Unto a Good Land Read Online Free PDF Page A

it’s true. Wheat-flour Jesus was murdered. Last month.”
    “Whom are you talking about, Landberg?”
    “Erik Janson, of course. A prophet even in the old country, where he traveled about and sold wheat flour. That’s why they called him Wheat-flour Jesus.”
    “The prophet Janson? Murdered?”
    “Yea. He was shot like a dog at Cambridge, in the court where he had brought suit. The defendant shot him.”
    The captain was not surprised by the news. He thought he had some knowledge of the handling of legal matters in this country. Perhaps, tacked to the wall of the courtroom, was the same notice he had seen in a saloon in New York: “Shoot first! Live longer!”
    But he realized that the Charlotta ’s old carpenter was much excited by the happening.
    Long Landberg, the apostate, continued: Erik Janson was the worst scoundrel ever to tramp the ground of North America. Landberg had seen him daily during many months and he knew the prophet’s creed. Janson called himself the new Christ and had chosen as his apostles twelve befuddled louts whom he kept in attendance, like a tyrant king. Indeed, he had been a cruel tyrant to his followers, plaguing them enough to make angels weep, if there were tears in heaven. No doctor was called for the sick; when one of the disciples lay at death’s door, unable to move toe or finger, Janson ordered him to rise up and be healthy, and if the sick one could not, Janson condemned him for sin and lack of faith. Janson, of course, was free from sin and righteous in all ways.
    Once, Landberg had defended some poor sick sectarians against this tyranny, with the result that Janson had seized everything he owned, including most of his clothes. Without means, he had been unable to bring suit against the prophet. Janson had said that he was equal with God. . . . Well, the fact was, humanity could thank the man who had shot Wheat-flour Jesus; through this splendid deed he had freed North America from a beast. Janson, a raw, presumptuous peasant boor! Yes, said Landberg, he even looked like the Evil One, his teeth were like tusks, no doubt he was possessed by an evil spirit and had been sent into the world by the devil.
    Captain Lorentz, when he had transported some of Janson’s followers, had heard them speak of their leader as a Heavenly Light, lit for them in the dark heathen land of Sweden. They had been honest in their faith; to them he had been the returned Christ. And now, after his murder, they would undoubtedly say that, like Christ, he had sealed his religion and faith with his blood.
    Was Erik Janson sent by God or by the devil? Perhaps by neither; who could tell? One had to be satisfied that God Himself knew.
    Now Lorentz asked his former carpenter how things were with these sectarians; how were they getting along in that vast prairie land of Illinois where he had heard they were settled?
    “Janson said he founded a new Jerusalem,” Landberg retorted with derision. “But the fact is, he founded a new hell.”
    It was true that the community which Janson had built and named Bishop Hill, after his home parish Biskopskulla, had been called Bishop Hell by the Americans, and letters so addressed had reached their destination. But the Janson followers, Landberg admitted, were fine, industrious farmers; they had greatly improved their situation; no longer did they live like beasts in earth huts, but had built themselves houses of bricks, which they made. Nor were bricks the only things they made: though in Sweden they had been temperance people, in Bishop Hill they had built a still, operated by steam and capable of making three hundred gallons of brännvin a day. When they got drunk, they blamed this on the Holy Ghost “filling them,” as they called it.
    Last spring the sectarians had sent a group of their men to California to dig for gold in the name of God. Even two of their apostles had been sent. Could anyone imagine Saint Peter or Saint Paul digging for gold? But Janson did not