On August 30th, the Indians and I met Daniel H. Wells, who had been counselor to President Young in the First Presidency. At that interview President Wells told me I had performed a great and good work, and to ask me to return to Arizona was too much to require of me. I was therefore honorably released from that mission. Subsequently I received a formal release from President John Taylor, who succeeded to the presidency of the Church.
After the funeral of President Young, which was held on September 2nd, I accompanied the Indians as far south as Gunnison, Sanpete County, on their way home. There I bade them goodbye, and returned northward, to resume my missionary labors, traveling and lecturing among the settlements in Utah, southern Idaho, and western Wyoming. I also purchased a tract of eighty acres of land on the Redwood Road, in the western part of Salt Lake City, and worked on that in the spring and summer, traveling and preaching in the autumn and winter as President Young had directed me to do.
Thus my time was occupied till the spring of 1892 with the exception of the months of March, April and May, 1888. With a firm conviction that plurality of wives was a law of God. I had entered into that relationship honorably with a sincere purpose to follow the right. My family were united with me in accepting this union as of the highest, holiest, most sacred character in the sight of the Most High. I could not feel to cast aside my wives whom I had married under these conditions, and therefore, on March 12, 1888, I was sentenced to prison on a charge of unlawful cohabitation, the legal term applied to living with more than one wife, the law being specially directed at one of the religious practices of the Latter-day Saints. The judgment pronounced against me was three months' imprisonment in the penitentiary and to pay a fine of one hundred dollars and costs, which amounted in my case to twenty-seven dollars and fifty cents. I paid the fine and served the term, less the time allowed for good behavior, and was released May 28, 1888, having been in prison two months and sixteen days.
As was the case with other Mormons in my position, our offense was not looked upon even by non-Mormons acquainted with the circumstances as containing the element of crime; but our incarceration was in fact an imprisonment for conscience sake, that being the position in which the law found us. A term in the penitentiary under those conditions and at that time, while a severe hardship, especially upon one in my state of health, was by no means a moral disgrace, since those who had to endure it were of the better class of men, whose uprightness, honor, integrity and sincerity were beyond question in the community where their lives were an open book.
CHAPTER LXIII.
VISITED BY PRESIDENT JOSEPH F. SMITH—CALLED ON ANOTHER MISSION TO THE SOCIETY ISLANDS—PREPARE TO RESPOND—A BLESSING BY APOSTLE LORENZO SNOW—APPOINTED TO PRESIDE OYER THE SOCIETY ISLANDS MISSION—ATTEMPTS TO DISCOURAGE ME FROM UNDERTAKING THE JOURNEY—SURPRISE PARTY BY MY CHILDREN—FAREWELL RECEPTION IN THE WARD HALL—START ON MY MISSION, ACCOMPANIED BY MY SON AND OTHERS WHO HAD BEEN CALLED—VOYAGE TO TAHITI—MADMAN ON BOARD THE VESSEL—AT MARQUESAS ISLANDS—STRANGE CHARACTERS—TATTOOED WHITE MAN—HIS PECULIAR CAREER—CATCHING SHARKS—ARRIVE AT PAPEETE—MY RECEPTION THERE—MEET NATIVE JOSEPHITE PREACHERS, WHO SEEM CONFUSED—ELDERS FROM UTAH GREET US—IN POOR HEALTH.
ON March 30, 1892, President Joseph F. Smith called at my residence in Salt Lake City, and handed me a letter written by an Elder who was on the island of Tahiti. At the same time President Smith asked me how I would like to take another mission to the Society Islands, in the South Pacific Ocean. I told him I did not wish any man to call me on a mission—that my health was not good, and such a journey as he suggested was a big undertaking for one in my condition. He replied that he would leave the letter for me to read, and would call the next day to learn what I thought of it. He came according to appointment, and informed me that the First Presidency wanted me to undertake the mission. I replied that when properly called I was not afraid to go, as I had faith that God would not require of any man more than he would have the ability to do if he were faithful. The day following this conversation I visited the First Presidency and learned that they were a unit in requesting me to go to the Society Islands.
From this time I began to settle my affairs to meet the call. On April 8th, I was set apart for the mission, Elder Francis M. Lyman being mouth in the blessing. On the 15th, I went to Ogden on business, and while on the train met Apostle Lorenzo Snow, who told me he felt the spirit of prophecy. He said that the mission I was going on should be one of the greatest I had ever performed; that I would prosper therein and be blessed with more power and influence than ever before; that the Lord would be with me to sustain and comfort me, and that my family should be provided for. As he spoke I felt a thrill of testimony through my whole being. When he concluded he took from his pocket two five-dollar gold pieces, remarking that he had been a missionary himself, and insisted that I should take the money, keep it till I got in a close place, and then use it, which I did.
On April 22nd I received at President Woodruff's office a letter of appointment to preside over the Society Islands Mission, which included the Society and Tuamotu groups, comprising from eighty to one hundred islands and an area of about fifteen hundred square miles. About this time I had many visitors, a considerable number of whom expressed surprise at my being appointed to such a mission at my time of life and in my condition; for I was sixty-four years of age and walked on crutches and one foot, as I had to abandon my artificial limb in Arizona, owing to the intense pain it caused me. One man said that he would not go in my situation for ten thousand dollars. But these discouraging remarks did not raise a doubt in my mind of the propriety of the call.
On the 24th of April I was engaged in writing, when my children and grandchildren to the number of sixty-five burst in upon me in a surprise party. We had a happy time and I gave them a father's blessing. Then we repaired to the Seventeenth Ward meeting house, where members of the ward had assembled, and I preached a farewell sermon and took an affectionate leave of the people.