General Secretary of Home Missions, including in its scope the duties of office work and general oversight, and with Dr. J. A. Carmichael and Dr. J. C. Herdman as Western Field Superintendents. Dr. Robertson had, as circumstances at the outset demanded, spent nearly all his time on field work, and Dr. McLaren's special contribution to the Church was his putting the department of Home Missions into a system working through the head office. But this, with the general oversight and much travelling, proved too great a strain, and after eight years' strenuous labor Dr. McLaren retired to take up educational work in Vancouver. Then a rearrangement took place. Dr. A. S. Grant, the pioneer missionary to the Yukon, was appointed General Superintendent, with Rev. J. H. Edmison as Secretary of the Board. Under Dr. Grant there are ten District Superintendents, each of whom has oversight of a large area of the rapidly-growing country.

Meanwhile, the West has become a tremendous hive of activity. Prairies over which in my boyhood one could ride for days without seeing a living human being, are blossoming everywhere and becoming the granary of the world. Cities stand where a few years ago the buffalo and the coyote and the adventurous

hunter or trapper were in possession, and the moment is electric with opportunity.

"We are living, we are living,

In a grand and awful time,
In an age on ages telling

To be living is sublime."

Let us look at this Western country, with the peoples that compose its population. The little congregation of Kildonan has become a thousand and the small colony a mighty nation. Perhaps the remarkable way in which our Church has moved forward in the West is due also to its adaptability. In the report presented to the 1912 Assembly by Rev. W. D. Reid, Superintendent of Missions for Alberta, the following is stated amongst other " very definite conclusions with regard to the work." Mr. Reid says: "Presbyterianism specially suits this West. There is in it a virility, a strength, a democratic spirit, a practicalness, a straightforwardness, an aggressiveness, a genuine honesty and manliness in life that appeals to the average Westerner." This being true, it will probably be clear to most thinking men that the elements which produce the type of life that Mr. Reid describes should not be allowed to perish. In a certain city in the old world, some years ago, the municipally-supplied water

was so soft that growing children were found to be deficient in bone, and elements had to be introduced to make the water hard enough to produce that highly necessary part of the human anatomy. This is Canada's growing time, and it is not a time for soft creeds. We need a creed with elements that make bone if this young country is going to stand erect and take a man's place amongst the nations of the earth.

CHAPTER IV.

A MEETING-PLACE OF NATIONS.

As we are entering upon a study of the condition of things amongst the people of the Canadian West, we may be called on to halt and explain why we should be asked to prosecute mission work in a land of such abounding wealth. A lot of people seem to be obsessed with the idea that the Gospel is only for the down and out class. The average evangelist, with all due respect to him, is rather too much given to this idea, and people get it into their heads. If this proceeds from a conception of the Gospel as unable to deal convincingly and helpfully with the well-to-do, it is on an entirely wrong basis. The Gospel is the power of God, and hence it can deal with people apart from what is superficial and accidental. The Gospel has done this effectually all along the ages. Matthew and Zaccheus and Joseph of Arimathea are still with us, and only when they have Christ in their hearts will they discover what they ought to do with their wealth. We must exercise common sense in regard to these matters. Instead of indiscriminately condemning men and countries to whom the Lord has given wealth, we should

capture them for Jesus Christ, and harness them and their wealth for Him and His Church. Such men and such countries need the Gospel to prevent them wallowing in the mire of self-gratification. There is nothing necessarily criminal in being well-to-do. Poverty is a crime if it is due to sloth or vicious living or deliberate failure to avail one's self of the surroundings into which God has thrust us. It is no credit to a man to be poor if he is camping on a gold mine and knows it. There is nothing in all this world so contemptible as making money by grinding the faces of the poor or by foul business or unrighteous methods. But all money is not made that way. And yet, however it is made it will ruin any man who does not get the grace of God in his heart-ruin him to all eternity. Hence our need of work amongst well-to-do people and in a well-to-do country. Blessed is he who works amongst the poor, but blessed is he also who works faithfully and fearlessly amongst the rich. Both need the Gospel. We speak at times as if the minister who works in the slums is worthy of all praise, while we are rather doubtful about him who works in the West End. But if we can get more Gospel into the West End we shall have less slum in the East End. So let us, while providing amply for the