Still, William, Underground Rail Road:
A Record of Facts, Authentic Narratives, Letters, Etc.

Porter & Coales, Publishers, Philadelphia, PA, 1872
Call Number: 1400, MSA L1117

MSA L1117, Image No: 810   Enlarge and print image (51K)

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Still, William, Underground Rail Road:
A Record of Facts, Authentic Narratives, Letters, Etc.

Porter & Coales, Publishers, Philadelphia, PA, 1872
Call Number: 1400, MSA L1117

MSA L1117, Image No: 810   Enlarge and print image (51K)

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FRANCES ELLEN WATKINS HARPER. 779 seventeen years of public labor she has made thousands of speeches without doing herself or people discredit in a single instance, but has accomplished a great deal in the way of remo%'ing prejudice. May we not hope that the rising generation at least will take encouragement by her example and find an argument of rare force in favor of mental and moral equality, and above all be awakened to see how prejudices and difficulties may be surmounted by continual struggles, intelligence and a virtuous character? Fifty thousand copies at least of her four small books have been sold to those who have listened to her eloquent lectures. One of those productions entitled " Moses " lias been used to entertain audiences with evening readings in various parts of the country. With what effect may be seen from the two brief notices as follows : " Mrs. F. E. W. Harper cidivered a poem npor. ' Moses' in Wilbraham to a largo and delighted audience. She is a woman of high moral tone, with superior native powers highlv cultivated, and a cap'.ivating eloquence that hold her audience in rapt, attention from the beginning to the close. She will delight any intelligent audience, and those who wish first-class lecturers cannot do better than to secure her services."—Zion's JJerald, Jjost'jn. " Mrs. Frances E. W. Ilnrper read her poem of ' Moses' last evening at Rev. Mr. Har-rison's church to a good aud.-r>nce. It deals with the story of the Hebrew Mos«s from his finding in (he wicker basket, on the Nile to his death on Mount Nebo and his burial in an unknown grave; following closely the Scripture account. It contains about 700 lines, beginning with blank verse of the common measure, and changing to other measures, but always without rhyme ; and is a pathetic and well-sustained piece. Mrs. Harper recited it with good efft-ct, and it was well received. She i.i a lady of much talent, and always speaks well, particularly when her subject relates to the condition of her own people, in whose welfare, before and since the war, she lias taken the deepest interest. As a lecturer Mrs. Harper is more effective tban most of those who come before our lyceutns; with a natural eloquence that is very moving."—Galesburgh licgiftcr, 111. Grace Greenwood, in the Independent in noticing a Course of Lectures in which Mrs. Harper spoke (in Philadelphia) pays this tribute to her: " Next on the course was Mrs Harper, a colored woman ; about as colored as some of the Cuban belles I have met with at Saratoga. She has a noble head, this bronze muse; a strong face, with a shadowed glow upon it, indicative of thoughtful fervor, and of a nature most femininely aensitive, but not in the least morbid. Her form is delicate, her hands daintily small. She stands quietly beside hpr desk, and speaks without notes, with gestures few and fitting. Her manner is marked by dignity and composure. She is never assuming, never theatrical. In the first part of her lecture she waa most impressive in her pleading for the race with whom her lot is cast. There was something touching in her altitude as their representative. The woe of two hundred years sighed through her tones. Every glance of her sad eyes was a mournful remonstrance against injustice and wrong. Feeling on her soul, as she must have felt it, the chilling weight of caste, she ssemed to say : 'I lift my heary heart op (solemnly, As onc« Electro her pepulchral urn.' * * * As I listened to her, there swept over me, in a chill wave of horror, the reali-