“Old Wolf Collar proved a quick pupil, and as soon as he had obtained a tolerable mastery of the system he got together of an evening some ten or twelve young Indians, to whom he imparted his new knowledge by writing the characters again and again on a large sheet of paper. It was good work well begun; and to-day, I think, there isn’t a single family on the reservation that has not at least one member who can read and write the syllabic. With the aid of the system, Old Wolf Collar taught, and partly prepared for baptism, several men to whom I had seldom, if ever, spoken personally; and when he thought their preliminary instruction was sufficient, he sent them up to me. “I will give you an idea of what the old man’s faith was like. But first you must know that originally he had two wives, and when he became converted he put one away, providing for her, and married the other by Christian rites. He won all his family to Christianity; and then a series of terrible bereavements befell him. First, one of his two daughters died, then his only son, after that his second daughter, and finally his wife, so that the old man was bereft of all who were near and dear to him; though, presently, with my concurrence, he married the wife he had put away, and she is still spared to him. What I was going to tell you was this: At the time of his heavy bereavement I visited him one day, when he took his pipe from his mouth and said: ‘Why is it, do you think, that a man, when he becomes a Christian, should have sorrow and trouble which he never had before? Before I became a Christian I had all my family complete, and I had no sadness. Now I have all this trouble to bear. What is the reason?’ I said: ‘You are not the only one who has asked that question. There are lots of problems that we cannot solve. But do you remember what I was teaching you about Abraham?’ ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘you mean about offering up Isaac? Ah, do you think that’s it?’ I replied: ‘I’m not saying it is. I don’t know. I’m just asking you to bear it in mind.’ ‘If you think God is testing Old Wolf Collar,’ was his reply, ‘He won’t find I will go back on Him.’ Old Wolf Collar is a minor chief, and he exercises his authority wisely, like Running Rabbit, the gentle old fellow of seventy-four who at present occupies the supreme position.” In the case of young men, Canon Stocken explained, the conferring of high tribal rank sometimes reacts prejudicially on character. In this connection he told me more about Axe, to whose personality he had already afforded some clues.