Under the sub-heads of religion and education statistics are presented showing the progress of the race along these lines. A total church membership of 2,673,977 shows that there is one communicant to every 2.79 of the Negro population, against one in every 3.04 for the whites. There were 1,288,736 pupils in the common schools and 34,129 in the higher schools, colleges, and universities. Ordinarily these facts are regarded as the most wonderful evidences of progress which the world has ever witnessed on the part of a backward people. But not so with Mr. Hoffman; the necessities of his theories compel him to explain away every apparent advantage in favor of the Negro. The author announces with an implied negative response to the suppressed question: "It remains to be shown whether the educational process which the race has undergone during the past quarter of a century and the additional efforts and opportunities for religious instruction have materially raised the race from its low social and economic condition at the time of emancipation."[49] This statement needs no refutation, for it will fall beneath the ponderous weight of its own absurdity. CRIMINAL RECORD. The following table, if unexplained, tells a startling tale of the Negro's criminal propensity: _Prisoners in the United States, 1890._[50] Total. Male. Female. White 58,052 53,519 4,433 Colored 24,277 22,305 1,972 Male, Female, per cent. per cent. Proportion of Negro criminals to total (over 15) 29.38 30.79 Proportion of Negro population to total (over 15) 10.20 11.09 The Negro element, which constitutes only 12 per cent of the population, commits 30 per cent of the crimes. Before concluding that this preponderance of crime is due to "race traits," let us examine more closely into the circumstances of the case. The discrepancy in the administration of the law in the South has undoubtedly some effect upon this relative showing. In order to escape the charge of slander, I will use the words of a distinguished Virginian who boasts of "my southern ancestry, birth, rearing, residence and interest."