THE CHILDREN’S PAGE.
From a Private Letter of a Pastor’s Daughter on a Visit to Talladega College, Alabama.
By the Road-side, Aug. 24, ’78.
Dear Auntie: Where do you think I am? This morning, Miss L. (the matron of the college) and Mr. W. (one of the teachers) and I started out, with horse and open buggy, for Anniston, a little town twenty-six miles away. We got up early, and ate our breakfast before the rest, then put the three satchels and water-proof, shawl, two umbrellas, two blankets and pail of oats and lunch-basket in the bottom and back of the buggy. Then we three piled in, stopping in the village just long enough to get some lemons. We had a lovely ride—part of the way through the woods—catching glimpses of the mountains in the distance, all along.
Perhaps you know that Alabama abounds in springs; so, whenever we go out for a drive or a picnic, we always aim for a spring—taking a gourd with us for a cup. We learned at a little town just below here that there was a fine spring a little farther on; and here we are now right in the woods. I am writing on a Sabbath-school Teacher, which doesn’t take the place of a desk very well. We have eaten our dinner and washed the dishes, and have been reading aloud. We are now just ready to pick up the blankets and things, and start again, for we have eleven miles yet to go. So, bye-bye, till the next stopping-place.
Anniston, Ala., Sunday.
I am going to write part of my letter Sunday, you see. I didn’t tell you what we came here for, did I? Well, many of the scholars at the college go out to teach in the summer, and sometimes the teachers who are staying there through vacation go off to see their old scholars, and encourage them in their Sunday-schools. They do a great deal of good in this way. I have visited two of these mission-schools; and this time we came to see Mr. M., one of the theological students who has just been ordained here at Anniston.
We found him and his wife living in a neatly-painted house, close by his little church. It did me so much good to go into his home and see what it was. Not much like most of the colored people’s houses—log-huts, dirty, low, and only one room, with so few comforts. This was a house of two rooms—the front room carpeted neatly; a nice bureau and bed in the room; a little table with books on it (one of which was a copy of Shakspeare!) In one corner of the room was his writing desk, with library over it—and a very good library it was; books on Isaiah and Psalms; Gospels and Epistles; several, or rather all of Barnes’ Notes; a book on Moral Philosophy, etc. I suppose that doesn’t sound like much of anything to you; but when you know how many of these people live, and how ignorant they are, it seems so much. There were pictures on the wall, a clock on the mantel, shades and curtains at the windows, etc. The church has a good bell, and is to be painted very soon.