They Are Also Far Cleaner In Their Huts
Than Any But The VERY BEST English Poor.
The 'Predigt' was delivered, after more singing, by a missionary
cabinet-maker, in Dutch, very ranting, and not very wise; the
congregation was singularly decorous and attentive, but did not
seem at all excited or impressed - just like a well-bred West-end
audience, only rather more attentive.
The service lasted three-
quarters of an hour, including a short prayer and two hymns. The
people came out and filed off in total silence, and very quickly,
the tall graceful girls draping their gay silk shawls beautifully.
There are seven missionaries, all in orders but one, the
blacksmith, and all married, except the resident director of the
boys' boarding-school; there is a doctor, a carpenter, a cabinet-
maker, a shoe-maker, and a storekeeper - a very agreeable man, who
had been missionary in Greenland and Labrador, and interpreter to
MacClure. There is one 'Studirter Theolog'. All are Germans, and
so are their wives. My friend the storekeeper married without
having ever beheld his wife before they met at the altar, and came
on board ship at once with her. He said it was as good a way of
marrying as any other, and that they were happy together. She was
lying in, so I did not see her. At eight years old, their children
are all sent home to Germany to be educated, and they seldom see
them again. On each side of the church are schools, and next to
them the missionaries' houses on one side of the square, and on the
other a row of workshops, where the Hottentots are taught all
manner of trades.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 78 of 141
Words from 20852 to 21134
of 37925
