We arrived at Baltimore at the season of the “Conference.”  I must be excused from giving any very distinct explanation of this term, as I did not receive any.  From what I could learn, it much resembles a Revival.  We entered many churches, and heard much preaching, and not one of the reverend orators could utter the reproach,

“Peut-on si bien precher qu’elle ne dorme au sermon?”

for I never even dosed at any.  There was one preacher whose manner and matter were so peculiar, that I took the liberty of immediately writing down a part of his discourse as a specimen.  I confess I began writing in the middle of a sentence, for I waited in vain for a beginning.  It was as follows:-

“Nevertheless, we must not lose sight of the one important, great, and only object; for the Lord is mighty, his works are great, likewise wonderful, likewise wise, likewise merciful; and, moreover, we must ever keep in mind, and close to our hearts, all his precious blessings, and unspeakable mercies, and overflowings; and moreover we must never lose sight of, no, never lose sight of, nor ever cease to remember, nor ever let our souls forget, nor ever cease to dwell upon, and to reverence, and to welcome, and to bless, and to give thanks, and to sing hosanna, and give praise,”—­and here my fragment of paper failed, but this strain continued, without a shadow of meaning that I could trace, and in a voice inconceivably loud, for more than an hour.  After he had finished his sermon, a scene exactly resembling that at the Cincinnati Revival, took place.  Two other priests assisted in calling forward the people, and in whispering comfort to them.  One of these men roared out in the coarsest accents, “Do you want to go to hell tonight?” The church was almost entirely filled with women, who vied with each other in howlings and contortions of the body; many of them tore their clothes nearly off.  I was much amused, spite of the indignation and disgust the scene inspired, by the vehemence of the negro part of the congregation; they seemed determined to bellow louder than all the rest, to shew at once their piety and their equality.

At this same chapel, a few nights before, a woman had fallen in a fit of ecstasy from the gallery, into the arms of the people below, a height of twelve feet.  A young slave who waited upon us at table, when this was mentioned, said, that similar accidents had frequently happened, and that once she had seen it herself.  Another slave in the house told us, that she “liked religion right well, but that she never took fits in it, ’cause she was always fixed in her best, when she went to chapel, and she did not like to have all her best clothes broke up.”