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ing the whole program, the delivery was exceedingly good; every
one appearing cool and self-possessed, giving one the idea that he
or she had a thorough knowledge of the subject treated. Several
numbers were particularly outstanding. Among them was a reading
by Albert Edwards, of the Senior College class. This reading, com-
posed by Mr. Edwards, treated the revelations of a black boy on Flan-
ders fields. Another was the history of the "National Association for
the Advancement of Colored People." This enlightening essay was
delivered by Madeline White, a senior Normal student.

Others were quite as interesting in their own way. There were
piano solos by Louise Logan, of Tuskegee and Altona Trent of At-
lanta; essays by Beatrice Holmes, Ruth Lemon and Eloise Greenwood,
of the senior Normal class; a song, "Beautiful Moonlight," by a quar-
tette of Mrs. Slades' second year girls; reading by Helen Toliver, a
junior Normal, and Merritt Cohen.

The orations were by Lillian L. Henderson and Louis J. Harper, Jr., Junior College students, while Marcia B. Brown and Nolden E. White represented the Senior College class. We look forward with pleasure, and invite our friends, to our public rhetorical exercises of this year, for if the first of the series has been so successful, surely those which follow must attain a higher degree of proficiency.

HARPING ON ONE STRING.

There is one danger that besets colored students at all times, but especially during these times and that is the danger of harping on one string. By that I mean precisely this: There is danger of thinking too much on a certain theme, namely, the Negro problem.

Of course, all of our students are deeply interested in this problem,
and they are perhaps more interested in it than anybody else, and
I will even grant that they ought to be more interested in it than
anybody else. Nevertheless the continual pulling upon one string
destroys harmony and dulls the appreciation of the player and also of
the listener. In after life it may become one's main interest to further
some particular cause of which he must necessarily think unceasingly,
but he will be ill prepared for best thinking if he has spent no time
during his education in gathering a variety of ideas which is the mate-
rial for effective thinking upon a definite theme.

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15

As a teacher I have had great difficulty in dissuading students from writing upon some phase of the Negro problem which was not new and to which, according to their own confession, they did not mean to make any fresh contribution of knowledge or to treat in a new and interesting manner. They only wanted to give out their ideas because they thought they were their ideas, as perhaps they really were, but for everybody else they were the same trite sayings that we have all heard and read a thousand times.

Of course, it is to be expected that young college students will not
have many startlingly new ideas about anything, but I insist that if
they never try to think and talk about more than one interesting sub-
ject, they will never have any fresh ideas about anything. This is
not a criticism against concentration. If there were real concentra-
tion, then there would be some fresh ideas on the Negro problem, but
precisely there is the fault. Many young people choose to write upon
the Negro question just because it is the one subject which requires
of them least concentration to write something that will pass. I know
some men who never think and who never speak for any length of
time on any other theme. In consequence, I am always bored by
their harangues. On the other hand, one of the clearest writers and
one of the most interesting speakers on this problem is a Negro of
the broadest culture who can converse interestingly of music, painting,
business and travel, and in two or three languages. There is a man
who has taken pains to think about something else as is revealed both
by his speech and his writing.

I once met another colored men, a college professor, on a hot sum-
mer's day at a hotel where I had just arrived from a tedious journey.
As soon as I sat down on the veranda where we were introduced, his
first remark to me in a deep bass voice was: "Well, professor, what
do you think is the ultimate solution of the Negro problem?" I was
so hot and so much exasperated that the most polite answer I could
think of was: "God only knows." That floored my new acquaintance.
He seemed to have absolutely nothing else to talk about. I tried then
to draw him out on the subjects that he taught, but I had no success
at that. After we had eaten dinner, I gave just one little crack of op-
portunity to talk on the Negro question. He jumped into it and pried
it open as wide as a barn door and I had to suffer an avalanche of

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commonplace opinions and theories that I had endured many times
before.

Now, I know that this problem lies near our hearts, and perhaps,
I repeat, it ought to; but there is nothing more narrowing than to
be everlastingly talking about it without saying anything that is fresh
or really worth while. It is just this narrowing effect that furnishes
the greatest danger to young Negro students.

The few years that our young people have in college should be
used in grazing widely in fresh pastures, in feeding in fields that for-
merly have been closed to them by virtue of their scant opportunities
to visit libraries and art galleries; in sharpening their wits, deepening
their sympathies and widening their knowledge by discussing philosoph-
ical, literary, economic and social questions; in getting new ideas
about the world and all peoples which they have not been able to get
through travel. Twenty years ago in college we were discussing
Nittsche, but I was surprised in learning when the great war began
fifteen years later, that most educated people had never heard of the
prolific young German scholar.

That is the sort of intellectual leadership we have a right to expect
of our colleges and our Negro students must not fail in taking part in
that leadership.

I do not say that our students should lay aside altogether the Negro
problem, and lose their interest in it, or that they should cease to talk
and write about it, but I do say that they should talk and write about
something else also, lest what they say and write about the Negro
problem will not be worth attention.

G. A. TOWNS.

## NOTICE

On account of the S. A. T. C. last term we did not publish the
Scroll during the first semester, but we are getting an early start this
year and we feel safe in saying there will be an issue every school
month of the year.

The subscription price for the term will be fifty cents. We invite
the patronage of all our friends.

All money for subscriptions should be sent to G. W. Hodges, Busi-
ness Manager, Atlanta University, Atlanta, Ga.