LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS "THE WIDOW IN THE SOUTH Reveries of a Widow/' Price, Cloth, $1.50; Paper, 50 cents. "\JHiat some of the leading newspapers say ol "Reveries of a Widow." For lively, engaging and brilliant flashes of wit and love ' 'Rev eries of a Widow," by Teresa Dean, is not bad reading. It is built on a plan not unlike, on the surface, that of the famous reveries by Ik Marvel, although in reality they are totally unlike. They are supposed to be toe reflections of a lively and slangy young widow, who will not marry her "dear Jack," although she un consciously loves him, because he is "too easily managed." Boston Herald. In * 4 Reveries of a Widow/' the author, Teresa Dean, has written the story of a coquette who loves and yet refuses to acknowledge that passion until it is too late. It is one of those books that may best be described as "clever." Troy Daily Times. These " Reveries" of a widow with two " pasts " one dead, the other a living one are a revealing of feminine psychology, and abound in feminine philosophy and the wisdom that is the fruit of experience. The book might almost be called a study ii sex differentiation from a society point of view. Detroit Free Press. Every dealer in books keeps it or will procure It for you, or it will be sent postpaid, on receipt of price, by TOWN TOPICS PUBLISHING CO. 452 Fifth Avenue. New York. "The Widow" In The South A Series of Letters BY TERESA DEAN THE WIDOW," of Town Topics Editorial Staff AUTHOR OF "REVERIES OF A WIDOW? " WHITE CITY CHIPS," ETC. 19O3 The Smart Set Publishing Co, NEW YORK LONDON LIBRA] ITY OF CALIFORNIA. DAVIS COPYRIGHTED 1903, by TOWN TOPICS PUBLISHING CO. COPYRIGHTED 1903, by THE SMART SET PUBLISHING CO. Be Honest Fear Xone, Favor Xone." TOWN TOPICS SERIES COPYRIGHT BOOKS In Attractive Paper Binding, Covers Illustrated from Original Drawings in Five Colors PRICE, 25 CENTS FRONTISPIECES IN COLORS i An Unspeakable Siren, 2 Santa Teresa, 4 The Wrong Man, 6 The Game of Gloris, 8 Six Months in Hades, - 9 An Eclipse of Virtue, ii The Hunt for Happiness, 12 A Prince of Impudence, - 13 Margaret's Misadventure, 14 A Deal in Denver, - 15 The Temptation of Curzon, - 16 The Cousin of the King, - 17 That Dreadful Woman, 21 A Witch of To-day, 23 Half a Wife, 24 The Kiss that Killed, 25 Her Strange Experiment, 26 Fetters that Sear, - 28 Too Many Maidens, 29 Cupid's House Party, 30 The Man's Prerogative, 33 A Very Remarkable Girl, 34 The Sale of a Soul, 35 Paint and Petticoats, 36 Princess Enigma, 37 The Master Chivalry, John Gilliat William T. Whitlock Champion Bissell Brunswick Earlington Clarice Irene Clingham Champion Bissell Anita V. Chartres Charles Stokes Wayne A. S. Van Westrum Gilmer McKendree Louise Winter Adrian S. Van Westrum H. R. Vynne Charles Stokes W T ayne Louise Winter Percival Pollard H. R. Vynne - H. R. Vynne Edward S. Van Zile Justus Miles Forman Edward S. Van Zile L. H. Bickford C. M. S. McLellan John Gilliat Clinton Ross - Margaret Lee For sale by all booksellers and newsdealers, or sent direct by the publishers, upon receipt of price, 25 cents (stamps) each. The Smart Set Pub. Co CONTENTS CHAPTER PARE PREFACE 9 I. Is THERE NO MURDER EXCEPT WHEN THE VICTIM is ASLEEP ? 1 1 II. SHE SHOWS PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT THE ERROR OF His WAYS 18 III. Aw, THE SOUTH WANTS is TO BE LET ALONE 33 IV. THE NEGRO A STUMBLING BLOCK AND GONZALES A MARTYR 52 V. SHE BEGINS WITH CHILD LABOR AND TACKLES BLIND TIGERS 69 VI. SHE SUGGESTS SENDING COLORED TROOPS TO THE PHILIPPINES 81 VII. THEORETICALLY IT is WRONG, PRACTI CALLY IT HAS ADVANTAGES 99 VIII. IT MUST BE LET ALONE TO WORK OUT ITS SALVATION in IX. SHE DEPRECATES ALL DISCUSSION OF THE RACE PROBLEM. ... 123 Preface ON account of the widespread agitation following the appointment of Dr. Crum as Collector of the Port of Charleston, I, early this year, made an extended trip through the South, at the request of my Editor-in-Chief. In sending me to look up so delicate a mat ter as the race problem from the Southern standpoint, my only instruction was to write entirely without personal prejudice the real sentiment of the Southern people if I could get at it. I was enabled, through being hos pitably entertained by representative old families, to make deductions as to the true situation, founded on indubitable and con vincing facts. That the crossed wires of politics alone stand responsible for the ques tions which bring the negro into a promi nence where he must necessarily show fail- 9 preface ure, sad though it be, is nevertheless the case. Thus forced to leap over the space of his own unfitness, his progress is backward rather than forward. But for this he might now, after forty years of freedom, be showing a solid foundation for his true position a re sult which could easily have been attained had he been left to the kindness and guidance of those who understood best his capabilities and slow mental growth. TERESA DEAN. NEW YORK CiTY,/#/y, 1903. IO The Widow in the South. i " IS THERE NO MURDER EXCEPT WHEN THE VICTIM IS ASLEEP ? " CHARLESTON, S.C., January 20. SOME day, when I have time and a map, I am going to study out how it is that I have come South. Numberless times en route I have found myself going backward when I was trying religiously to ride forward. Never have I gone to sleep or neglected to look out of the window for two hours without discovering myself going in the opposite direction. It began at Philadelphia and con tinued all the way. It was as bad as the Pei Ho River. However, I arrived only two hours late, which was most remarkable time, ii the zigzag course considered. The route was over a new branch of the railroad, where sleeping coaches and dining-cars are curiosi ties to the townspeople, and through a country where there are miles and miles of stagnant water and waste-wood. With one- half of the wood there cut and decaying, New York would not be suffering from lack of fuel. The first news that greeted me as I stepped from the train was the death of Editor Gon- zales, the victim of Lieutenant-Governor Tillman. If I were talking to a South Carolinian, instead of writing to the North, I should be cautious about using the word " victim.'* For already it is easy for me to understand that I might be running up against local prejudice. What would be considered a victim of the death bullet in the North might be only just retribution in the South. Very little is said about the 12 3!n shooting, and there seems no excitement in Charleston. Sympathy is extended on every side, and there is sadness in some faces, but there is no expressed bitterness against the man who sought revenge for political injury. This makes one feel as if it was rather a dangerous atmosphere in which to have opinions of your own. Still, as opinions derogatory to character must be backed by keeping your hand in your pocket in which a revolver is supposed to be con cealed before the fatal bullet is fired at you, The Widow may return safely. Notwithstanding native prejudices and a perceptible caution against " trying the case in the newspapers," the News and Courier in this morning's issue publishes several strong editorials. In one, headed, " The Dead and the Living," the writer concludes his comparisons by reference to South Caro lina social conditions, saying: " In a better 13 condition of society we should be able to predict with certainty what the result of the trial of such a case would be, and we are almost equally sure what the outcome of the trial of Mr. Tillman will be in the conditions existing in this State. But we must not go into a discussion of the case. It will not be tried by the newspapers, but by the ordinary methods of the law. If these methods prove to be insufficient for the protection of society, so much the worse for society. There have been so many miscarriages of justice, so many farcical proceedings in court, so much waste of dignity and legal learning, so many violent men who have escaped any sort of punishment, that we do not look with much confidence to the orderly proce dure of the courts in a certain class of cases which are treated as above the law. It would be for the highest good of the State if, on account of the deep damnation of his taking off, the death of Mr. Gonzales should 14 9!n mark the beginning of a new era in the en forcement of the law against murder in South Carolina." Another writer asks : " What is the limit which a white man must pass in committing a homicide in South Carolina before he en dangers his own life and liberty under the law ? We wish to keep the issue perfectly clear, and present it, therefore, as sharply as we can. The people generally of the State have waited and watched for many years for a case of homicide in which white men should be concerned, and in which the plea of self-defense should be found unavailable. The question suggested anew by the Colum bia killing is simply whether a man is cer tainly safe from the penalties of the law who, having had a quarrel with another, meets him with his hand in his pocket and kills him on that ground. This is not an ex aggerated statement of the issue. More IS than one manslayer, we believe, has been acquitted by juries in the State on this plea. It is the plea that has been put forward already in the Columbia case. Its accept ance as always valid and sufficient is, of course, a serious matter. If one man may kill another with assured impunity on such ground, every man's life is in the hands of his hostile or unfriendly neighbor. The slayer will have only to plead that his victim had his hand in his pocket, or that the slayer was under that impression, and feared, there fore, for his own life, and that plea will acquit him and set him free. Have we really reached this condition of things in South Carolina ? The question, as we have said, concerns every man in the State and every home in the State very deeply. In many of the other States of the nation, and in most of the civilized States of the world, a homicide committed on such a pretext would be pun ished as murder without fail. Is it a wholly 16 9!n safe crime in South Carolina? And, if so, what is required to make homicide a certainly unsafe crime for a white man in this State ? Is there no c murder ' short of killing a man in his sleep ? " u SHE SHOWS PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT THE ERROR OF HIS WAYS. CHARLESTON, S. C., January 27. PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT appears to be es tablishing two flags again in this united country one for the North and another for the South. Bitter, indeed, is the feeling here in Charleston over the nomination of a colored man as Collector of the Port. It is regarded as a personal indignity put upon the white people. It may be good heart, broad mind, philanthropy, a desire to ad vance and encourage the colored race on the part of the President, but it is a matter that should be judged entirely from the stand point of the South. In this atmosphere every fair-minded thinker will ask why 18 9Jn tljt should the President the one President for both North and South so forget the pre judices and traditions of the South ? Or even, not forgetting, why should he expect so much more of the South than of the North ? Is it necessary for the advance ment of one race to place indignities upon the other ? Would it not be considered an injury and indignity in the North to appoint a colored man to an office under which the most intelligent white people must serve ? Neither President Roosevelt nor a hun dred thousand United States officials can re move Southern traditions or America's social line between whites and blacks. They can, however, provoke tragedies. It will mean innumerable tragedies to place in official positions colored people to dictate and di rect, in many instances, sons of proud old Southern families whose wealth disappeared in the march of war and in the emancipation 19 Clje of the negro men who are but just now beginning to see again prosperity for the South. These appointments may " en courage" the black race, but they discourage the white. Which of the two is to be con sidered the backbone of the South ? Never yet has the most enthusiastic Northern "negro lover*' been heard to say that the colored race could get on without the white race as backbone. The only ambition of the best educated negro is to have his ability recognized by the whites. His love for his own people his interest in their advance ment, generally speaking has never yet reached the point where he makes the sacri fice of living among his less favored brethren and doing personal work in trying to uplift them. On the contrary, the greatest "aris tocrats " and the most exclusive people from their standpoint in our country are the negroes with a little education and a little white blood. They hold themselves 20 3jn most rigidly aloof from " common niggers/' as they call them. This trait is as noticeable in the North as in the South. Here in Charleston, as I heard a lady re mark, had the President taken a big spoon and stirred up the town, he could not have mixed things more. The whites feel the indignity, the unkindness ; the blacks feel the their importance. Prominent repre sentative men and women say : " We cannot understand it ! We did everything we could to entertain the President when he was here. We showed him every hospitality, and he seemed to appreciate it. Now he has done this ! " The colored people, the most sedate and dignified house-servants servants who have been in close and responsible positions to families are entirely changed in their demeanor, and in overheard snatches of con versation say : " Why not ? De colored people am jus* good as de white people/' 21 It can be readily understood, under these circumstances, that routine life in staid old Charleston is a good deal at sixes and sevens. Yet there are no other people in existence who give affection to the colored folk as do these Southerners no greater affection goes out of the heart of the negro than that which he gives " marse and missy." Many of the cemeteries show the burial of the family servants alongside of the family. Yesterday I attended a tea, where I met some of the most representative Charleston ladies. One of them came in with a sad face. She had been at a hospital for two hours, reading and talking to someone who was very ill. She spoke freely, but with much feeling, of how someone had kissed her hand at parting, how sorry she was that in her absence this someone had been sent away, and how she regretted that she must leave town again. My curiosity was aroused. 22 3!n tlje It did not seem that it was exactly a close friend of whom she was talking, yet it was certainly someone dear to her. Imagine my surprise when she turned to me and explained that an old family servant a negro was lying critically ill ! And so it is gener ally. These family servants refused to desert their masters after the war, and would take no pay for their services. As families scat tered and servants were left to their own resources some of them prospered better than their masters. I heard a gentleman say that not long ago he ran across one of the old stock in Washington. It had been seventeen years since he had seen her. She was one of the " aristocratic " colored moderately well off. He went to her house. He was still " Marse Willie" to her, and she would not sit down in his presence, but paid him the same deference as in the old days. This understanding between the white and 23 black is, of course, entirely a matter of the training of the family servant. The field negro is another being. He is a savage quite as much as is the American Indian or the member of a Philippine tribe. If the ad vancement of the race is really a Presidential ambition, civilization should first be con sidered. If the negroes, who are already ad vanced to the point of recognition from the President, are not interested in their own people enough to try to better their condition, then something should be done by the* Government. All through Virginia, South Carolina and the South generally are negroes who recognize neither government nor law. Only twelve or fifteen miles from Charleston these black savages are living. They recog nize no authority nor power but the bullet or bonfire. Murders among themselves are so usual and so expected that though sometimes they are reported, they are oftener not. No white woman is safe who lives near. They 24 3|tt tljc are beings so much lower than Indians in their savagery that there is no comparison. They have an unintelligible language called " gullah ' a mixture of the African and English. They kill, murder and practice voodooism, and yet have had over thirty years in which to become respectable Ameri can citizens. As field-hands under white overseers their savage instincts were not al lowed to develop. To-day the only way they can be controlled by the authorities is through the methods that are so often criti cised by those who do not understand con ditions. Surely, the advancement and en couragement of the negro in the South mean something more than appointing to political position one or more who have advanced be yond primeval ignorance. Under these con ditions such appointments mean dire disaster and encouragement to crime. The offices are positions of honor and re- 25 sponsibility, and are sought by white men. Should the colored man be considered first ? Would he be chosen from a standpoint of justice or ability, independent of this distress ing political and philanthropic idea ? And is it just or philanthropic to slap a white man in the face to carry a point ? The world over, the white man has the right of way. When it is not conceded, he fights for it. Charleston has many men much better fitted by education and courtesy for the po sition of Collector of the Port than this colored man. It has been the custom on the arrival of distinguished travelers for the Mayor of Charleston to accept the hospitality of the launch used by this Government officer to go out to meet them. It would be impos sible and against every inborn instinct of the Southern nature to accept this social courtesy from a colored man. We would not do it in the North. 26 9!n tyt There is no argument that can ever do away with the racial prejudice. These quiet Southern men and women understand better than anyone else the characteristics of the colored people. They tell you in detail how the educated negroes educated only because they have risen above others of the race claim that they do not aspire to social equality, yet prove continually it is their only ambition. The negro knows and admits that social equality anywhere in the United States is utterly impossible. He makes the disclaimer, however, a telling point in his claim to recognition from other standpoints, winning friends by this intel ligent manifestation of common sense in rec ognizing his own inequality. Yet, when was a negro ever known to refuse social recogni tion ? If this man of color, this Dr. Crum, whom the President has nominated for an office which involves many courtesies that tread upon social lines, be honest in his as- 27 sertion that he does not aspire to social recog nition, he would decline the office instead of fighting for it. He knows full well, with this feeling so rampant here in the South, that to decline the office on the ground that he would be placed in power over some of the best white blood in the South that this would cause dissension and bitterness, and that he would be harming his own people instead of advancing them would mean for him, personally, in all probability, more than any President of the United States can offer him. But no. It is social recognition these colored people want. They want it from the great and mighty white. It is their only ambition. These people say, " Look at Booker T. Washington. He asserts intel ligently and with dignified humility that he does not claim social equality." If this be true, the Southern people ask, why, then, did he not place himself on record with white people, and as an example to the colored 28 people, by refusing to lunch with the Presi dent of the United States? No. He pre ferred to have the whole South feel that it had been insulted, and to have the President himself placed in an equivocal position. It did not occur to him to refuse social recog^ nition. Yet a well-born white man, under circumstances much less serious, and affecting only persons instead of the whole country, would not have hesitated to say : "Mr. President, I thank you, but I cannot accept your kind invitation." As I said in the beginning, we cannot change nor do away with the traditions of the South. A drop of colored blood makes a negro. It makes a negro in the North as well as the South. It may be right ; it may be wrong ; it may, many times, be heartrending ; but the social taint is there. It is this the col ored man feels ; but not grandly and nobly and with ambitions to help his own people to independent conditions of their own. As 29 his color grows lighter through intermarriage his hatred of his blacker brother becomes intense. The most " exclusive " society in Charleston, the most rigid in their ideas of exclusiveness, are these bleached negroes. They will have nothing to do with the c< niggers " save as servants. They ape the white people, but, unlike the whites, they hate the blacks. They have no sympathy for the race, and are absolutely cruel, at times, in their treatment of it. They recog nize no heart, no soul, no humanity under the black skin. They feel that it is the col ored skin that is keeping them where they are, though now they have some education and money. Their only opportunity to show their distinction is to hold themselves above those of darker skin. To Dr. Crum personally no one objects. He is respected as a man of color and of mediocre education. He is not, by any 30 means, the best man for the place, even though color were not an objection. In fact, a white man of no greater ability would not be considered for a moment. These things make the action of the President seem all the more an indignity to the Charlestonians. They really and honestly cannot understand why President Roosevelt should do such a thing. They feel, also, that he never would have done so could he have viewed the situ ation from the Southern standpoint, or had he realized how much harm it will do, how much of a setback it will give the much dis cussed colored question. They speak fre quently of the President when he was here, going out of his way to shake hands with a line of colored servants that was drawn up at the back of a house where he had been en tertained. They ask, would a guest of a Northern house be doing the correct thing to shake hands with the servants in departing ? President Roosevelt, in his good-hearted- ness, broad-mindedness, or philanthropy, or campaign play, or whatever it is, has cer tainly pulled down a hornet's nest. Some good friend should talk white people to him, instead of colored people. White people can bolt and never forgive. Colored people will follow on anyway, and are much better at doing what they are told to do. Tragedies should be averted, not invited. gin in ALL THE SOUTH WANTS IS TO BE LET ALONE. CHARLESTON, S. C., February 2. ONE thing must be admitted : the people of the North do not understand the people of the South. Northerners suppose that to return the Confederate flags, to raise monu ments on victorious battlefields to Southern generals or to erect statues of them in Wash ington conciliates, inasmuch as it shows to the Southerners a Northern willingness to forget past differences. This is a mistake. To the Southerner it means never letting them forget never letting them alone. They do not want to be reminded. Fur thermore, they do not care a fillip for this kind of forgiveness on the part of the North. All they ask is to be let alone. 3 33 " We were thoroughly thrashed thor oughly conquered awfully, awfully pun ished ; we want to be good American citi zens ; we would not go back to slavery if we could ; we did not bring slavery into the States ; but we do want to be let alone. We want to work out our own salvation," said a representative, successful, prominent man of the South to me the other day. " We will not submit to negro rule, and if negroes are placed in power then the white people will get away." He talked honestly, earnestly, without prejudice, without personal or political am bitions. His words were but the echo of the sentiments of all true Southerners, though many are more controlled by pre judice and the old feeling of a disunited country. Covering battlefields of the I was going 34 to say Rebellion, but writing from this hos pitable atmosphere I must not say Rebel lion covering battlefields of the Civil War with monuments to General Robert E. Lee, or erecting statues of him in Washington even by the side of George Washington himself by the Northern people, would not appease, please or conciliate the South erners in the way the Northerners imagine. It would be, to a majority, only another way of cramming the old victory down Southern throats again and refusing to allow them to forget, and by them it would be regarded as impertinent, vulgar and patronizing conde scension on our part. I am not saying this in criticism. Far from it. I think the Southerners every side considered are quite right. We may have " thrashed " them and " conquered " them ; they may fully recognize our victory, but we never took from them their spirit 35 nor their pride. They recognize our fight ing strength, but they do not recognize our right to offer and force conspicuous olive branches before the Southerners want them and are ready to receive them. They are, without question, over-sensitive, but they are natural, and, at worst or best, only hu man. They are altogether too refined to put it to us bluntly, as I have done ; but when one is received among them and listens to their side of the South's condition ; to their calm admissions of our victory in the old struggle ; to their resignation to the dire poverty that fell to them in the aftermath ; to their confidences if they will go that far about present situations and their own wishes, it is an easy matter to make clear de ductions. Possibly I am assisted greatly by my own knowledge of Northern sentiment. Having won the victory and administered the punishment, we now graciously offer and allow monuments and things for conciliation, 36 and I think I must be honest and confess that I, too, look upon it as rather patroniz ing on our part. The monuments are more to our own generosity than to brotherly love, aren't they ? Anyway, I am sure that we, too, are only human ; and if we had not been the victors, I don't suppose we should be willing to set up monuments to South ern generals any more than the Southern ers are doing it for the North. We should be feeling as they do, and we should not take our medicine so quietly. We would clinch our fists, give black eyes, and, in the words of Barry Bulkley, of Washington, when someone suggested his going to war and being a hero, and he thought it would be just his luck to be assigned to "Jimmie" Elaine's command, we would " knock the stuffing out of him" who dared to speak to us on such a vital subject. We may not shoot so easily as they do in the South, but surely we strike out from the shoulder 37 more, and on less provocation. So, too, can we understand how we should dislike to be continually reminded that we were the under dogs in a fight. Every time the North tries to show that the old feeling has passed away, and that we are now one nation, it serves as a reminder, and an added sensation of resentment is caused. This is a perfectly natural emotion, con trolled neither by politics nor nation. It is just human nature that cries out : " Can't you let us alone ? Haven't we had enough ? " As for the leaving alone, surely the South understands its own better than we do. The conditions between the races through politics have grown much worse instead of better since the Civil War. The men of the Southern families went to the front to fight for principle, leaving their women and children in the care of the colored people, 38 with never a thought that the confidence would be betrayed. Neither was it. Such a thing would be impossible to-day. Free dom has taught the negro more the meaning of license than of liberty. He is notable to distinguish between the two, and a law-abid ing citizen with responsibilities is entirely be yond his uneducated intelligence. He, in his primitiveness, has no particular ambition. He is not even anxious to make money. All he cares for is enough to live on. If he has any money at all beyond present needs, he prefers not to work. He never thinks of saving and laying aside for a " rainy day." Someone else must think of that. Major Trimble, a Northerner, of the Volunteer Service,who is interested in the pro duction of American tea and has a plantation at Summerville, a few miles out of Charleston, and who employs about 200 negroes, tells me that the only way to get steady work out of 39 the blacks is to pay themjust enough to live on. Fifty cents a day keeps them going. If he wants extra work, and gives them extra pay, he makes a mistake. This he has learned by experience. He does not get any more work done, but with the extra pay the negro lays off and idles until it is gone. He is obliged to have white men for overseers to get any work at all out of the blacks. His greatest difficulty is in getting competent white men for the positions. The field negroes of the South are with out any sense of morality, and are cruel to each other, without any of the finer sensibil ities to make them the human beings the Northern politician is trying to " encourage." In sickness they attend each other up to the time death is certain, then they leave the sufferer to die. He can beg piteously for water or other relief, but no one cares. He dies alone. The funeral, however, is a great 40 feast and gala day. The colored picnic as we know it in the North is a sad affair com pared to the revel of the field negro's funeral. For commercial and financial consider ations no Southerner would go back to slavery. It is much cheaper in every way to hire labor than to own slaves. To own even 200 laborers would mean an invest ment of a large capital in the beginning. In addition there would be clothing and provi sions, and loss through sickness and death. In hiring colored labor at fifty cents a day there is no responsibility aside from getting the work out of the laborer. In most in stances, if the man of color can get his fifty cents without working for it, he will not work. There are about 55,000 inhabitants of Charleston, 29,000 of whom are colored. It would be sad indeed to have colored men in power or colored rule in any quarter of the town. The streets seem full of idle negroes. They are peaceful and quiet and appear to be well fed, but absolutely without ambition, other than to stand around, sit on doorsteps and gaze into vacancy. They are poorly dressed, but it must be impossible judging from filled out cheeks for anyone to starve here in the South. I have never seen any of them begging. If you ask how they live, no one seems to know. Yet they are all very much alive. The better class of ne groes, the family servants, are just as improvi dent as the field negroes. They never save any money and seem to have no ideas of thrift. They live on, carelessly, happily, and never give the least thought to the mor row. Their trust seems to be entirely in the white man at the helm. To take the white man away would leave them stranded and helpless. Yet the appointment of col ored men to Federal offices in the South means the driving away of the best and most 42 3]n substantial of the white population. Several times I have heard men say, " We will leave the country and live in Europe." Every white person in Charleston hopes that Presi dent Roosevelt will reconsider the nomina tion he has made for Collector of the Port. Failing to do this will mean that more ap pointments of the same nature will have to be made to satisfy the colored man's demand. If these appointments must be made for the sake of political honor I suppose there is such a thing as political honor it would be better to find the offices for the colored man somewhere up North. Then Jet the North fight it out. I agree with these Southerners. They should be let alone. They don't care for monuments or statues that may be gentle re minders, but reminders just the same, and they do understand the negroes. They get on with them quietly and successfully if out- 43 side influences do not come in. They can work out the problems of the South through intelligent knowledge, while the Northerner in his zest and zeal and blundering will keep the pot boiling and everything stirred up. The Southern gentlemen are good sports. But don't think I mean the Tillmans Senator and Lieutenant-Governor ; they belong to a different class. The good sport in a fight recognizes the victor. The loser holds out his hand in friendship when the fight is ended. He respects the power of the winner. Then he wants to forget and he wants others to forget. It would be in better taste if the North what was that schoolboy game ? Shinny ? shinnied on its own side. Charleston is probably the most conser vative of all Southern cities, and clings most to the old traditions. It is not at all bitter in its resentment of conditions forced by the Civil War. Or if it be bitter, its people are 44 too well bred to indicate it. Nevertheless, they glory in being of the old South. They have a worship of ancestry equal almost to the inhabitants of North China. A grand father is of much more importance here than the millions of a Vanderbilt. It makes no difference that they are now poor ; it makes no difference that old customs have changed ; that a new generation has not the same reverence for forefathers, and in its eager ness to do something itself forgets to rattle ancestral bones ; it makes no difference that the square corners of the modern era cannot fit the round circles of the old ; it makes no difference that Charleston may stand entirely alone, with the world rushing on and leaving her behind. She is perfectly satisfied. She is distressed only when something forces her even for an instant out of the groove that was established in the last century. Church, society, houses, homes, driveways and streets that were known to their fore- 45 fathers are good enough for the old Charles- tonians of to-day. And the stately, dis tinguished Charlestonians of the old school are the kings and queens and rulers of Charleston society. No flippant, disrespect ing new generation has any power or influence socially. This respect for silver-haired age has its counterpart only among the Knicker bockers of the North, and is gradually being lost sight of through deaths or the infirmities of age. In the North New York as the representative city the mantle does not seem to fall on the shoulders of the next generation as it does here. New York is too cosmopolitan. " Old Schools " get lost in new amusements. The stately dame must step aside for the daughter who rushes by in her automobile. How can any auto mobile generation be stately ? Charleston society does not go by in auto mobiles. It belongs to the St. Cecilia. The 46 St. Cecilia is the oldest dancing club in America. It began as a musical club, and was established in 1761. It is a wealthy society, but wealth does not open its doors to you. You must have grandfathers. Three balls are given during the season. Though the club is over 140 years old, its doings have never been mentioned in the news papers. I believe there is a legend that some rash individual attempted to describe costumes, mention names and speak pleas antly of famous beauties, at one time, but the matter is spoken of with such bated breath, and with such horror at the sacrilege, that it has been impossible for me to get the particulars. The old-time courtesies of the ballroom are strictly observed the old- time courtesies when our fathers and mothers danced by step, and when the polka and the quadrille were the favorite numbers. Though the dances have become modern in the march of years the etiquette of the ballroom ' 47 is unchanged. There is no going out be tween dances, no sitting out dances on bal conies or in conservatories, no little sneaks for a minute's private talk on near-by stairs, nothing careless, nothing without the sanc tion of the most conscientious chaperon. All around the room, against the wall, is a row of chairs. The dancing begins promptly at nine o'clock. Cards are filled beforehand, usually, and under no consideration would a Charleston girl divide a dance. It would be considered most improper by her chaperon and just cause for a duel by the -man who had his name down for the number. The chaperon usually takes charge of the dancing card and deals out the girl to the different claimants. The girl takes the dance with the claimant and also the promenade after the dance, around and around the room. He then takes her religiously back to her chaperon, where her next partner is sure to find her. And I must say this is a great improvement over the Northern method, and no end of a convenience. The pretty girls ejaculate they have " noth ing to wear/* but dainty muslins make ball room belles here as much as lace and chiffon do at home. An elaborate supper is served and champagne flows freely. " Yet, strange as it may seem," I heard a man say, " I have never seen a St. Cecilian exhilarated by wine. They drink at will, but everybody is so well poised, so constantly living up to old traditions of respectability, that even wine does not affect them/' This club never admits outsiders to its sacred portals, and visitors in the town are not invited unless by special request of some member or for some personal distinction. To become a member ? Well, to be a de scendant of King George, or William the Conqueror, or to have in you a few drops of Argyle blood might admit you, but it is 4 49 better to have a Charlestonian grandfather. Then there will be no doubts and no ques tions asked. There is a younger element in Charleston that entertains delightfully, and is not quite so devoted to ancestral worship, yet is, too, of the old stock. Its homes are elegant and its servants colored, of course in numbers and in training the envy of every Northern visitor. A country club about three miles out of the city is a daily recreation. Al together the quiet, peaceful, moderate pace of Charleston life is certainly ideal. On the Battery, where the handsomest homes are, is a promenade looking off to the different islands and military forts, and nowhere else on the coast is the view so fine. A new hotel is talked of for one end of the Battery, but the conservatism of the Charlestonians keeps the idea in embryo. The older ele ment see too many intruders. An attractive 9jn hotel in such an ideal spot would certainly bring people to Charleston who would never understand all that is so sacred to these in habitants, and would, without doubt, destroy much of Charleston's charm. For it is a charm in this selfish, ambitious, rushing life to find a spot so unspoiled by worldliness. iv THE NEGRO A STUMBLING BLOCK AND GONZALES A MARTYR. COLUMBIA, S.C., February 10. CONDITIONS are all wrong in the South either for carrying out high, moral purpose, or for instantaneous changes. The negro is the stumbling block. Northern politics have placed him where, under the flag and constitutionally, he has the same privileges as a white citizen. Politics did not remember that the negro in his natural state is a savage and in his civilized state a dependent slave. To give him his freedom does not take from him the instincts of his nature or of the later servility ; cannot put into him force of character or ambition. Freedom, if it means 52 3In anything to him, means doing as he pleases, with no knowledge whatever of the finer sen sibilities that make thralldom of one's own conscience. Free as the negro is, the South ern negroes must still be led, or must be driven, or else must be given time and the right conditions for development into respon sible, law-abiding, law-protecting citizens. This cannot be brought about through poli tics. Politics, however, through franchise and wire-pulling, can bring about a condition that makes the negro vote legal. Should this become general in towns where the colored population is the largest, it would mean disaster to the South and a racial war. This country is supposed to be a white man's country. Even the most daring and unscru pulous politician would not in his senses as sert that the Stars and Stripes are meant for more than to protect colored people under white rule. Yet, under present conditions, with colored political appointments rasping 53 against traditions, with compulsory education being legislated reading and writing being the test that makes the negro a voter our flag does not seem much of a protection. Surely the problems of the South are a Chi nese puzzle ! With two such distinct races in color and mental development, there should be differ ent laws one for the negro, one for the white race. I heard a prominent Judge, who has been on the bench for years in South Carolina, say that he always meted out much severer punishment to the white prisoner than to the colored ; that he considered the white man much more responsible for his sins than the negro ; that the intelligence of the negro fell far below even the lowest class of white. Yet politics and the franchise place them equally in affairs of the country ! For very shame's sake, and perhaps to have something to legislate these people seem to* 54 91n be indefatigable legislators bills against child labor, bills for compulsory education and bills for the bettering of all conditions in the South are introduced in State Legis latures and then fall flat or become inopera tive because of struck-out clauses or from the fact that the negro must be helped the same as, and by the side of, the white people. There is no class of white child that will sit down by the side of a colored child in the schools of the South. They can play to gether as children, but the black child fetches and carries for the white child and is still the subject as in the slave days. The great question of child labor has for its strongest point the fact that while the white child is employed in the cotton mills no colored people are ever employed in these mills the negro child is getting ahead in education. The negroes, knowing that they are not vot ing citizens without the knowledge of read ing and writing, and being taught that to 55 vote is power, crowd the schools with a seem ing ambition away beyond the whites. Their ambition does not go beyond the franchise clause, excepting in rare instances where an intelligent half-ancestry has overbalanced the negro drifting instincts. Compulsory education, which has become a law in this State, has been made inoper ative by striking out the clause fining or im prisoning parents who do not enforce the law. In every instance the incentive for this condition of things is to keep the negro be low the privileges accorded by the Govern ment. It sounds badly to admit or assert that the South does try to keep the negro down, but the Southerners know the negro. They know his possibilities and impossibil ities. They know his condition is better when entirely cared for by the white people than when he does for himself. They know he cannot get on without the guidance of the 56 3]n white people. They know he lacks the reasoning power that makes an intelligent, wide world in one accord. Because of this lack of reasoning power and the impulse that alone guides his actions, and with his ideas of license misunderstood liberty the negro is the menace to Southern civilization as we gauge it from the North. The negro is not held down by the South, but the negro can not be made into an independent citizen as a race. He must now and always be led. The Southerners know, as we do not, and in their knowledge of the negro character have the best interests of the colored race at heart. When franchises and politics get the negro on the wrong plane, then the South erner must do the best he can for the Southern country, and the result is a condi tion that makes problems. These " walking arsenals," this constant " killing his man," in the South, this evt^r- 57 ready use of a weapon that is concealed, are indirectly the result of forced contact with lawless negroes. He is a mighty brave man who goes, at all times, without a weapon. Still, it is not the custom to carry weapons. Many men say they never carry a weapon, and none of the better class of men the more intelligent class considers it necessary. Yet, the most conservative, refined and broadest thinkers of this class will tell you in detail of the unsettled conditions, and that there is risk in going without something for self-protection. " But," they add, " it is so cowardly to go armed/' The colored people, if they can scrape together enough money, always carry some kind of a weapon a ra zor or a revolver. And you can never tell when you will run up against the sharp edge of their impulsive, uncontrollable tempers. Late at night you may accidentally jostle a negro ; he feels insulted, immediately whips out a razor or revolver, and can be subdued 58 only by the flash of steel. The most conser vative men who say the revolver is unneces sary will add, " Well, I must admit that every woman who lives out of the city limits should go armed. White women are never safe from the brutality of these black beasts." The most intelligent men and women de plore the fact of the carrying of firearms, and really believe themselves when they say the impression that it is a custom is erroneous. Yet they will tell you of a time they " really needed a revolver," or else of a time " it was lucky they chanced to have a revolver ! " Two or three years ago, a representative man met an acquaintance on the train, who said, " I am going to stop in Columbia if you think I won't run into a shooting ; I declare I am almost afraid to stop there, your bullets fly so easily." " Nonsense ! " said the Columbian ; "you have an entirely wrong idea ; you people of 59 the North are always rilled with wrong ideas of the South. Just get off the train, and I will show you the most peaceful, law-abiding little town you ever saw.*' The acquaintance decided, laughingly, to run the risk. He went to the hotel, started out to see the town before supper, and at the first corner ran into the worst shooting affair of the year. So he returned to the hotel, took his satchel, went supperless to the station and left on the first train. I arrived here at night. The next morn ing's paper had in the first column the killing of a father and son by a neighbor for some dispute over a dog, in a suburban district. Each day there seems to be an affair that values human life very cheaply, but these dear, good people don't notice it. If I speak of it, they immediately remind me of the horrible butcheries, cold-blooded mur ders, trunk discoveries, man-hole conceal- 60 3]n ments, dismembered bodies, saloon death blows and a few other killings we have in the North, and they have the best of the argu ment. The murders here are clean-cut and sure, not disfiguring ; if methods must be considered, these seem the most respect able. There are a lot of things these dear Columbia people refer to about the North if I try to get at conditions here. So I am being led to believe, C( seeing oursel's as ithers see us," that the South is much more civilized problems or no problems than the North. Anyway, I am cultivating a humble and neu tral spirit, and trying to have no prejudice, no favor. But I certainly do have skirmishes. And I certainly have struck a " South " in Co lumbia. The hotel is filled with State Sena tors and Congressmen, and my talk seems to catch those that are still seceding. They all acknowledge one country, one flag, but the things I hear about the North and the 61 way it does not know anything about the South ! It makes me bring my batteries to bear, and the blood of my ancestors to boil, and the spirit of my womanhood to flash every little while. We fight our battles over the soup, fish, roast and ice, and then run up flags of truce over the dessert. We all go off the field of battle together, and then find our fighting forces gathered again at the next meal. They seem to think they are still " Johnnie Rebs " to us, as we are " Yankees " to them, and that we hate them. I have wanted to repeat some little platitudes about love begetting love, etc., but I refrain. Still one of the men at the table a man with whiskers, who knows everything both North and South, and who, I suppose, would be considered in the light of an oracle seems quite proud of his Northern son-in-law, who, he says, is worth a million ! Perhaps he is gauging Northern honor by those millions. I wonder how the son-in-law got the mil- 62 3]n lion ? Perhaps he belongs to some of those trusts of ours. Yes, Columbia is a mighty good place to be humble and neutral. . You cannot stay in Columbia any length of time without learning to reverence the name of the murdered editor, N. G. Gon- zales. If any man ever built a monument for himself, he did it. His work and very soul seemed to be for the good of South Carolina. His strength of purpose was so great that if he could have looked into the future and known what his fate was to be he would not have hesitated. While, perhaps, he could not be called popular in the general sense of the term, he was worshipped by those who knew him personally. Just in proportion to the love he called out, so did he inspire hate in those whom he pinned to the wall with his pen and kept writhing while he exposed their assailable points. He had all the Spanish vituperance and fluency, 63 tempered with the highest American resolu tions, reason and desire to build for the South a foundation that should be for all time. He was not a fluent talker, but words dropped in his editorial column like a tor rent at Niagara. His pen strength was so great that whatever he attacked, whatever he dug up, whatever he set out to do, was done, because back of his wonderful wording was always the watchword for the truth and the right. Tillman aspired to be Governor ; it was bad enough that he was Lieutenant- Governor. The Tillman politics of the South were like the Croker politics of the North. His record was so openly bad that proof after proof was given by this facile pen. Tillman " took" all kinds of accusa tions. He was called a falsifier. It was proven that he was one. He was called " a blackleg," a scoundrel everything that a man of spirit or manhood would resent. He was dared to deny the accusations. He 64 gin " took it " like a craven cur. He was de feated. Every man, woman and child knows of the traits that make him a man to be de spised, though a brute to be feared. The truthful pen of Mr. Gonzales told much, but withheld more. It told only those things that would affect the public if he were made their Governor. His private life those things that would reflect upon his family or that of his father it withheld. Then, after five months had passed and the Lieutenant- Governor had to lay aside his purple robe as President of the Senate and could not step into the honored position so ably filled by Governor Heywood, the beast predominated. Though the man had not resented nor recog nized what he could have termed insults, the savage instinct wanted revenge. He could not act the part of the Southern gentleman, who is expected to " shoot on sight " at the proper time, when it is the quickest and best shot that modifies the crime. He had met 5 65 Mr. Gonzales several times in the interim, but the circumstances were not so propitious for his crime. This time there was no dan ger for himself. Mr. Gonzales had turned to one side, and was defenseless. It is remarkable the silence of The State the newspaper owned by the Gonzales brothers about Tillman. His name has never been mentioned. This dignified si lence is as impressive as the deep love and worship everywhere in this town for the victim. Though three weeks have passed since the death of Mr. Gonzales, the mourn ing is as apparent as at first. One lady said, " Even the stone pavements seem to cry out, he was so much a part of all that is best that the town represents/' When I ask if they think that justice will be done and a white man will meet his punishment for the crime, they say, " Yes ! Yes ! There must no doubt of it creep into one's mind. If 66 3fn there is virtue in thought- waves, it must be brought to bear on this man's crime. If we think he will be punished, it may help to bring it about." Then they add, thought fully and sadly, " If, at last, this crime in South Carolina is punished, I believe even Mr. Gonzales would have been willing to die for the good to the State." The friends of Mr. Gonzales begged him to go armed. He would not. He helped pass the law making it a crime to carry con cealed weapons. He said and believed that only cowards carry firearms. Yet the con ditions here are certainly as bad as on the wild Western prairies, where everybody looks to his belt and cartridges as a part of every-day dress. Theories are right; laws are civilized and elevating, but conditions are all wrong at present in the South. There is only one solution to the problem : Keep the negro out of politics. His real friends are the Southerners. With no fear of negro rule, conditions would soon change. 68 SHE BEGINS WITH CHILD LABOR AND TACKLES BLIND TIGERS. COLUMBIA, S. C., February 14. The Child Labor Bill had passed the State Senate and the House was to have the an nual fling at it. When I arrived there was a heated discussion about whisky versus education. Some man wanted the tax on liquors raised so the appropriation for schools could be increased, and another man insisted that education should not depend on whisky ; the tax was already high enough ; you could not get a drink without buying a bottleful ; prices were exorbitant ; and as for higher 69 l)C taxation, a profit of $566,898 in 1902 was enough money for any State to make. Certainly it did seem as if the State had a fine eye to money as well as morals, when it decided to go into the liquor business. The State watches against the smuggling of any brands outside of the Dispensary supplies, and it punishes with fines and imprisonment the selling of a drink, or the opening of a bottle on the premises, and the purchase must be made " between the hours of sun rise and sunset." Blind tigers seemed to worry the men who did or didn't want higher taxation. Blind tigers are places generally innocent looking restaurants where people forget laws and quench a man's thirst from an open bottle. In the figures and arguments that flowed fast and furious about education and the different grades of whisky, high licenses did not do nearly so well for the city and county treasuries as taxation and 70 3Jn State management have done. High license only turned in $4,000 the year before the Dispensary was established. The first year of the Dispensary system the profit to the city and county was double. As improved morals seemed an important part of the argument, and over $3, 000,000 profit has accrued in less than ten years, 1 decided that the quality pure brands must have some thing to do with pure morality as well as high prices. It is claimed that the Dispensary law has reduced drunkenness over 47 per cent. In 1892 voters were asked, in casting their votes for State officers, to register their pref erence for " Prohibition " or " High License." About 90,000 votes were cast ; 50,000 on the question, 30,000 for prohibi tion, 20,000 for high license. As a happy compromise the State went into the liquor business, which became a legislative matter Clje that never ceases, though profits are so satis factory. Its supporters claim that in the plain, unattractive, sealed bottles and wooden boxes, the dusty, warehouse-looking building and the cold daylight, with no treating of friends at a glittering bar, no places to sit at a cosy table and no free lunches, no one is tempted. The sociability and conviviality are taken out of drinking, and the men who really want the stuff for the drink's sake get it, take it away and do not tempt others. On the other hand, opposers claim that the consumption is larger and the profits show it ; that, instead of the man who wants a drink taking one and walking on, he buys a bottleful and keeps drinking until it is gone ; that, where before his drinking was done away from his family, now the bottle is taken home, and that morals are not bet tered, only covered from the public gaze. The average sale of liquor through the Dis pensaries of South Carolina amounts to one 72 9ln and a half million gallons a year. This would seem an immense consumption with out attractions or " gilt edges " in any way, and I am wondering what the conditions were before morals were improved 47 per cent. The Dispensary people claim that the drinkers who actually crave whisky are left over from the old regime, and that as they die off from age or alcohol the new genera tion will have healthier appetites. But if the 40,000 people who did not vote either way had said " high license " the State would not have gone into the liquor business. Eminently respectable and substantial citi zens say quietly : cc High license would be best all round/' You cannot get even Apollinaris or Saratoga Spring waters except at drug stores or Dispensaries. Hotels in Columbia are innocent of spring waters as well as bar liquors, yet the waiter, as he takes your order, asks kindly and insinua- 73 tingly : cc Anything to drink ? " I suppose there must be cases and sealed bottles some where about the house or does the waiter stand in with the blind tigers and skip across the road or around the corner to fill an order ? From the prohibition side the arguments are strong and far-reaching. They claim that in selling intoxicating drinks the State en courages immorality and makes homes des olate, and all the rest of the pathos that comes from the poverty and misery side of the drunkard's home. They also throw a radium light on the