Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 8.djvu/255

 An Elder of Ye Olden Time.

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��Starting thus with his wife for Vir- ginia, he found himself fairly launched upon the life of struggle that ever at- tends a poor, young minister. More than ordinary embarassments and vicis- situdes fell to his lot. Peculiar ques- tions on slavery, on the rights of the clerg), established at that time in Vir- ginia, and strong battles for liberty in the courts and at the polls, arose and in which he bore himself well.

The spot selected for his labor has been made historic ground since that day by the marching of great armies. Over the roads he trod in his simple un- ostentatious life of the ministry, Corn- wallis followed with the scarlet-clad sol- diers of Britain, and Washington led to victory the noble men that came up from the frosts and starvation of Valley Forge. Where Leland pushed into the wilderness and over the low lying hills, Grant and Lee, and Jackson and Hooker have called their vast muster rolls.

Travelling from Orange to York, preaching day after day — sending ap- pointments far in advance, for such an hour of such a day. Providence permit- ting — he was rarely late, and never disappointed the masses that gathered at the name of John Leland ; as the Highland clans gather at the first note of the pibroch clashing along the High- land mountain sides.

Though sometimes desultory in his work, he was an unflagging worker and had the power of continued, persistent, unremitting labor. There are those who assert — with some shadow of truth, pos- sibly, — that the strain on body and brain to which he subjected himself in the exciting, engi-ossing work of the Evan- gelist could not have been endured on any principle save the one, that God filled the mouth of His child with the words he wished him to speak.

��The following incident is often told of him as proof conclusive that the same mighty aid, given to the fishermen of Judea, was vouchsafed in times of need to this modern disciple.

When tobacco was used as cuiTency, and was somewhat of a drug in the market, a stipulated sum was allowed as the salary of a clergyman of the stab- lished Church. As time went on, and this commodity grew in value, and came to command fair and even large prices in the markets of the old world, the clergymen insisted upon their wonted pay and it grew into a great burden for the people, who subjected it to severe criticism.

Upon one occasion a leading member of the vestry held a sharp controversy with his minister, told him in strong words of his life of ease, with only one day of the seven devoted to work ; that while he M'as growing rich upon the fat salary gleaned from the number of pounds of tobacco allowed him, his parishoners were growing poor in a corresponding ratio as they toiled early and late in order to raise the neccessary supply. To which argument the minister re- plied, " But my good brother, you are greatly mistaken ; what of the brain work, the continued study and thought devoted during the six days to our ser- mons, that on the seventh we may ap- pear in our pulpits to preach acceptably to our people ? "

"All unnecessary, entirely so," said the lay brother ; " you should do as John Leland does ; he can preach upon any topic, eloquently and well without a moment's notice." The minister re- fused to believe the statement and closed a spirited discussion by saying, " Not until I see will I believe ; if you will arrange for John Leland to preach in my pulpit on a day that I will fix, allow me to provide the text in my ovm

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