the sole and only building in the country representative of the great
Church which lay behind it, and which, under able statesmanship, was
seeking to hold the new West for things high and good. The Big River
people were proud of their manse. The minister was proud of it, and
with reason. It stood for courage, faith, and self-denial. To the
Convener and Superintendent, in their hours of discouragement, this
little building brought cheer and hope. For, while it stood there it
kept touch between that new country and what was best and most
characteristic in Canadian civilisation, and it was for this that they
wrought and prayed. But, though to people and minister, Convener and
Superintendent, the little manse meant so much, the bareness, the
unloveliness, and, more than all, the utter loneliness of it smote
Shock with a sense of depression. At first he could not explain to
himself this feeling. It was only after he had consciously recognised
the picture which had risen in contrast before his mind as the home of
the Fairbanks, that he understood.

"I could never bring her to such a house as this," was his thought. "A
woman would die here."

And, indeed, there was much to depress in the first look at the little
board building that made a home for the McIntyres, set down on the
treeless prairie with only a little wooden paling to defend it from the
waste that gaped at it from every side. The contrast between this bare
speck of human habitation and the cosy homes of his native Province,
set each within its sheltering nest of orchard and garden, could
hardly, have been more complete. But as his eyes ran down the slope of
the prairie and up over the hills to the jagged line of peaks at the
horizon, he was conscious of a swift change of feeling. The mighty
hills spoke to his heart.

"Yes, even here one might live contented," he said aloud, and he found
himself picturing how the light from those great peaks would illumine
the face that had grown so dear within the last few months.

"And my mother would like it too," he said, speaking once more aloud.
So with better heart he turned from the trail to the little manse door.
The moment he passed within the door all sense of depression was gone.
Out of their bare little wooden house the McIntyres had made a home, a
place of comfort and of rest. True, the walls were without plaster,
brown paper with factory cotton tacked over it taking its place, but
they were wind-proof, and beside