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Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 1804-1864

"Passages from the American Notebooks, Volume 1"


Nothing can be neater than the churches and houses. The graveyard is on
the slope, and at the foot of a swell, filled with old and new
gravestones, some of red freestone, some of gray granite, most of them of
white marble, and one of cast-iron with an inscription of raised letters.
There was one of the date of about 1776, on which was represented the
third-length, has-relief portrait of a gentleman in a wig and other
costume of that day; and as a framework about this portrait was wreathed
a garland of vine-leaves and heavy clusters of grapes. The deceased
should have been a jolly bottleman; but the epitaph indicated nothing of
the kind.
In a remote part of the graveyard,--remote from the main body of dead
people,--I noticed a humble, mossy stone, on which I traced out "To the
memory of Julia Africa, servant of Rev." somebody. There were also the
half-obliterated traces of other graves, without any monuments, in the
vicinity of this one. Doubtless the slaves here mingled their dark clay
with the earth.
At Litchfield there is a doctor who undertakes to cure deformed people,--
and humpbacked, lame, and otherwise defective folk go there.


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