After three months in Europe we sailed from Southampton in the
steamship St. Louis. On this steamer there was a fine library
that had been presented to the ship by the citizens of St. Louis,
Mo. In this library I found a life of Frederick Douglass, which I
began reading. I became especially interested in Mr. Douglass's
description of the way he was treated on shipboard during his
first or second visit to England. In this description he told how
he was not permitted to enter the cabin, but had to confine
himself to the deck of the ship. A few minutes after I had
finished reading this description I was waited on by a committee
of ladies and gentlemen with the request that I deliver an
address at a concert which was to begin the following evening.
And yet there are people who are bold enough to say that race
feeling in America is not growing less intense! At this concert
the Hon. Benjamin B. Odell, Jr., the present governor of New
York, presided. I was never given a more cordial hearing
anywhere. A large proportion of the passengers with Southern
people. After the concert some of the passengers proposed that a
subscription be raised to help the work at Tuskegee, and the
money to support several scholarships was the result.
While we were in Paris I was very pleasantly surprised to receive
the following invitation from the citizens of West Virginia and
of the city near which I had spent my boyhood days:--
Charleston, W.
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