led to
violent controversy but to religious division, the most notable split
being that of the Episcopal Methodist Church, which henceforth had its
Northern and Southern sections, the latter being founded on a
pro-slavery basis.

Young as he was when the great revolution of complete abolition in the
Southern States was brought about, Booker Washington was still able to
show a child's keenest interest in what was taking place. It was as if
the sun had risen on new times altogether; the very winds seemed to blow
more cheerfully; the sky above seemed to be bright with promise with
better things to come than mere _niggers_ had ever known before; it was
as though the Golden Age itself had dawned. The sharp-witted little son
of the slave-girl could heartily enter into his mother's joy, but he
could not take in the meaning of the things that were happening as he
has been able to understand them since. Such a child was naturally
affected by the growing boldness and enthusiasm of his elders, who for
some time before the fi