That Zulu country where poor Allen Gardiner had made his first attempt became doubly interesting to the English when the adjoining district of Natal became a British colony. It fell under the superintendence of Bishop Robert Gray, of Capetown, who still lives and labours, and therefore cannot be here spoken of; and mainly by his exertions it was formed into a separate Episcopal See in the year 1853. Most of the actors in the founding of the Church of Natal are still living, but there are some of whom it can truly be said that-
'Death hath moulded into calm completeness
The statue of their life.'
Charles Frederick Mackenzie was born in 1825 of an old Scottish Tory family, members from the first of the Scottish Church in the days of her persecution. His father, Colin Mackenzie, was one of Walter Scott's fellow-Clerks of Session, and is commemorated by one of the Introductions to 'Marmion,' as-
'He whose absence we deplore,
Who breathes the gales of Devon's shore;
The longer missed, bewailed the more.'
His mother was Elizabeth Forbes, and he was the youngest of so unusually large a family that the elders had been launched into the world before the younger ones were born, so that they never were all together under one roof. The father's delicacy of health kept the mother much engrossed; the elder girls were therefore appointed as little mothers to the younger children, and it was to his eldest sister, Elizabeth (afterwards Mrs. Dundas), that the young Charles always looked with the tender reverence that is felt towards the earliest strong influence for good.
From the first he had one of those pure and stainless natures that seem to be good without effort, but his talents were only considered remarkable for arithmetic. His elder brothers used to set him up on a table and try to puzzle him with questions, which he could often answer mentally before they had worked them out on their slates. His father died in 1830, after so much invalidism and separation that his five-year- old boy had no personal recollection of him. The eldest son, Mr. Forbes Mackenzie, succeeded to the estate of Portmore, and the rest of the family resided in Edinburgh for education. Charles attended the Academy till he was fifteen, when he was sent to the Grange School at Bishop's Wearmouth, all along showing a predominant taste for mathematics, which he would study for his own amusement and assist his elder brothers in. His perfect modesty prevented them from ever feeling hurt by his superiority in this branch, and he held his place well in classics, though they were not the same delight to him, and were studied rather as a duty and as a step to the ministry of the Church, the desire of his heart from the first. At school, his companions respected him heartily, and loved him for his unselfish kindness and sweetness, while a few of the more graceless were inclined to brand him as soft or slow, because he never consented to join in anything blameable, and was not devoted to boyish sports, though at times he would join in them with great vigour, and was always perfectly fearless.
From the Grange he passed to Cambridge, and was entered at St. John's, but finding that his Scottish birth was a disadvantage according to restrictions now removed, he transferred himself to Caius College. He kept up a constant correspondence with his eldest sister, Mrs. Dundas, and from it may be gathered much of his inner life, while outwardly he was working steadily on, as a very able and studious undergraduate. With hopes of the ministry before his eyes, he begged one of the parochial clergy to give him work that would serve as training, and accordingly he was requested to read and pray with a set of old people living in an asylum. The effort cost his bashfulness much, but he persevered, with the sense that if he did not go 'no one else would,' and that his attempts were 'better than nothing.' This was the key to all his life. At the same time he felt, what biography shows many another to have done, the influence of the more constant and complete worship then enjoined by college rules. Daily service was new to him, and was accepted of course as college discipline, but after a time it gathered force and power over his mind, and as the
His fellow-collegians thought of him as a steady, religious-minded man, but not peculiarly devout, and indeed the just balance of his mind made him perceive that the prime duty of an undergraduate was industry rather than attempts to exercise his yet unformed and uncultivated powers. In 1848 he was second wrangler. There were two prizes, called Dr. Smith's, for the two most distinguished mathematicians of the year. The senior wrangler's papers had the first of these; for the second, Mackenzie was neck and neck with a Trinity College man, and the question was only decided by the fact that Dr. Smith had desired that his own college (Trinity) should have the preference.
After this he became tutor and fellow of his college, taking private pupils, and at the same time preparing for Holy Orders, not only by study of books, but by work among the poor, with whom his exceeding kindness and intense reality gave him especial influence at all times.
He was ordained on the Trinity Sunday of 1851, and took an assistant curacy at a short distance from Cambridge, his vigorous powers of walking enabling him to give it full attention as well as to his pupils and to the University offices he filled. His great characteristic seems always to have been the tenderest kindness and consideration; and in the year when he was public examiner, this was especially felt by the young men undergoing an ordeal so terrible to strained and excited intellect and nerves, when a little hastiness or harshness often destroys the hopes of a man's youth.
With this combination of pastoral work and college life Mackenzie was perfectly satisfied and happy, but in another year the turning-point of his life was reached. A mission at Delhi to the natives was in prospect, and the Rev. J. S. Jackson, who belonged to the same college with him, came to Cambridge in search of a fellow-labourer therein. During the conversations and consultations as to who could be asked, the thought came upon Mackenzie, why should he strive to send forth others without going himself. He could not put it from his mind. He read Henry Martyn's life, and resolved on praying for guidance as to his own duty. In the words of his letter to Mrs. Dundas, 'I thought chiefly of the command, 'Go ye and baptize all nations,' and how some one ought to go; and I thought how in another world one would look back and rejoice at having seized this opportunity of taking the good news of the Gospel to those who had never heard of it; but for whom, as well as for us, Christ died. I thought of the Saviour sitting in heaven, and looking down upon this world, and seeing us, who have heard the news, selfishly keeping it to ourselves, and only one or two, or eight or ten, going out in the year to preach to His other sheep, who must be brought, that there may be one fold and one Shepherd; and I thought that if other men would go abroad, then I might stay at home, but as no one, or so few, would go out, then it was the duty of every one that could go to go. . . . And I thought, what right have I to say to young men here, 'You had better go out to India,' when I am hugging myself in my comfortable place at home.' And afterwards, 'Now, dear Lizzie, I have always looked to you as my mother and early teacher. To you I owe more than I can ever repay, more than I can well tell. I do hope you will pray for me and give me your advice.'
Mrs. Dundas's reply to this letter was a most wise and full expression of sympathy with the aspiration, given with the deep consideration of a peculiarly calm and devotional spirit, which perceived that it is far better for a man to work up to his fullest perception of right, and highest aims, than to linger in a sphere which does not occupy his fullest soul and highest self; and she also recognized the influence that the fact of one of a family being engaged in such work exercises on those connected with them.
Others of the family, however, were startled, and some of his Cambridge friends did not think him adapted to the Delhi Mission, and this therefore was given up, but without altering the bent that his mind had received; and indeed Mrs. Dundas, in one of her beautiful letters, advised him to keep the aim once set before him in view, and thus his interest became more and more turned towards the support of missionary work at home.
In 1854, the first Primate of New Zealand, George Augustus Selwyn, visited England, after twelve years of labour spent in building up the Colonial and Maori Church, and of pioneering for missions in the Melanesian Isles, over which his vast see then extended. He preached a course of four sermons at Cambridge; Mackenzie was an eager listener, and those forcible, heart-stirring discourses clenched his long growing resolution to obey the first call to missionary labour that should come to him, though, on the other hand, he desired so far to follow the leadings of Providence that he would not choose nor volunteer, but wait for the summons-whither he knew not.
Ere long the invitation came. The erection of the colony of Natal into a Bishop's See had been decided upon a year before, and it had been offered to John William Colenso, a clergyman known as active in the support of the missionary cause, and a member of the University of Cambridge. On his appointment he had gone out in company with the Bishop of Capetown to inspect his diocese and study its needs, as well as to lay the foundations of future work. In the party who then sailed for Natal was a lady who had recently been left a widow, Henrietta Woodrow by
