The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1898-03-24
THE COLORED NUNS.
THE ONLY ORDER IN AMERICA IS At
NEW ORLEANS.


Founded Over Half Century Ago-The
Special Object Of It's Institution-The
Converts Orphan Asylum-Oyer q Hun
dred Children Are Sheltered There.
In the old French quarter of New
Orleans, with is narrow streets, latticed
windows and jealousy guarded courts,
where the fig and orange trees grow, is
a square of rather miscellaneous archi-
lecture. Its central building, III Or
leans street. is several hundred years
old. It has a stately entrance, with
great pillars and old fashioned, ornately
carved doors. 1t was once the old Creole
Opera House and ballroom of the early
days. Now it is the home of the colored
nuns.
The powdered and ringleted damsels
with hoop distended skirts who stepped
daintily across that threshold to scenes
Of gayety in bygone years have given
place to dark robed figures whose white
ruffied caps only bring into stronger re-
lief the bronze and ebony of their skins.
The very names of the streets here are
rich in history and romance. There are
Orleans and Bourbon, Chartres and
him of the iron hand and gentle heart
Tonty. Shades of the past are jostling
one another, though in gentle, shade
like way, at every street corner, and at
nothing do they seem to be more aston
ished than at the sight of the colored
nuns
Yet the order is not such very mod
ern one after all, for it was founded in
New Orleans over half century ago.
Its members are now we'll known fig
ures on the streets CT the Crescent City.
The special object of it's institution was
the education and moral training OF
young colored girls and the care of or.
phans and aged infrm people of tia
race. 1t has had the cordial support of
such eminent churchmen as Archbishops
Blame, Odin, Perche, Leroy and JAMS
sens, who successfully filed the arch
episcopal see of New Orleans It was
also a novitiate where young colored
girls are trained for the work of the order
with the view of extending that work
to every parish in Louisiana and if pos
slble into every southern state.
One Of the most interesting parts of
the convent is the orphan asylum, where
children ranging in age from the wee
tots just beginning to walk to girls of
IL and ID years are cared for. One of
the sisters in charge of the babies was
an ex-slave. She is real nanny"
still.
"But, reverend mother, you seem to
have some white children here,' said
the northern visitor, commenting on the
fair white skin of some of the children.
ooh, no!' said the nun, smiling a
bit wistfully at the ignorance of her
visitor. '''They all have colored blood
in their veins. Maybe they are only
quadroons, octoroons. Some of them,
indeed, have only one-tenth colored
blood. but that one-tenth black counts
more than the nine-tenths white and
makes them belong forever to the COL
ored people,"
One is reminded of some of Cable S
stories, the pathos and the tragedy
thereof.
In the orphan asylum 1876 children
are sheltered who would otherwise be
thrown upon the state. These as we'll
as the 60 poor old colored men and wo-
men and many of the children in the
school \dependent upon the sisters
tor their daily bread. Formerly the sis
ters obtained fair revenue by going
through the streets of New Orleans,
from door to door and into business
houses and railroad offices, soliciting
aims for their charges So quietly did
they labor that few outside the city
were even aware of the existence of the
order, the only colored sisterhood in the
United States. But the yellow fever
which broke out in the south in August
caused that section to be hemmed in by
quarantine, and the wheels of COM
MERGE were stopped. AS pathetic let
ter recently received from one of the
sisters says: "Our friends have always
been among the poor laboring classes,
who seem to feel most for US, and since
this class has suffered particularly
through lack of employment for three
months and their distress at present is
almost as great as ours, we cannot in
conscience apply to them for aid. Even
if we did, it would not be forthcoming,
as they have not the means. st. Louis
Republic.
A Church For crest and Meditation"