For four years Mr. Black was the sole intermediary between the Foreign Mission Committee of the Church and Mr. Nisbet. When the Presbytery of Manitoba was established in 1870 matters took a slightly different shape. A Foreign Mission Committee of Presbytery was formed, of which Mr. Black was convener.
Mr. Nisbet did such itinerant work as he was able. He journeyed to Edmonton, a point upwards of 400 miles west of Prince Albert. He visited the Indians of Carlton House once a month and had success with them. But the management of an industrial centre, such as Prince Albert had become, was plainly inconsistent with any large amount of sowing the Gospel "broadcast" among the wandering tribes, from fifty to five hundred miles away. Another difficulty overtook Prince Albert as an Indian mission in a few years after its founding. It was the centre of a fertile region very attractive to white settlers. The white settlement led the bands of wandering Crees to retreat to more remote districts. The writer in 1871 became a member of the Presbytery's Committee, of which Mr. Black was convener, and well remembers the unrest of the period.
At this time the large expense of an establishment like Prince Albert was meeting opposition in the Church and this, along with the other considerations stated, brought much trouble to the venerable convener in regard to the mission which he loved as a child of his own. In 1872 Dr. Moore, of Ottawa, went as a delegate to the Saskatchewan, in behalf of the General Assembly. His report led to the discontinuance of the industrial phase of the mission, but it also rendered a tribute of commendation and praise to the faithful work that had been done by the founder, to the high reputation borne by the mission among all the bands of Crees, and to the steady influence for righteousness attached to the name of James Nisbet. In the course of time the Indian mission at Prince Albert ceased to be, unless the mission school among a wandering band of Sioux still maintained there be so regarded. John McKay, afterwards ordained, was invited to a band of Crees north of Carlton, and till his death ministered to Mistawasis' band. Other churches have taken hold of the bands about Prince Albert, and to-day as a result direct or indirect, of James Nisbet's work, few Indians of the district are without the Gospel.
Shortly after Dr. Moore's visit to Prince Albert, Mr. Nisbet and his wife visited his old home in Ontario, and he was present at the General Assembly of 1873. He returned to his dear Prince Albert, but being left alone by the resignation of Rev. Edward Vincent who had come to Manitoba, and finding his plans somewhat changed by the action of the Church, he arrived with his wife at Kildonan, in September, seeking a temporary rest. The writer well remembers them as they returned. Their work seemed to be done, and the Presbytery soon decided to lay hands on Hugh McKellar, an earnest student, and license and ordain him for the work in Prince Albert. Mrs. Nisbet soon passed away in the home where she was born, and eleven days afterward her husband followed her. They are together in Kildonan churchyard. His grave marks the spot where lies as true, brave and single-minded a man as ever laid a foundation stone in the work of missions.
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.