the first mail
because I feel anxious concerning you. I fear that if you undertake
a journey to Quebec in your present state of weakness and disease,
that it will be fatal to you. You are providentially unable to bear
the bodily and mental exertion. God does not send a sick man to
labour in any good work, and he requires us to use ourselves
tenderly, when he weakens us.

_Brantford, May 9th._--Rev. John Ryerson writes: I had no idea that
you had been so seriously ill. It is, however, gratifying now to
learn that you are convalescent, and the loss of a little of your
"fleshly substance" may prove no great calamity. Were I to lose
"forty pounds," as you have, there would be very little of me left!

_Brantford, December 22nd._--Rev. John Ryerson writes: During my
long missionary tour I preached about ten times, always with
liberty and freedom. Since I returned home I have resumed all of my
domestic and private devotional exercises, and after my missionary
labours realize the return of quiet peace and spiritual communion.
Recently, after much prayer, I received a great blessing to my
soul, the peace of God coming down upon my heart and going all over
me, and I still have peace. God is my portion, my righteousness,
and my salvation all the day long.

In September, 1864, Dr. Ryerson wrote the following account of visits
which he made to his native county of Norfolk:--

In compliance with many requests, I have thought it would not be
improper, and might be acceptable to my Norfolk friends, for me to
give an account of my visits during the last two years to my native
place, and to the Island within Long Point, which my father
obtained from the Crown, and which now belongs to me--marked on old
maps as Pottahawk Point, but designated on later maps, and more
generally known, as "Ryerson's Island."

I may remark, by way of preface, that for more than thirty-five
years of my public life my constitution and brain seemed to be
equal to any amount of labour which I might impose on them; but of
late years, the latter has been the seat of alarming attacks and
severe pain, under any protracted or intense labour; and the former
has been impaired by labour and disease. Change of scene and
out-door exercise have proved the most effectual remedy for both.
My first