several of them were in my class. One of the boys strongly attracted
my attention from the first day I saw him. His face was as black as
night, but shone as though it were polished; he had sparkling eyes,
and when he opened his mouth, he displayed glistening white teeth. It
struck me at once as appropriate to call him "Shiny Face," or "Shiny
Eyes," or "Shiny Teeth," and I spoke of him often by one of these
names to the other boys. These terms were finally merged into "Shiny,"
and to that name he answered good-naturedly during the balance of his
public school days.

"Shiny" was considered without question to be the best speller, the
best reader, the best penman--in a word, the best scholar, in the
class. He was very quick to catch anything, but, nevertheless, studied
hard; thus he possessed two powers very rarely combined in one boy. I
saw him year after year, on up into the high school, win the majority
of the prizes for punctuality, deportment, essay writing, and
declamation. Yet it did not take me long to discover that, in spite of
his standing as a scholar, he was in some way looked down upon.

The other black boys and girls were still more looked down upon. Some
of the boys often spoke of them as "niggers." Sometimes on the way
home from school a crowd would walk behind them repeating:

"_Nigger, nigger, never die,
Black face and shiny eye_."

On one such afternoon one of the black boys turned suddenly on his
tormentors and hurled a slate; it struck one of the white boys in the
mouth, cutting a slight gash in his lip. At sight of the blood the boy
who had thrown the slate ran, and his companions quickly followed.