HTML: 3C 1874- 1875
Mr. J.C. C. Rust, Brunswick.
Jan. 4, 1874.
Dear Sir! On Dec. 16, 1873, I mailed a letter to you containing an order list of seeds and a money order for 18 Prussian Talers to G. Uhle & Co. As it is possible that my letter got lost (which would cause a lot of trouble), I am going to send you today again a copy of my seed order list with the urgent request to send me at once the ordered articles.
Respectfully, …
F.A. Müller, B. 45, Rushford, Minn., Fillmore Co.
M.P. M.C. W. Jan. 16, 1874.
I received your letter of May 7. Besides the kinds of seeds I listed in my catalog from last year (and which I will sell this year at the same price), I can recommend to you the following kinds: …
<T154> Fred Gluck, Brownsville, Minn.
Febr. 4, 1874.
Hoping that you were satisfied with the bushes I sent you last year, I want to recommend myself to you again this year with my seeds, and want to ask you besides for a small favor.
A certain Ferdinand Brehme received last year in spring seeds for $6.50 from me. If you think you could collect this small sum for me, I am going to send you the bill, and will give you half of the money for your trouble.
Respectfully, F.A.M.
Mr. John Ulrich, La Crosse, Wis.
Feb. 4, 1874.
Would you please print the following announcement in the Nordstern, and keep back the amount, as well as for the Nordstern, from the first order in summer that Mr. Frölich will send to me.
Respectfully, F.A.M.
==
F.A. Meissner
Seed Grower and Gardener, M.P. M.C., Wis.
I want to announce to my dear business friends as well as to the general public that I have again a supply of the best and most excellent kinds of vegetable seeds as well as fresh flower seeds from all the most beautiful and bright kinds fitting for the free country.
Vegetable seeds: five cts. per paper.
Peas, beans, and sweet corn: 10 cts. per paper
Flower seeds: 10 cts. per paper.
All seeds will be sent—postage paid—for the above price.
Address to F.A.M., M.P., M.C., W.
==
Verbenas, fire red and other new wonderful colors: Seeds, 25 cts. per paper.
Trophy Tomato, the earliest, the biggest and best tomato: The seeds are collected from fruits that weighed 15 [?] to 16 oz.: 25 cts. per paper
Sent postage paid for the above price.
Address to F.A.M. …
<T155> P.S. May I ask you to have the enclosed English ad put into the ‘Weekly Liberal Democrat’ or into the ‘Republican and Leader’—which of them you think best suited for—and either to have it paid in the manner as above or send a bill to me.
Fred Gluck, Brownsville, Minn.
Febr. 18, 1874.
I received your letter of the 6th of this month. I am going to mail today with this letter a package for you with flower seeds, containing 18 kinds for 10 cts. each and 14 kinds for five cts. each: $2.50
I also will include free a sample of my new verbenas and Trophy tomatoes.
You will find enclosed Mr. Brehme’s seed order and a note saying to pay it to you. Do what you can. It takes much work and labor before the seed is ready for sale, and I have to feed many hungry mouths, who all earn only little or nothing.
Respectfully …
==
Mr. Ferdinand Brehme in Brownsville, Minn.
To F.A. Meissner, M.P. Wi.
Db: April 16, 1873. Garden seeds according to order list: $6.50
Please pay to Fred Gluck in Brownsville.
F.A. Meissner
Professor Dr. Renghly, La Crosse, W.
March 6, 1874.
Dear Sir! I was told that you are quite interested in gardening and flower raising. I therefore take the liberty to hand over to you herewith my seed catalog, which surely does not impress anybody by disarming pictures, but if you want to give it a try you can convince yourself that I try to offer to my customers only a fine selection of the best and newest seeds.
Respectfully …
Mr. C.B. Richard, Boas, N.Y. & Hamburg.
March 16, 1874.
On Febr. 19, I received the following announcement from Mr. Karl Jentsch in Brunswick:
==
<T156> Brunswick, Jan. 28, 1874==
Mr. F.A. Meissner in Sparta, Wis.==
I sent you according to your request, for your dear bill and risk #965, one box via train in Express freight by negotiation of Mr. G.B. Richard & Boas in Hamburg."
The box above, containing seeds, which were supposed to complete my assortment, has not arrived yet. It had not yet arrived in N.Y. by March 9—as you wrote to me—and I therefore suspect that it must have been misplaced in Hamburg.
The time for seed sales has come, and I have many orders here that I am unable to fulfill as I lack the articles that were in the box. You yourself can imagine how great my damage will be. I am sorry that my first attempt to have the seeds sent via Hamburg instead of Bremen came to such a bad end, as I also always had a preference for Hamburg, because I was formerly a gardener with James Booth.
Respectfully, …
Karl Jentsch in Brunswick.
March 16, 1874.
I received your letter of [Jan.] the 6th on Jan. 27, in which you indicated that you had received my seed order and money order for 18 Talers. You also mention that you will send the seeds off in a few days. But only on Jan. 28, that is three weeks afterwards, you finally mailed my seeds. you took so little consideration for my urgent request. The worst of it all is, however, that the box had not arrived yet in N.Y. on March 9, and must have been kept lying on the train or in Hamburg. Will you please—as soon as you receive my letter—inquire about it. The seeds will be too late anyhow for selling, but maybe I still could use some for my own sowing.
Respectfully …
<T157> Mr. John A. Salzer, La Crosse, Box 391.
March 20, 1874.
I have received your complaint that you had to pay 18 cents postage for the seeds that you received from me. I would be very grateful if you could tell me for what reason the Postmaster asked for this additional payment. As I promise to send my seeds postage paid, I will gladly compensate you for this expense. Please keep the envelope from the seeds with the address and the two-cent stamp. You also received last year seeds from me: Did you also have to pay extra postage?
You would do me a great favor if you could give me the above mentioned information.
Respectfully, … F.A.M.
Mr. John Bayer, Onalaska, La Crosse County, Wis.
March 27 [1874].
I mailed your seeds the day before yesterday. You will be able to get excellent beautiful asparagus plants as soon as the frost leaves the soil, but I will have to send these by express as they are to big for the mail. I would advise you to take the biennial plants.
Respectfully, F.A.M.
Mr. Karl Frölich, La Crosse.
April 23, 1874.
Dear Sir! I received today your letter of the 21st and I am very sorry that I have caused your displeasure, but you will excuse me if I try to explain it to you. When I received no order from you, and thought of the possibility that it might have been lost, I therefore addressed some lines to you. This is surely no [?] proof that I was interested in your order. When I received on answer to this letter either, I wondered how I could have lost your sympathy. Only Tuesday, April 14, your second order arrived, and that when I was in Sparta trading with seeds, so that I couldn’t get everything prepared until the next Sunday (the 19th) in order to have it sent by mail to Sparta on Monday morning. Unfortunately, we had the hardest snowstorm of the whole winter on Monday, so that the stage could go only on Wednesday to Sparta, and the seeds are now probably in your hands. Your first letter did not arrive at all, and your second one only very recently. Maybe <T158> it is your Postmaster’s or his clerk’s fault, as I had quite a controversy with him, because he had John Salzer pay postage for a package of seeds.
With my friendly greetings …
Fred Gluck, Brownsville, Minn.
May 1, 1874.
I will send you today a box containing:
10 Chinese peonies, five red and five white ones @ 50 cts.: $5.00
1 pink Chinese Hybridia, has to be covered in winter time; is also nice in a pot.
1 yellow filled [double] buttercup, hardy perennial
2 Lychius Hageniana, beautiful and fire red, also nice in a pot.
1 Delphinium Chinensa Pamila, nice in a pot.
How about friend Brehme? Did you squeeze anything out of him? Wishing a good reception, I sign …
Mr. John Bayer, Onalaska, La Crosse County, Wis.
May 1, 1874.
I will send you today by Express from Sparta 25 asparagus plants from the new big kind (Conovers Colossal). Wishing a good reception, I remain your devoted … F.A.M.
Mr. Ernst Christian Konrad Wrede, in Brunswick.
Oct. 1, 1874.
Dear Sir! Two years ago I received, through the assistance of the Postmaster in Brunswick, your seed catalogue as well as that from Mr. J.C. C. Rust, but both arrived too late for my order. Last winter I sent a small order to Mr. Rust, now Karl Jentsch; the reason why I decided in his favor was that he raised the majority of the seeds himself. I however have no reason to be satisfied with the execution of my order. Mr. Jentsch received my order with the payment in cash in the beginning of January and mailed the seeds only end of the same month. The result was that they arrived too late for my spring seed trade, which caused me a great disturbance and made it necessary for me to buy seeds here once again.
<T159> Besides: Early short hard carrots were long Brunswick; long red English radishes were round; red Brunswick onions germinated only 1/4; and so many other kinds are a mixture of everything and anything. If I don’t want to call this plain fraud, it indicates at least that Mr. Jentsch’s business is in great disorder. I would have cheated my customers if I would have sold them long carrots as short ones, round radishes as long ones, and old onion seeds as new ones. But the question is now—can I expect anything better from you?—So I will give it a try, and will send you my order as soon as my answer arrives. This should be around the beginning of December, but as money here pays very big interest, I would not like to pay you for such a long time ahead in advance. I will therefore send you a money order to the First National Bank of Sparta, payable on May 1, 1875. If you will [take] this money order to the bank, it will send you in return a money order for Uhl in Brunswick.
Expecting a kind reply, I sign …
Karl Jentsch in Brunswick.
Oct. 1, 1874.
Dear Sir! Last spring I received from you under the name ‘Frankfurter Giant Cauliflower’ a kind of cauliflower seed that is excellently early and gives very beautiful heads. I therefore suggest that it was the ‘Earliest Erfurter Branch Cauliflower.’ Please send me from the same kind, under the right name, two dozen capsules; and if you have Frankfurter Giant Cauliflower and it is very good for the free country, please send also a dozen capsules from this kind, both by mail. The postage has to be paid in advance and therefore [you] can put it on my bill. My early ‘Berliner Shoot Cauliflower’ has not produced a single head until now. In general, many errors occurred with the seeds you sent me this spring, like …
As the seeds arrived too late, I cheated only a few of my customers with the wrong kinds. I did not sell the red onion seed at all, as I tested it and it was bad. The yellow one was good.
Please send me the cauliflower at once, and tell me whether <T160> you will compensate me for my loss caused by the bad seed. I will then send you a bill about it with my next order.
Ernst C.K. Wrede in Brunswick.
Dec. 23, 1874
Dear Sit! You will find herewith my seed order and a money order for 20 Talers. I hope you will execute my order at once, and will send me good seed. It costs me with customs and freight the double price till here.
== Important Directions:
Pack the seeds into a box (not a barrel), the cover of which can be opened in the Customs House in N.Y. without breaking the box all apart. Address the box to F.A.M., Sparta, Wisc., N.A., and send it by Express to Konstantin Württemberger in Bremen. Include your bill—affirmed by the American Consul, which is necessary for the Customs House in N.Y.—If you will execute my small order fairly to my satisfaction (I ask less for the price, but most of all for good seeds and good kinds), you can be assured of my gratitude and my continuing patronage.
Ernst C.K. Wrede in Brunswick.
Jan. 1, 1875.
Dear Sir! I mailed on Dec. 26th my order list, and enclosed a money order for 20 Talers to Uhle & Co. in Brunswick, but as there is the possibility that the letter might get lost, which would cause a lot of trouble for me, I will send you herewith a duplicate. Please let me know by a postcard of their arrival.
Seed list …
Mr. John Ulrich, La Crosse, Wisc.
Jan. 4, 1875.
Dear Sir. The last Nordstern contained the following ad: "Wanted: A well educated boy, who knows how to speak German, can find a good job in the Nordstern office." I have a boy [Ernest] fitting pretty much the above description. He is 15 years old and over five feet tall, speaks and understands German, however is unable to read or write German. If you would let me know what he is supposed <T161> to do and how much he could earn, I could better decide whether he would fit for this job. I surely have enough work here for the boy, but I would like to use this opportunity in order to give him a better education.
Mr. John Boll, Dallas, Dallas Co., Texas
Jan. 4, 1875.
Dear Sir! If you should feel yourself moved to send me the small amount of my bill from March 1, 1873 ($7.30), you can do so best by P.O. Money Order to Sparta, Wis. and you can be assured of my gratitude.
Respectfully …
<Written in English.> Henry Crouse, Greenville, Beaver Co., Utah Terr.
Feb. 17, 1875.
<T161, cont.> Charles Helmuth, N.Y., P.O.. Box 4336
Febr. 19, 1875
Dear Sir! I just received your card saying that my seeds have arrived. I wrote you already some days ago that you should send the box by American Express, Sparta, Wisc. Could you not moderate your bill a bit? Last year I received my seeds via Hamburg and Mr. Richard & Bliss’s bill was only $11.00
Respectfully … F.A.M.
John Bayer, Onalaska, La Crosse Co., Wis.
March 1, 1875.
Dear Sir! I received your kind letter last Saturday. My seed crop from last autumn was so good that I can execute you and all other possible orders to the satisfaction of my dear patrons. Please recommend me to your neighbors. I don’t have the kind of onions you want, but I have good seeds from early red and big red Wethersfield onions. I enclose my catalog.
Recommending myself to you, I sign …
Mr. John Ulrich, La Crosse, Nordstern.
March 1, 1875.
Dear Sir! Please print the following announcement in the Nordstern, if possible still this week, and have it there for this month.
I still have a demand to John Boll in Dallas, Texas. Would it not be possible to have it collected by your cousin who lives in Dallas? If you think it possible, please give me his address.
Respectfully, …
==
<T162> F.A. Meissner, Seed Farm and Garden, Mt. Pisgah, M.C., Wis.
Seeds
The climate of last summer and autumn was here at my place so good for seed raising that I can send you again especially good and fresh seed to my business friends and patrons this spring. I have a complete selection of the best vegetable varieties, and exceptionally good flower seeds; and I recommend these to the readers of the Nordstern. Seeds are sent postage paid for the catalog price to all regions in the U.S. Written inquiries or orders are to be addressed to: F.A.M., M.P., M.C., Wis.
<Written in English.> Henry Tate, Esq., Viroqua, Vernon Co., Wis.
March 25, 1875.
Dear Sir, I want to sell my place. I think it would be a good speculation for some rich man to buy the place for a tavern site. My place is certainly the best situation between Viroqua and Sparta for a stopping place. I own the whole valley up to Griffin’s barn … I own the whole 160 acres more or less, my water rights are worth 500 dollars, my buildings worth 300 dollars, my trout pond has the very best situation—no flood will swamp it. I have some of the healthiest bearing fruit trees, and my garden is in a high state of cultivation. I will sell the whole for $1,500, the low price for certain reasons known to myself.
<T162, cont.> Mr. Felix Meyer, Bangor, Wis.
Sunday, March 28, 1875
Dear Sir! Last Thursday I received your letter with a seed order dated March 19, and I sent you the seeds last Friday. I sell my seeds this spring for 10 cts. per paper or three p. for 25 cts. I have been forced to raise the price because I sell only germinating seeds, and I am therefore forced every spring to burn a lot of seeds that did not pass the test. But I executed your order at the old price.
I will send the asparagus plants for Mr. Hussa as soon as the weather will allow it. Concerning the planting of the asparagus, I ask you to toll Mr. Hussa that it is surely good to make a two foot deep ditch, to fill it one foot deep with good rotten dung, and to cover it again with the dug up soil; and then to set the plants so deep that the heads are covered with four inches soil [diagram]. I plan to go to La Crosse via Bangor in a few days with seeds, and I won’t forget to call on you then.
<T381> [Loose letter].
La Crosse, April 10, 1875.
Dear Mr. Meissner, Be so kind and send me one paper of each of the following flower seeds: German aster, strawflower, phlox, Reseda [mignonette], asparagus, and zinnia. I also want to have about 1/4 hundred of the best asparagus plants.—If you have a dark red kind of peony, you can send me a plant, but please no white or pale red one, as I have already many of these.
Send me your bill and I will send you the money right away.
Respectfully … Your Karl Frölich ($2.00)
<T162, cont.> Karl Frölich, La Crosse, Wisc.
April 15, 1875.
Dear Sir. I will mail you today a paper of flower seed, a dark red peony, and asparagus plants will be sent to you in a few days.
6 papers of flower seeds: $0.50; one plant dark red peony: $0.50; 1/3 hundred biennial [second year?] asparagus: $1. I ask you to write this amount in my favor: $2.00 .
Respectfully, F.A.M.
<T381, cont.> [Loose letter].
La Crosse, April 21, 1875.
Dear Mr. Meissner, Last Saturday I received your letter of the 15th of this month, and the box with the asparagus plants arrived on Monday. Unfortunately I am still waiting today for the seeds, which were probably stolen at some post office. As it is late already for sowing, I ask you to send me once again the same, and also the following kinds for a neighbor:
2 papers Belfornien [?], one Stocks, one strawflowers, one Reseda [mignonette], one iron carnation, one zinnia, one phlox.
Send me once again your bill and I will send you soon the receipt from Mr. Ulrich.
Respectfully … Your Karl Frölich ($2.00)
P.S. There is a letter for you at the post office.
<T163> Mr. Fred Gluck, Brownsville, Minn.
April 26, 1875
Dear Sir! I want to thank you for your money order for $1.75 which I received. Concerning Brehme, I can tell you the following details: On February 4, 1874, I wrote to you that Brehme owes me $6.50, and I asked you whether you would not want to collect the default for me, in which case I promised to pay you for you kindness half of the amount. You answered that you wanted to try. I sent you the following bill on Febr. 18, 1874:
== Mr. Ferdinand Brehme in Brownsville, Minn.
To F.A. Meissner, M.P. Wis. Obr.
April 16, 1873. Garden seeds according to order list: $6.50
Please pay to Fred Gluck in Brownsville.
F.A. Meissner
==
I also enclosed as proof Mr. Brehme’s order list.
You replied to my inquiry from May 1, 1874, that Brehme is a slow payer and you did not receive anything yet. After reading this explanation, you will surely again remember this affair.
Respectfully, F.A.M.
In the town of Jefferson, Monroe Co., close to the Pine Hollow Settlement, in the night of 29 to 30 April the new barn of Georg Klos burnt down, and with it some beautiful young horses, three cows, one foal, one calf, as well as wagons, plows, and other farming tools. The fire broke out after midnight. The origin is still a riddle, as nobody went to the stable with light or a pipe the night before. Four years ago the whole family went to church on Good Friday and found their house with beds, clothes, and all furniture in ashes when they returned.
<Written in English.> George H Crouse alias Krauss etc.
June 27, 1875
<Written in English.> G. Henry Crouse alias Krauss, Greenville [Utah].
13 Aug 1875 [excerpt].
… We directed our letters to Beaver City as directed by you. If you change your name and post office so often, it will be hardly any use to write to you. … We have built a new dwelling house, into which we intend to move this fall.
<T163, cont.> Mr. Ferdinand Kaiser, Eisleben, Germany.
Aug. 20, 1875.
Dear Sir! For several years already, you were so kind and sent me your catalogs. I would not mind to order my small demand of seeds from you (despite the fact that your prices are slightly higher than in Quedlinburg or Brunswick, if I <T164> would be convinced that your seeds are better than the ones from the other suppliers). So far I took always only few seeds when I changed. Everyone praises his seeds, the paper [?] is patient, but rarely I receive what I want.
In order to repay your friendliness and to get to know you better, I would like to propose a small trade business to you. I have a beautiful assortment of Phlox Dommondii in separate colors, from which I could this autumn to give 16 to 20 ‘lot’ away. I also have an excellent assortment of hybrid verbenas, scarlet red, fire red, a white one, blue, dark red, rose red, striped, etc. … but not in separate colors but mixed, from which I am expecting to have five to eight spare ‘lot.’ I formerly had my verbena seeds sent from Germany, but never received so beautiful kinds as I have now. I would like to trade these seeds (or as many as you want) for other flower seeds from you, and I will send these postage paid for your own catalog price to you, and you will send me yours also by mail postage paid.
Besides Stocks of which I can use several ‘lot,’ I will need mostly only assortments or samples
Asking for a reply soon, I remain …
Plant Seed Company, St. Louis, Mo.
Aug. 20, 1875.
Dear Sirs! I raise a great deal of my seeds for my small trade business myself, as I experienced often that one receives bad and wrong kinds from Germany. The reason of this might be that the big stores have too many varieties. I raise only a small selection of all the best kinds, which I try to keep pure and good.
I have an excellent crop this year, and I could sell some articles by the lb. if you would favor me to do a small exchange with me. I would like to trade these for Kentucky Blue Grass, but you must guarantee me that the seed is fresh and good. If you will agree to my plan, I will send you as soon as possible a list of the seeds that I can give away. I will guarantee for their trueness and goodness. I was out of some articles in the spring of 1874 and I got these from J.B. Root, Rockford, Ill., partly because he was closest, and partly because I was seduced by his honest <T165> sounding announcements, but I was never cheated worse.
Expecting a kind reply, I remain …
Wm. Friese & Co., La Crosse, Wis.
Oct. 3, 1875
Dear Sir! I received yesterday your letter of Sept. 29, and I can send you the reply that I can fill your order: Sage in barrels, 30 cts. per lb.; sage in 1/2 and 1/4 lb. packages, 40 cts. per lb.; summer savory in 1/2 and 1/4 lb. packages, 40 cts. per lb.; caraway seeds in 1/2 and 1/4 lb. packages, 40 cts. per lb..
I could also sell you parsley roots; price without the green leaves is $4 per 100 lb. Five pieces make about a pound. If you want these with the leaves, I will give 500 pieces for $5.00 and will deliver them with sage and summer savory postage paid to La Crosse.
Respectfully, …
Samuel Kraenbühl., Whitewater, Wisc.
Dec. 1, 1875
Dear friend! I first want to congratulate you on your marriage. Then I wanted to ask you whether you already disposed of your farm for the next year, as Sam will move away (so I heard). My boys get bigger every year, and I think if we would buy another horse, we could surely manage your farm also.
Give my regards to your wife and children. Expecting a kind reply, I sign …
<Written in English.> Louis Hunt and others, Officers of the Melvina Temperance Lodge.
9 Dec 1875 [excerpt].
Gentlemen, I wish to inform you that I can not have my boy Ernest [about 16-1/2 years old—LPM] tramp every Thursday night rain or shine, through mud or snow, three miles down to the Melvina Schoolhouse to attend your secret meetings. I have forbid him to do so any more, and do hereby ask you and demand of you to strike his name from your roll …
<T165, cont.> To: Willi. Rud. Jähring, minister in Schönbach near Neusalz in the Saxon Oberlausitz.
Dec. 25, 1875
Your Honor! Dearest Friend! I surely can address you so, you, who have given to a man entirely unknown to him so many signs of friendship.
I received and also answered a letter from my former playmate Volkmar Jähnicher, but ass he maybe did not like the information I gave him about America, he never wrote again. His curiosity was satisfied. Friend Jähne, whose first and only letter—very friendly—ended with the assurance to continue the slow <T166> correspondence and to answer my letters as soon as possible, has never written again; and I cannot keep the thought out of my mind that he considers me to be a mangy scoundrel who is not worthy of his friendship. If you—my dearest friend—would not bind me to my old home by your friendly letters, I would become entirely strange to it. You must not believe that—just because I did not answer your last letter for nearly two years now—I did not think often of you and conversed with you in my mind.
Last winter here was unusually hard and long. The result was that nearly everybody suffered from rheumatism. I, who was spared till my 70th year from this disease that was very common in my father’s family, got my right arm paralyzed, and that so badly that I had to stay in bed for many weeks and was made to sleep with pain, and did not know where to put the arm. This lameness made it impossible for me to hold a pen, and lasted till late in spring, so that my children had to take care of my garden. Summer is very short here, and the work therefore so urgent that no time is left for writing letters; and finally, when the most necessary autumn tasks are done, I can relax a little and write to you.
Last spring was very late, but the summer started out very promising, and all garden and field crops did excellently. On August 22 we had a hard night frost, which harmed corn, potatoes, and all tender vegetables very much. After it had recovered a little, a frost on the 16th, 17th, and 18th of Sept. ruined everything that had been spared the first time. The wheat crop was excellent, but much of it spoiled by the continuing rain when it stood on the fields after mowing, and we had had dry weather all summer long. Wheat cost until recently $1 per bushel (60 lb.), but now it fell to $(3/4).
I cannot understand how friend Jähne, who was in such a position that gave him the opportunity to acquire knowledge, can hand still so tight to his religion. He who was put into this life with so many privileges is not satisfied with the pleasures he enjoyed here and cannot give up the faith in a reward in heaven. The small soul he inherited from <T167> his father keeps him down.
I have come to the conclusion that it takes several generations in the world of plants to improve a variety [species?]. In the same way as the Englishman proves the ennobling of his horses by their pedigree, so little the mobility of the human spirit can be acquired by learning. Our two last Presidents are a good example of this. Lincoln climbed the throne by his own abilities, but when he was on top he got dizzy. He missed the inborn nobility. Grant was put on the throne by circumstances, but his rise did not ennoble him. He has and will always have a little soul. After his last speech to Congress, one should believe he finally woke up from his slumber and started to govern, but probably he did not write the speech himself. He has been forced to it by the circumstances and he will acquire thereby a 3rd term. How many families were ruined by his long negligence; during his whole past time of governing cheats were protected. When once one of these got the mask torn from his face and was punished by five or 10 years in prison, Grant pardoned him after a few months. This indulgence seduced rich and well respected (especially German) families, in whose hands lies the brewery business, to tremendous frauds with customs. Now suddenly as a lightning stroke out of the blue sky, the touching ‘nemesis’ of their frauds attacks them, and they are investigated and punished without mercy. Many left everything behind and fled.
I would like to say to Friend Jähne, if he still can hear, Schiller’s words: "You had hoped …."
As you know, I was born and raised in the Lutheran Christian religion and I was only 11 or 12 years old when my father died [Ernst Friedrich Meißner d. 1 May 1817 when F.A.M. was 12 y 5 m old], but later on I remembered still many things from my father’s life that made me believe that his spirit thrived to get rid of the dead religion. When I was about 15 or 16 years old, I studied Leopold Trautman’s Doctrine of Agriculture. The theoretical part was about chemistry, and proved that all organic creations are in a constant change. Now the scales fell from my eyes. I learned to understand how impossible resurrection of the human body is, as it is taught in the Bible. This was the first hole in my faith. With this <T168> small knowledge of enlightenment, I learned to understand many things about my favorite poet, Schiller, which were first dark to me. "A fire sparks truth only thrown keenly into the [?] soul ..."
I never read free-thinking literature, I only learned from them when they were occasionally mentioned in the common newspapers. I sent you with the Nordstern a sample of the ‘Free Thinker,’ which I had sent to me along time ago as a free sample. I never subscribed to the paper itself, but only read an issue now and then. I still have to mention about the ‘Nordstern,’ that it was formerly an opponent of Grant, but since its editor received a fat office last Autumn, the wind has changed. That’s the way how the Government silences the opposition newspapers.
Concerning religious matters, I can tell you that the Catholics advance with giant steps, and small communities in the country bring tremendous sacrifices, to which only their religion enables them. The German Catholic Community on the St. Joseph’s Ridge, some hours away from here, had only a small log chapel some years ago, but since that time they built a beautiful church from bricks which cost $4,000 to $5,000; a home for their minister, also bricks, for $2,000; a Catholic school for $2,500; and nuns moved into the old, still well-kept minister’s house, and they teach there for the girls. Half an hour away from here is the German St. Peter community. Their new church (cost $4,000) was broken down last summer by a storm. Now they are preparing themselves and cutting stones to build a stone church in spring. The whole community counts only 50 families, all farmers from Cologne near the Rhine or from Alsace. In La Crosse the Catholics built a big monastery, and a friend of mine who was in Minnesota a short time ago told me that they are going to build a monastery there that is supposed to be the most beautiful building in the whole Northwest. The Catholic communities are either German or Irish, but the latter don’t seem to be as self-sacrificing as the former.
The Lutherans are represented by the Norwegians, which form big communities and build beautiful churches.
<T169> The German Methodists have less nice churches. They have their meetings in schools and farmhouses, also outdoors. As the churches here are not supervised by the State, every denomination has a free hand, but I am very afraid that the enlightened people will remain the minority, if Congress does not go through with the taxation of church property. This law has thrived for already a long time here, and was recommended by the President in his speech this year.
You—dear friend—advise me to preserve religion as well as reason; but where is reason supposed to end and religion to begin? No reasonable man can any longer believe in the Bible as God’s revelation. It contains, besides some good, too much nonsense. The faith that God is the Father of all and takes care for us as a Father is surely a nice delusion, but it is too much contradicted to reality. The faith in a higher, better world, where we are supposed to go after our death, is so much proven as false that it cannot exist any longer.
According to my belief, there is another life for body and soul after death, but no resurrection as it is taught by the Church and believed by her members. After death, the human body falls to ashes and dissolves itself into different gases. This dissolution serves as food for plants, the plants as food for animals, the dead things live again under another form: It is an eternal cycle. If all the plants, animals, and men who ever lived would not have been created always from the same material, the earth would be so overfilled with things that no little space would be left any more.
The same circulation goes for the spirit, and Luther’s spirit goes on living—multiplied and enlarged—in his members; so do Schiller and other great men: the greater the spirit, the more it has spread and multiplied itself.
The explanation of the newer learned people about the creation does not seem right to me. They say the substance was here from the beginning, and the world was formed by natural forces. But where did the substance come from? Let’s please have a religion instead. There is and was a God who created all this. But there is the question, who created God? Answer: God was there before all time. But if God is here since before all time, the creation has to be before all time also. If such a great, <T170> mighty Being with the power to create would have been without a creation for some time, he would have felt bored [?] in the limitless nothingness. Time and space, eternity and future, are thoughts that the human mind cannot grasp, and it can understand religion still less.
But we have conversed now long enough about higher spheres. That which we don’t grasp and are unable to investigate, we want to leave be. We want to return to the earth, and accept that the earthly substance arose from an unknown origin. Where do the plants, trees, and animals, where does man come from? The learned people again say, nature brought forth all this. First there were only raw, imperfect kinds of animals and plants here, later on perfect creations arose, the best of which was man. But if this creative power is in nature, why does it not continue to bring forth newer and better creations? As much as I know, animals die out but I never heard of newly created ones. It is much easier for our limited reason to say that this creative power, this supernatural power, is God.
But my letter will get much too long this time. I will also enclose some excerpts from the papers that either confirm my statements, as the first speech of Rector Dillman in the University of Berlin, or some which I think you will be interested in.
I expect from your kindness which you showed so often to me, that (even if you are unable to agree to my thoughts) you won’t punish me in this case with your silence.
Sending my best wishes, I remain your devoted F.A.M.
Mr. Ferdinand Kaiser, Eisleben, Germany
Dec. 29, 1875
Please send me by mail the following seed samples. I will pay you as soon as they arrive.
Respectfully F.A.M.
[Seed list.]
P.S. You will know as well as I, that packages with goods samples should not be heavier than 1/2 lb., and that you therefore have to make two packages maybe. Also, the postage has to be paid in advance. I naturally will pay you back.
The above.
<T171> Mr. Karl Jentsch in Brunswick
Dec. 29, 1875
I received your post card with the extract from your books, and although the loss I received by your bad seeds and false kinds is much higher I will only bill you for two Mark and 81 [?] in order to balance your assets.
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