Dana, Richard Henry, 1815-1882; Sailors; Seafaring life; Voyages and travels
I could not complain that I had not a choice of places of worship. The
Roman Catholics have an archbishop, a cathedral, and five or six
smaller churches, French, German, Spanish, and English; and the
Episcopalians, a bishop, a cathedral, and three other churches; the
Methodists and Presbyterians have three or four each, and there are
Congregationalists, Baptists, a Unitarian, and other societies. On my
way to church, I met two classmates of mine at Harvard standing in a
door-way, one a lawyer and the other a teacher, and made appointments
for a future meeting. A little farther on I came upon another Harvard
man, a fine scholar and wit, and full of cleverness and good-humor, who
invited me to go to breakfast with him at the French house--he was a
bachelor, and a late riser on Sundays. I asked him to show me the way
to Bishop Kip's church. He hesitated, looked a little confused, and
admitted that he was not as well up in certain classes of knowledge as
in others, but, by a desperate guess, pointed out a wooden building at
the foot of the street, which any one might have seen could not be
right, and which turned out to be an African Baptist meeting-house. But
my friend had many capital points of character, and I owed much of the
pleasure of my visit to his attentions.
The congregation at the Bishop's church was precisely like one you
would meet in New York, Philadelphia, or Boston. To be sure, the
identity of the service makes one feel at once at home, but the people
were alike, nearly all of the English race, though from all parts of
the Union. The latest French bonnets were at the head of the chief
pews, and business men at the foot. The music was without character,
but there was an instructive sermon, and the church was full.
I found that there were no services at any of the Protestant churches
in the afternoon. They have two services on Sunday; at 11 A. M., and
after dark. The afternoon is spent at home, or in friendly visiting,
or teaching of Sunday Schools, or other humane and social duties.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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