“One of the problems met with in the outset was that of the fallen woman,” said the Doctor, “although the Negroes were never so immoral as was alleged of them. You will recall that after the Civil War many of the slave marriages were declared illegal and remarriage became necessary. Twenty-five cents was the license fee. Thousands showed their faithfulness to each other by complying with this law--a most emphatic argument of the Negro’s faithfulness to the marriage vows. Day after day long files of these sons of Africa stood in line waiting with their ‘quarters’ in hand to renew their vows to the wife of their youth. Many were old and infirm--a number were young and vigorous, there was no compulsion and the former relations might have been severed and other selections made; but not so, they were renewing the old vows and making legal in freedom that which was illegal now because of slavery. Would the 500,000 white divorcees in America in your time have done this?” the doctor asked. “Let me relate to you a story connected with the work of one of the Cecilian Guilds,” said the doctor. “A bright faced octoroon girl living in one of our best Southern homes became peculiarly attractive to a brother of her mistress, a young woman of much character, who loved her maid and loved her brother. The situation grew acute; heroic treatment became necessary as the octoroon related to her mistress in great distress every approach and insinuation made by the young Lothario, his avowals of love, his promises to die for her, his readiness to renounce all conventionalities and flee with her to another state. To all this the octoroon was like ice. Her mother had been trained in the same household and was honored and beloved. Her father was an octoroon--and the girl was a chip of both old blocks. The mistress remonstrated, threatened and begged her brother to no avail, and finally decided to send the girl North, as a last resort, a decision which pleased the maid, who desired to be rid of her tormentor.