CHANGES IN PROSPECT.
It was at the end of June that I arrived at Sarnia. Very glad was I to
be at home again after my long, rough journey, and very glad too was my
wife to see me, for it was but seldom that we had had an opportunity of
writing to one another during my absence. In the autumn our second
child was born--a boy--to whom the Indians gave the name of
Suhyahquahdung (proclaimer), and shortly after this we gave up our
cottage on the Indian Reserve to Mr. Jacobs, and moved to a larger
house in the town, where we should have room to take two or three
Indian pupils as boarders. This seemed to be a judicious step, as of
all things it appeared to be the most important, to commence preparing
young men who might afterwards act as catechists and school teachers
among their people.
And so Mr. Jacobs, who had recently married, settled in at the Mission-
house as Pastor of the Sarnia Indians, and an Indian from Walpole
Island was appointed to take his place as catechist at Kettle Point.
Our readers will not have forgotten poor Shegaugooqua, the poor
decrepid bed-ridden creature whom we found in such a pitiable condition
in an old wigwam back in the Bush. They will remember also the mention
we made of her little five-year-old boy, with his shock of rough, black
uncombed hair, and his bright intelligent eyes. This little boy, Willie
by name, we now took in hand. I arranged that the catechist who had
been appointed to the Kettle Point Mission should take two little boys
into his family, and train them up to a Christian and useful life. One
of them was to be Willie, and the other a grandchild of the unfortunate
man who was murdered--Tommy Winter. So, a few days before Joshua
Greenbird was expected, we brought Willie and Tommy to our house in
Sarnia to prepare them for entering upon their new life. The first
thing was to divest them of their dirty rags, and give them each a
thorough good scrubbing; then they were put into two new little suits
of grey cloth which my wife and I had each taken a share in making with
the sewing machine. Thus, clean and neat, these two little fellows of
six years old were shipped off to their new home. Walpole Island, where
Joshua the catechist was coming from, was some 40 miles south of
Sarnia, and Kettle Point was 30 miles or more to the north, the road
lying direct through the town; and as Joshua had arranged to drive in a
waggon the whole way with his family and baggage, he made our house his
stopping-place on the road, and we gave him and his wife and four
children all a lodging for the night; then in the morning they started
on again, taking Willie and Tommy with them. For the first week or two
the two little boys were quite happy and contented in their new home,
and went regularly to school with the other children who lived at
Kettle Point; but after a time they got home-sick, and then they did
what Indian boys often do when first taken in hand and put under
restrictions--they ran away. However, they did not get far on their
thirty mile journey homeward before they were accosted by a farmer who
was driving along in his waggon. Willie, always ready with his tongue,
and already knowing a little English, called to the former, "Say, you
going Sarnia?" The farmer immediately guessed what was in the wind, and
cried, "Yes, come along, boys; jump in." So in they jumped; but were
somewhat mortified--poor little fellows--to find themselves, half an
hour later, back again at the catechist's house. The lesson was a good
one for them, and from that day forward they had the impression deeply
printed on their minds that farmers were everywhere on the watch for
them, ready to bring them home if they tried to run away.
It was during this winter (1870-71) that we began making plans for
building a church for the Sarnia Indians. The little building that we
had put up on our first arrival had never been intended as a permanent
church; so now that the Mission was fairly established and was
beginning to show good signs of prospering, it seemed to be only right
that a more substantial building should be erected for the purpose of
Divine worship, and that the little frame building should be kept
simply for a school. The first thing was to trundle the old building
out of the way; so a "bee" was called, and a number of the Indians
assembled, and with levers and rollers, and after working hard for a
couple of days, the school was twisted round and removed to the far
corner of the lot. Then the foundations were dug for the new church. It
was decided that it should be a brick building, with a spire, to cost
about 1500 dollars. Mr. Jacobs, my assistant, busied himself in the
matter, and together we managed to raise the requisite funds; and early
in the spring building operations were commenced.
However, it was not my destiny to be the pastor of this little brick
church among the Sarnia Indians. God was calling me to other work. It
so happened that, in the providence of God, the Garden River Mission
just at this time fell vacant. The Rev. Mr. Chance, who had laboured
there so faithfully for the past 18 years, was called away to another
sphere in a more southerly district. Great were the lamentations of the
poor Garden River Indians when he left. Both he and his wife had become
much endeared to the people. Mrs. Chance was the schoolmistress and
doctor, and what would the poor children and the poor sick people do
without her? and what would they do without their Missionary who had
laboured so long and so faithfully among them: who had baptized their
children, and united their young people in marriage, and buried their
dead, and preached to them the glad tidings of the Gospel, and visited
them, and sympathized with them, and helped them in their homes? Mr.
Chance's children had all been born and brought up at Garden River;
Indian nurses had attended them and cared for them during their infant
days; the Indian women had learned to look upon them almost as their
own; and one dear little girl--Alice--had died after a short illness,
and was buried in the Indian Cemetery. It was a terrible wrench for
these poor Indians one and all to be separated from their Missionary
and his family. And the worst feature of all was that there seemed to
be considerable fear lest the Mission might be given up altogether. The
New England Company, under whose auspices Mr. Chance had worked, had
determined on withdrawing from that portion of the field; and unless
some other Society saw fit to take them up, there seemed but little
prospect that the work among them would be continued.
All these things weighed with me, and I earnestly sought the guidance
of Almighty God in prayer, content to follow His will and to be led by
His hand.
As Mr. Chance intended to leave Garden River early in the spring, and
it was a part of my duty to make extended tours among the scattered
Indians, and minister to their spiritual wants, I decided on making
another trip northward as soon as possible after navigation opened. My
wife accompanied me, and we took an Indian boy with us, named Aleck
Bird, as cook and general servant.