From this trip I had just returned with these thoughts in my mind, and was entering upon my senior year, when it was announced that Dr. S. R. House, a missionary from Siam, would address the students. Expectation was on tiptoe to hear from this new kingdom of Siam. The address was a revelation to us all. The opening of the kingdom to American missionaries by the reigning monarch, Mahā Mongkut—now an old story—was new then, and sounded like a veritable romance. My hesitation was ended. Here was not merely a village or a parish, but a whole kingdom, just waking from its long, dark, hopeless sleep. Every sermon I preached there might be to those who had never heard that there is a God in heaven who made them, or a Saviour from sin. The appeal was for volunteers to go at once. None, however, of the men who had announced themselves as candidates for service abroad were available for Siam. They were all pledged to other fields. The call found Jonathan Wilson and myself in much the same state of expectancy, waiting for a clear revelation of duty. After anxious consultation and prayer together, and with Dr. House, we promised him that we would give the matter our most serious thought. If the Lord should lead us thither, we would go. Meanwhile the Rev. Andrew B. Morse had been appointed a missionary to Siam, and the immediate urgency of the case was thus lightened. Shortly before the close of my Seminary course, in 1856, there came to me a call to the pastorate of two contiguous churches, those of Carthage and of Union, in my native county in North Carolina. The call seemed a providential one, and I accepted it for one year only. My classmate, Wilson, soon after accepted a call to work among the Indians in Spencer Academy. My parish was an admirable one for the training of a young man. The church at Union was one of the oldest in the state. The church at Carthage, five miles away, was a colony from Union. No distinct geographical line separated the two. Many of the people regularly attended both. That, of course, made the work harder for a young pastor. The extreme limits of the two parishes were fifteen miles apart. But these were church-going folk, mostly of Scottish descent—not “dry-weather Christians.” The pastorate had been vacant a whole year. At the first morning service the church was crowded to its utmost capacity. Some came, no doubt, from curiosity to hear the new preacher; but most of them were hungry for the Gospel. They had all known my father; and some had known me—or known of me—from boyhood. I could not have had a more sympathetic audience, as I learned from the words of appreciation and encouragement spoken to me after church—especially those spoken by my brother, who was present.