Neville Trueman, the Pioneer Preacher Part 1

Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher.

by William Henry Withrow.

PREFACE.

In this short story an attempt has been made--with what success the reader must judge--to present certain phases of Canadian life during the heroic struggle against foreign invasion, which first stirred in our country the pulses of that common national life, which has at length attained a st.u.r.dier strength in the confederation of the several provinces of the Dominion of Canada.

It will he found, we think, that the Canadian Methodism of those troublous times was not less patriotic than pious. While our fathers feared G.o.d, they also honoured the King, and loved their country; and many of them died in its defence. Reverently let us mention their names. Lightly let us tread upon their ashes.

Faithfully let us cherish their memory. And sedulously let us imitate their virtues.

A good deal of pains has been taken by the careful study of the most authentic memoirs, doc.u.ments, and histories referring to the period; by personal examination of the physical aspect of the scene of the story; and by frequent conversations with some of the princ.i.p.al actors in the stirring drama of the time--most of whom, alas! have now pa.s.sed away--to give a verisimilitude to the narrative that shall, it is hoped, reproduce in no distorted manner this memorable period.

W. H. W.

TORONTO, March 1st, 1880.

CHAPTER I.

WAR CLOUDS.

Now lower the dreadful clouds of war; Its threatening thunder rolls afar; Near and more near the rude alarms Of conflict and the clash of arms Advance and grow, till all the air Rings with the brazen trumpet blare.

Towards the close of a sultry day in July, in the year 1812, might have been seen a young man riding along the beautiful west bank of the Niagara River, about three miles above its mouth. His appearance would anywhere have attracted attention. He was small in person and singularly neat in his attire. By exposure to summer's sun and winter's cold, his complexion was richly bronzed, but, as he lifted his broad-leafed felt hat to cool his brow, it could be seen that his forehead was smooth and white and of a n.o.ble fulness, indicating superior intellectual abilities. His hair was dark,

--his eye beneath Flashed like falchion from its sheath.

His bright, quick glances, alternating with a full and steady gaze, betokened a mind keenly sympathetic with emotions both of sorrow and of joy. His dress and accoutrements were those of a travelling Methodist preacher of the period. He wore a suit of "parson's grey," the coat having a straight collar and being somewhat rounded away in front. His buckskin leggings, which descended to his stirrups, were splashed with mud, for the day had been rainy. He was well mounted on a light-built, active-looking chestnut horse. The indispensable saddle-bags, containing his Greek Testament, Bible, and Wesley's Hymns, and a few personal necessaries, were secured across the saddle. A small, round, leathern valise, with a few changes of linen, and his coa.r.s.e frieze great-coat were strapped on behind. Such was a typical example of the "clerical cavalry" who, in the early years of this century, ranged through the wilderness of Canada, fording or swimming rivers, toiling through forests and swamps, and carrying the gospel of Christ to the remotest settlers in the backwoods.

Our young friend, the Rev. Neville Trueman, afterwards a prominent figure in the history of early Methodism, halted his horse on a bluff jutting out into the Niagara River, both to enjoy the refres.h.i.+ng breeze that swept over the water and to admire the beautiful prospect. At his feet swept the broad and n.o.ble river, reflecting on its surface the snowy ma.s.ses of "thunderhead"

clouds, around which the lightning still played, and which, transfigured and glorified in the light of the setting sun, seemed to the poetic imagination of the young man like the City of G.o.d descending out of heaven, with its streets of gold and foundations of precious stones, while the rainbow that spanned the heavens seemed like the rainbow of the Apocalypse round about the throne of G.o.d.

Under the inspiration of the beauty of the scene, the young preacher began to sing in a clear, sweet, tenor voice that song of the ages, which he had learned at his mother's knee among the green hills of Vermont--

Jerusalem the golden, With milk and honey blest, Beneath thy contemplation, Sink heart and voice opprest,

I know not, oh! I know not What joys await me there; What radiancy of glory, What bliss beyond compare.

They stand, those walls of Zion, All jubilant with song, And bright with many an angel, And all the martyr throng.

With jasper glow thy bulwarks, Thy streets with emeralds blaze, The sardius and the topaz Unite in thee their rays.

Thine ageless walls are bonded With amethyst unpriced;

The saints build up its fabric, The corner-stone is Christ.

[Footnote: We cannot resist the temptation to give a few lines of the original hymn of Bernard of Clugny, a Breton monk of English parentage of the 12th century--"the sweetest of all the hymns of heavenly homesickness of the soul," and for generations one of the most familiar, through translations, in many languages. The rhyme and rhythm are so difficult, that the author was able to master it, he believed, only by special inspiration of G.o.d.

Urbs Syon aurea, patria lactea, cive decora, Omne cor obruis, omnibus obstruis et cor et ora, Nescio, nescio, quae jubilatio, lux tibi qualis, Quam socialia gaudia, gloria quam specialis.]

For a moment longer he gazed upon the broad, flowing river which divided two neighbouring peoples, one in language, in blood, in heroic early traditions, and the common heirs of the grandest literature the world has ever seen, yet severed by a deep, wide, angry-flowing stream of strife, which, dammed up for a time, was about to burst forth in a desolating flood that should overwhelm and destroy some of the fairest fruits of civilization in both countries. As he gazed northward, he beheld, on the eastern bank of the river, the snowy walls and gra.s.s-grown ramparts of Fort Niagara, above which floated proudly the stars and stripes.

As he gazed on the ancient fort, the memories of its strange eventful history came thronging on his mind from the time that La Salle thawed the frozen ground in midwinter to plant his palisades, to the time that the gallant Prideaux lay mangled in its trenches by the bursting of a cohorn--on the very eve of victory. These memories have been well expressed in graphic verse by a living Canadian poet--a denizen of the old borough of Niagara. [Footnote: William Kirby, Esq., in CANADIAN METHODIST MAGAZINE for May, 1878.]

Two gra.s.sy points--not promontories--front The calm blue lake--the river flows between, Bearing in its full bosom every drop Of the wild flood that leaped the cataract.

And swept the rock-walled gorge from end to end.

'Mid flanking eddies, ripples, and returns, It rushes past the ancient fort that once Like islet in a lonely ocean stood, A mark for half a world of savage woods; With war and siege and deeds of daring wrought Into its rugged walls--a history Of heroes, half forgotten, writ in dust.

Two centuries deep lie the foundation stones, La Salle placed there, on his adventurous quest Of the wild regions of the boundless west; Where still the sun sets on his unknown grave.

Three generations pa.s.sed of war and peace; The Bourbon lilies grew; brave men stood guard; And braver still went forth to preach and teach Th' evangel, in the forest wilderness, To men fierce as the wolves whose spoils they wore.

Then came a day of change. The summer woods Were white with English tents, and sap and trench Crept like a serpent to the battered walls.

Prideaux lay dead 'mid carnage, smoke, and fire Before the Gallic drums beat parley--then Niagara fell, and all the East and West Did follow: and our Canada was won.

As the sun sank beneath the horizon, the flag slid down the halyards, and the sullen roar of the sunset gun boomed over the wave, and was echoed back by the dense forest wall around and by the still low-hanging clouds overhead. A moment later the British gun of Fort George, on the opposite side of the river, but concealed from the spectator by a curve in the sh.o.r.e, loudly responded, as if in haughty defiance to the challenge of a foe.

Turning his horse's head, the young man rode rapidly down the road, beneath a row of n.o.ble chestnuts, and drew rein opposite a substantial-looking, brick farmhouse, but with such small windows as almost to look like a casematad fortress. Dismounting, he threw his horse's bridle over the hitching-post at the gate, and pa.s.sed through a neat garden, now blooming with roses and sweet peas, to the open door of the house. He knocked with his riding-whip on the door jamb, to which summons a young lady, dressed in a neat calico gown and swinging in her hand a broad-leafed sunhat, replied.

Seeing a stranger, she dropped a graceful "courtesy,"--which is one of the lost arts now-a-days,--and put up her hand to brush back from her face her wealth of cl.u.s.tering curls, somewhat dishevelled by the exercise of raking in the hayfield.

"Is this the house of Squire Drayton?" asked Neville, politely raising his hat.

The young lady, for such she evidently was, though so humbly dressed--_simplex munditiis_--replied that it was, and invited the stranger into the large and comfortable sitting-room, which bore evidence of refinement, although the carpet was of woven rags and much of the furniture was home-made.

"I have a letter to him from Elder Ryan," said Neville, presenting a doc.u.ment elaborately folded, after the manner of epistolary missives of the period.

"Oh, you're the new presiding elder, are you?" asked the lady. "We heard you were coming."

"No, not the presiding elder," said Neville, smiling at the unwonted dignity attributed to him, "and not even an elder at all; but simply a Methodist preacher on trial--a junior, who may be an elder some day."

"Excuse me," said the young lady, blus.h.i.+ng at her mistake. "Father has just gone to the village for his paper, but will be back shortly. Zenas, take the preacher's horse," she continued to a stout lad who had just come in from the hayfield.

"I will help him," said Neville, proceeding with the boy. It was the almost invariable custom of the pioneer preachers to see that their faithful steeds were groomed and fed, before they attended to their own wants.

Miss Katherine Drayton--this was the young lady's name--was the eldest daughter of Squire Drayton, of The Holms, as the farm was called, from the evergreen oaks that grew upon the riverbank. Her mother having been dead for some years, Katherine had the princ.i.p.al domestic management of the household. This duty, with its accompanying cares, had given her a self-reliance and maturity of character beyond her years. She deftly prepared a tasteful supper for the new guest, set out with snowy napery and with the seldom-used, best china.

"h.e.l.lo! what's up now?" asked her father, cheerily, as he entered the door. He is worth looking at as he stands on the threshold, almost filling the doorway with his large and muscular frame. He had a hearty, ruddy, English look, a frank and honest expression in his light blue eyes, and an impulsiveness of manner that indicated a temper--

That carries anger as the flint bears fire, Which much enforced, showeth a hasty spark, And straight is cold again.

He was not a Methodist, but his dead wife had been one, and for her sake, and because he had the instincts of a gentleman, of respect to the ministerial character, he extended a hospitable welcome to the travelling Methodist preachers, who were almost the only ministers in the country except the clergyman of the English Church in the neighbouring village of Niagara.

"The new preacher has come, father. He brought this letter from Elder Ryan," said Katherine, handing him the missive.