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He stops! Will he fall? Lo! for answer, a gleam like a meteor's track,

And, hurled on the stones of the pavement, the red brand lies shattered and black.

Once more the shouts of the people have rent the quivering air;

At the church door, vestry, and people wait with their feet on the stair;

And the eager throng behind them press for a touch of his hand —

The unknown saviour, whose daring could compass a deed so grand.

But why does a sudden tremor seize on them while they gaze?

And what means that stifled murmur of wonder and amaze?

He stands in the gate of the temple he had periled his life to save;

And the face of the hero before them is the sable face of a slave.

History tells that the slave was promptly given his freedom as a reward for what he had done, and that in after life this man was known by the name of Will Philip Lining.

"RUBE" LEE

AT the Alabama Constitutional Convention held recently in Montgomery, a member made an attack on the negro race as a whole, charging that it was unreliable, untruthful, insolent, indolent, and entirely wanting in the elements of manhood and womanhood.

An old Montgomery negro named Reuben Lee heard the wholesale charges, and, as the recollections of his slave days came back to him, talked feelingly of the past.

In a trembling voice Mr. Lee told several members of the Constitutional Convention incidents of the dark days during the Civil War. "I cannot believe," said he, "that the younger white men, like the speaker, really understand and know my people, else they would not make such statements about them. I wish he could know something of the relations that existed between master and slave. I remember one night, soon after the war began, my old master had some fresh mutton that had been killed that day, and old mistress wanted their daughter, who lived about three miles away, to have some of it.

"Master said it would be a good thing for her to have some of the mutton if there was any one by whom they could send it. 'Why not send Rube?' said the mistress, and the old man agreed that I should go. When they told me what they wanted, I objected, telling them I was too tired from work in the field that day. They told me I might ride the old horse, and so I took a leg of mutton and rode over to my young mistress's house.

"When I reached the house and the young woman found out who I was, she rushed to the door to meet me, exclaiming: 'Oh, Rube, I am so glad to see you! I haven't slept any for several nights. [illustration omitted] My husband and brothers have all gone to the war, and I have been so scared, back here by myself with my two little children, that I could not sleep. You must stay all night, so I can get a little sleep.' I told her that her father and mother were expecting me back that night, but she pleaded so earnestly with me to stay that I could not refuse. Wrapping myself up in some quilts which she gave me, and with my head resting on an old washboard, I remained all night under a hickory-tree at the gate of my young mistress's house. Next morning, with tears in her eyes, she thanked me for staying there and protecting her and her two little children, and said that although there was no house or any other living soul within a distance of two miles, she felt safe while I was there, and that she had not slept so well for more than a week. So, for many months after that, I watched first at her house, sleeping under the hickory-tree, and then at my old master's. Perhaps if those who attack my race knew of such incidents as these, which were constantly happening then, and which happen even now, they would not seek to incite such intense feelings of race hatred."

________

The End | Go to top

The

Negro Problem

by Booker T. Washington, et al.

Electronically Developed by MobileReference

I Industrial Education for the Negro

Booker T. Washington

II The Talented Tenth

W.E. Burghardt DuBois

III The Disfranchisement of the Negro

Charles W. Chesnutt

IV The Negro and the Law

Wilford