Yet he was not cast down when he became aware of the fact, for he had anticipated it.
"People pity me and think me unfortunate," he remarked; "but I think myself the happiest of missionaries."
In 1889, sixteen years after landing at Molokai, Father Damien died.
When he was nearing his end, he wrote of the disease as a "providential agent to detach the heart from all earthly affection, prompting much the desire of a Christian soul to be united—the sooner the better—with Him who is her only life".
During his last illness he suffered at times intensely; yet was patient, brave, and full of thoughtfulness for his people through it all, and looked forward with firm hope to spending Easter with his Maker. He died on the 15th April, 1889. "A happier death," wrote the brother who nursed him in his illness, "I never saw."
There, far away amongst those for whom he gave his life, lie the remains of one of the world's great examples, whose name will ever be whispered with reverence, and who possessed to a wonderful extent "the peace which the world cannot give".
A GREAT ARCTIC EXPLORER.
THE STORY OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.
The passage to the North Pole is barred by ice fields and guarded by frost and snow more securely than Cerberus guarded the approach to the kingdom of Pluto.
For three centuries and more the brave and daring of all nations have tried to pass these barriers. Hundreds of men have been frozen to death, hundreds have died of starvation; and yet men continue to hazard their lives to find out this secret of Nature.