without bringing up the "race question." If a Northern white man
happened to be in the group, the time could be safely cut to thirty
minutes. In this respect I consider the conditions of the whites more
to be deplored than that of the blacks. Here, a truly great people, a
people that produced a majority of the great historic Americans from
Washington to Lincoln, now forced to use up its energies in a conflict
as lamentable as it is violent.

I shall give the observations I made in Jacksonville as seen through
the light of after years; and they apply generally to every Southern
community. The colored people may be said to be roughly divided into
three classes, not so much in respect to themselves as in respect to
their relations with the whites. There are those constituting what
might be called the desperate class--the men who work in the lumber
and turpentine camps, the ex-convicts, the bar-room loafers are all in
this class. These men conform to the requirements of civilization much
as a trained lion with low muttered growls goes through his stunts
under the crack of the trainer's whip. They cherish a sullen hatred
for all white men, and they value life as cheap. I have heard more
than one of them say: "I'll go to hell for the first white man that
bothers me." Many who have expressed that sentiment have kept their
word, and it is that fact which gives such prominence to this class;
for in numbers it is only a small proportion of the colored people,
but it often dominates public opinion concerning the whole race.
Happily, this class represents the black people of the South far below
their normal physical and moral condition, but in its increase lies
the possibility of grave dangers. I am sure there is no more urgent
work before the white South, not only for its present happiness, but
for its future safety, than the decreasing of this class of blacks.
And it is not at all a hopeless class; for these men are but the