cancer of the land, concluded that the editor of the _Visiter_
horsewhipped the unfortunate man she called husband, once a day, with
great regularity. Much sympathy was expressed for that much-abused man;
and this was amusing to those who knew he could have tied four such
tyrants in a sheaf, and carried them off like a bundle of sticks. But
people had found a monster, a giantess, with flaming black eyes, square
jaws and big fists, who lived at the top of a very high bean-pole, and
ate nothing but the uncooked flesh of men.

However, the man-eating idea came to be useful, and proved that a bad
name is better than none.

In '49, the _Visiter_ began a weekly series of "Letters to Country
Girls," which were seized upon as a new feature in journalism, were very
extensively copied, and won golden opinions from all sorts of men. In
'54 they were collected in book form, and "mine ancient enemy," George
D. Prentiss, gave them kindly notice.

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE MOTHER CHURCH.

When the _Visiter_ entered life, it was still doubtful which side of the
slavery question the Roman church would take. O'Connell was in the
zenith of his power and popularity, was decidedly anti-slavery, and
members of Catholic churches chose sides according to personal feeling,
as did those of other churches. It was not until 1852, that
abolitionists began to feel the alliance between Romanism and slavery;
but from that time, to be a member of the Roman church was to be a
friend of "Southern interests."

In Pittsburg there was great harmony between Catholics and Protestants,
for the Protestant-Irish, by which Western Pennsylvania was so largely
settled, were generally refugees driven from Ireland for their
connection with the Union, or Robert Emmet rebellion. Our pastor, Rev.
John Black, escaped in the night, and he and the only Catholic priest in
Pittsburg, Father McGuire, were intimate friends.

The Bishop of the diocese, R.R. O'Conner, was, I think, a priest of the
Capponsacchi order, one of those men by whose existence the Creator
renders a reason for the continuance of the race. After the days of
which I write, there was an excitement in Pittsburg about Miss Tiernan,
a beautiful, accomplished girl, who became a nun, and was said to have
mysteriously disappeared. When the Bishop resigned his office and became
a member of an austere order of monks, there were not lacking those who
charged the act to remorse for his connection with her une