The Amish by Fredric Klees

The reliance the Mennonites put on the Bible, in which each man tended to interpret the Scriptures for himself, as well as the lack of an educated ministry, led to disputes and even division within the church. Even before the emigration to Pennsylvania the Amish had split off from the Mennonites. The principal theological difference which caused this split was the Amish doctrine of Meidung-literally avoidance or shunning. Based on the Pauline injunction "not to keep company," "not to eat" with an unfaithful member (I Corinthians 5: I I), but to "put away from among yourselves that wicked person," this doctrine is used to correct and punish an erring member. In 1693 Jacob Amman, a Mennonite preacher in the canton of Bern, began to insist on the strict enforcement of the doctrine of Meidung. His followers, splitting off from the Mennonite Church, were given the name of their leader and called Amish. This ban, as determined by Dirk Philips, an early Amish preacher, includes all social relations and particularly those of bed and board. Today when an Amishman is put "under the ban" it means complete ostracism: business, social, religious, and domestic. He becomes literally "as a heathen man and a publican." None of his fellow church members may buy anything from him or sell anything to him; they may not visit with him or pass the time of day. His wife and his children may not even sit at the same table with him. The Mennonites held that this point of view was too severe, that Paul's injunction "not to eat" was intended only to keep the transgressor from taking Communion. Hence the split.

Footwashing, too, was stressed by Jacob Amman, and this tended to set the Amish off from the Mennonites even more. This rite was later adopted by the Brethren, or Dunkards, and became one of the characteristic features of that church. The holy kiss as an expression of fellowship and brotherly love was also commonly used by the Amish. In essentials, however, the Amish are a branch of the Mennonite Church, which they came to recognize more and more during the Second World War, when they worked with the Mennonites on relief.

Though little by little the Amish built up a culture of their own different in numerous ways from that of the Mennonites and in amazingly complete detail unlike that of "the world's people," in the eyes of most Pennsylvanians it is their use of wagons and buggies and the brilliant colors of their dress that distinguish the Amish from the Mennonites. Vivid delphinium-blue, bright violet, rich wine-red, and shouting winter-wheat green: such are the colors the Amish choose to wear. Mennonites usually dress in black or gray, or at most in a coffee-and-cream tan or a quiet print; but the Amish are a treat to the eye. The gaudy streak in the Pennsylvania Dutch comes out strongly in the clothes of the Amish. These gay colors have become so identified with the Amish in the Dutch country that storekeepers have difficulty in selling material of these colors to ordinary people; they are rejected as being too Amish. Men's and boys' shirts and women's and girls' dresses among the Amish are almost always of these colors. The men and boys except for their shirts wear black-broadbrim hats with low crowns, in winter felt and in summer natural straw; coats without either lapels or outside pockets; vests and trousers. The trousers instead of buttoning or zipping up the front are of the broadfall type often known as "barn-door breeches." It is ironic that this type of trousers is confined to the Amish and until this year-to sailors, the one group as guarded in their morals as any people in America and the other noted for the freedom of their ways with women. The trousers are kept up by homemade suspenders or by a drawstring around the waist. The men's and boy's clothes are made at home or are made by a local seamstress. After all, where would you go to buy barn-door breeches or coats without lapels? The hats are made by a hatter in the neighborhood. Hooks and eyes and even zippers take the place of buttons. It was the lavish use of buttons on military uniforms back In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that led to the Amish ban on buttons. Neckties, too, are forbidden as worldly; but with the bushy Amish beards they are not missed. In winter an overcoat with a short cape reaching to the shoulders is worn, a garment that might well have kept warm the ancestors of these Amishmen when they landed in Philadelphia in the reigns of George I and George II.

The women, with their brightly colored dresses, wear black bonnets and black aprons and in winter black shawls. The dresses are very like those worn by the Mennonites, a tight bodice with long sleeves, a kerchief brought to a point below the waist both in front and in back, and a long full skirt. Kerchiefs of the same color as the dress are worn by married women, white kerchiefs by unmarried women who have joined meeting. They wear no jewelry except, say, a pin to fasten the shawl. Their hands are plain and unadorned-no diamonds, no painted fingernails. The little girls dress much the same except that their bonnets are brightly colored. Scampering across the fields on their way home from school, the little girls seem all bonnets and shawls, with thin little legs sticking out below. The bonnet worn by the Amishwoman is a commodious one, much larger than the bonnets worn by the women of the other plain sects. It has a full skirt or rome in the back, one of the distinguishing marks of an Amishwoman. Under the capacious bonnets they wear simple little house caps of white lawn with long strings, which are usually left untied. These house or prayer caps, as they are sometimes called, are worn by the women of all the "plain people" throughout the day to cover the head, as St. Paul commanded. Thus so every woman at every moment of the day is ready for prayer. The hair is parted in the middle and combed smoothly with a plait on either side that is wound around the head and fastened in a knot, which in turn is tucked under the back of the white house cap. The hair, worn without combs, is never curled. No Amish woman ever gets a permanent wave; indeed, no Amish woman ever sets foot inside a beauty parlor. For them the world of fashion does not exist.

Even more picturesque than their elders are the children, whose clothes are copies in little of the ones worn by the grownups. The boys have the same broadbrim hats, which they keep on their heads throughout most of the day, even when playing ball. Their black trousers are high of waist and rather short, reaching beyond the middle of their calves. Broad bands of cloth across the shoulders serve as suspenders. In winter or on Sundays black coats and shoes and stockings are worn, but on weekdays in summer all Amish children go barefoot. Sometimes even an Amishwoman, when washing off the porch or raking her smoothly shaven grass plot, goes barefoot as a goose. The skirts of the older Amish girls are not long like those of the older women but, like the boys' pants, stop at the tops of the old-fashioned shoes, which are high-laced. The babies, too, from the time they are born are put into regulation Amish dress-girl babies in bonnets and boy babies in broad-brim hats. On tiny children the costume is unmatched; it is amusing and it is bewitching. They are as quaint and beguiling as the children in the paintings of the old Dutch masters. When a friend of mine-one of the world's people-took his children to Lancaster market, they were so enchanted by the sight of the Amish children that they turned to their father and said, "Daddy, why can't we be Amish too?"

One of the many pleasures of living in the Dutch country is the glimpse every now and again of the Amish. A buxom Amish mother sharing the front seat of a rockaway with her little serious daughter and her even smaller son tucked in between them, a young bearded father in an open buggy with a wide-eyed little boy by his side: such a sight as either of these is enough to set a man up for the day. Yet to catch the flurry of purple skirts it is almost necessary to live in their home county of Lancaster, no very great hardship in itself. One Sunday a number of springs ago I was showing some friends the Dutch country. I had hoped to come upon some "plain people"; but the morning was about gone and we had met with little success. Except for half a dozen Mennonites at Goodville we had seen no bonnets and shawls. Suddenly we came upon a whitewashed Amish meetinghouse by the side of the road with the congregation just coming out. I jammed on the brakes and for ten seconds we sat staring, until I realized how grossly discourteous we were. We moved on, reluctant to leave, and in the next moment stopped again. In the graveyard behind the meeting-house were fifteen or twenty little Amish children for whom the long preachings had been too much. In charge of two girls in their early teens they were picking fat bunches of the largest golden dandelions I have ever seen-shy little girls with rose or blue bonnets and little black jackets and dresses of purple, blue, or green; little solemn boys looking out from under broadbrim hats. There they stood among the tombstones, the thick green grass powdered with dandelions. Along the fence row that separated the graveyard from the rich Lancaster County fields were cherries in blossom. Spring and youth and beauty were caught here all together in one picture, and behind it all was the suggestion of death to give it poignancy.

"The Beardy Men" is a name sometimes given to the Amish, and not without reason. An Amishman's beard and his long hair set him off from most of the Mennonites, who almost always are clean-shaven, and from other Americans as well. Only some of the River Brethren and older Dunkards are likely to sport such beards. Among the older Amishmen the beards are long and bushy-fine, magnificent beards. These are patriarchs straight out of the Old Testament. Among the younger men the beards are of scantier growth. Here again the Amish are taking to heart the admonitions of the Bible (Leviticus 19: 27 and 21 :5). The upper lip is always shaved, since two or three centuries ago the mustache was the pride, almost the hallmark, of the soldier. The young Amishman, however, often shaves before he marries, although he is not supposed to shave once he joins church. Many of the young unmarried men let their beards grow for a few days before church but shave at other times. The eJders disregard this as one of the more innocent foibles of youth; but if the young Amishman marries and shaves he soon finds himself in hot water. The Amishman's hair is bobbed at the top of his ears with bangs across the forehead and a part in the middle. Parting on the side is a matter for church discipline. The haircuts are homemade, a bowl to clap on the head and a pair of shears being all that are needed. Amishmen never payout a penny to a barber.

The Amish wagons and buggies also distinguish them from the world's people. That heathen invention, the automobile, is forbidden by the church. Sober married folk generally use small boxlike wagons or rockaways open only in front. The tops are of gray, black, yellow, white, or brown, all according to the particular branch of the Amish church to which the owner belongs. There is no dashboard, no mudguards, no whip socket. Set high on four wheels, it has a spare and naked appearance. Inside it is usually crowded: almost always three or four little faces peer over the shoulders of the bearded father and bonneted mother on the front seat. The young, beardless bachelors drive topless buggies polished so highly that they shine even on an overcast November day. They drive spirited horses, which they handle with coolness and skill. They are fine-looking animals beautifully groomed. The harness is spotless; each ring and buckle shines. Yesterday there was no checkrein on the bridle, but this vanity is creeping in. When the young men look with envious eyes at the new-model cars speeding along the Lincoln Highway, the elders find it wise to give in on checkreins and mettlesome horses. At the same time there is something pleasingly boyish in the satisfaction these young men take in their briskly trotting horses and even in the recklessness with which they drive. They may not be able to do seventy miles an hour in a sports-model roadster, but they can and do drive like demons down the country pikes. Their elders are unhappy about this. There is the ever present danger that their sons may break their necks. Ever more likely is the growth of an overweening pride in the horses; and pride, among the Amish, is a cardinal sin. But what can one do to curb the hot blood of youth? A topless buggy may also be used by a young married couple without children, or by an old couple; but the solid family man drives a rockaway, and the dashing young Amish buck would die rather than drive the boxlike family wagon.

In winter sleighs take the place of the wagons and buggies, but sleighs of one color only. Sleighs of two colors are forbidden; and sleigh bells, too, are looked upon as worldly. This objection to bells is carried so far that on Amish farms a horn is blown instead of a bell being rung to call the men in from the fields to dinner. Naturally, sleighing parties are considered a worldlyy pleasure. With their preference for the horse and buggy the Amish have only a modified enthusiasm for paved roads. Dirt roads are easier on their horses' feet.

Although most branches of the Amish forbid their members to own automobiles, they may ride in a car if it is not for pleasure. They may take the bus to Lancaster just as they may take the train to Philadelphia. The opposition to cars is not founded on any biblical injunction but is due to their desire to live apart from the world. Since Lancaster County is the heart of the Amish domain and since this county is one of the most thickly settled parts of Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania one of the most populous sections of the Union, to keep the world at a distance is by no means easy.

As in the case of the Mennonites, it was the bitter persecution with which they met in Europe that led the Amish to turn their backs on the world. Seeking religious freedom, they started to migrate to Penn's colony early in the eighteenth century until by the middle of the century a good part of all the Amish in Europe had settled in Pennsylvania. Although a few stray settlers came earlier, the first substantial colony of Amish to come to America arrived in Philadelphia on October 8, 1737, on the Charming Polly-a singular name to be associated with this godly people. The newcomers settled along the Northkill Creek in the northwestern part of Berks County, not far from a gap in the Blue Mountains, the very edge of the frontier. The land they took up was a lovely part of the Great Valley in a section where the floor of the valley is very uneven. Little rounded hills shoulder one another for space, and in the little valleys between the hills are brooks. To the north rise the Blue Mountains.

Unfortunately, the Northkill country was a poorly chosen site. With the French and Indian War about to break out, the Amish had selected an extremely vulnerable position. Although the Blue Mountains hemmed them in on the north, there were gaps in the mountains to weaken this natural defense. Soon Indians on the warpath descended through the gaps, raiding the farms to the south. Houses and barns were burned, cattle driven away, and the settlers tomahawked or taken captive. The Amish, like the Quakers and the Moravians, found that their pacifism did not save them from the raids. The Indians did not stop to ask a man's religious beliefs. The wife and two small children of Jacob Hochstetter were killed and he and several sons carried off into captivity. As the raids continued many of the Amish fled to Morgantown in the southern tip of the county. In the end Northkill ceased to exist as an Amish community. Today few of the people who live along the Northkill know that the Amish ever dwelt there.

The leading settlement of Amish in Pennsylvania is in Lancaster County. In the Lancaster Plain near Intercourse and Bird in Hand live the House Amish, who, objecting to churches as worldly, worship in houses or barns. Farther north along the Conestoga from Morgantown to Blue Ball are the Church Amish, who have simple meeting-houses like the Quakers. Farther south, too, near Gap and Honey Brook, live more Church Amish. And up in Mifllin County, in the Kishacoquillas Valley, is another thriving Amish settlement. Elsewhere in the East there are colonies of Amish near Dover, Delaware, and Norfolk, Virginia, as well as anew settlement in St. Marys County, Maryland. Scattered through the Middle West and West are other colonies: in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa, four states in which the Pennsylvania Dutch strain is strong; in Kansas, Nebraska, the Dakotas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma; even in Colorado, Montana, Idaho, and Oregon.

Like the Mennonites the Amish choose their preachers by lot from among their own number. Remembering the simple, godly men Christ chose as his disciples, they look on education as unnecessary for their leaders. The lack of an educated ministry has encouraged each man to interpret the Bible for himself. As a consequence there have been many splits in the Amish churches, often on extremely trivial issues. The chief division is between the House Amish and the Church Amish. Although the House Amish condemn the use of meetinghouses as savoring of worldliness, the two groups in essentials have much in common. The Peachey Amish, who take their name from an Amish preacher, are almost as unorthodox as the Church Amish. A few years back there was a further division among the Peachey Amish into the King people and the Stoltzfus people. Both groups use tractors and electricity on their farms, but the Stoltzfus people have gone so far as to use automobiles.

The religious services of these groups do not differ much one from another. All are marked by a note of austerity. The services last for two or three hours, during which time the worshipers sit on backless benches. To endure such an ordeal one must be inured to it from early childhood. Among the House Amish the men and boys sit in one room, the women and girls in another. In the central room, where the preaching takes place, the men sit in two groups facing one another with the preachers in between. Each Amish congregation has from two to four ministers and a deacon, with a bishop to every two meetings.

The ordinary service among the House Amish begins about half past eight in the morning or quarter to nine. All the men keep on their hats until the first hymn is announced, when with one swoop they all come off. First there are three hymns followed by a short sermon about half an hour in length. Then the congregation kneels in silent prayer, and after that the deacon reads the lesson for the day from the New Testament. Then comes the main sermon, which lasts for an hour or an hour and a half. This is followed by the brief comments of the other ministers and the deacon on subjects touched upon in the main sermon; then there are a few remarks by the preacher of the main sermon. Then, while the congregation kneels, a prayer is read from the prayer book. After th1s there is the benediction, the reading of the banns, and finally a hymn. After the last hymn the men put on their hats and leave; then the young women leave, and last of all the older women.

The service is followed by a dinner at which there are three or four sittings. The old people eat first, the men together and the women together. As at all Amish meals, thcre is a silent grace at the beginning of the meal and again at the end. In the old days bean soup was served, but the standard meal now is of bread and apple butter, sour beets, pickles, snitz pie, and coffee. There are no plates. The few utensils, which remain unchanged throughout the meal, are used by several people in succession. Communion among the Amish is held twice a year. A fortnight or so before each Communion there is a fast day, Good Friday in the spring and Michaelstag, or Michaelmas old style (October 11th), in the fall. The mornings of these days are spent in meditation. On the Sunday following the fast days questions of discipline are taken up, violations of regularity dealt with, and quarrels and misunderstandings smoothed over.

The Communion service is a long one. Beginning about eight in the morning, it opens with hymns followed by prayers, after which one of the ministers reads long passages from the Bible about the search of the children of Israel for the Promised Land and discusses them in great detail. Then another minister, usually the bishop, speaks of the sufferings of Christ and the significance of Communion and foot washing, also at extreme length. As the bishop's sermon is timed to end at three o'clock, the hour of Christ's crucifixion and the time set for Communion, the congregation slips out one by one before then-usually about noon-for a bite to eat, after which they return to the meeting. As each member partakes of the Communion bread and again when he drinks the wine, he bends the knee. This genuflection is also made at the end of each meeting, when the benediction is pronounced, in accordance with the text, "That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow." Communion is followed by the rite of foot washing, after which each member makes his gift to the poor fund. Finally, about half past four or five o'clock, the service comes to an end.

Baptism usually takes place four weeks before Communion. Before being baptized, each person must be approved by the congregation. At the ceremony, which is trinitarian, the bishop dips a tin cup into a bucket and pours the water over the applicant's head. With almost no exceptions everyone joining church was born into an Amish family. The Amish do not attempt to make any converts. They hold no revivals; they have neither home missions nor foreign missions. Voluntary withdrawals are also exceedingly rare. The Amish have little difficulty in holding their own people.

Although the Amish speak English with as much ease as many of the Lutheran and Reformed faiths, their sermons are in German. Amish children are taught to read and sing in German at a Saturday afternoon class conducted during the winter months by one of the members of the congregation. Since German is no longer used by the "church people" and by the other sects, the Amish use of German in their services has become still another means of setting them off from the world. As English has become the mother tongue of most Amishmen, many of the younger preachers find preaching in a language imperfectly known an almost superhuman task. A further disadvantage in the use of German is that many of the children find it impossible to understand the sermons.

The old Froschauer Bible, published at Zurich in the time of Luther, is still widely used by the Amish, as it is by the Mennonites. Another book to which they cling is Enchiridion, a treatise by the sixteenth century Anabaptist preacher Dirk Philips, which was reprinted for their use as late as 1910. This book they treasure because of its emphasis on Meidung and foot washing. The use of Meidung is a powerful weapon to keep the members of the church in line. No Amishman can face it lightly. The very possibility of being placed "under the ban" helps him to resist the temptations of the world, be they the lesser evils of going to see a movie or smoking a cigarette or the more serious ones of speculating in the stock market or going to law or marrying outside his faith. Meidung is so severe a punishment that it is employed only with the utmost caution. The matter is brought up before the whole congregation and the ban applied only with their consent. If an Amishman who has been banned proves to be unrepentant, he is cast off by the church and "committed to the devil and all his angels." The threat of a step so extreme is usually enough to bring the sinner to his knees. For an Amishman under the ban there is no easy way out. An Amishman in good standing in the church might leave the House Amish, say, and join the Church Amish; but a man under the ban would not be accepted by any other group of Amish. There is nothing halfhearted in the Amish attitude toward religion. Like most pious Roman Catholics, they believe that man's obedience to God must be absolute. In the lower that the church has over his life the Amishman most closely resembles the Puritan. It is a power that was unsurpassed in seventeenth century Boston and is unequaled outside the walls of a monastery elsewhere in America.

The most notable of all the Amish religious books is their hymn book, the Ausbund, the oldest hymn book in use in the country. Published at Schaffhausen in 1583. it contains hymns of an even earlier date. One was written by John Hus, while others were sung by Anabaptist prisoners at Passau in Bavaria as early as 1537. Some of the music to which these hymns are sung is even more ancient. The tune "Hildebrand," to which "Von Herzen woll' wir" is set, has been sung for at least 1,100 years. The Ausbund was the hymn book of the Swiss Mennonites and many of the south Germans as well as the Amish, but only the Amish have continued to use it. The first American edition was printed by Chistopher Sauer in Germantown in 1742. The Ausbund which the Amish often call Das dick Buch (The Thick Book) because of its size, contains 140 hymns, many of extreme length-several with scores of stanzas-and all of "old, unhappy, far-off things"; all celebrating the sufferings of the early Anabaptist martyrs. As many of the Amish bear the same names as the martyrs extolled in the Ausbund and the Martyr Book, the sufferings of these men and women who died four centuries ago are brought home all the more vividly to the Amish of Bird in Hand and Blue Ball. These books, along with the draft boards and school boards, have kept alive in many of the Amish the belief that they have been and are a persecuted people.

Since the hymns in the Ausbund have always been printed without music, the tunes have been handed down from one generation to another and in certain instances have undergone so great a change as to make them unrecognizable. Even today the same hymn will vary greatly from one congregation to another. The style of singing is slow and doleful. A leader plunges into the melody, the others joining in. There is no part singing, for this is ruled out as a worldly innovation. There are no choirs in an Amish meeting and no organs or musical instruments of any kind. Though many of the Amish show astonishing skill in singing, a man who is able to lead the singing in meeting is regarded with real respect. In addition to the Ausbund the Amish have second, or lesser, hymn book commonly known as Das dinn Buchli (The Thin Little Book). This is the book used for the Sunday night singings." Many of its tunes were borrowed from the hymns of other churches, but a score or more are the great-grandchildren of the folk melodies brought over by their English-speaking neighbors. The music of "Wer weiss wie nah" is a variation of that of the familiar ballad "Barbara Allen," while, "Nun sich der Tag" is sung to the tune "Dundee" and "In der stillen" to "Aberystwyth." "Wie bist du mir" makes use of the melody "Ortonville"; "O Jesu Christ," of "Rockridge" ; "Sei Lob und Ehr," of "Babe of Bethlehem," and "Von Himmel," of "A Frog Went A-Courting"!

Music except that produced by the human voice is condemned as worldly. There are no pianos, phonographs, radios, or television in Amish homes. A small boy with a mouth organ may be excused, but there the line is drawn. This objection to musical instruments is based on Amos 6, beginning "Woe to them that are at ease in Zion," and then going on to describe that "ease":

That lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall;
That chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of musick, like David;
That drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments.

To have such a modern invention as the radio banned because of this ancient pronouncement pleases me greatly. Yet to say that the radio is banned is to exaggerate: it is merely restricted to the barn. After all, the weather reports are of use to a farmer. If other programs are heard now and again-well, that sort of thing will happen. Sometimes a man is too busy to turn the radio off.

In many ways the Amish lead a Spartan life. They pass over Christmas and Easter with no celebration except church services. Their houses are large and plain but without central heating, bathrooms, electricity, and telephones. In winter only the kitchen and possibly a sitting room are heated. Much of the family life goes on in the kitchen, where a large coal range dominates the room. The bedrooms are unheated except for one downstairs and the one over the kitchen, in which a microscopic register in the floor takes a little of the chill off the room. All through the house they sleep between blankets, and on the coldest nights they put a hot brick in the bed. The lack of bathrooms may strike most people as the greatest hardship of all. Instead of running water there is a pump at the kitchen sink. Yet the Amish are a very clean people. The women are always spotless, the men in their personal appearance are the tidiest farmers I have ever encountered, and even the children look freshly scrubbed. They may have no bathrooms and they may have to pump their water at the kitchen sink or carry it from the well in the back yard, but the Amish are clean. They may have to work hard to get clean, but no Amishman was ever afraid of work.

The ban on telephones leads to amusing inconsistencies. Since they are forbidden to have telephones on their property, public pay-station booths are erected in Amish communities here and there along the road, always on public property. Amishmen have even been known to contribute toward the expense of a more worldly neighbor's telephone to persuade him to have one in the house. This is but one of several contradictions. Most amusing of all is their attendance at circuses. Since God made the animals, it is all right for man to look at them. As for the rest of the performance-well, you are there and you have paid your money, so why not see it? Permission is not granted but neither is it refused. Attendance at county fairs, on the other hand, is strictly forbidden.

Some of the prohibitions, like the one on large windowpanes in houses, are difficult to account for. I suppose that when large windowpanes were first introduced in the Victorian era they seemed fashionable and worldly to the Amish. At any rate, their houses look all the better for the small panes in the windows. Curtains at the windows are also forbidden. This lack of draperies gives the houses a certain austerity, a quality that is little relieved by the cool light blue with which so many of the rooms are painted. This blue is so widely used by the Amish that among the Pennsylvania Dutch it is often called Amish blue. The walls of the rooms are always painted or whitewashed. Wallpaper, too, is worldly. The only carpets on the floor are rag rugs. Except for the ornamental family records and calendars from the butcher, the baker, the grocer, and the feed-and-grain merchant, there are no pictures on the wall. A calendar is a thing of use rather than a decoration. If a picture comes with the calendar-well, it is possible to put up with the picture. As the Amish are forbidden to have their photographs taken, there are never any family pictures on the wall. Embroidered towels, greatly prized by collectors, sometimes hang on the wall. And potted plants, geraniums, primroses, begonias, and "colies," fill the kitchen windows. The bedrooms, except for the gay patchwork quilts are as plain as the other rooms. Often a bedroom will have two or more beds, for most Amish families are prepared to house a number of visitors.

Among the House Amish the farmhouses are constructed with moveable partitions in the downstairs rooms instead of interior walls so that when meeting is held in that house several rooms can be thrown into one. When a preaching is held at a farm the whole place is put in apple-pie order. The house is scrubbed and scoured until it is spotless. Even the cellar is whitewashed. The barn gets a thorough cleaning. Cobwebs come down from the rafters above the hay; the wagon shed is swept and the wagons are lined up as though for a drill. The houseyard and the barnyard are tidied up. Even the manure pile is banked until its sides are perfectly straight, then it is covered with fresh straw. Spring house cleaning is nothing to this, for the family knows it is about to be judged by the entire neighborhood.

Occasionally if the weather is mild, church will be held in a barn. The Church Amish worship in meetinghouses. These with their whitewashed walls and backless benches are as simple and plain as can be, if anything they are even simpler than Mennonite and Quaker meetinghouses.

Yet the Amish do not think of their lives as Lenten in their austerity. Possibly more than any other people in America they have realized their hearts' desire. Look at the faces of the women or men behind the stalls at Lancaster market or as they drive along the Pike at Paradise or Goodville. The serenity of their faces-and that word "serenity" above all others describes them-bespeaks the good life. They are at peace with the world. They live in a fat land. They have more than enough: sausages and hams in the smokehouse, bolts of broadcloth and yard goods in the attic. Their lives are simple, temperate, and regular; although filled with labor they are beautifully uncomplicated. Their marriages are untroubled by the threat of scandal or divorce. Their sons are cheerful, husky, hard-working boys who will till the soil after them; their daughters will settle down on neighboring farms, sew, clean, bake and bring Amish babies into the world. There are no loafers, no drunkards, no gamblers, no ne'er-do-wells among the Amish. These are contented, self-respecting people, unworldly, clannish, yet kindly and friendly. Even Henry Miller, who has hardly a good word to say for anything or anyone in America, is impressed by the great peace and silence of the land of the Amish. In "Good News! God Is Love" (Fragment from The Air-conditioned Nightmare) be praises the Amish for having converted the Pennsylvania earth into a garden of peace and plenty. Just the same, a non-Amish family living in an Amish community may have a lonely time of it, largely because an Amishman has such a vast number of friends and relatives among the members of his own faith that he seldom gets around to the rest of the world. Yet there is a warmth and friendliness in the Amish that is undeniably attractive. See them in Lancaster market as they help a customer pick out a plump immaculate fowl or explain to him the taste of the apple named Fanny or direct him to a stall where he can find the first sauerkraut of the season. It is not only the wonderful food the Amish sell or the Old World dress they wear that makes going to Lancaster market a pleasure; even more it is their cheerful, friendly attitude. The Amish are the quintessence of country ways and country life. As Clare Leighton has so happily put it, "These bearded Amish farmers and bonneted Amish women bring with them the color of ripening barley and the scent of clover fields in flower."

Almost all of the Amish today are direct descendants of the Amish immigrants of the eighteenth century, probably only five hundred in number. As marriage outside the church is forbidden, the Amish have intermarried to an amazing degree, until today there are only about thirty surnames among them. Indeed, most of them have one of a dozen surnames. There is a school in Lancaster County in which for the last ten years 95 to 100 per cent of the children, and the teacher as well, have been named Stoltzfus. Small wonder that they resort to almost every personal name in the Bible: Aaron, Abner, Abram, Amos, David, Elam, Enos, Isaac, Jacob, Jesse, Job, John, Levi, Mahlon, Milo, Moses, Naaman, Stephen, Urie. Even so, six or seven men in the same community may bear the same name. Since more than a name is needed to tell them apart, six Jacob Zooks may be known as Big Jake, Hickory Jake, Henner's Jake, Red Jake, Turkey Jake, and Smoketown Jake. Incidentally, titles of respect are not used by the Amish. These are plain people who prefer to be called by their first names or, if a stranger is addressing them, by their full names. With all this inter-marriage the health and vigor of the Amish today speak well for the soundness of the original stock. On the other hand, close intermarriage is not encouraged. A young Amishman from Lancaster County will often visit another Amish community-down Dover way, perhaps, or up in the Kishacoquillas Valley, or one of the western settlements--to seek out a wife.

The Amish insist on a rural way of life for all their people. Although a few of them may live in small villages, the church forbids them to live in towns and cities. Nor does a single Amish family live off by itself among more worldly people; they always settle in colonies. When a new settlement is made, enough families move to the new colony to form a religious unit and to a lesser degree a self-sustaining economic unit as well. In this way their ancient customs and beliefs are preserved.

The family farm is usually inherited by the youngest son. By the time a man is ready to retire, the older sons are usually settled on farms of their own; the youngest son is the one who stays at home. Even when an Amishman retires, he does not move into town. A part of the spacious farmhouse is set aside for him. This is the Grossdawdy (Grand-father) house, where he has his own separate establishment. The farm has been his life, and he very wisely stays there. A horse and wagon are always reserved for his use so that he can be free to come and go as he wishes. From time to time he may help with the work on the farm just as his wife may lend a helping hand with the sewing. Living in a house of their own yet surrounded by grandchildren, an aged Amishman and his wife spend the latter days of their life in quiet and happiness. When they have enough of grandchildren and relatives, they can retire into their own part of the house and need not emerge for a week of Sundays. As the Grossdawdy house has its own kitchen, the elderly Amishwoman can prepare a favorite dish for her husband or whip up a batch of cookies for her grandchildren whenever the fancy strikes her. Beyond the shadow of a doubt the Amish have hit upon the perfect solution for the care of the aged. Even in the case of a man with no children, a part of the farmhouse is reserved for his use when he sells the farm. No Amishman ever goes to an old people's home.

With each farmer hoping to settle all his sons on farms of their own, there is an eager and everlasting search for land. Almost all farms put up for sale in the Amish country are bought by the Amish. Especially great is the rivalry where House Amish meet Church Amish. There land values have doubled. Since there are not enough farms to go around and since urban life is out of the question, the Amish have been forced to seek out farms elsewhere. Hence the recent colonies in Lebanon County and in Berks.

The Amish farms along the two branches of the Conestoga or those farther south on the Lancaster Plain are paragons of neatness. Hardly a weed is to be seen in the fields. The houses and barns and tobacco sheds have all been painted; the fields are plowed right up to the fences, the ground harrowed so fine that it looks as though it has been gone over with a currycomb. Many farms elsewhere are rich and prosperous, but none but the Amish farms have been scrubbed behind the ears.

An intense love of the land distinguishes the Amish and Mennonites from other American farmers. Others may boast of the number of bushels of wheat they harvest, of the fertility of the soil; so do the Amish and Mennonites. Yet the Amish and Mennonites never dream of selling out and retiring to Los Angeles in their old age. They are wedded to their farms for life. One of the most valuable heritages that the Amish and the Mennonites brought with them to America was their method of farming. In their efforts to make a living on the poor soil of the Swiss mountain valleys in which they found refuge, they were the first people in central Europe to experiment with new crops, new feed for their cattle, new ways of fertilizing the land. When they moved down to the Rhineland, they were able to apply these new methods to rich soil. Different communities tried different experiments, of which they kept one another informed so that all might benefit from the success of one. This gave the early Amish and Mennonites a broader point of view than that of the ordinary farmer, whose horizon was bounded by the hills of his own parish. Such advances in farming as diversified farming, rotation of crops, and improving the soil by fertilizing it with barnyard manure and by growing red clover were first put into general use in America in southeastern Pennsylvania and were more widely practiced on Amish farms than on any others. Furthermore, their stock was well housed. In fact, to this day the stock is better housed on the farms of south- eastern Pennsylvania than anywhere else in America.

All the Amish farms are family farms worked by a man and his sons; they are never "factories in the fields." Oddly enough, though very few Amish smoke, tobacco is the big money crop on many Amish farms. Not all the Amish are easy in their consciences about growing tobacco, and in recent years many have replaced it with tomatoes, potatoes, or peas; yet tobacco is still generally grown by most Amish farmers. The crop is carefully rotated so that it does not wear out the soil. With the Amish the land comes first and the tobacco crop second. An Amishman who does not give his land proper care is brought up before the church. He who robs the soil sins against both God and man. Impairing the fertility of the soil is as undoubtedly a sin as adultery or theft. In the Amish country the abandoned fields so characteristic of the old tobacco plantations of tidewater Maryland and Virginia are unknown. This is one part of America in which the land is as fertile as it was two or more centuries ago, when the forests were first cut down. The House Amish in their concern for the land even go so far as to reject tractors for use in the fields. Ingenious though tractors may be, a farmer gets from them no manure to put on the land. Instead three horses abreast pull the plow and five the disk harrow. There is considerable dis-satisfaction on the part of some of the Amish with the ban on tractors, especially when they see the excellent use made of them by non-Amish farmers. There is a wide use of most other machinery, such as cultivators, self-binders, and sprayers, although none of it may be run by electricity. The ban on the use of electricity is hard on the Amish engaged in dairying or poultry raising, both of which have been on the increase on Amish farms in recent years. They do not mind putting up with coal-oil lamps in the house, but they would like to use electricity in the cowsheds and henhouses. There is likewise some objection among the House Amish to the ban on trucks for farm work. Once more they see how useful trucks are to their more worldly neighbors. In Ohio a group of Amish go to the extreme of rejecting mules for farm work on the ground that they are "unnatural" animals. The Lancaster County Amish, however, use mules with equanimity. On the other hand, the Amish are undeniably superior farmers and are generally eager to adopt modern farming methods. Contour plowing, though, has made slow progress among them, possibly because so many of the Pennsylvania Amish live on the flat Lancaster Plain or in relatively level valleys. Yet they are no longer as far in advance of the ordinary farmer as they once were. Their extreme conservatism has held them back.

Sometimes the unworldly attitude of the Amish strikes more materialistic men as incredible. For instance, the Amish refuse to ship out milk on Sunday. No arguments the Philadelphia milk dealers have been able to think up have made them change their minds. Since they refuse to permit their milk to be picked up on Sunday morning, there is a Saturday evening collection of milk an hour or two after milking time. The Sunday morning milk is used on the farm, while that of Sunday evening is combined with Monday morning's milking.

When the New Deal went in for restriction of crops, the Amish grew less wheat and raised fewer pigs but declined to accept any money for the smaller yield of wheat or the lesser number of porkers. Diogenes could not have been more startled when he found his honest man than the officials in Washington were when the Amish refused to pocket the money the government was eager to pay them. The Amish fear of the "unequal yoke," of joining with people of the world, was responsible for this decision-though in the end a few broke down and accepted the government's money. This principle of the "unequal yoke" also prevents the Amish from joining farmers' cooperatives when farmers other than Amish are members. To a cooperative supported only by the Amish, such as the Lancaster County Swiss cheese plant, they have no objection, for there the principle of the "unequal yoke" does not apply.

The Amish have the social security that the government desires for all the people. The specters of unemployment and poverty in illness or old age have been successfully laid by generosity, common sense, and hard work. Their belief in the brotherhood of man is not mere lip service reserved for Sundays; they live their religion. If a man with a wife and four or five small children is taken sick, his neighbors come to his help. They do his chores and the farm work until he recovers his health. Enough will turn up to harvest a crop in a single day. Or suppose he dies. What happens to his wife and children? If the wife's parents are still living, she will very likely move back home; or she may move in with her husband's parents or a brother or brother-in-law, an uncle or an aunt. Even in those rare cases when there is no relative to take her in, the Amish will provide a place for her and for her children.

If a man's barn burns down, that is an act of God. The Amish decline to oppose God's will by putting lightning rods on their barns, although if they buy a farm with lightning rods on the barn they generally let them stay. They will not take out fire and storm insurance with a company that might "yoke" them with worldly people; instead they have formed an Amish aid society, to which most of the Amish in Lancaster County, the Kishacoquillas Valley, and Delaware belong and which effectively takes the place of the commercial companies. Life insurance, however, is absolutely forbidden. Who are they to stand in the way of the Lord? It is God's right to end a man's life when He sees fit. Yet they believe that man should treat with tenderness one whom the Lord has smitten. If a man's barn burns down and his cattle and crops are destroyed, his fellow Amishmen-and often his more worldly neighbors as well-gather from all over the countryside to clear away the charred timbers and raise a new barn. They come not singly but by the hundreds. By evening the barn is virtually built, all except for a handful of nails still to be driven or a few finishing touches that a man can do by himself. In the days before the Amish aid society was formed, they contributed money, cattle, and grain as well; all shared in the loss. Plows, harrows, and the essential farm machinery were bought. Horses and cows replaced the ones lost-not as many, perhaps, as before; since a man must bear a part of his misfortune himself. But it is the community as a whole, and not the individual, who bears the burden. The wind is tempered to the shorn lamb.

This is clearly not the policy of rugged individualism, of each man for himself and the devil take the hindmost. This is the kingdom of God on earth-or at least as close to it as the Amish have been able to come. Competition has not been ruled out: it has been combined with cooperation. To rugged individualism has been added brotherly love. As far as possible each Amishman supports himself, his wife, and his children.

The Amish attitude toward the accumulation of wealth is in direct contrast to that held by most of their fellow Americans. In moderation wealth is good, but by moderation they really mean moderation. Enough money to enable a man to give each of his sons a farm or help him acquire one is as much as anyone should desire. The accumulation of wealth as such is sanctioned nowhere in the Bible: a truth that the Amish alone among Christian churches seems to have recognized. Many of the more usual ways of making money, such as investments in stocks and bonds, are regarded as sinful by the Amish. This attitude has helped them to weather financial depressions with greater ease than their fellows who tried to make a killing in the stock market.

The Amish believe in hard work. In their interpretation of the seven deadly sins, tremendous emphasis is put on sloth. The Amish farmer gets up between four and five, and after a few chores he has breakfast at five-thirty. From six until dinner at eleven he works in the fields in spring and summer and fall and in the barn stripping tobacco in winter. During the hot sultry days of summer he may rest for half an hour or even an hour after dinner before going out to the fields again. Supper at four-thirty is followed by the evening chores and often more work in the fields until dark; then to bed at eight-thirty or nine. Few people in America work so hard.

His life, though, is not without its joys. He finds pleasure in his work: in seeing the wheat sprout, in watching the tobacco leaves grow more gigantic day by day, in rubbing down his sleek horses, in whitewashing the springhouse, even in hauling manure to his fields. The thousand and one tasks of the farm give him a solid satisfaction. He takes time out for fun too-not for movies, pinochle, or bingo-but for auctions, for weddings, one might almost say for funerals, and above all for visiting back and forth. Visiting is the Amishman's chief diversion. He is so extraordinarily fond of visiting his relatives and friends that church is held only every other Sunday. Half the Sundays in the year are "off" Sundays reserved for visiting. This is the time for the freindschaft to get together. Out in the barnyard the boys play corner ball and blumsock or try their skill at wrestling. On the pavement by the grape arbor the girls skip rope. The women, sitting in the shade of the porch or hugging the stove, have time for a good talk. The men go out to the barn to look over the stock and talk crops. These are simple pleasures but very real ones. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Second Christmas, Good Friday afternoon, Easter Monday, and Whitmonday are other favorite visiting times. In winter or sometimes in August, when there is a lull in field work, long visits are common. These may last for several days or even several weeks. This is the time to visit other Amish communities, to go up to the Kishacoquillas Valley or down to Dover or even out Indiana way. Or there may be a barn-raising in his own township. The cornhusking bees, threshing bees, apple-butter cookings, and quilting parties are largely things of the past. Only the barn-raisings are as common in this century as they were in the last. With a huge dinner served to all the workers, this occasion is turned into a frolic. Quite as much as the family gathering and the barn-raising the Amishman loves an auction. These are usually held in February and March, when farm work is light. The Amish gather from miles away for a country sale. Even if he doesn't want to buy anything, it's too good a chance to see old friends to stay away.

The young people have a somewhat gayer time than the settled married folk. The young men and women growing up together have ample opportunity to get to know one another. The innocent country pleasures of the Amish youth are those of early America. Although the cornhusking parties followed by supper and games on the threshing floor are rarely held today, games are often combined with the Sunday evening singings. These folk games, Skip to My Lou, Twin Sisters, There Goes Topsy Through the Window, O-h-i-o, Six-Handed Reel, and others, often involve kissing. The Sunday-night singings are the principal diversion of Amish youth. The young folks of the House Amish usually meet early on a Sunday evening at the village of Intercourse, where they learn at which farm the singing is to be held. At Intercourse, too, they pick up their partners. A young Amishman will drive his sister to Intercourse, but there he swaps her for somebody else's sister. After the singing, which breaks up before midnight, he drives the girl of his choice to her home. The singings start soberly enough with the singing of hymns. About ten o'clock, though, the old folks go to bed and the young people turn to the games. In the "pickings" with which the games start the girls pick the boys and the boys pick the girls until rows of them, first a girl and then a boy, fill the benches on the threshing floor. Suddenly they all stand up, and each boy kisses the girl on his right and then the girl on his left. After that fun the "pickings" start all over again. Sooner or later they take time out for other games and for cider or coffee, cookies, and snitz pie.

The singings are not exactly decorous. In the kissing games the young men find that pretty girls have the same effect on them that they, have on young men the world over. The Amish blades cut up and show off. On the way home the young bloods show their girls-and the other fellow-how much speed their horses have. Not that the Amish boys are mired in sin; they are not. It is only that the Amish are such a godly people that it comes as something of a shock to find even an Amish youth of sixteen going in for high jinks.

No myth about the Pennsylvania Dutch has established itself more firmly in the public mind than the one of the Amishman painting his gate blue to tell the world that he has a daughter ready for marriage. Picturesque though this legend may be, there is not a grain of truth in it. Some gates, it is true, are painted blue. Blue is a favorite color of the Amish. The Amishman's kitchen and his farm wagon are likely to be painted blue; his shirt and his sons' shirts, too, may be blue. Furthermore, Amishmen do at times have daughters ready for marriage. But there is no connection between their daughters, the color blue, and the front gate. This is merely a legend that has caught the public fancy Amish courting customs are sufficiently curious to stand in no need of legendary additions. Most of the courting is done on the sly, with all the secrecy of courtly love of medieval days. Never do you see an Amish boy and girl buss one another openly on the streets. The boy goes courting only by night. When late evening has come and the girls parents are safely in bed, he goes a-wooing. In the old days a handful of pebbles or corn tossed against the pane of the girl's bedroom window let her know that her suitor had come; now a flashlight turned on her window informs her of her lover's presence. Usually the girl, who has only pretended to go to bed to hoodwink her parents, comes down and lets the young man in. Today most of the courting takes place in the kitchen, where a coal fire is burning in the range. In the past, however, the young couple often resorted to bundling just as they did in New England. It is possible that bundling may linger on in some Amish communities, although everywhere the church fathers condemn the practice. Even in bundling the Amish were characteristically moral. There were no shotgun weddings. Amish children born out of wedlock are as rare as the phoenix. There may be one every hundred years but no oftener than that. If accused by his friends or his family of paying suit to a girl, a young Amishman lies blatantly. This is regarded as a white lie wholly justified.

When finally the youth has made his choice and won the girl's consent, he sends an older man, a Schteckleimann, usually a deacon of the church, to ask the approval of the girl's parents. If they consent, the intentions of marriage are announced in church at least a fortnight before the wedding. As soon as the banns are read, the prospective bridegroom leaves the meeting and drives directly to the girl's home, where on that particular Sunday she is awaiting him.

Nowhere does the individual quality of the Amish way of life appear more clearly than in their weddings. These are always big affairs. They take place in the fall after the harvest is in, for the farmers have more leisure at that time and there is an abundance of food, The weddings are held only on Tuesdays or Thursdays. Wednesday is believed to be an unlucky day and so is Friday. There is not enough time to get ready for a Monday wedding, since no unnecessary work may be done on Sunday; and Saturday is too close to Sunday. No engraved invitations are sent out. Instead the groom calls in person on all the people to be invited. As there are sometimes two hundred or more guests, often the whole meeting and most of the relatives on both sides are asked to the wedding, this is no light chore.

Often friends of the family are asked to help with the baking and the cooking. There may be fully a score of helpers, since both a wedding dinner and wedding supper are served. Sometimes the marriage ceremony may be performed at a neighbor's house because all the available space at the bride's house is needed for the extensive tables for the wedding dinner.

At the wedding there is the usual Amish order of service. With the announcement of the first hymn, the bride with her two bridesmaids, known as "waiters," and the groom with his attendants, also known as waiters, accompany the preachers to the stairs. The waiters stay hello while the bride and groom go upstairs with the ministers, there to receive instructions on the duties and ethics of marriage. When the bride and groom come downstairs, their waiters rejoin them and they all take their places on two benches before the ministers, the three women facing the three men. The main sermon preached is a standard wedding sermon that is preached at all Amish weddings. Among the House Amish the preachers dwell upon the marriage of Tobias and Sarah from the Book of Tobit. At the end of the sermon the wedding ceremony is performed.

In other particulars as well an Amish wedding differs from the usual church wedding. There is no bride's bouquet, no wedding ring, no one to give her away. The bride is dressed in the traditional garb of the young, unmarried Amishwoman-black cap, white kerchief and apron, and her dress of any of the usual Amish colors, but never white. The white kerchief and apron will be put away to be kept for her shroud. Only when she is dead can she wear them again.

The wedding dinner is a bountiful one, thanks to the biblical example of the wedding feast at Cana. There are roast chicken, stewed chicken, fried ham, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, bread and butter, apple butter and jellies, and numerous pies and cakes. The wedding supper is almost as ample: cold turkey, stewed chicken, ham, roast beef, bread and butter, jellies, cakes, stewed and canned fruit, and wine. The most elaborate cake is placed in front of the bride. The seating arrangement for the wedding dinner is an unusual one. Tables are placed together to form a large hollow square with one side open. The bride and groom are seated at one of the outer corners which is known as the bride's corner. On the bride's left are her waiters with the young unmarried women beyond them; on the groom's right are his waiters and still more unmarried women beyond them. On the other side of the table are the young unmarried men. Beyond the young unmarried people are the young married women, with the young married men across the table from them. The middle-aged married people follow next and finally the old people. As it is not often that all these can be seated in one room, tables for the old people, and usually for the middle-aged couples as well, are set up in the downstairs bedroom and in the kitchen. At the wedding supper they all sit in couples.

After the wedding dinner the three traditional marriage hymns of the Amish are sung. These are followed by more hymns, which finally give way to conversation. About four o'clock the young people go out to the barn to play the usual folk games. This is the last day on which the bride and groom may play these games. After this day they are a sober married couple. Sometime or other during the day the young men get hold of the groom and toss him over a fence to show him that, they have cast him out from among them, that he is now "on the other side."

After the wedding supper there are more hymns. Then the cooks come in with brass dippers to collect money for their work. They put on quite an act, extolling their skill, exaggerating their labor, and beseeching the guests to take pity on their poverty. The guests feign reluctance to pay, but in the end each one permits himself to part with a coin or two. The money collected is divided among the cooks, and with it each buys some little memento to mark the day. Finally there are more games on the threshing floor until late in the evening the bride and groom slip away to their room. This is the signal for the guests to leave.

A day or two after the wedding the groom brings the bride to his own home. Instead of a honeymoon they start on a round of visits, staying overnight at the home of each uncle and aunt and often cousins as well and calling on every person who had been invited to the wedding. At every house at which they stay a bountiful dinner is served to them, and at this time many of their wedding presents are given to them. After a fortnight or more of such visits, they at last move into their own home.

The parents of both the bride and groom do their utmost to give the young couple the best possible start in life. It is the dream of every Amish fanner to give each of his sons a farm. If the home farm is large enough, it will be divided and a new house built for the young couple; or if the groom's father has enough money he will buy a farm for his son. At the very least the father will give his son some money toward a farm; and usually some other Amishman will advance the rest of the money, accepting a mortgage at low interest and far beyond what any bank would consider the margin of safety. This is done partly from the Amishman's desire to keep his money in land but even more from the wish to help young members of his faith establish themselves. Nor do the young couple go empty-handed to their farm. All through his youth the groom has worked on his father's farm without wages, and now his father does what he can to set him up as a fanner and head of a household. He gives his son a horse and harness, a cow, a plow and harrow and possibly some other farm machinery, a pig or two, some furniture for the house, and probably some dishes and linen. The bride as her dower may bring a cow and some chickens, a stove, a cupboard, a table, a bureau, a bed and bedclothing, six chairs and a rocker to match, linen, dishes, hams, potatoes, and a barrel of flour. Between the two families the house will be fairly well furnished. The wedding gifts from their relatives and friends include not only such usual presents as dishes, clocks, lamps, and linen but also such eminently practical gifts as axe, hammers, wrenches, and other tools necessary on a farm.

Amish funerals are as distinctive as the weddings. They are always held in the home, never at funeral parlors. They are the acme of simplicity. There is no crape at the door and no flowers at the funeral. The coffin, usually of plain walnut boards, is made by a local carpenter. Until the state law required embalming, the body, instead of being handed over to an undertaker, was washed and dressed by two members of the same sex. For a woman the shroud is always white-cap, kerchief, apron, and dress; for a man, a white shirt and a black suit. For, this occasion not only the family but almost all attending the funeral", wear black. Four friends of the family dig the grave and act as pallbearers. It is they, too, who make the round of friends and relatives and invite them to the funeral; and it is they who take the meeting bench to the house for the funeral. The coffin is hauled to the graveyard in the Todtenwagen (hearse), a spring wagon very like the Amish carriages but somewhat larger, or one of the farm wagons may be used. Friends come in to prepare the funeral dinner, which, like the old-time funeral dinners so common in many country sections, is more of a feast than a plain dinner. At the funeral, no hymns are sung. The introductory sermon, then silent prayer and reading from the Scriptures ; then the main funeral sermon, which never takes the form of a eulogy; and finally a prayer from the prayer book and the benediction. At the cemetery there is a short service at the grave. Then the pallbearers fill in the grave while the family remains. When the mound has been rounded off, the minister reads a hymn, after which they all repeat the Lord's Prayer silently. Then the minister speaks a few more words and pronounces the benediction.

Amish graveyards are very plain. Among the Church Amish the graveyard is usually next to the church; among the House Amish it is down a lane, off in the fields. The tombstones are simple ones with rounded tops, bearing usually only the name and dates of birth and death. No shrubs, neither box nor yew nor rose, are planted in the graveyard; no flowers are ever placed on the graves. The Amish very seldom visit the graveyards. Once a year the men of the meeting will set aside a day to fill up sunken graves, set up fallen tombstones, and if necessary mow the grass; but often a few sheep are kept in the graveyard so that the grass is always well clipped. The graveyard is owned by the whole meeting. Individual members are never charged for lots. If more land is needed to extend the ggraveyard, it is bought by the whole congregation.

It is in their views on education and politics that the Amish, like the Mennonites, are most open to criticism. Except for a mastery of the three R's they are opposed to education. They maintain that book learning is not needed to make a good farmer or a farmer's wife. High school is bad for a boy or girl, they insist, and college even worse. The knowledge acquired is of little practical value, while the way of life there makes an Amish boy or girl soft and lazy. They are ruined for hard work on the farm. Better to know the rotation of crops, or how to make a man's shirt or cook apple butter. The years a boy spends in high school are the very ones in which he should be trained for the work he is to do. And the only way a man can learn a job, the Amish maintain, is by doing it. This is the theory behind the old apprentice system that worked successfully for centuries.

The Amish look around them and see the deserted Episcopal and Presbyterian churches, the abandoned Quaker meetinghouses-all of them belonging to people who believed in education. Once there were thriving communities supporting these churches; now the Episcopalians and Presbyterians and Quakers have vanished, and Amish and Mennonites farm the land these people once owned. Even land owned for generations by Lutheran and Reformed families is now being bought up by Poles and Italians and by the Amish and Mennonites as the sons and daughters of the "church people" drift into the towns and cities. The Amish think they know the moral of this. If they are to perpetuate their way of life..if their children are to plow the fields their fathers plowed before them, education beyond the three R's must be resisted. The Amish believe that it was God's intention for man to till the soil and tend his flocks. God put man on the land, and man is right only as long as he stays on the land. Certainly the most superficial examination of the Amish and Mennonite farms shows that their ability to cling to their farms has been a positive benefit to American agriculture. On the other hand, the Amish must depend on people of other faiths for their doctors, dentists, and veterinarians.

The Amish belief in the little red schoolhouse is a part of their attempt to maintain their way of life. As the Amish form self-contained communities in which they work with other Amishmen, go to Amish meetings, and visit back and forth with other Amish families, they naturally want their children to go to school with Amish children. If the children go to a one-room country school, most of the other children there will be Amish; but if they go to a large consolidated township school, the Amish are likely to be seriously outnumbered. Not only must they ride in busses, to which their elders object, but the other children are likely to poke fun at them. They are exposed daily to worldly ways, for most consolidated schools pride themselves on being modern: they have entertainments and dances and plays; they have bands and orchestras; they put emphasis on sports. Of none of these can the Amish approve. From the Amish point of view the little red schoolhouse is far better and much less expensive.

The ambitious youth desiring an education has a hard row to hoe if he is born an Amishman. He must rebel. He may even have to break all family ties and religious ties too. Usually such a person ceases to be an Amishman. But such a youth is extremely rare among the Amish. Most Amish boys and girls have no desire to rebel; they fit into the life easily. As the Amish have been farmers for centuries, farming is in their blood. From his early childhood the Amish boy has been brought up, with the expectation of becoming a farmer. At eight or nine he is helping with the chores and able to take a hand at milking. He has a calf of his own and possibly a pig and some chickens to raise and market. He has a little garden in which to grow some vegetables. When he is a little older, he is given a small plot of land on which he raises a highly profitable crop of tobacco. Not that he works all the time. Like other boys he will go swimming, not in a public pool, but in a near-by creek or mill dam. Between sixteen and eighteen he gets his own horse and buggy. These children do not have a bad time of it, as their roguish faces clearly show. If the Amish didn't love children, they wouldn't have so many of them. And among the Church Amish, at least, the size of the family is a matter of choice.

When it comes to politics, the Amish try to live apart from the world. They keep in mind the biblical admonition to "come out from among them" and be separate (II Corinthians 6:17). In general they neither vote nor hold office themselves, nor will they serve on a jury . It is only when they are faced with the shutting down of their oneroom schoolhouses or the neglect of the roads leading to their farms that they will turn out to vote. Then they come in droves, bringing their wives with them. Even then they will vote only for school director or road supervisor; never for a county office, much less for a state or federal one. But if worst comes to worst, they will serve on the school board or become road supervisors themselves. Normally they are exemplary and law-abiding people. As far as the Amish go, the Lancaster County police can sleep the year around. But if they have to choose between conscience and jail, conscience wins every time. Their refusal to accept the rights and duties of citizenship fills many of their fellow Americans with misgiving. One cannot help wishing that they had for the country as a whole some of the same feeling of responsibility they have for the members of their own sect. But to the larger issues of the nation they close their eyes, as they do almost invariably to those of the state and even the county. For the most part they see no farther than the township. Others may make the laws; if their consciences permit, they will obey them.

One last point: the place of the Amish women. Broadly speaking, it is in the home, as it was for women generally during the Victorian Age. There is no belief in the equality of the sexes. That the men should sit in front in meeting and the women behind is characteristic. The Bible puts it very clearly in I Corinthians II :7-9: "He [man] is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man. For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man." That, for the Amish, settles the matter. As the Amish woman is the domestic type, she does not demur. There are no career women among them. The Amish women stay in their homes busy with household duties, with the care of their husbands and children. Occasionally they may "stand market" or go shopping in Lancaster or Reading. Although their families are usually large, this is as they would have it. In an Amish home babies are genuinely welcome, whether the first or the twelfth. The peace and happiness in the faces of the Amish women show that this is the life they want for themselves. There is no hint of rebellion. Fortunately there are few spinsters among the Amish, for this way of life has no place for the unmarried. A very few become schoolteachers or nurses, but most live the life of an "aunt" in the home of a married brother or sister.

Probably the Amish are best summed up in a remark once made by Oliver Allston, which perhaps should be chalked up to the credit of his creator, Van Wyck Brooks. "All the old sects have not gone," he wrote. "Remember Pennsylvania, and thank heaven for the Amish." To which I can only say " Amen"

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