Milnor Jones, however, was in Oregon when the Bishop was ready to commence his mountain work. In January, 1894, Cheshire wrote asking him to return to North Carolina. In replying to Bishop Cheshire, Jones wrote this characteristically laconic letter: "Where do you want me to go? What do you wish me to do? And what salary will you give? Not that the _amount_ of the salary makes any difference; I only wish to know just what I have to go on." The Bishop answered as concisely: "I want you to go to Valle Crucis, on the Watauga River. I want you to revive the old Valle Crucis Mission, as your special work; and I give you for your field of operations Watauga, Mitchell, and Ashe Counties, to do what you can in them. I will give you six hundred dollars a year, payable monthly."[31] Milnor Jones was a rough, plain-spoken individual with a remarkable faculty for understanding and winning the confidence of the simple mountain folk. He had a deeply religious nature, and a complete fearlessness in preaching the Gospel as he understood it. Bishop Cheshire found him an unusually effective man in laying the foundations of missionary work, but from that point he seemed to lack the power to build further. Jones entered with enthusiasm upon his work in the mountains of North Carolina. When the Bishop began his visitations to the western counties in June, 1895, he found that Jones had made a promising beginning. Bishop Cheshire spent several weeks with him, visiting one mission station after another in the counties of Mitchell, Watauga, and Ashe. They preached, baptized, and confirmed in the most out-of-the-way places and under the most varied conditions. When they first visited Bakersville they held services in the courthouse, but upon their return for a second service some time later, they were refused the use of the building on the grounds that the courthouse was not safe for large crowds. The local newspaper, however, gave as the reason for the refusal the fact that the Methodists and Baptists held that "the Episcopalians had been preaching uncomfortable doctrine." The Bishop and Jones were not to be daunted; they held their service on the street in front of the courthouse. A large congregation gathered for the service. When the Bishop began preaching he did not think his voice would reach the assemblage, but after a few minutes he felt as if he could make himself heard "a mile away." He afterwards declared that "I never spoke with more ease, freedom, and enjoyment, or with a greater sense of the high privilege of being a servant and ambassador of my Lord."[32]