ists.

On the 3rd, they left for Neuhoffnung. They travelled in a covered
carriage, which, though without springs, was a great improvement on their
last vehicle. They came the first day as for as Konski, where they passed
the night, sleeping in the carriage, the air being very mild the night
through. In the afternoon they arrived at another Mennonite colony,
Schoenweise, where they had a short interview with Pastor Obermanz and a
few of his flock. These people produce a small quantity of silk. The
travellers were now on the Steppes; they found them very thinly peopled,
so that all the country out of sight of the villages appeared like a vast
desert. On the 4th they passed through three colonies--Gruenthal, Priship,
and Petershagen. The settlers here are from all parts of Germany, mostly
from Prussia and Wuertemberg. Next came Halbstadt, the seat of the Bishop,
and Alexanderwohl, where the Friends passed the night. They were
surrounded by a large number of settlements on all sides.

These were the places where, according to his previous impressions and
apprehension of duty, John Yeardley was to have entered on that work of
gospel-labor to which he had so long looked forward. But, instead of
finding, as on former occasions of a similar kind, his heart enlarged and
his mouth opened to preach the word, he seems now to have felt himself
straitened in spirit, and to have been obliged to pass in silence from
colony to colony, a wonder perhaps to others, a cause of humiliation to
himself. Never before, in all his many journeyings, had such a trial
befallen him; and it may be supposed that, coming so soon after the
copious and unrestrained exercise of his gift which he had experienced in
Norway, it would press upon him with peculiar force. The people to whom he
was now come, seem, it is true, to have been in a different state from the
simple-hearted Norwegians, who thirsted for the "pure milk of the word;"
and their comparative indifference to spiritual things may have been a
main cause of the silence which he felt to be imposed upon him. With the
reserve natural to him, he has left but little clue to the motives and
feelings under which he acted. Great must have been the relief when, as
happened on several occasions, his bonds were loosened, and the command
was renewed to speak in the name of his only-loved and gracious Lord.

On the 5th they passed through several colonies to Gnadenfeld, where, says
J.Y.:--

We halted to