real benefit from present
difficulties?"

The most spectacular feature of the exercises was the parade. It
extended for almost a mile and included a score or more of floats,
hundreds of men and women in appropriate costumes, and dozens of
horses, mules, and other live stock.

There were a large number of colored preachers in attendance who
showed that they had adopted the Washington slogan of trying to make a
heaven on earth and whose testimony showed that they were now giving
as much time to soil salvation as to soul salvation. One of them told
of a flourishing Pig Club which he had organized among his
parishioners after reading Mr. Washington's open letter, "Pigs and
Education; Pigs and Debts," the circulating of which will be later
described.

[Illustration: This old woman was a regular attendant at the Tuskegee
Negro Conference and idolizingly watched Mr. Washington during the
whole four hours that he would preside over one of the Conference
sessions.]

After the awarding of prizes for the best floats the declarations of
the conference were read by Major R.R. Moton of Hampton Institute, who
then little realized that before the year was out he was to be chosen
to succeed the leader of his race as the Principal of Tuskegee
Institute.

The following were the especially significant paragraphs of these
declarations:

"It is found that for every dollar's worth of cotton we grow, we raise
only forty-nine cents' worth of all other crops. An investigation has
shown that there are 20,000 farms of Negroes on which there are no
cattle of any kind; 270,000 on which there are no hogs; 200,000 on
which no poultry is raised; 140,000 on which no corn is grown; on
750,000 farms of Negroes no oats are grown; on 550,000 farms no sweet
potatoes are grown, and on 320,000 farms of Negroes there are no
gardens of any sort. These hundreds of thousands of farms without
cattle, grain, or gardens are for the most part operated by tenants.
In their behalf, the Tuskegee Negro Conference respectfully requests
of the planters, bankers, and other representatives of the financial
interests of the South that more opportunities be given Negro tenants
on plantations to grow crops other than cotton."

After the regular conference the usual Conference of Workers was held.
This conference is composed of people such as heads of schools and
colleges, preachers, teachers, and persons generally holding
responsible positions of leadership in their