Page:Annual report of the superintendent of Negro Affairs in North Carolina, 1864.djvu/50

48 The negro made free is the great fact of this century, and its vouchers are a national debt of two thousand millions of dollars and the graves of half a million of young men! My official duties in North Carolina have been greatly aided by my assistant superintendents. Especially were the labors of Rev. Clarendon Waite of use to the service at New Berne, during the first half of the year. Could we have offered an adequate compensation to this gentleman, he might perhaps have been retained permanently, if it be proper to apply the term permanent to a service which is confessedly but temporary, and preparatory to a new organization of society. To present the business of the last year to the eye of the reader in a more compact and tangible form, a statement is here given of our operations in the form of a debt and credit account. From this it may be seen what the government has done for the negroes, and in part what the negroes have done for themselves. It will serve to show, at least, that the aid extended by the government to these people in their homelessness and poverty, is in some measure compensated by their patient and faithful efforts on their own behalf. They have not been supported as mendicants, but helped frugally and considerately.