in it, and began putting into it every kind
of book that I could get my hands upon, and called it my "library."

Notwithstanding my success at Mrs. Ruffner's I did not give up the idea
of going to the Hampton Institute. In the fall of 1872 I determined
to make an effort to get there, although, as I have stated, I had no
definite idea of the direction in which Hampton was, or of what it would
cost to go there. I do not think that any one thoroughly sympathized
with me in my ambition to go to Hampton unless it was my mother, and she
was troubled with a grave fear that I was starting out on a "wild-goose
chase." At any rate, I got only a half-hearted consent from her that
I might start. The small amount of money that I had earned had been
consumed by my stepfather and the remainder of the family, with the
exception of a very few dollars, and so I had very little with which to
buy clothes and pay my travelling expenses. My brother John helped me
all that he could, but of course that was not a great deal, for his work
was in the coal-mine, where he did not earn much, and most of what he
did earn went in the direction of paying the household expenses.

Perhaps the thing that touched and pleased me most in connection with
my starting for Hampton was the interest that many of the older coloured
people took in the matter. They had spent the best days of their lives
in slavery, and hardly expected to live to see the time when they would
see a member of their race leave home to attend a boarding-school. Some
of these older people would give me a nickel, others a quarter, or a
handkerchief.

Finally the great day came, and I started for Hampton. I had only a
small, cheap satchel that contained a few articles of clothing I could
get. My mother at the time was rather weak and broken in health. I
hardly expected to see her again, and thus our parting was all the more
sad. She, however, was very brave through it all. At that time there
were no through trains connecting that part of West Virginia with
eastern Virginia. Trains ran only a portion of the way, and the
remainder of the distance was travelled by stage-coaches.

The distance from Malden to Hampton is about five hundred miles. I had
not been away from home many hours before it began to grow painfully
evident that I did not have enough money to pay my fare to Hampton.
One experience I shall long remember. I had been travelling over the
mountains most of the afternoon in an o