a very inadequate idea, to a work which has resulted in the beautiful scene we have witnessed this morning. I only wish to add that I am very much obliged to you for the satisfactory and loyal address with which you have greeted me. The very fact of you being in a position to express yourselves with so much propriety is in itself extremely creditable to you, and although it has been my good fortune to receive many addresses during my stay in Canada from various communities of your fellow-subjects, not one of them will be surrounded by so many hopeful and pleasant reminiscences as those which I shall carry away with me from this spot.”

Subsequently, Lord Dufferin, in a speech delivered in Government House, Victoria, before about two hundred leading citizens, including the members of the Provincial Government, said:

"I have traversed the entire coast of British Columbia, from its southern extremity to Alaska. I have penetrated to the head of Bute Inlet; I have examined the Seymour Narrows, and the other channels which intervene between the head of Bute Inlet and Vancouver Island. I have looked into the mouth of Dean's Canal, and passed across the entrance to Gardener's Channel. I have visited Mr. Duncan's wonderful settlement at Metlakahtla, and the interesting Methodist Mission at Fort Simpson, and have thus been enabled to realize what scenes of primitive peace, and innocence, of idyllic beauty, and material comfort, can be presented by the stal

wart men, and comely maidens of an Indian community under the wise administration of a judicious, and devoted Christian missionary. I have seen the Indians in all phases of their existence, from the half-naked savage, perched, like a bird of prey, in a red blanket upon a rock, trying to catch his miserable dinner of fish, to the neat maiden in Mr. Duncan's school at Metlakahtla, as modest and as well dressed as any clergyman's daughter in an English parish. What you want are not resources, but human beings to develop them and consume them. Raise your thirty thousand Indians to the level Mr. Duncan has taught us they can be brought, and consider what an enormous amount of vital power you will have added to your present strength."

A further quotation will be given later on in reference to the land question, from this speech of Lord Dufferin.

Lord, and Lady Dufferin, were greatly impressed by the evidences they beheld on every hand, at Metlakahtla, of the substantial creation of a civilized community, from a people rescued in a single generation, from the lowest degradation, and savagery.

Lady Dufferin, especially noted a remarkable refinement of taste and the choice of quiet colors, and modest dresses of the women.

Mr. St. John who accompanied Lord Dufferin and reported the above address, writing of Mr. Duncan's plan of dealing with his people, among other things says:-

refers to them again and agonias

106

THE STORY OF METLAKAHTLA.

"It struck me that he threw, and successfully threw, cold water on the Governor-General's bestowing any special mark of recognition on the chiefs. He has to conduct his operations in a peculiar way, and it can be easily shown, he understood that much of his advice and direction, would be thrown away, were there a recognized authority over the Indians other than himself. He strives to make industry and merit the standards by which the men of the village are measured and in presenting an address to the Governor-General, which was done immediately after the singing was concluded there was no apparent priority or distinction among them."-"Sea of Mountains." London, 1877.

The Church of England Missionary Society of London, was so proud of Mr. Duncan's work, that it published, and widely circulated, a book entitled "Metlakahtla," in which it extols Mr. Duncan's work, giving him unstinted praise, for the marvellous things he had accomplished, among the ferocious, wild savages, of the great Northwest. This book was the means of bringing many thousand pounds in contributions to the Society's coffers "for the purpose of converting the heathen of foreign. lands." The Church Missionary Society's publications continually chronicled the progress of his work, and held him up as an example for missionaries throughout the world.

The Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge, London, published a book, edited by

the Rev. J. J. Halcombe, M.A., titled "Stranger than Fiction." This book, devoted entirely to Mr. Duncan's mission work, has passed through many editions, and I have been informed; something like twenty thousand copies have been sold. The author begins by saying that Mr. Duncan's work "presents a series of incidents without parallel in the missionary annals of the Church," and from beginning, to end, lauds his methods.

In reference to the founding of Metlakahtla he says:

Gradually assuming shape and consistency, until it finally issued in the establishment of the native settlement, the singular and successful development of which has already constituted it one of the marvels of the day,

"Thus we have seen the foundation laid, and the superstructure begin to rise upon it. What the nature of the foundation has been we have sufficiently indicated. Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, even Jesus Christ,' seems to have been pre-eminently the principle upon which, as a true missionary-'a wise master builder'-Mr. Duncan from the first proceeded in his work. 'Jesus Christ and Him crucified,' all the historical facts of our Lord's life and death, the causes which led to, and the results which followed from, the 'one all-sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world,' offered by Christ upon the cross; these had been, so to speak, the mate

rials ceaselessly thrown in amongst the quicksands of ignorance, and superstition, which would otherwise have baffled all hope of erecting any solid superstructure upon them.

"It is difficult, in a narrative like the present, to convey any sufficiently adequate idea of the untiring perseverance with which Mr. Duncan seems thus to have made his preaching, and teaching rest upon and centre round the great facts of the history of man's redemption. Line upon line, precept upon precept, in season, and, as some would have thought, out of season the same theme was evidently regarded as the only motive-power, which could be brought to bear with any reasonable hope of a successful result attending it.

"But of all tests of progress in such a settlement as Metlakahtla the development of a missionary spirit is the most trustworthy. Nor was this sign wanting. Amongst all classes of the community there seems to have been a constant desire leading to continued and earnest efforts to bring home the truths of the Gospel to their heathen brethren.' In narrating the remarkable career of Legaic, Dr. Halcombe writes:

The case of Paul Legaic was, be it remembered, no exceptional one, though rendered somewhat more remarkable by his former rank. His history is only one out of a very large number of a similar kind which the experience of this Mission would furnish.