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It
is the first time that a Negro has made a speech in the South on any
important occasion before an audience composed of white men and women. It
electrified the audience, and the response was as if it had come from the
throat of a whirlwind.
Mrs.
Thompson had hardly taken her seat when all eyes were turned on a tall tawny
Negro sitting in the front row of the platform. It was Professor Booker T.
Washington, President of the Tuskegee (Alabama) Normal and Industrial
Institute, who must rank from this time forth as the foremost man of his
race in America. Gilmore's Band played the "Star-Spangled Banner,"
and the audience cheered. The tune changed to "Dixie" and the
audience roared with shrill "hi-yis." Again the music changed,
this time to "Yankee Doodle," and the clamour lessened.
All
this time the eyes of the thousands present looked straight at the Negro
orator. A strange thing was to happen. A black man was to speak for his
people, with none to interrupt him. As Professor Washington strode to the
edge of the stage, the low, descending sun shot fiery rays through the
windows into his face. A great
shout greeted him. He turned his head to avoid the blinding light, and moved
about the platform for relief. Then he turned his wonderful countenance to
the sun without a blink of the eyelids, and began to talk.
There
was a remarkable figure; tall, bony, straight as a Sioux chief, high
forehead, straight nose, heavy jaws, and strong, determined mouth, with big
white teeth, piercing eyes, and a commanding manner. The sinews stood out on
his bronzed neck, and his muscular right arm swung high in the air, with a
lead-pencil grasped in the clinched brown fist. His big feet were planted
squarely, with the heels together and the toes turned out. His voice range
out clear and true, and he paused impressively as he made each point. Within
ten minutes the multitude was in an uproar of enthusiasm--handkerchiefs were
waved, canes were flourished, hats were tossed in the air. The fairest women
of Georgia stood up and cheered. It was as if the orator had bewitched them.
And
when he held his dusky hand high above his head, with the fingers stretched
wide apart, and said to the white people of the South on behalf of his race,
"In all things that are purely social we can be as separate as the
fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to mutual
progress," the great wave of sound dashed itself against the walls, and
the whole audience was on its feet in a delirium of applause, and I thought
at that moment of the night when Henry Grady stood among the curling wreaths
of tobacco-smoke in Delmonico's banquet-hall and said, "I am a Cavalier
among Roundheads."
I
have heard the great orators of many countries, but not even Gladstone
himself could have pleased a cause with most consummate power than did this
angular Negro, standing in a
nimbus of sunshine, surrounded by the men who once fought to keep his race
in bondage. The roar might swell ever so high, but the expression of his
earnest face never changed.
A
ragged, ebony giant, squatted on the floor in one of the aisles, watched the
orator with burning eyes and tremulous face until the supreme burst of
applause came, and then the tears ran down his face. Most of the Negroes in
the audience were crying, perhaps without knowing just why.
At
the close of the speech Governor Bullock rushed across the stage and seized
the orator's hand. Another shout greeted this demonstration, and for a few
minutes the two men stood facing each other, hand in hand.
So
far as I could spare the time from the immediate work at Tuskegee, after my
Atlanta address, I accepted some of the invitations to speak in public which
came to me, especially those that would take me into territory where I
thought it would pay to plead the cause of my race, but I always did this
with the understanding that I was to be free to talk about my life-work and
the needs of my people. I also had it understood that I was not to speak in
the capacity of a professional lecturer, or for mere commercial gain.
In
my efforts on the public platform I never have been able to understand why
people come to hear me speak. This question I never can rid myself of. Time
and time again, as I have stood in the street in front of a building and
have seen men and women passing in large numbers into the audience room
where I was to speak, I have felt ashamed that I should be the cause of
people--as it seemed to me--wasting a valuable hour of their time. Some
years ago I was to deliver an address before a literary society in Madison,
Wis. An hour before the time set for me to speak, a fierce snow-storm began,
and continued for several hours. I made up my mind that there would be no
audience, and that I should not have to speak, but, as a matter of duty, I
went to the church, and found it packed with people. The surprise gave me a
shock that I did not recover from during the whole evening.
People
often ask me if I feel nervous before speaking, or else they suggest that,
since I speak often, they suppose that I get used to it. In answer to this
question I have to say that I always suffer intensely from nervousness
before speaking. More than once, just before I was to make an important
address, this nervous strain has been so great that I have resolved never
again to speak in public. I not only feel nervous before speaking, but after
I have finished I usually feel a sense of regret, because it seems to me as
if I had left out of my address the main thing and the best thing that I had
meant to say.
There
is a great compensation, though, for this preliminary nervous suffering,
that comes to me after I have been speaking for about ten minutes, and have
come to feel that I have really mastered my audience, and that we have
gotten into full and complete sympathy with each other. It seems to me that
there is rarely such a combination of mental and physical delight in any
effort as that which comes to a public speaker when he feels that he has a
great audience completely within his control. There is a thread of sympathy
and oneness that connects a public speaker with his audience, that is just
as strong as though it was something tangible and visible. If in an audience
of a thousand people there is one person who is not in sympathy with my
views, or is inclined to be doubtful, cold, or critical, I can pick him out.
When I have found him I usually go straight at him, and it is a great
satisfaction to watch the process of his thawing out. I find that the most
effective medicine for such individuals is administered at first in the form
of a story, although I never tell an anecdote simply for the sake of telling
one. That kind of thing, I think, is empty and hollow, and an audience soon
finds it out.
I
believe that one always does himself and his audience an injustice when he
speaks merely for the sake of speaking. I do not believe that one should
speak unless, deep down in his heart, he feels convinced that he has a
message to deliver. When one feels, from the bottom of his feet to the top
of his head, that he has something to say that is going to help some
individual or some cause, then let him say it; and in delivering his message
I do not believe that many of the artificial rules of elocution can, under
such circumstances, help him very much. Although there are certain things,
such as pauses, breathing, and pitch of voice, that are very important, none
of these can take the place of soul in an address. When I have an address to
deliver, I like to forget all about the rules for the proper use of the
English language, and all about rhetoric and that sort of thing, and I like
to make the audience forget all about these things, too.
Nothing
tends to throw me off my balance so quickly, when I am speaking, as to have
some one leave the room. To prevent this, I make up my mind, as a rule, that
I will try to make my address so interesting, will try to state so many
interesting facts one after another, that no one can leave. The average
audience, I have come to believe, wants facts rather than generalities or
sermonizing. Most people, I think, are able to draw proper conclusions if
they are given the facts in an interesting form on which to base them.
As
to the kind of audience that I like best to talk to, I would put at the top
of the list an organization of strong, wide-awake, business men, such, for
example, as is found in Boston, New York, Chicago, and Buffalo. I have found
no other audience so quick to see a point, and so responsive. Within the
last few years I have had the privilege of speaking before most of the
leading organizations of this kind in the large cities of the United States.
The best time to get hold of an organization of business men is after a good
dinner, although I think that one of the worst instruments of torture that
was ever invented is the custom which makes it necessary for a speaker to
sit through a fourteen-course dinner, every minute of the time feeling sure
that his speech is going to prove a dismal failure and disappointment.
I
rarely take part in one of these long dinners that I do not wish that I
could put myself back in the little cabin where I was a slave boy, and again
go through the experience there--one that I shall never forget--of getting
molasses to eat once a week from the "big house." Our usual diet
on the plantation was corn bread and pork, but on Sunday morning my mother
was permitted to bring down a little molasses from the "big house"
for her three children, and when it was received how I did wish that every
day was Sunday! I would get my tin plate and hold it up for the sweet
morsel, but I would always shut my eyes while the molasses was being poured
out into the plate, with the hope that when I opened them I would be
surprised to see how much I had got. When I opened my eyes I would tip the
plate in one direction and another, so as to make the molasses spread all
over it, in the full belief that there would be more of it and that it would
last longer if spread out in this way. So strong are my childish impressions
of those Sunday morning feasts that it would be pretty hard for any one to
convince me that there is not more molasses on a plate when it is spread all
over the plate than when it occupies a little corner--if there is a corner
in a plate. At any rate, I have never believed in "cornering"
syrup. My share of the syrup was usually about two tablespoonfuls, and those
two spoonfuls of molasses were much more enjoyable to me than is a
fourteen-course dinner after which I am to speak.
Next
to a company of business men, I prefer to speak to an audience of Southern
people, of either race, together or taken separately. Their enthusiasm and
responsiveness are a constant delight. The "amens" and "dat's
de truf" that come spontaneously from the coloured individuals are
calculated to spur any speaker on to his best efforts. I think that next in
order of preference I would place a college audience. It has been my
privilege to deliver addresses at many of our leading colleges including
Harvard, Yale, Williams, Amherst, Fisk University, the University of
Pennsylvania, Wellesley, the University of Michigan, Trinity College in
North Carolina, and many others.
It
has been a matter of deep interest to me to note the number of people who
have come to shake hands with me after an address, who say that this is the
first time they have ever called a Negro "Mister."
When
speaking directly in the interests of the Tuskegee Institute, I usually
arrange, some time in advance, a series of meetings in important centres.
This takes me before churches, Sunday-schools, Christian Endeavour
Societies, and men's and women's clubs. When doing this I sometimes speak
before as many as four organizations in a single day.
Three
years ago, at the suggestion of Mr. Morris K. Jessup, of New York, and Dr.
J.L.M. Curry, the general agent of the fund, the trustees of the John F.
Slater Fund voted a sum of money to be used in paying the expenses of Mrs.
Washington and myself while holding a series of meetings among the coloured
people in the large centres of Negro population, especially in the large
cities of the ex-slaveholding states. Each year during the last three years
we have devoted some weeks to this work. The plan that we have followed has
been for me to speak in the morning to the ministers, teachers, and
professional men. In the afternoon Mrs. Washington would speak to the women
alone, and in the evening I spoke to a large mass-meeting. In almost every
case the meetings have been attended not only by the coloured people in
large numbers, but by the white people. In Chattanooga, Tenn., for example,
there was present at the mass-meeting an audience of not less than three
thousand persons, and I was informed that eight hundred of these were white.
I have done no work that I really enjoyed more than this, or that I think
has accomplished more good.
These
meetings have given Mrs. Washington and myself an opportunity to get
first-hand, accurate information as to the real condition of the race, by
seeing the people in their homes, their churches, their Sunday-schools, and
their places of work, as well as in the prisons and dens of crime. These
meetings also gave us an opportunity to see the relations that exist between
the races. I never feel so hopeful about the race as I do after being
engaged in a series of these meetings. I know that on such occasions there
is much that comes to the surface that is superficial and deceptive, but I
have had experience enough not to be deceived by mere signs and fleeting
enthusiasms. I have taken pains to go to the bottom of things and get facts,
in a cold, business-like manner.
I
have seen the statement made lately, by one who claims to know what he is
talking about, that, taking the whole Negro race into account, ninety per
cent of the Negro women are not virtuous. There never was a baser falsehood
uttered concerning a race, or a statement made that was less capable of
being proved by actual facts.
No
one can come into contact with the race for twenty years, as I have done in
the heart of the South, without being convinced that the race is constantly
making slow but sure progress materially, educationally, and morally. One
might take up the life of the worst element in New York City, for example,
and prove almost anything he wanted to prove concerning the white man, but
all will agree that this is not a fair test.
Early
in the year 1897 I received a letter inviting me to deliver an address at
the dedication of the Robert Gould Shaw monument in Boston. I accepted the
invitation. It is not necessary for me, I am sure, to explain who Robert
Gould Shaw was, and what he did. The monument to his memory stands near the
head of the Boston Common, facing the State House. It is counted to be the
most perfect piece of art of the kind to be found in the country.
The
exercises connected with the dedication were held in Music Hall, in Boston,
and the great hall was packed from top to bottom with one of the most
distinguished audiences that ever assembled in the city. Among those present
were more persons representing the famous old anti-slavery element that it
is likely will ever be brought together in the country again. The late Hon.
Roger Wolcott, then Governor of Massachusetts, was the presiding officer,
and on the platform with him were many other officials and hundreds of
distinguished men. A report of the meeting which appeared in the Boston
Transcript will describe it better than any words of mine could do:--
The
core and kernel of yesterday's great noon meeting, in honour of the
Brotherhood of Man, in Music Hall, was the superb address of the Negro
President of Tuskegee. "Booker T. Washington received his Harvard A.M.
last June, the first of his race," said Governor Wolcott, "to
receive an honorary degree from the oldest university in the land, and this
for the wise leadership of his people." When Mr. Washington rose in the
flag-filled, enthusiasm-warmed, patriotic, and glowing atmosphere of Music
Hall, people felt keenly that here was the civic justification of the old
abolition spirit of Massachusetts; in his person the proof of her ancient
and indomitable faith; in his strong through and rich oratory, the crown and
glory of the old war days of suffering and strife. The scene was full of
historic beauty and deep significance. "Cold" Boston was alive
with the fire that is always hot in her heart for righteousness and truth.
Rows and rows of people who are seldom seen at any public function, whole
families of those who are certain to be out of town on a holiday, crowded
the place to overflowing. The city was at her birthright fete in the persons
of hundreds of her best citizens, men and women whose names and lives stand
for the virtues that make for honourable civic pride.
Battle-music
had filled the air. Ovation after ovation, applause warm and prolonged, had
greeted the officers and friends of Colonel Shaw, the sculptor, St. Gaudens,
the memorial Committee, the Governor and his staff, and the Negro soldiers
of the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts as they came upon the platform or entered
the hall. Colonel Henry Lee, of Governor Andrew's old staff, had made a
noble, simple presentation speech for the committee, paying tribute to Mr.
John M. Forbes, in whose stead he served. Governor Wolcott had made his
short, memorable speech, saying, "Fort Wagner marked an epoch in the
history of a race, and called it into manhood." Mayor Quincy had
received the monument for the city of Boston. The story of Colonel Shaw and
his black regiment had been told in gallant words, and then, after the
singing of
Mine
eyes have seen the glory Of the
coming of the Lord,
Booker
Washington arose. It was, of course, just the moment for him. The multitude,
shaken out of its usual symphony-concert calm, quivered with an excitement
that was not suppressed. A dozen times it had sprung to its feet to cheer
and wave and hurrah, as one person. When this man of culture and voice and
power, as well as a dark skin, began, and uttered the names of Stearns and
of Andrew, feeling began to mount. You could see tears glisten in the eyes
of soldiers and civilians. When the orator turned to the coloured soldiers
on the platform, to the colour-bearer of Fort Wagner, who smilingly bore
still the flag he had never lowered even when wounded, and said, "To
you, to the scarred and scattered remnants of the Fifty-fourth, who, with
empty sleeve and wanting leg, have honoured this occasion with your
presence, to you, your commander is not dead. Though Boston erected no
monument and history recorded no story, in you and in the loyal race which
you represent, Robert Gould Shaw would have a monument which time could not
wear away," then came the climax of the emotion of the day and the
hour. It was Roger Wolcott, as well as the Governor of Massachusetts, the
individual representative of the people's sympathy as well as the chief
magistrate, who had sprung first to his feet and cried, "Three cheers
to Booker T. Washington!"
Among
those on the platform was Sergeant William H. Carney, of New Bedford, Mass.,
the brave coloured officer who was the colour-bearer at Fort Wagner and held
the American flag. In spite of the fact that a large part of his regiment
was killed, he escape, and exclaimed, after the battle was over, "The
old flag never touched the ground."
This
flag Sergeant Carney held in his hands as he sat on the platform, and when I
turned to address the survivors of the coloured regiment who were present,
and referred to Sergeant Carney, he rose, as if by instinct, and raised the
flag. It has been my privilege to witness a good many satisfactory and
rather sensational demonstrations in connection with some of my public
addresses, but in dramatic effect I have never seen or experienced anything
which equalled this. For a number of minutes the audience seemed to entirely
lose control of itself.
In
the general rejoicing throughout the country which followed the close of the
Spanish-American war, peace celebrations were arranged in several of the
large cities. I was asked by President William R. Harper, of the University
of Chicago, who was chairman of the committee of invitations for the
celebration to be held in the city of Chicago, to deliver one of the
addresses at the celebration there. I accepted the invitation, and delivered
two addresses there during the Jubilee week. The first of these, and the
principal one, was given in the Auditorium, on the evening of Sunday,
October 16. This was the largest audience that I have ever addressed, in any
part of the country; and besides speaking in the main Auditorium, I also
addressed, that same evening, two overflow audiences in other parts of the
city.
It
was said that there were sixteen thousand persons in the Auditorium, and it
seemed to me as if there were as many more on the outside trying to get in.
It was impossible for any one to get near the entrance without the aid of a
policeman. President William McKinley attended this meeting, as did also the
members of his Cabinet, many foreign ministers, and a large number of army
and navy officers, many of whom had distinguished themselves in the war
which had just closed. The speakers, besides myself, on Sunday evening, were
Rabbi Emil G. Hirsch, Father Thomas P. Hodnett, and Dr. John H. Barrows.
The
Chicago Times-Herald, in describing the meeting, said of my address:--
He
pictured the Negro choosing slavery rather than extinction; recalled Crispus
Attucks shedding his blood at the beginning of the American Revolution, that
white Americans might be free, while black Americans remained in slavery;
rehearsed the conduct of the Negroes with Jackson at New Orleans; drew a
vivid and pathetic picture of the Southern slaves protecting and supporting
the families of their masters while the latter were fighting to perpetuate
black slavery; recounted the bravery of coloured troops at Port Hudson and
Forts Wagner and Pillow, and praised the heroism of the black regiments that
stormed El Caney and Santiago to give freedom to the enslaved people of
Cuba, forgetting, for the time being, the unjust discrimination that law and
custom make against them in their own country.
In
all of these things, the speaker declared, his race had chosen the better
part. And then he made his eloquent appeal to the consciences of the white
Americans: "When you have gotten the full story or the heroic conduct
of the Negro in the Spanish-American war, have heard it from the lips of
Northern soldier and Southern soldier, from ex-abolitionist and ex-masters,
then decide within yourselves whether a race that is thus willing to die for
its country should not be given the highest opportunity to live for its
country."
The
part of the speech which seems to arouse the wildest and most sensational
enthusiasm was that in which I thanked the President for his recognition of
the Negro in his appointments during the Spanish-American war. The President
was sitting in a box at the right of the stage. When I addressed him I
turned toward the box, and as I finished the sentence thanking him for his
generosity, the whole audience rose and cheered again and again, waving
handkerchiefs and hats and canes, until the President arose in the box and
bowed his acknowledgements. At that the enthusiasm broke out again, and the
demonstration was almost indescribable.
One
portion of my address at Chicago seemed to have been misunderstood by the
Southern press, and some of the Southern papers took occasion to criticise
me rather strongly. These criticisms continued for several weeks, until I
finally received a letter from the editor of the Age-Herald, published in
Birmingham, Ala., asking me if I would say just what I meant by this part of
the address. I replied to him in a letter which seemed to satisfy my
critics. In this letter I said that I had made it a rule never to say before
a Northern audience anything that I would not say before an audience in the
South. I said that I did not think it was necessary for me to go into
extended explanations; if my seventeen years of work in the heart of the
South had not been explanation enough, I did not see how words could
explain. I said that I made the same plea that I had made in my address at
Atlanta, for the blotting out of race prejudice in "commercial and
civil relations." I said that what is termed social recognition was a
question which I never discussed, and then I quoted from my Atlanta address
what I had said there in regard to that subject.
In
meeting crowds of people at public gatherings, there is one type of
individual that I dread. I mean the crank. I have become so accustomed to
these people now that I can pick them out at a distance when I see them
elbowing their way up to me. The average crank has a long beard, poorly
cared for, a lean, narrow face, and wears a black coat. The front of his
vest and coat are slick with grease, and his trousers bag at the knees.
In
Chicago, after I had spoken at a meeting, I met one of these fellows. They
usually have some process for curing all of the ills of the world at once.
This Chicago specimen had a patent process by which he said Indian corn
could be kept through a period of three or four years, and he felt sure that
if the Negro race in the South would, as a whole, adopt his process, it
would settle the whole race question. It mattered nothing that I tried to
convince him that our present problem was to teach the Negroes how to
produce enough corn to last them through one year. Another Chicago crank had
a scheme by which he wanted me to join him in an effort to close up all the
National banks in the country. If that was done, he felt sure it would put
the Negro on his feet.
The
number of people who stand ready to consume one's time, to no purpose, is
almost countless. At one time I spoke before a large audience in Boston in
the evening. The next morning I was awakened by having a card brought to my
room, and with it a message that some one was anxious to see me. Thinking
that it must be something very important, I dressed hastily and went down.
When I reached the hotel office I found a blank and innocent-looking
individual waiting for me, who coolly remarked: "I heard you talk at a
meeting last night. I rather liked your talk, and so I came in this morning
to hear you talk some more."
I
am often asked how it is possible for me to superintend the work at Tuskegee
and at the same time be so much away from the school. In partial answer to
this I would say that I think I have learned, in some degree at least, to
disregard the old maxim which says, "Do not get others to do that which
you can do yourself." My motto, on the other hand, is, "Do not do
that which others can do as well."
One
of the most encouraging signs in connection with the Tuskegee school is
found in the fact that the organization is so thorough that the daily work
of the school is not dependent upon the presence of any one individual. The
whole executive force, including instructors and clerks, now numbers
eighty-six. This force is so organized and subdivided that the machinery of
the school goes on day by day like clockwork. Most of our teachers have been
connected with the institutions for a number of years, and are as much
interested in it as I am. In my absence, Mr. Warren Logan, the treasurer,
who has been at the school seventeen years, is the executive. He is
efficiently supported by Mrs. Washington, and by my faithful secretary, Mr.
Emmett J. Scott, who handles the bulk of my correspondence and keeps me in
daily touch with the life of the school, and who also keeps me informed of
whatever takes place in the South that concerns the race. I owe more to his
tact, wisdom, and hard work than I can describe.
The
main executive work of the school, whether I am at Tuskegee or not, centres
in what we call the executive council. This council meets twice a week, and
is composed of the nine persons who are at the head of the nine departments
of the school. For example: Mrs. B.K. Bruce, the Lady Principal, the widow
of the late ex-senator Bruce, is a member of the council, and represents in
it all that pertains to the life of the girls at the school. In addition to
the executive council there is a financial committee of six, that meets
every week and decides upon the expenditures for the week. Once a month, and
sometimes oftener, there is a general meeting of all the instructors. Aside
from these there are innumerable smaller meetings, such as that of the
instructors in the Phelps Hall Bible Training School, or of the instructors
in the agricultural department.
In
order that I may keep in constant touch with the life of the institution, I
have a system of reports so arranged that a record of the school's work
reaches me every day of the year, no matter in what part of the country I
am. I know by these reports even what students are excused from school, and
why they are excused--whether for reasons of ill health or otherwise.
Through the medium of these reports I know each day what the income of the
school in money is; I know how many gallons of milk and how many pounds of
butter come from the diary; what the bill of fare for the teachers and
students is; whether a certain kind of meat was boiled or baked, and whether
certain vegetables served in the dining room were bought from a store or
procured from our own farm. Human nature I find to be very much the same the
world over, and it is sometimes not hard to yield to the temptation to go to
a barrel of rice that has come from the store--with the grain all prepared
to go in the pot--rather than to take the time and trouble to go to the
field and dig and wash one's own sweet potatoes, which might be prepared in
a manner to take the place of the rice.
I
am often asked how, in the midst of so much work, a large part of which is
for the public, I can find time for any rest or recreation, and what kind of
recreation or sports I am fond of. This is rather a difficult question to
answer. I have a strong feeling that every individual owes it to himself,
and to the cause which he is serving, to keep a vigorous, healthy body, with
the nerves steady and strong, prepared for great efforts and prepared for
disappointments and trying positions. As far as I can, I make it a rule to
plan for each day's work--not merely to go through with the same routine of
daily duties, but to get rid of the routine work as early in the day as
possible, and then to enter upon some new or advance work. I make it a rule
to clear my desk every day, before leaving my office, of all correspondence
and memoranda, so that on the morrow I can begin a NEW day of work. I make
it a rule never to let my work drive me, but to so master it, and keep it in
such complete control, and to keep so far ahead of it, that I will be the
master instead of the servant. There is a physical and mental and spiritual
enjoyment that comes from a consciousness of being the absolute master of
one's work, in all its details, that is very satisfactory and inspiring. My
experience teachers me that, if one learns to follow this plan, he gets a
freshness of body and vigour of mind out of work that goes a long way toward
keeping him strong and healthy. I believe that when one can grow to the
point where he loves his work, this gives him a kind of strength that is
most valuable.
When
I begin my work in the morning, I expect to have a successful and pleasant
day of it, but at the same time I prepare myself for unpleasant and
unexpected hard places. I prepared myself to hear that one of our school
buildings is on fire, or has burned, or that some disagreeable accident has
occurred, or that some one has abused me in a public address or printed
article, for something that I have done or omitted to do, or for something
that he had heard that I had said--probably something that I had never
thought of saying.
In
nineteen years of continuous work I have taken but one vacation. That was
two years ago, when some of my friends put the money into my hands and
forced Mrs. Washington and myself to spend three months in Europe. I have
said that I believe it is the duty of every one to keep his body in good
condition. I try to look after the little ills, with the idea that if I take
care of the little ills the big ones will not come. When I find myself
unable to sleep well, I know that something is wrong. If I find any part of
my system the least weak, and not performing its duty, I consult a good
physician. The ability to sleep well, at any time and in any place, I find
of great advantage. I have so trained myself that I can lie down for a nap
of fifteen or twenty minutes, and get up refreshed in body and mind.
I
have said that I make it a rule to finish up each day's work before leaving
it. There is, perhaps, one exception to this. When I have an unusually
difficult question to decide--one that appeals strongly to the emotions--I
find it a safe rule to sleep over it for a night, or to wait until I have
had an opportunity to talk it over with my wife and friends.
As
to my reading; the most time I get for solid reading is when I am on the
cars. Newspapers are to me a constant source of delight and recreation. The
only trouble is that I read too many of them. Fiction I care little for.
Frequently I have to almost force myself to read a novel that is on every
one's lips. The kind of reading that I have the greatest fondness for is
biography. I like to be sure that I am reading about a real man or a real
thing. I think I do not go too far when I say that I have read nearly every
book and magazine article that has been written about Abraham Lincoln. In
literature he is my patron saint.
Out
of the twelve months in a year I suppose that, on an average, I spend six
months away from Tuskegee. While my being absent from the school so much
unquestionably has its disadvantages, yet there are at the same time some
compensations. The change of work brings a certain kind of rest. I enjoy a
ride of a long distance on the cars, when I am permitted to ride where I can
be comfortable. I get rest on the cars, except when the inevitable
individual who seems to be on every train approaches me with the now
familiar phrase: "Isn't this Booker Washington? I want to introduce
myself to you." Absence from the school enables me to lose sight of the
unimportant details of the work, and study it in a broader and more
comprehensive manner than I could do on the grounds. This absence also
brings me into contact with the best work being done in educational lines,
and into contact with the best educators in the land.
But,
after all this is said, the time when I get the most solid rest and
recreation is when I can be at Tuskegee, and, after our evening meal is
over, can sit down, as is our custom, with my wife and Portia and Baker and
Davidson, my three children, and read a story, or each take turns in telling
a story. To me there is nothing on earth equal to that, although what is
nearly equal to it is to go with them for an hour or more, as we like to do
on Sunday afternoons, into the woods, where we can live for a while near the
heart of nature, where no one can disturb or vex us, surrounded by pure air,
the trees, the shrubbery, the flowers, and the sweet fragrance that springs
from a hundred plants, enjoying the chirp of the crickets and the songs of
the birds. This is solid rest.
My
garden, also, what little time I can be at Tuskegee, is another source of
rest and enjoyment. Somehow I like, as often as possible, to touch nature,
not something that is artificial or an imitation, but the real thing. When I
can leave my office in time so that I can spend thirty or forty minutes in
spading the ground, in planting seeds, in digging about the plants, I feel
that I am coming into contact with something that is giving me strength for
the many duties and hard places that await me out in the big world. I pity
the man or woman who has never learned to enjoy nature and to get strength
and inspiration out of it.
Aside
from the large number of fowls and animals kept by the school, I keep
individually a number of pigs and fowls of the best grades, and in raising
these I take a great deal of pleasure. I think the pig is my favourite
animal. Few things are more satisfactory to me than a high-grade Berkshire
or Poland China pig.
Games
I care little for. I have never seen a game of football. In cards I do not
know one card from another. A game of old-fashioned marbles with my two
boys, once in a while, is all I care for in this direction. I suppose I
would care for games now if I had had any time in my youth to give to them,
but that was not possible.
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