“And will let me come for you at half-past eight, to show you the way?”
“Why, yes, sir; I was about to say as much, if it be not giving you too much trouble.”
“Do not speak of tr-r-ouple”—this last word will give a very good notion of Guert's accent, which I cannot stop to imitate at all times in writing—“and do not say your fre'nt, but your fre'ntz.”
“As to the two that are not here, I cannot positively answer; yonder, however, is one that can speak for himself.”
“I see him, Mr. Littlepage, and will answer for him, on my own account. Depent on it, he will come. But the Dominie—he has a hearty look, and can help eat a turkey and swallow a glass of goot Madeira—I think I can rely on. A man cannot take all that active exercise without food.”
“Mr. Worden is a very companionable man, and is excellent company at a supper-table. I will communicate your invitation, and hope to be able to prevail on him to be of the party.”
“T'at is enough, sir,” returned Ten Eyck, or Guert, as I shall henceforth call him, in general; “vere dere ist a vill, dere ist a vay.” Guert frequently broke out in such specimens of broken English, while at other times he would speak almost as well as any of us. “So Got pless you my dear Mr. Littlepage, and make us lasting friends. I like your countenance, and my eye never deceives me in these matters.”
Here, Guert shook us both by the hand again, most cordially, and left us. Dirck and I next strolled up the hill, going as high as the English church, which stood also in the centre of the principal street, an imposing and massive edifice in stone. With the exception of Mother Trinity, in New York, this was the largest, and altogether the most important edifice devoted to the worship of my own church I had ever seen. In Westchester, there were several of Queen Anne's churches, but none on a scale to compare with this. Our small edifices were usually without galleries, steeples, towers, or bells; while St. Peter's, Albany, if not actually St. Peter's, Rome, was a building of which a man might be proud. A little to our surprise, we found the Rev. Mr. Worden and Mr. Jason Newcome had met at the door of this edifice, having sent a boy to the sexton in quest of the key. In a minute or two, the urchin returned, bringing not only the key of the church, but the excuses of the sexton for not coming himself. The door was opened, and we went in.
I have always admired the decorous and spiritual manner in which the Rev. Mr. Worden entered a building that had been consecrated to the services of the Deity. I know not how to describe it; but it proved how completely he had been drilled in the decencies of his profession. Off came his hat, of course; and his manner, however facetious and easy it may have been the moment before, changed on the instant to gravity and decorum. Not so with Jason. He entered St. Peter's, Albany, with exactly the same indifferent and cynical air with which he had seemed to regard everything but money, since he entered “York Colony.” Usually, he wore his cocked-hat on the back of his head, thereby lending himself a lolloping, negligent, and, at the same time, defying air; but I observed that, as we all uncovered, he brought his own beaver up over his eye-brows, in a species of military bravado. To uncover to a church, in his view of the matter, was a sort of idolatry; there might be images about, for anything he knew; “and a man could never be enough on his guard ag'in being carried away by such evil deceptions,” as he had once before answered to a remonstrance of mine, for wearing his hat in our own parish church.
I found the interior of St. Peter's quite as imposing as its exterior. Three of the pews were canopied, having coats of arms on their canopies. These, the boy told us, belonged to the Van Rensselaer and Schuyler families. All these were covered with black cloth, in mourning for some death in those ancient families, which were closely allied. I was very much struck with the dignified air that these patrician seats gave the house of God. [21]