The financial plan, adopted at the beginning of the year, that of collecting the funds in the classes, had proved a success.  At the close of the year, the Pastor was fully paid, and the Society was out of debt.

CHAPTER XII.

Conference of 1851.—­Presiding Elder.—­Presentation.—­Give and Take.—­Fond du Lac District—­Quarterly Meeting—­Rev. J.S.  Prescott.—­Footman vs.  Buggies—­Fond du Lac.—­Two Churches.—­Greenbush Quarterly Meeting—­Rev. David Lewis—­Pioneer Self-Sacrifice.—­Finds a Help-Meet.—­Sheboygan Falls.—­Rev. Matthias Himebaugh.—­Oshkosh—­First Class.—­Church Enterprises.

The Conference for 1851 was held June 25th, at Waukesha.  The Sessions were deeply spiritual, and were characterized by general harmony among the preachers.  At this Conference the Committee on Periodicals, of which I was a member, reported in favor of the establishment of a North Western Christian Advocate, and the report was unanimously adopted.

In the arrangement of appointments I was assigned to the Fond du Lac District.  The appointment was a great surprise to myself, and doubtless to others.  Besides, it was not in harmony with my judgment or wishes.  It seemed to me to be an unwise measure to take so young a man, only twenty-nine, from the companionship of books and the details of the Pastoral office, and place him on a District where both of the Departments of labor, so essential to success in the Ministry, must necessarily be abridged.  And in the next place, it appeared to me that, since there were so many other men in the Conference, who were better qualified than I for the position, my appointment was but doing violence to the work.  But I soon came to the conclusion that when an appointment has been made there is no further need to debate the question.  In such a case, the sooner both the Ministers and people adjust their views to the new order of things, the better for all concerned.  Accepting this view, I hastened to conform to the situation with as good grace as possible.  And to aid me perhaps a little, several of the preachers surprised me by the presentation of a cane.

I had heard it remarked that when a man used a cane, it was an evidence that he had a weak place somewhere between the crown of the head and the sole of the foot.  I was now puzzled to know what the cane meant.  There was doubtless a weak spot somewhere, in the opinion of the brethren.  It must of course be either in the District or the incumbent.  But my query as to which was soon answered.  Dr. Bowman, my father-in-law, was traveling soon after in company with a good brother, when the conversation turned upon the appointments of the recent Conference.  It had not proceeded far when the brother remarked, in referring to my appointment, “The Conference must have been hard up for material when it appointed that young stripling Presiding Elder.”  The mystery of the cane was now explained.  The good brethren of the Conference doubtless thought the matter could be helped out by the use of a cane.