On a bright day in August the Solitary Brethren arranged in a circle about a heap of burning brush fed by most willing hands, we consigned to the glowing embers all the books and writings of Onesimus, among them being his polemic against the Moravians; and three days later the Sisterhood of Saron repeated a similar ceremony, upon which occasion two of his German broadsides and a pillar against the Moravians as well as his hymns were consumed by the fire. And to make sure naught of contamination remained with us, on the sixth day the brethren of the Secular Congregation gathered all the writings and mementos of Onesimus and committed them also to the flames.

"We consigned to the glowing embers
all the books and writings of Onesimus."
Page 198.

Not many weeks later the prior and his brother, Jephune, with Timotheus and several other followers, fled about four hundred miles toward the setting of the sun, until beyond all Christian government they reached a stream which runs toward the Mississippi, New River by name, where they were joined soon after by the rest of the Eckerlings.

With their exit an immediate change took place. The mills were immediately closed, and word sent abroad that all our agreements were cancelled—only we would fulfill our standing orders—but that hereafter no grain or seed or logs or rags would be purchased by us, excepting such as would be absolutely necessary for our own use. Our horses and wagons and oxen were sold, and the different helpers who were not of our belief discharged, for we were determined that, as we had come here to serve God and not Mammon, God we would serve. But in spite of our resolution such was the excellence of the flour and the wheat and the oil, and the quality of the paper and cardboard we had made, that for many years demands were made upon us repeatedly; but I rejoice to say no effort was made in all the long after years again to reinstate these things for anything except our own uses, and when two years later three of our mills were lost by fire, which certain malicious ones attributed to our superintendent, and which could not be extinguished either by our wooden fire charms or our incantations, not one of us greatly regretted the event, so far as the loss of the mills themselves were concerned, only that we felt the loss of the large stores of wheat and other grain. Thus as Brother Lamech hath well said, "Did the fire, with God's permission, make an end to all the mammon which the Eckerlings, by their flaying, scraping, miserly conduct had gathered in the former household."

And now I feel I must turn again to my Sonnlein, who by this time was a sturdy boy of about thirteen, and that it may be known from his actions, instead of my great love for him what manner of boy he was, I shall tell of his first fight, that is, the first one I knew of; and this I can say of him, even though he was not a perfect example of the doctrine of non-resistance, he cared naught for fighting, but suffered in silence many a taunt and vile insult that made the blood rush to his cheeks; for not only did the neighbors' children—learning this from their idle-tongued parents—call him a "nobody's child"—for as he grew older he soon found there were ever ready ones to poison his happiness by telling him of his unknown parentage—but the elders themselves oft nicknamed him "Brother Jabez' chicken," for that he was always under my wing.

But one hot day in summer—and I take an unholy pleasure in writing this—Sonnlein and a lot of other boys and girls, were paddling bare-legged in the cool waters of the Cocalico, nigh the turnpike ford, filling the air with their thoughtless shrieks and laughter, so that the quiet-loving Brothers and Sisters were sorely tried in patience. Suddenly the harmless shrieks and laughter rose into a tremendous uproar, and so unusual was this tumult to mine ears I started hurriedly for the ford, fearing some awful calamity had befallen the children. As I came nigh I saw a lot of boys of all ages and sizes—so I wondered where they all came from—gathered in a struggling, yelling mass in the meadow along the creek, a fringe of frightened, white-faced little girls in the background—each boy, large and small, with might and main pressing forward toward the center of the howling little maniacs as if something of great moment were proceeding there. And indeed there was, for I was almost on them before they saw me or heard me call out sternly, "What meaneth all this noise?" When they did hear me and see my form hanging over them like some great thunder cloud they fled quickly, only that some from a distance in derision of my tonsure cried out at me, "Alter Blatkopf" (old baldhead), so that like Elisha I wished the bears to eat them up.

All but two had fled, and they were rolling about in the grass, now one on top and then the other, then to their feet, striking, clawing, and scratching like nothing so much as two angry cats; but suddenly the smaller but more active one, who seemed to me strangely like Sonnlein, delivered a marvelously directed blow full upon the upturned nose of the other, bringing forth a goodly stream of rich, red blood, whereupon the bleeding one put across the meadows, his hand to his face, bawling at the top of his lungs, the victorious gladiator following a short distance and crying after the vanquished, "Dost want some more of 'Brother Jabez' chicken'?" and then horrors upon horrors, I saw through all the mud and dirt and disordered hair, and the fierce, distorted features, 'twas my boy Sonnlein!

He saw me about the same time, and then the angry face fell into one of shame as I called to him, "Come hither!" He came obediently enough, saying nothing; but the wild passion of conflict could not die out at once, and as he stood there, digging his toes into the earth and casting sullen, rebellious glances at me, such as I had never received from him, and sorely they wounded me, he blurted out, "He began 't."