mechanics, the heart of the parent beats with hope.  He sees the children of the white man engaged in employment; and he trusts that there is a door open to his boy, to get an honest living, and become a useful member of society.  But, when he comes to the workshop with his child, he finds a bolt there.  But, even suppose that he can get this first bolt removed, he finds other bars.  He can’t work.  Let him be ever so skilled in mechanics, up starts prejudice, and says, ‘I won’t work in the shop if you do.’  Here he is scourged by prejudice, and has to go back, and sink down to some of the employments which white men leave for the most degraded.  He hears of the death of a child from home, and he goes in a stage or a steam-boat.  His money is received, but he is scourged there by prejudice.  If he is sick, he can have no bed, he is driven on deck:  money will not buy for him the comforts it gets for all who have not his complexion.  He turns to some friend among the white men.  Perhaps that white man had sat at his table at home, but he does not resist prejudice here.  He says, ’Submit.  ’Tis an ordinance of God,—­you must be humble.’  Sir, I have felt this.  As a minister, I have been called to pass often up and down the North River in steam-boats.  Many a night I have walked the deck, and not been allowed to lie down in a bed.  Prejudice would even turn money to dross when it was offered for these comforts by a coloured man.  Thus prejudice scourges us from the table; it scourges us from the cabin, from the stage-coach, from the bed.  Wherever we go, it has for us bolts, bars, and rods.”

And now let us attend the speaker’s funeral.  Professor Whipple will be our guide.  As we proceed, crowds of coloured people are hastening in the same direction from all quarters.  We are at the house.  But so great is the throng that it is impossible to get in.  Here, however, comes Dr. Cox.  “Make room for Dr. Cox!”—­“Make room for Dr. Cox!” is now heard on every hand.  A path is opened for the great man, and we little men slip in at his skirt.  On reaching the room where the remains of the good man lie, we find Dr. Patton and the Rev. Mr. Hatfield.  They and Dr. Cox are there in a semi-official capacity, as representing the Presbytery with which Mr. Wright was connected.  Louis Tappan, the long-tried and faithful friend of the coloured race, is there also.  I am asked to be a pall-bearer:  without at all reflecting on the duties and inconveniences of the office, I good-naturedly consent.  A white cotton scarf is instantly thrown over my shoulder.  There is the coffin; and there is a lifelike portrait of Mr. Wright hung up against the wall, and looking as it were down upon that coffin.  But you can see the face of Mr. Wright himself.  The coffin-lid is screwed down; but there is a square of glass, like a little window, just over the face, as is generally the case in America, and you can have a view of the whole countenance.

A black man reads a hymn, and, in connection with it, begins an address in a very oracular style, and with very solemn pauses.  A hint is given him not to proceed.  They sing.  Mr. Hatfield delivers an appropriate address.  A coloured minister prays, sometimes using the first person singular, and sometimes the first person plural; also talking about the “meanderings of life,” and a great deal of other nonsense.