A CANADIAN SKY PILOT.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 53, 27 March 1909, Page 3

A CANADIAN SKY PILOT.

I "Ralph Connor," in Jiis ix'iM'iitljf-pub-lished "Tim Life of James Robertson, ha* given a delightful account of t lie stienuou.-, Life of the great Presbyterian missionary pioneer of Canada. A poor Scottish boy at school in tin* village of Dull, near Aberi'eldy. RoberUoii was blessed with a mother boih industrious and am,bilious for her mmis. He was studious, though "a terrible; iiglih-r when .lighting was to be* done." One night lu- wrestled with an arithmetical ; problem, which, alter heai.ng Kdinburgh, had got into .Robertson's hands for solution. "Are you not coming to your bed, lad?" saidi hits iullit. "Yes. after a while/' he replied. Hut when next morning the father came in to light the lire .lames rose from the spot whereho hud Ihmi left sitting the night before. The solution of the problem was in his hand*.

That'was the spirit that carried liiiu on in, Canada, whither the family sought new hope wlicn lie was sixteen -that and the deep human insight and line straig»litforward:iiesp) of the man. At the mine, oil the ranch, in villagvs or cities, holding service by the dim light of smoky Ja litems, however rough the men were, Robertson could touch them. "Say, isn't he a corker?" exclaimed a British Columbian minor, adding solemnly, after due thought, "lie's a Jim Dandy corker!" His hatred of drink came out strongly during the quiet early married days, when lie was minister at Norwich, Ontario. A lire occurred at the local hotel; he worked harder than any to extinguish the flumes, and the owner sent a bottle of brandy for his refreshment. ''Never will 1* forget," writes a member of his congregation, "the manner in which lie seized that brandy bottle by the neck, swung it round his head, and dashed it against I the brick wall, exclaiming as he did j so, 'That's a fire that can never bo put | out!'" Robertson was n most successful "beggar." An amusing story is told in connection with liis great effort lot' tine cJiurch and manse building fund. He was put up by an Ottawa gentleman at the Kideau Club, and, running his eye down the list of members, he discovered forty or fifty names of good l're.sbyterians. Not a man of them ee-

capcd. A 0.1'.R. magnate tried to get rid of him for oOdol. Robertson would not take it, holding it would he a bad example in others less wealthy. ''l am doing your work, sir," he told this man. "Aly work?" "Yes, sir; you are. a Presbyterian, you are a Canadian, and you are interested in the West. Anxious as lie was to collect money, Robertson never allowed himself to be patronised or bullied! in. the process. Before entering upon his great work of superintendent Robertson had refused an oflVr from rich New York. "The time for self is gone," he remarked. Canada west of the Great Lakes was his lield. l''our congregations and eighteen missions in ISSI swelled to 111 congregations and 2:211 missions in 1!)02. One of his most active periods was that spent in hurrying t'onvan! missionaries to the remote and perilous Yukon. Ralph Connor is within the mark in suggesting that by the noble character of those who represented the Presbyterian Oliurch much wickedness has been .saved in that north land. "I am done out," said Robertson on his deathbed at the age of sixty-three; and it was the only ■ time in his career of heroic labor that he confessed himself wearv.