In a kindred spirit of charity,
no doubt, she refused ever to attend church with people of her elder and
wholesomer blood. When she went to church, she said, she always went to a
white church, though while with us I am bound to say she never went to
any. She professed to read her Bible in her bedroom on Sundays; but we
suspected, from certain sounds and odors which used to steal out of this
sanctuary, that her piety more commonly found expression in dozing and
smoking.
I would not make a wanton jest here of Mrs. Johnson's anxiety to claim
honor for the African color, while denying this color in many of her own
family. It afforded a glimpse of the pain which all her people must
endure, however proudly they hide it or light-heartedly forget it, from
the despite and contumely to which they are guiltlessly born; and when I
thought how irreparable was this disgrace and calamity of a black skin,
and how irreparable it must be for ages yet, in this world where every
other shame and all manner of wilful guilt and wickedness may hope for
covert and pardon, I had little heart to laugh.
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