203 NEGRO EDUCATION. [CHAP. XV. 



been come to (by a majority of all the proprietors of the church, 

 as I was afterward informed), that one of the side galleries 

 should henceforth be set apart exclusively for people of color. 

 This resolution, he said, had been taken in order that they and 

 their servants might unite in the worship of the same God, as 

 they hoped to enter hereafter together into his everlasting king 

 dom, if they obeyed his laws. I inquired whether they would 

 not have done more toward raising the slaves to a footing of 

 equality in the house of prayer, if they had opened the same 

 galleries to negroes and whites. In reply, I was assured that, 

 in the present state of social feeling, the colored people would 

 gain less by such joint occupancy, because, from their habitual 

 deference to the whites, they would yield to them all the front 

 places. There were few negroes present ; but I am told that, if 

 I went to the Baptist or Methodist churches, I should find the 

 galleries quite full. There are several Sunday schools here for 

 negroes, and it is a singular fact thai, in spite of the law against 

 instructing slaves, many of the whites have been taught to read 

 by negro nurses. A large proportion of the slaves and free 

 colored people here are of mixed breed. The employment of 

 this class as in-door servants in cities arises partly from the in 

 terest taken in them by their white parents, who have manu- 

 mited them and helped them to rise in the world, and partly 

 because the rich prefer them as domestic servants, for their ap 

 pearance is more agreeable, and they are more intelligent. 

 Whether their superiority is owing to physical causes, and that 

 share of an European organization which they inherit in right 

 of one of their parents, or whether it may be referred to their 

 early intercourse and contact with the whites, in other words, 

 to a better education, is still matter of controversy. 



Several Virginian planters have spoken to me of the negro 

 race as naturally warm-hearted, patient, and cheerful, grateful 

 for benefits, and forgiving of injuries. They are also of a relig 

 ious temperament, bordering on superstition. Even those who 

 think they ought forever to remain in servitude, give them a 

 character which leads one to the belief that steps ought long 

 ago to have been taken toward their gradual emancipation, 



