which made this impracticable. There were several Methodist Churches already in their neighborhood, more than were really needed, and it was a struggle with some of them to maintain a healthy existence, and they did not want another and as formidable a rival as this would be. Moreover, they were not Methodists; few of them had any experience that familiarized them with our ways and work; and I told them I did not think they would work well in Methodist harness, and advised them to adopt the Congregational polity, which they did soon after I left them. The experience I had with the Church of Christian Endeavor was valuable to me. I have always leaned toward the largest liberty in belief and Church government, and I saw there that for efficiency in Church work a strong government is best; and as the value of a system must be determined by its fitness to do the work designed, I came away from Brooklyn better satisfied with Methodism than before. I must say, however, that the people there were always kind and courteous, and I left them with the most fraternal feeling on my part and, I think, on their part also.

XXXIII

WINONA, THIRD TERM

WHEN the hot weather in July came, being ill myself with malarial sickness, and many of the people going out of the city, I resigned and spent the rest of the summer with my wife in Philadelphia. The pulpit of Spring Garden Street Church in that city having been made vacant by the election of Dr. Henry W. Warren to the episcopacy, I supplied there till September, when, being invited again to Central Church, Winona, I returned there for the third term.

My ministry having begun in Minnesota and nearly all of it spent there, it seems like home to me, and no part of it more so than Winona, where, as pastor, presiding elder, and superannuate, twenty-three years of my life have been passed.

This last term here, like those that preceded it, was marked by the goodness and mercy of God and by the kindness and gen

erosity of the Church and congregation. My health much of the time was not good, but I got through without breaking down, and in the fall of 1883 moved to Red Wing, where I spent the full term of three years.

During my Red Wing pastorate my good wife was again called to "endure as seeing Him that is invisible" in the fiery furnace of affliction; but all that human kindness and sympathy could do to alleviate our distress. was done, and God only can recompense our friends and neighbors there for their ministrations of help and mercy in our times of need.

In our Church there we had two superannuated ministers, grand old men, Chauncey Hobart and Sias Bolles, to know whom as long and as well as I did I count among the privileges which more than compensate for the privations incident to our itinerant ministry. Of Dr. Hobart I have already spoken, of Sias Bolles I will now speak.

XXXIV

A SAINT OF THE OLD SCHOOL

BROTHER BOLLES (what other title could fit him so well as brother?) was an old-fashioned Methodist of the best type, for whom the doctrines, the discipline, and the experiences of the fathers were good enough for all times and places and people.

During the last twenty years of his life retired by age and infirmity, he passed out of sight and died unnoticed, except in his immediate locality. Yet few men did more for the Church or led more souls to God than he. In his time and prime he was an evangelist with rare power to awaken, convict, and convert men to Christ. When the distinguished Church historian, Dr. Abel Stevens, was editor of the Christian Advocate, in an article on preaching he cited Sias Bolles as an example of the popular and powerful preachers who, more than any other class of men, have made Methodism.

At that time he was widely known, especially in the West, as a revivalist whose preaching was "in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.'

Born, raised, converted, and called to the ministry in New York State, he early joined the Genesee Conference and, after a few years there, went to Illinois and to the Rock River Conference, when it included a large part of the Northwest.

The first twenty years of his ministry in those Conferences were marked by great revivals, in which multitudes were converted. In one of these, at Galena, it is said that a thousand souls were saved. The preacher did not and could not preach "great sermons, " but his simple talks were more ef fective than most sermons. Often before they were ended, sometimes before they were fairly begun, people would crowd to the altar without waiting to be invited, and by their prayers and cries for mercy turn the preaching into prayer and praise.

Similar scenes were witnessed in other places in that time of frequent changes of pastors, and this plain preacher, without aid of an evangelist or any other aid but "the