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supposed and indefinable value education has for their race, in that, while slaves, this was one of the blessings prohibited by statutory law enforced with scrutinous care. To whatever cause different minds may attribute this intensity of desire, it was evident to an impartial witness, that the freedmen were quick to seize and improve the opportunities brought within their group.
The exhibition of this spirit reacted favorable upon themselves, and was grateful to their benefactors, in many instances, their sufficient and sole reward. But the fact still remained that the freedmen were emancipated slaves. Their newly found freedom pointed to no "royal road to learning;" it brought with it no fabulous stores of wealth; only the God-given right to the toil of their own hands.
They were poor, destitute of all things but the "might that slumbered in their sable arms". They were set free without houses or lands, without school houses or churches, without teachers or books; all these must be acquired, by years of of honest, faithful toil, under seemingly hard conditions. It was evident, however keen their enthusiasm, however ardent their desire, it could not, unaided, organize itself into instrumentalities for their speedy elevation.
Coupled with this wide spread destitution was a dearth also, owing to generations of enforced ignorance, of vigorous mental activity. Among them were few, if any, men fitted by experience or education for