My mother was kept very busy with her sewing; sometimes she would have another woman helping her.
From James Weldon Johnson
My luck at the gambling table was varied; sometimes I was fifty to a hundred dollars ahead, and at other times I had to borrow money from my fellow workmen to settle my room rent and pay for my meals.
My appearance was always good and my ability to play on the piano, especially ragtime, which was then at the height of its vogue, made me a welcome guest.
I thought of Paris as a beauty spot on the face of the earth, and of London as a big freckle.
But I must own that I also felt stirred by an unselfish desire to voice all the joys and sorrows, the hopes and ambitions, of the American Negro, in classic musical form.
As I look back now I can see that I was a perfect little aristocrat.
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