And here it is utterly impossible to resist the depressing effects of that deep feeling of gloom which settles upon one as thoughts like the following crowd into the mind. How much, how very much, has been lost to art in this country through that fell spirit which for more than two hundred years has animated the majority of its people against a struggling and an unoffending minority,--a spirit which ever sought to crush out talent, to quench the sacred fire of genius, and to crowd down all noble aspirations, whenever these evidences of a high manhood were shown by those whose skins were black! Ah! we may never know how much of grandeur of achievement, the results of which the country might now be enjoying, had not those restless, aspiring minds been fettered by all that was the echo of a terrible voice, which, putting to an ignoble use the holy words of Divinity, cried up and down the land unceasingly, "_Hitherto shalt thou come, but no farther!_" For to judge as to what "might have been," and what yet may be, despite the cruelties of the past (since, even in this instance, "the best prophet of the future is the past"), we have only to look at what is. But from those bitter days of a barbarous time, when hearts were oft bowed in anguish, when tears of blood were wept, and when often attempts were made to dwarf yearning intellect to a beastly level,--let us turn quickly our weeping eyes from those terrible days, now gone, we hope never again to return, towards that brighter prospect which opens before our delighted vision: let us joyfully look upon what is, and think of what may be. For "The world is cold to him who pleads; The world bows low to knightly deeds." Returning, then, directly to the subject in hand (viz., the colored musical artists of New Orleans), I first quote from a paper prepared by a cultured gentleman of that city, himself a fine musician, the following retrospective comment on some of the former residents there:-- "For want of avenues in which to work their way in life, and for many reasons which are easily understood, our best artists [colored] removed to other countries in search of their rights, and of proper channels in which to achieve success in the world. Among these were Eugene Warburg, since distinguished in Italy as a sculptor; Victor Sejour, in Paris, as a poet, and composer of tragedy; Caraby, in France, as a lawyer; Dubuclet, in Bordeaux, as a physician and musician; and many others." All these were forced to leave New Orleans, their native city, because of the prejudice that prevailed against them on account of their color. In other countries, which Americans have been wont to style, forsooth, "despotic," these aspiring men found ready recognition, and arose, as has been seen, to high distinction in their chosen callings.