ntly left behind and who
could not yet speak intelligible English. Though there were many who
were skilled in household arts and in the useful customary
handicrafts, large numbers were acquainted only with the simplest toil
of the open fields. There were a few free blacks who possessed
property, in some instances to the value of many thousands of
dollars, but the great bulk were wholly inexperienced in the
responsibilities of ownership. There were some who had mastered the
rudiments of learning and here and there was to be found a gifted
mind, but ninety per cent of the negroes were unacquainted with
letters and were strangers to even the most rudimentary learning.
Their religion was a picturesque blend of Christian precepts and
Voodoo customs.

The Freedmen's Bureau, authorized by Congress early in 1865, had as
its functions to aid the negro to develop self-control and
self-reliance, to help the freedman with his new wage contracts, to
befriend him when he appeared in court, and to provide for him schools
and hospitals. It was a simple, slender reed for the race to lean upon
until it learned to walk. But it interfered with the orthodox opinion
of that day regarding individual independence and was limited to the
period of war and one year thereafter. It was eyed with suspicion and
was regarded with criticism by both the keepers of the _laissez faire_
faith and the former slave owners. It established a number of schools
and made a modest beginning in peasant proprietorship and free
labor.[12]

When this temporary guide was withdrawn, private organizations to some
extent took its place. The American Missionary Association continued
the educational work, and volunteers shouldered other benevolences.
But no power and no organization could take the place of the national
authority. If the Freedmen's Bureau could have been stripped of those
evil-intentioned persons who used it for private gain, been so
organized as to enlist the support of the Southern white population,
and been continued until a new generation of blacks were prepared for
civil life, the colossal blunders and criminal misfits of that bitter
period of transition might have been avoided. But political
opportunism spurned comprehensive plans, and the negro suddenly found
himself forced into social, political, and economic competition with
the white man.

The social and political struggle that followed was short-lived. There
were a few desperate years under t