Читать книгу Working With the Hands. Being a Sequel to "Up from Slavery," Covering the Author's Experiences in Industrial Training at Tuskegee онлайн

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The meeting was not at all what I had expected. Mrs. Ruffner talked to me in the kindliest way, and her frank and positive manner was tempered with a rehearsal of the difficulties encountered with the boys who had preceded me, how and why they had failed to please, and what was expected of them and of me. I saw that it would be my fault if I failed to understand my duties, as she explained them in detail. I would be expected to keep my body clean and my clothes neat, and cleanliness was to be the motto in all my work. She said that all things could be done best by system, and she expected it of me, and that the exact truth at all times, regardless of consequences, was one of the first laws of her household—a law whose violation could never be overlooked.

I remember, too, that she placed special emphasis upon the law of promptness, and said that excuses and explanations could never be taken in the place of results. At the time, this seemed to me a pretty stern program to live up to, and I was fighting a sense of discouragement when, toward the end of the interview, she told me that if I were able to please her she would permit me to attend school at night during the winter. This suggestion so stimulated my ambition that it went a long way toward clinching the decision to make the effort of my life to satisfy my employer and to break all records for length of service in her household.