Jacksonville, when I was there, was a small town, and the number of educated and well-to-do colored people was small; so this society phase of life did not equal what I have since seen in Boston, Washington, Richmond, and Nashville; and it is upon what I have more recently seen in these cities that I have made the observations just above.  However, there were many comfortable and pleasant homes in Jacksonville to which I was often invited.  I belonged to the literary society—­at which we generally discussed the race question—­and attended all of the church festivals and other charitable entertainments.  In this way I passed three years which were not at all the least enjoyable of my life.  In fact, my joy took such an exuberant turn that I fell in love with a young school teacher and began to have dreams of matrimonial bliss; but another turn in the course of my life brought these dreams to an end.

I do not wish to mislead my readers into thinking that I led a life in Jacksonville which would make copy for the hero of a Sunday-school library book.  I was a hail fellow well met with all of the workmen at the factory, most of whom knew little and cared less about social distinctions.  From their example I learned to be careless about money, and for that reason I constantly postponed and finally abandoned returning to Atlanta University.  It seemed impossible for me to save as much as two hundred dollars.  Several of the men at the factory were my intimate friends, and I frequently joined them in their pleasures.  During the summer months we went almost every Monday on an excursion to a seaside resort called Pablo Beach.  These excursions were always crowded.  There was a dancing pavilion, a great deal of drinking, and generally a fight or two to add to the excitement.  I also contracted the cigar maker’s habit of riding around in a hack on Sunday afternoons.  I sometimes went with my cigar maker friends to public balls that were given at a large hall on one of the main streets.  I learned to take a drink occasionally and paid for quite a number that my friends took; but strong liquors never appealed to my appetite.  I drank them only when the company I was in required it, and suffered for it afterwards.  On the whole, though I was a bit wild, I can’t remember that I ever did anything disgraceful, or, as the usual standard for young men goes, anything to forfeit my claim to respectability.

At one of the first public balls I attended I saw the Pullman car porter who had so kindly assisted me in getting to Jacksonville.  I went immediately to one of my factory friends and borrowed fifteen dollars with which to repay the loan my benefactor had made me.  After I had given him the money, and was thanking him, I noticed that he wore what was, at least, an exact duplicate of my lamented black and gray tie.  It was somewhat worn, but distinct enough for me to trace the same odd design which had first attracted my eye.  This was enough to arouse my strongest suspicions, but whether it was sufficient for the law to take cognizance of I did not consider.  My astonishment and the ironical humor of the situation drove everything else out of my mind.