Ryerson's mother had a very strong influence over him. She was a very religious woman with a great love for her children, and from her Egerton learned lessons that never ceased to influence him. After telling how she treated him when he had done something naughty, he says that "though thoughtless and full of playful mischief, I never afterwards knowingly grieved my mother, or gave her other than respectful and kind words." The whole family had to work hard at clearing the land and farming it. Before he was twenty-one years of age he "had ploughed every acre of ground for the season, cradled every stalk of wheat, rye, and oats, and mowed every spear of grass, pitched the whole first on a wagon, and then from the wagon to the haymow or stack." This was the work that gave him strength and health to do the great things that were before him. His years in the district school were few, yet he made such good use of them that when he was only fifteen years old he was asked to take the place of one of his teachers during the latter's illness. Further instruction from teachers was not given him till he came of age. Then he went to Hamilton to study in the Gore district grammar school for one year. Here he studied so strenuously that he was seized with an attack of brain fever, which was followed by inflammation of the lungs. His life was despaired of, but his good constitution and his mother's nursing restored him to health. Shortly afterwards he began his work as a Methodist preacher. When twenty-three years old, he undertook a mission to the Indians at the Credit and resided among them as one of themselves, to show them better ways of living and working. This is part of his account: "Between daylight and sunrise, I called out four of the Indians in succession and, working with them, showed them how to clear and fence in, and plough and plant their first wheat and cornfields. In the afternoon I called out the schoolboys to go with me, and cut and pile and burn the brushwood in and around the village." In 1829 _The Christian Guardian_ newspaper was organized as the organ of the Methodists, and the young preacher placed in the editorial chair; in 1841 he was chosen President of Victoria College.