Page:The White Slave, or Memoirs of a Fugitive.djvu/127

 family prayers, night and morning, with the most punctilious regularity. He prayed long and fervently, and on his bended knees. He was particularly earnest in his petitions for the universal spread of the gospel; he asked most devoutly, that as all men were creatures of the same God, they might speedily become children of the same faith. Yet not only the plantation slaves were never invited to join in this family worship, but even the house-servants were excluded. The door was shut; — and at the very moment when the devout Mr Carleton professed to prostrate himself in the dust before his Creator, he felt too strongly the sense of his own superiority, to permit even his household servants to participate in his devotions!

But for all this, Mr Carleton evidently had the cause of religion very much at heart, and seemed ready to spend. and be spent in the service. There were very few clergymen in the part of the country in which he resided, and his zeal frequently led him to supply the gap, by acting as an exhorter. Indeed there was scarcely a Sunday that he did not hold forth somewhere in the neighborhood. Within ten miles of Carleton-Hall, in different directions, there were as many as three churches, wretched, ruinous, little buildings, that looked more like deserted barns than places of public worship. All of these Mr Carleton had caused to be repaired, principally at his own expense, and in each of them he preached occasionally. But he did not consider a church as indispensable to an exhortation. During the summer, he frequently held meetings in some shady grove, or by the side of some cool spring; and in the winter, sometimes in his own house, and sometimes in the houses of his neighbors. He was generally pretty sure-of a considerable audience. That part of the country was thinly inhabited, and the people had but few amusements. They were glad of any occasion of assembling together, and seemed to care very little whether it were a preaching or a frolic. Besides, Mr Carleton was really an agreeable speaker; and the earnestness and vehemence of his manner, were well calculated to attract an audience.

A very considerable proportion of his hearers were slaves; for though he did not judge it expedient: to allow them to