Nothing is so fatiguing as sight-seeing. The number and variety of
objects to which your attention is called, and the rapid succession in
which they pass in review, at once wearies and perplexes the mind; and
unless you take notes to refresh your memory, you are apt to find you
carry away with you but an imperfect and indistinct recollection.
Yesterday was devoted to an inspection of the Tunnel and an
examination of the Tower, two things that ought always to be viewed
in juxta-position; one being the greatest evidence of the science and
wealth of modern times; and the other of the power and pomp of our
forefathers.
It is a long time before a stranger can fully appreciate the extent
of population and wealth of this vast metropolis. At first, he is
astonished and confused; his vision is indistinct. By degrees he begins
to understand its localities, the ground plan becomes intelligible and
he can take it all in at a view. The map is a large one; it is a chart
of the world. He knows the capes and the bays; he has sailed round them,
and knows their relative distance, and at last becomes aware of the
magnitude of the whole. Object after object becomes more familiar. He
can estimate the population; he compares the amount of it with that
of countries that he is acquainted with, and finds that this one town
contains within it nearly as great a number of souls as all British
North America. He estimates the incomes of the inhabitants, and finds
figures almost inadequate to express the amount. He asks for the
sources from whence it is derived. He resorts to his maxims of political
economy, and they cannot inform him. He calculates the number of acres
of land in England, adds up the rental, and is again at fault. He
inquires into the statistics of the Exchange, and discovers that even
that is inadequate; and, as a last resource, concludes that the whole
world is tributary to this Queen of Cities. It is the heart of the
Universe. All the circulation centres here, and hence are derived all
those streams that give life and strength to the extremities. How vast,
how populous, how rich, how well regulated, how well supplied, how
clean, how well ventilated, how healthy!--what a splendid city! How
worthy of such an empire and such a people!
What is the result of his experience? _It is, that there is no such
country in the world as England, and no such place in England as London;
that London is better than any other town in winter, and quite as good
as any other place in summer; that containing not only all that he
requires, but all that he can wish, in the greatest perfection, he
desires never to leave it._
Local description, however, is not my object; I shall therefore, return
to my narrative.
Our examination of the Tower and the Tunnel occupied the whole day, and
though much gratified, we were no less fatigued. On returning to our
lodgings, I found letters from Nova Scotia. Among others, was one
from the widow of an old friend, enclosing a memorial to the
Commander-in-Chief, setting forth the important and gratuitous services
of her late husband to the local government of the province, and
soliciting for her son some small situation in the ordnance department,
which had just fallen vacant at Halifax. I knew that it was not only
out of my power to aid her, but that it was impossible for her, however
strong the claims of her husband might be, to obtain her request. These
things are required for friends and dependants in England; and in the
race of competition, what chance of success has a colonist?
I made up my mind at once to forward her memorial as requested, but
pondered on the propriety of adding to it a recommendation. It could do
no good. At most, it would only be the certificate of an unknown man; of
one who had neither of the two great qualifications, namely, county or
parliamentary interest, but it might do harm. It might, by engendering
ridicule from the insolence of office, weaken a claim, otherwise well
founded. “Who the devil is this Mr. Thomas Poker, that recommends the
prayer of the petition? The fellow imagines all the world must have
heard of him. A droll fellow that, I take it from his name: but all
colonists are queer fellows, eh?”
“Bad news from home?” said Mr. Slick, who had noticed my abstraction.
“No screw loose there, I hope. You don’t look as if you liked the
flavour of that ere nut you are crackin’ of. Whose dead? and what is to
pay now?”
I read the letter and the memorial, and then explained from my own
knowledge how numerous and how valuable were the services of my
deceased friend, and expressed my regret at not being able to serve the
memorialist.
“Poor woman!” said Mr. Hopewell, “I pity her. A colonist has no chance
for these things; they have no patron. In this country merit will always
obtain a patron--in the provinces never. The English are a noble-minded,
generous people, and whoever here deserves encouragement or reward,
is certain to obtain either or both: but it must be a brilliant man,
indeed, whose light can be perceived across the Atlantic.”
“I entertain, Sir,” I said, “a very strong prejudice against relying
on patrons. Dr. Johnson, after a long and fruitless attendance on Lord
Chesterfield, says: ‘Seven years, my Lord, have now past, since I waited
in your outward rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which time
I have been pushing on my work, through difficulties, of which it
is useless to complain, and have brought it at last to the verge of
publication, without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement,
or one smile of favour. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never bad
a patron before.”
“Ah!” said Mr. Hopewell, “a man who feels that he is wrong, is always
angry with somebody else. Dr. Johnson, is not so much to be admired
for the independence that dictated that letter, as condemned for the
meanness and servility of seven years of voluntary degradation. It is no
wonder he spoke with bitterness; for, while he censured his Lordship,
he must have despised himself. There is a great difference between a
literary and a political patron. The former is not needed, and a man
does better without one; the latter is essential. A good book, like
good wine, needs no bush; but to get an office, you want merits or
patrons;--merits so great, that they cannot be passed over, or friends
so powerful, they cannot be refused.”
“Oh! you can’t do nothin’, Squire,” said Mr. Sick, “send it back to Old
Marm; tell her you have the misfortin to be a colonist; that if her son
would like to be a constable, or a Hogreave, or a thistle-viewer, or
sunthin’ or another of that kind, you are her man: but she has got the
wrong cow by the tail this time. I never hear of a patron, I don’t think
of a frolic I once had with a cow’s tail; and, by hanging on to it like
a snappin’ turtle, I jist saved my life, that’s a fact.
“Tell you what it is, Squire, take a fool’s advice, for once. Here you
are; I have made you considerable well-known, that’s a fact; and will
introduce you to court, to king and queen, or any body you please. For
our legation, though they can’t dance, p’raps, as well as the French one
can, could set all Europe a dancin’ in wide awake airnest, if it chose.
They darsent refuse us nothin’, or we would fust embargo, and then go
to war. Any one you want to know, I’ll give you the ticket. Look round,
select a good critter, and hold on to the tail, for dear life, and see
if you hante a patron, worth havin’. You don’t want none yourself, but
you might want one some time or another, for them that’s a comin’ arter
you.
“When I was a half grow’d lad, the bears came down from Nor-West one
year in droves, as a body might say, and our woods near Slickville was
jist full of ‘em. It warn’t safe to go a-wanderin’ about there a-doin’
of nothin’, I tell _you_. Well, one arternoon, father sends me into the
back pastur’, to bring home the cows, ‘And,’ says he, ‘keep a stirrin’,
Sam, go ahead right away, and be out of the bushes afore sun-set, on
account of the bears, for that’s about the varmints’ supper-time.’
“Well, I looks to the sky, and I sees it was a considerable of a piece
yet to daylight down, so I begins to pick strawberries as I goes along,
and you never see any thing so thick as they were, and wherever
the grass was long, they’d stand up like a little bush, and hang in
clusters, most as big and twice as good, to my likin’, as garden ones.
Well, the sun, it appears to me, is like a hoss, when it comes near dark
it mends its pace, and gets on like smoke, so afore I know’d where I
was, twilight had come peepin’ over the spruce tops.
“Off I sot, hot foot, into the bushes, arter the cows, and as always
eventuates when you are in a hurry, they was further back than common
that time, away ever so fur back to a brook, clean off to the rear of
the farm, so that day was gone afore I got out of the woods, and I got
proper frightened. Every noise I heerd I thought it was a bear, and when
I looked round a one side, I guessed I heerd one on the other, and I
hardly turned to look there before, I reckoned it was behind me, I was
e’en a’most skeered to death.
“Thinks I, ‘I shall never be able to keep up to the cows if a bear comes
arter ‘em and chases ‘em, and if I fall astarn, he’ll just snap up a
plump little corn fed feller like me in less than half no time. Cryin’,’
says I, ‘though, will do no good. You must be up and doin’, Sam, or it’s
gone goose with you.’
“So a thought struck me. Father had always been a-talkin’ to me about
the leadin’ men, and makin’ acquaintance with the political big bugs
when I growed up and havin’ a patron, and so on. Thinks I, I’ll take
the leadin’ cow for my patron. So I jist goes and cuts a long tough ash
saplin, and takes the little limbs off of it, and then walks along side
of Mooley, as meachin’ as you please, so she mightn’t suspect nothin’,
and then grabs right hold of her tail, and yelled and screamed like mad,
and wallopped away at her like any thing.
“Well, the way she cut dirt was cautionary; she cleared stumps, ditches,
windfalls and every thing, and made a straight track of it for home as
the crow flies. Oh, she was a dipper: she fairly flow again, and if ever
she flagged, I laid it into her with the ash saplin, and away we started
agin, as if Old Nick himself was arter us.
“But afore I reached home, the rest of the cows came a bellowin’, and a
roarin’ and a-racin’ like mad arter us, and gained on us too, so as most
to overtake us, jist as I come to the bars of the cow yard, over went
Mooler, like a fox, brought me whap up agin ‘em, which knocked all the
wind out of my lungs and the fire out of my eyes, and laid me sprawlin
on the ground, and every one of the flock went right slap over me, all
but one--poor Brindle. She never came home agin. Bear nabbed her, and
tore her most ridiculous. He eat what he wanted, which was no trifle, I
can tell you, and left the rest till next time.
“Don’t talk to me, Squire, about merits. We all want a lift in this
world; sunthin’ or another to lay hold on, to help us along--_we want
the cow’s tail_.
“Tell your friend, the female widder, she has got hold of the wrong cow
by the tail in gettin’ hold of you, for you are nothin’ but a despisable
colonist; but to look out for some patron here, some leadin’ man, or
great lord, to clinch fast hold of him, and stick to him like a leach,
and if he flags, (for patrons, like old Mooley, get tired sometimes), to
recollect the ash saplin, to lay into him well, and keep him at it, and
no fear but he’ll carry her through. He’ll fetch her home safe at last,
and no mistake, depend on it, Squire. The best lesson that little boy
could be taught, is, that of _the Patron, or the Cows Tail_.”