My salary was fixed on the basis of the old Disciplinary allowance:  Quarterage, $216; Table Expenses, $200; House Rent, $125; Traveling Expenses, $5; making a total of $546.  This amount would be considered a small allowance at the present time, but at that early day it was believed to be a generous provision for a family of three persons.

My first Sabbath, always a trial day to the Preachers as well as the people, passed without any special disaster.  Perhaps it was owing in part to the presence of the Presiding Elder, who sat at my back.  Whatever he or the people may have thought, I certainly felt that I was a mere stripling going out with nothing in my hand but a sling and a pebble.  Nor did it relieve my embarrassment when I saw the great congregation, and remembered that they had enjoyed for two years the ministry of the most eloquent man in the Conference.

It is said that a minister ought always to be ready to preach or to die.  I think, on that occasion, if I had been permitted to choose between them, I would have accepted the latter.  As it was, I very nearly did both.  And that I really did neither, I have always considered a special intervention of Providence.  On the part of the people there was evidently a suspension of judgment.  They were doubtless puzzled by my contradictory appearances.  In form I was slight and fragile, not weighing more than one hundred and thirty pounds, but in my face, though only twenty-eight years of age, I bore the appearance of being ten years older.

At the close of the service a large number of people remained and gave the new Minister a hearty greeting.  It was timely, giving me to realize I was not quite gone to the land of shadows.

I was informed afterwards that one good brother went home from the service and told his wife, who had not been present, that he had shaken hands with the new Minister and his daughter.  “No, father,” said the daughter, “that lady was not the Minister’s daughter, but his wife.”  “Well,” replied the father, “she must be his second wife, for she looks young enough to be his daughter.”  Whether this opinion should be interpreted as complimentary to the Minister or his wife, I was never fully able to decide.

Having passed the crisis, the first Sabbath, and survived the following week, I now began to adjust myself to my work.  I was happy to find that the good people were strongly attached to Prayer and Class-Meetings.  This gave an assurance that there were at least some efficient laborers in the Church, who could be relied on if we should find ourselves in a revival.  I also found that the people could endure a large amount of pastoral visiting.  These discoveries were enough for a start, and I entered upon the work without delay.