Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 23, February, 1873

THE MEN OF SPENERSBERG

This Spenersberg, about which Leonhard was not a little eager to know more when he shut the door of the apartment into which his host had ushered him—for he must remain all night—what was it?

A colony, or a brotherhood, or a community, six years old. Such a fact does not lie ready for observation every day—such a place does not lie in the hand of a man at his bidding. What, then, was its history? We need not wait to find out until morning, when Leonhard will proceed to discover. He is satisfied when he lies down upon the bed, which awaited him, it seems, as he came hither on the way-train—quite satisfied that Spener of Spenersberg must be a man worth seeing. Breathing beings possessed of ideas and homes here must have been handled with power by a master mind to have brought about this community, if so it is to be called, in six short years, thinks Leonhard. He recalls his own past six years, and turns uneasily on his bed, and finds no rest until he reminds himself of the criticism he has been enabled to pass on Miss Elise's rendering of "He is a righteous Saviour," and the suggestion he made concerning the pitch of "Ye shall find rest for your souls." The recollection acts upon him somewhat as the advancing wave acts on the sand-line made by the wave preceding. When he made the first suggestion, Sister Benigna stood for a moment looking at him, surprised by his remark; but, less than a second taken up with a thought of him, she had passed instantly on to say, "Try it so, Elise: 'He is a righteous Saviour.' We will make it a slower movement. Ah! how impressive! how beautiful! It is the composer's very thought! Again—slow: it is perfect!"

Was this kind of praise worth the taking? a source of praise worth the seeking? Leonhard had said ungrateful things about his prize-credentials to Miss Marion Ayres, and I do believe that these very prizes, awarded for his various drawings, were never so valued by him as the look with which priestly Benigna seemed to admit him at least so far as into the fellowship of the Gentiles' Court.

He would have fallen asleep just here with a pleasant thought but for the recollection of Wilberforce's letter, which startled him hardly less than the apparition of his friend in the moonlight streaming through his half-curtained window would have done. Is it always so pleasant a thought that for ever and ever a man shall bear his own company?

But this Spenersberg? Seven years ago, on the day when he came of age, Albert Spener, then a young clerk in a fancy-goods store, went to look at the estate which his grandfather had bequeathed to him the year preceding. Not ten years ago the old man made his will and gave the property, on which he had not quite starved, to his only grandson, and here was this worthless gorge which stretched between the fields more productive than many a famous gold-mine.

The youth had seen at once that if he should deal with the land as his predecessors had done, he would be able to draw no more from the stingy acres than they. He had shown the bent of his mind and the nature of his talent by the promptness with which he put things remote together, and by the directness with which he reached his conclusions.

He had left his town-lodgings, having obtained of his employer leave of absence for one week, and within twenty-four hours had come to his conclusion and returned to his post. Of that estate which he had inherited but a portion, and a very small portion, offered to the cultivator the least encouragement. The land had long ago been stripped of its forest trees, and, thus defrauded of its natural fertilizers, lay now, after successive seasons of drain and waste, as barren as a desert, with the exception of that narrow strip between the hills which apparently bent low that inland might look upon river.

Along the banks of the stream, which flowed, a current of considerable depth and swiftness, toward its outlet, the river, willows were growing. Albert's employer was an importer to a small extent, and fancy willow-ware formed a very considerable share of his importations. The conclusion he had reached while surveying his land was an answer to the question he had asked himself: Why should not this land be made to bring forth the kind of willow used by basket-weavers, and why should not basket-weavers be induced to gather into a community of some sort, and so importers be beaten in the market by domestic productions? The aim thus clearly defined Spener had accomplished. His Moravians furnished him with a willow-ware which was always quoted at a high figure, and the patriotic pride the manufacturer felt in the enterprise was abundantly rewarded: no foreign mark was ever found on his home-made goods.

But his Moravians: where did these people come from, and how came they to be known as his?

The question brings us to Frederick Loretz. In those days he was a porter in the establishment where Spener was a clerk. He had filled this situation only one month, however, when he was attacked with a fever which was scourging the neighborhood, and taken to the hospital. Albert followed him thither with kindly words and care, for the poor fellow was a stranger in the town, and he had already told Spener his dismal story. Afar from wife and child, among strangers and a pauper, his doom, he believed, was to die. How he bemoaned his wasted life then, and the husks which he had eaten!

In his delirium Loretz would have put an end to his life. Spener talked him out of this horror of himself, and showed him that there was always opportunity, while life lasted, for wanderers to seek again the fold they had strayed from; for when the delirium passed the man's conscience remained, and he confessed that he had lived away from the brethren of his faith, and was an outcast. Oh, if he could but be transported to Herrnhut and set down there a well man in that sanctuary of Moravianism, how devoutly would he return to the faith and practice of his fathers!

When Spener returned from his trip of investigation he hastened immediately to the hospital, sought out poor half-dead Loretz, laid his hand on his shoulder, and said, "Come, get up: I want you." And he explained his project: "I will build a house for you, send for your wife and child, put you all together, and start you in life. I am going into the basket business, and I want you to look after my willows. After they are pretty well grown you shall get in some families—Simon-Pure Moravians, you know—and we will have a village of our own. D'ye hear me?"

The poor fellow did hear: he struggled up in his bed, threw his arms around Spener's neck, tried to kiss him, and fainted.

"This is a good beginning," said Spener to himself as he laid the senseless head upon the pillow and felt for the beating heart. The beating heart was there. In a few moments Loretz was looking, with eyes that shone with loving gratitude and wondering admiration, on the young man who had saved his life.

"I have no money," said this youth in further explanation of his project—for he wanted his companion to understand his circumstances from the outset—"but I shall borrow five thousand dollars. I can pay the interest on that sum out of my salary. Perhaps I shall sell a few lots on the river, if I can turn attention to the region. It will all come out right, anyhow. Now, how soon can you be ready? I will write to your wife to-day if you say so, and tell her to come on with the little girl."

"Wait a week," said Loretz in a whisper; and all that night and the following day his chances for this world and the next seemed about equal.

But after that he rallied, and his recovery was certain. It was slow, however, hastened though it was by the hope and expectation which had opened to him when he had reached the lowest depth of despair and covered himself with the ashes of repentance.

The letter for the wife and little girl was written, and money sent to bring them from the place where Loretz had left them when he set out in search of occupation, to find employment as a porter, and the fever, and Albert Spener.

During the first year of co-working Loretz devoted himself to the culture of the willow, and then, as time passed on and hands were needed, he brought one family after another to the place—Moravians all—until now there were at least five hundred inhabitants in Spenersberg, a large factory and a church, whereof Spener himself was a member "in good and regular standing."

Seven years of incessant labor, directed by a wise foresight, which looked almost like inspiration and miracle, had resulted in all this real prosperity. Loretz never stopped wondering at it, and yet he could have told you every step of the process. All that had been done he had had a hand in, but the devising brain was Spener's; and no wonder that, in spite of his familiarity with the details, the sum-total of the activities put forth in that valley should have seemed to Loretz marvelous, magical.

He had many things to rejoice over besides his own prosperity. His daughter was in all respects a perfect being, to his thinking. For six years now she had been under the instruction of Sister Benigna, not only in music, but in all things that Sister Benigna, a well-instructed woman, could teach. She sang, as Leonhard Marten would have told you, "divinely," she was beautiful to look upon, and Albert Spener desired to marry her.

Surely the Lord had blessed him, and remembered no more those years of wanderings when, alienated from the brethren, he sought out his own ways and came close upon destruction. What should he return to the beneficent Giver for all these benefits?

Poor Loretz! In his prosperity he thought that he should never be moved, but he would not basely use that conviction and forget the source of all his satisfaction. He remembered that it was when he repented of his misdeeds that Spener came to him and drew him from the pit. He could never look upon Albert as other than a divine agent; and when Spener joined himself to the Moravians, led partly by his admiration of them, partly by religious impulse, and partly because of his conviction that to be wholly successful he and his people must form a unit, his joy was complete.

The proposal for Elise's hand had an effect upon her father which any one who knew him well might have looked for and directed. The pride of his life was satisfied. He remembered that he and his Anna, in seeking to know the will of the Lord in respect to their marriage, had been answered favorably by the lot. He desired the signal demonstration of heavenly will in regard to the nuptials proposed. Not a shadow of a doubt visited his mind as to the result, and the influence of his faith upon Spener was such that he acquiesced in the measure, though not without remonstrance and misgiving and mental reservation.

To find his way up into the region of faith, and quiet himself there when the result of the seeking was known, was almost impossible for Loretz. He could fear the Judge who had decreed, but could he trust in Him? He began to grope back among his follies of the past, seeking a crime he had not repented, as the cause of this domestic calamity. But ah! to reap such a harvest as this for any youthful folly! Poor soul! little he knew of vengeance and retribution. He was at his wit's end, incapable alike of advancing, retreating or of peaceful surrender.

It was pleasant to him to think, in the night-watches, of the young man who occupied the room next to his. He did not see—at least had not yet seen—in Leonhard a messenger sent to the house, as did his wife; but the presence of the young stranger spoke favorable things in his behalf; and then, as there was really nothing to be done about this decision, anything that gave a diversion to sombre thoughts was welcome. Sister Benigna had spoken very kindly to Leonhard in the evening, and he had pointed out a place in one of Elise's solos where by taking a higher key in a single passage a marvelous effect could be produced. That showed knowledge; and he said that he had taught music. Perhaps he would like to remain until after the congregation festival had taken place.

CHAPTER VII.

THE BOOK

In the morning the master of the house rapped on Leonhard's door and said: "When you come down I have something to show you." The voice of Mr. Loretz had almost its accustomed cheerfulness of tone, and he ended his remark with a brief "Ha! ha!" peculiar to him, which not only expressed his own good-humor, but also invited good-humored response.

Leonhard answered cheerily, and in a few moments he had descended the steep uncovered stair to the music-room.

"Now for the book," Loretz called out as Leonhard entered.

How handsome our young friend looked as he stood there shaking hands with the elderly man, whose broad, florid face now actually shone with hospitable feeling!

"Is father going to claim you as one of us, Mr. Marten?" asked the wife of Loretz, who answered her husband's call by coming into the room and bringing with her a large volume wrapped in chamois skin.

"What shall I be, then?" asked Leonhard. "A wiser and a better man, I do not doubt."

"What! you do not know?" the good woman stayed to say. "Has nobody told you where you are, my young friend?"

"I never before found myself in a place I should like to stay in always; so what does the rest signify?" answered Leonhard. "What's in a name?"

"Not much perhaps, yet something," said Loretz. "We are all Moravians here. I was going to look in this book here for the names of your ancestors. I thought perhaps you knew about Spenersberg."

"I am as new to it all as Christopher Columbus was to the West India islands. If you find the names of my kinsmen down in your book, sir, it—it will be a marvelous, happy sight for me," said Leonhard.

"I'll try my hand at it," said Loretz. "Ha! ha!" and he opened the volume, which was bound in black leather, the leaves yellowed with years. "This book," he continued, "is one hundred and fifty years old. You will find recorded in it the names of all my grandfather's friends, and all my father's. See, it is our way. There are all the dates. Where they lived, see, and where they died. It is all down. A man cannot feel himself cut off from his kind as long as he has a volume like that in his library. I have added a few names of my own friends, and their birthdays. Here, you see, is Sister Benigna's, written with her own hand. A most remarkable woman, sir. True as steel—always the same. But"—he paused a moment and looked at Leonhard with his head inclined to one side, and an expression of perplexity upon his face—"there's something out of the way here in this country. I have not more than one name down to a dozen in my father's record, and twenty in my grandfather's. We do not make friends, and we do not keep them, as they did in old time. We don't trust each other as men ought to. Half the time we find ourselves wondering whether the folks we're dealing with are honest. Now think of that!"

"Are men any worse than they were in the old time?" asked Leonhard, evidently not entering into the conversation with the keenest enjoyment.

"I do not know how it is," said Loretz with a sigh, continuing to turn the leaves of the book as he spoke.

"Perhaps we have less imagination, and don't look at every new-comer as a friend until we have tried him," suggested Leonhard. "We decide that everybody shall be tested before we accept him. And isn't it the best way? Better than to be disappointed, when we have set our heart on a man—or a woman."

"I do not know—I cannot account for it," said Mr. Loretz. Then with a sudden start he laid his right hand on the page before him, and with a great pleased smile in his deep-set, small blue eyes he said: "Here is your name. I felt sure I should find it: I felt certain it was down. See here, on my grandfather's page—Leonhard Marten, Herrnhut, 1770. How do you like that?"

"I like it well," said Leonhard, bending over the book and examining the close-fisted autograph set down strongly in unfading ink. Had he found an ancestor at last? What could have amazed him as much?

"What have you found?" asked Mrs. Loretz, who had heard these remarks in the next room, where she was actively making preparations for the breakfast, which already sent forth its odorous invitations.

"We have found the name," answered her husband. "Come and see. I have read it, I dare say, a hundred times: that was what made me feel that an old friend had come."

"That means," said the good woman, hastening in at her husband's call, and reading the name with a pleased smile—"that means that you belong to us. I thought you did. I am glad."

Were these folk so intent on securing a convert that in these various ways they made the young stranger feel that he was not among strangers in this unknown Spenersberg? Nothing was farther from their thought: they only gave to their kindly feeling hearty utterance, and perhaps spoke with a little extra emphasis because the constraint they secretly felt in consequence of their household trouble made them unanimous in the effort to put it out of sight—not out of this stranger's sight, but out of their own.

"Perhaps you will stop with us a while, and maybe write your name on my page before you go," said Loretz, afraid that his wife had gone a little too far.