Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 302, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 December 1910 — THE MEN WHO NEVER SPEAK [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE MEN WHO NEVER SPEAK

THE Trappist monastery of Gethsemane, twelve miles from Beardstown, Ky., Is especially interesting now because of the expulsion of the religious orders from Portugal and their Imminent expulsion from Spain, which will drive many of them to seek refuge In this country. The expulsion of the religious orders from France a few years ago sent many monks and nunß to America and England and resulted In the establishment of monasteries and conventß In various places. The members of the Trappist order are pledged to silence for the remainder of their days. It is the Order of the Silent Brotherhood. The abbey of Gethsemane is a selfsustaining institution. Everything Its monks require Is raised or made on the .2,000 acres of beautiful Kentucky farm country that surrounds the monastery. And not only are they forbidden to speak to anyone, but they are not allowed to read anything except the old books in the monastery library. Even letters or newspapers are not allowed to enter the silent place. It Is doubtful if three men In the abbey know the name of the president of the United States or the governor of Kentucky. All tender and sympathetic emotions which th this life visit the human heart are suppressed. The deaths of nearest and dearest relatives are never announced to them. Forgotten by the world, they themselves forget the world. Among their number are many men of distinguished careers, many who have borne titles. A once celebrated operatic tenor died among the monks a few years ago. The son of the founder of the famous Sunnybrook distillery, who squandered nearly half a million in less than a year, is a member of the order. A farmer who drove the writer over to the monastery from Bardstown, and who knows more about the monks than anyone the country round, pointed out the former Count de Bourbon, Baron de Saumur and Oscar Bachstetz as they left the gate. There are many others, equally important in their early days. In this living tomb. The only rooms in the abbey that are comfortably furnished are the library and the abbot’s apartment. All the other rooms are perfectly bare except for wooden tables and chairs and Biblical inscriptions on the walls. There is a musty odor that seems to pervade everything, and it is a great relief to get out into the monastery garden with its geometrical flower beds and shrines. The most attractive part of the abbey is Its 2,000 acres of land, which consists of Mrood- | ed hills, fields where hundreds of cattle graze and some of the finest farmling country in the state of Kentucky. The Trapplsts are good farmers. They i also make fine butter and cheese, some of which is sold in the markets j of Louisville. Few visitors go to Gethsemane any | more. Bardstown, the nearest town,

is twelve miles away, making a visit a rather difficult task. Years ago when James Lane Allen wrote “Th< White Cowl," his descriptions of th« abbey brought many visitors then from all over the United States, but today the monastery is almost forgot ten by the outside world. When th« members of the order die they an laid to rest in the little cemetery out side the monastery walls. There ths original founders of, the abbey are buried. ' — The abbey owes its direct origin to the abbey of La Meilleraye, in the deportment of Loire-Inferieure, France, The abbot of the latter institution made an arrangement with the French government back in the early forties to lay the foundation for a monastery of their order on property situated on the island of Martinique, given to

them by Louis Philippe. After the downfall of the monarchy the original plan was abandoned In favor of a colony in the United States, and this was established at Gethsemane in 1848. The Trapplst order was founded In the twelfth century. Roton, count of Perche, built the abbey of Notre Dame de la Malson-Dieu de la Trapps in 1140 at Soligny-la-Trappe, a village of Haute-Perche, department of the Orne, named La Trappe after the narrow gorge which forms Its entrance, comparable to a trap door. During the middle ages the monastery was captured and pillaged many times, and It waff not until the middle of the seventeenth century that the order was put on a firm basis and spread toother lands. Until Napoleon became emperor of France their order prospered. He was not In sympathy with them, and he confiscated their property and expelled them from the country. A visit to the latter abbey Is like stepping back a thousand years Into the past There la another famous Trapplst monastery at Oca, a fewi miles from Montreal, Canada

A Trappist Farmer.