them and their sentimental doings, and they have not invited me since.
I had a very pleasant drive yesterday to make a bridal call on the Presbyterian minister, who has been quite polite. The country reminded me in some parts of our charming Staten Island drives, though the scenery here will not, of course, compare with that little gem.
The people of Henderson were all very friendly
to me personally, and my relations always pleasant
with them; but the injustice of the state of society
made a gradually deepening impression on my mind.
The inhabitants lived in constant fear of an outbreak
among the slaves. Women did not dare to walk in
the pleasant woods and country around the village,
for terror of runaway slaves. Painful social contrasts
constantly forced themselves on my notice. I well
remember sitting with my hostess, who was reclining
in her rocking-chair, on the broad, shaded
verandah, one pleasant Sunday morning, listening to
the distant church bells and the rustling of the locust
trees, when the eldest daughter, a tall, graceful girl,
dressed for Sunday, in fresh and floating summer
drapery, came into the verandah on her way to
church. Just at that moment a shabby, forlorn-looking
negro in dirty rags approached the verandah;
he was one of the slaves working in the tobacco
plantation. His errand was to beg the mistress to
let him have a clean shirt on that Sunday morning.
The contrast of the two figures, the young lady and
the slave, and the sharp reprimand with which his
mistress from her rocking-chair drove the slave
