Part 15 (2/2)

In closing this resume of this little work it is proper that I should warn the younger members of the race against despondency, and against the looseness of character and habits that is singularly consequential of a despondent spirit. Do not be discouraged, give up, and throw away brilliant intellects, because of seeming obstacles, but rather resolve to BE SOMETHING AND DO SOMETHING IN SPITE OF OBSTACLES.

”It was not by tossing feather b.a.l.l.s into the air that the great Hercules gained his strength, but by hurling huge bowlders from mountain tops 'that his name became the synonymn of manly strength.'

So the harder the struggle the greater the discipline and fitness.

If we cannot reach success in one way, let us try another. 'If the mountain will not come to Mahomet let Mahomet go to the mountain.'”

[Ill.u.s.tration: UNCLE SAM AND HIS NEW ACQUISITIONS.--(N.Y. WORLD.)]

THE SOUTH IS A GOOD PLACE FOR THE NEGRO TO LIVE, provided, however, the better cla.s.s of citizens will rise up and demand that lynchings and mobs shall cease, and that the officers of the law shall do their duty without prejudice. The only way to suppress mob violence is to make punishment for the leaders in it, sure and certain. The reason we have mobs is because the leaders of them know they will not be punished. The enforcement of the law against lynchers will break it up.

The white ministers should take up the cause of justice rather than endorse the red s.h.i.+rts, or carry a Winchester themselves. They should be the counselors of peace and not the advocates of bloodshed. Most of them, no doubt, do regret the terrible deeds committed by mobs on helpless and innocent people, but it is a question as to whether or not they would be suffered by public sentiment to ”cry aloud” against them. It takes moral courage to face any evil, but it must be faced or dire consequences will follow of its own breeding. Our last word then, is an appeal to our BROTHERS IN WHITE, in the pulpit, that they should rally the people together for justice and; condemn mob violence. The Negroes do not ask social equality, but civil equality; let the false notions that confound civil rights with social rights be dispelled, and advocate the civil equality of all men, and the problem will be solved.

Edmund Burke says that ”war never leaves where it found a nation.”

applying this to the American nation with respect to the Negro it is to be hoped that the late war will leave a better feeling toward him, especially in view of the glorious record of the Negro soldiers who partic.i.p.ated in that conflict.

LIST OF ILl.u.s.tRATIONS.

William McKinley.......................................Frontispiece

General Fitzhugh Lee............................................. 6

General Antonio Maceo............................................ 8

Miss Evangelina Cosio y Cisneros ............................... 10

U.S.S. Maine.................................................... 12

Eddie Savoy..................................................... 14

Jose Maceo...................................................... 16

Sergeant Frank W. Pullen........................................ 20

Charge on El Caney.............................................. 26

Corporal Brown ................................................. 28

George E. Powell................................................ 35

Col. Theodore B. Roosevelt...................................... 39

Gen. Nelson A. Miles.......... ................................. 47

Sergeant Berry.................................................. 48

General Thomas J. Morgan........................................ 50

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