e and Saddlebags.--Receives Instruction.--The Final
Struggle.--Arrives at Brothertown.--Reminiscences of the Red Man.--The
Searching Scrutiny.--The Brothertown People.--The Mission.--Rev. Jesse
Halstead.--Rev. H.W. Frink.

In March, A.D. 1845, a letter from Rev. Wm. H. Sampson, then Presiding
Elder of Green Bay District, Rock River Conference, found me at Waupun.
The intervening nine months, since our arrival in the preceding July,
had been spent in making improvements upon the land I had selected, and
in the erection of a lumber mill, of which I was in part proprietor.

The bearer of the letter found me in the mill, engaged in rolling logs
to the saw and in carrying away the lumber. I opened the letter and
glanced at its contents. To my surprise and utter consternation it
contained a pressing request that I would take charge of the Brothertown
Indian Mission until the next session of the Conference, as the
Missionary, Rev. H.W. Frink, had been called away by family afflictions.
I instinctively folded the letter and then crumpled it in the palm of my
hand, inwardly saying, "Hast thou found me, oh! mine enemy?" No rash
answer, however, was given. This question of duty was certainly assuming
grave aspects. For four years it had haunted me at every turn. And even
in the wilds of Wisconsin it was still my tormenter. Like Banquo's
ghost, it would not down at my bidding. I now tried to look the
question fairly in the face, and make the decision a final one, but
found it exceedingly difficult to do so. To yield after so long a
struggle, and especially to surrender all my fondly cherished plans for
the future, appealed at first to my pride, and then to what I conceived
to be my temporal interests, and the appeal for a moment seemed to gain
the ascendency. But how then could I answer to God? was the startling
question that burned into my soul at every turn of the argument. In the
midst of my embarrassment the thought was suggested, "It is only until
Conference, and then you can return and resume your business."

Catching at this straw, thus floating to me, and half believing and half
hoping that three months of my incompetency would satisfy the church and
send me back to my business again, I consented to go. Leaving my
temporal interests in the hands of my father, I hastened to make the
necessary preparations for my new responsibilities. The outfit was
provokingly limited. The horse and saddlebags, the inevitable Alpha, if
not