A NEW DEPARTURE.
Though Mr. Black as Convener of the Foreign Mission Committee of the Presbytery had some sympathy for the industrial ideal of Missions among the Indians held by Mr. Nisbet, yet, on the decision of the General Assembly being given, he loyally accepted the plan proposed, of attending simply to evangelistic work among the tribes and to teaching the young. It is to be remembered, however, that between 1866 and 1874 circumstances had changed. It was evident in 1874 that the buffalo was soon to be a thing of the past, and the Canadian Government approved the plan of settling the Indians upon reserves and of teaching them to be farmers. The policy of the Government thus left the Church to pursue its own method.
The Committee now began to extend its work. George Flett, who had left Prince Albert Mission in 1869, was sent to two bands, one near Fort Pelly, the other on the west side of Riding Mountain. These missions were very successful. Mr. Flett was ordained as an Indian missionary, and lived to see the Okanese Reserve on Little Saskatchewan entirely Christianized. The Fort Pelly band was left to a young half-breed of Red River, Cuthbert McKay, since dead, and has grown to be the Crowstand Mission of to-day. In 1875 the Sioux or Dakota band of refugees from the United States living on the Birdtail Creek were taken under the care of the Presbytery's Foreign Mission Committee and a pure blooded Sioux missionary from the States obtained for them. This mission is still maintained, and is part of the constituency of the Birtle Indian boarding school.
Mr. Black lived long enough to see the Mistawasis, Okanese, Pelly, and Birdtail missions fairly established. Nothing delighted him more than to preside at the meeting of his committee, read the letters from the missionaries, and then to write the necessary letters of counsel and advice, and at times even of gentle fault-finding, which were agreed on. All his friends lament that he passed away too soon to know of Round Lake, File Hills, the western Qu'Appelle Valley reserves and the Portage la Prairie, Birtle and Regina Indian schools. He saw enough, however, to assure him that his dream of a Christianized Indian population would in the end be realized.