sickness excused any member of the family, servants included, from
attending morning prayers, and every Sunday the well-appointed carriage
bore those who wished to attend church to the most fashionable one in
the city. The children attended Sabbath-school regularly, and in the
afternoon the girls who were old enough taught classes in the colored
school. Here, Sarah was the only one who ever caused any trouble. She
could never be made to understand the wisdom which included the
spelling-book, in the hands of slaves, among the dangerous weapons, and
she constantly fretted because she could only give her pupils oral
instruction. She longed to teach them to read, for many of them were
pining for the knowledge which the "poor white trash" rejected; but the
laws of the State not only prohibited the teaching of slaves, but
provided fines and imprisonment for those who ventured to indulge their
fancy in that way. So that, argue as she might, and as she did, the
privilege of opening the storehouse of learning to those thirsty souls
was denied her. "But," she writes, "my great desire in this matter
would not be totally suppressed, and I took an almost malicious
satisfaction in teaching my little waiting-maid at night, when she was
supposed to be occupied in combing and brushing my long locks. The
light was put out, the keyhole screened, and flat on our stomachs
before the fire, with the spelling-book under our eyes, we defied the
laws of South Carolina."

But this dreadful crime was finally discovered, and poor Hetty barely
escaped a whipping; and her bold young mistress had to listen to a
severe lecture on the enormity of her conduct.

When Sarah was about twelve years old, two important events occurred to
interrupt the even tenor of her life. Her brother Thomas was sent off
to Yale College, leaving her companionless and inconsolable, until, a