the groaning at certain intervals.

At midnight a hush fell upon all, and the pastor's prayer told us a new
year had begun. Then all started up an old-time plantation song, the
only words being "A Happy New Year" in all its changes, and we found we
were expected to shake hands with everyone, and not any ordinary shaking
hands was it, but the tighter our hands were clasped, the better did it
show the individual's religious zeal. Before this, it had seemed as
though some of our teachers would get struck by the mourning ones as
they threw their arms around in their frenzy, but when the hand-shaking
began and each one danced up to us, keeping time with the music and
shook our hands in time, until the measure changed and they passed on to
the next, we realized that we had, indeed, been taken right in. Thus the
meeting closed, and many left--two, rigid in their spasms, lying on the
benches.

But we found that the more devoted ones were to stay longer still, and
as one of the sisters came up and asked me to stay and see them get real
happy shouting, we did so. And now commenced a religious dance,
perfectly indescribable, and as long as I have been in the South it was
perfectly new to me. The leader started down one of the aisles chanting
a weird plantation song, and every joint in his body moving in time with
the measure; the sisters took it up and followed two by two until there
was a complete circle all around the church, all dancing in time with
the music. We were told that they would keep that up until morning.

It is rarely that we attend anything of this kind, but I think we had
enough of the old-time religion to last us through 1890 at least. We
have a number of scholars from this church, and it makes my heart sad
when I think how hard it will be for them to put what they are taught in