In the brush : $b or, Old-time social, political, and religious life in the southwestPierson, Hamilton W. (Hamilton Wilcox)
History
In the brush : $b or, Old-time social, political, and religious life in the southwest
Pierson, Hamilton W. (Hamilton Wilcox)
Missions -- Southwest, Old; Southwest, Old -- Social life and customs
both sexes studied the higher English, classical, and mathematical
branches, and completed their education at this school. This diversity
in the ages of the scholars and the books they attempted to master
added greatly to his labors; but from early Monday morning until late
Friday afternoon he toiled faithfully in the school-room, term after
term and year after year. With all this teaching, he had the other
labors indispensably connected with such a school--the care of the
school-room, consultations with parents, the collection of bills,
and all the nameless calls and duties connected with its care and
government. When to the long rides and other labors as a pastor, and
the duties of a teacher, that I have enumerated, are added those of a
housekeeper in providing for his family, there would seem to be little
time left for the preparation of sermons. But these were thoroughly
studied, and very often fully written, in hours that most others would
have given to rest and sleep.
On a cold midwinter day I mounted my horse and rode with him some
twenty miles to his regular appointment on Saturday afternoon. When we
reached the log-school-house in the outskirts, of his congregation but
a small number had come out through the cold, and at his request I
preached to them. We then rode home with an old Presbyterian elder, the
cold constantly increasing in severity. His heart was much warmer than
his log-house. We slept in a room which he tried in vain to warm with
a large wood-fire. But the water we were to use in the morning froze
solid, though placed as near the fire as possible. After breakfast we
mounted our horses and rode a few miles to church, though it was so
cold that I nearly froze in going, and was obliged to stop on the way
to warm myself. I preached to a congregation of about forty, and we
reorganized the county Bible Society. Having kindly rendered me all
the aid in his power, he mounted his horse after dinner, and rode home
through the cold in order to be able to open his school promptly on
Monday morning. At other seasons of the year, when the weather was such
that the people could assemble for worship, he was accustomed to preach
at the church in the morning, and at some school-house like that in
which I had preached, in other and distant parts of the congregation,
late in the afternoon. He would then mount his horse and ride over the
roughest roads, often through mud, rain, and darkness, reaching home
late at night, so that without fail he might promptly open his school
the next morning. I inquired and learned of others the salary that
was _promised_ him for preaching in this manner to this congregation,
twenty miles from his home, twice each month. I would state the
amount, but I remember the story, told me by my genial friend, the late
Rev. Dr. William L. Breckenridge, of an Irishman who desired to have a
letter written home to Ireland from Kentucky, many years before, when
provisions were most abundant and cheap.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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