When my communicative guide left me to attend to his duties, I strolled up the Zittau road to the place where, in a small opening by the wayside, stands a square stone monument, on which an inscription records an interesting historical incident:
On the 17th June, 1772, was
on this place for the building
of Herrnhut the first tree felled.
Ps. lxxxiv. 4.
It was cool there in the shade; and sitting down on a seat overhung by the trees, I fell into a reverie about things that had befallen since Christian David's axe wrought here to such good purpose. At that time all was dreary forest; no house nearer than Berthelsdorf, and little could the poverty-stricken refugees have foreseen such a result of their struggle as Herrnhut in its present condition. All at once I was interrupted by an elderly woman, who, returning to her village, sought a rest on the plinth of the monument, and proved herself singularly talkative. Perhaps she owed the Brethren a grudge, for she wound up with: "Nice people, them, sir, in Herrnhut; but they know how to get the money, sir."
About two hundred persons, mostly youthful, were present at the evening service. The dais was occupied as before, but by a lesser number. The preacher, the same eloquent man, gave an exposition of a portion of the Epistle to the Romans, elucidating the Apostle's meaning in obscure passages, which lasted half an hour. He then pronounced a brief benediction, and delivered the first line of a hymn, which was sung by all present, and, as in the afternoon, only at the last two lines did any one stand up.
I was deeply impressed by the contrast between the two services here in the unadorned edifice, and what I witnessed at Prague. Here no ancient prejudice, or ancient dirt, or slovenly ritual, as in the synagogue; but the outpouring of hope and faith from devout and cheerful hearts. Here no showy ceremonial; no swinging of censers, or kissing of pictures, or endless bowings and kneelings, or any of those mechanical observances in which the worshipper too often forgets that it has been given to him to be his own priest, and with full and solemn responsibility for neglect of duty.
The service over, I went and asked permission to look over the Sisters' House: I had seen the Brothers' House at Zeist. It was past the hour for the admission of strangers; but the stewardess, as a special favour, conducted me from floor to floor, where long passages give access on either side to small sitting-rooms, workrooms, and one great bedroom; all scrupulously clean and comfortably furnished. The walls are white; but any sister is at liberty to have her own room papered at her own cost. I saw the chapel in which the inmates assemble for morning and evening thanksgiving;—the refectory where they all eat together;—the kitchen, pervaded by a savoury smell of supper;—and the ware-room in which are kept the gloves, caps, cuffs, and all sorts of devices in needlework produced by the diligent fingers of the sisters. There were some neither too bulky nor too heavy for my knapsack, and of these I bought a few for sedate friends in England.
The unmarried sisters, as the unmarried brothers, dwell in a house apart; and as they eat together, and purchase all articles of consumption in gross, the cost to each is but small. Two persons are placed in authority over each house; one to care for the spiritual, the other for the economical welfare of the inmates. There are, besides, separate houses for widowers and widows.