abused them, now came to ask pardon, and even the most untractable in former times, stood along the shore as they passed by, entreating them to land, and tell them the words of God. On their return the cold was intense; the boat was covered with so thick a crust of ice that they could scarcely row it, though there were seven of them; and the spray which dashed over congealed so suddenly, that it would have sunk the vessel, but for their unremitted exertions in lading it out. The awakening among the heathen was found to extend much beyond those places which had enjoyed the immediate instruction of the Missionaries: thus Anna, the late Samuel's widow, who had lived above a year with her brother, among the heathen, told the Missionaries, that several leagues up the inlet, where the Brethren could seldom go, there were many people who had a great desire to hear something of our Saviour, if they had but any one to instruct them. "I was often sent for (says she) to perfect strangers, who constrained me to speak, which I did, but I poor creature am still so defective and ignorant, what shall I say to other people?" In this manner, the scattering abroad of the little flock of the baptized, when the necessity of seeking abroad for provisions, drove them from their winter retreat, proved a blessing to the surrounding country. Yet, when they took leave, it was never without pain, and the Missionaries laboured to impress upon their minds the necessity of prayer and watchfulness, in order that they might not fall under the power of the many temptations to which their intercourse with the heathen, and their removal from their teachers, would expose them. The following extract from the diary, represents the Missionaries in the act of dismissing their believing Greenlanders to their summer's employment. "When they were making ready for their departure, we sent for all the baptized brethren and sisters, and spoke with them separately. We were like Jacob when he dismissed Benjamin. We entreated them with tears not to lose Jesus, who was crucified, out of their sight, and to watch over their hearts while surrounded with the temptations of the heathen. They promised us they would, with tears in their eyes, and thanked the A FATAL ACCIDENT. 127 Lamb for the grace they had enjoyed this winter. We blessed them, and kissed them, and went with them down to the strand. There we once more spoke a few words on Acts xx. 32. "And now, Brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified." The Missionaries were much cheered, when they found that some of the baptized returned frequently to see them, and to acquaint them how it went with themselves and the rest of the believing Greenlanders. At such times there was always joy on both sides; the Brethren also rejoiced to hear from the heathen, that the baptized behaved in an edifying manner. Where several of them met in one place, their cordial love of one another was observed by all who saw them. This always excited the astonishment, and often the displeasure, of their heathen countrymen. But a fatal accident soon called the Brethren to the assistance of the people. In Kookœrnen a dead spermaceti whale was driven ashore. All the Greenlanders that come, have a share in such a booty, and on such occasions they keep a great festivity, which is always concluded with a dance. Some Greenlanders from the colony admonished them not to indulge in such riot, but to thank God for his gifts. But the barbarians only laughed at them, and shouted so much the more. In the midst of the tumult one of them fell down and died, soon after two more that had eaten of the fish died, and others the next day. They brought ashore directly many that were sick, and the Brethren were so successful as to rescue a few of them from death by some antidotal drops; for they had heard that the whale was green and blue on the side which was struck by the harpoon, from whence they supposed that the harpoon must have been poisoned. It was observed, that first the eyes of the sick people grew fixed, and their tongues white, then they lost their senses and their feeling, swelled very much, and so died away without any pain. But those that lived fortyeight hours, recovered again. All that had eaten of the green flesh, died, but some of the others were restored by medicine. Upon this occasion a woman brought her sick son of twelve years old upon her back; he desired with a weak voice, that they would tell him something of our Saviour before he died; they did so, and exhorted him to look to the wounds of Jesus with a believing heart, and to think of nothing but, Jesus died for me! Thus be expired during their discourse, after they had blessed him, and recommended his soul into the hands of Jesus. The Brethren could not directly go in their boat, to those that were sick abroad, because they had their house full of them at home, and, among the rest, a believing Greenlander named Noah, whose exemplary life had afforded them much satisfaction. He was uncommonly cheerful during his sickness, and said, as they were keeping a meeting around his bed: "O what great joy have I had this winter, when we have been speaking, praying, and singing together! but now I can be no more with you." They comforted him by saying, that he would mingle with a much larger assembly around the throne of the Lamb, and chant much more agreeably that hymn: "Unto the Lamb that was slain, &c." When they asked him whether he loved our Saviour very much? He answered: "Yes, I do love him." In his last hours he said: "I have another younger brother, whom I would gladly have spoken to of our Saviour. I recommend him to you, and when he comes, pray keep him here, and tell him that I desired it on my death-bed." They sung that hymn with him: The Saviour's blood and righteousness, &c. Sometimes he joined in the singing with much devotion, for he had the command of his senses to the last moment, and testified by his words and deportment his longing to be soon with Christ. May 2d, at five in the morning, he expired, during the imposition of hands and prayer, attended with many tears. On this occasion the Missionaries write thus: "We thank our Saviour for the grace he hath shewn to him and his family. It is not a full year since he came here first, but as soon as grace began to work on him, we perceived an upright walk, and a daily growth. We never saw an unhappy discontented look in him, though he was obliged to put up with very indifferent accommodations; and when the others went to other places to better their MEANS OF GRACE. 129 outward circumstances, he said: I will stay with you, I have no want here. He had not such gifts as the others to speak to the heathen; but he was a disciple on the breast of Jesus. O how doth the Lord love the people! Deut. xxxiii. 3. This text furnished the subject for the funeral discourse." The last moments of several other Greenlanders, who were ushered into eternity by this calamitous event, afforded gratifying evidence that the Gospel had not been proclaimed to them in vain. As the season advanced, various circumstances brought several heathen families to the neighbourhood of the Mission-house; and the Brethren had the satisfaction of seeing a large company of Greenlanders, besides the baptized, gathered together at New Herrnhuth again for the winter. In addition to former means of advancing the heathen in the knowledge of Christianity, a singing school with the grown Greenland women was commenced. The men who had not time to attend the school, learned the hymns and the tunes from the females in their houses. The truths of the Gospel were thus instilled into the minds of the Greenlanders in a very agreeable, and perhaps an easier manner, than by question and answer. They learned the verses presently by heart, and sooner took the freedom to ask the meaning of a verse, than of a discourse. The singing of the Greenlanders was grateful to the heathen themselves, for they had been used from the beginning not to a boisterous vociferation, but to a soft, slow, and intelligible mode of singing, and many a stranger has been induced by it to stay and hear one of the Missionaries, while he catechized the Greenlanders, delivered a discourse, or read a chapter in the Bible. The little flock of the baptized was augmented in the course of this year by eleven persons; and the first Christian pair were united in holy matrimony. We conclude the history of this year by two extracts from the diary, descriptive of the blessing which attended the preaching of the Gospel in the Greenland congregation. "The Lamb of God be heartily praised that towards evening he sends forth light, and puts more frequent opportunities into our hands to dispel the darkness by the light of the Gospel, to make tender the obduracy and coldness of the hearts of men, and to attract them to him by the power of his blood and death. May he help us on from day to day, and convince us and all the other Greenlanders what his blood can effect on poor sinners." Another time they say: "Once there was a great stirring perceived among them, when we read the 22d chapter of St. Matthew to them, and told them that Jesus Christ, the King of Glory, would now have them called too, and that they might all come to him as they were, and get themselves adorned with his blood as the wedding-dress. My heart, says one brother, burned for love, and some of the Greenlanders burst out into floods of tears, and said, that they had felt an energy in their hearts which they could not describe." And here the editor cannot deny himself the pleasure of directing the attention of the reader to the power of divine grace, manifested in the humble spirit which the Missionaries were enabled to maintain, after such unexampled suffering, and in the midst of such elevating success. "When we are sometimes so poor and defective, that we scarce know one word to say, the Lamb of God grants us a look into his wounds, and then the words flow like a torrent, that both we ourselves and the hearers are overpowered with something unutterable. "We all know who and what we are, Dear brethren, you have very little in us to rejoice at; however, rejoice in this, that we become poor sinners more and more. We will remain in faith and love. "We'll follow Jesus' leadings Throughout our life's proceedings, And venture when the Prince permits,' but not as heroes, for we cannot act the hero, but as children, who would gladly do the will of their Father.' The spirit of inquiry after truth which prevailed among the heathen, still continued in progress during |
