conditions of salvation, and was told he must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. But what was faith? what was it to believe? was the next inquiry. On this his mind laboured. He remembered that one of his farmers was a very zealous, praying man, and he sent for him; and on his coming before him, he asked him what faith was. The plain farmer replied, that it was taking God at his word. This pleased him, but it was so simple that he was afraid to trust to it, and sent for a learned minister to explain the nature of faith to him. He gave him a very laboured, sound, and learned exposition of faith. When he had got through, the lord said, "I like the farmer's faith best, after all; I prefer to die in his faith."

THE POOR INDIAN.-A minister was preaching in the West on the death of Christ for sinners. When he had closed his remarks, a poor Indian rose, and advancing near the minister, inquired if

Jesus died for him, for poor Indian. The minister told him he did, and was able and willing to save him. "Well," said the Indian, with tears in his eyes, "me got no land to give Jesus, white man got all Indian's land away, but me give Jesus my dog and my rifle." The minister informed him that Jesus could not accept such gifts. The son of the forest added, "Me give my rifle, my dog, and my blanket; Indian got nothing more, me give Jesus all." The minister again informed him that Jesus could not accept such gifts. The Indian bowed his head in sorrow; but after a moment's reflection, he raised himself up, and fixing his eye on the minister, said in a subdued tone, "Here is poor Indian, will Jesus have him ?" That was the offering which Jesus could accept, and in that moment the Spirit did its work, and he who had been so poor felt the witness within that he was heir to an inheritance. From Lee on Revivals.

DEAR BROTHER,-Through the good providence of our gracious God I arrived in safety with my family in Birmingham on the 7th ult. Our voyage, on the whole, was good; and, through mercy, I escaped sea-sickness, though the rest of the passengers all suffered more or less from this unpleasant appendage to a seavoyage. The California, owned by the Messrs. Orrs of Glasgow, in which I came across the Atlantic, is sailed on temperance principles; and, in consequence, we had no drinking, no fighting, no swearing. Everything was as orderly and as peaceable on board as in any wellconducted family on shore. Captain Gall, the commander of the vessel, is both a Christian and a gentleman; and at his request I conducted worship in the cabin morning and evening, and preached twice on the two Sabbaths on deck when it was practicable, and once in the cabin on each of the two Sabbaths that it was squally. The whole of the crew and the passengers showed us the greatest attention and kindness, so that we left the California with regret. I am happy also in being able to state that my own health and that of my family was never better than on landing on our native shores. I find that during my absence many of our

beloved relatives and friends are no more; still it is matter of thankfulness that so many yet live, whom we found in excellent health, and right glad to see us after so long an absence. My spirit has been much refreshed, and my determinations to exert all my powers to extend the Redeemer's cause have been greatly strengthened, by the very cordial and truly Christian manner in which my ministerial brethren and our beloved people in this country, with whom I have met, have welcomed me to my native land. I find that I have not been forgotten, and am ready to dispute the truth of the old adage, "Out of sight, out of mind." The unspeakable pleasure I have felt in renewing old Christian friendships compensates in some measure for the indescribable pain I had to endure in leaving in the New World so many dear friends with whom I have laboured, wept, and prayed, in striving to gather souls to Christ and form them into Churches under our excellent system of ecclesiastical government. Having been so intimately connected with the whole of our work in Canada, from nearly the commencement of our operations therehaving assisted in forming the plans by which we have done some good service

to that country-having helped in raising up a Church which, it is hoped, will be a blessing to that land even to distant ages and having spent twelve years of the best part of a minister's life in preaching the everlasting Gospel to the settlers in that interesting country-I could not leave our people in Canada without deep emotions of anxiety and sorrow, and without a determination to repair again to that scene of labour the moment the providence of God opens my way to return. Canada is engraven on my heart; and for its best interests I hope to preach and pray, to labour and give, as long as life lasts.

In obedience to your expressed wish, I shall now proceed to state a few things respecting our work in Canada, which I hope will prove interesting to the numerous supporters of our Missions. Our last Conference was one of the most interesting that we ever had. There were assembled about forty-four representatives from the Circuits; and most of the ministers not in charge of Circuits were also present. The business of the Conference was gone through with care, despatch and great unanimity. Important resolutions were passed in favour of education, the better observance of the Sabbath, and against the support of any Christian Ministers by the State-whether from the Clergy Reserve Fund or from any other State source. R. H. Brett, Esq., gave us an account of what he had seen and heard of our friends in this country, and of the deep anxiety of the Connexion here to aid to the utmost of their ability in extending the work of God in Canada, which called forth the heartiest expressions of thankfulness and joy from all in the Conference; and most fervent prayers for the peace and prosperity of our beloved Connexion on this side the Atlantic. On examining the state of the Connexion, it was found that there had been a clear increase of 328 members. This number might have been augmented; but the Conference was determined not to return any who could not be relied upon. When the announcement respecting the increase was made business was immediately suspended, and united fervent prayer was offered, thanking God for having prospered the work of our hands, and beseeching him to give still greater prosperity the eusuing year. In examining the accounts of the Auxiliary Mission Fund, we were happy in finding that £487 some odd shillings had been raised on the different stations, being £50 more than last year. On the different stations there was raised

by quarterage and collections for the preachers' support £1,230 0s. 2d. And from the Missionary Committee in England, after deducting the General Superintendent's salary, and £60 for the Beneficent and Paternal Funds, they received £484 3s. 4d. Still there was a deficiency of about £120, which the preachers had to lose, there being no fund from which this deficiency could be met. The amount, then, which our Mission cost last year in Canada, exclusive of General Superintendent's salary, the Beneficent and Paternal Funds, chapels, Sabbathschools and parsonages, was,£2,201 3s.6d. * and this was raised from the following

Superintendent's salary,expenses, funds, &c. &c., paid by the English Missionary Committee. 242 0 0 £2443 3 6

Such, then, was the actual cost of the Canadian Mission for the past year. I have given these facts and figures in order to show our people in England that our Canadian brethren are willing to help themselves, and that there is no disposition on their part to ask more from England than is imperatively needed to sustain our present operations; to extend the work of God to those newly-formed settlements where they have not the means of supporting the ministry of the Word, and to introduce our system into the cities and towns. I would just state, before I proceed further, that all the items in the above statement are put down in Halifax currency, the common and legal currency of America, which allows £1 4s. 4d. for the English sovereign.

The Conference, on examining the return of the Circuits for the increase of the married preachers' salaries from £50 currency to £75, found that the great majority of the Circuits were in favour of the increase; and therefore passed a resolution that in future the salaries of the preacher should be £75 currency; this, with house-rent, fire-wood, and horse-feed, allowed as extras, will enable our brethren in Canada to live comfortably, and will place them more on a footing with other Methodist bodies. But still their condition will not be much improved unless our friends in

England will support our Mission Fund more liberally than they have done; for most assuredly our Canadian friends, with few exceptions, are doing to the utmost of their ability. There was a deficiency in meeting the just demands of the preachers to the amount of £120 last Conference, and there must, with the increased salary, be a greater deficiency next year.

With a liberality worthy of ministers of Jesus Christ, our Canadian ministers repudiate Conference debts; and what cannot be met at each Conference is given up and never again presented. I have often been delighted with the true Christian liberality manifested by the brethren to each other at Conference. I have seen men who were ten, fifteen, and even twenty pounds short of their own salary uniting their mites to help a brother who was still worse off than themselves, and who had not the means to pay his debts or get to his next Circuit without help of this kind and an advance from the General Superintendent on his next year's grant from the Mission Fund.

In concluding what I have to say about the last Conference, I must state, or I should be ungrateful, that the brethren for the fourth time conferred on me the honour of President, and took leave of me at the close with every expression of thankfulness for my unremitting attention to their interests, &c., and with most fervent prayers for my future peace and prosperity. It was a sorrowful parting on both sides; but we could say, and "The will of the Lord be done."

did say, They then looked forward with hope and prayer for my successor's arrival, whose way, I have no doubt, will be opened by our blessed Redeemer, who has said to his ministers," Lo, I am with you alway, even to the end of the world."

The representations of Mr. Brett and myself respecting our beloved brother who has succeeded me in Canada, with a short extract from a letter of Mr. R.'s to Mr. Brett read to the Conference, produced just that happy impression on the minds of the brethren which I so ardently desired; and I am happy to inform you, from letters which I have received from two reliable parties in Canada, that Mr. Robinson made a most favourable impression on the minds of our Toronto friends by his pulpit labours on his arrival in that city. That the God of heaven may bless him, and make him a thousand times more useful in Canada than I have been, is my sincere and constant prayer.

The stations we now occupy, forty in number, are chiefly in the country parts and the back-woods of Canada. They are all, however, places of great importance, and we could not, without great detriment to the Mission, give one of them up. Some of these places have around them places of great spiritual destitution, where additional missionaries might be employed with great advantage. Arthur, Sydenham and Durham, on the Owen Sound line; Blanchard, Brock, Exfrid, London North, Lake Erie, Newcastle, Oxford and Manvers are peculiarly mission-ground; and in those regions there might be several more missionaries employed with great benefit to the Connexion and with great spiritual advantage to those who have settled in the townships around these stations, where the Word of God is seldom or never preached. On most of the other stations they have also numerous calls from destitute places which cannot be attended to for the want of more men. The present stations, with some few exceptions, are too large to be worked efficiently; they need dividing, but the want of suitable men prevents their division at present. Soon, however, this evil will be removed; for the young men we have will soon attain that age and experience which will fit them for the charge of stations.

When we commenced operations in Canada, my beloved brother, Addyman, whose praise is in all our Churches in Canada, and myself were especially charged by the best friends of the Canadian Mission in England to go into the back settlements and look up those for whose souls no man eared; not to mind so much the cities and towns, as these were sure to be looked after by other bodies. Those directions have been carried out both in letter and in spirit; and we have succeeded in sending the Gospels to hundreds and thousands of destitute settlers, who from our missionaries have heard the words of life and been saved. These have been formed into Churches, and are now among the best of our present stations. Our devoted missionaries in Canada have, to their utmost ability, laboured to supply the spiritual destitution of that land; and consequently we have more than doubled our membership in the last ten years.

But something more is now wanted at our hands. We have laboured in the bush, we have succeeded in our efforts, we have gained the confidence of the Canadian public, and now the cities, towns, and villages, through the length

and breadth of the land, are calling to us to "come over and help." We have but two cities and one town of importance included in the whole list of our stations. These are Toronto, Hamilton, and London.

Here we have three good chapels, and our interest in these places exerts a mighty influence for good upon our country stations. Had we men and means we might immediately occupy Montreal, the largest city in Canada, from whence we had a representative at our last Canadian Conference, earnestly desiring us at once to send a man to that city, assuring us that a good Church might now be raised; but this call had to be denied for the present. Bytown, an important town at the junction of the Ottawa River and the Rideau Canal, in the immediate neighbourhood of our Goulburn and Fitzroy Circuit, has again and again called upon the authorities of our Connexion to send a preacher there, and, could we do so, we might have a good society and congregation in twelve months. Brantford, a large and rising town, twenty-five miles from Hamilton, on the road leading to London, has repeatedly called for a labourer. We have some members already there who are lost to us because we have no society in that town. Woodstock, Simcoe, Goderich, Galt, Kingston, Coburgh, and Quebec, all towns of importance, especially Kingston and Quebec, are unoccupied by us; and our existence as a body is scarcely known in these places. The establishment of societies in the cities and towns would soon change the face of our Canadian Mission. cieties in these places would soon support themselves and soon be able to support the whole missionary work in the back settlements. Though in London we had to build a chapel and support a young man; yet during the three last years that society has raised for the Auxiliary Mission Fund £196 11s. 6d. currency. Last year, Toronto raised for the support of its own minister £125 currency, besides what was raised for the interest on the chapel, for the Sabbathschool, and the Mission. The little money that is in circulation in Canada finds its way to the cities and towns; and unless we get our men into these, and form Churches in them, we shall have to give to the support of the Canadian Mission for many, many years. Could we form prosperous Churches in the cities and towns of Canada, I firmly believe that in 1861 our Canadian work would not only be self-supporting, but would aid us in sending the Gospel to India, China, or

So

any other destitute portion of the earth, where the people are sitting in darkness and the region of the shadow of death.

How, then, are these places of importance in Canada to be occupied by us as & people? The answer is, our Connexion in England must furnish both the men and the means-not in one year, but during the next ten years. If the next Annual Conference could appropriate to the Canadian Mission £1000 sterling, exclusive of the General Superintendent's salary; and send to the help of our Canadian brethren two married Missionaries from among our own Cir. cuit preachers-men of six or eight years standing in the Connexion at home, who would be capable of filling any station in the province of Canada to which it might be deemed advisable to send them -such an arrangement would be an important benefit. I have again and again pressed the subject upon the attention of our Missionary Committee; but what can the Committee do? With the best of intentions towards Canada, and with continual acknowledgments of the soberness and justness of my views, they have been reluctantly compelled only to dole out annually for the support of more than fifty missionaries the very trifling sum of £600 sterling, and to be content with now and then sending us out a young man to commence his probation in Canada. As a lover of Canada, I am thankful for these small favours; but as a child of the Methodist New Connexion, born and reared in her palaces, and as a minister of the Gospel on her walls, I am ashamed of the little that has been done for Canada during the last fourteen years. Our Connexion has resources. She can do more for Missions; both God and man require her to do more. Instead of raising on our Circuits in England only £1,795 13s. 3 d. for the Mission Fund, she ought to raise double that sum. Just look at the Missionary subscriptions for last year, and you will find that among all our wealthy friends in England only two that gave five guineas each to the Mission Fund. This requires amendment. Unless our friends of ability will give more than they have done, our Missions, for anything I can see to the contrary, must stand still. The poor among us evidently do their share; but the rich must make greater efforts, and pour more liberally into the treasury of the Lord, before ever it can be said of them that they have done what they could. Our Connexion has instituted a mission in Canada; has given to its support; and our mem

bership have prayed earnestly to God for its prosperity. God has heard and answered their prayers; and now Jehovah demands of all who have prayed for its prosperity to give more largely of the worldly substance which he has intrusted to their management, that he may still more abundantly prosper our Mission in that land. Shall he call in vain ? Have our prayers been mere empty breath? or when we prayed for God to prosper our work in Canada, were we in earnest, and were we resolved to support the Mission to the extent that God should bless and prosper, and to the extent of the ability he has given? Let these important questions be proposed and answered, in the fear of God, by all who sanctioned the formation of our Missions, who have given to their support, and who have prayed for their prosperity, and I doubt not but we shall be able, next Conference, to do all that is needed for Canada, Ireland and Bolton, and to send out two or three additional home Missionaries. The need for more liberality in support of our Missions arises, so far as Canada is concerned, from the past liberality and fervent prayers of our people, and surely they cannot now withdraw their hand from the good work. I remain, yours affectionately,

--

H. O. CROFTS.

THE

OLDHAM. RE-OPENING OF CHAPEL. Many throughout our beloved community will be happy to learn that, after all the struggles with which our dear people have had to contend in this populous town, they still have a name and a place in Oldham. Many from necessity and other causes have removed into distant parts, some have proved unfaithful, while others have gone to reap the reward of their labours "where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest." Yet a few worthies occupy the field. Strong confidence in our principles and faithful attachment to the Captain of our Salvation have rendered them victorious in every engagement. Their little Ebenezer, after having been closed several weeks for the purpose of cleaning and painting, was re-opened on Sunday, August 17th, when three sermons were preached: that in the morning by our beloved superintendent, the Rev. T. W. Ridley; in the afternoon by our venerable father, the Rev. T. Allin; and in the evening by the writer. After each service, a collection was made, which, with previous subscriptions, amounted to the munifi

cent sum of 401. 13s. 6d., and which, our faithful and persevering committee are happy to say, more than covers the expenses incurred in beautifying both school and chapel. All seem highly pleased with this worthy effort in the right direction; and we hope our Ebenezer here will become the centre of attraction to many, that we may soon have to enlarge the place of our tent; and knowing that our success depends upon the blessing of Heaven, may we live daily in the atmosphere of devotion, and at the throne of grace cry, "Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their children; and let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands, establish thou it." Oldham.

BAZAARS.

G. WOOD.

BAZAAR FOR THE RELIEF OF WEST HOLBORN CHAPEL, SOUTH SHIELDS.— After the numerous reports of successful bazaars in districts where our interest is stronger and our friends are wealthier than in this neighbourhood, we think that the very assiduous efforts of our ladies here may well be noted, if only by way of supplement. Our trust estate in this town being rather burdened, and the Chapel Committee having made a generous offer of aid, contingent on proportionate local effort, a few faithful friends, the wives and daughters of our members and seat-holders, generously resolved to unite their labours and influence to assist, by means of a bazaar, for this desirable object. Our hope of success had no other basis than the proved attachment and diligence of these friends; and most satisfactorily did they evince these qualities in their enterprize. It would be a very difficult task for your correspondent to detail the many elegant offerings that were produced, and the numerous evidences of self-denying zeal which gave interest to the effort. Suffice it to say that the stalls, under the presidency of the following ladies, Mrs. Welch, Mrs. Johnson, Mrs. W. Carr, Mrs. Turner, Mrs. Stoker, Mrs. G. Foreman, Mrs. Bruce, Miss Potts, Mrs. Potts, Mrs. Simpson, Miss Bruce, and Miss E. J. Carr, and other friends, at the opening of the bazaar on the 6th of May, exhibited a profusion of articles useful and ornamental, delighting to our friends and matter of wonder to our visitors. The proceeds, including the sale of some artieles since the holding of the bazaar,