rs were graduates of the Hampton Institute. We gave our Hampton
friends, especially General Armstrong, a cordial welcome. They were all
surprised and pleased at the rapid progress that the school had made
within so short a time. The coloured people from miles around came to
the school to get a look at General Armstrong, about whom they had heard
so much. The General was not only welcomed by the members of my own
race, but by the Southern white people as well.

This first visit which General Armstrong made to Tuskegee gave me an
opportunity to get an insight into his character such as I had not
before had. I refer to his interest in the Southern white people. Before
this I had had the thought that General Armstrong, having fought the
Southern white man, rather cherished a feeling of bitterness toward the
white South, and was interested in helping only the coloured man there.
But this visit convinced me that I did not know the greatness and the
generosity of the man. I soon learned, by his visits to the Southern
white people, and from his conversations with them, that he was as
anxious about the prosperity and the happiness of the white race as the
black. He cherished no bitterness against the South, and was happy
when an opportunity offered for manifesting his sympathy. In all my
acquaintance with General Armstrong I never heard him speak, in public
or in private, a single bitter word against the white man in the South.
From his example in this respect I learned the lesson that great men
cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of hatred.
I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it
strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.

It is now long ago that I learned this lesson from General Armstrong,
and resolved that I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might
be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him. With God's
help, I believe that I have completely rid myself of any ill feeling
toward the Southern white man for any wrong that he may have inflicted
upon my race. I am made to feel just as happy now when I am rendering
service to Southern white men as when the service is rendered to a
member of my own race. I pity from the bottom of my heart any individual
who is so unfortunate as to get into the habit of holding race
prejudice.

The more I consider the subject, the more strongly I am convinced that
the most harmful effect of the practic