Provincial Agricultural Show
"A happy scene of rural mirth,
Drawn from the teeming lap of earth,
In which a nation's promise lies.
Honour to him who wins a prize!--
A trophy won by honest toil,
Far nobler than the victor's spoil."
S.M.
Toronto was all bustle and excitement, preparing for the Provincial
Agricultural Show; no other subject was thought of or talked about. The
ladies, too, taking advantage of the great influx of strangers to the
city, were to hold a bazaar for the benefit of St. George's Church; the
sum which they hoped to realise by the sale of their fancy wares to be
appropriated to paying off the remaining debt contracted for the said
saint, in erecting this handsome edifice dedicated to his name--let
us hope not to his service. Yet the idea of erecting a temple for the
worship of God, and calling it the church of a saint of _very doubtful
sanctity_, is one of those laughable absurdities that we would gladly see
banished in this enlightened age. Truly, there are many things in which
our wisdom does not exceed the wisdom of our forefathers. The weather
during the two first days of the exhibition was very unpropitious; a
succession of drenching thunder showers, succeeded by warm bursts of
sunshine, promising better things, and giving rise to hopes in the
expectant visitants to the show, which were as often doomed to be
disappointed by returns of blackness, storm, and pouring rain.
I was very anxious to hear the opening address, and I must confess that
I was among those who felt this annihilation of hope very severely; and,
being an invalid, I dared not venture upon the grounds before Wednesday
morning, when this most interesting part of the performance was over.
Wednesday, however, was as beautiful a September day as the most
sanguine of the agricultural exhibitors could desire, and the fine space
allotted for the display of the various objects of industry was crowded
to overflowing.
It was a glorious scene for those who had the interest of the colony at
heart. Every district of the Upper Province had contributed its portion
of labour, talent, and ingenuity, to furnish forth the show. The
products of the soil, the anvil, and the loom, met the eye at every
turn. The genius of the mechanic was displayed in the effective articles
of machinery, invented to assist the toils and shorten the labour of
human hands, and were many and excellent in their kind. Improvements in
old implements, and others entirely new, were shown or put into active
operation by the inventors,--those real benefactors to the human race,
to whom the exploits of conquerors, however startling and brilliant,
are very inferior in every sense.
Mechanical genius, which ought to be regarded as the first and greatest
effort of human intellect, is only now beginning to be recognised
as such. The statesman, warrior, poet, painter, orator, and man of
letters, all have their niche in the temple of fame--all have had their
worshippers and admirers; but who among them has celebrated in song and
tale the grand creative power which can make inanimate metals move, and
act, and almost live, in the wondrous machinery of the present day!
It is the mind that conceived, the hand that reduced to practical
usefulness these miraculous instruments, with all their complicated
works moving in harmony, and performing their appointed office, that
comes nearest to the sublime Intelligence that framed the universe, and
gave life and motion to that astonishing piece of mechanism, the human
form.
In watching the movements of the steam-engine, one can hardly divest
one's self of the idea that it possesses life and consciousness. True,
the metal is but a dead agent, but the spirit of the originator still
lives in it, and sways it to the gigantic will that first gave it motion
and power. And, oh, what wonders has it not achieved! what obstacles
has it not overcome! how has it brought near things that were far off,
and crumbled into dust difficulties which, at first sight, appeared
insurmountable. Honour to the clear-sighted, deep-thinking child of
springs and wheels, at whose head stands the great Founder of the world,
the grandest humanity that ever trode the earth! Rejoice, and shout for
joy, ye sons of the rule and line! for was he not one of you? Did he not
condescend to bow that God-like form over the carpenter's bench, and
handle the plane and saw? Yours should be termed the Divine craft, and
those who follow it truly noble. Your great Master was above the little
things of earth; he knew the true dignity of man--that virtue conferred
the same majesty upon its possessor in the workshop or the palace--that
the soul's title to rank as a son of God required neither high birth,
nor the adventitious claims of wealth--that the simple name of a good
man was a more abiding honour, even in this world, than that of kings or
emperors.
Oh! ye sons of labour, seek to attain this true dignity inherent in your
nature, and cease to envy the possessors of those ephemeral honours that
perish with the perishing things of this world. The time is coming--is
now even at the doors--when education shall give you a truer standing in
society, and good men throughout the whole world shall recognise each
other as brothers.
"An' o'er the earth gude sense an' worth
Shall bear the gree an' a' that."
Carried away from my subject by an impetuous current of thought, I must
step back to the show from which I derived a great deal of satisfaction
and pleasure. The space in which it was exhibited contained, I am told,
about sixteen acres. The rear of this, where the animals were shown, was
a large grove covered with tall spreading trees, beneath the shade of
which, reposing or standing in the most picturesque attitudes, were to
be seen the finest breeds of cattle, horses, and sheep, in the province.
This inclosure was surrounded by a high boarded fence, against which
pens were erected for the accommodation of plethoric-looking pigs, fat
sleepy lambs, and wild mischievous goats; while noble horses were led
to and fro by their owners or their servants, snorting and curveting
in all the conscious pride of strength and beauty. These handsome,
proud-looking creatures, might be considered the aristocracy of the
animal department; yet, in spite of their prancing hoofs, arched necks,
and glances of fire, they had to labour in their vocation as well as the
poorest pig that grunted and panted in its close pen. There was a donkey
there--a solitary ass--the first of his kind I ever beheld in the
province. Unused to such a stir and bustle, he lifted up his voice, and
made the grove ring with his discordant notes. The horses bounded and
reared, and glanced down upon him in such mad disdain, that they could
scarcely be controlled by their keepers. I can imagine the astonishment
they must have felt on hearing the first bray of an ass; they could not
have appeared more startled at a lion's roar. Whoever exhibited Mr.
Braham was a brave man. A gentleman, who settled in the neighbourhood of
Peterboro twenty years ago, brought out a donkey with him to Canada, and
until the day of his death he went by no other name than the undignified
one of Donkey.
I cannot help thinking, that the donkey would be a very useful creature
in the colony. Though rather an untractable democrat, insisting on
having things his own way, he is a hardy, patient fellow, and easily
kept; and though very obstinate, is by no means insensible to kind
treatment, or incapable of attachment; and then, as an _exterminator of
Canadian thistles_, he would prove an invaluable reformer by removing
these agricultural pests out of the way. Often have I gazed upon the
_Canadian thistle_--that prolific, sturdy democrat of the soil, that
rudely jostles aside its more delicate and valued neighbours, elbowing
them from their places with its wide-spreading and armed foliage--and
asked myself for what purpose it grew and flourished so abundantly?
Surely, it must have some useful qualities; some good must lie hidden
under its hardy structure and coat of mail, independently of its
exercising those valuable qualities in man--patience and industry--which
must be called into active operation in order to root it out, and hinder
it from destroying the fruits of his labour. The time, perhaps, may
arrive when its thick milky juices and oily roots may be found to yield
nutricious food, or afford a soothing narcotic to alleviate the restless
tossings of pain. I firmly believe that nothing has been made in vain;
that every animate and inanimate substance has its use, although we may
be ignorant of it; that the most perfect and beautiful harmony reigns
over the visible world; that although we may foolishly despise those
animals, plants, and insects, that we consider noxious, because their
real utility has never been tested by experience, they are absolutely
necessary as links in the great chain of Providence, and appointed to
fulfil a special purpose and end.
"What shall we do for firewood when all the forests are burned?" was a
very natural question asked us the other day by a young friend, who,
with very scanty means, contemplated with a sort of horror the increased
demand for fuel, and its increasing price.
Tupper has an admirable answer for all such queries:--
"Yet man, heedless of a God, counteth up vain reckonings,
Fearing to be jostled and starved out by the too prolific increase
of his kind,
And asketh, in unbelieving dread, for how few years to come
Will the black cellars of the world yield unto him fuel for his
winter.
Might not the wide waste sea be bent into narrower bounds?
Might not the arm of diligence make the tangled wilderness a garden?
And for aught thou can'st tell, there may be a thousand methods
Of comforting thy limbs in warmth, though thou kindle not a spark.
Fear not, son of man, for thyself, nor thy seed--with a multitude
is plenty:
God's blessing giveth increase, and with it larger than enough."
Surely it is folly for any one to despair of the future, while the
providence of God superintends the affairs of the universe. Is it not
sinful to doubt the power of that Being, who fed a vast multitude from a
few loaves and small fishes? Is His arm shortened, that he can no longer
produce those articles that are indispensable and necessary for the
health and comfort of the creatures dependent upon his bounty? What
millions have been fed by the introduction of the potato plant--that
wild, half-poisonous native of the Chilian mountains! When first
exhibited as a curiousity by Sir Walter Raleigh, who could have imagined
the astonishing results,--not only in feeding the multitudes that for
several ages in Ireland it has fed, but that the very blight upon it,
by stopping an easy mode of obtaining food, should be the instrument in
the hands of the great Father to induce these impoverished, starving
children of an unhappy country, to remove to lands where honest toil
would be amply remunerated, and produce greater blessings for them than
the precarious support afforded by an esculent root? We have faith,
unbounded faith, in the benevolent care of the Universal Father,--faith
in the fertility of the earth, and her capabilities of supporting to the
end of time her numerous offspring.
The over-population of old settled countries may appear to a casual
thinker a dreadful calamity; and yet it is but the natural means
employed by Providence to force the poorer classes, by the strong law of
necessity, to emigrate and spread themselves over the earth, in order to
bring into cultivation and usefulness its waste places. When the world
can no longer maintain its inhabitants, it will be struck out of being
by the fiat of Him who called it into existence.
Nothing has contributed more to the rapid advance of the province than
the institution of the Agricultural Society, and from it we are already
reaping the most beneficial results. It has stirred up a spirit of
emulation in a large class of people, who were very supine in their
method of cultivating their lands; who, instead of improving them, and
making them produce not only the largest quantity of grain, but that of
the best quality, were quite contented if they reaped enough from their
slovenly farming to supply the wants of their family, of a very inferior
sort.
Now, we behold a laudable struggle among the tillers of the soil, as to
which shall send the best specimens of good husbandry to contend for
the prizes at the provincial shows, where very large sums of money are
expended in providing handsome premiums for the victors. All the leading
men in the province are members of this truly honourable institution;
and many of them send horses, and the growth of their gardens, to add to
the general bustle and excitement of the scene. The summer before last,
my husband took the second prize for wheat at the provincial show, and I
must frankly own that I felt as proud of it as if it had been the same
sum bestowed upon a prize poem.
There was an immense display of farm produce on the present occasion at
Toronto, all excellent in their kind. The Agricultural Hall, a large,
temporary building of boards, was completely filled with the fruits of
the earth and the products of the dairy--
"A glorious sight, if glory dwells below,
Where heaven's munificence makes all the show."
The most delicious butter and tempting cheese, quite equal, perhaps, to
the renowned British in every thing but the name, were displayed in the
greatest abundance.
A Mr. Hiram Ranney, from the Brock district, contributed a monster
cheese, weighing 7 cwt., not made of "double skimmed sky-blue," but of
milk of the richest quality, which, from its size and appearance, might
have feasted all the rats and mice in the province for the next twelve
months. It was large enough to have made the good old deity of heathen
times--her godship of the earth--an agricultural throne; while from
the floral hall, close at hand, a crown could have been woven, on
the shortest notice, of the choicest buds from her own inexhaustible
treasury.
A great quantity of fine flax and hemp particularly attracted my
attention. Both grow admirably in this country, and at no very distant
period will form staple articles for home manufacture and foreign
export.
The vast improvement in home-manufactured cloth, blankets, flannels,
shawls, carpeting, and counterpanes, was very apparent over the same
articles in former years. In a short time Canada need not be beholden to
any foreign country for articles of comfort and convenience. In these
things her real wealth and strength are shown; and we may well augur
from what she has already achieved in this line, how much more she can
do--and do well--with credit and profit to herself.
The sheep in Canada are not subject to the diseases which carry off so
many yearly in Britain; and though these animals have to be housed
during the winter, they are a very profitable stock. The Canadian
grass-fed mutton is not so large as it is in England, and in flavour
and texture more nearly resembles the Scotch. It has more of a young
flavour, and, to my thinking, affords a more wholesome, profitable
article of consumption. Beef is very inferior to the British; but since
the attention of the people has been more intently directed to their
agricultural interests, there is a decided improvement in this respect,
and the condition of all the meat sent to market now-a-days is ten per
cent better than the lean, hard animals we used to purchase for winter
provisions, when we first came to the province.
At that time they had a race of pigs, tall and gaunt, with fierce,
bristling manes, that wandered about the roads and woods, seeking what
they could devour, like famished wolves. You might have pronounced them,
without any great stretch of imagination, descended from the same stock
into which the attendant fiends that possessed the poor maniacs of
Galilee had been cast so many ages ago. I knew a gentleman who was
attacked in the bush by a sow of this ferocious breed, who fairly treed
him in the woods of Douro, and kept him on his uncomfortable perch
during several hours, until his swinish enemy's patience was exhausted,
and she had to give up her supper of human flesh for the more natural
products of the forest, acorns and beech-mast.
Talking of pigs and sheep recals to my mind an amusing anecdote, told
to me by a resident of one of our back townships, which illustrates,
even in a cruel act of retaliation, the dry humour which so strongly
characterizes the lower class of emigrants from the emerald isle. I will
give it in my young friend's own words:--
"In one of our back townships there lived an old Dutchman, who was of
such a vindictive temper that none of his neighbours could remain at
peace with him. He made the owners of the next farm so miserable that
they were obliged to sell out, and leave the place. The farm passed
through many hands, and at last became vacant, for no one could stay
on it more than a few months; they were so worried and annoyed by this
spiteful old man, who, upon the slightest occasion, threw down their
fences and injured their cattle. In short, the poor people began to
suspect that he was the devil himself, sent among them as a punishment
for their sins.
"At last an Irish emigrant lately out was offered the place very cheap,
and, to the astonishment of all, bought it, in spite of the bad
_karacter_, for the future residence of himself and family.
"He had not been long on the new place when one of his sheep, which had
got through a hole in the Dutchman's fence, came hobbling home with one
of its legs stuck through the other. Now, you must know that this man,
who was so active in punishing the trespasses of his neighbours' cattle
and stock, was not at all particular in keeping his own at home. There
happened to be an old sow of his, who was very fond of Pat's _potaties_,
and a constant _throuble_ to him, just then in the field when the
sheep came home. Pat took the old sow (not very tenderly, I'm afraid)
by the ear, and drawing out his jack-knife, very deliberately slit her
mouth on either side as far as he could. By and by, the old Dutchman
came puffing and blowing along; and seeing Pat sitting upon his
door-step, enjoying the evening air, and comfortably smoking his pipe,
he asked him if he had seen anything of his sow?
"'Well, neighbour,' said Pat, putting on one of his gravest faces, 'one
of the strangest things happened a short while ago that I ever saw. A
sheep of mine came home with its leg slit and the other put through it,
and your old sow was so amused with the odd sight that she split her
jaws with laughing.'"
This turned the tables upon the spiteful old man, and completely cured
him of all his ill-natured tricks. He is now one of the best neighbours
in the township.
This was but a poor reparation to the poor sheep and the old sow. Their
sufferings appear to have been regarded by both parties as a very minor
consideration.
The hall set apart for the display of fancy work and the fine arts
appeared to be the great centre of attraction, for it was almost
impossible to force your way through the dense crowd, or catch a
glimpse of the pictures exhibited by native artists. The show of
these was highly creditable indeed. Eight pictures, illustrative of
Indian scenery, character, and customs, by Mr. Paul Kane, would have
done honour to any exhibition. For correctness of design, beauty of
colouring, and a faithful representation of the peculiar scenery of
this continent, they could scarcely be surpassed.
I stood for a long time intently examining these interesting pictures,
when a tall fellow, in the grey homespun of the country, who, I suppose,
thought that I had my share of enjoyment in that department, very coolly
took me by the shoulders, pulled me back into the crowd, and possessed
himself of my vacant place. This man should have formed a class with
the two large tame bears exhibited on the ground appropriated to the
poultry; but I rather think that Bruin and his brother would have been
ashamed of having him added to their fraternity; seeing that their
conduct was quite unexceptionable, and they could have a set a good
example to numbers of the human bipeds, who pushed and elbowed from
side to side anything that obstructed their path, while a little common
courtesy would have secured to themselves and others a far better
opportunity of examining everything carefully. The greatest nuisance
in this respect was a multitude of small children, who were completely
hidden in the press, and whose feet, hands, and head, dealt blows,
against which it was impossible to protect yourself, as you felt
severely without being able to ward off their home-thrusts. It is plain
that they could not see at all, but were determined that every one
should sensibly _feel_ their disappointment. It was impossible
to stop for a moment to examine this most interesting portion of the
Exhibition; and one was really glad to force a passage out of the press
into the free air.
Large placards were pasted about in the most conspicuous places, warning
visitors to the grounds to look out for pickpockets! Every one was on
the alert to discover these gentry--expecting them, I suppose, to be
classed like the animal and vegetable productions of the soil; and the
vicinity of a knowing-looking, long-bearded pedlar, who was selling
Yankee notions at the top of his voice, and always surrounded by a
great mob, was considered the most likely locality for these invisible
personages, who, I firmly believe, existed alone in the fancy of the
authors of the aforesaid placards.
There was a very fine display of the improved and foreign breeds of
poultry; and a set of idle Irish loungers, of the lower class, were
amusing themselves by inserting the bowls of their pipes into the pens
that contained these noble fowls, and giving them the benefit of a
good smoking. The intoxicating effects of the fumes of the tobacco upon
the poor creatures appeared to afford their tormentors the greatest
entertainment. The stately Cochin-China cocks shook their plumed heads,
and turned up their beaks with unmistakeable signs of annoyance and
disgust; and two fine fowls that were lying dead outside the pens, were
probably killed by this novel sport.
I was greatly struck by the appearance of Okah Tubee, the celebrated
Indian doctor, who was certainly the most conspicuous-looking person in
the show, and on a less public occasion would have drawn a large number
of spectators on his own hook.
Okah Tubee is a broad, stout, powerfully built man, with a large fat
face, set off to the least possible advantage by round rings of braided
hair, tied with blue ribbons, and with large gold ear-rings in his ears.
Now, it certainly is true that a man has a perfect right to dress his
hair in this fashion, or in any fashion he pleases; but a more absurd
appearance than the blue ribbons gave to his broad, brown, beardless
face, it is impossible to imagine. The solemn dignity, too, with which
he carried off this tomfoolery was not the least laughable part of it.
I wonder which of his wives--for I was told he had several--braided all
these small rings of hair, and confined them with the blue love-knots;
but it is more than probable that the grave Indian performed his own
toilet. His blue surtout beaver hat accorded ill with his Indian
leggings and moccassins. I must think that the big man's dress was in
shocking bad taste, and decided failure. I missed the sight of him
carrying a flag in the procession, and mounted on horseback; if his
riding-dress matched his walking costume, it must have been rich.
Leaving the show-ground, we next directed our steps to the Ladies'
Bazaar, that was held in the government buildings, and here we found
a number of well-dressed, elegant women, sitting like Mathew at the
receipt of custom; it is to be hoped that their labours of love received
an ample recompense, and that the sale of their pretty toys completely
discharged the debt that had been incurred for their favourite saint.
Nor was the glory of old England likely to be forgotten amid such a
display of national flags as adorned the spacious apartment.
The Banner Of England.
"The banner of old England flows
Triumphant in the breeze--
A sign of terror to our foes,
The meteor of the seas
A thousand heroes bore it
In battle fields of old;
All nations quail'd before it,
Defended by the bold.
"Brave Edward and his gallant sons
Beneath its shadow bled;
And lion-hearted Britons
That flag to glory led.
The sword of kings defended,
When hostile foes drew near;
The sheet whose colours bended--
Memorials proud and dear!
"The hist'ry of a nation
Is blazon'd on its page,
A brief and bright relation
Sent down from age to age.
O'er Gallia's hosts victorious,
It turn'd their pride of yore;
Its fame on earth is glorious,
Renown'd from shore to shore.
"The soldier's heart has bounded
When o'er the tide of war;
Where death's brief cry resounded,
It flash'd a blazing star.
Or floating over leaguer'd wall,
It met his lifted eye;
Like war-horse to the trumpet's call,
He rush'd to victory!
"No son of Britain e'er will see
A foreign band advance,
To seize the standard of the free,
That dared the might of France.
Bright banner of our native land,
Bold hearts are knit to thee;
A hardy, brave, determined band,
Thy champions yet shall be!"