MEMOIRS, LETTERS,

&c.

CHAPTER I.

ARMINE SIMCOE HENRY MOUNTAIN, the fifth son of Jacob Mountain, first Bishop of Quebec, was born in Quebec on the 4th of February, 1797, in a house in St. Louis Street, which had previously been occupied by Prince Edward, afterwards Duke of Kent, the father of Queen Victoria.

Bishop Mountain was descended from a French Protestant family, who took refuge in England upon the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (the name having been originally Montaigne, and of the same family as the celebrated Essayist), and became possessed of a moderate landed property, the estate of Thwaite Hall, in Norfolk. He married Miss Eliza Mildred Wale Kentish, co-heiress of Little Bardfield Hall in the county of Essex, a property that had belonged to her family for nearly 600 years. She was a descendant of Sir Thomas Wale, a Knight of

the Garter in the reign of Edward III. It is said that the right to wear the Crusader's Cross was won by an ancestor of the family of Wale (then written Vaux) under Richard I.

Dr. Mountain was appointed to the new diocese of Quebec in 1793, and presided over the Church in Canada for thirty-two years. The following passage, taken from a periodical published in Quebec shortly after his death, will show the estimation in which he was held in that city:

"His relations and friends will always remember him with most reverential affection, and all who knew him, with respect. The poor will mourn him as a benefactor of no common generosity; and the blessing of him that was ready to perish' will mix itself, to embalm his memory, with the thankful recollections of many whom he has soothed in affliction, relieved in embarrassment, advised in perplexity, withheld from imprudence, reconciled in estrangements from their brethren, or led by the hand in the way of Truth. Those who have known him in the public business of the province, will acknowledge no less his ready exercise of the powers of a mind rarely gifted and richly stored, than his integrity, his droiture d'âme, his singleness of purpose, his firmness and consistency of conduct; and those with whom he acted in concert will own, that there were times when others leaned upon him in difficulty, borrowed strength from his example, and counted upon him to preserve things in their proper course. He was emi

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nently a scholar, a gentleman, a companion, a domestic guide and comforter; and united, in a most remarkable manner, qualities which commanded respect and even awe, with a cheerful affability, and often a playfulness which threw a charm about his society, and made him as it were the centre of a system, to the whole of which he imparted light and warmth. Besides the three learned languages which he had acquired in the course of preparation for his profession, he was acquainted with as many foreign tongues. In all things he possessed a delicate and cultivated taste, and excelled in early life in many accomplishments, which he discarded as trifles when he became a Bishop in the Church of Christ. Never was a character more perfectly genuine, more thoroughly averse to all flourish or ostentation in religion. He was friendly, both from feeling and principle, to all exterior gravity and decorum in sacred things; and in his own public performance of the functions proper to the episcopal office, the commanding dignity of his person, the impressive seriousness of his manner, and the felicitous propriety of his utterance, gave the utmost effect and development to the beautiful services of the Church. In the pulpit, it is not perhaps too much to say that the grace, the force, the solemn fervour of his delivery, the power and happy regulation of his tones, the chaste expressiveness of his action, combined with the strength and clearness of his reasoning, the unstudied magnificence of his language, and that piety,

that rooted faith in his Redeemer which was, and showed itself to be, pregnant with the importance of its subject, and intent upon conveying the same feeling to others, made him altogether a preacher who has never in modern times been surpassed."

Bishop Mountain left four sons and two daughters. The two elder sons took Holy Orders; the second became in 1836 Bishop of Montreal, and is now Bishop of Quebec. The third son, Robert, entered the army, and served during the Peninsular War in the 75th Regiment. He was with the forlorn hope at the siege of St. Sebastian; and once, when in charge of the defence of a bridge, he was severely wounded in the foot; but though suffering great pain, the ball having entered the instep, he could not be persuaded to leave his post, and remained, with his wound bleeding, leaning on a sergeant, till the enemy had retired. After the peace of 1815 he returned to England; and in 1819 resigned his commission in the army, and entered into the ministry of the Church.

The fourth son died in childhood.

The fifth son, Armine, the subject of this memoir, was placed in 1805, together with his three elder brothers, with the Rev. T. Monro, rector of Little Easton, in Essex, a favourite pupil of the celebrated Dr. Parr, and a scholar of repute. There he remained for about three years, and made good advances in classical learning.

When about four years old, the child of his nurse,

to whom he was much attached, a much older boy, who was allowed to play about the house, used to tyrannise over him; and one day in the courtyard forced him under the shafts of a cart, hurting him very much, and putting him in considerable danger. The butler, who saw this from a window, saved the child, and called down the Bishop; but the only fear of the little sufferer was lest his oppressor should be punished, and he cried out, "Oh, papa, pray forgive him! he was only in fun, and did not know it hurt me."

Of his early religious dispositions, little has been recorded; and one of his brothers, writing in the present year, says:

"On this subject I have nothing marked to say. In the personal history of individuals, as in the advance of the Gospel over the world, it may often be said that the kingdom of God cometh not with observation. My brother was one whose parents prayed for him, and sought to mould him, without any austerity or forcing process, in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; and he was a very good and amiable boy, in whose young heart the seed took effect, and developed its fruit gradually more and more through life. I may mention, that my father took particular pains with his children before their confirmation; and when I was about sixteen myself, he went through with us a course of very familiar conversational lectures upon the Gospels, sometimes reverting to the subject as we walked about the fields, and making it as engaging to our boyish minds as he could by very