d Big Bethel.

The nigger with Sam he yells out, when he sees us:

"Glory be! HYAH dey comes! Hyah dey comes NOW!"

And he throwed up his arms, and started on a lope up the road toward the
church, singing out every ten or fifteen yards. A little knot of niggers
come out in front of the church when they hearn him coming.

Sam, he stood his ground, and waited fur us to come up to him, kind of
apologetic and sneaking--looking about something or other.

"What kind of lies have you been telling these niggers, Sam?" says the
doctor, very sharp and short and mad-like.

Sam, he digs a stone out'n the road with the toe of his shoe, and kind
of grins to himself, still looking sheepish. But he says he opinionates
he been telling them nothing at all.

"I dunno how-come dey get all dem nigger notions in dey fool haid," Sam
says, "but dey all waitin' dar inside de chu'ch do'--some of de mos'
faiful an' de mos' pra'rful ones o' de Big Bethel cong'gation been dar
fo' de las' houah a-waitin' an' a-watchin', spite o' de fac' dat reg'lah
meetin' ain't gwine ter be called twell arter supper. De bishop, he dar
too. Dey got some dese hyah coal-ile lamps dar des inside de chu'ch do'
an' dey been keepin' on 'em lighted, daytimes an' night times, fo' two
days now, kaze dey say dey ain't gwine fo' ter be cotched napping when
de bridegroom COMeth. Yass, SAH!--dey's ten o' dese hyah vergims dar,
five of 'em sleepin' an' five of 'em watchin', an' a-takin' tuhns at
hit, an' mebby dat how-come free or fouah dey bes' young colo'hed mens
been projickin' aroun' dar all arternoon, a-helpin' dem dat's a-waitin'
twell de bridegroom COM eth!"

We seen a little knot of them, down the road there in front of the
church, gathering around the nigger that had been with Sam. They all
starts toward us. But one man steps out in front of them all, and turns
toward them and holds his hands up, and waves them back. They all stops
in their tracks.

Then he turns his face toward us, and comes slow and sollum down the
road in our direction, walking with a cane, and moving very dignified.
He was a couple of hundred yards away.

But as he come closeter we gradually seen him plainer and plainer. He
was a big man, and stout, and dressed very neat in the same kind of rig
as white bishops wear, with one of these white collars that buttons in
the back. I suppose he was coming on to meet us alone, because no one
was fitten fur to give us the first welcome but himself.