These disasters, and the debts which pressed on the congregation, put a stop for a time to all efforts to establish matters on a suitable footing. After Dr. Barry's consecration, the old church was refitted and furnished in a way to make it quite respectable for the cathedral of a new diocese, and a spacious mansion was purchased for the episcopal residence. But at this time Dr. Barry was living, like a bishop _in partibus infidelium_, in a small and poor frame dwelling-house, containing only four or five rooms, and the clergy were putting up, in the best way they could, with rooms over the sacristy of the church. Just round the corner, an aged negro, with a long white beard, who was a Methodist preacher, might be seen sitting all the day long in the sun on a little stool, holding a cow by a rope around her horns, while she nibbled the grass which grew along the streets; and the old gentleman chatted with the passers-by, or prepared his sermons for the next Sunday, highly delighted at the friendly salutations which the fathers always gave him as they passed by. {148} Every now and then a black nurse passed along the street, carrying or wheeling the little white infant of her charge; or a troop of negro boys and their young masters, playing together with the utmost familiarity. The sunny, Southern atmosphere was vocal with the merry, free-and-easy sounds of laughing, chatting mirth, or work carried on like a play without much care or hurry, so characteristic of a city in the far South. Savannah is a very beautiful and picturesque place, where, at that time, Southern life and manners could be seen at the greatest advantage; and the novelty of the scene gave it a great zest to those of our number who had not seen it before. The clergy were, most of them, old veteran missionaries, brought to this country by the celebrated Bishop England, full of rich and piquant anecdotes of their past experience among the wild, sparsely-settled regions of Georgia and the neighboring States, related with inimitable wit and humor. [Footnote 6] The mission was still further enlivened by a visit to Savannah from Archbishop Hughes, accompanied by his amiable secretary, who were making a tour of recreation to restore the archbishop's shattered health; and from Dr. Lynch, soon after appointed to the see of Charleston. [Footnote 6: One of these good clergymen, the Rev. Peter Whelan, during the late civil war, remained a long time among our prisoners at Andersonville, and spent four hundred dollars in gold at one time in purchasing bread for their necessities.]