bright young fellow who was himself a student, and told him that I was
going to Atlanta to attend school. I had also asked him to tell me
where I might stop for a day or two until the University opened. He
said I might go with him to the place where he stopped during his
"lay-overs" in Atlanta. I gladly accepted his offer and went with him
along one of those muddy streets until we came to a rather rickety
looking frame house, which we entered. The proprietor of the house
was a big, fat, greasy-looking brown-skin man. When I asked him if he
could give me accommodations, he wanted to know how long I would stay.
I told him perhaps two days, not more than three. In reply he said:
"Oh, dat's all right den," at the same time leading the way up a pair
of creaky stairs. I followed him and the porter to a room, the door of
which the proprietor opened while continuing, it seemed, his remark,
"Oh, dat's all right den," by adding: "You kin sleep in dat cot in de
corner der. Fifty cents, please." The porter interrupted by saying:
"You needn't collect from him now, he's got a trunk." This seemed to
satisfy the man, and he went down, leaving me and my porter friend in
the room. I glanced around the apartment and saw that it contained
a double bed and two cots, two wash-stands, three chairs, and a
time-worn bureau, with a looking-glass that would have made Adonis
appear hideous. I looked at the cot in which I was to sleep and
suspected, not without good reasons, that I should not be the first to
use the sheets and pillow-case since they had last come from the wash.
When I thought of the clean, tidy, comfortable surroundings in which
I had been reared, a wave of homesickness swept over me that made me
feel faint. Had it not been for the presence of my companion, and that
I knew this much of his history--that he was not yet quite twenty,
just three years older than myself, and that he had been fighting his
own way in the world, earning his own living and providing for his own
education since he was fourteen--I should not have been able to stop