ing forth in the morning to its task of breaking up the
rough fern land. The printing press had been brought from the north, and
was kept busily at work; weaving, carpentry, and shoe-making also were
carried on. One of the largest buildings was a hospital--the first in
New Zealand--where patients were attended by "the Brethren and Sisters
of the Hospital of St. John," whose vows bound them "to minister to the
wants of the sick of all classes, without respect of persons or
reservation of service, not for any material reward, but for the love of
God." Schools for Maori and English children formed, as before, an
essential part of the scheme, and the little chapel with its daily
services shed a hallowing influence over the whole. The communistic
character of the organisation was maintained, but one-third of the
profits of the farm were divided among the lay associates to enable them
to stock farms of their own when the time of their training should
expire. Prominent among the students were two youths who had walked to
Auckland from Poverty Bay. These were Leonard Williams, son of the
Archdeacon of Waiapu; and Samuel, second son of Archdeacon Henry
Williams. This young man, who was afterwards to become famous for his
agricultural success, his wealth, and his generosity, was ordained in
the college chapel on Sept. 20th, 1846, and married, at the same place,
a few days later, to a member of his uncle's family. The double event
drew a large concourse of both the Williams families, and thus served to
emphasise the solidarity which existed in that hopeful spring-tide
between the bishop and the missionary clergy.
Such evidences became all the more precious in the light of outside
events. The relations between the bishop and the Church Missionary
Society, so far from improving, became worse. The Society had tried to
make some atonement for its closure of Waimate by presenting the bishop
with the printing-press, and also with a yacht (the _Flying Fish_), in
which Hadfield had been wont to visit the _pas_ in the Nelson sounds.
But it would not give way on the question of the placing of its agents;
and on the bishop refusing to acquiesce in a divided authority, it
declined to present any more of its catechists for ordination. The
brothers Williams by no means approved of this policy, for to them it
seemed that the bishop was more likely to know the wants of the whole
diocese than could a committee in London, and they trusted his judgm
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