"The audience was taken back as much by the bluntness of the remarks as if they had been doused with cold water. Indignation was everywhere visible on the countenances of the people. But Mr. Washington appeared unruffled. On the contrary, his heavy jaw was hard set and his eyes danced in a merry measure. It was a time to keep one's temper and wits, and he did so, as usual. Without betraying any feeling in the matter, and when everybody expected him to announce the next speaker, he said: "'Ladies and Gentlemen: I am sure you will agree with me that we have had enough eloquence for one occasion. We shall listen to the next speaker at another occasion, when we are not so fagged out. We will now rise, sing the doxology, and be dismissed.' "The audience did so, but it was the most funereal proceeding I had ever witnessed upon such an occasion. Mr. Washington's imperturbable good nature alone saved the day." Some time after President Roosevelt had begun to consult Booker Washington on practically all his appointments and policies which particularly affected the relations between the races, and after several Southern white men had been given Federal appointments on Mr. Washington's recommendation, the bitterness against him grew so intense, especially among the "Talented Tenth" element of the Northern Negroes, that he decided to meet a group of their leaders face to face, and have it out. Accordingly, through Mr. Fortune, he arranged to meet a number of these men at a dinner at Young's Hotel in Boston. Mr. Fortune thus describes what took place: "At the proper time, when the coffee and cigars were served, I arose and told the diners that Dr. Washington had desired to meet them at the banquet table and at the proper time to have each one of them express freely his opinion of the race question, and how best the race could be served in the delicate crisis through which it was then passing. Each of the speakers launched into a tirade against Dr. Washington and his policies and methods, many of them in lofty flights of speech they had learned at Harvard University. The atmosphere was dense with discontent and denunciation. "The climax was reached when William H. Lewis, the famous Harvard football coach, told Dr. Washington to go back South, and attend to his work of educating the Negro and 'leave to us the matters political affecting the race.' Every eye was upon Dr. Washington's face, but none of them could read anything in it; it was as inscrutable as a wooden Indian's. When every one of them had had his say, I called upon Dr. Washington to respond to the speakers who had unburdened themselves. Dr. Washington rose slowly, and with a slip of paper in his hand, said: "'Gentlemen, I want to tell you about what we are doing at Tuskegee Institute in the Black Belt of Alabama.'