ir support. Notwithstanding that we have practically a whole race
dependent upon agriculture, and notwithstanding that thirty years have
passed since our freedom, aside from what has been done at Hampton and
Tuskegee and one or two other institutions, but very little has been
attempted by State or philanthropy in the way of educating the race in
this one industry upon which its very existence depends. Boys have
been taken from the farms and educated in law, theology, Hebrew and
Greek,--educated in everything else except the very subject that they
should know most about. I question whether among all the educated
coloured people in the United States you can find six, if we except
those from the institutions named, who have received anything like a
thorough training in agriculture. It would have seemed that, since
self-support, industrial independence, is the first condition for
lifting up any race, that education in theoretical and practical
agriculture, horticulture, dairying, and stock-raising, should have
occupied the first place in our system.

Some time ago, when we decided to make tailoring a part of our
training at the Tuskegee Institute, I was amazed to find that it was
almost impossible to find in the whole country an educated coloured
man who could teach the making of clothing. We could find them by the
score who could teach astronomy, theology, grammar, or Latin, but
almost none who could instruct in the making of clothing, something
that has to be used by every one of us every day in the year. How
often has my heart been made to sink as I have gone through the South
and into the homes of people, and found women who could converse
intelligently on Grecian history, who had studied geometry, could
analyse the most complex sentences, and yet could not analyse the
poorly cooked and still more poorly served corn bread and fat meat
that they and their families were eating three times a day! It is
little trouble to find girls who can locate Pekin or the Desert of
Sahara on an artificial globe, but seldom can you find one who can
locate on an actual dinner table the proper place for the carving
knife and fork or the meat and vegetables.

A short time ago, in one of the Southern cities, a coloured man died
who had received training as a skilled mechanic during the days of
slavery. Later by his skill and industry he built up a great business
as a house contractor and builder. In this same city there are 35,000
coloured