THE WINTER PACKET--HARRY HEARS FROM OLD FRIENDS, AND WISHES THAT HE WAS
WITH THEM.
Letters from home! What a burst of sudden emotion--what a riot of
conflicting feelings, of dread and joy,--expectation and anxiety--what a
flood of old memories--what stirring up of almost forgotten associations
these three words create in the hearts of those who dwell in distant
regions of this earth, far, far away from kith and kin, from friends and
acquaintances, from the much-loved scenes of childhood, and from _home_!
Letters from home! How gratefully the sound falls upon ears that have
been long unaccustomed to sounds and things connected with home, and so
long accustomed to wild, savage sounds, that these have at length lost
their novelty, and become everyday and commonplace, while the first have
gradually grown strange and unwonted. For many long months home and all
connected with it have become a dream of other days, and savage-land a
present reality. The mind has by degrees become absorbed by surrounding
objects--objects so utterly unassociated with or unsuggestive of any
other land, that it involuntarily ceases to think of the scenes of
childhood with the same feelings that it once did. As time rolls on,
home assumes a misty, undefined character, as if it were not only
distant in reality, but were also slowly retreating farther and farther
away--growing gradually faint and dream-like, though not less dear, to
the mental view.
"Letters from home!" shouted Mr Wilson, and the doctor, and the
skipper, simultaneously, as the sportsmen, after dashing through the
wild storm, at last reached the fort, and stumbled tumultuously into
Bachelors' Hall.
"What!--Where!--How!--You don't mean it!" they exclaimed, coming to a
sudden stand, like three pillars of snow-clad astonishment.
"Ay," replied the doctor, who affected to be quite cool upon all
occasions, and rather cooler than usual if the occasion was more than
ordinarily exciting--"ay, we _do_ mean it. Old Rogan has got the
packet, and is even now disembowelling it."
"More than that," interrupted the skipper, who sat smoking as usual by
the stove, with his hands in his breeches pockets--"more than that, I
saw him dissecting into the very marrow of the thing; so if we don't
storm the old admiral in his cabin, he'll go to sleep over these prosy
yarns that the governor-in-chief writes to him, and we'll have to
whistle for our letters till midnight."
The skipper's remark was interrupted by the opening of the outer door
and the entrance of the butler. "Mr Rogan wishes to see you, sir,"
said that worthy to the accountant.
"I'll be with him in a minute," he replied, as he threw off his capote
and proceeded to unwind himself as quickly as his multitudinous haps
would permit.
By this time Harry Somerville and Hamilton were busily occupied in a
similar manner, while a running fire of question and answer, jesting
remark and bantering reply, was kept up between the young men, from
their various apartments and the hall. The doctor was cool, as usual,
and impudent. He had a habit of walking up and down while he smoked,
and was thus enabled to look in upon the inmates of the several
sleeping-rooms, and make his remarks in a quiet, sarcastic manner, the
galling effect of which was heightened by his habit of pausing at the
end of every two or three words, to emit a few puffs of smoke. Having
exhausted a good deal of small talk in this way, and having, moreover,
finished his pipe, the doctor went to the stove to refill and relight.
"What a deal of trouble you do take to make yourself comfortable!" said
he to the skipper, who sat with his chair tilted on its hind legs, and a
pillow at his back.
"No harm in that, doctor," replied the skipper, with a smile.
"No harm, certainly, but it looks uncommonly lazy-like."
"What does?"
"Why, putting a pillow at your back, to be sure."
The doctor was a full-fleshed, muscular man, and owing to this fact it
mattered little to him whether his chair happened to be an easy one or
not. As the skipper sometimes remarked, he carried padding always about
with him; he was, therefore, a little apt to sneer at the attempts of
his brethren to render the ill-shaped, wooden-bottomed chairs, with
which the hall was ornamented, bearable.
"Well, doctor," said the skipper, "I cannot see how you make me out
lazy. Surely it is not an evidence of laziness my endeavouring to
render these instruments of torture less tormenting? Seeking to be
comfortable, if it does not inconvenience any one else, is not laziness.
Why, what _is_ comfort?" The skipper began to wax philosophical at
this point, and took the pipe from his mouth as he gravely propounded
the momentous question. "What _is_ comfort? If I go out to camp in the
woods, and after turning in find a sharp stump sticking into my ribs on
one side, and a pine root driving in the small of my back on the other
side, is _that_ comfort? Certainly not. And if I get up, seize a
hatchet, level the stump, cut away the root, and spread pine brush over
the place, am I to be called lazy for doing so? Or if I sit down on a
chair, and on trying to lean back to rest myself find that the stupid
lubber who made it has so constructed it that four small hard points
alone touch my person--two being at the hip-joints and two at the
shoulder-blades; and if to relieve such physical agony I jump up and
clap a pillow at my back, am I to be called lazy for doing _that_?"
"What a glorious entry that would make in the log!" said the doctor, in
a low tone, soliloquisingly, as if he made the remark merely for his own
satisfaction, while he tapped the ashes out of his pipe.
The skipper looked as if he meditated a sharp reply; but his intentions,
whatever they might have been, were interrupted by the opening of the
door, and the entrance of the accountant, bearing under his arm a packet
of letters.
A general rush was made upon him, and in a few minutes a dead silence
reigned in the hall, broken only at intervals by an exclamation of
surprise or pathos, as the inmates, in the retirement of their separate
apartments, perused letters from friends in the interior of the country
and friends at home: letters that were old--some of them bearing dates
many months back--and travel-stained, but new and fresh and cheering,
nevertheless, to their owners, as the clear, bright sun in winter or the
verdant leaves in spring.
Harry Somerville's letters were numerous and long. He had several from
friends in Red River, besides one or two from other parts of the Indian
country, and one--it was very thick and heavy--that bore the post-marks
of Britain. It was late that night ere the last candle was extinguished
in the hall, and it was late, too, before Harry Somerville ceased to
peruse and re-peruse the long letter from home, and found time or
inclination to devote to his other correspondents.
Among the rest was a letter from his old friend and companion, Charley
Kennedy, which ran as follows:--
MY DEAR HARRY,--It really seems more than an age since I saw you.
Your last epistle, written in the perturbation of mind consequent upon
being doomed to spend another winter at York Fort, reached me only a
few days ago, and filled me with pleasant recollections of other days.
Oh! man, how much I wish that you were with me in this beautiful
country! You are aware that I have been what they call "roughing it"
since you and I parted on the shores of Lake Winnipeg; but, my dear
fellow, the idea that most people have of what that phrase means is a
very erroneous one indeed. "Roughing it" I certainly have been,
inasmuch as I have been living on rough fare, associating with rough
men, and sleeping on rough beds under the starry sky; but I assure you
that all this is not half so rough upon the constitution as what they
call leading an _easy life_, which is simply a life that makes a poor
fellow stagnate, body and spirit, till the one comes to be unable to
digest its food, and the other incompetent to jump at so much as half
an idea. Anything but an easy life, to my mind. Ah! there's nothing
like roughing it, Harry, my boy. Why, I am thriving on it--growing
like a young walrus, eating like a Canadian voyageur, and sleeping
like a top! This is a splendid country for sport, and as our
_bourgeois_ [the gentleman in charge of an establishment is always
designated the bourgeois] has taken it into his head that I am a good
hand at making friends with the Indians, he has sent me out on several
expeditions, and afforded me some famous opportunities of seeing life
among the redskins. There is a talk just now of establishing a new
outpost in this district, so if I succeed in persuading the governor
to let me accompany the party, I shall have something interesting to
write about in my next letter. By the way, I wrote to you a month
ago, by two Indians who said they were going to the missionary station
at Norway House. Did you ever get it? There is a hunter here just
now who goes by the name of Jacques Caradoc. He is a first-rater--can
do anything, in a wild way, that lies within the power of mortal man,
and is an inexhaustible anecdote-teller, in a quiet way. He and I
have been out buffalo-hunting two or three times, and it would have
done your heart good, Harry, my dear boy, to have seen us scouring
over the prairie together on two big-boned Indian horses--regular
trained buffalo-runners, that didn't need the spur to urge, nor the
rein to guide them, when once they caught sight of the black cattle,
and kept a sharp look-out for badger-holes, just as if they had been
reasonable creatures. The first time I went out I had several rather
ugly falls, owing to my inexperience. The fact is, that if a man has
never run buffaloes before, he's sure to get one or two upsets, no
matter how good a horseman he may be. And that monster Jacques,
although he's the best fellow I ever met with for a hunting companion,
always took occasion to grin at my mishaps, and gravely to read me a
lecture to the effect that they were all owing to my own clumsiness or
stupidity; which, you will acknowledge, was not calculated to restore
my equanimity.
The very first run we had cost me the entire skin of my nose, and
converted that feature into a superb Roman for the next three weeks.
It happened thus. Jacques and I were riding over the prairie in
search of buffaloes. The place was interspersed with sundry knolls
covered with trees, slips and belts of woodland, with ponds scattered
among them, and open sweeps of the plain here and there; altogether a
delightful country to ride through. It was a clear early morning, so
that our horses were fresh and full of spirit. They knew, as well as
we ourselves did, what we were out for, and it was no easy matter to
restrain them. The one I rode was a great long-legged beast, as like
as possible to that abominable kangaroo that nearly killed me at Red
River; as for Jacques, he was mounted on a first-rate charger. I
don't know how it is, but somehow or other everything about Jacques,
or belonging to him, or in the remotest degree connected with him, is
always first-rate! He generally owns a first-rate horse, and if he
happens by any unlucky chance to be compelled to mount a bad one, it
immediately becomes another animal. He seems to infuse some of his
own wonderful spirit into it! Well, as Jacques and I curvetted along,
skirting the low bushes at the edge of a wood, out burst a whole herd
of buffaloes. Bang went Jacques's gun, almost before I had winked to
make sure that I saw rightly, and down fell the fattest of them all,
while the rest tossed up their tails, heels, and heads in one grand
whirl of indignant amazement, and scoured away like the wind. In a
moment our horses were at full stretch after them, on their _own_
account entirely, and without any reference to _us_. When I recovered
my self-possession a little, I threw forward my gun and fired; but
owing to my endeavouring to hold the reins at the same time, I nearly
blew off one of my horse's ears, and only knocked up the dust about
six yards ahead of us! Of course Jacques could not let this pass
unnoticed. He was sitting quietly loading his gun, as cool as a
cucumber, while his horse was dashing forward at full stretch, with
the reins hanging loosely on his neck.
"Ah, Mister Charles," said he, with the least possible grin on his
leathern visage, "that was not well done. You should never hold the
reins when you fire, nor try to put the gun to your shoulder. It an't
needful. The beast'll look arter itself, if it's a riglar
buffalo-runner; any ways, holdin' the reins is of no manner of use. I
once know'd a gentleman that came out here to see the buffalo-huntin'.
He was a good enough shot in his way, an' a first-rate rider. But he
was full o' queer notions: he _would_ load his gun with the ramrod in
the riglar way, instead o' doin' as we do, tumblin' in a drop powder,
spittin' a ball out your mouth down the muzzle, and hittin' the stock
on the pommel of the saddle to send it home. And he had them
miserable things--the _somethin'_ 'cussion-caps, and used to fiddle
away with them while we were knockin' over the cattle in all
directions. Moreover, he had a notion that it was altogether wrong to
let go his reins even for a moment, and so, what between the ramrod
and the 'cussion-caps and the reins, he was worse than the greenest
clerk that ever came to the country. He gave it up in despair at
last, after lamin' two horses, and finished off by runnin' after a big
bull, that turned on him all of a suddent, crammed its head and horns
into the side of his horse, and sent the poor fellow head over heels
on the green grass. He wasn't much the worse for it, but his fine
double-barrelled gun was twisted into a shape that would almost have
puzzled an Injin to tell what it was." Well, Harry, all the time that
Jacques was telling me this we were gaining on the buffaloes, and at
last we got quite close to them, and as luck would have it, the very
thing that happened to the amateur sportsman happened to me. I went
madly after a big bull in spite of Jacques's remonstrances, and just
as I got alongside of him up went his tail (a sure sign that his anger
was roused), and round he came, head to the front, stiff as a rock; my
poor charger's chest went right between his horns, and, as a matter of
course, I continued the race upon _nothing_, head first, for a
distance of about thirty yards, and brought up on the bridge of my
nose. My poor dear father used to say I was a bull-headed rascal,
and, upon my word, I believe he was more literally correct than he
imagined; for although I fell with a fearful crash, head first, on the
hard plain, I rose up immediately, and in a few minutes was able to
resume the chase again. My horse was equally fortunate, for although
thus brought to a sudden stand while at full gallop, he wheeled about,
gave a contemptuous flourish with his heels, and cantered after
Jacques, who soon caught him again. My head bothered me a good deal
for some time after this accident, and swelled up till my eyes became
almost undistinguishable; but a few weeks put me all right again. And
who do you think this man Jacques is? You'd never guess. He's the
trapper whom Redfeather told us of long ago, and whose wife was killed
by the Indians. He and Redfeather have met, and are very fond of each
other. How often in the midst of these wild excursions have my
thoughts wandered to you, Harry! The fellows I meet with here are all
kind-hearted, merry companions, but none like yourself. I sometimes
say to Jacques, when we become communicative to each other beside the
camp-fire, that my earthly felicity would be perfect if I had Harry
Somerville here; and then I think of Kate, my sweet, loving sister
Kate, and feel that, even although I had you with me, there would
still be something wanting to make things perfect. Talking of Kate,
by the way, I have received a letter from her, the first sheet of
which, as it speaks of mutual Red River friends, I herewith enclose.
Pray keep it safe, and return per first opportunity. We've loads of
furs here and plenty of deer-stalking, not to mention galloping on
horseback on the plains in summer and dog-sledging in winter. Alas!
my poor friend, I fear that it is rather selfish in me to write so
feelingly about my agreeable circumstances, when I know you are slowly
dragging out your existence at that melancholy place York Fort; but
believe me, I sympathise with you, and I hope earnestly that you will
soon be appointed to more genial scenes. I have much, very much, to
tell you yet, but am compelled to reserve it for a future epistle, as
the packet which is to convey this is on the point of being closed.
Adieu, my dear Harry, and wherever you may happen to pitch your tent,
always bear in kindly remembrance your old friend, CHARLES KENNEDY.
The letter was finished, but Harry did not cease to hold intercourse
with his friend. With his head resting on his two hands and his elbows
on the table, he sat long, silently gazing on the signature, while his
mind revelled in the past, the present, and the future. He bounded over
the wilderness that lay between him and the beautiful plains of the
Saskatchewan. He seized Charley round the neck, and hugged and wrestled
with him as in days of yore. He mounted an imaginary charger, and swept
across the plains along with him; listened to anecdotes innumerable from
Jacques, attacked thousands of buffaloes, singled out scores of wild
bulls, pitched over horses' heads and alighted precisely on the bridge
of his nose, always in close proximity to his old friend. Gradually his
mind returned to its prison-house, and his eye fell on Kate's letter,
which he picked up and began to read.--It ran thus:--
MY DEAR, DEAR, DARLING CHARLEY,--I cannot tell you how much my heart
has yearned to see you, or hear from you, for many long, long months
past. Your last delightful letter, which I treasure up as the most
precious object I possess, has indeed explained to me how utterly
impossible it was to have written a day sooner than you did; but that
does not comfort me a bit, or make those weary packets more rapid and
frequent in their movements, or the time that passes between the
periods of hearing from you less dreary and anxious. God bless and
protect you, my darling, in the midst of all the dangers that surround
you. But I did not intend to begin this letter by murmuring, so pray
forgive me, and I shall try to atone for it by giving you a minute
account of everybody here about whom you are interested. Our beloved
father and mother, I am thankful to say, are quite well. Papa has
taken more than ever to smoking since you went away. He is seldom out
of the summer-house in the garden now, where I very frequently go, and
spend hours together in reading to and talking with him. He very
often speaks of you, and I am certain that he misses you far more than
we expected, although I think he cannot miss you nearly so much as I
do. For some weeks past, indeed ever since we got your last letter,
papa was engaged all the forenoon in some mysterious work, for he used
to lock himself up in the summer-house--a thing he never did before.
One day I went there at my usual time, and instead of having to wait
till he should unlock the door, I found it already open, and entered
the room, which was so full of smoke that I could hardly see. I found
papa writing at a small table, and the moment he heard my footstep he
jumped up with a fierce frown and shouted, "Who's there?" in that
terrible voice that he used to speak in long ago when angry with his
men, but which he has almost quite given up for some time past. He
never speaks to me, as you know very well, but in the kindest tones,
so you may imagine what a dreadful fright I got for a moment; but it
was only for a moment, because the instant he saw that it was me his
dear face changed, and he folded me in his arms, saying, "Ah, Kate,
forgive me, my darling! I did not know it was you, and I thought I
had locked the door, and was angry at being so unceremoniously
interrupted." He then told me he was just finishing a letter of
advice to you, and going up to the table, pushed the papers hurriedly
into a drawer. As he did so I guessed what had been his mysterious
occupation, for he seemed to have covered _quires_ of paper with the
closest writing. Ah, Charley, you're a lucky fellow to be able to
extort such long letters from our dear father. You know how difficult
he finds it to write even the shortest note, and you remember his old
favourite expression, "I would rather skin a wild buffalo bull alive
than write a long letter." He deserves long ones in return, Charley;
but I need not urge you on that score--you are an excellent
correspondent. Mamma is able to go out every day now for a drive in
the prairie. She was confined to the house for nearly three weeks
last month, with some sort of illness that the doctor did not seem to
understand, and at one time I was much frightened, and very, very
anxious about her, she became so weak. It would have made your heart
glad to have seen the tender way in which papa nursed her through the
illness. I had fancied that he was the very last man in the world to
make a sick-nurse, so bold and quick in his movements, and with such a
loud, gruff voice--for it _is_ gruff, although very sweet at the same
time. But the moment he began to tend mamma he spoke more softly even
than dear Mr Addison does, and he began to walk about the house on
tiptoe, and persevered so long in this latter that all his moccasins
began to be worn out at the toes, while the heels remained quite
strong. I begged of him often not to take so much trouble, as _I_ was
naturally the proper nurse for mamma; but he wouldn't hear of it, and
insisted on carrying breakfast, dinner, and tea to her, besides giving
her all her medicine. He was for ever making mistakes, however, much
to his own sorrow, the darling man; and I had to watch him pretty
closely, for more than once he has been on the point of giving mamma a
glass of laudanum in mistake for a glass of port wine. I was a good
deal frightened for him at first, as, before he became accustomed to
the work, he tumbled over the chairs and tripped on the carpets while
carrying trays with dinners and breakfasts, till I thought he would
really injure himself at last; and then he was so terribly angry with
himself at making such a noise and breaking the dishes--I think he has
broken nearly an entire dinner and tea set of crockery. Poor George,
the cook, has suffered most from these mishaps--for you know that dear
papa cannot get angry without letting a _little_ of it out upon
somebody; and whenever he broke a dish or let a tray fall, he used to
rush into the kitchen, shake his fist in George's face, and ask him,
in a fierce voice, what he meant by it. But he always got better in a
few seconds, and finished off by telling him never to mind, that he
was a good servant on the whole, and he wouldn't say any more about it
just now, but he had better look sharp out and not do it again. I
must say, in praise of George, that on such occasions he looked very
sorry indeed, and said he hoped that he would always do his best to
give him satisfaction. This was only proper in him, for he ought to
be very thankful that our father restrains his anger so much; for you
know he was rather violent _once_, and you've no idea, Charley, how
great a restraint he now lays on himself. He seems to me quite like a
lamb, and I am beginning to feel somehow as if we had been mistaken,
and that he never was a passionate man at all. I think it is partly
owing to dear Mr Addison, who visits us very frequently now, and papa
and he are often shut up together for many hours in the smoking-house.
I was sure that papa would soon come to like him, for his religion is
so free from everything like severity or affected solemnity. The
cook, and Rosa, and my dog that you named Twist, are all quite well.
The last has grown into a very large and beautiful animal, something
like the stag-hound in the picture-book we used to study together long
ago. He is exceedingly fond of me, and I feel him to be quite a
protector. The cocks and hens, the cow and the old mare, are also in
perfect health; so now, having told you a good deal about ourselves, I
will give you a short account of the doings in the colony.
First of all, your old friend Mr Kipples is still alive and well, and
so are all our old companions in the school. One or two of the latter
have left, and young Naysmith has joined the Company's service. Betty
Peters comes very often to see us, and she always asks for you with
great earnestness. I think you have stolen the old woman's heart,
Charley, for she speaks of you with great affection. Old Mr Seaforth
is still as vigorous as ever, dashing about the settlement on a
high-mettled steed, just as if he were one of the youngest men in the
colony. He nearly poisoned himself, poor man, a month ago, by taking
a dose of some kind of medicine by mistake. I did not hear what it
was, but I am told that the treatment was rather severe. Fortunately
the doctor happened to be at home when he was sent for, else our old
friend would, I fear, have died. As it was, the doctor cured him with
great difficulty. He first gave him an emetic, then put mustard
blisters to the soles of his feet, and afterwards lifted him into one
of his own carts, without springs, in which he drove him for a long
time over all the ploughed fields in the neighbourhood. If this is
not an exaggerated account, Mr Seaforth is certainly made of sterner
stuff than most men. I was told a funny anecdote of him a few days
ago, which I am sure you have never heard, otherwise you would have
told it to me, for there used to be no secrets between us, Charley--
alas! I have no one to confide in or advise with now that you are
gone. You have often heard of the great flood; not Noah's one, but
the flood that nearly swept away our settlement and did so much damage
before you and I were born. Well, you recollect that people used to
tell of the way in which the river rose after the breaking up of the
ice, and how it soon overflowed all the low points, sweeping off
everything in its course. Old Mr Seaforth's house stood at that time
on the little point, just beyond the curve of the river, at the foot
of which our own house stands, and as the river continued to rise, Mr
Seaforth went about actively securing his property. At first he only
thought of his boat and canoes, which, with the help of his son Peter
and a Canadian, who happened at the time to be employed about the
place, he dragged up and secured to an iron staple in the side of his
house. Soon however, he found that the danger was greater than at
first he imagined. The point became completely covered with water,
which brought down great numbers of half-drowned and quite-drowned
cattle, pigs, and poultry, and stranded them at the garden fence, so
that in a short time poor Mr Seaforth could scarcely move about his
overcrowded domains. On seeing this, he drove his own cattle to the
highest land in his neighbourhood, and hastened back to the house,
intending to carry as much of the furniture as possible to the same
place. But during his short absence the river had risen so rapidly
that he was obliged to give up all thoughts of this, and think only of
securing a few of his valuables. The bit of land round his dwelling
was so thickly covered with the poor cows, sheep, and other animals,
that he could scarcely make his way to the house, and you may fancy
his consternation on reaching it to find that the water was more than
knee-deep round the walls, while a few of the cows and a whole herd of
pigs had burst open the door (no doubt accidentally) and coolly
entered the dining-room, where they stood with drooping heads, very
wet, and apparently very miserable. The Canadian was busy at the back
of the house, loading the boat and canoe with everything he could lay
hands on, and was not aware of the foreign invasion in front. Mr
Seaforth cared little for this, however, and began to collect all the
things he held most valuable, and threw them to the man, who stowed
them away in the boat. Peter had been left in charge of the cattle,
so they had to work hard. While thus employed the water continued to
rise with fearful rapidity, and rushed against the house like a
mill-race, so that it soon became evident that the whole would ere
long be swept away. Just as they finished loading the boat and
canoes, the staple which held them gave way; in a moment they were
swept into the middle of the river, and carried out of sight. The
Canadian was in the boat at the time the staple broke, so that Mr
Seaforth was now left in a dwelling that bid fair to emulate Noah's
ark in an hour or two, without a chance of escape, and with no better
company than five black oxen in the dining-room, besides three sheep
that were now scarcely able to keep their heads above water, and three
little pigs that were already drowned. The poor old man did his best
to push out the intruders, but only succeeded in ejecting two sheep
and an ox. All the others positively refused to go, so he was fain to
let them stay. By shutting the outer door he succeeded in keeping out
a great deal of water. Then he waded into the parlour, where he found
some more little pigs, floating about and quite dead. Two, however,
more adventurous than their comrades, had saved their lives by
mounting first on a chair and then upon the table, where they were
comfortably seated, gazing languidly at their mother, a very heavy fat
sow, which sat, with what seemed an expression of settled despair, on
the sofa. In a fit of wrath, Mr Seaforth seized the young pigs and
tossed them out of the window; whereupon the old one jumped down, and
half walking, half swimming, made her way to her companions in the
dining-room. The old gentleman now ascended to the garret, where from
a small window he looked out upon the scene of devastation. His chief
anxiety was about the foundation of the house, which, being made of a
wooden framework, like almost all the others in the colony, would
certainly float if the water rose much higher. His fears were better
founded than the house. As he looked up the river, which had by this
time overflowed all its banks and was spreading over the plains, he
saw a fresh burst of water coming down, which, when it dashed against
his dwelling, forced it about two yards from its foundation. Suddenly
he remembered that there were a large anchor and chain in the kitchen,
both of which he had brought there one day, to serve as a sort of
anvil when he wanted to do some blacksmith work. Hastening down, he
fastened one end of the chain to the sofa, and cast the anchor out of
the window. A few minutes afterwards another rush of water struck the
building, which yielded to pressure, and swung slowly down until the
anchor arrested its further progress. This was only for a few
seconds, however. The chain was a slight one. It snapped, and the
house swept majestically down the stream, while its terrified
occupants cowered within it.
For two days nothing was heard of old Mr Seaforth. Indeed, the
settlers had too much to do in saving themselves and their families to
think of others; and it was not until the third day that people began
to inquire about him. His son Peter had taken a canoe and made
diligent search in all directions, but although he found the house
sticking on a shallow point, neither his father nor the cat was on or
in it. At last he was brought to the island, on which nearly half the
colony had collected, by an Indian who had passed the house and
brought him away in his canoe, along with the old cat. Is he not a
wonderful man, to have come through so much in his old age? and he is
still so active and hearty! Mr Swan of the mill is dead. He died of
fever last week. Poor old Mr Cordon is also gone. His end was very
sad. About a month ago he ordered his horse and rode off, intending
to visit Fort Garry. At the turn of the road, just above Grant's
House, the horse suddenly swerved, and its rider was thrown to the
ground. He did not live more than half an hour after it. Alas! how
very sad to see a man, after escaping all the countless dangers of a
long life in the woods (and his, you know, was a very adventurous
one), thus cut violently down in his old age! O Charley, how little
we know what is before us! How needful to have our peace made with
God through Jesus Christ, so that we may be ready at any moment when
our Father calls us away! There are many events of great interest
that have occurred here since you left. You will be glad to hear that
Jane Patterson is married to our excellent friend Mr Cameron, who has
taken up a store near to us, and intends to run a boat to York Fort
next summer. There has been another marriage here which will cause
you astonishment at least, if not pleasure. Old Mr Peters has
married Marie Peltier! What _could_ have possessed her to take such a
husband! I cannot understand it. Just think of her, Charley, a girl
of eighteen, with a husband of seventy-five!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
At this point the writing, which was very close and very small,
terminated. Harry laid it down with a deep sigh, wishing much that
Charley had thought it advisable to send him the second sheet also. As
wishes and regrets on this point were equally unavailing, he endeavoured
to continue it in imagination, and was soon as deeply absorbed in
following Kate through the well-remembered scenes of Red River as he had
been, a short time before, in roaming with her brother over the wide
prairies of the Saskatchewan. The increasing cold, however, soon warned
him that the night was far spent. He rose and went to the stove; but
the fire had gone out, and the almost irresistible frost of these
regions was already cooling everything in Bachelors' Hall down to the
freezing-point. All his companions had put out their candles, and were
busy, doubtless, dreaming of the friends whose letters had struck and
reawakened the long-dormant chords that used to echo to the tones and
scenes of other days. With a slight shiver, Harry returned to his
apartment, and kneeled to thank God for protecting and preserving his
absent friends, and especially for sending him "good news from a far
land." The letter with the British post-marks on it was placed under
his pillow. It occupied his waking and sleeping thoughts that night,
and it was the first thing he thought of and re-read on the following
morning, and for many mornings afterwards. Only those can fully
estimate the value of such letters who live in distant lands, where
letters are few--very, very few--and far between.