n the tools needed. I then told the merchant that I had no money,
and of the place I had to work the next morning. He said nothing for a
moment, looked me over, and then said: "All right take them." I felt
great relief when I paid the merchant and my landlord on the following
Saturday.

Why do I detail to such length these items of endeavor; experiences
which have had similarity in many lives? For the reason that they seem
to contain data for a moral, which if observed may be useful. Never
disclose your poverty until the last gleam of hope has sunk beneath the
horizon of your best effort, remembering that invincible determination
holds the key to success, while advice and assistance hitherto laggard,
now with hasty steps greets you within the door.

I was not allowed to long pursue carpentering. White employees finding
me at work on the same building would "strike." On one occasion the
contractor came to me and said, "I expect you will have to stop, for
this house must be finished in the time specified; but, if you can get
six or eight equally good workmen, I will let these fellows go. Not that
I have any special liking for your people. I am giving these men all the
wages they demand, and I am not willing to submit to the tyranny of
their dictation if I can help it." This episode, the moral of which is
as pertinent today as then, and more apparent, intensifies the necessity
of greater desire upon the part of our young men and women to acquire
knowledge in skilled handicraft, reference to which I have hitherto
made. But my convictions are so pronounced that I cannot forbear the
reiteration. For while it is ennobling to the individual, giving
independence of character and more financial ability, the reflex
influence is so helpful in giving the race a higher status in the
industrial activities of a commonwealth. Ignorance of such activities
compel our people mostly to engage in the lower and less remunerative
pursuits. I could not find the men he wanted or subsequent employment of
that kind.

All classes of labor were highly remunerative, blacking boots not
excepted.

I after engaged in this, and other like humble employments, part of
which was for Hon. John C. Fremont, "the pathfinder overland to
California."

[Illustration: BOOKER T. WASHINGTON.

"The Sage of Tuskegee."

The Leader of Leaders For Negro Advancement.]

Saving my earnings, I joined a firm already established in the clothing
business. After a year