Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher | Page 7

for maintaining the
connexional unity of the Church under the stress of disorganizing
influences, and certain provisions effected for the unforeseen
contingencies of the war. Then, after commending one another to God
in fervent prayer, and invoking His guidance of their lives and His
blessing on their labours, they sang that noble battle hymn and
marching song of Charles Wesley's:--
In flesh we part awhile, But still in spirit joined, To embrace the happy
toil Thou hast to each assigned; And while we do Thy blessed will, We
bear our heaven about us still.
They looked like a forlorn hope, like a despised and feeble remnant, but
they were animated with the spirit of a conquering army. With many a
hearty wring of the hand and fervent "God bless you!" and, not without
eyes suffused with tears, they took their leave of one another, and fared
forth on their lonely ways to their remote and arduous fields of toil.

CHAPTER II
.

THE EVE OF BATTLE.
The next scene of our story opens on the eve of an eventful day in the
annals of Canada. About sunset in an October afternoon, Neville
Trueman reached The Holms, after a long and weary ride from the
western end of his circuit, which reached nearly to the head of Lake
Ontario. The forest was gorgeous in its autumnal foliage, like Joseph in
his coat of many colours. The corn still stood thick, in serried ranks, in
the fields, no longer plumed and tasseled like an Indian chief, but
rustling, weird-like, as an army of spectres in the gathering gloom. The
great yellow pumpkins gleamed like huge nuggets of gold in some
forest Eldorado. The crimson patches of ripened buckwheat looked like
a blood-stained field of battle: alas! too true an image of the deeper
stains which were soon to dye the greensward of the neighbouring
height.
The change from the bleak moor, over which swept the chill north wind
from the lonely lake, to the genial warmth of Squire Drayton's
hospitable kitchen was most agreeable. A merry fire of hickory wood
on the ample hearth--it was long before the time of your close, black,
surly-looking kitchen stoves--snapped and sparkled its hearty welcome
to the travel-worn guest. It was a rich Rembrant-like picture that
greeted Neville as he entered the room. The whole apartment was
flooded with light from the leaping flames which was flashed back
from the brightly-scoured milk-pans and brass kettles on the
dresser--not unlike, thought he, to the burnished shields and casques of
the men-at-arms in an old feudal hall.
The fair young mistress, clad in a warm stuff gown, with a snowy
collar and a crimson necktie, moved gracefully through the room,
preparing the evening meal. Savoury odours proceeded from a pan
upon the coals, in which were frying tender cutlets of venison-- now a
luxury, then, in the season, an almost daily meal.
The burly squire basked in the genial blaze, seated in a rude
home-made armchair, the rather uncomfortable-looking back and arms
of which were made of cedar roots, with the bark removed, like our
garden rustic seats. Such a chair has Cowper in his "Task" described,--
"Three legs upholding firm A messy slab, in fashion square or round.
On such a stool immortal Alfred sat, And swayed the sceptre of his
infant realms: And such in ancient halls may still be found."

At his feet crouched Lion, the huge staghound, at times half growling
in his sleep, as if in dreams he chased the deer, and then, starting up, he
licked his master's hand and went to sleep again.
On the opposite side of the hearth, Zenas was crouched upon the floor,
laboriously shaping an ox-yoke with a spoke-shave. For in those days
Canadian farmers were obliged to make or mend almost everything
they used upon the farms.
Necessity, which is the mother of invention, made them deft and handy
with axe and adze, bradawl and waxed end, anvil and forge. The squire
himself was no mean blacksmith, and could shoe a horse, or forge a
plough coulter, or set a tire as well as the village Vulcan at Niagara.
"Right welcome," said the squire, as he made room for Neville near the
fireplace, while Katherine gave him a quieter greeting and politely
relieved him of his wrappings. "Well, what's the news outside?" he
continued, we must explain that as Niagara, next to York and Kingston,
was the largest settlement in the province, it rather looked down upon
the population away from "the front," as it was called, as outsiders
almost beyond the pale of civilization.
"No news at all," replied Neville, "but a great anxiety to hear some.
When I return from the front, they almost devour me with questions."
The early Methodist preachers, in the days