The Coconino weekly sun., 1896-04-16
splendid specimens of the negro race in

splendid specimens of the negro race In Washington, and a number of them are of superior intelligence. There is a large Roman Catholic church on Eff. teenth street maintained by colored people, and their choir is an aggrega. tion of excellent musical talent. On the same street, near the white house, there is Presbyterian church main. tained by the same race of people, and some of its comnunicants are quite wealthy, many of them being promi' nent in the political world.
 Then, at the foot of Capitol hill, not far from the Botanical gardens, there is q Methodist church where revivals are held four or five times each year. Hut this church is contiguous to the lower regions of South Washington, and numerous scenes of disorder have occurred there during recent years.
 But the majority of the negroes are ig. norant, poor and vicious. There are distinct classes of them, and they are as readily divided and discerned as are the currents of the ocean. Some of them come from the old families of Washing ton, others from the old homes and plan- tations of Virginia and Maryland. and a few from the better classes in states more remote. These are quiet, docile, gentlemanly and well-bred people. They have as much pride in their fam. flies and family histories as the bluo bioods of the cavaliers of the southern states.
 When the union armies converged here at the close of the civil war they brought with them the riffratf of the colored population of the south. The negro camp followers did not represent the better element of their enslaved race. The good negroes were loyal to their masters and mistresscs. Tens of thousands of them declined to accept freedom, preferring to live upon the old plantations with their white folks. Only the worthless and vagabond classes ran away and followed the armies. Con. when they were sloughed off here by the disbanding of the armies, they became our permanent lazzaroni. They have propagated their kind, and fully 2O,00O negroes of the lower order are numbered with the total population of the District of Co., lumbia. They drink, carouse. steal, violate all of the ten commandments, md ignore all human law. Their chief cause of continued crime and degrada- ton is the bottle. Like the redmen who inhabited this entire con tinent, they have fallen victims to the demon of the still. It is the prime cause of their woes and crimes.
 You have no idea how the faithful negroes loved their masters and homes before the war;" says Senator-elect | fernando D. Money, of Mississippi. | No book ever had such g. sale, at that | period of our history, as Uncle Toms | cabin,' and yet it was dreadful ex- ,ggeration of facts and conditions. It | vas really political pamphlet; and it | produced it's effect. The worst scenes lepictUd by Mrs. Stowe were not ex- but the book conveyed the that those. worst scenes
  where slavery existed; but in reality hey were the exception.
 You must remember that the black ,eople were regarded by their owners IS chattels. and they were valuable. No nan in the north who possessed horse worth $1,S00 would beat him to death. io man owning q calf worth $2O would lay it alive. You can understand that uch n man as old Uncle Tom, faithful, uluable and honest, would have been asily worth S2,0OO; and his owner ould not carelessly drive that piece of to death. after horrible tor nre. On the contrary, he would keep i'm we'll fed and we'll clad, and look fter h,s health.
 Well, no matter about that now; for lavery has gone. What was going tc ell you was about the faithfulness of he negroes to their masters and mis- resses. An old negro who had belonged D my father, remained on the planta ion until after the war. and then said