for help that rich people are constantly being flooded with.  I know wealthy people who receive as much as twenty calls a day for help.  More than once when I have gone into the offices of rich men, I have found half a dozen persons waiting to see them, and all come for the same purpose, that of securing money.  And all these calls in person, to say nothing of the applications received through the mails.  Very few people have any idea of the amount of money given away by persons who never permit their names to be known.  I have often heard persons condemned for not giving away money, who, to my own knowledge, were giving away thousands of dollars every year so quietly that the world knew nothing about it.

As an example of this, there are two ladies in New York, whose names rarely appear in print, but who, in a quiet way, have given us the means with which to erect three large and important buildings during the last eight years.  Besides the gift of these buildings, they have made other generous donations to the school.  And they not only help Tuskegee, but they are constantly seeking opportunities to help other worthy causes.

Although it has been my privilege to be the medium through which a good many hundred thousand dollars have been received for the work at Tuskegee, I have always avoided what the world calls “begging.”  I often tell people that I have never “begged” any money, and that I am not a “beggar.”  My experience and observation have convinced me that persistent asking outright for money from the rich does not, as a rule, secure help.  I have usually proceeded on the principle that persons who possess sense enough to earn money have sense enough to know how to give it away, and that the mere making known of the facts regarding Tuskegee, and especially the facts regarding the work of the graduates, has been more effective than outright begging.  I think that the presentation of facts, on a high, dignified plane, is all the begging that most rich people care for.

While the work of going from door to door and from office to office is hard, disagreeable, and costly in bodily strength, yet it has some compensations.  Such work gives one a rare opportunity to study human nature.  It also has its compensations in giving one an opportunity to meet some of the best people in the world—­to be more correct, I think I should say the best people in the world.  When one takes a broad survey of the country, he will find that the most useful and influential people in it are those who take the deepest interest in institutions that exist for the purpose of making the world better.