He and Elder John Chislett were sent to Penzance, Cornwall, to introduce the gospel to the inhabitants. They met with no encouragement, yet they did not feel justified in leaving the place until they had given the people a thorough warning. Their funds were so low that the two of them were forced to live on a penny's worth of bread and a penny's worth of soup per day; yet their faith was strong, and they spent much of their time in prayer. Finally, as a last resort, in the effort to awaken an interest in the message they had to bear to the people, they decided to give a course of public lectures. Elder Halliday pawned his watch to raise the necessary money to rent a hall and publish some placards announcing their meetings, and on the first evening appointed they were gratified at seeing a few come to hear them. Among the audience they noticed particularly a well-dressed gentleman and lady, the latter of whom commenced weeping almost as soon as she entered the hall and continued to do so as long as the meeting lasted. The Elders, of course, could assign no reason for this peculiar conduct while the meeting was in progress, nor were they any more enlightened when, at the close of the services, the lady came forward with her husband and invited them to visit her at her home at St. Just, about six miles distant. This was the first invitation they had received from anyone in the place, and they accepted it joyfully, and would willingly have gone home with her that night, but, to their disappointment, she named the following Wednesday as the time when she would be pleased to receive them. Nothing further passed between them, but it was evident that a favorable impression had been made upon her, and that she was a woman of intelligence and refinement. While anticipating the pleasure of visiting her and waiting for the day to arrive, the Elders continued to subsist upon their scanty fare, and spent their time in vainly endeavoring to proselyte among the citizens of Penzance.
Wednesday morning came and with it a drenching rain storm, through which the Elders tramped the whole six miles, hungry and penniless. Shortly before arriving at St. Just, and while they were crossing a plowed field, with the mud clinging to their boots so they could scarcely walk, the Lord deigned to comfort them by giving Elder Halliday the gift of tongues and the interpretation of the same, in which it was made known to him that the lady whom they were going to visit had been favored with a vision in which she had seen himself and Elder Chislett; also that she was the owner of several houses, one of which she was going to allow them to use to hold meetings in, and that he was going to baptize her that very night.
As soon as this had passed through his mind, for he had not spoken aloud, but to himself, he joyfully slapped his companion on the shoulder and exclaimed, "Cheer up, John! I have had a revelation!" He then proceeded to relate all that had been revealed to him.
When they arrived at the house they were drenched as badly as if they had been in a river. Even their boots were full of water, so that when they pulled them off and turned the tops downward it ran out of them in a stream. Their friend, however, had been anxiously looking for them, and had prepared a blazing fire to warm them and spread the table with tempting food. She also proposed for them to change their clothes as far as she could supply them with dry ones to put on from her husband's wardrobe. "But," said she, "I can hardly wait for you to change your clothes, I am so anxious to talk to you."
"Oh, you need not be in such a hurry," remarked Elder Halliday, "for I know what you are going to say!"
She looked at him in surprise and inquired how he knew.
"Why," he said, "I have had it revealed to me on the way here." He then related to her every particular as it had been made known to him, until he got to that part relating to her baptism, when she interrupted him by exclaiming in surprise to her husband:
"There, now, is that not just as it occurred? How could he have learned that? for you know I have not talked with anyone but you about it!" She then admitted that the week previous, while lying awake in bed, she saw a bright light in the room and awoke her husband and pointed it out to him. He also saw it, and it passed around the room in the direction of Penzance, to which place it led her in her mind, and there she saw two men trying to raise a standard, in which labor the people who looked on seemed unwilling to lend a helping hand. She reproached them for their lack of interest, and took hold herself to assist. This vision was so plain that she afterwards related the whole of it to her husband and even described the appearance of the men. Then she could not rest until she had, in company with her husband, visited Penzance and attended the lecture she there saw announced. As soon as she entered the hall and saw the two Elders she recognized them and could not refrain from crying. As to the other part of what had been revealed to him, she said it was true that she was the owner of a row of houses, which she pointed out to the Elders, and that the last one was a school-house in which her husband taught school, and which they were welcome to use as a meeting house as long as they wanted to free of charge.
"But," said Elder Halliday, "that is not all that the Lord revealed to me. He told me that I was going to baptize you before I went to bed to-night, and now I want your husband to go and find some water for that purpose."
Brother Halliday, in telling what had been revealed to him, felt a good deal as he imagined the prophet Jonah must have felt when the Lord commanded him to go to Nineveh and declare the destruction of that city. He had before him the fear of being declared a false prophet, and it required a great deal of faith in him to tell it, especially that part relating to her baptism. However, he was soon relieved on that score, for the good lady expressed her readiness and anxiety to go immediately and be baptized. But her husband declared there was not a stream or pond in that region deep enough to baptize a person in, and it would be no use for them to think of doing such a thing that day. "Is there not a ditch or hollow anywhere around here that is deep enough?" said Elder Halliday, "Please go and see."