The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1901-06-07
THREE COLLECTIONS.
They Puzzled a Visitor to Country
Church In Holland.

A Sunday among the strid burghers
of Holland gave Mr.. Clifton johnson
an opportunity to see three church col
Iections taken up in rapid succession.
He had asked to be directed to char
acteristic country church in an outlay
ing village. As result he went by
train from Leyden to little place
with an unpronounceable name, where
there was church as severe in its
simplicity as the meeting house of col
onial New England.
1t resembled them, too. in its chilli
ness for there was no attempt at
warming it, and the people were de-
pendent upon foot stoves of the old
fashioned type that was beginning to
go out of vogue in America hundred
years ago. Several score of these little
boxes stood in the church entry, neatly
piled against the wall, ready to be fill
ed with smoldering peat and supplied
to the worshippers as they came in.
When the time for the collection ar
rived, a man started out from the
rallied off space before the pulpit,
which place was occupied by the eld-
ers, and with black pocket at the
end of an eight foot pole proceeded to
his task With this accessory he could
reach clear to the end of pew, only
he had to be careful not to hit some
worshiper with the butt end while
making his short reaches.
Everybody in the congregation put
in something, and the collector made
a little bow every time coin jingled
in the pocket. He had gone about half
way round when another elder started
out with another bag and pole The
writer wondered he had not started
before. His purpose, however, was not
to help his fellow collector finish the
work. Instead, he started just where
the other had begun and passed the
bag to the same people, and every one
dropped in a coin as faithfully as he
had done the first time.
Nor was this the end, for the second
collector had no sooner got good
start than third stepped out from the
pulpit front with a bag and pole and
went as industriously over the ground
as the two others had done. He was
just as successful as has predecessors.
Things were getting serious. The
stranger had put silver in the first bag,
but fearing that the collection might
continue Indefinitely he dropped cop
per coins in the second and third bags
and was not little relieved when he
saw that the rest of the men in the
elders seats kept their places.
Later he learned the secret of the
process. The first man collected for
the minister, the second for the
church, the third for the poor. AS
each member of the congregation con-
tributed one Holland cent to oach bag
it seemed as if a little calculation
might have saved much collecting.
The sum of the three deposits would
in our money be about one and one
fifth cents for each person.
At the moment when the bags began
to pass the minister gave out hymn,
but the congregation finished singing
it long before the collection was over.
There did not, however, ensue one of
those silences during which you can
hear pins drop and flies buzz, for the
minister ignored the collectors, who
were still making their halting pro-
gress through the aisles, and promptly
began his sermon Youths Com
panion.