There is nothing more common in the city of New Orleans, than Colored Clerks, Salesmen and Business men.  In many stores on Chartier, Camp and other business streets, there may always be seen colored men and women, as salesmen, and saleswomen, behind the counter.  Several of the largest Cotton-Press houses, have colored Clerks in them; and on the arrival of steamers at the Levees, among the first to board them, and take down the Manifestos to make their transfers, are colored Clerks.  In 1839-40, one of the most respectable Brokers and Bankers of the City, was a black gentleman.

Mr. William Goodrich of York, Pennsylvania, has considerable interest in the branch of the Baltimore Railroad, from Lancaster.  In 1849, he had a warehouse in York, and owned ten first-rate merchandise cars on the Road, doing a fine business.  His son, Glenalvon G. Goodrich, a young man of good education, is a good artist, and proprietor of a Daguerreo-type Gallery.

Certainly, there need be no further proofs required, at least in this department, to show the claims and practical utility of colored people as citizen members of society.  We have shown, that in proportion to their numbers, they vie and compare favorably in point of means and possessions, with the class of citizens who from chance of superior advantages, have studiously contrived to oppress and deprive them of equal rights and privileges, in common with themselves.

XI

LITERARY AND PROFESSIONAL COLORED MEN AND WOMEN

Dr. James McCune Smith, a graduate of the Scientific and Medical Schools of the University of Glasgow, has for the last fifteen years, been a successful practitioner of medicine and surgery in the city of New York.  Dr. Smith is a man of no ordinary talents, and stands high as a scholar and gentleman in the city, amidst the literati of a hundred seats of learning.

In 1843, when the character of the colored race was assailed to disparagement, by the representative of a combination of maligners, such was the influence of the Doctor, that the citizens at once agreed to give their presence to a fair public discussion of the subject—­the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the races.  This discussion was kept up for several evenings, attended by large and fashionable assemblages of ladies and gentlemen, until it closed.  Doctor Smith, in the estimation of the audience, easily triumphed over his antagonist, who had made this a studied subject.  The Doctor is the author of several valuable productions, and in 1846, a very valuable scientific paper, issued from the press in pamphlet form, on the “Influence of Climate on Longevity, with special reference to Life Insurance.”  This paper, we may surmise, was produced in refutation of the attempt at a physiological disquisition on the part of Hon. John C. Calhoun, United States Senator, on the colored race, which met with considerable favor from some quarters, until the appearance