His language, too, was appropriate and correct.  He was evidently a man of good common sense.  His text was Psalm li. l2, l3.  He referred very properly to the occasion on which the Psalm was composed, and drew from the text a large mass of sound practical instruction.  The chapel (capable of containing about 150 people) was only half-full.  Before the sermon, I had observed a very old negro, in a large shabby camlet cloak and a black cap, ascending the pulpit-stairs.  I supposed that, being dull of hearing, he had taken that position that he might better listen to the service.  However, when the sermon was over, this patriarchal-looking black man rose to pray; and he prayed “like a bishop,” with astonishing correctness and fluency!  He was formerly a slave in Kentucky, and was at this time about eighty years of age.  They call him “Father Watkins.”  At the close I introduced myself to him and to the minister.  They both expressed regret that they had not had me up in the pulpit, to tell them something, as “Father Watkins” said, about their “brothers and sisters on the other side of the water.”  The minister gave me his card, and invited me and my wife to take tea with him on Tuesday afternoon.  This was the first invitation I received within the city of Cincinnati to take a meal anywhere; and it was the more interesting to me as coming from a coloured man.

In the evening I went, according to appointment, to the Welsh Chapel.  There I met a Mr. Bushnel, an American missionary from the Gaboon River, on the western coast of Africa.  He first spoke in English, and I afterwards a little in Welsh; gladly embracing the opportunity to exhort my countrymen in that “Far West” to feel kindly and tenderly towards the coloured race among them; asking them how they would themselves feel if, as Welshmen, they were branded and despised wherever they went!  I was grieved to see the excess to which they carried the filthy habit of spitting.  The coloured people in their chapel were incomparably cleaner in that respect.

In the morning a notice had been put into my hand at the Presbyterian Church for announcement, to the effect that Mr. Bushnel and myself would address the “monthly concert at the church in Sixth-street” on the morrow evening.  Of this arrangement not a syllable had been said to me beforehand.  This was American liberty, and I quietly submitted to it.  The attendance was not large; and we two missionaries had it all to ourselves.  No other ministers were present,—­not even the minister of the church in which we were assembled.  The people, however, seemed heartily interested in the subject of missions.  At the close, a lady from Manchester, who had seen me there in 1845 at the missionary meeting, came forward full of affection to shake hands.  She was a member of Mr. Griffin’s church in that city, and had removed to America a few months before, with her husband (who is a member of the “Society of Friends”) and children.  I was glad to find that they were likely to be comfortable in their adopted country.