But something more was done under this pressure, something more than
creation of a habit of physical exertion to productive ends. Skill was
developed. Skilled labor, which needs brains, was carried to a high
degree of performance. On almost all the Southern plantations, and in the
cities also, negro mechanics were bred, excellent blacksmiths, good
carpenters, and house-builders capable of executing plans of high
architectural merit. Everywhere were negroes skilled in trades, and
competent in various mechanical industries.

The opportunity and the disposition to labor make the basis of all our
civilization. The negro was taught to work, to be an agriculturist, a
mechanic, a material producer of something useful. He was taught this
fundamental thing. Our higher education, applied to him in his present
development, operates in exactly the opposite direction.

This is a serious assertion. Its truth or falsehood cannot be established
by statistics, but it is an opinion gradually formed by experience, and
the observation of men competent to judge, who have studied the problem
close at hand. Among the witnesses to the failure of the result expected
from the establishment of colleges and universities for the negro are
heard, from time to time, and more frequently as time goes on, practical
men from the North, railway men, manufacturers, who have initiated
business enterprises at the South. Their testimony coincides with that of
careful students of the economic and social conditions.

There was reason to assume, from our theory and experience of the higher
education in its effect upon white races, that the result would be
different from what it is. When the negro colleges first opened, there
was a glow of enthusiasm, an eagerness of study, a facility of
acquirement, and a good order that promised everything for the future. It