CONCLUSION.
And now our book is at its end. How well it serves the purpose for which it was produced, the reader will determine. We gratefully recognize the substantial services rendered by friends, as during the past ten years we have hunted and gleaned for subject matter. The author is under special obligations to Messrs P. W. Williamson, F. D. Davis, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Walker, Rev. T. W. Walker, Dr. Waldrop, Dr. and Mrs. Pettiford, Mrs. Rachel Jenkins, Mrs. H. C. Bryant, Mr. and Mrs. W. S. Simpson, of Birmingham; Mr. Tom Posey, Bessemer, and Hon. H. A. Loveless, of Montgomery.
To such as may feel disposed to credit me with the ability to continue at work, I would say that but for the faithful toil and sacrifice of my wife, Mrs. M. A., and of my daughter, Miss Octavia B. Boothe, it is hardly likely that my name would now appear in its humble place on the roll of writers. They have borne the burden with me, and we together have performed these humble tasks. With them I cheerfully divide my meagre honors. The writer lays down his pen at the end of a pleasant but arduous task, fully believing that what we have done is but the bud and prophecy of what we can and will do in the years to come. This book can only tell of our infancy and youth while the historian who shall come upon the stage after twenty or thirty years beyond this date, will bring forth a book wherein shall appear a portraiture of our ripened manhood, out of which shall have grown great enterprises, manned by unity, wisdom, wealth and righteousness.
