Reuben Harris Fund," to assist in providing regular courses of free
public lectures upon the most important branches of natural and moral
science, also free instruction to mechanics and artisans in drawing, and
in practical designing, in patterns for prints, silks, paper hangings,
carpets, furniture, etc. Free courses of lectures were given to advanced
students in art, also lectures in physics, geology, botany, physiology,
and the like for teachers, and the public.

Gertrude felt that the perpetuity and usefulness of such a fund or
monument dedicated to her father would outrival the pyramids. She greatly
encouraged among the wives of the workmen the growth of kindergartens for
children, and the cultivation of flowers, in and out of their homes,
offering valuable prizes at annual flower shows. Harrisville voted to
annex the village of Harris-Ingram, hoping that the gospel of helpfulness
that had worked such wonders might leaven their whole city.

George Ingram was now forty years of age. His great ability and practical
good sense had arrested the attention and admiration of not only his own
employees, but of the citizens of Harrisville, who demanded that he
should be chosen mayor of the city.

CHAPTER XXVI

UNEXPECTED MEETINGS

Christine De Ruyter had long contemplated a visit to the new world.
She was familiar with the history of the Dutch West India Company, a
political movement organized under cover of finding a passage to Cathay,
to destroy the results of Spanish conquest in America.

No doubt, love of discovery and of trade also stimulated the Dutch in
making explorations. In the vessel "Half Moon" they sailed up the Hudson,
and after building several forts, they finally established themselves in
New Netherlands. Peter Minuit for a trifle bought from the Indians the
whole of Manhattan Island. In locating on Manhattan Island, the Dutch
secretly believed that they had secured the oyster while the English
settlements further north and south were the two shells only. The
development of almost three centuries and the supremacy of New York
to-day, as the new world metropolis, verifies the sound sense of the
Dutch.

Christine was alive to the important part which her countrymen had early
played across the Atlantic. Her mother had died, and Christine still
unmarried, controlled both her time and a goodly inheritance. She
resolved to visit her sister Fredrika, whose husband was agent in New
York of a famous G