176 



AMERICAN JOURNEY. 



[Chap. V. 



marked the track. Montreal seemed to him a truly magnificent 

 city, with its towers and domes backed by a wooded hill. He 

 was most hospitably received by Dr. Cordner, the Unitarian 

 minister. It was very pleasant to him, after his boarding-house 

 life, to be in a refined home where there were children, with 

 whom he was soon on the best terms ; and after holding his 

 tongue for six weeks, he enjoyed giving his temperance lectures 

 (followed by exhibitions with the magic lantern, which proved 

 very popular). His first audience was a " respectable " one : 

 but the people clapped when he told them that he should con- 

 sider he was speaking to a plain English teetotal meeting ; and 

 then the ice was broken ! One afternoon he " gave a Mazatlan 

 lecture to the Natural History class at the McGill College (the 

 university), at Professor Dawson's request : a very intelligent 

 class of students in their gowns. Professor Dawson is the 

 Principal, who has raised the college to its present high stand- 

 ing. He seems a kind of mixture of my beau ideal of pro- 

 fessors, J. D. Forbes, with the Natural History talent of 

 Edward Forbes." During his visit to Montreal, Philip had 

 much intercourse with Dr. Dawson, who became his intimate 

 friend. He also spent some time at the rooms of the Geological 

 Survey, at the head of which was Sir W. Logan, who had 

 devoted much time and money and ability to the object, and 

 had gathered round him a number of men eminent in their 

 respective departments. Philip exchanged books with him; 

 and Dr. Dawson got him to arrange the shells at the new 

 NaturahHistory rooms, which were opened with a grand soiree. 



On two Sundays he preached in the morning for Dr. 

 Cordner : he doubted whether his plain speaking would suit 

 the congregation ; " but if people will ask strangers to 

 preach, they must take what comes." In the afternoons he 

 attended vespers at the great Catholic Church of Notre Dame. 

 " The organ gallery and parts of the others were filled with 

 thousands of children, mostly boys. Fancy the swell of their 

 voices in the grand old Gregorian chants in that vast building : 

 the altar choir antiphonizing with them, all in solid unisons 

 reverberating through the vast space, with the harmonies given 



