Their character has not been well
understood. They possess excellent qualities for the making of good
Americans. Christianity in pure and true form is all they need.
[Sidenote: A Home-loving and Musical People]
The Bohemians are a home people, social, and fond of organizations of
every kind. Music is their passion, and their clubs, mutual benefit
societies, and loan associations, successfully run, show large capacity
for management. They have forty-two papers, seven of them religious, two
Protestant. Their freethinking is not all of it by any means of the
dogmatic sort which has its catechism of atheism. There is another
class, represented by an old woman with a broad brow over which the
silvery hair is smoothly parted, who says to the missionary, "I have my
God in my heart, I shall deal with him. I do not want any priest to step
between us." That is the class which the gospel can reach and ought to
reach speedily.
[Sidenote: Where Located]
About seventy-five per cent, of the Bohemians live in the northwest. In
Cleveland they have entered into various industries. In New York they
are largely employed in cigar-making, at which the women and girls work
under conditions not calculated to inspire them with regard for God or
man.
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