“It always makes my blood boil,” said a maiden lady who was present, “to see a great hulk of a man shambling around complaining of hard times, and that he can’t get work, when his wife is just working herself down to the grave to keep up the family.”  I asked Mrs. Johnson, who just lives in the wash tub and is the main stay of her family, what would her husband do if she were to die? and she said, ‘get another wife.’  Now, I just think she has spoiled that man and if she dies first, I hope that he will never find another woman to tread in her footsteps.  He ought to have me to deal with.  When he got through with me he would never want to laze around another woman.”

“I don’t think he ever would,” said Mrs. Harcourt, while a gleam of humor sparkled in her eye.  Her neighbor was a maiden lady who always knew how to manage other people’s husbands, but had never succeeded in getting one of her own, and not having any children herself understood perfectly well how to rate other people’s.

Just then a knock was heard at the door and Mr. Thomas, Annette’s former school teacher, entered the room.  After an exchange of courtesies he asked, “How does Annette come on with her new teacher?”

“I have not heard any complaint,” said Mrs. Harcourt.  “At first Mrs. Joseph’s girl did not want to sit with Annette, but she soon got over it when she saw how well the other girls treated Annette and how pleasant the teacher was to her.  Mr. Scott, who has been so friendly to us, told us not to mind her; that her mother had been an ignorant servant girl, who had married a man with a little money; that she was still ignorant, loud and [dressy?] and liked to put on airs.  The nearer the beggar the greater the prejudice.”

“I think it is true,” said Mr. Thomas.  “If you apply those words, not to condition, but human souls, for none but beggarly souls would despise a man because of circumstances over which he had no control; noble, large-hearted men and women are never scornful.  Contempt and ridicule are the weapons of weak souls.  I am glad however, that Annette is getting on so well.  I hope that she will graduate at the head of her class, with high honors.”

“What’s the use of giving her so much education? there are no openings for her here, and if she gets married she won’t want it,” and Mrs. Harcourt sighed as she finished her sentence.

Mr. Thomas looked grave for a moment and then his face relaxed into a smile.  “Well, really, Mrs. Harcourt, that is not very complimentary to us young men; do we have no need of intelligent and well educated wives?  I think our race needs educated mothers for the home more than we do trained teachers for the school room.  Not that I would ignore or speak lightly of the value of good colored teachers nor suggest as a race, that we can well afford to do without them; but to-day, if it were left to my decision, whether the education of the race should be placed in the hands of the school teacher or the mothers and there was no other alternative, I should, by all means, decide for the education of the race through its motherhood rather than through its teachers.”