He travelled on snow-shoes in the winter, and by boat or on horseback in the summer, and when these failed, he journeyed by log canoe, or walked over the bad roads. Once he walked forty five miles that he might spend the Sabbath with the people in Windsor. Sometimes he was in dangers by the sea, and glad after a hard day's work in the winter to have a little straw to lie upon, and a thin cover to shelter him from the cold. Like the early preachers he was often compelled to suffer opposition, rough fellows disturbing the services by shouting and seeking to break up the meeting, and some who were possessed of education demanding his authority for preaching the gospel, but to them all, he was patient, and some of his revilers were soundly converted, and learned to revere him as a man of God.
As a preacher he was eminently successful in awakening the people from a state of spiritual torpor, and winning many souls for Christ. In nearly every service there were conversions, and deep manifestations of the presence and power of God. When he preached at Memramcook, "some were deeply affected;" at French village, he left the people in tears, and the truth had a softening power upon the hearts of the people; and when he was leaving them, "weeping was upon every hand," and they pressed him so hard, that he remained another day, when many were deeply affected, and he left them in tears. On the same day and the one following, he was at Hillsborough, when "it was a moving time, many were in great distress, as appeared from their heaving breasts and weeping eyes;" at Tantramar, "many were remarkably happy," and one little girl of seven or eight years of age, "got up on a form, and told in a wonderful manner, what Jesus had done for her soul," and in this journey of eight days he preached eighteen times, and excepting two meetings, he says, "I know not a single occasion in which it was not evident that many who heard the Word were melted into tears, if they did not cry aloud for mercy."
All through his journal, there are evidences that he was a preacher of great power, eminent in the conversion of the people, for the pages abound with references to the services as "a time of power," where "many were in sore distress" as they hung around him, "eager to catch every word," and "weeping was on every hand," as they besought him to remain longer with them. When preaching one evening a young man trembled exceedingly, and cried out in agony of soul, and about bed-time, the preacher heard him praying and crying in the barn. On one of his missionary tours there were so great manifestations of power, that at Horton many cried for mercy, and others rejoiced and shouted aloud; at Cornwallis the arrows of conviction were felt by some "as they had never felt them before, and wept aloud most of the time;" and at Falmouth, "many felt the power of the word," and rejoiced exceedingly.