Wallingford, Berkshire; and his father, the Rev. F. J. Allnatt,
M.R.C.S., is at present the vicar of Grinsdale, Carlisle, England. The
subject of this sketch was educated at St. Augustine’s College,
Canterbury, and, coming out to Canada in 1864, was immediately on his
arrival, ordained deacon by the Anglican bishop of Quebec, and appointed
to the mission of Drummondville, on the St. Francis river. This he
retained for twenty-one years, with the exception of a period of two
years (1872-4), during which he volunteered for service as missionary on
the coast of Labrador. He was ordained priest in 1865, and took the
degree of Bachelor of Divinity in 1878, and that of Doctor in 1886, at
Bishop’s College, Lennoxville. In 1879 he was appointed as colleague to
share with Dr. Weir, of Morrin College, the inspection of academies and
model schools for the province of Quebec, an office which he held, in
addition to his parochial charge, until 1885, when he resigned both on
being appointed rector of St. Matthew’s church, in the city of Quebec.
Early in the present year (1887) it was definitely decided to establish
at the University of Bishop’s College, Lennoxville, a new chair, that of
Pastoral Theology, with the object of inaugurating a more complete
method of training and discipline for those graduates and other students
who were engaged in immediate preparation for holy orders. The most
important feature of this new departure was the residence of these
students with the professor, for the purpose of closer intercourse with
him and more frequent opportunities for devotion and instruction. Dr.
Allnatt was appointed as the first occupant of the chair, and entered
upon his new duties in September, 1887. He had previously, for some ten
years, held the office of examiner in Divinity to the university. In
1874, Dr. Allnatt married the widow of Ignace Gill, M.P.P. This lady is
a daughter of the late William Robin, a native of London, but of Swiss
descent, and educated at Geneva. He entered the British service under
the auspices of the Count de Meuron, and was a lieutenant in a regiment
named after that nobleman, and when about eighteen years of age the
regiment was sent to Canada, about 1812. It was disbanded a few years
afterwards, and officers and men received grants of land in the
neighborhood of Drummondville. Besides minor literary efforts, Dr.
Allnatt has published a book entitled, “The Witness of St. Matthew,” an
inquiry into the sequence of inspired thought pervading the First
Gospel, and into its result of unity, symmetry and completeness, as a
perfect portrait of the Perfect Man. This book, which is published by
Kegan Paul, London, England, has met with much favorable notice at the
hands of both the British and American press. The London _Guardian_, in
the course of a very flattering review, designates it as “a careful,
thorough and systematic analysis, with suitable remarks, of the contents
of the first Gospel, with a view to elicit and illustrate the special
features of St. Matthew’s presentment of Christ’s Person and work,—a
task which the author has accomplished with much discernment and
lucidity.”
* * * * *
=Emmerson, Rev. Robert Henry=, New Brunswick.—The late Rev. Robert
Henry Emmerson, a clergyman of the Baptist denomination in New
Brunswick, had his birth in Northumberland county, N.B., October 11th,