pleasant a thought that for ever and ever a man shall bear his own
company?

But this Spenersberg? Seven years ago, on the day when he came of age,
Albert Spener, then a young clerk in a fancy-goods store, went to look
at the estate which his grandfather had bequeathed to him the year
preceding. Not ten years ago the old man made his will and gave the
property, on which he had not quite starved, to his only grandson, and
here was this worthless gorge which stretched between the fields more
productive than many a famous gold-mine.

The youth had seen at once that if he should deal with the land as
his predecessors had done, he would be able to draw no more from the
stingy acres than they. He had shown the bent of his mind and the
nature of his talent by the promptness with which he put things remote
together, and by the directness with which he reached his conclusions.

He had left his town-lodgings, having obtained of his employer leave
of absence for one week, and within twenty-four hours had come to
his conclusion and returned to his post. Of that estate which he had
inherited but a portion, and a very small portion, offered to the
cultivator the least encouragement. The land had long ago been
stripped of its forest trees, and, thus defrauded of its natural
fertilizers, lay now, after successive seasons of drain and waste, as
barren as a desert, with the exception of that narrow strip between
the hills which apparently bent low that inland might look upon river.

Along the banks of the stream, which flowed, a current of considerable
depth and swiftness, toward its outlet, the river, willows were
growing. Albert's employer was an importer to a small extent,
and fancy willow-ware formed a very considerable share of his
importations. The conclusion he had reached while surveying his land
was an answer to the question he had asked himself: Why should
not this land be made to bring forth the kind of willow used by
basket-weavers, and why should not basket-weavers be induced to gather
into a community of some sort, and so importers be beaten in the
market by domestic productions? The aim thus clearly defined Spener
had accomplished. His Moravians furnished him with a willow-ware
which was always quoted at a high figure, and the patriotic pride
the manufacturer felt in the enterprise was abundantly rewarded: no
foreign mark was ever found on his home-made goods.

But _his_ Moravians: where did these people come from,