The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-06-16

sire them sufficiently, already and all | most immediately attainable.
 | Manhood has brought me an equally l personal sense of grievance. Drawn to the study and writing of history as my
 chief occupation, it is hardly too much
 to say that l have found myself, for that
 reason, practically exiled from the region
 of my birth It is within bounds, | think, even to add that the fact of my
 devotion, in large measure, to southern l history, did not alter the case. To study | the south's own past, l, for one-of course
 l cannot pretend to speak for all work | CTS in this fleld-haVe found it advisable
 to live in the north. The south does not
 contain the collections of books and man. | uscripts which the scholar must have in | order to study, to the best advantage her
 own history and institutions. That good work in this kind has in fact been done | by professors in southern colleges, and | by others whose homes have been in the
 south, is creditable rather to the men | themselves than to the communities in | which they have lived. Of course, do
 not ignore the help 1t is, in studying | southern life, merely to have lived IL: | but l have in mind only students who. like myself, begin with that advantage. Many of these will, feel sure, agree with me that for the best use of printed and written material, and for the best atmosphere to work in, it is necessary to go to one of three four centers of in- tellectual life outside of the south's proper boundaries.
 So long as this is so, how idle it is to eomplain-as we so often do justly or unjustly-that southern children are forced to learn history in books written With northern bias, or, at least. from northern point of viewi Nor is this the entire weakness of our position In this matter. It is necessary to take account of another fact, once gruffly brought to my attention by well-known editor and publisher-himself, by the way, a south erner-when he broke out, apropos of my suggestion that a certain book might be popular in the south: "Ohl They don't buy books down there" Recently. at Rlchmond, before an immense assem- blage, costly monument to Jefferson Da wis was unveiled. Not that day onlv hut Tor years, the late president of the con leoeracy has been regarded by great nuinners ot the southern people as in a peculiar sense the souths hero and mar tyr. Yet l have it on good authority that ms own history and defense of the con federacy, which was naturally expected to sell well at the south, sold so Ill there in fact that the publishers lost money by the book.
 But l am breaking my promise to be personal and brief. I could not I fear De brief, but I could, I think continue to be personal-so intense has always been my concern about distinctly south ern questions-if 1 should go on and try to show the bearing of this movement for libraries on the greatest and most per picking of all the problems with which we have to deal. Let me at least how ever, make the broad suggestion that, In transmitting that problem to the next generation, we should do what we can to make sure that we are leaving it in the hands of cultivated men and women; that every step to be taken in the com ing years shall be sanctioned by req sonably enlightened public opinion. No; that Is not Q6ite the right or the strong est way to but it. The supremely desir- able thing Is not that steps shall be taken" or laws passed, or any other for nal and high-sounding thing done, one way rather than another The supreinely desirable thing Is that in all the count less, constant, silent changes through which southern civilization Is passing. and must pass in future, there shall pre- vail, more and more, the gentle spirit and the steadfast purpose which are the sure and noble fruits of the tree we plant whenever we build library
 The present state and the immediate fu- ture of southern civilization, now that piOHpViity iie'S tohiS eit idsl, luuSl De matter of lively interest to every inteli- gent America. Interest is too faint word for the concern we feel who through the long winter of discontent have watched so eagerly, sometimes so we'll nigh hopelessly, for better days. We did not altogether fall I trust, to find the sweeter uses of that diversity. Let us not fail to find likewise some noble uses of this fresh prosperity. "We" and "us T insist upon that phrasing-and as per scnally as I began. For not one, I am sure of the small band of exiles whose cause I have just ventured to plead will consent that "exile' shall mean, in the slightest degree, 'alien." Least of all would such one consent to that inter- pretation of his life, if, after years of ab- sence, after years of resolutely candid criticism-even perhaps now and then of positively hectoring criticism-of his own