There is no
Episcopal church there yet, excepting a Roman Catholic one, to which
they will not go, though they speak with thankfulness of the kindness
they have received from the priest.
They said their father used to tell them to read their Bible, do their
duty, and learn their way to heaven, and this they wished to do. They
were honest, straightforward good women, and _ladies_ in their minds,
though great curiosities to look at.
This walk, and our subsequent explorings in Grafton, occupied the whole
forenoon, the temptation to pick the red leaves and shake the trees for
hickory nuts being very great, and having greatly prolonged the time
which our walk occupied. But the village itself, for it is no more,
though, having a mayor, it calls itself a city, had great objects of
interest, and is a curious instance of what a railway will do in
America to _make_ a town; for it scarcely had any existence three years
ago, and is now full of artificers and others employed in the railway
works, all fully occupied, and earning excellent wages.
The people marry so early that the place was almost overflowing with
children, who certainly bore evidence in their looks to the healthiness
of the climate.
This being a slave state, there was a sprinkling of a black population;
and among the slaves we were shocked by observing a little girl, with
long red ringlets and a skin exquisitely fair, and yet of the proscribed
race, which made the institution appear more revolting in our eyes than
anything we have yet seen.
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