The old people, in the meantime, showed very little appreciation, often, indeed, taking the children away with the most silly excuses.
On their hunting and fishing trips they carried nearly all their household effects, children, dogs, cats, chickens, etc. Hence we often had to follow them and teach school on the beach, or under a shady tree on the bank of the river.
After I had been some time at this work, spending my whole energy for the benefit of their children, some of the parents asked me how long they had to let their children go to school before I would pay them. I replied, “Oh, I couldn’t pay you. In our country the people pay the teacher.” “Oh, well,” they said, “we cannot let them go much longer unless you pay us.”
But by and by the swing, our singing and kindness won the hearts of the little ones, and they came of their own accord when the hand-bell was rung.
Sometimes, on a fine day in the summer, they would take a notion to run off and keep away from school. What boy or girl likes to attend school on a hot day? When I started to round them up they made for the beach, and when I drew near they would slip off their blanket or simple dress and make a bolt for the salt water. In they would go, the tide being up, diving and swimming away out of reach of everybody. For a little you would lose sight of them, then away in the distance you would see two or three little fellows pop up, shake their heads, rub their hands over their faces, and cry out, “Ha! ha! ha!”
In spite of all the difficulties in the way of rapid progress, many who were naturally bright made considerable advancement. It was from this school that little Satana (afterwards David Sallosalton) came to me and gave himself up to God and the work of evangelizing his people.
It was while I was engaged in my work at Nanaimo that I had the pleasure of a visit from Wm. Duncan, of the Church Missionary Society, who had spent several years among the Tsimpseans at Metlakatlah, and who afterwards was instrumental in founding the model missionary community at that place. The pleasurable acquaintance thus made was years afterwards renewed when I went north to undertake missionary work among the people of the same nation. Wm. Duncan was one of the most successful of missionaries, earnest, devoted, resourceful, a man the influence of whose life and labors will always be felt among the people for whom his life was given.