coast, and to perform episcopal functions in the C. M. S. Mission.
Accordingly, in November, 1877, Bishop Bompas, reached Metlakahtla
after a long and difficult journey across the Rocky and Cascade
Mountains, and the wilderness of lakes and rivers stretching between
those chains. He remained three months on the coast, visited the
outlying stations, confirmed 124 of the Christian Indians, ordained Mr.
Collison deacon and priest, and assisted Mr. Duncan and the other
missionaries in maturing plans for the extension of the Mission.
[Footnote: Bishop Bompas' account of the Christmas he spent in
Metlakahtla is given at page 75. A narrative of his journey across the
Rocky Mountains appeared in the _C. M. Intelligencer_ of August,
1878.]

In 1879, Bishop Hills, being on a visit to England, arranged with the
Church Missionary Society a plan for providing its Missions with
episcopal oversight. He had come, charged by his Diocesan Synod to take
steps for dividing his vast diocese into three--Columbia, New
Westminster, and Caledonia--which would form an ecclesiastical province
on the west side of the Rocky Mountains, just as, on the east side, the
four dioceses of Rupert's Land, Moosonee, Athabasca, and Saskatchewan,
form the province of Rupert's Land. The northernmost of these three
divisions, Caledonia, would comprise the field of the C. M. S.
Missions; and the Society therefore undertook to guarantee the income
of the Bishop for this division, provided that the Committee were
satisfied with the appointment made. The scheme was happily consummated
by the choice of the Rev. Wm. Ridley, vicar of St. Paul's,
Huddersfield, who had been a C. M. S. missionary in India, but whose
health had been unequal to the trying climate of the Peshawar Valley.
Mr. Ridley was consecrated on St. James's Day, July 25th, 1879, at St.
Paul's Cathedral, at the same time as Dr. Walsham How to the Suffragan