Darkwater

and down, neatly trimmed, and there were five rooms, a tiny porch, a rosy front yard, and unbelievably delicious strawberries in the rear. A South Carolinian, latel

is Dutch captor, "Coenraet Burghardt," sullen in his slavery and achieving his freedom by volunteering for the Revolution at a time of sudden a

oba-gene m

uli, be

randfather, Othello,-or "Uncle Tallow,"-a brown man, strong-voiced and redolent with tobacco, who sat stiffly in a great high chair because his hip was broken. He was probably a bit lazy and given to wassail. At any rate, grandmother had a

in her softness. The family were small farmers on Egremont Plain, between Great Barrington and Sheffield, Massachusetts. The bits of land were too small to support the great families born on them and

tward, others went cityward as cooks and barbers. Mother worked for some years at house service in Great Barrington, and after a disappointed lov

s a dreamer,-romantic, indolent, kind, unreliable. He had in him the making of a poet, an adventurer, or a Beloved Vagabond, according to the life that closed round him; and that life gave him all too little. His father, Alexander Du Bois, cloaked under a stern,

nd the Gilberts had plantations. There he took a beautiful little mulatto slave as his mistress, and two sons were born: Alexander in 1803 and John, later. They were fine, straight, clear-eyed boys, white enough to "pass." He brought them to America and put Alexand

ield; and finally he retired and ended his days at New Bedford. Always he held his head high, took no insults, made few friends. He was not a "Negro"; he was a man! Yet the current was too strong even for him. Then even more than now a colored man had colored friends or none at all, lived in a colored world or lived alone. A few fine, strong, black men gained the heart of this silent, bitter man in New York

r he was, naturally, a failure,-hard, domineering, unyielding. His four children reacted characteristically: one was until past middle life a thin spinster, the mental image of her father; one died; one passed over into the white world and her children's children are now white, with n

a flood of Negro blood, a strain of French, a bit of Dutch, but,

of shrubbery, and a brook; to another house abutting a railroad, with infinite interests and astonishing playmates; and finally back to the quiet street on which I was born,-down a long lane and in a homely, cozy cottage, with a living-room, a tiny sitting-room, a pantry, and two attic bedrooms. Here mo

a lane, into a widened yard, with a big choke-cherry tree and two buildings, wood an

that soiled it. The gold was theirs, not ours; but the gleam and glint was for all. To me it was all in order and I took it philosophically. I cordially desp

f whom none of us approved. The homes I saw impressed me, but did not overwhelm me. Many were bigger than mine, with newer and shinier things, but they did not seem to differ in kind. I think I probably

mother's quiet influence came in here, as I realize now. She did not try to make me perfect. To her I was already perfect. She simply warned me of a

recite with a certain happy, almost taunting, glibness, which brought frowns here and there. Then, slowly, I realized that some folks, a few, even several, actually considered my brown skin a misfortune; once or twice I became painfully aware that some human beings even thought it a crime. I was not for a moment daunt

and made part of a mightier mission. At times I almost pitied my pale companions, who were

d now and then they played in our games, when I joined in quite as naturally as the rest. It was when strangers came, or summer boarders, or when the oldest girls grew up that my sharp senses noted little hesitan

was lame, then, and a bit drawn, but very happy. It was her great day and that very year she lay down with a sigh of content and has not yet awakened. I felt a certain gladness to see her, at last, at peace, for she had worried al

he mill owners' sons had aimed lower. Finally it was tactfully explained that the place for me was in the South among my people. A scholarship had been already arranged at Fisk, and my summer earnings would pay the fare. My relatives grumbled, but after a twinge I felt a strange

o-be-forgotten marvel of that first supper at Fisk with the world "colored" and opposite two of the most beauti

veil of wish and after-thought, I seem to view my life divided into four distinct parts: the Age

the joy of living. I seemed to ride in conquering might. I was captain of my sou

lle, brushing by accident against a white woman on the street. Politely and eagerly I raised my hat to apologize. T

rrow valley: I willed and lo! my people came dancing about me,-riotous in color, gay in laughter, full of sympathy, need, and pleading; darkly delicious girls-"colored" girls-sat beside me and actually talked to me while I gazed in tongue-tied silence or babbled in boastful dreams. Boys wi

standing before governor, president, and grave, gowned men, I told them certain astonishing truths, waving my arms and breathing fast! They applauded with what now seems to me uncalled-for fervor, but then! I walked home on pink clouds of glory! I asked for a fellowship and

earching. I went at them hammer and tongs! I plied them with testimonials and mid-year and final marks. I intimated plainly, impudently, that they were "stalling"! In vain did the chairman, Ex-Pr

of new-mown hay-Holland and the Rhine. I saw the Wartburg and Berlin; I made the Harzreise and climbed the Brocken; I saw the Hansa towns and the cities and dorfs of Sout

y beneath all life clutched me. I was not less fanatically a Negro, but "Negro" meant a greater, broader sense of humanity and world-fellowship. I felt

med and loved and wandered and sang; then, after two long

judge, whose dignity we often ruffled and whose apples we stole, had had his way and sent me while a child to a "reform" school to learn a "trade"? Suppose Principal Hosmer had been born with no faith in "darkies," and instead of giving me Greek and Latin had taught me carpentry and the making of tin pans? Suppose I had missed a Harvard scholarship? Suppose the Slater Board had then, as now, distinct ideas as to where the educa

e. I wrote to Hampton, Tuskegee, and a dozen other places. They politely declined, with many regrets. The trustees of a backwoods Tennessee town

rners had taken their cure at Tawawa Springs and where white Methodists had planted a school; then came the little bishop, Daniel Payne, who made it a school of the African

n, Greek, English, and German. I helped in the discipline, took part in the social life, begged to be allowed to lecture on sociology, and bega

tions of a country town loaded with traditions. It was my first introduction to a Negro world, and I was at once marvelously inspired and deeply depressed. I was inspired with the children,-had I not rubbed against the children of the world and did I not find here the same eagerness, the same joy of life, the same bra

thing. I had all the wild intolerance of youth, and no experience in human tangles. For the first time in my life I reali

cted to my position. I was slowly winning a way, but quickly losing faith in the value of the way won. Was this the place to begin my life work? Was this the work which I was best fitted to do? What

ed dollars. How did I dare these two things? I do not know. Yet they spelled salvation. To remain at Wilberforce without doing my ideals meant spiritual death. Both my wife and I were homeless. I dared a home and a temporary job. But

eceived me with no open arms. They had a natural dislike to being studied like a strange species. I met again and in different guise those curious cross-currents and inner social whirlings of my own people. They set me to groping. I conclude

and studied human beings. I became widely-acquainted with the real condition of my people. I realized the terrific odds which faced them. At Wilberforce I was their captious critic. In Philadelphia I was their cold and scientific investigator, with microscope and probe. It took but a few years of Atlanta to bring me to hot and indignant

ox and contradiction of streaming eyes and mad merriment. I emerged into full manhood, with the ruins of some ideals about me, but with others planted above

ful conceit and bumptiousness, I found developed beneath it all a reticence and new fear of forwardness, which sprang from searching criticisms of motive and high ideals of efficiency; but contrary to my dream of racial so

iasts, at Niagara Falls, had all the earnestness of self-devotion. At the second meeting, at Harper's Ferry, it arose to the solemnity of a h

I who had always overstriven to give credit for good work, who had never consciously stooped to envy was accused by honest colored people of every sort of small and

o fight the battles of the Negro race. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is such a body, and it grows daily. In the dark days at Wilberforce I planned a time when I could speak freely to my people and of them, interpreting between t

ncipation of the American Negro. I came at their call. My salary even for a year was not assured, but it was the "Voice without reply." The result

n nature some time soon and in the fullness of days I shall die, quietly, I trust, with my face turned

ny at

in mist and mystery hath left our ea

s, goo

doubt are made a mockery in Thy Sanctuary. With

hee to hear

s do deviltry, curse Thou the doer and the deed,-curse them as we curse them, do to the

pon us, mise

and fed them on injustice? Who ravished and debauched their mothers and their gran

owest,

easier than innocence and the innocent be cru

O Judge

en in Heaven's halls Thine hearsed and lifeless form stark amidst the black

hou that

of suns, where worlds do swing of good and gentle men, of women strong and free-far fr

; leave us not to

body and lu

od, del

power and l

od, del

d lying of desp

od, del

; clang, crack, and cry of death and fury filled the air and trembled underneath the stars where church spires

Thine ea

ng hands, but they-did they not wag their heads and leer and cry with bloody jaws: Cease f

our captivi

m. They told him: Work and Rise! He worked. Did this man sin? Nay, but someone told how someone said another did-one whom he had never

O heavenl

nt blood roar in Thine ears and pound in our hearts for vengeance? Pile the pale frenzy of blood-crazed

d Lord; we know

armposts of Thy throne, we raise our shackled hands and charge Thee, God, by the bones of our stolen fathers, by the tea

Thou sile

d dumb to our dumb suffering. Surely Thou, too, art n

t of all

still the God of our black fathers and in Thy Soul's Soul sit some

lence is white terror to our hearts! The way,

s blood; within, the coward, and wi

lcome, d

ot beyond our strength, for there is that clamoring and clawing within, to whose voice we wou

la

East tremb

e; I will repay,

, O Lord

e El

ne these pleadin

hee to hear

en soft to the sobbing of

hee to hear

nk in silence

s, goo

God of a g

m

ce, O Si

la