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T —i BLACK AMISH OF INDIANA
>.. L.lj
A Settlement That B2rs the Modern—Why the People
>x Adame County Hate the Threshing Machine—A
Stern, Strait Sect That Frowns on Art, But Practices
Charity.
TV..- s'.cam thrasher "Trust-," ;ve
no hold on the conservative “black”
Amish settlements of Indiana, in
which, it is asserted, says the Fort
Wayne correspondent of the
apolis News, that the world is flat
instead of round; that man has
ri~ht to work God’s winds by the use
of wind- ’ll-, and where the devil
said to he in steam and in man's
modern devices. The thrashing sea
son has just begun in this section of
the State, and in the conservative
“black” Amish settlements, which
are strung in spots fiom Troy, O., to
Eikhart, Tnd., one ran wit ~s the
sights of several decades ago—
thrashing by horsepower.
The harvest of the grain in these
settlements was equally as interest¬
ing. The wheat was ah cut by ma¬
chines that were free from ..ie self
binding improvements of recent
years and it was hound by hand.
The men are so firmly grounded in
their religious convictions against
the new, quick, “devilish” order of
things wear long beards and long
hair that have not been profaned by
the use of shears or clippers, --”1
they dr- in coarse garments of
black or work garments of a yellow¬
ish brown cast. These garments are
made without the use of the sewing
machine—ar’, if possible, they are
made of cloth that lias not bee t
woven in a steam loom, Indiana has
many inter"-"— queer religious
sects, hut probably the “black” Am¬
ish people are the queerest, and one
can see them at this season of the
year in t.teir most interesting phases.
They began cutting their wheat
two weeks ago, and carefully avoided
all of the --'"dern labor-saving ma¬
chines. They brought out of hiding
some of the old-time implements the
country at large in its rapid march
of progress discarded about six gen¬
erations ago—those old machines
that let the wheat fall on a bed from
which, at Intervals, It is raked by
hand and carefully bound by hand,
wheat itself Instead of twine being
used for the binding.
* ,\ow that the thrashing season is
on. the conservative' “black” Amish
a- carefully avoids the steam throrh
er am 1 is proceeding along equally
and horsepow er. He
aays that the devil himself la in the
new devices of man to eliminate
work,* and the conservative “black”
Amish will not be the devil's patron.
Berne, located in Adams Co-,-"*-,',
might be said to be the capital of
the "black” Amish belt, and it is
around that locality that the most
interesting of the old customs and
prejudices of the queer lot of people
can be observed. They fight any¬
thing that in tHeir opinion encour¬
ages slothfulness, and, of course, find
Biblical support for every one if
their firmly grounded convictions
against modern methods. They be¬
lieve that the sewing machine is an
invention of the evil powers to tempt
women to laziness. They prohibit
wind pumps because they believe it
wrong for man to have God pump
the water for him.
“Devil in Them.”
The steam engine and the electric
dynamo, both of the great labor ja' - -
ers, are considered the climax of the
devil’s efforts to commit the flesh to
weakness, and no “black” Amish
farmer will use a binder, thrasher, or
any of the other modern farm imple¬
ments because “the devil is in them.”
They do not believe in a paid min¬
istry, for it is held to be anotne* ..j
vice of the devil; they do not believe
in churches, but like the apost’es of
old they gather in their upper cham¬
bers and worship with the spirit.
Whenever the “black” Amish builds
a house, he provides at least one big
room for Sunday services. Every
Sabbath, the "black” Amish of a com¬
munity gather at the home of one of
their number for religious ser.ice.
Of course, no musical instrument—
and certainly not an organ—is used.
The singing is all in a nasal tone.
The women sit on one side of the
room and the men on the other. The
host of the day feeds the worship¬
pers and their horses. Beer and
wine are used freely, but temperate¬
ly.
The homes of the "black" Amish
are good, substantial ones, and are
free from gewgaws or flashy paint—
in fact, most of them are either paint¬
ed a plain white or arc not p#*.nted
at all. They religiously avoid all
worldly ostentation and personal
glorification.
The men dress in either black or
the coarse brownish-yellow cloth in
which they work, and the women and
children ordinarily dress in blue
gingham or calico, or in black. The
women wear Quaker bonnets. Even
buttons are considered ornamental,
and are tabooed, and hooks and eyes
are used in their stead. When they
ride, they jog along behind animals
that are as fat as they can be made,
and as “slow as sin,” and they will
not ride on any wagon or buggy that
has easy springs, though some have,
in recent years, adopted half-springs
that are about equal to no springs.
Though th-y denounce the steam
engine, they will—probably with
mental protest*—patronize the rail¬
roads when going on a long journey.
For a short journey they use their
pringless wagons. Their homes are
as severely plain as their garments.
They carefully remove all nickel dec¬
orations from the stoves that they
buy, and most of them use rag car¬
pets.
They refuse to stop work by pro¬
claiming the dinner hour by the
means of the good old reliable din¬
ner bell. It is another invention of
the evil one to entangle man in the
meshes of slothfulness and useless¬
ness. They are all farmers, most of
them holding that business and town
life are sinful. All of the older ones
believe implicitly in a full frother
liood of mankind, and when one has
urgent need of something he does
not possess, he goes to his brother’s
barn or larder, and gets it without
asking.
Opposed to Pictures.
They stand out resolutely against
the photographer’s art—a protest
against “graven images”—and pict¬
ures of them can be made only when
they do not know it. They do not
believe in swearing or affirming, and
several years ago the State of Indi¬
ana had to proceed against some of
them at Berne for refusing to make
tax returns. Suits were also brought
against certain of them for failing
to make marriage returns. They
read nothing but the Bible, and, most
of them being of German or French
descent, they hold to the German lan¬
guage. In fact, as soon as the win¬
ter public school is over, the school
houses are opened again for German
school, which lasts through the sum¬
mer.
The “black” Amish are an offshoot
from the Mennonite church. They
are, in. fact, the last remaining land¬
mark cf the old Mennonite church.
All of -ad the after others s^em to hav» N>£
— a succession splits,
which has resulted in eight or nine
various Mennonite churches, the ma¬
jority of the membership of the Men¬
nonite church is at last thoroughly
up to date.
Charitable and Kind.
Queer as they may be, the “black”
Amish—as well as all Amish—have
many good points. They are frugal,
upright, and honest. They are very
charitable and kind, except to those
u ho break off from tlieir particular
beliefs, and to them they are most re¬
lentless—fathers even refusing shel¬
ter to children who differ from them.
Though men, women and children
in their severe costumes look most
forbidding and gloomy, they are after
all, a happy, contented lot, and are
rather free-hearted. They are ceen
in their lighter moods at marriages,
which are celebrated in true old Ger¬
man and French style. A great deal
of wine and beer is imbibed.
The great period of festivities is
at Christmas, and at that season one
again catches a glimpse of old Ger¬
many. All kinds of fancy cakes,
great supplies of candy and lighted
candles make it the great festival of
the children. While modern relig¬
ious revolution may be against medi¬
cine, this old conservative people
hold firmly to the patent medicine
bottle and the doctor seems to be
the patron saint.
It is said that some of their phys¬
ical shortcomings are due now to the
fact that intermarriages are tending
to weaken the stock of what was
once a sturdy race. They have lived
aloof from the world around them
and of necessity their marriages,
which largely are “arranged,” as in
the old country, by the parents and
religious advisers, have been among
themselves.
Though this sort of life seems to
be monotonous it is surprising to see
the hold that the older people have
on their offspring. Few of them
break away from the stiff poke bon¬
nets that the girls get in infancy;
few seem to long for their “graven
images” being struck off by the pho¬
tograph man. and all seem to be very
well satisfied with the hooks and
eyes, three good meals a day and the
peaceful life. There now seems to
be no great tendency shown on the
part of the young of these people to
get into the strenuous life, thougn
when there was a break a few years
ago and a crowd of young men at
Berne did lay aside their cloaks of
seclusion and clipped ope another’s
hair they were almost suffocated by
the harvest that fell around the
shingling chair and that nearly filled
up the room.
The Age of Machinery.
We live in the age of machinery.
The thinking, directing mind be¬
comes daily of more account, while
mere brawn fails correspondingly in
value from day to day. That eccen¬
tric philosopher, Elbert Hubbard,
says in one of his esrays, “Where a
machine will do better work than the
human hand, we prefer to let the ma¬
chine do the work.”
It has been but a few year3 since
the cotton gin, the “spinning jenny”
and the power loom displaced the
hand picker, the spinning wheel and
the hand loom; since the reaper and
binder, the rake and tedder, the
mowing machine took the place of
the old cradle, scythe, pitchfork and
hand rake; since the friction match
superseded the flint and tinder; since
the modern paint factory replaced
the slab and inuller, the paint pot
and paddle.
In every case where machinery has
been introduced to replace hand la
j bor, the laborers have resisted the
change; and as the weavers, the
sempstresses, and the farm laborers
protested against new-fangled looms,
sewing machines and agricultural
implements, so in more recent times
compositors have protested against
typesetting machines, glass blowers
against bottle-blowing machines, and
painters against ready mixed paints.
And as in the case of these short¬
sighted classes of an earlier day, so
with their imitators of to-day, the
protest will be in vain. It is a pro¬
test against civilization, against the
common weal, against their own wel¬
fare.
The history of all mechanical im¬
provements shows that workmen are
the first to be benefited by them.
The invention of the sewing machine,
instead of throwing thousands of
women out of employment, increased
the demand to such an extent that
thousands of women have been em¬
ployed, at better wages, for shorter
hours and easier work where hun¬
dreds before worked in laborious
misery to eke out a pitiable exist¬
ence. It was so with spinning and
weaving machinery, with agricultural
implements—in fact, it is so with
every notable improvement. The
multiplication of books in the last
decade is a direct result of the in¬
vention of linotype machinery and
fast presses. ^
The mixed pain industry, in which
carefully designed paints for house
painting are pr pared on a large
scale by speci% machinery, is an¬
other improvement of the same type.
The cheapue d general excellence
of these pre has so stimulated
paim.
L services of painters
ha-., w*,. .,on ngly multiplied. Be
fore the adv#nt of these goods a
well-pained house was noticeable
from its ratity, whereas to-day an ill
painted house is conspicuous.
Nevertheless the painters, as a
rule, following the example set by
the weavers, the sempstresses and
the farm laborers of old, almost to a
man, oppose the improvement. It
is a real improvement, however, and
simply because of that fact the sale
of such products has increased until
during the present year it will fall
not far short of 90,000,000 or 100,
000,000 gallons.
Hindsight is always better than
foresight, and most of us who de¬
plore the short-gightedness of our an¬
cestors would do well to see that we
do not in turn furnish “'terrible ex¬
amples” to our posterity.
P. G.
Crimes of passion are weaVher, more preval¬
ent in hot and humid philos¬
ophizes the New York World. Crimes
of ingenuity and skill have a higher
development in winter, but crimes of
violence show chart-waves like the
Weather Bureau’s thermometric
maps.
WHY?
Mamma—Remember that every
cloud has a silver lining.
Little Bess—Then why don't God
turn ’em inside out?—Chicago News
--- v-
BUT OH! THE DIFFERENCE.
I loved a dark-haired girl last year,
I felt she was my fate,
I held that brunette very dear
(Blondes I abominate).
But, when I heard of her this year,
I really could have cried,
Excuse a (paradox and) tear!
1 he girl l loved had—dyed.
. New York Sun.
DANGEROUS.
Mrs. Hornbeak (In the midst of her
^reading)—Mercy sakes alive! Here
is an item about a surgeon, over at
Biggerville, removin’ an epithelioma
from a man’s lip
Farmer Hornbeak—Well, I sh’u’d
Judge it was about time for people to
quit using such long words when it
requires a doctor to git ’em out.—
Americans are amazed, and inclin¬
ed to laugh, when they see friendly
Arabs meet. Their salutation is al¬
most grotesque, fir they shake hands
seven or eight times, and sometimes
repeatedly kiss each other.
POSSESSIONS.
Man wants but little here below,
Where little’s to be had:
And when lie gets It data show
He gets it mighty bad.
HIS POSITION.
Stella—“Did he get on his knees
when he proposed?”
Bella—“No, he stood pat.”—New
York Sun.
B’GOSH.
Silas Hayfield—“That stuff grow¬
ing over there is cattails.”
Miss Summergirl—“Do they have
to pull them up to get the cats?”—
Life.
HEFTY WORDS.
“They say that Henry James care¬
fully weighs each word before he
sets it down.”
“That’s so? And what does he
use? Hay scales?”
LITERALLY.
• “Did you see the human ostrich
eating glass mirrors?”
“Yes, that’s what you would call
food for reflection, isn’t it?”—Louis*
ville Courier-Journal.
NO COMFORT IN THAT.
Kwoter — “You know, they say
‘pity is akin to love,’ and so-”
Glumley (despondently) — “Per¬
haps, but it’s a very poor relation.”
—Catholic Standard and Times.
OLD-FASHIONED AND FOOLISH.
“Simmons is an old-fashioned sort
of a chap, isn’t he?”
“I never noticed it.”
“He still gets excited every time
the world’s largest steamship is
launched.”—Chicago Record-Herald.
WANTED TO RETAIN ’EM.
%k
Jessie—“You seem to like his at¬
tentions. Why don't you marry
him?”
Jennie—“Because I like his atten¬
tions.”—Ally Sloper’s Half-Holiday.
THE CRIME.
Dismukes—“Oh, well; I can com¬
fort myself with the thought that
poverty is no crime.”
Piggmus — “On the contrary, it
must be a crime, because it is punish¬
able by hard labor for life.”—Ameri*
can Spectator.
POLITENESS OF CHILDHOOD.
“What kind of pie will you have,
Willie—mince or apple?”
“I’ll take two pieces of each,
please.”
“Two pieces!”
“Yes’m. Mamma told me not to
ask twice.”—Life.
CONDITIONAL.
Colored Stevedore—“Ah wants a
day off, cap’n, ter look up a job fo’
mah wife.”
Mate—“Will you be back to-mor¬
row?”
Colored Stevedore—“Yes, ef she
don’t git it.”—Judge.
THE PRICE OF VANITY.
“What became of that life-guard
who had forty-one medals for saving
people's lives?”
“The poor fellow fell out of a
launch last month with them all on,
and the combined weight sank him.”
—Minneapolis Journal.
i
HELPFUL.
“I suppose now, Susie,” said the
visitor, “that you're getting old
enough to help your mamma at her
housework.”
“Oh, yes,” replied Susie, "when¬
ever she tells me to get out of her
way I don’t.”—Philadelphia Press.
THE JEALOUS WIFE.
“I don’t see why she Isn’t happy
with him. He’s certainly very atten¬
tive her.” '
to j
“That’s just it. She argues that;
he couldn’t be so attentive to her. if,
he hadn’t had a lot of experience.
with some one else.”—Catholic Stan-'
dard and Times !
THE PROPER TERM.’
“I was drivin’ through a country
road-”
“You mean driving over it, do you
not?”
“No; I was drivin’ through it. It
was three feet deep in some places."
—xjouisville Courier-Journal.
THE MIGHT OF PIE.
“I heard of a fellow the other day
who fell from an open window where
he was sitting eating pie, and was in¬
stantly killed.”
"I don’t doubt it. I’ve often been
knocked out by pie myself.”—Balti¬
more American.
FADED TO A SHADOW.
Worn Down by Five Years of Suffer¬
ing From Kidney Complain/.
Mrs. Remethe Myers, of ISO South
Tenth St., Ironton, O., says: *T have
worked hard in my time and have
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for six months I could not get out of
the house. I was nervous, restless
and sleepless at night, and lame and
sore in the morning. Sometimes ev¬
erything would whirl and blur before
me. I bloated so badly I could not
wear tight clothing, and had to put
on shoes two sizes larger than usual.
The urine was disordered and pas¬
sages were dreadfully frequent. I
got help from the first box of Doan’s
Kidney Pills, however, and by the
time I had taken four boxes the pain
and bloating were gone. I have been
In good health ever since.”
Sold by all dealers. 5 0 cents a
box. Foster-Milburn Co., Buffalo,
N. Y.
A Cautious Sentinel.
It was the small brother of pretty
Margaret who opened the front door
In response to Mr. Goodyear’s ring,
and his face took on a singularly alert
expression as he surveyed the caller.
“No she Isn’t In,” said Margaret’s
brother. “Are—are you Mr. Hamlin?”
“No,” said the young man, “I am
Mr. Goodyear. Dees that make any
difference about her being at home?”
and he looked searchingly at the boy.
“Course not!” said .Bobby, indig¬
nantly. “I don’t tell stories, nor Mar¬
garet doesn’t. But if you’d been Mr.
Hamlin, I was to tell something about
get ten ceatv
if I did it right and didn’t tell
wrong one. I need that money, and
so, you see, I didn’t want to make
any mistake. Good-by!”
AN HONEST MILLIONAIRE.
They were motoring In to business
in the ciool of the morning.
‘Fine place, that, old Millionaire
Bunk’s,” said the visitor, as they shot
past a great Elizabethan house set
in a sunken garden. “What sort of
a chap is Bunk, any way?”
“Well,” said the host, “since his
retirement from business, an honester
man than Bunk doesn’t breathe.”—At¬
lanta Constitution.
JURY WAS EXPERIENCED.
“Flatman, I hear you were arrested
the other day for insulting and brow¬
beating a janitor. How did you come
out?”
“I was tried for it and acquitted.”
“On the ground that it was justifi¬
able?”
“No; the jury couldn’t be made to
believe such a thing was possible.”—
Chicago Tribune.
WELL PEOPLE TOO
Wise Doctor Gives Postum to Con¬
valescents.
A wise doctor tries to give nature
(ts best chance by saving the little
strength of the already exhausted
patient, and building up wasted en¬
ergy with simple but powerful nour¬
ishment.
“Five years ago,” writes a doctor,
“I commenced to use Postum in my
own family instead of coffee. I ,/as
so well pleased with the results that
I had two grocers place it in stock,
guaranteeing its sale.
“I then commenced to recommend
It to my patients in place of coffee,
as a nutritious beverage. The con¬
sequence is, every store in town is
now selling it, as it has become a
household necessity in many homes.
"I’m sure I prescribe Postum as
often as any one remedy In the Ma¬
teria Medica—in almost every case
of indigestion and nervousness I
treat, and with -the best results.
"When I once introduce it into a
family. It is quite sure to remain. I
shall continue to use it and prescribe
it in families where I practice.
“In convalescence from pneumonia,
typhoid fever and other cases, 1 give
it as a liquid, easily absorbed diet.
You may use my letter as a refer¬
ence any way you see fit.” Name
given by Postum Co., Battle Creek,
Mich. Read “The Road to Wellville”
in pkgs. “There's s>
been exposed again
and again to changes
of weather. It is no
wonder my kidneys
gave out and I went
all to pieces at last.
For five years I was
fading away and
finally so weak that