The Icelandic Canadian - 01.06.2004, Page 26

172
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Vo!. 58 #4
now we are inquiring into how much
money people are willing to pay their min-
ister, and I suppose that you will soon
receive an official letter concerning the
matter. Most people here place you as their
first choice. Some, however, have scruples
asking you because they had already asked
Rev. Pall, but all want you to come if Rev.
Pall does not come. Rev. Pall shall not be
able to serve here as "Synod" minister (but
that is the only possible condition for him.)
By the way, last fall I did not openly
oppose Rev. Pall's proposal since I did not
know whether or not we had any other
choice. Nevertheless, I openly announced
that I would help chase the "Synod" away
from this colony in case Rev. Pall were to
come here, and I am still determined to do
so.
Anyway, I do hope that you will come
here for a visit in the spring. The trip
should be affordable and the visit could
prove extremely beneficial--in so far as you
would realize that your service would be
invaluable to us, resulting in your deciding
to settle down here, bringing fruitful
results to yourself as well as to us: You can
sow that kind of seed which grows to bring
about those changes in our minds necessary
for us to succeed and without which no one
can manage.
The letter carrier is just about leaving,
forcing me to stop writing. Please remem-
ber me to your wife and Halldor. I owe
Halldor a letter, but your wife owes me
two letters—-both these situations need to
be corrected.
Sincerely yours,
Fr. Fridriksson
I suddenly remembered something. As
far as I know I am presently the only one
from this colony who is a member of the
Icelandic Literary Association. Sigtryggur
wants to join. Would you please accept him
as a member. Please send us 10 - 12
almanacs. How does my account stand?
Don't I owe postage? Please, let me know
about these things
Gimli, Apr. 30, 1877
Letter #13
Dear Rev. Jon Bjarnaon:
A long time has passed since I wrote to
you, but not too long ago I wrote to your
wife, and I am hoping to get an answer
from her soon.
This morning we received your letter
to Sigtryggur and a letter to H. Briem. I
thought that these letters might be impor-
tant, and therefore I had them taken imme-
diately north.
Tonight a letter to you from
Sigtryggur is supposed to arrive here, obvi-
ously written before he received the above
mentioned letter from you.
I shall now describe our conditions
here in the colony and surroundings: The
weather changed for the better around the
10th of this month. It took the snow only
a few days to disappear. Recently the
weather has constantly been nice, occasion-
ally, however, the frost has been consider-
able. Red River is clear of ice all the way to
the mouth of the river, but Lake Winnipeg
is still covered with ice. Last year it became
clear of ice around the 23rd day of May—
apparently the ice is going to melt even ear-
lier this year. Fishing was fine all around
the lake so that all have enough food. The
last 6-7 weeks, none has suffered from the
smallpox, but quite a number of people got
scurvy. Most of these have recovered and
none died from it. There is plenty of work
here. The farmers are clearing the woods,
putting up fences, building houses, and
fishing. Recently, the Government gave us
a loan of $25,000. This money is to be used
for tools, cattle, and food. When hearing
about this loan many were relieved.
Hopefully, this is the last time we need a
loan from the Government. Mr. Taylor,
the Icelandic agent, is now on his way to
Winnipeg to buy necessities for this
money.
On the whole, people work hard in
this colony even though individual cases of
idleness can be found. Social life is still in
the state of "childhood." However, I am
confident that if we don't give up social