of art merely because it is the product of a man of color. Who to-day can read the poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar and not feel a regret that so fine a spirit as his should have lived among us and received so little notice or sympathy that it had to beat its wings red against the bars of our indifference? The Negroes of the United States are extremely sensitive to the opinion and attitude of the white people, and what they crave, and deserve more than anything else, is to be respected according to their merits. To accord this respect to the Negro involves no breaking down of the ethnical separateness of the races, but it involves the building up of better race relations and a higher culture for both races. Every aspiring Negro should be encouraged by the white people to rise to the top, and should be applauded by them when he gets there, for nothing is more sure to hamper the advance of one race than to live side by side with another which is deprived of hope. Lord Macaulay believed that poetry necessarily declined with the advance of civilization, for the reason that civilization has a tendency to obliterate from the mind of man that imagery which is the essence of all poetry. Among a somewhat backward people, whose interests are mostly objective, the mind of the individual is a sort of picture gallery, filled with the imagery of the outer world; whereas among a highly civilized people, whose interests are mostly subjective, the mind of the individual is merely so many pigeon-holes for storing up abstract and classified knowledge. A highly civilized people, therefore, will have many distinguished scientists, but no great poets.* If Macaulay's theory is correct it would lead us to anticipate, for some years to come, an increasing ascendancy of Negro poetry, and, since poetry is destined to be a scarce article in the future, we should give a cordial welcome to whatever muse, white or black, may be able to enliven and charm our declining imagination. • "Essay on Milton." CHAPTER 40 NEGRO NOVELISTS AND HISTORIANS Novels of Chesnutt and Dunbar-Historical Studies of Williams, Brawley, Scott, Grimké, and Others IN N novel-writing Charles Waddell Chesnutt takes the highest rank among the Negroes. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1858, he began as a teacher in a public school in North Carolina, the state from which his parents had come. Later he was chosen principal of the North Carolina Normal School at Fayetteville. At the age of twenty-five he left North Carolina and for a while worked in a newspaper office in New York. Then he returned to his native home in Cleveland, where he worked as a stenographer and at the same time studied law. In 1887 he was admitted to the bar, but his natural bent carried him into the field of literature. His observations in North Carolina led him to write a series of short stories portraying the dialect, manners, superstitions and tribulations of the Southern Negro. These were published in the Atlantic Monthly and later appeared in book form under the title The Conjure Woman. Chesnutt is distinctly a problem novelist. His stories deal with the problem of race prejudice and the tragedy of those who live on the border-line of color. His first novel, The House Behind the Cedars, which appeared in 1900 and which has been the most widely read, has as its central theme the tragedy of the mulatto. The heroine of the story is a mulatto girl who has the aspiration of the Caucasian and the handicaps of the Negro. The story reveals the sufferings and tragic pathos resulting from the white man's sin in bringing into the world a child endowed with the passion to rise, but without hope. Two others of Chesnutt's novels, The Marrow of Tradition and The Colonel's Dreams, revolve around the same theme and reflect the shadows that overspread the life of the half-caste. Paul Laurence Dunbar, though distinguished as a poet rather than as a writer of prose, is the author of several novels: Folks from Dixie, 1898, The Love of Landry, 1900; Heart of Happy Hollow, 1904; etcet era. He also wrote Strength of Gideon and Other Stories, 1902. All of these have literary and artistic merit and reveal much that is picturesque and blithesome as also much that is disconsolate in human nature. Had his poetry not overshadowed his prose, he would have won a respectable place in literature as a novelist. A novel, The Fire in the Flint, by Walter E. White, represents the ill treatment of the Negro and all of the darker aspects of the race problem in a small Georgia town. A recent book by Jean Toomer entitled Cane is made up of short stories, a drama and a few poems, all having reference mostly to the Negroes in Georgia and Washington, D. C. Its In the field of history a conspicuous figure is George W. Williams, author of The History of the Negro Race in America. This book is highly valuable as a piece of research, giving a scholarly presentation of the status of the Negro from Colonial times to the present. chief fault is animus against the white man. The author dwells bitterly upon the grievances of his people, and overlooks the many blessings and splendid opportunities which fortune has brought to them through contact with the white man's culture. The book sounds no note of enthusiasm over the enlargement of the Negro's freedom in the West Indies, in North and South America, and even in Africa. It stresses what the Negro has endured, not what he has achieved. Moreover, it lacks the discriminating judgment which is essential in writing history. A historian of the opposite type is Benjamin Brawley, who deals with more recent history and shows us what the Negro has accomplished as a result of such opportunities as chance has placed in his path. Mr. Brawley received the degree of master of arts from Harvard and is now professor of English in the Atlanta Baptist College. His publications are: A Short History of the American Negro, 1913; The Negro in Literature and Art, 1918; A Social History of the American Negro, 1921; Africa and the War, 1918; Women of Achievements, 1919. All of these books are valuable in telling what the Negro has done and is doing, and in furnishing the inspiration for further strides upward. Dr. Carter G. Woodson, founder and editor of the Journal of Negro History, is the author of the following books: The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861, The History of the Negro Church, The Negro in Our History, and A Century of Negro Migration. All of his books are based on painstaking research, and they bring to light a vast collection of important facts showing the part which the Negro has played in American history. As editor of the Journal of Negro History, Dr. Woodson is doing a valuable service in furnishing a medium through which the achievements of the Negro can reach the educated public. Archibald H. Grimké, of Boston, is the author of biographical sketches of Garrison and Sumner, written for the American Reformers Series, also author of Modern Industrialism and the Negro of the United States, and of sundry papers dealing with the civil rights ques tion. The most recent historical writer is Emmett J. Scott, author of The American Negro in the Great War. His book gives a very interesting and full account of the part played by both the Negro soldiers and Negro civilians in the Great War. It covers the period from the declaration of war against Germany to the mustering out of the soldiers after the armistice. It tells of the various services rendered by each of the Negro regiments in the Army, with a recital of many heroic and thrilling incidents of the battle-field, including the names of the regiments, companies, and individuals receiving the Croix de Guerre and other recognitions of distinguished service. The book is an exceedingly valuable contribution to the history of the World War. CHAPTER 41 THE NEGRO ON THE RACE PROBLEM Personality and Points of View of Booker T. Washington, W. E. B. DuBois, and James D. Corrothers-Discussions of the Problem by Thomas, Holtzclaw, Kelly Miller, and Others BOOKER T. WASHINGTON, who has impressed the American people more than any other Negro, is the author of many books and magazine articles covering matters of vital interest alike to the American Negro and the American white man. His most notable book is his autobiography, Up from Slavery. Commenting upon this book, William Archer, an English novelist, says: "His life, as related by himself in 'Up from Slavery,' is a story of great heroism to rank with any in literature. Born a slave in a one room cabin, with no glazed window, and an earthen floor, he remained there until, when he was eight or nine, emancipation came. After that he worked in a salt-furnace and in a coal mine, devoured all the time by a passion for knowledge which overcame what seemed almost incredible difficulties. At last he set forth for Hampton Institute, where General Armstrong was then just beginning his beneficent work. He had five hundred miles to travel and scarcely any money. He worked and often begged his way; for Mr. Washington has never been ashamed to beg when there was a good object to be served. Arriving at Richmond, Virginia, without a cent, he worked for several days unloading a ship, and slept at night in a hollow under a wooden sidewalk. "At Hampton he found the system in operation which he has since adopted at Tuskegee Normal; that tuition is covered by endowments, while the student is enabled to pay (in part, at any rate) by work for his board and clothing. He soon distinguished himself, not by great attainments, but by the thoroughness of his work and the sincerity and elevation of his character. Then, in 1881, it occurred to the State of Alabama to start a normal school for coloured people at a little village named Tuskegee, some forty miles from the capital, Montgomery. It did not, however, occur to the State of Alabama to provide any buildings or apparatus; it simply allotted £400 a year to be applied to the |