there was already an Old Seamen's
Home, but it had gradually become a roost for boozers, and when with
the trustees we made an inspection of it, it proved to be only worthy
of immediate closure. This was promptly done, and the money realized
from the sale of it, some ten thousand dollars, was kindly donated to
the fund for our new building.

After a few years of my collecting funds spasmodically, a number of
our local friends got "cold feet." Reports started, not circulated by
well-wishers, that it was all a piece of personal vanity, that no such
thing was needed, and if built would prove a white elephant, to
support which I would be going round with my hat in my hand worrying
the merchants. We had at that time some ninety thousand dollars in
hand. I laid the whole story before the Governor, Sir Ralph Williams,
a man by no means prejudiced in favour of prohibition. He was,
however, one who knew what the city needed, and realized that it was a
big lack and required a big remedy.

A letter which I published in all the St. John's papers, describing my
passing fifteen drunken men on the streets before morning service on
Christmas Day, brought forth angry denials of the actual facts, and my
statement of the number of saloons in the city was also contradicted.
But a saloon is not necessarily a place licensed by the Government or
city to make men drunk--for the majority are unlicensed, and a couple
of experiences which my men had in looking for sailors who had
shipped, been given advances, and gone off and got drunk in shebeens,
proved the number to be very much higher than even I had estimated it.

Sir Ralph thought the matter over and called a public meeting in the
ballroom of Government House. He had a remarkable personality and no
fear of conventions. After thoroughly endorsing the plan for the
Institute, and the need for it, he asked each of the many citizens who
had responded to his invitation, "Will you personally stand by the
larger scheme of a two hundred thousand dollar building, or will you
stand by the sixty thousand dollar building with the thirty thousand
dollar endowment fund, or will you do nothing at all?" It was proven
that when it came to the point of going on record, practically all who
really took the slightest interest in the matter were in favour of the
larger plan--if I would undertake to raise the money. My own view,
since more than justified, was that only so large a building could
ever hope to me