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The " Colonial and Continental Church Society " carries off the palm of having sent out to Columbia the pioneer clergyman who actually raised the standard of the Cross, on I'ebruary 29th, 1859, and by the first solemnization of Divine service, accord- ing to the Liturgy, discipline, and usage of the English Church, took formal possession of that distant land for the English branch of the Catholic Church. But "poetic justice" being 772 The Christian Advocate and Review. done to this excellent Society, the remainder of the truth is as gladly chronicled : viz., that at the heels of the first pioneer was the representative of the venerable " Society for the Propagation of the Gospel," in the person of my esteemed friend and brother, the Eev. A. D, Pringle, who arrived a few months after myself. And behind him was the good, earnest-minded Bishop Hills, who came out some twelve months after, with such a staff of clergy, for 80 young a colony, as made Columbia — which is the complement now of The Dominion on the Pacific sea-board — seem to spring, like Minerva, armed cap-d-pie, ecclesiastically at least, from the forehead of Great Britain. A preliminary sketch of the geography, and political and com- mercial importance of this colony, of (we must not- now say " British " ) Columbia, will give clearness to the narrative of its evangelization. This Colony, which is about the size of France, lies on the western side of the Eocky mountains, and forms a rough paral- lelogram, being bounded on the east by them, on the west by the Pacific, on the south by the 49th parallel, and on the north by the Russian Alaska territory, lately bought by the United States. Colonists in general, and Canadians in particular, marvel at the fatuous lack of sympathy between Great Britain and themselves : here is violated the ftpophthegm that " love generally descends." The very existence of Great Britain may some day depend upon the cordial loyalty to the mother country of these young giants. Here at home we are criminally ignorant of the feelings and statistics of our colonies ; and more intense interest is excited in the Imperial Parliament by some bye-question of domestic politics, than about vital concerns of a colossus like the Canadian "dominion," a confederation of British Colonies, which ranges across the whole American continent, at its widest part, from ocean to ocean. How they all love us, and our institutions, and our literature ; and how they venerate our old Apostolic Church ! How it chills them to the marrow to come in contact with the supercilious apathy of the Mother to whom they are so faithful ! Why, as has been truly said in my hearing lately, by a good loyal Canadian clergyman, on a missionary platform, " our radi- cals are more conservative than your tories ! " Columbia is now added to the British North American confede- ration, and completes the grand symmetrical British counterpoise to the inorganic conglomerate called " The United States." For The English Church in Columbia. 773 every international, strategic, and commercial reason. Great Britain should bestir herself in every way to consolidate the interests of this mammoth British constituency. The United States have already stolen a n.arch upon British stolidity, — above they have bought Alaska, and below us they have improvised an inter-oceanic railway from Atlantic to Pacific ; before many years they will have monopolized the whole carrying-tiadewith the East, m't^ the western route; unless Canada is aided in 'he competition. Nature herself however has played the engineijr, as only she can, and with marked favouritism laid out a roi.te exclusively on British soil, from Atlantic to Pacific shores, s iperior to all others in the new world : from the termination of the Grand Trunk Line, as a terminus a quo ou this side westward, there lie some fifteen hun- dred miles of land as level as an English park, up to the Kocky Mountains, which are some three hundred miles wide ; strange to say, the only pass through them practicable for a railway, too, is on British tenitory, "The Vermillion Pass;" then onward through Columbia, the line would be easily continued to the coast, or to the capital. New Westminster. From hence to China, India, Australia, etc., etc., would run a service of " Great Easterns," to pour the resources of the East through the new channel cut England- wards, inaugurating a new era in the nature and dimensions of the carrying-trade. There are coal-mines also, prepared by Nature in rich abundance, at each of the twc termini, and in the middle in the whole valley of the Sascatche- wan. This route would be eleven days shorter, at least, than the United States rival line, besides possessing many other advan- tages in favour of Great Britain. If England will not guarantee a loan for constructing this railway, what safer speculation could be offered to capitalists ? Columbia was once called New Caledonia, and was almost a terra incognita, until as "British Columbia" it has become a household word, — thanks to its gold, to the labours of the very first pioneer of the Protestant Evangelical Societies, Mr. Duncan, and to the golden opinions won for it by the indefatigable Bishop. When I went out in 1858, the Committee could only point to some vague sporadic marks upon an apocryphal map, as indicating the " foreign parts, or thereabouts," to which I was commissioned. Now all that is changed. There is less of the romance which attaches to hyperborean geography, but there is more of sober promise, both in a political, commercial, and religious aspect. 774 The Christian Advocate and Review. In 1857 great excitement was produced, even in England, by the report of gold being found there, in such quantities as promised to raise the hitherto unknown land to the rank of the gold-fields of California and Australia. The correspondent of the "Times" wrote home and spoke of the country as an El Dorado for gold, and a paradise for agriculture, — dipping his pen in the colours of a rich fancy. Soon some 30,000 men had invaded the quiet of the old Hudson Bay Company's desert soli- tude ; and strained to the utmost the simple resources of their patriarchal system of government. But still the cry was " They come." In canoes, in boats, in steamers, in ships, and in almost everything but rafts and by swimming, from almost everywhere, they swarmed to Victoria, the capital of Vancover's Island, which lies with regard to the continent of Columbia as Ireland to the island of England. The pious and humble-spirited Mr. Cridge (now Dean of Victoria), who was chaplain then to the Hudson Bay Company, wrote home to the "Colonial and Continental Church Society," imploring them to send him instant help, for that he was almost at his wits end with the sudden inundation. In the mean time the British Government was not idle, the first coloniz- ing party, under the charge of the accomplished and amiable Colonel Moody, E.E., was organized. With him the committee took counsel, and put out an advertisement for a suitable clergyman, whilst actively collecting funds for a special mission. Some ap- plied for information, and some candidates were all but accepted, I believe ; their friends however, interposed, fearing such expatri- ation, and the arrangement fell through. But time went on, and it was feared no answer would be received in time for the clergyman to accompany Colonel Moody. That rare spirit, Mr. (now Dr. Mesac) The mas. Bishop of Goulburn, was the main- spring of the "Colonial and Continental Church Society," at that time. He said, "Well, we will insert the advertisement once more." That " once more " was the very time when it met my eye. I was lying on the sofa, seriously weakened by my share of work amongst 30,000 souls in the parish of St. Mary- lebone. Strange to say, I had, under an undefined impulse, already warehoused my furniture and gone into lodgings, so that I was ready for an almost instantaneous start. Under the guidance of God's good providence, the way opened, I seemed to be called, and "I went into Arabia" — not "Felix," but " Petrsea," — Stony Arabia, indeed ! The English Church in Columbia. 775 Our colonizing party started from Liverpool, by Cunard steamer, " Asia," for New York. From thence we coasted down North America, to the Isthmus of Panama, in a genuine Yankee " bottom," though from being nearly all " top " it rolled so fear- fully as to be called the "Rolling Moses," instead of the "Moses Taylor ; " she rolled over clean, the trip before, and caught fire then ] — these steamers are floating hotels, more than ships ; but travelling America, especially on the Californian route, takes such gentle episodes as railway and steamer accidents with a beautiful equanimity. We escaped peril of yellow fever, for an express train was prepared for us at the Aspinwall terminus, a British colonizing party being " Open Sesame " everywhere • and we soon crossed the forty miles of the isthmus over a railroad, the sleepers of which, from loss of life in making the line, are meta- phorically Irishmen's bones, to the old Spanish city of Panama. " The Sonora" took us to San Francisco, California (colloqually "Frisco, Cal"), where I officiated several times in the American Episcopal Church, and was most kindly entertained by the Rector of Gracechurch, and by the Bishop, Dr. Kip.* Another steamer took us to our destination, Victoria, Vancouver's Island. Very auspicious was the day on which the pioneer of the coming, and already organized, Church, reached the low- lying, granite-bound, fir-fringed shores of the new land : — the Feast of the Nativity, a.d. 1858. My valued friend, the well-known companion in Arctic research of Sir John Franklin, Captain Richards, R.N. (on that station head of the HydrOgraphic Survey, now Hydrogapher to the Admiralty), received us on board his ship, the " Plumper," where, amongst honest Englishmen, we ate our Christmas roast beef and plum pudding in peace. The delight with which Mr. Cridge and his dear wife welcomed a brother minister and wife, may be imagined ; but realized only I a As we were sitting? in the common room of my hotel (the " International "), I happened to say, " How does the State provide for your Lordship to be desig- nated ? " Before he could frame a reply, there appeared the apparition of a fat woman, gaudily dressed in what looked like stuflF for Belgravian window-cur- tains. On seeing Dr. Kip, she sailed directly down upon him, saying in an unctuous, patronizing way (of course nasally), "Wa'al, Bishop, arid heou air you ? and heou is Miss Kip ? " On resuming his seat, he said, somewhat bit- terly, "Now you see how the States have provided for us to be designated." The social tyranny of women and children, especially little chits of girls, whose ears we should box summarily, in the parts of the United States where I was, is quite a phenomenon : white-haired men pay them obsequious deference. 776 The Christian Advocate and Review. by any who have tasted of the Patmos exile of such a solitude as his, for years amongst Indians and half-casts, and the associa- tions of Sj, wild trading enterprise like that of the Hudson Bay Company. But for the kindness of such father of the colony, and as I found, father of the Church, as Governor Douglas, now de- servedly Sir James Douglas, C.B., Mr. Cridge's exile had been unendurable ; and my mission had either never been attempted, or less favoured than it was. Whilst arranging all the preliminaries of my new evangelistico- pastoral cure up the great Fraser river, at Fort Langley, about thirty miles up on the left bank of the stream, I helped Mr. Cridge in his unwieldy charge at Victoria. Amongst other necessary preliminaries for my new sphere was the construction of a house-full of furniture, to which somewhat puzzling pre- liminary duty I was aided merely by the empiric mechanical efforts of schoolboy days. However, with six chairs given me by good Mr. Pemberton, the magistrate at Victoria, I worked awa> at my new craft, and (then, and subsequently) got the necessaries completed; although stern truth, as historian, compels me to add, that the tables (doubtless from the severity of the climate) afterwards suffered somewhat from the rickets, and the bedsteads groaned with rheumatism in the joints ! My home-ipade furniture lasted me however until I left. In the meantime the Governor carried a Bill in the House of Assembly for a church and par- sonage to be erected at Derby {i.e., lower Langley, but re-ramcd from the late Lord Derby, then Premier), near the barracks. The mode of presentation to the mi generis, though not particularly rich, piece of "preferment" of the rectory of Derby-cum-Langley, the only gust of Church and State ever, or ,ever to be again, enjoyed in that democratic region, having been sui generis also, is worth detailing. I was invited to dine at the Governor's, at James' Bay. On my plate lay a por^^entous blue envelope, sealed with the royal arms, and a lavish amoupt of red wax. On re- turning home I opened the packet, and found it to be what I suspected, the presentation by the Governor to "the Living." Az the Bishop was not expected for some time, and it was as well, we thought, to set the right keynote in things ecclesiastical, I called this first church in Columbia a " Kectory " — St. John's, in remembrance of St. John's, Deptford, where, as a young deacon, I was curate with the Rev. C. F. S. Money. In this I followed what I found to be the nomenclature throughout the The English Church in Columbia. 777 American Church, and I believe our own colonial Church. The Bishop confirmed the designation by using it generally in his diocese. Before the church at Derby could be built, I went up on a missionary excursion into the new colony, where for a time I was to labour as bishop, archdeacon, rural-dean, and presbyter, a representative of the Church system in its most compendious form. It was on this first journey of exploration into Columbia, whilst staying at Fort Langley, that I raised the Cross, by holding the first of those services of Divine worship which have now been multiplied so greatly over the colony, by the energy and administrative abilities of the wisely selected Bishop. February 29th, 1858, was the red-letter day. The Hudson Bay Forts are a queer compound of trading-post and fort-military. Such posts are scattered at immense intervals all over northern North America ; and are connected only by Indian trails, and by rivers. Each fort is the centre of a brisk trade, by barter with the Indians in its neighbourhood, who bring their mink, sable, ermine, silver- fox, sea-otter, and other skins, more or less precious, to barter them for muskets, tobacco, blankets, shot and powder, English goods, whiskey, and trinkets. All these skins are collected from each fort once a year, and sent by the caravan (which vires acquirit eundo) along " the brigade trail " to Fort Hope, where it strikes the Fraser river ; and from thence they are forwarded by scows and batteaux to Victoria ; from thence to be conveyed by "Princess Eoyal," or other Hudson Bay vessel, to Fenchurch Street, London. A fort, whether large or small, is a series of large log houses, disposed in an oblong quadrangle, inside a rough stockade ; it has the fort-hall, trading-shop, blacksmith's forge, and homes for the employes, etc. . *. " chief trader " will be over the smaller, a " chief factor " over the larger forts. It was in the large fort-hall of Fort Langley that the first parochial service was held ; for I except a morning service which I held merely as chaplain to the troops at the barracks, two miles and a-half lower down at Derby, where the church was to be built. Let me describe as unique a scene, and Service, as was ever associated with the solemnization of divine worship by the clergy and ministers of even maritime and missionary England. The Hudson Bay Fort stands on high ground, rising out of an irregular triangle of sand which lies between it and the Fraser. About a quarter of a mile Derby-wards, i.e., towards the mouth 778 The Christian Advocate and Beview, of the riv*, was (all has been long since washed away by the encroachment of the stream) " the sand-spit," and on it a vigorous mushroom-town of shanty " stores " and extemporized drinking, gambling, and refreshment "restaurants." Here flourished a brisk trade for some years, fed by the gold-miners going up and down the river — to the gold districts hundreds of miles higher up, and returning after failure or success. On the great triangular flat below the fort, before mentioned, was at the time in question a canvas town, composed of the peculiar little gold-miner's tent ; with the outside of which I was first acquainted in those early days, but with the inside of which, as my own shelter, I became familiar subsequently. All the afternoon, of that inaugural day I was about amongst " the boys " on " the levee " (i.e., any water- frontage) at the little town, and on the flat. I invited them to the evening Service in the fort-hall, and most of them promised to come. They all wore the Garibaldi shirt, generally of red stuff, nnd every man was armed with bowie-knife and revolver. All were busy mending large Queen Charlotte Indian war-canoes, or flat boats ; or packing them with coffee, " beans and bacon," the " daily bread " of the gold-miner. If any one imagines that all these gold miners were nothing but a set of ignorant navvies, although they were the refuse and rowdies of even the Californian mines, they would make a huge mistake. Bad enough were most perhaps morally, but sharp as razors were all of them mentally ; they were very many of them well educated men: and not a few had dropped from being lawyers, doctors, school-masters, and ministers of Christ, to the nomadic life of adventurers. It was no joke to get into a billiard saloon, or restaurant, where these men clustered (you seldom could catch them, unfortunately, night or day, alone), for as soon as your black coat appeared amongst them it was the signal for as regular a dialectic hunt, as that of the red skin of a fox nearer home for its own kind of chase. To bait a parson (" a minister " when speaking of him, — " waal, doctor " when speaking to him), was a rare treat for these compounds of unscrupulous conscience and keen wit. But any graduate of an English University, especially of Oxford (why the Americans so respect our elder University I know not, save that Oxford is the more prominent in political and theological history), was to them like the choice Andalusian bull in the Spanish arena. They tried, by matching themselves with a disciplined and mint-marked intellect, to The English Church in Columbia. 779 show off their own powers; and moreover it gratified their vanity if they could pose or out-argue a scholar, for whose Degree they entert'^iued an almost superstitious respect, with their sophistries. Life from youth up in London, however, I found a very excellent training for such passages-of-arms ; not that much good resulted from mere thrust and repartee, but that superiority with their own lighter rapier afforded opportunity for change of weapons to "the Sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God." It was wonderful how meekly they would bear horae-thrusting with this sacred weapon, too, from any one whom they respected as in earnest, and not unfurnished for ministry amongst cosmopolitan spirits such as they deemed themselves. I dwell a little on these preliminaries because it is time that the Chu'ch at home knew the calibre of the spirits with which thf^ir missionary chaplains and pioneer parochial clergy are often con- fronted now, more or less all over the world, as the vanguard of our Anglo-American civilization. Of " the mix^^.d multitude " of store-keepers and others I have said nothing, bat it is enough here to say that they were from every nation under heaven, — descendants of Shem, Ham, and Japheth. All weie burning with enterprise, sanguine with hope, and energized by that strange weird infatuation, which inspires the hunger-bitten with the ''auri sacra fames." Very poor were all the chances, to carnal expec- tancy, of diverting the sad subjects of such mania from the gold of Columbia to "the golden wedge of Ophir." However the covenant faith which was vouchsafed to enter on the field, sup- ported and blessed in its labours, in a remarkable degree. The " Britisher " who reads can now imagine with tolerable accuracy the elements of that first parochial congregation, gleaned from the stores and tents, and assembled at seven o'clock p.m. in the large fort-hall. We had beforehand drawn severely upon our aesthetic powers, by an honest ritualism, to ^jaake the grim old rough-hewn hall somewhat ecclesiastical. A cow-horn was being vigorously blown outside as our chapel bell ; a monster table, erect on its hind legs, like a grizzly bear " on his form," with the Hudson's Bay Company's flag over it, was our desk and pulpit ; barrels and blocks, with boards, our " free and unap- propriated " seatage ; fat " dips " impaled against the walls by two-pronged black forks round the room, our corona lucis ; and opposite the pulpit was placed his own primitive, high-backed, green chair for Mr. Yale, the chief-factor in charge of the fort. -Ji... 780 The Christian Advocate and Review. who sat in state as squire, churchwarden, and patron, all in one. Imagine the benches filled with some sixty or seventy of the gold-miners before photographed, now clean and gentleman-like, bright and reverential ; but every man armed with bowie-knife and Colt's six-shooter in the belt which cemented the fellowship of " Garibaldi ' and " pants," and you have a vivid picture of the/ow-s et origo of " the river of the water of life " which is now watering the new colony of Columbia. Mr. Yale said that that inaugural sermon was the first which he had heard for forty years. Very unsatisfactory was the state into which many of the Hudson's Bay employes had degenerated : living insulated, from boyhood often to grey hairs, amongst debased savages, they had married squaws, and their half-bred offspring but too often were mere degraded savages like the mother. But now the rising tide of Christian civilization, bearing on its bosom the vessel which carries the Cross, is changing all that. None can guage so exactly as the pioneer in a new land the power which the Gospel exerts over men as a restraining and moral force, where as yet it has little sanctifying and regenerating energy. Blessed " sowing " is that of cb irch, parsonage, school, bishop, priest, deacon, and holy Bible " beside all waters ! " The Eoyal Engineers, under Captain Grant, RE., were at Derby (then called Lower Langley), building the barracks. When finished they very kindly gave me a room for myself, and I put up there, with a negro-boy, whom my children called " Black Ebbard." My first domestic experience of Yankee "helps" began with this boy, who was a genuine male " Topsy." As I was sitting on the floor in the room aforesaid, on the mattress rolled up, shaving in a bit of glass, ready for the Service on Sunday morning, I became aware that shaving was a novelty where all wore beards, — and myself a spectacle. In the coolest manner possible the boy was standing, hands akimbo, staring at the operation. When I had done, his under lip ceased to droop, and he said, with condescending sympathy, " Wa'al, I guess you feel clean now, don't ye ? " His services, however, were very valuable to us, in spite of his ape-like tricks and perverseness, there in that life of peril, Ion jliness, and toil which, with wife and two children, I lived for two years at Derby. No navvy and his wife work harder than we slaved for nearly four years. My hands were so horny with constant use of paddle, axe, hammer, or spade, that it was with great difficulty I could hold a pen, or The English Church in Columbia. 781 keep my shaking hand in order to write the minimum of cor- respondence and memoranda. After a few months our little wooden rectory and church, the first in the land, were finished, and ourselves didy installed as the occupants. The first parish in Columbia was composed of the small town near the church down at Derby, and of the town on the "sand- spit " (together with the Fort), two or three miles up the river. The usual Sunday routine was — morning, Service at the church, and then I pulled up the river to an open-air service on the sand- spit. Standing upon any vantage-ground, such as planks, or barrel, or boat-end, with often a good many miners present when the weather permitted, I preached amongst those Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. Once when I arrived, hot and worn with a heavy pull on a scorching day against a rapid stream, — caused by the " freshet," or melting of snow on the mountains, — I was cheered by finding a nice little stage erected for me against a hut, with planks behind to shade me from the sun. But I could not always reach the upper town, especially iu winter. Once I remember fighting my way through an ice- fioQ into sight of my destination, and then, benumbed and worn out, being quietly returned at a mile an hour to the place from whence I came, by the drifting ice. In the week day I mixed, free and easy, amongst the miners and settlers, dressed in brown leather, and generally axe on shoulder, — a working man like themselves. This pleased them much, and gave many openings. Once I remember meeting a man — an employ^ at the Fort — who had received good from one of Mr. Ryle's tracts (" Eepent or Perish "), which he had picked up all wet and torn out of the Fraser river ; he dried it and had been reading it over and over again. I had given the tract to some miner, I expect, and he had dropped (or " pitched ") it overboard. " Cast thy bread upon, the waters, and it shall be found after many days." My dear, valued friend. Captain Richards, R.N., was surveying as high up as Derby, and attended Service with the " Plumper's " crew whilst thera One day he presented himself at my " stoop " (porch), in his own quaint, good-tempered way, and said, " Come along with me : I want you." He did not speak again until we reached the bank of the river, when he said, " Come now, you are one of the pioneers here, and I know how you have borne the burden and heat of the day ; so you must be immortalized. 782 The Christian Advocate and Review. Which of those three mountains opposite shall I name after you?" Under his advice I selected the middle one, — a long whale-backed mountain, which went down as " Mount Crickmer," in the Admiralty Chart ; that on the left was named " Mount Prevost," after the excellent captain (then) of H.M.S. " Satellite," in which he brought out Mr. Duncan ; and the corresponding mountain was named after Captain Grant, R.E., of whom I have spoken, who was, with his amiable wife, up at the Fort in early days, to my great comfort. These memoranda are mere bagatelles in themselves, but they are sweet for me to remember, as oases in a veritable desert ; and their value generally is that they are suggestive of the character of any pioneer mission. Having been baffled so often in the Sunday afternoon Service up at the Fort and the Sandspit, I resolved to make a bold effort to build there a " chapel-of-ease " to the mother church. My first step was to beg ; and very open-handed were the store-keepers and gold-miners, either in coin or gold dust. Then I went to the saw-mill, which lay below my rectory, on the opposite shore of a great lake-like reach, made by the river just here. The American owner received me very graciously, — heard my peti- tion, — pointing it off all through with the usual expletives and interjections, — mused silently a minute or two, — and then with hearty good- will said, " Wa'al now I'll tell you what I'll do : I'll donate the lumber ! " Having thus all the timber given us, we started "right away," and our little chapel-of-ease became an established fact. Let me describe this architectural gem. It was a wooden "frame-built" structure, holding about forty people. In the little belfry was no bell, for that we could not get, but T got the blacksmith at the Hudson's Bay Company's smithy to bend a great bar of iron into a mighty triangle, which I hung in my " trianglefry ; " this, when cleverly beaten with another bar of iron, could be heard as far as I wanted. The former un- pleasant duty of going round to all the saloons and gambling- places was thus done away; for, before that, I went roimd to each, ringing a hand-bell, and saying, " Well boys, won't you come up to church this afternoon ? " This was dangerous, too, here and elsewhere, as their dogs flew at me. Upon my communion-rails were two slabs : one served as desk, the other as pulpit. One corner of the east end (?) was curtained off with a piece of green baize for my vestry, the opposite for my organist : It The English Church in Columbia. 783 my organist was Mr. Saunders, a clerk at the Fort, who was very useful, and my organ was his concertina, which led many a hearty chant and hymn in that primitive house of prayer in the wilds. The communion-cloth was equally original, for I embroidered on the front of some red salmon-cloth a device, by picking tassels (also traded for salmon) to pieces ; the white cloth was given by a Jew store-keeper.* A word about the " Occasional Services," as I have sketched the regular worship. Births come first, and so first of Holy Baptism. I had to baptize two children of a Kanakkar (Sandwich-islander), named Henry, who was a Christian, but lived at a little settle- ment of Kanakkars with his father, Peo-peo, very much like the Indians as to domestic habits. When the babe was presented for baptism the mother held it out by the toes, as though it was a petrifaction ; the stiffness resulted from its being swaddled, like the Indian babies, upon a board : in this board is a hole, so that sometimes they hang up the child on a peg! Marriage comes next. As I was walking past a hovel, under the eminence on which Fort Langley stood, a Yankeeized employe thereof called out, " Mr. Crickmer, will you take a drink ? " This I knew harbingered business, for the Americans, and all the stran- gers, except they take drinks do not transact the smallest affair, holding the tradition of their fathers. I declined "the wet," of course, but listened to his appeal. " Now what'U you marry me for ? 'cos I want to hev' one of them Injin gals up ai the Fort, and then I could do double th»3 business I do now." I told him that until the said Indian girl was a Christian and baptized I could not marry him to her at all ; and remonstrated with him on his godless, cold-blooded matrimonial speculation. And funerals. The saddest I had, save one, and there was occasion for sadness, indeed ! — but of that anon, — was in the Hudson's Bay Company's cemetery, just outside my little chapel- of-ease on the Sandspit. Near us, at Derby and Langley, was the 49th parallel of latitude, the boundary arranged by Treaty, 1844 ; here the American and English sappers were cutting a thoroughfare, forty yards wide, from the Pacific Ocean, through the primeval forest, to the rocky mountains. During a severe gale of wind one of the sappers of our Eoyal Engineers was » In this month's (October) Scattered Nation (Nisbet), I have contributed an article upon the Jews, which may invereat lovers of Israel : "A Glimpse at the Jews in the North Pacific." . . 784 The Christian Advocate and Review. killed by the falling of a pine-tree. His fellows determined to bring him over for me to bury him. A party under (then) Lieutenant Darrah penetrated through the rough trail, carrying their dead comrade a twenty-five miles journey, which might be trebled on a turnpike road with less fatigue ; and happily arrived just after Service on Sunday afternoon. Never was there such a crush at the little church, and they were thronging the whole building outside too. At the grave I gave them an address, in the form of just the very message their departed friend and fellow- soldier would (I believed) have sent to them, in concern for their souls, as his most grateful return for what they had undergone to show sorrow for his sad end, affection for himself, and desire Christianly to bury his poor mutilated body. The days however, of Derby and Langley drew to a close, the First Commissioner of works had not confirmed Governor Douglas's choice of Derby for the capital of Columbia, but had selected a site some eighteen miles lower down the Eraser, on the opposite bank. Well do I remember the site of what is now the large flourishing city of New Westminster, when it was the concave bank of a bight in the river, heavily timbered with some of the finest pine on the lower Fraser, Then I remember the first begin- ning ; even now I can see the thin spiral column of blue smoke amoagst the pines, coming from the shanty where Captain Par- sons, R.E., and his men, were preparing for the camp which was to be near the new city. They called it Queenborough first of all, but Her Majesty, I believe, re-named it New Westminster. William B. Crickmer. I m \ m 922 The Christian Advocate and Review. i i STORY OF THE PLANTING OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH IN COLT^MBIA. PART II. The new Bishop had just arrived, and, in obedience to his orders, I left Derby for Fort Yale, which is about a hundred miles from the mouth of the Frazer, and in the heart of the gold-mining of the lower Frazer. Yale was, in my day, the head of steambor.t navigation, and the rising commercial place of the whole colony. It lies, as in a well, in the Alpine district, amongst the mount- ains of the Cascade range, which is a spur of the Rocky Mountains. Here I was in the midst of gold-miners, gold-mining, and all its concomitants; besides being at the depot of the Chinese, and more domesticated than even at Derby amongst the Indians. Let me go on to describe the Mission. Our ideas are formed by contrast. If I had come straight from the hyper-cultivation of home to Fort Yale, I should have dtv^med it a Patmos indeed. But contrasted with the dreadful isolation of Derby, it seemed like a return to the outskirts of civilization. At Derby, I had at last to depend on the turn of the date in the calendar every morning, to know when Sunday came. One day I was uncertain whether it was the first or the last day of the week, and took both my gown and a sack in the boat. If Sunday, I should have used the gown ; if Saturday, got the sack filled with po- tatoes at the Hudson Bay Fort, at Langley. The sack won the day, as it happened. Fort Yale consisted of the characteristic long street of wooden buildings, nearly all stores (i.e., shops), which forms the germ of all colonial towns. It began with the Hudson Bay Fort, a large oblong building, made of roughly squared logs ; and at the other end, farther up the river, "feathered off" into shanties irregularly built. In front of this long street was the " levee," or broad wharf between the town and the river Frazer. From whence the river issued through the mountains above, or whither escaped below, you could not well see. The scenery is very grand and impressive, as Alpine scenery always is, especially to the Christian, since "the mountains brought peace." "When blazing with gold, as on a winter's afternoon when the sun bathed them, all snow-clad, in rosy splendour; or when the Tlie English Church in Columbia. 923 lA. ,ers, xom of Dor.t variegated foliage of the American " Indian Summer " was all aglow with the rich light of an autumn sunset, words are all too weak in which to paint such gems of natural beauty as Fort Yale. We were fortunate enough to secure a good-sized house, be- longing to poor Dr. Pfifer (why " poor," the story will show), a diplomaless surgeon, who had been prominent in the days of the Vigilance Committee at San Francisco. By putting up a par- tition, we turned his shop into a tolerable hall and " drawing- room;" a little room which had been his "office," served as dining-room ; and two rooms in the roof were our dormitories. We built a kitchen outside. I need scarcely add that we were our own servants. The back premises were what they vulgarly called " sweat-holes ; " that is, large hollows where the Indians live in winter, after covering them in. From November till March, fifty will live in each ; therm. 90° ! This savoury locality I " graded " and fenced ; and do not wonder at the mag- nificent proportions to which the marrowfats of Messrs. Sutton of Eeading attained, for soil where Indians have been camping for centuries must have enchanted even British seeds with the more than guano-] ^ke richness of the new home in which they found themselves ! Here we were, then, in the heart of the gold-mining system of the Lower Frazer, where the gold washed down by the river from above is worked out of the flats or "bars" which have gradually accumulated in the angles, as the river altered its bed. This is " grain-gold ; " and it is coarser and coarser the higher you go towards the matrix, in the Cariboo country, where it has to be extracted from the quartz: that is the Upper Frazer system. How romantic, — to have one's house built (as it was) on gold, — to drink water out of a mining " flume " just in front of one's " hall door ! " Alas, as with the romantic savage, so it is with the poetry of gold-mining : " 'tis distance lends enchantment to the view ! " How exciting it was when gold-miners came down from the upper country laden with gold! The whole place went half mad, and the gold fever seemed as though it would drive quiet store-keepers to chance everything and go up. One day, I re- member, two Irishmen and a Frenchman brought down three horses laden with gold-dust. We had little coin ; almost every- thing was transacted in gold-dust, to weigh which there were scales 924 The Christian Advocate and Review. on the counter of every store. The usual way of transporting the gold-dust was by the " Express-man." This is an " institution " in America, especially in mining districts. Ballou's Express was both post and bank. Few letters went by post. Generally the Express-man brought them. Each cost a shilling. He went up, the river, and then collecting gold-dust all the way down, sent it where he was ordered, or took it to Victoria, Vancouver Island. To describe the colonists who " kept stores " at Yale, would be to catalogue almost as many representatives of different nations and races as there were individual adventurers, — descendants of Noah's three sons, as we saw was the case at Langley, and as everywhere else. It was quite a museum of ethnology. Every several store contained a specimen of a race, or nationality, in the form of an intelligent man, abundantly able to explain the specimen — himself ! or he had not been there. The morals and the wits, alas, varied inversely ! It was most remarkable, how- ever, as an experiment in support of the truth of man's moral consciousness, to see how the advent of an accredited servant of the Most Hig God, possessor of heaven and earth, acted like a moral tonic and disinfectant. As if by common consent, the squaws were banished from the shameless publicity of sinful companionship, and outward decencies brought forward. At first . Jl creeds and sects came to the Church, and all the children to the daily school which I taught (gratuitously) : Irish, Hanoverian, French Canadian, Papal States, German, French, Eoman Catholics, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Scotch Kirk, and all the Protestant varieties. The Bishop was welcomed at a great public meeting by all the town, which hailed his advent, from disinterested motives, as well as because a bishop was somewhat of a guar- antee for the prosperity of the new Colony in which they had embarked their fortunes. At the meeting (at the chief restaurant) a Lutheran was in the chair, and Komanists spoke. My coming was all coleur de rose. But, alas, some " occasional paper," pub- lished in England, appeared in the Colony, and in it his Lordship had spoken of a petition for a school from " the humbler classes of Fort Yale ! " This was written I presume, before he came and had experienced the radical difference between purely democratic, and home, divisions of society. It gave, however, the greatest umbrage to the proud American republican spirit, especially rampant at Yale, which was the most thriving commercial spot in British Columbia then ; and the being " chaffed " about it con- V of g The English Church in Cohimbia. 925 Ithe »> tinually in the local newspaper, kept the sore unhealed. A keen east wind had laid all the blossom at the foo< of the tree, and I had my congregation cut down in a week froii some forty (a very large proportion of the people) to units : however, I struggled on, and won such hold of the place, that I actually got them unanimously to shut up their stores on Sunday during service. The first Sunday this was done was a bright day ; something tangible seemed achieved. Gradually the congregation revived, and became more fixed and steady in attendance, a little band becoming communicants. The chapel was a mere shanty, lined inside with calico along the walls, stretched over for a ceiling. I had a melodeon — a species of American (Yankee) harmonium, — which was a great improvement on the concer- tina. It was snugly hid behind the slab on the Communion rails, which did duty for reading desk, so that it was very handy for use. The first thing on Sunday was to go in and dust the Church ; then light the fire in the stove (wood) ; then find the Psalms and Collects for the congregation, who were many of them Presbyterians and Lutherans, or foreigners, and were long before the Prayer-book came naturally to them ; then I sallied forth with a great bell, ringing all the way along ; the stores all shutting up behind me. After a time I got a fine tall Thompson-river Indian named " Jim," to go round, because the dogs, both Indian curs and the bull-dogs which the gold-miners affected much, flew at me and tore my gown, as at Langley. In the week-day I dressed in brown leather, and worked the hardest amongst them all, being frank and cheery ; so that the most vicious, and spiteful, and anti-British grew friendly, and showed much kindness in their own way. One valuable result of a Christian pastor being centred in such a region, was that he gathered out to himself all the best of the society, and became the nucleus for all that was pure and Christian. My house was quite a ren- dezvous at Yale for the best of the gold-miners, who coming down from the upper country, wintered there when the (eight months) season was over ; they would come in every night to read or chat ; and very sacred were the ties which united to us some who had otherwise been left no alternative but to sink into the prevalent vice incident to such enterprizes as gold-mining. They gave us gold-nuggets when they left, as a memorial and expression of grateful respect. Out of such precious result of one's own 926 The Christian Advocate and Kevieiv. gold-mining it was that the elect of God were gathered; for some, I trust and believe, were God's elect, even in those wild regions. Lady Franklin came to visit us. As Yale was the liighest point accessible by steamer, she was brought up to see it. The Yankees are great hero and heroine worshippers, so that her stay was one ovation, A steamer was placed at her Ladyship's dis- posal, — a stern-wheel boat, the " Maria." On her arrival she took up her quarters with me. That night, at a tea and soiree at my house, the entire town came to be introduced. Next day we manned a large Queen Charlotte Island canoe, with twelve fine Indians in red jersies, and took Lady Franklin up through the rocky passes of the Frazer, into the Little Canon (pronounced Canyon). As we were approaching the rocky gateway, which here is only some forty feet wide, through which rushes five hundred miles of river. Lady Franklin broke out into loud ex- clamations of wonder at the splendour of the mountain-locked basin in which we were, and at the rocky pass which ended it ; and said, " Has this magnificent pass no name ? " I put her ofi" with an unsatisfactory "'No, only the Little Canon;" for we had a conspiracy hatching. We entered the Canon ; stopped at a large Indian burying-place ; and went up to Mr. Dietz's "ways," — a machinery for getting large boats up above a deep rapid and fall. Then we descended rapid after rapid, — 'mid stream ; rocks sheer down to the right of us, rocks to the left of us, — the sun bright, — the Indians singing their great canoe-song, half- mad with the pace, and the honour of showing off before a great female King-George's-man "tyliee," — when, suddenly, we came under an immense piece of calico, stretching on a pole nearly across the river, with "Lady Fuanklin Pass," in large black letters, on it. This she only saw as we were right beneath it, when I said, " Now, Lady Franklin, this pass has a name, which will live as long as the hills." She burst into tears, and said nothing. It was just the compliment which touched, to the quick, the vigorous wife of the noble Arctic explorer. Numerous and somewhat embarrassing are the duties that fall to the lot of a pioneer, — where a few endowments go a great way. Whilst Lady Franklin was lunching in one room I had to run into another, and compose an Address from the Town of Fort Yale to her. This Address, with all becoming solemnity, I had to read to her Ladyship, on board the stei mer. But, lo, she said, " Now, Mr. I The English Church in Columhio. 927 •ed; for )8e wild Kighest t. The ler stay ip's dis- val she d soiree Qxfc day twelve through lounced , which lies five oud ex- i-locked [ided it ; i her off for we pped at Dietz's a deep stream ; Df us, — ig, half- a great e came y across letters, wlieii I cli will lothing. ick, the •us and lot of a st Lady mother, to her. 1 to her ow, Mr. Crickmer, will you be so good as to reply to the Address for me!" So that I had to face about, and to the worshipful delegates of the town reply to my own Address, — a delicate and not easy task. However, all went off well, and Lady Franklin left amidst a bewildering salutation. The Chinese fired off crackers and fireworks peculiarly " celestial ; " and the town authorities, with characteristic American " 'cuteness," having no cannon, ex- temporized some, by using two anvils : the hole of one is filled with powder, and a greased card put on it ; then the other anvil is placed on it face to face, and the train fired with a red hot iron. The report is that of a nine-pounder: the upper anvil being thrown some distance by the shock. As an illustration of one of the perils constantly attending trav- elling in such wild parts, I might instance a day's excursion, ending in a night of danger, which only differs in degree of peril from all journeying. (2 Cor. xi. 2G, 27.) The Bishop was to conse- crate a Church down at Fort Hope, erected by the zeal and home influence of my friend the Eev. A. D. Pringle, there stationed. He asked me to bring my melodeon, and play at the consecra- tion. The instrument was packed and placed in a canoe, and two Indians paddled nie. Going down rapids is merry work enough, so that for time and toil the fifteen miles which separate Yale from Hope were practically divisible by three ; whereas to return they might be multiplied by two, or more. We had some of the Sappers, that fine intelligent corps, for our choir ; and in good order too, for Dr. Seddall, the Surgeon to the Eoyal Engineers at liew Westminster (their camp), had well trained them. The Bishop had much to say, and kept me late in starting for my return journey ; so that night began to fall before I had got half-way home, and all the very worst " riffles " were a-liead. To make matters worse, one of the Indians was inefficient; and the melodeon so cramped us in a small canoe, that my services could not be utilized : and, to crown my misfortunes, with darkness came on also a terrific storm. We could not put ashore : we must push on. Foot by foot we fought our way over each riffle, forcing our frail bark between the granite boulders, round which the waters roared and foamed savagely. The one good Indian did wonderfully, jumping out often on to the boulder, and pushing the canoe up, and getting the "set" with his pole where it seemed impossible. Over and over again that night I prepared for the closing of my ministry, and my 928 The Christian Advocate and Review. life ; and yet the canoe outlived it. At last, very late, high up on the opposite distant bank, the first lights that appeared were from my own parsonage, whore I knew my little babes were sleeping soundly, and an anxious watcher was sitting near and trembling in the storm. One of the worst riffles had yet to be passed ; and then we had to turn the head of the canoe to the opposit( (the home) shore, and paddle with might and main ; only, wii h the best efforts, to be carried down the river again some three-quarters of a mile by the rapid central current. Cold, wet, hungry, but safe and sound, we all reached at last the shore, thankful for the preservation, the fire, and the food. There were about 70,000 Indians in Columbia ; but " fire- water," and the foul diseases and influences of so-called Chris- tians, have reduced them to perhaps half that number. The different tribes of the district in which I lived vary as much in language as in physique and habits. The Indians which live by fishing differ much from those who, like the Shushwaps and the Carriers (or Thompsons), live on berries, and are dashing horsemen. The language, bearing, and appear- ance of the latter was much finer than those of the former. The account of IVIr. Duncan's work amongst the Indians of Columbia ought to be possessed by every Christian. ** It is a marvellous evidence of the essential truth of Christianity in its Apostolic form. The Indians received a share of my labours, and much of my prayers and sympathy, although my Mission was to the goldminers and colonists. It was a strange sight when I got them for the first time packed into the Mission Chapel. I watched with deep emotion their awe-struck faces when they heard for the first time the full chords of the melodeon, in sacred music. Living amongst them afforded opportunity of speaking of the outline of our most holy religion, as well as I could in the trading jargon called " Chinook." All the tyhees (or chiefs) met and decided to make me, the King-George's-man Sockally Tyhee (high or heavenly chief), and bestow a present of two large wooden images, which I had seen and coveted for years : they stood sentry in their burying-ground, outside a wooden sarco- phagus, part of a row of images, but superior to all. As the Indians had taken it into their heads to empty the wooden boxes, and bu even cooki] taste » "Motlahkatlah^ or, Miasions to the Indians in British Cohimbia," Church Missionary Society's House, Salisbury Square. (Price Sixpence.) my 1 The ErKjlish Church in Coliunhia. 929 up »vere ivero and t to anoe and river rent, last |)d. fire- iris- and bury their late occupants like the whites, these two images were set free to be given. They wore the figures of a brother holding his sister's hand. The male figure was more mythological tliau anything I had seen: he had a mystic head, and he had his tongue in his hand, and stood upon a bracket formed of a mystic head, with its tongue too in a hand; this symbolizec H^^'^-illy the fact that as a chief he knew when to "hold his toL^^.. anc when to exercise his own especial right to speak: this is rath or curious in connection with the phrase " holding the tongue." The female image had a circle of bears round her neck, the tail of each in the mouth of his brother bear behind. They brought the images one morning, by special appointment, to my summer- house at the top of the garden, and we had a great " patlach," — coffee, and bread, and treacle, and cakes. It was amusing to see the grandness exhibited by those poor dirty Indians : after we had smoked the pipe of peace, they presented the images to me with a pomp and punctiliousness quite dramatic. The Chinese were in considerable numbers at Yale, especially during the winter, because it was their depot. They live just as in China, — importing all their simple diet of rice and dried bacon. It was very wholesome for one's vanity to live amongst Chinese and Yankees, who really looked down upon you, the one for being a Britisher, and the other for not being a China- man. The airs which John Chinaman can give himself are most diverting. One man we met in a forest told us that his wife was in China : we asked why he did not have her over. He looked unutterable things at us Occidental outer barbarians, and replied, " What ! my wife come here : she is too fine." One day, when out for a walk near the entrance to the Canon, where the Chinese buried their dead, I saw their ceremony when worshipping the manes of their fathers and dead relatives. Red slips of paper, on which were some Chinese characters, had been dropped all the way from the town, at intervals of about twenty yards ; as at their funerals. They had a grand feast ready in the cemetery, with an immense pig roasted whole, and glazed so as to make even the mouths of the terrestrials to water ; and much of the cooking would have done credit to a French cook, for varied taste and artistic form. They left three of the red papers at every grave, with lighted tapers stuck in the ground at the foot of each grave. Then all the chatter and jabber (unequalled in my experience for babel sounds) ceased, on a word from the 3o 930 The Christian Advocate and Review. master of the ceremonies ; and all prostrated themselves on carpets, touching the ground thrice with their foreheads. Then they all stood up, and it was babel again in a minute, — -just as though they had never left off for religious service. I need scarcely add that " the dear departed " had none of the roasted pig, or the other good things ! With the murder of Dr. Pfifer, and the execution of his nnir- derer, this hasty sketch of the a Iventures of a pioneer must close. One day, when on the le\ je, I saw a commotion : it was round Dr. Pfifer's store. On seeing me they asked me to go in ; for that a gold-miner had come up and shot the poor doctor through the heart, they feared, and would I go in to see if he was dead. There lay the poor murdered man in his " office," as they coll the room behind the store. A little blue star over the heart told the sad tale, and proved that he had been shot dead. In the meantime chase had been given to the murderer, who nearly escaped ; but was caught at Semiahmoo, on the frontier between our colony and Washington territory. The truth is this. Dr. Pfifer had quacked the murderer, — a goldminer named Wall, son of a coastguardsman at Belfast, iu Ireland, — poisoning him medically, and maiming him surgically ; and then he talked of the man's complaint scofiingly in the gambling-salooni?. Wall left for another mining bar, and only returned after a long time to Fort Hope. Here, when half- drunk, he fell in with an Irish papist, named McHagan, who had shot some Indians in Oregon. Wall, happening to speak of Dr. Pfifer, McHagan swore that if he were the subject he would shoot Pfifer. Now the medical maltreatment of Wall had super- induced softening of the brain, or nervous debility, wlacii rendered him perfectly mad when under excitement or stimulant. Ho responded to the devilish instigation, and fiercely vowed such should be the penalty of his injuries. Next day they hiretl a canoe, and came up to Yale. Wall lurked about all the morning, waiting for a convenient opportunity ; McHagan keeping him to the deed. About three o'clock my wife saw the doctor, a short, stout man, with spectacles, pass our door: he hung his head, swung his arm, and looked so sad that she remarked it at the time. Had he some vague, but genuine presentiment that he was walking straight to his doom, which came five minutes after ? Wall walked into his ofiice on seeing Pfifer enter, presented a paper with right chest. I s a I The English Church in Cohniibia. 031 -a Had ■Nvith his left hand, and then almost simnltaneously with his right presented the Colts' revolver within a few inches of his chest. I shall ever remember the first acquaintance I made with a murderer: he was in a cell in the gaol. A colonial gaol is rough accommodation : that at Fort Yale was a log hut, with cells partitioned off from a common centre chamber by boards, which had shrunk with the heat, and so left gaps, which v.ere the only apertures for light or air to the prisoners. The constable tlirew open the cell door, — ii was dusk of evening, — and there on a blanket lay Dr. Pfifer's murderer. I crawled into the gloom, and he crawled forward to meet me, growling at being molested, \'ery much like the wild beast he looked when I spoke to him. For a time lie was sullen, and my frequent visits only gradually told upon him ; but, after a time, strange to say, the man in the wliole place with whom I was most one, and for whom I felt most brotherly love, was that same murderer. He responded to a faithful outspoken Gospel, and God's Word fovmd out his conscience, if not his heart. Every day I was with him, I see him now, as the gaoler unbarred his cell, coming out, a large- built man, with his blue eyes beaming with welcome ; he had no shoes on, only blue woollen socks, a blue-striped shirt, no coat or waistcoat, and a way of his own of shuffling out, holding his leg-irons in his hands. He took up his place always on a rude form, leaning his right arm on a rolled-up mattrass, and I on a three-legged stool opposite. With meekness he received the engrafted Word, and said little; his receptive manner speaking more than words. He was tried, and of course found guilty, and sentenced to die ; and McHagan to seven years' penal servi- tude. I wrote to Governor Douglas, detailing the case, and showing liow helpless a victim Wall was in the hands oi a villain infinitely worse than himself, and begging for a com- mutation of the sentence to anything short of death. The steamer, which ought to have arrived early in the morning of the day preceding that fixed for the execution, was delayed by the rapid water ; and all day long our dreadful anxiety was unrewarded. As I was leaving the gaol for the last time that night, I passed the American carpenter, a good-hearted man, who had erected the gallows, aiKl was then fitting a lid to the coffin. He said to me (on my saying, "So you are making the poor man's coffin"), " Waal, now, .Mr. Crickmer, I tell you, I'm not comfortable about 932 T^ie Christian Advocate and Review. h that there galhis. Now nobody cares how he dies, and you are very mechanical, would you mind just going with me to test it, and see if the drop' II act ? " We went, painful though the duty was, and with heavy stones well tested the large wooden trigger- like apparatus which drew the bolt from beneath the drop. Next morning and no steamer ! The execution, too, fixed, from head-quarters, at eight o'clock. I went to the magistrate, and ear- nestly requested that it miglit be postponed to nine, so as to give the chance of a reply from tha Governor, which Mr. Sanders very kindly ventured to grant. At six o'clock I had been with Wall. At about half-past eight we heard the well-known whistle of the steamer (like our locomotives) when below the riffle, just coming up to the bend described in my night adventure in the canoe. The first thing was the large ominous packet from the Governor, with the great red seal and the royal arms. How intense life is at certain points ! The letter was opened, and read. Boomed! My kind-hearted old friend, Mr. (since, worthily, Sir James) Douglas, replied in the feeling and Christian way in which I knew he would reply ; but, though agreeing with the view that the murderer was not fully responsible morally, pro- ceeded to say that the act had been so dramatically public and daringly lawless, before the aliens, and the Americans, and the rowdies, that he dare not take upon himself the responsibility of staying the execution, as a solemn judicial warning to others. As I had not spoken of my intended writing to the Governor, there was no additional suffering for Wall in the failure. How appalling it is to look upon the visage of one in the prime of life, and practically hale and well, who is face to face with an absolutely inevitable, an ignominious, and violent, death ! Every circumstance, too, and association which could render it more distressing and harrowing, was present. He had nothing to leave but his short cutty pipe, which I have now, left half smoked, because the smith came to strike off his irons. His throat was dry, and he begged for something to lubricate it. Nothing was at hand, so he ate some soup. Then, as I said, he quietly ad- dressed himself to die, and strode along, keeping all the time as close to me, as though his future hopes were in my power. I walked by his side across the flat of about a quarter of a mile, picking our way through boulders and charred stumps of pines, to the gallows, which was erected beneatli a preicy hill, in a lovely spot. I could not supply him with texts of comfort The English Church m Columhia. 933 ''Oil are and strength fast enough, as he strode along towards the terribly- visible trysting-place. There had been elaborate preparations, because there was a gossiping rumour that all the men off' his late mining-bar meant to attempt a rescue at the last. The town and the authorities believed it the more that they assumed his re- pentance, which had excited much comment, to be part of the plot, by (as they said) " gulling the parson." However, soon all were convinced that no rescue was thought of, and that some other solution had to be found for the murderer's keeping, in life and at death, so close to the parson. We left all the constables and special-constables far behind, and he and I mounted the steps, before the magistrate and attendants were nearer than some forty yards. Wall sat on a block and was pinioned by a little-wizened old man, who had come a few days before for the duty, but whom no one had seen. He received .£'20. This man's face, and gro- tesque dress (which he put on so that no one might recognize him), and tout ensemble, were of that weird and revolting kind of which one reads in such writings as Sir Walter Scott's romances. I did not wonder that Wall shuddered when such an apparition touched him, at such a time, for such a purpose. After reading God's Word once more, and then kneeling down and praying with Wall, but including all present in the prayer, we stood side by side on the drop. I had anxiously waited for this moment, and it was come. I said, "Now, Wall, you have one single opportunity afforded you, do you think you can speak a word for your God ? " He made no sign, but stood silent. I feared that it was as it had been at his trial in court, that he was gone, from over-excitement. But the very reverse was the case : he was strangely sobered, and wonderfully strengthened. He was only meditating what to say. Then he began to speak, so calmly tliat the crowd at first scarcely realized that so ferocious a murderer could be the person who was uttering such calm, warning words. He said what was better there than mere religious sentiment or hysterical rhapsody, to which many of them would have attached no value ; so common amongst those present, chiefly Americans or Americanized, was an Antinomian alternation of sensational pietistic sentimentality, with the most vicious and abandoned living. T forget his words, but his tones, and the drift of his pithy, concise address, by such a preacher, from such a pulpit, I am not likely to forget, espe- cially because in his person I was preaching one of my very best 934 The Christian Advocate and Beview. sermons, as far as more than the congrej^ation then present was concerned. This is a resume : " Gentlemen, I now can feel, and do acknowledge, that my sentence is just; and very merciful has God been to me. I gave my victim no time to rej)ent ; but God has been more merciful to me, for He has given me si)ace for repentance. . . . Oh, gentlemen, if I had only read my Bible, I should not be standing here before you now, in this ignominious and awful situation." To hear a man speak thus, — whom they saw standing pinioned on a drop, with the death-tree for the frame of the picture they came to see, whilst the hangman stood by his side, holding the rope in one hand and the white hood in the other, — was a tableau to which even the hardened men who clustered beneath could not be spectators unmoved. Some of them were visibly moved. Perhaps, in " the day of visitation," that homily will have had its own value, as a preparative dispensation of conviction. The hangman got me off the drop. I bade my brother a bitter, affectionate farewell ; rushed to the back of the scaffold, threw myself down in prayer. There was a concussion as though the whole was coming down, a dreadful shudder, and another murderer was, T trusted and believe, where he was to whom the Saviour of sinners said, " To-day shalt thoit be with me in Paradise." Is not this " a brand plucked from the burning ? " Soon afterwards I left. So ended nearly four years of isolation, trial, anxieties, privations, suffering, and daily bodily toil, which seemed like forty years instead of four. My work was done in British Columbia ; and the ministrations, prayers, aspirations, and shortcomings of one of the pioneers of His Church in a new land, were, with the past history and ministry of each of us, gone up to be registered by the jMaster of the vineyard, in one of the " other books " that shall be " opened " on " that day." W. P>. CiaCKMEE. K i