We hear a good deal of talk about the American Sabbath, so that one would think it was first introduced here; and, indeed, the American Sabbath is our own patent. Not but what Scotland and rural England had one somewhat like it; but the American Sabbath par excellence is not the Jewish Sabbath, or the European Sabbath, but the Sunday of Puritan New England, which is generally meant when we hear of the American Sabbath. But the American Sabbath of the frontier can never become the European Sabbath without getting nearer to the New England type; for in Europe people do go to church in the morning, if they attend the beer-gardens in the afternoon. The Sabbath of the frontier has no church, and the beer-garden is open all day.

[212]Some reader will wonder what kind of a deacon a man would make who worked on Sunday. Well, he might be better; but, remember, that for one deacon who breaks the Sabbath, there are ten thousand who break the tenth commandment, which is just as important. The fact is, you must do the best you can under the circumstances, and wait for the next generation to go up higher. It is no use finding fault with candles for the poor light and the smell of the tallow. There is only one way: you must light the gas; and it, too, must go when electricity comes. You might as well expect concrete roads, Beethoven\'s Symphonies, and the Paris opera, as to have all the conditions of New England life to start with under such environments. Man has greater power to accommodate himself to new conditions than the beasts that perish; nevertheless, he is subject to them, at least for a time.

I know some will be thinking of the Pilgrim Fathers, staying in the little Mayflower rather than break the Sabbath; but[213] we must not forget, that, as a rule, the frontiers are not peopled with Pilgrim Fathers. It is true, the wildest settlers are not altogether bad; for you could have seen on their prairie schooners within the last year these words, "In God we trusted, in Kansas we busted;" which is much more reverent than "Pike\'s Peak or bust," if not quite so terse.

This is not meant for sarcasm. These words were written in a county that has been settled over two hundred and fifty years, and has not had a murderer in its jail yet, where the people talk as if they were but lately from Cornwall, where the descendants of Mayhew still live,—Mayhew, who was preaching to the Indians before the saintly Eliot.

We must remember, too, that the good men who first settled at Plymouth could do things conscientiously that your frontiersman would be shocked at. Think, too, of good John Hawkins sailing about in the ship Jesus with her hold full of negroes, and pious New Englanders selling[214] slaves in Deerfield less than a hundred and ten years ago; of the whipping-post and the persecuting of witches; and that these good men, who would not break the Sabbath, often in their religious zeal broke human hearts. No living man respects them more than I do. You cannot sing Mrs. Hemans\'s words,
"The breaking waves dashed high,"

without the tears coming to these eyes; and one sight of Burial Hill buries all hard thoughts I might have about their stern rule. They were fitted for the times they lived in, and we must see to it that we do our part in our time.

In my first field I well remember being startled at a tiny girl singing out, "Hello, Elder!" and on looking up there was a batch of youngsters from the Sunday-school playing croquet on Sunday afternoon. "Hello!" said I; and I smiled and walked on. Wicked, was it not? I ought to have lectured them? Oh, yes! and lost them. Were they playing a year[215] after? Not one of them. And, better still, the parents, who were non-churchgoers, had joined the church.

The saloons and stores were open, and doing a big business, the first year; but both saloons and stores were closed, side-doors too, after that. Some of the saloon-keepers............