then tied it up and got it safely launched the second time. And it
was not at all bad, though _very_ shapeless and unlike a trim plum
pudding, with the holly at the top."
And many another tale did she tell me of "Henry's" ceaseless activity,
and courage and patience. He had learnt three Indian dialects, the
_patois_ of the _habitant_, and the Gaelic of two Scotch settlements,
in order to converse freely with his people and understand their
wants properly. He could doctor the body as well as the soul,
set a fractured limb, bind a wound, apply ice for sunstroke and
snow for chilblains. He could harness a horse and milk a cow;
paddle a canoe and shoot and fish like an Indian, cook and garden
and hew and build--indeed there seemed nothing he could not do and
had not done, and all this along with the care of his office, as
much a missionary one as any could be. Peril of shipwreck and peril
of fire, peril of frost and peril of heat, peril of sickness, pain
and death, peril of men, ignorant and wicked, of wild beasts and
wilder storms--all these he had braved with his wife and little
ones for the sake of his convictions added to a genuine love of his
fellow-man. I began to consider, and rightly I think, the unknown,
obscure Bishop of Saskabasquia one of the most interesting men of
the day.
Our journey, however, could not always last. Our pleasant chats, our
lively table-talk, Mrs. Saskabasquia's pretty womanly confidences and
her husband's deep-voiced readings from Dickens which he told me were
of the utmost moral value to his people, all came to an end. We all
felt sorry to part, yet greatly relieved at seeing the mighty cliff
of Quebec draw nearer and nearer with each succeeding hour. I had
been quite ill for the last two days like nearly all the other
passengers. Coming up the Gulf of St. Lawrence that is sometimes the
case, and we were a miserable party that Friday, hardly anyone on
deck except the irrepressible Bishop and his family and myself. I
was wretched, sick and cold and trembling in every limb, undoubted
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