The gray stone walls of St. Anne's church and rectory made a
picturesque spot in the middle of the town, remaining still as a
lasting monument to the religious purpose which animated the
first manufacturers. The church arose close to the oldest
corporation (the "Merrimack"), and seemed a part of it, and a
part, also, of the original idea of the place itself, which was
always a city of worshipers, although it came to be filled with a
population which preferred meeting-houses to churches. I admired
the church greatly. I had never before seen a real one; never
anything but a plain frame meeting-house; and it and its benign,
apostolic-looking rector were like a leaf out of an English
story-book.
And so, also, was the tiny white cottage nearly opposite, set in
the middle of a pretty flower-garden that sloped down to the
canal. In the garden there was almost always a sweet little girl
in a pink gown and white sunbonnet gathering flowers when I
passed that way, and I often went out of my path to do so.
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