LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. Gl FT OF Class' r A SUMMBR OUTING By FRANCIS ALLEN HORTON A PASTORAL JOURNEY. Being Some Account of the Experiences of the Rev. Francis A. Horton as a Delegate to the Pan-Presbyterian Council. BY THE REV. FRANCIS A. HORTON Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, of Oakland, Gal. OAKLAND, CAL: TRIBUNE PUBLISHING COMPANY, 413, 415 AND 417 EIGHTH STREET. 1889. "V Hi PREFACE. Friends, who may dip into these letters here and there, or who may read them page by page, you will spare them your more severe tests when you recall the fact that they were written on the wing, and that since our return the cares of a heavy church have stood in the way of any recast, beyond a stray word or sentence or incident to make our thought clear or to correct errors in the first print. We had no idea but that the birth and burial of each letter would occur in the same issue of The Tribune. Still it is very grateful to us to find that the child born for a day is desired for a longer life. This wish could not well have been met but for the enterprise of the proprietors of The Tribune, who kindly undertake it at their own expense, solely to gratify their many friends and patrons who have expressed the wish both to them and to us. If our fireside chat may yield a pleasant hour or two now and then, if it may inspire hard working men to take^pity on themselves before friends need to pity their poor widows, if it may broaden any one's idea of living, if it may bring any back home, made over in brain and brawn, set back five or ten years towards youth in point of health and vigor, we shall be very happy, and in the hope that some such issues may come from this venture, I remain, sincerely, FRANCIS A. HORTON. Oakland, January, 1889. 1 58906 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. LETTER I. WYOMING, en route East, May 3d, 1888. Oakland is home to wife and me, and no mistake. " 'Tis home where'er the heart is," whether among glistening peaks or on blistering sands. How much to be envied are they whose hearts are set upon our beautiful city on the bay unequaled, and who find therein their home. The many tender words spoken and written to us in the past few days as well as previously, the hearty send off, blending with memories of five years of hard work crowned with a fair measure of success, fill our minds as the wheels are ever rolling us away, away. The glories.of nature revealed in Oakland, the beauties of the town, the sentiments of loving hearts, all unite in one presence and impression. Fact is, wife and I are downright homesick to-night and would give a handsome sum if the round of duty and recreation were traversed and we were this near to home again. After all, what is there in life but love ? Love is the constraining power, the inspiring genius. Love that reaches upward and impels to pureness and nobility, love that reaches into the home and directs labors and sacrifices for others' comfort, love that goes out to all and purifies society for the moral health of all. " What a world this might be If men were true and kind." Now that the harness is really off, reaction sets in. Headache prevails, accompanied by general lassitude, revealing a condition of weariness that was not recognized while the lash and command of duty urged us on. Here is one of the dangers of our climate. There are no days that freeze out the worker, none that burn him out. All days are favorable to business, and the year runs away with no excuse for any sound man not to be at his office, counter, or shop. The average active Californian of fifty years has probably done as much hard, unintermitted work as an Eastern man of the same class would have done at the age of sixty. We have more bald headed men to the thousand than any other community, probably. What is to be the effect of all this on posterity, is a ques- 6 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. tion in heredity. Like trees like men, in the effect of climatic influence upon stamina. We produce no very hard woods. The ailanthus, eucalyptus, soft maple and soft oak are our product. The hickory, the gnarled white oak, do not abound. Close obser- vers find that we are not raising a generation of hickory men and women. The cold and heat of Eastern States, the rougher con- ditions of life, are developing there a hardier race of men and women. We have as yet many of those who have been compacted amid the conditions named and anew influx is constantly pouring in- to our population. For this reason we do not see so clearly the effect of our climate upon vigor and endurance. But in these unquestion- able facts we find a further hint of the need of frequent rest and change. At least twice a year a hard working business man should sleep and eat and breathe in another climate for as many days or as few as he can snatch from a busy life, a whole week at least. Are you good at conundrums? Well, here is an original pro- duction. Why is this bush covered desert like the municipal coun- cil of well, say New York, for instance, as well as for safety ? Give it up ? Well, so do I. Perhaps there is no resemblance. But as I have raised your expectations, I will say that the idea came into my head as I observed what a retreat it is for bitter sage hens. Bad as that is for a conundrum, it is still better than a pun Joe got off just now. Joe is a San Francisco drummer in the section opposite, an agreeable young man and a good traveling companion. Wife named one of the two horned toads that she added to her stock of pets just below here after him when he told her that he was born with horns on, but his mother sandpapered them off. Both Joe and the toad seem well pleased with the arrangement. Looking out at the window just now, he (Joe, not the toad), saw large flocks of sheep feeding on the almost perpendicular faces of the hills, hang- ing on by their toes, when he exclaimed, " What a country for hung mutton!" What connection subsists between piety and clothes? The query arises as I look out of my window and study an ecclesiastic, a bishop from Japan on his way out to England to attend some con- vention, possibly the great Lambeth Convocation. He wears a soft, black felt hat, a flowing undercoat wrapped about him, and secured at the waist by a cord twice encircling and ending in large A PASTORAL JOURNEY. 7 tassels, cut high with standing collar, an outside coat of same cut secured at the neck by a single button, and flowing freely on the breeze, trowsers ending in the tightest of leggings with buttons down the outside and secured by a leather strap under the instep. The whole rig, except his standing collar, is of the most somber and lusterless black. Again we ask, what connection is there between the tailor's shears and the conversion of the heathen? What degree of impressiveness in preaching the laws of God belong to one suit of clothes rather than to another? How much supplementary aid can the draper and tailor furnish to the theological seminary ? Is there any sense in any man's making an unmitigated guy of himself ostensibly for the sake of Christ ? Jesus did not so, nor did any of his apostles. Why should we ? Certain proprieties all expect, and sensible men bow to them, but ultraisms excite ridicule and deserve all they get. Quite the opposite is the case of those who think that the Master is dishonored by any use of ornament or of dress beyond the very plainest. A flower on a lady's hat or a ring in her ear or on her finger is evidence to such minds of an unmodified state of heart, quite deplorable in a Christian. I have as little sympathy with this notion as with the other. Jesus probably dressed like any other carpenter's son, ornamentation included. We do not read that he instituted any dress reform. John the Baptist was out of the prevailing fashion, and a note is made of the fact. The whole truth, probably is, that where there is the adorning of a meek and quiet spirit the person is well dressed in the sight of God. After this their sanctified common sense must rule. Some of the meekest spirits in the world have dressed beautifully, having ample means to do so, and desiring to please their friends. It makes no beautiful woman more pious to dress her like a fright, nor is she necessarily yielding to temptation, to vanity, when she improves her talent of beauty for the brightening up of this workaday world. I often wonder whether this proclamation of alliance between religion and poverty, between religion and voluntary plainness and homeliness, remanding to the devil so much that is beautiful and helpful and cheerful, so many of the good things of life for the sake of some spook of fear, is not an asceticism that is contrary to the spirit of Christ, and chargeable with creating a per- verted notion of his true church on earth. Pure and true religion is one of the most sensible things in the world. It is loving and 8 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. serving God with a sincere desire to please him. Did God wish this earth to be somber, then why did he create beautiful colors and beautiful flowers ? Did he want men to exclude the voice of joy and gladness, then why the merry song of bird; why the joyful- ness of everything purest and most like himself? No, no, friends, let us have done with all this. Make the earth beautiful, make it gladsome. Conscience will work as well when addressed by the power of a beautiful piety as when by one bowed down like a bul- rush, and weeping like the ancient prophet. But I may not think as all do about this any more than about other matters, but I do think and speak as I think. Crossing this continent is like visiting Niagara. It grows on one at each visit. More stupendous seems the undertaking that has made California what she is, and will yet make her one of the fore- most States in the Union. I am very well content that they who overcame the obstacles and conquered mountain and desert for future thousands shall be greatly enriched. The smallest conceiv- able fraction of the wealth that they have made possible to the masses would make them richer still. Yet when one looks at the vastness of the worjt it is plainly evident that not man nor company built it, but the masses, the government, between whom and the constructors there should be a fair settlement of accounts. But do not think that I am riding on a free pass and am showing gratitude by these writings. Passes are issued to clergymen as well as to others, and to their wives, to my certain knowledge. But to the great mass the Interstate Commerce law is a convenient and effectual barrier. Yet how it vanishes when politics are to the front! Then a hint to the conductor written in pencil on a slip of brown paper, as I noted recently, is sufficient. Nor do I complain. A pass is an equivalent for services rendered or bid for. It always raises a question. The only fair thing to do is to treat all alike, and if favors are to be shown to any let it be to those on the Pacific coast who are building up the trade of the roads. Generally, however, they are sported by parties outside of this range, indicating the cor- rupt side of railroad influence in government circles. But I have rambled on far enough for this time. Amid sunshine, hail, and snow we are now dashing, soon to revisit old scenes and old friends, amid whom and which I shall not forget my transconti- nental loved ones and home. FRANCIS A. HORTON. A PASTORAL JOURNEY. LETTER II. DENVER, MAY yth, 1888. For once in my life I am able to look down upon all my good friends in Oakland. It is not my nature to be high minded, but on the contrary, to borrow the language of a character who afforded me a fund of amusement in earlier days, "I am .a very humbly man." But sometimes we cannot help getting up in the world. So here we are in Denver, Col., more than a mile higher up in the air than the top of the higher steeple of my church. And it is charming up here. The air is soft and smooth and pure, the lungs taking in great quan- tities of it with pleasure. At once a sound lunged person realizes what hope of continuance is here for the person of weak lungs. Yet there are limits. If the lung tissue is unimpaired all is well. But if disease has taken hold upon it this climate aggravates the case. But in many instances persons v\ho have sufferred from hemorrhage merely, have never had a return of the trouble after coming here to live. Yonder are the high peaks of the Rockies, eternally snow capped, acting as a refrigerator, sending to-day to us. a cool breath full of vigor. Overhead the sun shines through long beautiful hours in one word, it is as delightful a day as one ever finds any- where. Of course, it takes more than one day to make a season, but judging from the sample we enjoyed I do not wonder at the remark of Mr. Tabor to me, (Mr. Tabor who built the Grand Opera House, and who has in other ways invested vast sums of money in the city :) " We have as fine a climate for twelve months in the year as can be found on earth." Next to climate, in the make up of a city, comes the water sup- ply, which in this case is abundant and of the puiest quality. Ar- tesian wells reach water at sixteen feet below the surface. As the boring proceeds new veins are struck, yielding at times mineral waters of high value, as, for instance, at the Winsor House, where a stream of water flows ceaselessly from a nine hundred foot well, which waters are said to be very beneficial in all cases of kidney troubles. The main dependence, of course, is upon the city water- works, which secure their supply in other ways. The water rates do not differ materially from those of the Contra Costa Company. Charges, however, are made out on a different plan, a certain monthly 10 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. rental being assessed for household purposes, reaching throughout the twelve months, and an additional charge being made per month for irrigation purposes extending throughout the season of irrigation. Drainage, which is the next consideration, is here arranged for by nature, so that the system is well nigh perfect. The fall toward the streams in every direction is very considerable. In the item of building material, nature certainly has set her affection upon Denver. First, are the hills of brick clay which yield large supplies of good quality. Just now the prices are very stiff, good quality burnt brick selling at $9 per thousand, pressed brick being far more costly. A new residence was shown me, the pressed brick in which cost $32 per thousand. Then the marble yards are well stocked with good quality. Then the beautiful white and red sandstone is very abundant. But best of all to mv mind is the lava stone. It has several peculiarities. It is a light weight stone, weighing some twenty pounds less to the cubic foot than the sandstone. It is also soft and easily wrought into shape for use. It has the quality, however, of hardening with age, so that each year the structure composed of it grows more secure. Then it has those beautiful tints coming from injection of mineral substances while in molten state. Some parts are as gray as the white sandstone, some as pink as the red sandstone, with many intermediate tints. With these facilities at hand a solid city is the outcome. Curbstones are stones in fact, sidewalks are made of sawn slaos of smooth stone, houses are of solid material. Combinations most pleasing are effected. Thus we see brick houses trimmed with pressed brick, white sandstone trimmed with red sandstone, and vice versa, lava in combination with red sandstone, and, perhaps, finished about the entrances with polished granite. The charming effect of all this multiplied on every side can be easily imagined. In the building up of Denver it is further to be considered that the State of Colorado is in the mere infancy of its development. Its mineral resources are very great. Coal in abundance is found, but as yet of a poor quality, none having been found that will coke. Silver, gold, copper, iron, Spiegel iron in limited quantity, are here. Dr. Maynard of Cheyenne told me that he, with seven others, had laid claim under the Placer law of the State to a vein of kaolin several miles in length and some fourteen feet in breadth and depth, which was pure decomposed feldspar, absolutely destitue of iron or ^ OF THE UNIVERSITY , - A PASTORAL JOURNEY."" 11 any other mineral that would tint the pure white porcelain that could be manufactured from it. I remarked to him that I remembered being told at Sevres, in France, some years ago, at the celebrated porcelain works, that atmosphere had much to do with their industry. The idea seemed new to him, and at his request I shall make more particular inquiry on this point during the next few months. The vast herding interests of Colorado are gradually taking on better shape. The tendency now is toward smaller herds and more care, with less hardship and loss in winter. Blessed be pockets which men will regard even when the lowing of starving and freezing dumb creatures fall on hardened ears. I saw at the foot of one telegraph pole by the wayside the dead bodies of five full grown cattle lying where they fell. As all the interests of the State proceed in their rapid developement, Denver will feel the impulse and rise with the flood tide. This is all the more certain because eastward there is no city of importance until Kansas City is reached, and westward nothing to compete with it until we reach Salt Lake City. Thus with natural advantages, with un- limited resources, and with geographical position everything is in favor of a great, strong, and beautiful city. It all depends upon the people, and what they intend to do is well indicated by what they have done and are doing. The business atmosphere is full of ozone. The city is less than 30 years old, but has made for itself already a name. Note the one fact concerning the vast union depot, which is now too small and is about to be enlarged, as indicating how the business men take their own city in hand and govern matters amicably, as though they had something to say about things. This fact is that the depot and grounds belong to the city, and not to the railroads, the right to lay and use tracks being given by the city to the roads. Of course it is to the interest of the city to give the roads all the facilities they need for the transaction of business. It is a mutual affair, but the position of the city is one of much honor and safety therein. Heavy smelting works roll their dense smoke upwards, and the roar and whiz of manufacture are heard. Business blocks of vast size and beauty and costliness are going up to add to the numbers of such already built and occupied. When a city without a boom can afford to pull down good two and three story structures to erect far better ones, there is some foundation of prosperity under it. This is nature's boom. The 12 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. Tabor Opera House surpasses in beauty and extravagance of finish any similar structure in San Francisco. And it is used. The seven performances of the Booth-Barrett combination yielded $29,000. The new Denver Club building is the gem of the city. The dry goods house of Daniels & Fisher, externally and internally, would be a conspicuous object if placed on Market street. It is more like my memory of Lord & Taylor's of New York tban anything seen since. The hotels are roomy and well appointed. In the matter of churches the city is wonderfully developed. St. John's Cathedral is specially noticeable, cruciform, with beautiful windows, soft fresco, splendid organ. Trinity Methodist, far larger, not yet completed, the organ of which is intended to be the largest in America, the gift of one man, a former Californian, Mr. Blake. The Presbyterian churches likewise are fine structures, and, better than all, the spacious buildings are filled on each Sabbath at both services. The school buildings are very fine, especially the two High school buildings, which are large enough to serve as capitols for a young State. The county buildings also are on the same scale. I walked over the foundations of the new State Capitol, from which it is easy to see what is the thought of the architect. Private residences run up high into the thousands of dollars of cost in many cases. Over two thousand houses were built last year, and the city is extending. The Baptists have located their college out Colfax avenue as far as Mountclair, and the Wolff private school has secured a location near the same point. A cable line out Colfax is in the near future, and prosperity is moving along that entire line. New cities are the marvel of America's progress, and among them none excites more wonder and admiration than Denver. F. A. HORTON. LETTER III. ALBANY, MAY, nth. 1888. From the roof of the great hardware house of Horton, Gilmore, Me Williams & Co., Lake street, as far as the eye can see before us lies new Chicago. Without doubt the fire that swept over this vast area was one of the fiercest on record. When wood goes up in A PASTORAL JOURNEY. 13 smoke and ashes like shavings, there is some fire raging. When iron runs down like water there is intense heat in the conflagration. When brick melts we approach the limits of our ability to measure heat. But when a tongue of flame, fed by choicest combustibles and driven by a blast, touches stone and it snaps and crackles like powder under the match and then melts and runs down like molten glass, we have the climax of combustion in the open air. I well remember passing through here a few days after the worst was over, while yet great mountains of anthracite coal were blazing, and smoke and steam were ascending from numberless pits that once were cellars; when ashes and soot and blackness were on every side; when bridges were down, and over wide acres upon acres there was no sign of the city that had gone up. I look over it to-day, and, more marvelous than Arabian Nights, here stands without doubt, in solid blocks, the best built city in the world. Every man vied with his neighbor to build larger, costlier, and better than he. Nothing small and mean and cheap detracts from the magnificent. New York is richer and greater in many ways; Boston has more cul- ture, probably. Philadelphia may have the best blood, but in vigor and enterprise and business courage and undertaking Chicago leads them all. As an instance the conduct of the head of this firm under our feet has always been quoted by those who were conversant with the facts. He was at the time of the fire low down in the firm of William Blair & Co., an old and established hor.se doing an enor- mous business on the most conservative principles. Awakened at the dead of night by word that fire was rapidly approaching the store he hastily arose and went down town, but the sea of fire encircled their house so that he could come nowhere near to it. For a moment he viewed its destruction from a distance, then grasp- ing the situation he turned his back upon the scene that was wiping out their past and set to work to shape a future. He remem- bered seeing recently a very large brick building outside the fire cir- cle just approaching completion. Hunting up the owner he leased it at less than $10,000 per annum. Then striking off a business circular, he drummed up a printer and set him at work throwing them from his press. Then far and wide over the country he tele- graphed his orders for new stock, and when morning broke his house was on its feet again. The old store was still a mass of red 14 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. ruins, unapproachable for many squares, when the new was already a success. With the opening of business hours came the carpenters to put up the shelving and other necessary appurtenances. Then came telegrams from all quarters announcing goods on the way, and generally ending with " Hurrah for Chicago!" " Bully for you!" " Go in and win!" and other such sentiment. Also now came throngs of business men seeking quarters and offering almost any price for accommodation. Thirty thousand dollars rent could easily have been taken for the block, but the answer always came, "We pay so much for the building; William Blair & Co. cannot afford to make money out of such distress as now prevails ; whatever space we do not require is at your disposal, and we will apportion the rent agreed upon according to accommodation." Such grit and good spirit rebuilt the city, and this is the living spirit in its wheels of progress. By and by this grand store was enriched with an in- creasing trade. Then with the revolving years Mr. Nelson fell asleep, and Mr. Blair, full of years and wealth, retired, and Mr. Norton came to the head. Associating with himself younger men, backed by vast capital, he pushed on to greater development the house he has shown himself so well qualified to command. A poor boy from a country village, he has won every step of his progress by the excellence of his character and by dint of the hardest knocks. Such men should be a living inspiration to youth of both sexes. Be honest, be capable, be gritty, and success will make you her best bow. Nevertheless, when beauty is up for remark, big, busy, bustling Chicago must give place to Cleveland, the elegant. Soft with warm spring showers, wooed by strong sunbeams, her continuous lawns, close shaven, are at their greenest, the maples and elms are spring- ing to leaf. Choice crocuses and pansies and violets, vanguard of the great floral army that is marching northward, have already pitched their welcome tents. Here is the home of Dr. C. S. Sprecher, my esteemed predecessor in the First Presbyterian Church of Oak- land. The same success that attended him there and in San Fran- cisco still waits upon him here. His evening audiences are steadily increasing. Here also is my monument in the Case Avenue Presbyterian Church, the result of nine years of hard labor, a monument that will abide even should fire destroy the building of Amherst stone. No work is so lasting as that which is done for A PASTORAL JOURNEY. 15 God and humanity. No friendships can compare with those formed amid such associations. And within this circle the very strongest are found where the members are few and the work is great, where labors and denials are daily experiences and hope delayed makes the heart sick. Then the chaff is blown away by the rough gales of circumstance and the winnowed grain alone abides. Heart joins to heart, hand to hand, and through all sunderings of subsequent days the link of golden friendship firmly holds. What more natural, then, than that I should at once upon arrival drop in on Captain Kendall of the regular army, now retired ? What more in harmony with good form than that, after their first breath of surprise, they should say: " Must you go right on to-mor- row? Well, then, we will summon the old guard to dinner here to-night." And such of them as could be reached came and a happy time we had. Harness imagination to thought and draw no rein over the foam flecked steeds until within the better country ahead. Do you see yon animated group interested most of all in themselves? They are an "old guard," whose friendships, surviv- ing the wreck of fortune, the flight of time, the waste of disease, the crumbling to dust of the temple of the body, are strongest now and reformed for all eternity. The growth of the anti-saloon sentiment in Ohio is wonderful. And the most interesting feature of it all is that the Republican party is making it an issue before the people. The wind is being taken from the sails of the Prohibitionists, men who have become restive to an almost insufferable degree under the inactivity of the Republican party on this question are now being reassured and are re- turning to their allegiance with joy. The fear of losing the German vote has passed away, and, indeed, of losing anything. The sentiment of the Sute is rising, so that there is more to gain than to lose by an open advocacy of local option. Many small centers, where liquor has dominated from time unreckoned, have been c'eaned out at the ballot box, and now in a quiet way, but with great momentum, the drift of thought is toward a vote by wards in the great cities. Out often wards in almost any city seven would vote no liquor. This would throw the selling and drinking into the other three. This would so depreciate property by the comparison, by the moving out of better classes, that sooner or later, in self defense, those 16 A PASTORAL JOURNEY. wards would join the others. If not, then crimes would be concen- trated there, police patrol would be multiplied there, criminal statistics would point almost to the very doors where crime is fos- tered. Why cannot our good friends of the Prohibition party join us in working up to some such point ? Ohio has not done this in a day. Why insist upon conquering the rebellion in the battle of some one day? Ohio has a Sunday law and is using it with effect in this campaign. California should have one too. Free-thinkers hoot at the idea because it has a savor of religion about it. They might as well hoot at conscience for the same reason. The Adventists oppose it with all their vigor, and stand arrayed against the party of national reform and against the progress of the anti- saloon movement. The more is the pity. Others for other reasons are in the same class, but two things are clear in the future sky of California, viz : There will be a Sabbath law and the saloons must retire. The rising sentiment will before long overflow its banks and sweep in a deluge of life over our wide plains. May God speed the day. Phew ! How we are flying through New York State on the limited ! If I find anything finer than this in my travels in the way of railroading, I shall make a note of it. But don't set your heart on the note. I think it will not come. Palace day coaches, vestibuled, with dining car, stopping on an average once in eighty- eight miles, and going like Tarn O'Shanter running away from the witches, over a smooth road well ballasted, having four tracks, insuring safety against collision, all this is a combination not easily found. More than all, I have in my pocket a pair of those little conveniences which the unaccustomed Britisher calls "brasses," but which we invented and call checks. FRANCIS A. HORTON. LETTER IV. PHILMONT, N. Y., May i5th. Dear Robin Redbreast, why does he not come to Oakland to live ? the children would love him, he would be so happy skipping over our lawns with his 'Dot-and-go-one" hop, worms and fruit are there in satisfying abundance, why does he not come ? Yonder in the old pine trees just above this house where I was born, is singing A PASTORAL JOURNEY. 17 now one of those beautiful creatures his evening hymn. Oh ! how it chirps and swells and trills and rolls. I fancy that he is singing a welcome horns to me ; he certainly found his keynote in my heart. Doubtless he is a lineal descendant of those who have summered in that tree for generations. So tame were they that they would get in the way of the hoe in their eagerness to*ecure the fat earthworm. Dear fellow, how you carry me back along the track of time. How you cover again the fields that border the laughing Occawamuc with dense and primeval forests, broken only here and there by settle- ments. I see the young and handsome bride with her stalwart husband coming here to find a home. Your ancestors sang bridal carols for them morning and night. I see the first baby in its cradle, an occasion of wonder and curiosity to the dark, savage men, silent but friendly, who enter una n nounced at any hour. I see them lift it in their strong arms while the mother stands by a picture of smiling agony, smiling in order not to show fears or distrust, agony at the spectre of a possibility that they might walk off with it. While you sing the panoramic years roll on. The scene changes ; the forests are no more, save in the rocky fastnesses about the great falls where madly leaps the Occawamuc to a lower level a sheer hundred feet. Wild scenery, full of inspiration ! One cannot help singing, cannot help imagining great deeds. Its roar is like the tread of hosts, its shock and tremble are like the colliding of mighty forces, the soughing of the wind evermore through the trees is the music of the eternal battle. The red man now has gone, the wild' stream is tamed, and you, robin, who sang its days of freedom, sing now its days of fettered industry, as, like a blind old Sampson at his mill, it turns the multiplied wheels of manufacture. Then came my day. As along these waters I rambled with rod and line you sang for me. As through these meadows I hunted the luscious strawberry, small but sweet, you with Robert of Lincoln kept me company. In later years, when in this deep cave I made my first study and set me down to write my earliest sermon, you were my choirmaster. The murmuring waters rippling past its mouth filled up the melody, and ever since in all my later efforts I think I can detect the echo of your early encouragement, and the deep, soothing murmur of the heart of nature, that covers all defects and tones all into harmony. The panorama rolls and still you sing, and now that bride of yore, our aged and beloved mother, dies, and with 18 A PASTORAL JOURNEY.