His delight in the adventure was materially increased by his cousin's terror.
But once the swamp was crossed, and Black found himself on the firm road that wound over the sand-hills and through the open pine woods, he tossed his great mane back from his eyes, and getting his head set off at a pace that foreboded disaster to anything trying to keep before him, and in a short time drew up at the church gates, his flanks steaming and his great chest white with foam.
"My!" said Maimie, when she had recovered her breath sufficiently to speak, "is that the church ?" She pointed to a huge wooden building about whose door a group of men were standing.
"Huh-huh, that's it," said Hughie; "but we will soon be done with the ugly old thing." The most enthusiastic member of the congregation could scarcely call the old church beautiful, and to Maimie's eyes it was positively hideous.
No steeple or tower gave any hint of its sacred character.

Its weather-beaten clapboard exterior, spotted with black knots, as if stricken with some disfiguring disease, had nothing but its row of uncurtained windows to distinguish it from an ordinary barn.
They entered by the door at the end of the church, and proceeded down the long aisle that ran the full length of the building, till they came to a cross aisle that led them to the minister's pew at the left side of the pulpit, and commanding a view of the whole congregation.

The main body of the church was seated with long box pews with hinged doors.

But the gallery that ran round three sides was fitted with simple benches.
Immediately in front of the pulpit was a square pew which was set apart for the use of the elders, and close up to the pulpit, and indeed as part of this structure, was a precentor's desk.

The pulpit was, to Maimie's eyes, a wonder.