About an hour before midnight—Sonnlein having gone to sleep soon after dark—I bethought me to go to our brother's Kammer and give him such comfort as he might need. I found him alone in his little cell sitting feebly on his wooden bench, so that I could see he was suffering great weakness. At first he resisted my gentle persuasions to lie down and rest, but finally consented thereto, even, after much coaxing, letting me spread my robe under him and rest his head on it; for he was so thin I could not bear to see his poor frame with nothing between it and the hard board's.
I rejoiced to see him drop off into a deep sleep that I fondly hoped would last until the morning; but there was a something about his sleep so unnaturally deep and profound I feared it might be the forerunner of his speedy dissolution.
It was close now to the midnight hour and soon there rang out from the darkness the clear notes of our bell calling the Brothers and Sisters to their wonted devotions. Scarcely had the first stroke died away when I was startled almost out of my wits to see Brother Agonius sit up straight on his bench, looking ahead with a fixed, steady stare.
"What seest thou, brother?" I asked softly and I know my voice trembled, for I understood not his strange gazing.
But he heeded me not in the least only that he appeared to be muttering to himself. Then his voice, becoming more firm, he said, still as though to himself, "Ye foolish Eckerlings; flee ye from the wrath to come!"
"What meanest thou?" I asked wonderingly; but still he heeded not, only muttering as before something about the Eckerlings of which now and then I would catch some few words, which seemed to me like, "O ye Eckerlings; ye poor Eckerlings; driven away—alone—captured—tortured—separated—persecuted—homeless"; and then my brother sighed as though a world of woe oppressed him and murmured, "Repent ye; repent ye"; all this time my flesh creeping with dread as the low tone of the dying man uttered this marvelous prophecy; for such, in truth, it was.
Finally he lay down again, but still muttering and mumbling, only lower than before. Once he mentioned my name and it seemed to me he said pityingly, "Poor Brother Jabez," and then after a long pause, "Poor Sister Bernice," and then after a still longer pause, during which I waited anxiously for what might follow he said more clearly, "The fight will not be long; comfort thou him, Lord"; so that I could not keep out a great fear for that he should couple my name with my dear sister's so strangely; for I had oft heard that dying ones see not only the past but even the future with great clearness, and I could not help the dread that held my heart as though with a hand of ice.
When the Brethren dropped in after their devotions our brother was again suffering such agony that he declared—being in his senses again—his sacrifice on the cross was now complete, wherefore he did not know whether any saint had ever suffered such martyrdom, and while the Brethren were singing at his request the hymn, "The time is not yet come," he asked that they intercede with God that he might open to him his prison door.
As his end drew near he asked that certain psalms and parts of Tauler's "Last Hours" be repeatedly read to him, after which he asked to be anointed in the manner of the first Christians. This was done, Brother Beissel applying the chrism. On the Wednesday following, Brother Agonius kept looking keenly toward the hour-glass, for it had been revealed to him that his end was to come at the ninth hour of that day. And so when the ninth hour came he sat up straight on his wooden bench, but immediately fell over scarce breathing; but he revived again and asked feebly whether he had not died. With the end of the ninth hour he passed away with the senseless sands of the hour-glass.
The next day his mortal remains were placed in a neat coffin where the Brethren and Sisters and the settlers of all denominations for miles around could gaze once more upon the face and form of this unconquerable Christian soldier and martyr and pay their last respects to the memory of our eloquent exhorter. I shall not dwell upon the rites and ceremonies that made his burial so solemn and memorable. As his body was lowered into its resting-place in the meadow a little to the east of Brother Beissel's cabin, a special funeral hymn was sung by the Sabbatarians, composed for the occasion by his lifelong friend, our superintendent.