Karl G. Maeser’s Miraculous Witness of the Gift of Tongues

Upon his baptism, Karl G. Maeser prayed for a witness of the truth. While walking with Apostle Franklin D. Richards and William Budge in Dresden, Germany, Maeser asked questions in German and Richards answered in English, and both men miraculously understood each other for several miles without an interpreter, until they crossed a bridge, at which point the gift ceased.

Maeser's account of this miraculous event includes a specific detail about his prior expectation of it. Years before meeting the missionaries, while waiting in a garden salon to tutor the son of a Polish countess, Maeser experienced a long discussion in his 'spiritual ears' with an unknown man about the basic questions of Mormonism. When he later walked with Franklin D. Richards and William Budge over the Elbe bridge, he realized the conversation they were having was word-for-word the exact same discussion he had previously experienced in that garden salon. This confirmation solidified his conversion.

Fuller account of this event (in the witness’s own words):

Our conversation was on the subject of the authority of the Priesthood, Elder Budge acting as interpreter. Suddenly I stopped Elder Budge from interpreting President Richards’ remarks, as I understood them, and replied in German, when again the interpretation was not needed as President Richards understood me also. Thus we kept on conversing until we arrived at the point of separation when the manifestation as suddenly ceased as it had come. One evening, I went with him over the Elbe bridge and there word for word began the conversation that I had experienced in the garden salon of the countess. Since then my conversion to the Mormon Church has remained firm . . . in spite of all the attempts of my friends to dissuade me.