"I have a favorable opportunity of knowing the thoroughness with which your students are taught. Many of the undergraduates have applied to me for certificates of qualification to teach in the public schools. They show that they have been successfully instructed in both manners and matter. It is quite observable that the influence of the College is seen and felt by both races; and I cheerfully recommend it to all lovers of fallen humanity."
An editorial in the Mountain Home, the principal paper in the county, makes this statement: "In two particulars we had the same impression in all cases, namely: that the teachers are thoroughly equipped in all that constitutes efficiency as instructors, and that the students showed remarkable proficiency in their studies."
Rev. G. A. Lofton, D. D., in writing to the New York Examiner, says: "It would be impossible to tell the moral effect of this school as immediately felt upon this section of the State. Especially does it lay an excellent moral foundation upon which the students build character; and culture and refinement in all directions are everywhere manifest."
TOUGALOO UNIVERSITY.
This institution is located in the beautiful little village of Tougaloo, in the very middle of the State of Mississippi, a few miles from Jackson, the capital. It is in the heart of the Black Belt, where the colored people outnumber the whites. The standards in this school are very good, while the teaching is especially excellent.
Rev. Frank G. Woodworth, D. D., is its president. The number of pupils in all the departments of this institution for 1896 was upwards of 400.
Industrial education is thoroughly graded and ably taught. Students are not only made familiar with the use of tools, but are required to make out bills of material, working plans, plans for construction, etc., and to execute them intelligently. In agriculture, the plantation of Tougaloo comprises 640 acres, and about 150 acres are under excellent cultivation, and pupils are practically taught the care of cattle, horses, and mules, plowing and planting, cultivation of crops, gardening, fruit-culture, steam-sawing and the like. In nurse-training this school has had special advantages. Instruction is daily given in nursing and hygiene, with a special course of two years for those who desire to make nursing the sick a profession. The course in cooking, and in sewing and dressmaking, is excellent.
HOWARD UNIVERSITY.
This institution was established by the friends of the freedmen—especially through the instrumentality of the distinguished soldier whose name it bears, and whose spirit its teachers seek to emulate—immediately after the war. It has always welcomed all nationalities alike. Its work of years is now before the country. Every year the Trustees seek to enlarge its scope and fit it for greater usefulness. Important additions have lately been made to its teaching force, and to its literary and scientific appliances.
