No new settlement could be regarded as fairly established until it possessed a schoolhouse and a church. Naturally this involved much extra labor and personal sacrifice.
So the New England tourist of the present day is constantly finding these little old-fashioned emblems of self-denial tucked away, not only in small hamlets but at the cross roads. The influx of numerous people of different foreign nationalities and of the different religions, has in many instances left the churches a difficult problem, financial and otherwise, to the limited number of communicants yet remaining of the old New England stock.
Before so many of the younger generation became ambitious for city life and left the home farms to pass into the hands of strangers, these churches were very active centers of culture and uplift.
However, with human nature as it is, it could hardly be expected that there should not be some trying incidents connected with the close intimacies of the country congregation. The new pastor soon found that each of his parishioners had a very distinct individuality which was often calculated to jar upon other individualities of his flock. The nerve strain incident to preserving harmonious relations under these conditions was no doubt responsible in numerous instances for the “nervous dyspepsia” which has so frequently afflicted country ministers.
In the early days when barter rather than cash was the chief means of exchange, the parson’s salary was necessarily small, at least in actual cash. To make up to him what they were unable to deliver in the way of real money, the pastor was made the subject of countless acts of generosity in the form of loads of wood, potatoes, pork and various other elements of family subsistence. However, the crowning act of generosity on the part of parishioners was the annual Donation Party.
The Story of the “Raised” Biscuits
In a certain parish there was a clergyman whose family did not take very kindly to these rural substitutes for real money. Probably the minister’s wife had “seen better days” before she became the partner of a struggling country pastor. And quite likely she may have expressed her disapproval of the stingy characteristics of some in the parish in the presence of her children.
The annual Donation Party at this parsonage was a great success in point of numbers, but the donations themselves were rather small. Each matron of the community was of course expected to furnish her share of the refreshments. Probably there was not sufficient team work in the “Ladies’ Aid Society.” At any rate, the pastor’s wife found herself, at the conclusion of the evening’s festivities, in possession of an extraordinarily large number of exceedingly durable “raised biscuits,” the other donations being far below the proper standard.
It became necessary for the pastor and his wife to visit an adjoining town the next day, their children being left behind. During the absence of the parents there were developments which scandalized the entire neighborhood and filled the pastor and his wife with horror.