reckless about blows, to regard a big boy or a
schoolmaster as a natural enemy, and to feel
proud because there were few others so
prompt to defy or insult the teacher, or to
bite him while he plied the stick. I was
familiar with filth and falsehood. I am
ashamed to think of all that I, a very young
child, had learned, and I wonder at the
little incidents belonging to that time, which
show how hard a struggle the good spirit that
belongs to childhood had maintained, in self-
defence, against such miserable influences.
But the Seven Champions of Christendom
defended me from a great deal of harm. I
should have been undone had not the genii
and the white cat, whom I nursed secretly,
been on my side, and given me good counsel.

Brother Mieth it was who met me on the
pier when I first landed at New Unkrant,
with my small portmanteau, and there
welcomed me in broken English as no teacher
had ever welcomed me before.

He took me into a school containing about
one hundred and fifty boys. These were
associated as close comrades in groups of
twenty, formed by herding together those
most nearly alike in age. Each herd had its
own rooms superintended by two brothers:
one brother to take charge of the minds, the
other of the bodies, of the children. The
whole school dined and supped together in
one hall; we all slept together in one mighty
dormitory: each in the little bed that he himself
had made; and we all met at chapel. In
the classes that were changed from hour to
hour, we were thrown together in sets formed,
of course, not according to our age, but our
attainments. Out of doors, again, all were
together, often in the common playground, a
large garden outside the town. Each, therefore,
knew all. Of the play-garden, be it said
that there was material provided there for
plenty of rough sport, and there were temples
in it adorned with tablets to the memory of
dead teachers who had been much loved.
For incidents recurring almost daily, our
imaginations were appealed to, and our hearts
were touched.

That was the spirit of the school. Its
power was immense. The multitude of boys,
living together as a sort of federal republic,
was not only maintained in perfect discipline
without an act of violence, but very few went
away from among us whose minds had not
been, to some degree, enriched, enlarged,
ennobled. During the two years that I spent
there, not a blow was struck, except the few
that seasoned our own boyish quarrels. They
were few enough.

We were not milksops. We braved peril
in many of our sports; we were for true
knights, not for recreants; cowardice was
abhorred among us; we were chevaliers
without fear; but also, more than is usual
among communities of boys, without
reproach. A spirit of truthfulness, of gentleness,
of cordiality between the teachers and
the taught, pervaded our whole body;
punishments of the most nominal kinds sufficed
for the scholastic discipline; insubordination,
there was none; secret contempt of authority,
there was none. New-comers brought vices
with them very often, or began their new
school-life in the wrong tune; the good spirit
soon infected them; they fell into the right
harmony within a week or a month. And what
was the secret of the influence exerted over us
by these gentle Moravians? They lived
before us blameless lives; they had, in
themselves, a child-like simplicity of mind and
purpose; they were so truthful that they did
not seem able to understand deceit; and, as
I have said, they won our hearts by suffering
the free play of our fancies.

These Moravians are said sometimes to
resemble Quakers, and there is not much
fancy in a Quaker perhaps. It may be said,
for example, that the plan of burial used by
the brotherhood is Quaker-like in its
simplicity. There is a square churchyard with
a broad walk down the middle. The first
brother who dies is laid in one corner, and
the first sister who dies is laid in the opposite
corner; the dead who follow, are set in rows,
as beans are set in a field. The rows of
brothers multiply on one side of the walk, the
rows of sisters on the other, and no difference
of rank is shown. There is but a single form
for the flat stone that is laid over each grave
as a lid. Formality this may be, but it did
not seem formality to us. Our hearts were
moved at the aspect of a graveyard that was
so much like our own dormitory with its
rows of beds—a place in which all rested as
equals, until the time of the awakening. It
stirred our fancies more than any fancies
could be stirred by the colossal tea-caddies
in stone, and the stone tea-urns without
spouts, that indicate, in English cemeteries,
where the respectable dead bodies have been
placed. Concerning them, a child can only
wonder why there are only urns and tea-
caddies,—why none of the tombs are decorated
with a cup and saucer, or a spoon, or
sugar-tongues—where the well-executed
toast-rack is.

Of this Moravian churchyard, I have
more to say, for it was, in truth, part of our
school. Not that we learnt any geography
lessons among the tombs, but we did
certainly learn lessons there. I am about to
horrify some nervous parents. We boys used to
see corpses and attend funerals.

Gentle Brother Mieth was but a young
man. At one time of his life he had been to
the Greenland Mission; but, failing health
had warned his companions to send him
home to his own milder climate: so it chanced,
therefore, that he ended his life as a teacher
at New Unkrant. He taught, and he was
prompt to learn, while holding friendly talk
with boys from all parts of the world, assembled
in the school. There were a great many
of us English—all sad braggers about our