The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1879-11-27
Can't o Negro Sneeze.

The recent absurd statement that the
negro is never known to sneeze, which
has been going the rounds of the news
papers, led a reporter of the New York
Sun to make an effort to settle the dis
puted question by obtaining number
of interviews on the subject from intelli-
gent colored residents of New York
City. Without exception these inter-
views resulted in indignant denials of the
statement that the nasal possibilities of
the man of color were not equal to
those of his white brother. Here is the
report:
Ex-Alderman and present Deputy
Sheriff Seaton, the ebon giant who
guards the lower hallway of the Equita-
Bic building was highly indignant
when shown printed statement to the
effect that negroes were never known to
sneeze. With snort of contempt he
said: "That's lie, and I know its q
lie, for I'm q negro, and l sneeze.-
The fellow that wrote that must have
been some loafer who had nothing else to
do. I'll bet can sneeze more times in a
minute than he ever had dollars in his
life."
In restaurant in Park Row, Josh and
George and half a dozen other colored
walters listened with interest to the
reading of the obnoxious paragraph,
and their black faces were lighted by
broad grins before it was finished
"Well, I knows I sneeze," said one
''Me, too," said another, eve all sneeze,
don't we Josh? ?" But Josh only smiled
and walked away. George said that he
sneezed sometimes eft to sneeze his head
off,"
In the Astor House the flourish of a
whisk broom in close proximity TO
the reporters ears was suddenly sus-
pended as he mildly inquired of the
artist of the broom, "Do you sneeze? ?"
"Does I sneeze? does I sneeze? Why, of
course, I sneeze; everybody what has
breaf sneeze. Why, boss, you must be
little off to ask me such fool question
as that"
At Twenty.third street and Sixth
eyenue "Black Joe" pofishes boots; but
he stopped his work in astonishment
when the reporter, on whose boots ne
was laboring, asked him if gentlemen of
color like himself were able to sneeze.
"Sneeze! Does colored gemmen sneeze |!
Well, now, dey jess do for a fac. Why,
dere amt no sneezers in the worP like
niger sneezers. Fse sneezed morn
four million times myself, and even my
fo' months old baby sneezed that bad
only this mornin' that he sneezed his
self clean outer his cradle on to de flo.
Sumbody was foolin' you, for shuah,
when he told you that yarn bout US
colored folks not sneezin.'
A lusty colored youth, who acts as
stable boy in one of the great horse car
stables, was willing to bet, cam the
money planked down." that he could
sneeze louder than any white man in
the city, and he knew feller what could
sneeze louder'n me-" Suiting his ac-
tions to his words, he picked up whisp
of straw, tickled his nose with terri
BILE contortiou of the facial muscles,
startled the neighborhood with q sneeze
so loud and so emphatic that it alone
was sufficient to set at rest forever the
vexed question.
To make assurance doubly sure, the
reporter called upon an eminent physician
in an uptown hospital, and aroused
him from his perusal of work on his
tology by the question, "Can negro
sneeze?"
Certainly, sir; to be sure negro may
sneeze if he wants to-why not?"
"But mean, Doctor, are the nasal
organs of a negro so constructed as to
render him capable of sneezing?"
"Oh, understand; you, like the
gentleman who sometime ago came to
me with the conundrum, Are flies
scayengers? I? are in pursuit of informa-
ton. Well, sir, as you, of course,
know, sneezing is one of the commonest
examples of reflex action. The sternu-
tant, coming in contact with the delicate
schneiderian membrane lining the in
fuudibulum and meatus nasi, acts an ir-
ritant to branches of the fifth pair which
impression being conveyed to the medul-
Ia excites the expulsive pulmonary
muscles, and causes the act of sternu.
tation. Having examined a great
number of nasorum Africani during my
astrological researches, ind the sltua-
tion of the naso-palatime, the nasal fila
ments of the ophthalmic, and the nu-
merous branches of mechols ganglion,
to be identical in the two races; so that
q priori that which causes sternutation
in the one case must cause it IN the
other.