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“When he would come home at night tired out with labor, he would before going to bed, ask some of the family to read chapters (as was his usual course night and morning); and would almost always say: ‘Read one of David’s Psalms.’...

“Whenever he and I were alone, he never failed to give me the best of advice, just such as a true and anxious mother would give a daughter. He always seemed interested in my work, and would come around and look at it when I was sewing or knitting; and when I was learning to spin he always praised me if he saw that I was improving. He used to say: ‘Try to do whatever you do in the very best possible manner.’”^[9]

“Father had a rule not to threaten one of his children. He commanded and there was obedience,” writes his eldest son. “My first apprenticeship to the tanning business consisted of a three years’ course at grinding bark with a blind horse. This, after months and years, became slightly monotonous. While the other children were out at play in the sunshine, where the birds were singing, I used to be tempted to let the old horse have a rather long rest, especially when father was absent from home; and I would then join the others at their play. This subjected me to frequent admonitions and to some corrections for eye-service as father termed it.... He finally grew tired of these frequent slight admonitions for my laziness and other shortcomings, and concluded to adopt with me a sort of book-account something like this: