If we cannot reach the people in this way, why, there are other courses to pursue. We should not despair. If we fail in accomplishing our ends in one manner, we must try other plans, and finally we may be able to touch the right chord. (Dennis S. Thompson, Kansas City, Mo.) [Illustration: PROF. DENNIS S. THOMPSON, KANSAS CITY, MO. General newspaper correspondent for many of the leading race journals.] * * * * * The Negro problem, like Banquo's ghost, will not down. Like the poor, it is always with us. True, some there are who declare that there is no problem at all, only such as exists in the imagination; but he who will take the trouble to investigate will find that there is plenty of the problem lying around loose, and it will not require a Diogenes to find it. The most live phases of the problem are those which relate to the Negro's moral standard, educational progress, and his physical condition. Some of the views in this connection are grossly exaggerated, but in the main they represent observations which cannot be dismissed too lightly. It is now a matter too plain for conjecture that the Negro must look to his physical interests, that he must make certain alterations along moral and intellectual lines if he would preserve himself. Scientists have gone so far as to hazard the prediction that ultimate extinction is the forecast for the race. The race itself is apt to receive this declaration with derision, but it must not count its position too sure. We have yet to see an intelligent refutation of the statements which the scientists are making in this regard. The Negro press promptly sat down upon Prof. Hoffman when he touched upon its moral standard, but it was rather by ridicule than argument. Only the properly qualified should speak on a question of this character. By that we mean those reasonably informed and who have given the proper time to an impartial investigation of the subject. Howls of protest and indignation cannot take the place of scientific reasoning, and before the press of the country takes Mr. Hoffman and his kind to task it should be prepared to know whereof it speaks. But, aside from this, popular interest is very much aroused as to the present educational needs of the Negro. Prof. Washington, the great apostle of industrial education, thinks it the Negro's greatest want just now. President Mitchell, of Leland University, thinks the higher education of the race the proper thing. The "Advance" is inclined to the former view. The Negro may not be top-heavy; his higher education has hardly gone far enough for that in a general sense, but he has given altogether too much time to the intellectual side of his development. He should become skilled in manual arts; he should learn something that he has left unlearned: how to labor correctly and profitably. His intellectual offspring each succeeding year realize more and more difficulty in finding places, so that the