Deacon Chadwick leads the congregation in the songs of praise, by reading a line, for we have but four psalm books here, and then we sing such words as he has spoken; so it goes on throughout all the psalm, causing the music to sound halting and unequal. Besides which, it is seldom that the verses can be sung in such a manner within less than half an hour, and meanwhile we must all be kept standing. When the meeting is over, and the morning service is nearly always finished within four hours, we remain in our seats until the preacher and his wife have gone out, after which the men march around to the deacon's bench, and there leave furs or corn, money or wampum, if perchance they have any, as gifts toward the support of the preaching. Sometimes, when I have a feeling of faintness from the cold and long hours of sitting, I cannot help envying the preacher and his wife being able to leave thus early. THE TITHINGMEN The tithingmen are elected as town officers, and each has ten families to visit during the week, when they hear the children recite their lessons for the next Sabbath Day. It is their duty to see that every person goes to the meeting-house on Sabbath Day, with no loitering on the way, and even after the preaching is over, and we have returned to our homes, do they march up and down the street to prevent us from straying out of doors until the Sabbath is at a close. [Illustration] My mother believes, and so do I, that it would be better if the tithingmen refrained from walking to and fro in the church while the elder is preaching; but so they do, each carrying a stick which has a knob on one end and a fox or wolf tail on the other, striking the unruly children on the head with the knob end of the stick, and tickling with the fox tail the faces of those who are so ungodly as to sleep during the preaching. MASTER WINSLOW BRINGS HOME COWS I despair of trying to make you understand how thankful we were to God, when the ship in which Master Winslow and father returned, sailed into the harbor. It seemed to me as if I should never have enough of looking at him, or feeling the pressure of his hand upon my head, after he had thus been gone for eight weary months; but, strange to say, the others in the town thought it more pleasing to look at the cattle which Master Winslow brought, than at our people who had come back to us. Yes, in the ship _Charity_, on which Master Winslow and father came, were three cows and a bull, and you who have never known the lack of butter, cheese, and milk, cannot understand how grateful our people were for such things. [Illustration] The animals were no sooner on shore and eating greedily, than straightway we pictured to ourselves a large herd of cows, such as are seen in England, and when for the first time we saw the milk, a spoonful was given to each person in order that he or she might once more know the taste of it.