Once, while he was lumbering, mother remonstrated with him for wearing himself out so fast.  He replied that he saw so much needing to be done, and done at once, he felt compelled to push his work off his hands as fast as possible.  If it shortened his life, he said it made no difference to him, provided he could accomplish more than in a long life of easy work.  I heard him say once that we ought to make our life-work of so much importance, that neither cold, nor storm, nor any other hindrance should be allowed to interfere with the performance of duty.  And I seldom knew him to stop for bad weather of any kind.

In December, 1865, I had concluded to go to school a term at Manhattan, and asked father to take me there, for it was a hundred miles, and there was not a railroad in the State.  He sent an appointment to hold a meeting there at that time.  The morning that we were to start the thermometer was eighteen degrees below zero, and the wind blowing keenly from the northwest.  But if we postponed our journey he would miss an appointment, and so we started.  There was no snow, the roads were rough, and we had to travel in a lumber wagon, and were three days on the way.  I was well wrapped in blankets, and did not suffer severely, but father, on account of driving, could not wrap up so much, and had to walk nearly half of the time to keep from freezing.  His nose and cheeks were slightly frozen the second day, for it did not begin to moderate until the third day.

He held a good meeting of eight or ten days.  There were about a dozen baptisms, the ice being cut in the river for that purpose.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

REMINISCENCES—­CONTINUED.

In May, 1867, my two-year-old brother, Ernest, was accidentally scalded.  He lingered a week, then death claimed the youngest of the flock.

When the Central Branch Railroad was built the little town of Farmington was laid out, a mile to the northwest of father’s house—­Pardee being two miles to the southeast.  Many of the original members of the Pardee Church had helped to organize the Pleasant Grove Church, six miles west.  Father thought it would be wise to break up at Pardee., and move church and village to the railroad town, but some objected.  Thinking that the rest would soon follow, he left Pardee, and organized a church of twenty-three members at Farmington, October 6, 1867.  Bro.  McCleery held a successful meeting here the next December, and preached once a month during the following year.

For several years much of father’s time was given (gratuitously), in caring for this church and Sunday-school, and the church soon numbered a hundred members.