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- 246 REMINISCENCES OF OLD VICTORIA
entered the spacious, though empty, apartments des-tined for our reception, my wife fairly danced for joy at our release from the long and tedious confinement on shipboard. The very emptiness of the rooms was a charm. It was the new home to which from her mother's house in London only a few days before sailing together to the other end of the world, I had brought her, and what bride does not joy to see her work awaiting her, though the house be empty and bare ! With the help of our two servants, and local carpenters, sup-plies from the Company's stores, and our ample outfit, she soon effected a transformation.
I remember also, something of the evening and night of that first day; the tea and fresh milk and bread and butter; and how, when settling ourselves to sleep for the night, we saw a large white rat crossing the stove-pipe which ran through our bedroom from the great Canadian stove in the sitting-room. It is curious how trifling things cleave to the memory, while the monotonous things of everyday life, which are our proper business, give no signal.
The next morning I was introduced to several officers and cadets of the company messing at the Fort : W. J. Macdonald, now our well-known representative in the Senate; B. W. Sangster, Farquhar, Mackay, Newton, Sangster (Sangster's Plains Postmaster), also to Chief Factor Finlaison, who lived in a house iii the south-west corner of the Fort; and Dr. Helmcken, now, for reasons of state, the Hon. J. S. Helmcken, residing with his wife in the house which he still occupies; later J. D. Pemberton, who returned from England, bringing his sister, Miss Pemberton.
Looking back now to my first Sunday service, I have no recollection of it as distinguished from other similar
BISHOP CRIDGE'S CHRISTMAS STORY 247
services to follow. From my written records only I find that the text of my sermon on the occasion was, " Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature," and that I referred in the conclusion to the Crimean War just ended; but there is pictured in my memory the figure of a man coming past the bell-tower with a prayer book under his arm, " going to church." Him I was afterwards to know as good John Dutnall, a dear and faithful friend to me as long as he lived.
The church services were held in the messroom. There was no instrument and no organized choir. Of those whose voices contributed to this part of divine worship I think only Mrs. W. J. Macdonald survives.
As to my first Christmas Day, which this year ('55) fell on a Tuesday, I can remember nothing of it as distinguished from other Christmas Days to follow (more than fifty in number) ; but my records say that my text was, " Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill towards men." But where we dined, what we had for dinner, or how we spent the day, my wife might have told, but I cannot. I know that we spent many Christmas evenings at the Governor's very pleasantly, and this may have been, and probably was, one of them. I remember that one New Year's Eve there was a violent snowstorm, which hindered me from holding a service at Craigflower, as I had intended, but my records show what I do not in the least remember, that I preached at Craigflower on New Year's Day. I also remember that by Christmas Day we had moved into the Parsonage, and that my two sisters, who had arrived at Esquimalt from England, a week before, were with us on that day. I remember a good deal about the Parsonage in those early days. It was almost
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