work in the world, they should be encouraged to do it. It is not always easy to do right, I admit; but to whom much is entrusted, from him much is expected. But man lights up the night, that he may lengthen day in his effort to secure that which he does not need, and murders to gain it. He slays regardless of his demands, and consumes regardless of his needs. All for money and self.

CHAPTER VIII
SENT AS A DELEGATE TO NATIONAL NEGRO BUSINESS LEAGUE

SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE NATIONAL NEGRO BUSINESS LEAGUE IN HANDEL HALL, 46-48 RANDOLPH STREET.

CHICAGO, ILL., August 21-23, 1901.

        At ten o'clock, A. M., August 21st, the meeting was called to order by A. W. F. Taylor, President of a local League in Chicago. Invocation by Rev. Dr. J. W. E. Bowen, of Alabama. After which an address of welcome on behalf of the State by a member of the Governor's staff was delivered; this address was short, but interesting.

        The Governor, Richard Yates, was not in the State.

        An address of welcome on behalf of the city of Chicago was to have been delivered by the Mayor of this city, Hon. Carter H. Harrison, and he, too, was out of the city, and a member of his staff kindly consented to address us. His talk was interesting in regard to the progress the Negro is making. He said that it took the Anglo-Saxon race four hundred years to accomplish what the Negro has in the short period of time he has been free. He said that he was a Democrat, but not one of those Benjamin Tillman kind. He scored Mr. Tillman for his recent action, and remarks on lynching.

        Booker T. Washington was next introduced, but could not be heard for a long time on account of the prolonged applause. After a time he said: "Ladies and Gentlemen, - This is not a meeting of oratory and speech-making, but a meeting of workers. Our watchword and motto should be, 'Forward, March!'" He pointed to the place of the first meeting, in Boston, last year, with pride, because it was the place where the Negro first shed his blood for freedom. Then he spoke in the highest terms of Illinois, the place of the second meeting, the home of the

great emancipator. "Again, all through the last year's session order was so harmonious that not a man raised to the point of order. It is what we do that makes us men and women, and what we do n't do. There is no place like the South, with all its ups and downs, which affords the Negro such excellent opportunities. The Negro should begin at the bottom and go up."

        It was said by one during the session that Washington had the same control over those men and women that brain had over matter. He could handle them so very easily.

        Giles B. Jackson, Esq., of Richmond, Va., gave an account of the Business League in Virginia with the remarks, "We may be held back, but not kept back." He said that the organization had such an influence in Virginia that it caused business men to respect them perhaps where they would not otherwise.

        Rev. W. L. Taylor, Richmond, Va., had a very interesting paper on "Business Features of the Order of True Reformers," an organization that takes in children from three to fourteen years old. This organization was started in 1885 and has since banked seven million dollars. During Cleveland's last administration the white banks failed to cash an order for fifty dollars.

The School Board was in need of seventeen thousand dollars. They telephoned to the Negro bank to see if they could get the required amount. The answer was that "you can get one hundred thousand dollars." They telephoned again, thinking that maybe the black boys were mistaken. They got the same answer, so they came to the Negro bank and found it so busy that they had to wait some time before they could wait on them. The Board presented their check, and was waited upon so quickly they were so struck that they could not leave for some time, watching the black boys do business.

        This bank or company has a number of buildings and newspaper plants, a mercantile department which brings in nineteen thousand dollars per year, and an old folks' department worth fourteen thousand dollars (a farm). In each department of this bank their books must show that he or she is all right, and not his or her appearance. They have a chief over all, and a man who is called "accountant." These two men must agree, or else something is wrong. This bank does nineteen thousand dollars' worth of business per week. The Board of Directors of the bank is not satisfied with this; they make the cashier get all the money to correspond with

all of these books and lay it on the table every Saturday and show to those present.

        Mr. Taylor says that we are too ready to criticise one another in business. He then called his private secretary to stand up, who is just a boy of nineteen years and as black as the derby hat he wore. Mr. Taylor says, "Do you think that there is any white blood in that boy?"

        Mr. J. A. Wilson, of Kansas City, Mo., spoke of what the Twin City Business Association is accomplishing; he spoke of the progress and various kinds of businesses the Negro is doing in that city.

        Theodore W. Jones, of Chicago, Ill., had a paper entitled "Can the Negro Succeed as a Business Man?" In every vocation of life the Negro needs more grit and backbone, although he has come from the slave cabin to the professor's chair. The Negro must quit stumbling over impediments of his own and go forward.

EVENING SESSION, 8 P. M.

        They have an Old Folks' Home connected with it. The typewriting alone cost one hundred dollars per month. She insisted on us all to be natural and not put on so as to pretend we are more than we really are.

        Mr. Corbin, of Arkansas, spoke of wealth of the Negro there and in the South. He said that one Mr. Wiley Jones was the richest man there, his wealth being estimated at one hundred million dollars. About the time Mr. Corbin finished reading his paper Mr. Washington received a telegram from President McKinley, congratulating him and the League. It was stated by Mr. Washington that those who wish to become lifelong members of the League could do so by paying twenty-five dollars. There were several who did so. Also several of the white people joined as lifelong members.

        Judge Gibbs, of Little Rock, Ark., who is an ex-judge of Madagascar, spoke of his start in life and travels, to the present. He spoke of going on the postmaster's bond in Little Rock, who is a white man, for forty thousand dollars. He said, "When you are going into business and fail, again try; if you fail again, try, try; if you fail again, try, try, try!"

        Mr. Charles Banks, of Clarksdale, Miss.,

gave us a talk on the merchandising. He dwelt to a great extent as to how goods should be bought and sold, and our places of business properly kept. He has increased in wealth enough from his trade as a merchant for his taxes to amount to three hundred dollars per year.

        William Oscar Murphy, of Atlanta, Ga., had a paper on "The Grocery Business." He said that he was born a grocer because his father was keeping a grocery when he was born, and to-day he has property worth thirty-five thousand dollars, all unincumbered.

        A. N. Johnson, of Mobile, Ala., who is a druggist, editor of a weekly newspaper, and an undertaker, gave us an interesting talk on Negro business enterprises of Mobile. Out of thirty-six clerks in the postoffice in Mobile, twenty-eight of them are Negroes. One Negro named Mr. Peters, by the way, who was present at the meeting, owns forty-eight houses and lots in Mobile, Ala. The rating of business done by Negroes in Mobile in the various businesses ranges from eight dollars to seventy-five dollars per day. One Negro in the furniture business has an income of one hundred dollars per day.

THURSDAY MORNING, 10 O'CLOCK.

        Dr. Willis S. Sterris gave us a talk on the drug business. The doctor is located in Decatur, Ala. He said that there is in the State of Alabama an association composed of doctors of medicine, doctors of dental surgery, and doctors of pharmacy, of which he is President. The members of this association all own their homes except three.

        Mr. Russell, of St. Louis, Mo., gave us an interesting talk on the undertaking business. He started in business in 1894 in the rear of an old stable, with one horse and a spring wagon. Not one of the other undertakers nor stables would hire to him at twenty-five dollars per day, and to- day his income annually, from funerals alone, amounts to over twenty-five thousand dollars. Since he became an undertaker he has educated

two of his sisters; one of them clerks for him in the undertaking establishment, and the other clerks in a grocery, also owned by him.

        Mr. G. E. Jones, of Little Rock, Ark., who owns and conducts an undertaking establishment, a livery stable, tailor shop, and a drugstore, and also a business block known as the Jones Block, all of which are paid for, said it really seemed for a while that no race had any money and carried on any business but the Negro.

        The colored business women of the East were well represented by Mrs. Dora A. Miller, Brooklyn, N. Y. Mrs. Miller stated that they have a club, the membership of which numbers seventy-five women. Every member of this club was in business for herself; such as regalia- making, grocery-keeping, bakeries, hand-painting, dye houses, ladies' exchange, chiropodist, and so on. The ladies' exchange, she said, found many a home for girls who could not find work themselves.

        A Mrs. Lewis, of Springfield, Ill., told of her start in the hair-dressing business twenty-six years ago on fifty dollars, and has saved thirty-six thousand dollars and taught others the trade.

        Mr. Gilbert C. Harris, of Boston, Mass., also

a wigmaker and hair-dresser, carried a capital stock of ten thousand dollars in the hair business, all of which is his.

        Walter P. Hall, of Philadelphia, Pa., had a paper on the "Game and Poultry Business." This business brought him a yearly income of fifty to seventy-five thousand dollars.

        Mrs. Emma L. Pitts, of Macon, Ga., told us the way she started in the millinery and dressmaking business. She said that her husband died, leaving her without money, and her health would not allow her to take in washing; so, in order to help several girls who were idle, she started in the business on nothing, and to-day she employs one hundred girls. She spoke of wanting to raise money enough to put into her place of business more machinery. So very excellent was her paper, as soon as she had taken her seat, one Mr. Martin Ferguson, of Jacksonville, Fla., arose with a fiery speech and, holding up a five-dollar bill, said that there ought to be thirty men in the house who would give five dollars to a woman who had the courage to come all the way from Georgia to tell us what she was doing there. Mr. Booker T. Washington and two other men gave five dollars for said purpose.

        There was no night session Thursday evening, but instead there was a banquet tendered the officers and delegates at First Regiment Armory, at Sixteenth and Michigan Boulevard. Mr. Washington was the center of attraction. Twenty- five thousand people were present. After the speaking the platform was removed and one thousand took part in dancing at one time. It was one of the prettiest sights I witnessed while in Chicago. It impressed Mr. Washington so much that he spoke of it at the next day's session.

        We were also highly entertained by another club, known as the Appomattox, at its parlors, No. 3144 Wabash Avenue.

FRIDAY MORNING, 10 O'CLOCK.

        Mr. Martin Ferguson, of Jacksonville, Fla.,

told of his experience as an ice dealer and in the livery stable business. He started on nothing, but now owns both of these places of business.

        A. M. Boyd, of Nashville, Tenn., told how he started about fifteen years ago with two pencils and paper, and to-day he has one of the largest printing establishments in the South. He employs 125 men and women.

        The election of officers then followed.

        Mr. Fairweather, of Newport, R. I., a blacksmith; forty years' experience. Out of sixty- five horses shod by him, about fifteen belong to Negroes. He said that the Negro North has not been educated up to patronize one another as yet. He said that most any blacksmith can put a shoe on a horse; but when it comes to the scientific part of shoeing, very few can do that. When it comes to fast trotting horses, to keep them from forging and interfering, it is more than a notion to stop them.

        Mr. J. C. Napier, of Nashville, Tenn., gave an interesting talk on real estate. He said that prejudice in the South proved an advantage to the Negro rather than a hindrance.

        C. H. Smiley, of Chicago, Ill., gave us an interesting talk on catering. He said that he started waiting table in 1890, with fifty cents.

He waited on a lady who soon took a trip East, and when she came back she made the assertion that there was only one man in Chicago who could serve a party, and that was a black man by the name of C. H. Smiley. From that his fame started. He spoke of his linen, among other things. He has napkins from two dollars per dozen to fifteen dollars a piece; tablecloths from five dollars a piece to eight hundred dollars a piece. His wealth is now estimated at two hundred thousand dollars. I had the pleasure of visiting his place of business.

        Mr. John S. Tramer, of Philadelphia, Pa., said that he would rather his son be in business for himself than to hold a government position.

        Friday afternoon Mr. Armour chartered a train pulling coaches and took all of us delegates, even women and children, free of charge, to his slaughterhouses and stockyards. It was the most interesting sight of anything I saw while in Chicago. They kill ten thousand hogs a day in that one plant alone; 2,044 head of cattle a day. The stockyards of Chicago are as large as Springfield.

        At last we came to the evening session.

        One Mr. Clifford, of West Virginia, told the League that where he lived land can be bought

for fifty to seventy-five cents per acre, and that there is enough timber on top, and coal in the ground, to last seventy-five years. He urged the League to buy it.

        Mr. T. Thomas Fortune, editor of the New York Age, of New York, gave us an interesting talk on "The Logic of Business Development."

        Isaiah T. Montgomery, of Mound Bayou, Miss., gave an account of a Negro city there, owned and controlled by Negroes.

        Rev. S. L. Davis, of Hobson City, Ala., who is also the Mayor of that city, told us about the founding of the Negro city.

        The Rev. J. W. E. Bowen, of Alabama, closed with a stirring and forcible address. The session closed to meet in Richmond, Va., next year.

Yours, respectfully submitted,
THOMAS Sir. BURTON, M. D.
Springfield, Ohio.

CHAPTER IX
AS A CHRISTIAN WORKER

        Very often by reading the acts of others has come a warning to me; their footprints seen in the history which indicate their fate tell me that a like fate may befall me should the precedents be disregarded; and as near as I can I try to follow that infallible rule, that is: Do unto others as I would have them do unto me.

        One of the greatest pleasures of my life is Sunday-school work. Although a busy medical practitioner, unless there is something very urgent, I must spend the Sunday-school hour with the children and young folks. It is the duty of every Christian to study the Book of books,

which is the Holy Bible. By familiarizing ourselves with this book, by studying it daily - which one will have to do in order to become familiar with it - then we will depend more upon God when there comes a succession of falls, fountain of tears, upward struggles and debased and bleeding heart, and not tell our troubles to man. Man may mean all right, but he has another friend, to whom he will divulge your secrets, and yet at the same time he is supposed to be in sympathy with you. When you find yourself deceived you will think of the words of the Psalmist David when he complaineth of his enemies' treachery: "Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me. But then, O Lord, be merciful unto me and raise me up, that I may requite them." (Psalm 41:9, 10.)

        I find, if we live as God would like to have us live, when the storms of vexations, disappointments, and besetments overtake us, if we turn to this blessed Book we will find consolation, as did the children of Israel when assured