CHAPTER XVI. 

 Sunday at Fort Churchill. 



preparations for church — the rev. mr. lofthouse — a curious 

 courtship by photograph and letter — an intended bride 

 starts from the old country for hudson's bay to be- 

 come the wife of a missionary — the church and the 

 sermon — the dinner at churchill, etc. 



Where an odd little preacher is hunting a wife, 

 And the comforts of home and the blessings of life, 

 On the edge of perpetual winter are found. 



__ j£Mj OOD fortune favoured us all day on Sunday, the 7th Septem- 

 IPff^N ber. The morning was warm and bright, and by six o'clock 

 all on board were in active preparation for the visit to the 

 village. A number of the ship's crew and some of the 

 Expedition men " forward " had gone off with the rising of the sun 

 to desecrate the day, in shooting curlew, ducks and geese, and the 

 sharp reports from their guns came to the Neptune on the still, soft 

 morning air as the first sounds of awakening life. Boots that had 

 been banging about' under berths with the rolling and pitching of 

 the ship for weeks, were brought out and polished up in grand style ; 

 razors were strapped and faces were shaven ; wrinkled white shirts 

 and crumpled white collars were straightened out, and buttons were 

 fished out of disordered valises and fixed into their places ; even 

 hair oil, perfumed soap, and Florida water made their appearances ; 

 creased up and much mussed coats and vests and pants were shook 

 and pressed and dusted ; jammed and broken hats were patted into 

 something like their original shapes ; and in every corner of the 

 cabin, in the state rooms, and on the quarter-deck, wherever there 

 was a nook or corner available, might have been seen some one 



