84 Fontane Blätter 110 Unveröffentlichtes und wenig Bekanntes to the poet Shelley several times, so perhaps he assumed that was the proper English spelling. 15 In Wedel’s estimation the community leader Obadja Hornbostel was pre­sented as»ein schlau seine Vorteile berechnender Kirchenfürst, der ›Hohe­priester‹ von Nogat-Ehre.[...] Er versteht es, sein Vermögen zu vermehren«. Wedel himself had to delay marriage for years due in part to a lack of money. He made approximately$600 a year teaching both in New Jersey and Hal­stead. In general, rural Mennonite pastors were self-supporting farmers, as Fontane portrayed Obadja. But as spiritual leaders they were also obligated to care for the poor in their congregation or broader community. Certainly, wealthy farmers were over-represented among leadership, but they were ex­pected to give up a lot of time without compensation to serve the church. Wedel was paid to teach, but not to pastor. Wedel seemed highly offended at the insinuation that Mennonite pastors were somehow particularly attached to material wealth. 16 Equally appalling for Wedel was Obadja’s theology. His lengthy com­mentary on piety as a path to wealth continued in what for Wedel was an irreverent vein.»Was Benjamin Franklin von der Mäßigkeit sagt, das sag ich von der Frömmigkeit: sie bringt Kohlen zum Feuer, Mehl in das Mehlfaß, Geld in den Beutel, Kredit bei der Welt«. For readers of the college’s paper Wedel thought it would be clear that Fontane’s image of a rural Mennonite pastor had been»boshaft entstellend«. 17 Nonetheless the review ended with an offer, not subsequently repeated, that one could order the book from the editor for$1.25 plus a dime for ship­ping. Unfortunately, no copy from then remains in the college library today. Mennonitische Indianer-Mission – eine Karrikatur empörendster Art Wedel’s second review was primarily a heavily abridged version of the bap­tism ceremony at Nogat-Ehre described in chapter twenty-four that high­lighted the cultural elements at the expense of the religious ones. He first noted that Ruth had studied at Halstead and that Obadja visited there in preparation for the event. Then both Toto and L’Hermite were quoted trying to explain the ceremony. When the narrator’s voice resumes, Wedel included the ceremonial and not the religious aspects of the gathering. The contents of the sermon, for example, and Lehnert’s conversion were omitted while the drums of Gunpowder-Face were highlighted. For early Mennonite mission­aries, drums were still considered something heathen, a label Wedel sup­plies here in his editing of Fontane’s account. The first Mennonite mission­ary to Native Americans, Samuel S. Haury, on his initial encounter with their religious rituals that included drumming thought that it was»guided by Sa­tan«. Topping off a solemn baptism with such activity led Wedel to this con-