that when I opened them I would be surprised to see how much I had got.  When I opened my eyes I would tip the plate in one direction and another, so as to make the molasses spread all over it, in the full belief that there would be more of it and that it would last longer if spread out in this way.  So strong are my childish impressions of those Sunday morning feasts that it would be pretty hard for any one to convince me that there is not more molasses on a plate when it is spread all over the plate than when it occupies a little corner—­if there is a corner in a plate.  At any rate, I have never believed in “cornering” syrup.  My share of the syrup was usually about two tablespoonfuls, and those two spoonfuls of molasses were much more enjoyable to me than is a fourteen-course dinner after which I am to speak.

Next to a company of business men, I prefer to speak to an audience of Southern people, of either race, together or taken separately.  Their enthusiasm and responsiveness are a constant delight.  The “amens” and “dat’s de truf” that come spontaneously from the coloured individuals are calculated to spur any speaker on to his best efforts.  I think that next in order of preference I would place a college audience.  It has been my privilege to deliver addresses at many of our leading colleges including Harvard, Yale, Williams, Amherst, Fisk University, the University of Pennsylvania, Wellesley, the University of Michigan, Trinity College in North Carolina, and many others.

It has been a matter of deep interest to me to note the number of people who have come to shake hands with me after an address, who say that this is the first time they have ever called a Negro “Mister.”

When speaking directly in the interests of the Tuskegee Institute, I usually arrange, some time in advance, a series of meetings in important centres.  This takes me before churches, Sunday-schools, Christian Endeavour Societies, and men’s and women’s clubs.  When doing this I sometimes speak before as many as four organizations in a single day.

Three years ago, at the suggestion of Mr. Morris K. Jessup, of New York, and Dr. J.L.M.  Curry, the general agent of the fund, the trustees of the John F. Slater Fund voted a sum of money to be used in paying the expenses of Mrs. Washington and myself while holding a series of meetings among the coloured people in the large centres of Negro population, especially in the large cities of the ex-slaveholding states.  Each year during the last three years we have devoted some weeks to this work.  The plan that we have followed has been for me to speak in the morning to the ministers, teachers, and professional men.  In the afternoon Mrs. Washington would speak to the women alone, and in the evening I spoke to a large mass-meeting.  In almost every case the meetings have been attended not only by the coloured people in large numbers, but by the white people.  In Chattanooga, Tenn., for example, there was present at the mass-meeting an audience of not less than three thousand persons, and I was informed that eight hundred of these were white.  I have done no work that I really enjoyed more than this, or that I think has accomplished more good.