Page:The leopard's spots - a romance of the white man's burden-1865-1900 (IA leopardsspotsrom00dixo).pdf/268

 "I think you exaggerate the social danger, but I see the political end of it."

"I don't exaggerate in the least. I am looking into the future. This racial instinct is the ordinance of our life. Lose it and we have no future. One drop of Negro blood makes a negro. It kinks the hair, flattens the nose, thickens the lip, puts out the light of intellect, and lights the fires of brutal passions. The beginning of Negro equality as a vital fact is the beginning of the end of this nation's life. There is enough negro blood here to make mulatto the whole Republic."

"Such a danger seems too remote for serious alarm to me," replied the younger man.

"Ah! there's the tragedy," passionately cried the Preacher. "You younger men are growing careless and indifferent to this terrible problem. It's the one unsolved and unsolvable riddle of the coming century. Can you build, in a Democracy, a nation inside a nation of two hostile races? We must do this or become mulatto, and that is death. Every inch in the approach of these races across the barriers that separate them is a movement toward death. You cannot seek the Negro vote without asking him to your home sooner or later. If you ask him to your house, he will break bread with you at last. And if you seat him at your table, he has the right to ask your daughter's hand in marriage."

"It seems to me a far cry to that. But I see the political crisis. What is your plan?"

"This,—organise the young Democracy in every township in the state, and put yourself at its head, control the primaries and down the old crowd. They've got to follow you. Fight the campaign with the desperation of despair. If you are defeated, God have mercy on us, but you will be ready for the next battle."

"I'll do it," said Gaston with emphasis.