Although this is
only a yearly service, and a commemoration service of one whom the
people delight to honor, they made it pretty much a penitential service.
There were no seats but what the damp earth afforded, no stand for the
officiating minister but a grave; it was not, therefore, a very
attentive congregation which he addressed. The speaker, a Mr. Pepper,
had emigrated from thence when a lad to America. He now returned to the
people who had known him in earlier days. It was certainly listening
under difficulties, and we were obliged to leave, by limb-weariness,
before the service was over.
I had an opportunity on the morrow of seeing the handsome weaving of
damask. The looms are very complicated and expensive affairs, and do not
belong to the weaver but to the manufacturer. The pattern is traced on
stiff paper in holes. Was very much interested in watching the process
of weaving; of course did not understand it, and therefore wondered over
it. The web was two and a half yards wide, was double damask of a fern
pattern. The weaver, a young and nice-looking man, with the assured
manner of a skilled worker, informed me proudly that he could earn three
shillings a day--75 cents.
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