the Rev. T. E. Patteson was duly consecrated "Bishop of the Western Isles," at Auckland, New Zealand, in the presence of the Bishops of New Zealand, Wellington, and Nelson.*

In a few years he was to experience the sad reality that the perils which in ancient times encompassed preachers of Christianity, and conferred on so many the bright crown of martyrdom, are not unknown at the present day among those who devote themselves to the missionary service.

In 1864, Bishop Patteson, on his voyage to the different islands in his diocese, was accompanied in the Southern Cross (the mission vessel) by Edwin Nobbs, son of the Pitcairn chaplain, a fine handsome youth of twenty-one years of age, who it was hoped would succeed eventually to his father's office, and also by Fisher Young,† who had been a great favorite with Mrs. Selwyn, when in Norfolk Island.

Two years before, Bishop Patteson, during his annual visitation, had landed at several places on the island of Santa Cruz, and had been received with kindliness by the natives. The people had the name of being some of the most treacherous of the Pacific Islanders, but Bishop Patteson had seen no sign of the justice of the accusation, and was inclined to believe that it was a fabrication concocted by people who had provoked them by injury or insult, and had then found themselves attacked. He now, however, took his usual precaution of landing alone, so that his life only should be endangered, the boat, containing Fisher Young, Edwin Nobbs, and two Englishmen, Mr. Pearce and Mr. Atkins, remaining twenty yards from the coral reef.

*"Island Mission," p. 231.

† A descendant of Edward Young, of the Bounty.

Nothing occurred while the bishop was on shore to give him any suspicion of unfriendliness; he went up to the village and sat among the people, and then returned to the boat, swimming out to it, as usual. Three or four hundred natives stood upon the coral reef, and some, as usual, swam by the side, and there kept their hands, it was observed, upon the boat, and refused to detach them, so that the bishop had some difficulty in getting rid of them. Suddenly an arrow flew by, and another, and another. The bishop had not shipped the rudder, and held it up, hoping to ward off any arrow that came straight, but on looking round, he saw Edwin Nobbs with an arrow in his chest. Suddenly Fisher Young, who was rowing, gave a faint scream as an arrow transfixed his wrist, but the brave boy still pulled on, and the bishop and Mr. Atkins sustained no injury. As soon as possible the sail was hoisted up, and with a light breeze the Southern Cross, two miles off, was reached without further harm. The arrow wounds were dressed, though it was a work of difficulty to extract them, especially poor Fisher's, and then came days of suspense and anxiety—were the arrows poisoned or not? If so, it seemed impossible that the Norfolk Island lads, who, like all Pacific Islanders, were especially subject to lockjaw, should escape. Five days after, as Fisher was sitting with the bishop in the cabin, he said, "I can't think what makes my jaw so stiff." From that time there was no hope; the poor fellow grew worse and worse, his body rigid like a bar of iron, with fearful convulsions and spasms from time to time; but in his most terrible agony, he never lost faith and patience. Simple-minded and humble as he had always been, so he remained to the end, trusting that all things were ordered by his Heavenly Father for his good, and that the blow which thus struck him down in his early youth, while life was just opening before him, was

but opening the gate of the glorious land beyond. Several times his mind seemed to revert to the men who had killed him, and he said, "Poor Santa Cruz people! poor people!" His sufferings were mercifully ended on the Monday morning, when he passed away to his rest. Five days afterwards Edwin Nobbs was attacked by symptoms of the same terrible disease. His case appeared to take a less acute form, and for some days it was hoped that he would recover; but after lingering for some time, during which he showed the same Christian faith and steadfast endurance, he also died, and was buried at sea.

The bishop's next meeting with Edwin's and Fisher's parents was a very sad one, as may be imagined. But they felt that the cause in which their children had died was a noble one, and worth the sacrifice; and Mr. Nobbs, together with others, offered to commit to the bishop's care some more of their children to be trained by him to follow in the same career.

CHAPTER VIII.

Establishment of the Melanesian Mission College on Norfolk Island.— Letters from the Bishop of New Zealand, Sir William Denison, Sir John Young, etc., etc.

THE period had now arrived when the minds of the community were agitated by important questions concerning the Melanesian mission. Bishop Selwyn's indefatigable labors had made him familiar not only with Pitcairn and Norfolk Islands, but also with nearly all the inhabited islands* which stud the expanse of the Southern Ocean. Norfolk Island had especially attracted his attention, and he demonstrated its advantages as early as the year 1853, when first the proposal was entertained of discontinuing the convict station. It appeared to him to offer unusual advantages for the establishment of an episcopal see, fulfilling the necessary conditions by forming part of Her Majesty's dominions, and at the same time occupying a central position, from which supervision might be exercised over fifty neighboring islands. His plan included a training institution, where native missionaries might be instructed in the truths of the Gospel, and whence in due time they might spread abroad to evangelize their heathen brethren. These views were explained to the Pitcairn Island Fund Committee, in the year 1854, but did not obtain their concurrence, inasmuch as it was known that they were not favorably regarded by the Pitcairn (now Norfolk Island) community. The motives of the bishop were ex

* For an account of the islands included in the Melanesian Mission, see note, chap. vi., pp. 269, 270.

plained in a letter to Sir William Denison two years later, who, however, did not approve of the project, and it fell into abeyance for several years.

Letter of the Bishop of New Zealand to SIR WILLIAM

DENISON.

"Sydney, 19th June, 1856. "MY DEAR SIR WILLIAM,-Your Excellency's letter of June 16th has entirely removed from my mind the fear which I had entertained after our interview on Friday, that the civil and ecclesiastical friends of the Pitcairn Islanders, though all desiring the same end, might widely differ on the question of the plans to be adopted for their benefit. I am therefore encouraged to lay before you a full statement of the views and wishes of a very numerous and liberal body of friends to the Pitcairn Islanders, who are desirous, in a thankful sense of the merciful Providence which has caused this branch of holiness to spring out of a root of sin, to enable them, by the aid of the same overruling power, to make Norfolk Island, once too truly called by Judge Burton 'a hell upon earth,' the fountain of Christian knowledge to the islands of the Western Pacific.

"Your Excellency, I believe, agreed with me in opinion that the present state of primitive simplicity in which the Pitcairn Islanders are living can not be maintained in their new position in the midst of the great and wealthy colonies of Australasia, and in the track of the ships of all the great maritime nations. We therefore believe that they will need some more active salt to preserve them from corruption than the presence of their own island pastor, and the discharge of their own duties of religion. And we can not consider any work more likely to interest them than the evangelization of the heathen isles of the Western Pacific, of which it was proposed in England to make their new island the centre, and some of them, if possible, the instruments.

"It has been found in the London Mission that no other or higher prize is required to be held out to the native