THE LATE REV. B. Y. ASHWELL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XX, Issue 6827, 3 October 1883, Page 5

THE LATE REV. B. Y. ASHWELL.

We had lately to record the death of two leading missionaries of Che Wesleyan body. We have now to notice the departure from amongst us of the Rev. B. Y. Ashwell, one of the old missionaries of the Church Mis. sionary Society. Though not equal to most of his brethren either in weight of natural character or mental power, it may well be Questioned whether he has been surpassed by any one of them in the success which he achieved in his missionary enterprise. At the age of twenty-one he joined the Church Missionary Society, and having resided for about two yearn iin their institution at Islington, he went as lay-missionsry, or catechist, to Sierra Leone. For a man of his peculiar temperament no climate could hove bden more unsuitable. Of a frail body, bold even to rashness, and exceedingly excitable, he could not be induced to take the precautions which lire necessary for health in that land of fevers. He was therefore soon ordered by the physicians to return to Europe, but not before he had let the people oi that colony sen the Btuff of which he was made. In those days the Governor exercised a kind of despotic power over every one in Sierra Leone, said on one Sunday gave orders that in a praiticulur church no service niust be held. Coming to the church at the appointed hour, Mr. Ashwell heard of the prohibition." " Not a bit of it; not a bit of it!" he exclaimed. In he rushed to the church, seized the bell-rope, and rang the people into church. The Governor of course was greatly displeased. He might have sent Mr. Ashwell then and there out of the colony, but the wise and judicious counsels of Mr. Kissling, the then head oi the mission, assuaged his wrath, and the storm blew over.

I In about the year 1833, Mr. Ashwell came to Kew Zealand, and was locato/i amongst the missionaries in the Iforth, no part of the South being as yet open for a missionary station. But hi 3 powers were neither known nor appreciated. His excessively murcurial character provoked only the smiles oi: the missionaries, and led them to conclude that he was not suited for any heavy or responsible charge. They allowed him, therefore, to do as he pleased, bat took no account of him in their arrangements. Still, even then, he showed a spirit that put to shame more calculating men. Kossell, on the opposite side of Paihca, was the resort of a class of men known by the name of pakeha-Maoris, and was often crowded with sailors from the whale ships. Vice reigned triumphant. Thc-re was no law or magistrate, and a weak man like him had no certainty but that he would be knocked down or ducked in the harbour. He u;ed to go and talk to the people drinking ia the publichouse, have of course his battles with them, but never once was a hair of his head injured.

After some time he joined the Rev. R. Maunsell ou his, station at Waikato Heads. There also again his impulsive nature was near landing him in danger that might have proved destructive to both tlie missionaries and their mission. For about a year he resided with Mr. Maunsell, until the natives could bo induced to build him a house. He happened to have in his bedroom one night a kind of an aJze with which he had been working in the daytime, when at midnight he heard a noise in the kitchen. Forthwith he concluded that the goat had got- into the house, and was knocking about the clothes that were hanging to dry. He seized the adze, crept along the passage, and opening the door, was just about to strike a whitish object that was moving before him, when a cry "E Wera" iJAshwell) arrested his hand. It turned out to be a crazy Maori who had dag his way into the house.

After a time it was resolved that he should try his hand at an independent charge, and he set out to form a station at Taupiri. In a short time he surpassed all expectations. His courage, his zeal, his spirit of enterprise, his deep sympathy with the people, his self-sacrifice, carried him over every difficulty. The people might laugh at and mock his eccentricities, but " there is tho fact, he loves us, he is willing to give anything—his own life—for us. TVe can bear in him what we should not tolerate in others," With al l his irritability he wa9never known either to raise his hand or to threaten. He would storm, he would rage, he would rush up and down the room, his eyes would look fire; bat the aged chiefs whom he was scolding would quietly sit around Bmiling, and with a toothing, remonstrating voice would simply in ;erpass a cry, "E Wera! 3 Wera!" Shortly after they would see him throw his arms over the shoulders of one of their young men, who' gathered around in considerable numbers, and confer with them on some plans in the statiou or for the Sunday services. He was a privileged person. He might say or do what he liked. What few could accomplish he did. He induced the people todo what to them was a new thing, to give up their children to him and Mrs. Asbwell as boarders for their boarding school. Few in these days can tell how hard it was then to induce parents to give up their children, or the children to come to school. But he succeeded. ELe had his classes for young men, and for boys and girls —in all between eighty and a hundred—and maintained his school till the war cry raised in the Waikato in 1863 sent him fiyicg for his life to Auckland.

From that time till within a few months of his death he devoted himself with unabated ardour to the objcct to which he had i; devoted his life—the Hospital, the Gaol, the Old Men's Refuge, the Maoris wherever he could find them, and the lads at St. Stephen's School. To these were zealously . consecrated whatever little measure of physical strength he could command. For the one ' work of his Master he lived, and most earnestly did he maintain that he did not hope to live by it. When one oE his friends was praying Uy his bedside a day before he died, and thanking God for what he had enabled him to do daring his long life, he, though barely able to articulate, interjected " By grace ! by grace!" Though, as already said, he was not a man of commanding intellect, and though unequal to an argument, he vet drew ts him from ou'.side men of considerable mental pow=r, and was favoured' with seeing confirmed drunkards chr.age their liyes at his exhortations...

- Mr. Ashwell was o. dainud by Bishop Selwyn, He was twice married. By tho first of hi* wives he bad.turtle children, none of whom has survived of'- then), Saralij was ma/r;ed to the KuW ,T. Pulmer.oi Norfolk Island mission, and she was. in; every way a daaghter worthy of. h'-r lather both by the: sobVieny of her piety and the Bouuduess cf uc judgnieat.