It Had Been Open To Worshippers All Day,
But The Chief Service Was Held About Three O'clock In The Afternoon;
At All Events It Was At That Hour When A Great Attendance Of
Fashionable People Took Place.
I watched them as they came in couples,
families and small groups, in every case the ladies, beautifully
dressed, attended by their cavaliers.
At the door of the church the
gentleman would make his bow and withdraw to the street before the
building, where a sort of outdoor gathering was formed of all those
who had come as escorts to the ladies, and where they would remain
until the service was over. The crowd in the street grew and grew
until there were about four or five hundred gentlemen, mostly young,
in the gathering, all standing in small groups, conversing in an
animated way, so that the street was filled with the loud humming
sound of their blended voices. These men were all natives, all of the
good or upper class of the native society, and all dressed exactly
alike in the fashion of that time. It was their dress and the uniform
appearance of so large a number of persons, most of them with young,
handsome, animated faces, that fascinated me and kept me on the spot
gazing at them until the big bells began to thunder at the conclusion
of the service and the immense concourse of gaily-dressed ladies
swarmed out, and immediately the meeting broke up, the gentlemen
hurrying back to meet them.
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