The education of these students is rapidly progressing. We must remember that most of them were born in slavery, and have learned to read since the war. A generation or two must pass before we can see the results of life-long training in schools. What we now see, however, is sufficiently surprising. It would be hard to find at the North better teachers or better schools than the two Universities of which we speak; and their influence over the pupils is marvelous. Many of the recitations were very fine. The normal training of Fisk University seemed to deserve special commendation. We were also much pleased at a recitation in Xenophon’s _Memorabilia_, in which three young men were reciting to one of their own race, a graduate of the University—Miss Laura S. Cary. It would not be strange if this were the first instance of the kind in the history of the world. Perhaps a more valuable evidence of educational progress than recitations was the correctness of speech and richness of thought manifest in the conversations and remarks of the students. We were permitted to be present at a prayer-meeting, in which students of both sexes took part freely. There are few pastors in the North who would not be glad of such clear thought and apt expression in their meetings as we there heard. The discipline of these institutions is evidently giving the pupils rare qualities of earnestness and self-reliance. Undoubtedly those who have these qualities inborn are the ones who are most likely to be in the schools. But once in the course of study, all the influences tend to develop a manly and persevering spirit. The students are accustomed every summer to scatter through the South, in search of schools. These, in most of the States, they do not find ready to their hand. There are few organized schools and few school-houses for the colored people outside the cities. The University students desirous of a school must first hunt up children who will agree to come; then secure the use of some little colored church at the cross-roads, or, perhaps, of a vacant log-cabin; then they must obtain permission of the county commissioner to teach the school. It evidently requires courage and resolution to succeed under such circumstances, and yet these students earn every summer, in from three to five months of teaching, about a hundred dollars apiece. Sometimes parents are willing and able to educate their children, without throwing them thus on their own resources. After Fisk University was established, a colored man bought land near by, built him a comfortable house, and made his home there, with the express purpose of educating his large family of children. But such cases are rare. The youth who desire an education generally are obliged to secure the means themselves. We were much touched with the story of one young lady (as truly so as any in our Northern seminaries), who, at the age of fourteen, determined to go to Fisk University, and went to teaching till she had earned