“Yes; the man who occupies that house is one of the wealthiest men here. He made his money by selling to Negroes a preparation to smooth the kinks out of their wool. They’re simply crazy on that subject.”
“Does it work?”
“You haven’t seen any straight-haired Negroes, have you?” he asked.
Ignorance carries a big burden and climbs a rocky road!
Old Mammies and Nurses
The mass of coloured people still maintain, as I have said, a more or less intimate connection with white families—frequently a very beautiful and sympathetic relationship like that of the old mammies or nurses. To one who has heard so much of racial hatred as I have since I have been down here, a little incident that I observed the other day comes with a charm hardly describable. I saw a carriage stop in front of a home. The expected daughter had arrived—a very pretty girl indeed. She stepped out eagerly. Her father was halfway down to the gate; but ahead of him was a very old Negro woman in the cleanest of clean starched dresses.
“Honey,” she said eagerly.
“Mammy!” exclaimed the girl, and the two rushed into each other’s arms, clasping and kissing—the white girl and the old black woman.
I thought to myself: “There’s no Negro problem there: that’s just plain human love!”
“Master” Superseded by “Boss”