An Old Croaker in a Canoe.
It is the easiest thing in the world to find fault with people of whose conditions and circumstances we know nothing. And sometimes a little taste of the trials and toils which others have to endure is the best cure for such unfair complainings. We had an old friend, a Yorkshireman, on that coast, who was very apt to find fault with others, and especially with the ministers.
“Thoo knoa thease preeachers have good teams wi’ theeir fat salaries,” he would say. And then, seeing the gleam in my eye, he would hasten on: “Ah dean’t mean you, thoo knoas. Ah mean thease men ’at ez t’ big fat salaries; they can sit roond an’ dea vary little.”
“Stop your noise,” I would say to him. “I am a preacher, and don’t like to hear you find fault with the ministers.”
On one occasion he came to me and asked when I was going to New Westminster. When I told him and inquired why he wanted to know, he said:
“Ah would like to gang wi’ you.”
“You can go with one understanding,” I replied.
“Weel, what is that?”
“That you work your passage. I never take deadheads with me.”
“Weel, Ah thinks Ah can paddle a little bit,” he said.
So the day came and off we started in our little canoe, down among the lovely islands which dot the west side of the Gulf, and then across. I was steering, an Indian sitting at the bow paddling, and our old friend amidships. He was making a great, effort “to work his passage,” but not being used to that kind of thing, he seemed to work his whole body in the effort of paddling, and soon became very tired.
The day was quiet and warm, and we were making straight for Point Grey, near the north arm of the Fraser River. After he had pulled awhile, my friend looked round, and said:
“Ah say! do you knoa wot Ah thinks? ’At point deean’t seeam to get onny nearer.”
“Yes,” I replied, “it gets nearer every stroke. Pull away! Preachers get used to this kind of life.”
Then he pitched in again and made a great effort, while we were quietly keeping stroke. We had not gone far, however, before he turned again and said:
“Now, Ah can tell ye what it is, ’at point deean’t get onny nearer.”
“Of course it does,” I said; “every stroke brings us nearer. We must push on to get in before it is too dark.” And we pulled on and on until nine o’clock at night.
A little easterly wind was blowing out of the mouth of the river, accompanied by a fine rain. The tide was out, and it was difficult to find the channel, as it was getting dark. We would run into a sand-bank here and a mud-bank there, until finally we got up the channel some distance and could see the high dry shore of the river. After some considerable effort we got up the mud-bank with our camping outfit, and on to a dry knoll, where we started to make a fire. Gathering together some blocks of cedar and other dry wood, we soon had supper going.
All this time my friend was standing in the midst of the rain, his hands in his pockets, shrugging and shaking his shoulders, and remarking at intervals:
“Ah say, this is a nasty neet.”
“The night is all right,” I replied to him; “stir yourself and let us get something to eat.”
Supper and prayers over, we lay down under our tent, and, weary with the toil of the day, were soon fast asleep. It was about one or two o’clock in the morning when my old friend aroused me by shouting, “Ah say, t’ water is comin’ doon t’ back o’ me neck.” It seems that he had got his head close up to the wall of the tent, on the weather side, and the water was running right over his head and down his back.
“Oh, stop your noise!” I said, I am afraid a little impatiently, “and let me sleep. Preachers get used to this kind of thing.”
“Man, Ah can’t sleep,” he groaned, “t’ water is coomin’ doon t’ back o’ me neck.”
Next morning we were around bright and early and off up the river. Sixteen or eighteen miles up the old Fraser against the current required the strength of every muscle, and all the elbow grease we could put into it, to make headway at all, but finally we reached Queensborough (now New Westminster) in safety.
A few days after I met our old friend and said, “When will you be ready to return?”
“Ah’ll nivver gang back wi’ you,” he replied. “Ah’ll pay t’ last dollar t’ steamboat, an’ gang roon by Victoria. Ah’ll nivver gang wi’ you.”
It was an excellent lesson he had learned, for I never heard him croak about the preachers having a nice time after that.
CHAPTER XV.
VARIED EXPERIENCES.
“Who love the Lord aright,
No soul of man can useless find;
All will be precious in His sight,
Since Christ on all hath shined.”
—Keble.
Many and varied were my experiences among this people, some painful and distressing, some trying and toilsome, some bright and humorous, some hopeful and encouraging.
The kindness of the Indians as well as the whites, and their evident desire to do all they could for my comfort, helped to lighten many a burden and make smoother many a rough pathway.
I was “in journeyings oft”; sometimes on foot, overland, or on the back of an Indian “cayuse” (pony); more frequently by canoe, and, occasionally, on the deck of a steamer. At one time I was acquainted with nearly every settler within the bounds of my large field—about 160 miles wide by as many long.
After travelling some thirty miles and preaching at different points on the journey, I arrived one evening at an island where I had often preached before. As the day had been stormy and I had worked all the way, I was very wet. The old chief and his wife, both of whom were very kind and hospitable, made me welcome in their home. Piling up wood, they built a big fire, and I hung my wet blankets around the fire on poles to dry.
“How glad we are the ‘laplate’ (missionary) has come,” the old wife commenced to say, in an undertone, as if to herself. “It is a long time since he was here before. We forget many of the good words he has said to us. Why don’t you come oftener, missionary, and tell us more of the good story, that wonderful thing, you tell us, about the Great Chief on High who gave His Son?” And then, as if recollecting the needs of her guest, she said: “Oh, I must get some supper for him.”
By this time she had a small basket that would hold water, threw in some potatoes, gave them a roll around in the water, and then put them into a pot on the fire. Reaching down a dried salmon from a pile which was stored on a platform over the bed, where the cats and rats and other animals ran over them, she gave it a big slap against the post to knock the thickest of the dirt off, and then held it up before the fire to warm and heat it, so that the skin would peel off.
Very soon the potatoes were boiled and rolled out in a little trough-like dish about two feet long, the salmon was broken in pieces and laid on top of the potatoes, and the whole was set before the Indian boy and myself.
All this time she was talking away to herself: “How good it is for the missionary to come. He has come through all the storm, and we must be kind to him.”
Having washed our hands, I asked a blessing upon the food, and were soon at our supper of salmon and potatoes. We were sure that one side of the salmon was fairly clean, for the skin had been torn off it, and as for the potatoes, they had their jackets on, but we had to eat without a bit of salt.
As we were working away quietly at the supper, the old man was stirring up the fire, keeping away the dogs, and doing everything he could to make things agreeable. All at once the old woman came and crouched down by my side, saying: “Oh, the good missionary, we are so glad you have come. I will help you to peel your potatoes.” And suiting the action to the word she seized hold of one out of the dish, and with about two scratches of her long finger-nails she tore off the jacket of one potato, and then handed it to me, saying, “Oh, it is so good of you to bring us the blessed light. I’ll help you, I will, to get your supper.” We would very much rather have peeled our own potatoes, and had her a little at a distance, with her wretchedly dirty-looking blanket.
Suddenly she sprang up, as if a bright idea had occurred to her, and exclaimed, “Oh, I had nearly forgot. I kept it for the missionary when he should come.” Out of a big old box she brought something tied up in a piece of dirty looking rag.
“I have kept this till the missionary would come,” she said, as she opened out before us a little flour—possibly the only flour they had had for months, as the people did not see much flour in those days. “I will make them a cake, I will.”
We were too busy to notice very closely what she was doing, but we found in a few moments that she had the little flour in the same basket in which she had just washed the potatoes. We saw her give her hands a little rinse in the water, but we were never sure whether she threw this out or whether it was the same into which she put the flour. Soon, however, it was worked up into a paste, and taking it out in her hands she pressed it into a kind of cake. I had a chance then to notice her arms, bare from the shoulders, looking on the outside very black and dirty, and on the inside, where her cooking had removed some of the dirt, a little less dark. No wonder the cake was such a piebald looking thing!
This black and white cake was thrown into a hole, which she had scratched among the ashes, to bake, while our hostess got some hot water and made a kind of tea from certain herbs which they used, and which went under the name of “Indian tea.” In a few minutes, the cake, now quite baked, was poked out with a stick, broken in pieces and laid on a dish before us. With this and the tea, as dessert, we finished our supper.
Some have asked, “Did you eat it?” Certainly, we ate it, with all the relish we could, and would never have thought of refusing it after all the kindness shown by the dear old people of the house. It is true that these people were dirty beyond description, but out of a warm heart they did their best for us, and endeavored to make us comfortable, and we would have been meanly ungrateful if we had not appreciated it.
After a little religious service we retired to rest, not on the feather-bed that was offered us by the old chief, but with our own blankets, now warm and steaming, laid on some smooth rush mats; and though the dogs crowded around and seemed to quarrel as to which should be the nearest to us, and the fleas swarmed in such numbers as to drive sleep far away from one who was not used to them, we managed to rest very comfortably.