Of every day for Thee.
We ask no other wages,
When Thou shalt call us home,
But to have shared the travail
Which makes Thy kingdom come.”
—Monsel.
Under instructions from the District Meeting, in October, 1872, I left by steamer Onward for a journey to the vast interior, parts of which had never been visited by a Methodist missionary. Along the Thompson River and through the Nicola valley were large bands of Indians, mostly heathen, who, while speaking a different language, were nevertheless of the same stock as those among whom I had so long labored.
I took with me, as interpreter, a young man, a native of the Thompson, who had lived on the Chilliwack since he was a boy, and hence spoke the An-ko-me-num language as well as his native tongue. We were each provided with a little Indian “cayuse” or pony, which we shipped by steamer as far as Yale. In two weeks and three days we travelled 482 miles, preaching twelve times in English and fifteen times to Indians. The kindness of the people and their eagerness to hear the truth were remarkable. One Indian chief and some of his friends followed us fifteen miles to hear me preach again. We preached in court-houses, hotels, stores, log cabins, Indian shacks, and by the wayside, and everywhere the people “heard us gladly.”
At Yale I met Sandford Fleming, Principal Grant and their party, just newly arrived from their arduous overland trip across the continent. The story of this trip is found in Principal Grant’s famous book, “Ocean to Ocean.”
The journey up the old historic Cariboo road was exciting and romantic. We had several narrow escapes from having our horses go over the bluffs. Had they gone over they must have fallen in some places a thousand feet or more into the rushing waters of the Fraser River below. The road hugged the precipice, and in many places was not wide enough to permit two waggons to pass. The great stage coaches, which used to convey passengers to and fro over the 400 miles into Cariboo, would rush by with break-neck speed, while our little ponies stood aside on rocky ledges to permit them to pass. Here and there we met the large ox teams, of five or six yokes, returning with empty waggons from the interior, their huge flapping canvas covers frightening our little animals until it seemed as if we should not be able to get them by.