The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1884-08-14

ierviee In the Mormon Tabernacle.
Service in the Tabernacle is held on
Sundays mt 2 o'clock in the afternoon.
The Saints assemble not only from the
city, but from all the country round,
and many vehicles of all sorts are left
standing in the nelghborhood. The
center of the church fills rapidly with
women, while men predominant in the
side rows of seats. There are seats for
$1,000 persons in the amphitheater and
gallery, and many moro crowd III at
some of the great conferences A broad
gallery closes around at the front,
where the choir sit in two wings, fac ng
each other, the men on one side and
the women opposite. The space be-
tween is filled by three long crimson
cushioned pulpit desks, in each OF
which twenty speakers or so can sit
at once, each rank overlooking the
heads of the one beneath. The highest
was designed for the president and his
two counselors; the second one for
the twelve apostles, and the lowest for
the bishops, but L believe the order is
not very rigidly observed.
The acoustic properties of the house
are almost perfect. A former def
cheney of light hasbeen overcome by the
use of electricity; and the chilling bare
ness of the huge whitewashed vault is
relieved by hangings of evergreen and
flowers made of tissue-paper, the effect
of which is very good indeed.
Every Sunday the sacrament is adj
ministered, the table loaded with bas-
kets of bread and tankards of water
occupying dais at the foot of the pull
pits. Gradually a number of bishops
take their places behind this table, and
watch the congregation gather, people
coming in through the dozen or more
side doors as though the Tabernacle
was huge sponge absorbing the popu-
lation of the Territory. Mingling with
the rest come many strangers, bringing
the latest tailoring and millinery, and
these strangers are always conducted to
seats down in front, where they can be
addressed effectively in body. AT one
| door stands huge cask of cold water,
with several tin cups handy, and nearly
all stop to drink as they come in. Later
you will see tin pals holding q quart
| VI lnOlt, hud ilduAlltS Ou
both sides, circulating through the
audience, and filled from time to time
by small Ganymedes running about in
chip hats and well-starched pinafores.
| Precisely at o'clock the great organ
sends forth its, melodious summons,
and the noise of busy voices hum
of the veritable honey-bees of Deseret
in their home hive-is hushed. A hymn
is announced (by some brother in n
business coat whom you will meet in
trade tomorrow, perhaps) and sung by
the choir, for though the tune may be
one of the old familiar ones, the au-
i dience does not join in the singing.
The music of the Tabernacle has a
| great reputation in the West, and it
would hardly be fair to decry it because
it does not come up to a New York
performance. IL is conspicuously good
for the material at hand and the locali-
ty. The organ, handsome instru-
ment, nearly as large as the great or
gan in the Boston Music Hall, is not so
readily discounted, however. and is
played with much skill, to the constant
delight of the people.
After the singing comes long pray
er by layman priest, and hymn,
during the singing of which eight bish-
ops break the slices of bread into NOR
sells. Then, while the bread is being
passed through the audience to the
communicants-everybody, old and
young, partaking-President Taylor OIL
some other dignitary reads a chapter
from the Bible, usually from Revela-
ion, and makes eXtempore remarks
dpon it. Sometimes the Hon. George
}. Cannon, the most eminent of the
Mormon leaders, occupies the pulpit.
1t is 3 o'clock before the bread and
water have been partaken of 10y all,
and fully by the time the preacher
has ceased, the bishop pronounced the
benediction, and the congregation is
dismissed. AS the people scatter about
the great dusty yard, picking their way
among the blocks of stone awaiting
their place in the Temple, one sees how
largely foreigners they are, the pre-
dominant nationalities being British
and scandinavian. Their peasantry,
too, is Enthusiastically stamped upon their
faces, though they have changed their
foreign characteristics for rusticity OF
the American type. Among the most
prominent of the Mormon apostles are
Orson Pratt, the most distinguished
scholar and writer in the sect, and 10.
seph L. Smith, nephew of the original
Prophet and founder of Mormonism.
Ernest H1gersoU, IN Harper'S Maya
zine.