As we do not know Miss D., who is a very deaf old lady, staying here, like ourselves, for a day or two, our conferences with young Topsy have been necessarily very short, and constantly interrupted by Miss D.'s coming past us, and wanting her; but we should like very much to buy Almira, and bring her home to make a nursery maid of her, and teach her all she ought to know, and "'spect" after all she is not "too large" to learn, poor young slave! It was pleasant, in our first colloquy of the kind, to talk to such an innocent specimen of a slave. I mean innocent, as respects her ignorance of the horrors of slavery, of which she evidently had not even the faintest idea. I asked her what she did for Miss D.? "Dresses her, does her room, and fixes her up altogether." The real, original Topsy is no doubt a most correctly drawn character, judging by this specimen. And now adieu; you shall have a further chapter on Washington next time.
FOOTNOTE:
[6] I have tried, in vain, to alter this word, which is one coined at home, and used by the family, but cannot find a substitute for it. Lest, however, it be misunderstood, I must explain that it is applied in reference to the truly good and pious among our friends; as the word "saints," ought to be, had not that term been unhappily associated with the ridiculous, and a false pretension to religion.
LETTER VIII.
WASHINGTON.— BAPTIST CLASS-MEETING.— PUBLIC BUILDINGS.— VENUS BY DAYLIGHT.— BALTIMORE AND OHIO RAILWAY.— WHEELING.— ARRIVAL AT COLUMBUS.
Washington, 18th Oct. 1808.
I despatched my last to you the day before yesterday, and now must give you an account of our employments yesterday (Sunday, 17th instant). The morning was very hot, and very lovely, with a clear blue sky, and I wished that impertinent young lady, Emily, could see what sort of weather we have here, and how her good wishes for us are accomplished, beyond anything she can suppose; for we can barely support the heat in the middle of the day.
The weather being so lovely, we set off to a church in Georgetown, a suburb of Washington, where many of the foreign ministers live, and a very pretty suburb it is; but when we got there, papa's head began to ache so much, that we thought it best to return to a church nearer the hotel, so that if he became worse, he might leave the church, and walk home. We were able, however, to sit out the service, and heard a very dull sermon from a young missionary, who was to sail, two days afterwards, with his wife, from Baltimore, for Africa; his sermon was greatly taken from Livingstone's book, and he spoke more strongly against slavery than we should have looked for in a slave state. After the sermon, papa and I went to him, and we asked him a little about where he was going, &c. &c. He scarcely seemed to know, acknowledged he was but little acquainted with the work he had before him, and, finally, when papa put a piece of gold into his hand, he looked at it, and asked whether it was for himself or the Mission. We answered with some degree of inward surprise, that it was for any useful object connected with it, and we took leave of him, wishing him God-speed, but lamenting that a more efficient man was not going out.