856 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



DEC. 1. 



And when thev had gathered the church together 

 they rehearsed all that God had done with them.— 

 Acts 14 : 27. 



Last Sun(''a}' a new Methodist church was 

 dedicated in our town. It rained the day be- 

 fore, it rained in the mornino;, and it raineJ 

 all day. so that the cont,aegations in all the 

 churches were probably sparse, and we 

 thought it quite likely there would not be a 

 veryjiOod gathering at the new church, and 

 that they surely would not be able to raise 

 the money to pay for it. It cost !?l'.i,oOO. The 

 sum of i?90()0 had been already subscribed, so 

 that only ?.'i")00 was to be raised. During the 

 day I attended our own church; but in the 

 evening, as they had a sort of union service at 

 the new church, I was present, and was some- 

 what surprised to learn that the whole of the 

 §3500, and 7)iore foo, had been subsciibed at 

 the forenoon's service, in spite of the rain. 

 The good brother who managed the matter 

 told us that in matters of that sort tlierc were 

 always some subscriptions that, owing to ac- 

 cidents, sickness, or death, would probably 

 not be paid; and he urged that they might 

 raise about .^250 during the evening service, 

 so as to 1 e sure to have enough; and he men- 

 tione 1, likewise, that there were still some 

 things very much reeded in regard to the 

 church, if they had the money. 



It was a gray-haired veteran who called for 

 the subscriptions. He had his $250 in a very 

 short time. I enjoy meeting men of skill. 

 I like to .see a skilled mechanic. I like to 

 converse with a finished scholar; and I enjoy 

 above all things watching a man who h is the 

 power to manipulate a congregntion of people 

 — I mean, of course, where he manipulates 

 them for God's righteousness and God's king- 

 dom. It seems to me a little strange that a 

 people who can not all of themselves and 

 among themselves raise money to pay a debt 

 will do it easily when they get some old hand 

 in among thein to slir them up to a sense of 

 their shortcomings. I do not know very 

 much about such tilings; but I have often 

 heard that they pay a stranger from fifty to a 

 hundred dollars, and even more, to come in 

 among them and tell them what they knozv 

 already they ought to do. 



On Tuesday evening we had a sort of union 

 meeting in this same (.hurch. The ministers of 

 the five churclus of Medina all sat on one 

 platfoim, and we had five short sermons. 

 Some of our older readers may remember that 

 it was during a union nueting something over 

 twenty 3 ears ago that 1 broke away from in- 

 difference and skepticism, and united with 

 God's people; and during the evening I speak 

 of, it kept coming constantly into my mind 

 that my first public testimony was in a union 

 meeting in that same Methodist church — not 

 in the same building, but in the old building 

 that stood on the same ground. One <«f the 

 ministers was an old white-haired veteran. 



He told us about church people and church- 

 going fifty years ago. As he described it so 

 vividly my mind went back to the meetings in 

 the schoolhouse. 



He brought many smiles to the faces of the 

 yoimger ones by telling them how those eve- 

 ning meetings were lighted. The people who 

 were most interested brought each a tallow 

 candle. The candle was first lighted, then 

 tipped over till the tallow dropped on the cor- 

 ner of the desk ; then the broad blunt end of 

 the tallow dip was held down in the melted 

 grease until it " froze fast." The candle then 

 stood securely during the whole evening unless 

 somebocl}' bumped it over. Another way was 

 to stick a penknife through a candle and drive 

 the blade into the window-casing. This did 

 very well unless the room became too warm, 

 and somebody wanted a window let down a 

 little. Then the draft would make the candle 

 "flare." Pretty soon the tallow would run 

 down and drop on somebody's Sunday clothes 

 — perhaps on some young man's coat that he 

 hati put on in order to take his " best girl " to 

 "me;iting." Somelimes the melted liquid 

 dropped on some good lady's Sunday bonnet. 

 The speaker stated that people were then a 

 good deal as they are now ; and somelimes, so 

 Elder Cooley told us, there was " more grease 

 on the l)onnet than there was Christian grace 

 in the heart" after the accidtnt had happen- 

 ed. He .'^aid the minister sometimes used to 

 ride horseback ten or fifteen miles to meet his 

 appointment, and the people would hardly be 

 sa ished, after having taken pains to go so far, 

 unless he gave them a sermon at least two 

 hours long. The people usually came in lum- 

 ber wagons, and he said the wagons were al- 

 most always full. In fact, they would drive 

 around to the neighbors' homes, and the invi- 

 tation to go to the meeting was seldom un- 

 heeded. 



What a change fifty years have brought ! 

 A good many of the younger people who read 

 this piobably never .saw a tallow candle in all 

 their lives. Huber has seen them, for a few 

 nights ago he had one in a Chinese lantern 

 dan.;ling at the tail — no, it was not at the tail, 

 for the kite that carried tlie lantern was a 

 moilern " tailless " one. It dodged about and 

 " cavorted " over the town diu-ing the dark 

 night for an hour or two ; and very likely lots 

 of people will believe, as long as they live, 

 they actu^^lly did get a glimpse of the " air- 

 thip." Huber tried lamps, but the old-fash- 

 ioned sperm candle seemed to ansv\er best. 



Well, the candles are gone; and now, in 

 the climrhcs, at least, the lamf>s are going. 

 This beautiful new chuch was liglited by elec- 

 tricity. In the yery center of the dome over- 

 head a cluster of sparkling globes flashed and 

 glowed like a beau.iful flower, each ] elal of 

 which was like unto a shining meteor ; and 

 lesser lights were scattered here and there 

 lower down on the ceiling and along the walls. 

 They were lighted as if by a flash of light- 

 ning, and extinguished as quickly. How con- 

 venient ! how beautiful ! how grand ! No 

 matter how many times I see these incandes- 

 cent globes — no matter if 1 do meet them now 

 at every turn in my oiiJ)i Iwuie, again and 



