d gone to rest,
rose to give them milk and bread.

The next day they proceeded to Elizabethsdorf, being escorted on the way
by hospitable members of the settlements through which they passed. At
Elizabethsdorf they were received by schoolmaster Seib, a brotherly
Christian man, whose conversation was "seasoned with grace."

After tea, says John Yeardley. we held a devotional meeting, in which I
had an opportunity to address the little company; but the people generally
in the colonies are busy till late in the evening. Being much weary with
our jolting journey, I retired to the waggon for the night, as I supposed;
but W.R. soon came to inform me that a number of young persons, men and
women, were come, it being as early as they could be liberated from their
day's labor, to have some of our company. I sprang from the waggon with
joy, and we had a delightful meeting, with a pretty large company. They
sang repeatedly, and betweentimes I related to them something of my
travels in Germany and Greece, with which they appeared wonderfully
pleased. We were all served with tea out of doors, and the company
remained together till after eleven o'clock, and then returned joyfully
home.

I was much pleased with Seib. He and another schoolmaster, named Kapper,
have been dismissed from their office of teacher, because of their holding
private meetings and preaching in them, or explaining the Scriptures. Some
of the Lutheran ministers are so lifeless that they will not allow the
people to meet in private for their edification. The dead persecute the
living, and light struggles with darkness. This is even the case in some
districts among the Mennonites. The ministers fear that their people
should go before them in religious light. The more I see of the _one-man
system_, the more I prize the gospel liberty in my own beloved
religious Society.

They returned to Neuhoffnung, and on the 13th went to Nicolai Schmidt's at
Steinbach.

Attended the meeting there in the morning, and at Gnadenfeld in the
evening, in both which places opportunity was given me to communicate what
was in my heart for the people.

The settlements of the Molokans, consisting of three villages, each of
about a thousand inhabitants, lie to the south of the German colonies.
These people are native Russians and seceders from the Russo-Greek church;
they receive their name from the word _Moloko_, milk, because they
drink milk on fast-days, which is forbidden b