Note 27 — Front matter (continued 5)

At the present time, when the persecution of the Stundists in Russia is attracting considerable attention, it may interest my readers to hear that one of the earliest promoters of the Stundist movement was Yacub Dilakoff, a Syrian, and a graduate of the Old American College. He went to Russia thirty years ago, and was so horrified at the ignorance and gross superstition of the peasantry that he studied Russian in the hope of enlightening them, and to aid his purpose became an itinerant hawker of Bibles. The "common people heard him gladly," and among both the Orthodox and the Lutherans prayer unions were formed, from which those who frequented them received the name by which they are known, from stunde, hour.

Dilakoff, whom the Stundists love to call "our Bishop," has been thrown into prison several times, but on his liberation began to teach among the sect of the Molokans in the Crimea and on the Volga with such success that sixteen congregations have been formed among them. His zeal has since carried him to the Molokan colonies on the Amoor, where he has been preaching and teaching for three years with such remarkable results as to have received the title of "a Modern Apostle."