Rev. W. Benton 203 



By this time he was what the world calls a " tough cus- 

 tomer." Kipling has sung of England's Benton in the " Lost 

 Legion." 



" There's a Legion that never was 'Hsted, 



That carries no colours or crest, 

 But, spHt in a thousand detachments, 



Is breaking the road for the rest. 

 Our fathers they left us their blessing, 



They taught us, and groomed us and crammed ; 

 But we've shaken the clubs and the Messes 



To go and find out and be damned (dear boys). 



To go and get shot and be damned." 



The runaway schoolboy, stockbroker, private soldier, 

 deserter, war veteran, mounted policeman, and cook had grown 

 into a lean and sun-tanned man with keen eyes grown hostile 

 with much looking on the rough side of life, the sort of person a 

 man does not pick a quarrel with in a saloon if he can help it. 



What follows is at once extraordinary and commonplace. 

 Much of the story of his conversion by the missioners on Robben 

 Island reads like the wonderful histories of " How I was saved," 

 which are expounded at Salvation Army meetings ; but, however 

 that may be, this is the true account of a man whose after-life 

 shows him to have been a magnificent fellow, which makes it 

 interesting if for no other reason. 



His letters home at this time are not literature, but they are 

 the genuine outpourings of one who has suddenly found himself 

 and is struggling to become articulate. Phrases that sound 

 platitudinous to unsympathetic ears are to him splendid dis- 

 coveries that he is passionately anxious to make others under- 

 stand and exult over as he does. 



It so happened that just at this time a Mission was being 

 held in the island by Father Fitzgerald, who named it a 

 "Mission of Help." 



One evening as Benton was passing the place where Father 

 Fitzgerald was holding a meeting he thought he would look in 

 and see what it was like. At this time he believed in nothing, 

 was an agnostic, but he became interested in the address being 

 delivered by the missioner, and next day went to see him and 

 had a long talk. From this moment Benton began his life 

 afresh, taking a more serious view of his obligations and responsi- 

 bilities, ending with a very strong wish to take Holy Orders, 



