I am sure my old friend admonished me many a time during our
forty-six years of close friendship, but always in the most kindly
manner, that could not help impressing me, knowing it was well meant,
and knowing also that she considered it her duty to say what she did.
It was in February, 1859, as a boy of twelve, just arrived from San
Francisco, that I first met her. She and her husband had lately
arrived from Wisconsin, U.S., where they had been living some years,
and, having a sister here already, she had been induced to come to
her. Her sister, herself and their husbands had all come from
Cornwall. The elder sister and her husband (Trounce) had emigrated to
Van Diemen's Land, as Tasmania was then called; the Trounces
later on went to San Francisco, and from there came to Victoria, in
the same steamer as my father, in 1858.
The Trounces and Donalds lived in tents on Douglas Street in 1858,
and when our family arrived in 1859 they had just moved into what was
then considered a very handsome house. It now stands on Kane Street,
between Douglas and Blanchard.
Like Dorcas of Joppa, "she was full of good works and alms deeds."
The two sisters, with their husbands, were Wesleyan Methodists, and
Mrs. Donald, although eighty-eight years of age, attended church
twice on Sunday, and always walked both ways, to the Metropolitan
Church on Pandora Street. This she did to the end, having gone twice
the last Sunday. She did not believe in Sunday cars, and would not
use them, although they would have been such a help to her; but no,
she thought it wrong, so took the course she thought was right. My
wife and I called on her about ten days before her death, and on
asking her how she was she replied, "I am as well as can be expected,
for I am an old woman, you know." She was as cheerful as usual. She
never complained; everything was for the best, she thought.
And so it was in her case, for she was near her end, "having fought a
good fight and finished her course." She died literally in harness,
for an hour or so before she breathed her last, she was working for
the church, propped up in bed sewing. Towards the end, being
conscious, she said, "I think my Lord wants me," and so passed away
to a better life. She was attended at her death by an affectionate
niece, Miss Carrie Thomas; her other relatives being Mrs. Thomas and
Mrs. Morall.
Hon. Wymond Hamley.
[Portrait: Wymond Hamley.]
The late collector of customs, under whom I was privileged to serve
from 1882 to 1900, was appointed by Sir Edward B. Lytton as collector
of customs of New Westminster, and arrived by sailing vessel in 1859.
After the union of the mainland and island in 1867, the collector,
with his staff, came down to Victoria and established the customs
house on Government Street in a wooden structure near the post-office
of that day, and it was a very unpretentious affair.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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