is supporting his "sister's little girl," who, he says, is "like an adopted child to us. Her father and mother are living but they have three or four besides her to support." This man earns thirty dollars a month, on which he supports his own family and his sister's little girl, and is also saving in the bank and has a one-dollar fee in a sick benefit society.
One young "waiter-man," earning twenty-five dollars a month, is "making a home for his mother" and helping three sisters besides. But none of these cases appear in Table XIV, since none of them could give any kind of an estimate of the proportion of earnings given. That considerable was given in each of these cases, however, is obvious, and many similar instances might be cited. It is almost invariably true of bell boys and errand boys and girls that they take their entire earnings home to their parents to swell the general store. One young bell boy said that he "took all he earned home to his mother except twenty-five cents he kept himself and she saved that for him."
Summary.—A large part of the earnings of the colored domestics of the ward are thus seen to go towards the support of parents and dependents. This generosity towards their own will be attested, it is believed, by everyone who has had any considerable knowledge of the colored people. When one remembers that the same thing is noticeably true of the Jews, the thought naturally occurs that it is perhaps an instinct of self-preservation, which reveals itself among oppressed races.
Again, that with a majority of Negroes, some part of their earnings are steadily "put by for a nest egg"—to use one of their own quaint expressions—will doubtless be similarly at tested. There is of course much extravagance among Negroes. Much is doubtless spent for amusement, much certainly goes for finery. These outlays are comparatively large with some among the colored domestics of Philadelphia, although the facts which came to the knowledge of the investigator during these nine months in Philadelphia seemed to indicate that, speaking broadly, the colored domestics of that city are a thrifty class of people.
