Equipage for a Canadian Gentleman Farmer--Superiority of certain iron
tools made in the United States to English--Prices of Farming
Implements and Stock--Prices of Produce--Local and Municipal
Administration--Courts of Law--Excursion to the River Trent--Bay of
Quint--Prince Edward's Island--Belleville--Political Parsons--A
Democratic Bible needed--Arrogance of American politicians--Trent
Port--Brighton--Murray Canal in embryo--Trent River--Percy and Percy
Landing--Forest Road--A Neck or nothing Leap--Another perilous leap,
and advice about leaping--Life in the Bush exemplified in the History
of a Settler--Seymour West--Prices of Land near the Trent--System of
Barter--Crow Bay--Wild Rice--Healy's Falls--Forsaken Dwellings.
"A truant disposition" took me into another district on my return to
Kingston, as I was thoroughly determined to see a thoroughly new
Canadian settlement, and therefore prepared, by purchasing a new
waggon and a new pair of horses, to start for Seymour West, in the
Newcastle district, some 120 miles north-west, and upwards of twenty
miles in the Bush from the main stream of settlement, where a young
friend was beginning life, for whom the horses, waggon, and sundry
conveniences for farming and a few little luxuries were intended.
A waggon, dear settling reader, in Canada, is not a great lumbering
wooden edifice upon four wheels, whose broad circumferences occupy
about four feet of the road, and contain some ton or two of iron, as
our dear Kentish hop-waggons are wont to show in the Borough of
Southwark, or throughout lordly London, those carrying coals. No, it
is a long box, painted green or red, a perfect parallelogram, with two
seats in it, composed of single boards, and occasionally the luxury of
an open-work back to lean against; which boards are fastened to an ash
frame on each side, thus affording an apology for a spring seat. This
is the body; the soul, or carriage, by which said body is moved,
consists of four narrow wheels, the fore pair traversing by a
primitive pin under the body, the hind pair attached to the vehicle
itself. A pole, or, as it is called, a tongue, projects from the
front, and can be easily detached; _et voilà tout_! The expense is
sixteen pounds currency, or about twelve sterling for a first-rate
article, with swingle bars, or, as they are always called here,
"whipple-trees," to attach the traces to. A set of double harness is
six pounds, and two very good horses may be obtained for thirty more,
making in all fifty-two pounds Canada money, or a little more than
forty sterling, for an equipage fit for a gentleman farmer's all work,
namely, to carry a field, or to ride to church and market in.
There are two or three other things requisite, and among the foremost
a first-rate axe. No man should ever travel in Canada without an axe,
for you never know, even on the great main roads, when you may want it
to remove a fallen tree, or to mend your waggon with. A first-rate axe
will cost you, handle and all, seven shillings and sixpence currency,
but then it is a treasure afterwards; whereas, a cheap article will
soon wear out or break. Strange to say, Sheffield and Birmingham do
not produce coarse cutting tools for the Canada market, that can
compete with the American. It has been remarked, of late years, that
even all carpenters' tools, and spades, pickaxes, shovels, _et id
genus omne_, are all cheaper, better, and more durable from the
States, than those imported from England. Let our manufacturers at
home look to this in time, and, eschewing the spirit of gain, cease to
make cutting tools like Peter Pindar's razors. In the finer
departments, such as surgical and other scientific instruments,
Jonathan is as far astern; and, although he may use a sword-blade very
well, he has not yet made one like Prosser's.
In heavy ironwork Jonathan is advancing with rapid strides; and even
the Canadian, whom he looks down upon with some contempt, is competing
with him in the forging and casting of steam-engines. There are very
respectable foundries at Kingston, Toronto, Niagara, and Montreal. The
only difficulty I have yet heard of is in making large shafts. Every
other kind of heavy iron or steel manufacture can now be rapidly and
better done in Canada than in the United States--I say advisedly
_better_ done, because the boilers made in Canada do not burst, nor do
the engines break, as they do in the charming mud valley of the
Mississippi. For one accident in Canada there are five hundred in the
States; in fact, I remember only one by which lives were lost, and
that happened to a small steamer near Montreal, about four years ago;
whereas, they go to smash in the Union with the same go-ahead velocity
as they go to caucus, and seem to care as little about the matter.
John Bull often calculates much more sedately and to the purpose than
his restless offspring, who seem to hold it as a first principle of
the declaration of independence that a man has a right to be blown up
or scalded to death.
They are as national in this as in naming new cities. What names, by
the by, they do give them!--think of _Alphadelphia_ in Michigan,
Buc_y_rus in Ohio, _Cass_-opolis, from, I suppose, General Cass, in
Michigan, Juliet in Illinois, Kalida (it ought to be Rowland Kalydor)
in Ohio, Milan in Ohio, Massilon in Ohio, Peru in Iowa, Racine in
Wisconsin, Tiffin in Ohio, and Ypsilanti in Michigan. Cæsar, Pompey,
Cassius, Brutus, Homer, Virgil, and all the heathen gods, goddesses,
demi-gods, and republicans, are sown as thick as leaves in
Vallombrosa.
But to return to farming. You may have a plough, of the hundred new
Yankee inventions, or of a good substantial Canadian cut, for six
dollars, a wheat cradle scythe for the same, complete, a common scythe
for ten shillings, or less; and thus for less than one hundred pounds,
the farm may be stocked with two horses, two bullocks, two cows, (a
good cow is worth five pounds) pigs, and poultry. Sheep you must not
attempt, until a sufficient clearance of grazing ground is completed,
but you can buy as many there as you want, of the very best kind, for
three or four dollars a head. A good ram, bull, or boar, is, however,
scarce, and proportionably dear, but most of the districts now have
agricultural societies, at whose meetings prizes are given for every
kind of stock, and the farmers are devoting much more of their
attention to rearing horses, cattle, sheep, and pigs, than was the
case ten years ago, when almost all the markets were supplied from the
United States. Kingston and Toronto now are supplied from their own
bulk; and, as it will interest an emigrant intending to settle, I
shall give the market prices of both cities, premising only that, in
country towns, provision of all kinds is much cheaper.
Toronto, January 2, 1846.
s. d. s. d.
Flour, per barrel, 196 lb 25 0 @ 28 0
Oatmeal, per barrel, 196 lb 17 6 ... 20 0
Wheat, per bushel, 60 lb 4 9 ... 5 3
Rye, per bushel, 56 lb 2 9 ... 3 0
Barley, per bushel, 48 lb 2 4 ... 2 9
Oats, per bushel, 34 lb 1 10 ... 2 2
Peas, per bushel, 60 lb 2 6 ... 3 0
Timothy, per bushel, 60 lb 4 0 ... 5 0
Beef, farmers', per 100 lb 12 6 ... 17 6
Beef, per lb 0 3 ... 0 4
Pork, farmers', per 100 lb 21 3 ... 27 6
Bacon, per lb 0 4 ... 0 6
Mutton, by the quarter, per lb 0 2 ... 0 3
Veal, by the quarter, per lb 0 2 ... 0 4
Butter, in roll, per lb 0 8 ... 0 10
Butter, in tub, per lb 0 7 ... 0 9
Turkeys, each 1 3 ... 3 9
Geese, each 1 3 ... 1 6
Ducks, per couple 0 10 ... 1 3
Chickens, per pair 0 10 ... 1 3
Eggs, per dozen 1 3 ... 1 3
Potatoes, per bushel 3 0 ... 2 3
Hay, per ton 70 0 ... 90 0
Straw, per ton 40 0 ... 50 0
Kingston, January 31, 1846.
s. d. s. d.
Flour, per 112 lb 14 0 @ 14 6
Oatmeal, per 112 lb 14 6 ... 0 0
Wheat, per bushel 5 0 ... 5 6
Barley, ditto 3 0 ... 3 3
Hay, per ton 47 6 ... 52 6
Straw, ditto 25 0 ... 30 0
Potatoes, per bushel 2 0 ... 2 3
Beef, per hundred 20 0 ... 22 6
Veal, per lb 0 3 ... 0 4
Mutton, ditto 0 3 ... 0 4
Butter, in roll 0 9 ... 0 10
Eggs, per dozen 0 9 ... 0 10
Turkeys, per couple 5 0 ... 7 6
Partridges, per pair 5 0 ... 0 0
Ducks, per couple 1 8 ... 2 0
The standard weights of grain and pulse, in Canada West, were
regulated by Act of Parliament in 1835.
lbs.
Wheat 60
Rye 56
Peas 60
Barley 48
Oats 34
Beans 50
Indian Corn 56
Equal to a Winchester bushel.
The price of keeping one horse in Kingston is about sixpence per day,
in Toronto a shilling, but much less in all country places.
The affairs of the districts into which Canada is divided are managed
by a warden and councillors in each district, and two councillors are
elected for each township, having above 300 qualified voters, and one
for each having a less number. The improvement of the district roads,
bridges, schools, jails, court-houses, and all public matters
requiring expenditure of the taxes raised within the district, are
arranged by this Board. Some very useful information for settlers is
contained in the following:--
Statute Labour.--Every male inhabitant, from twenty-one to sixty, not
rated on the Assessment Roll, is liable to work on the highways for
two days.
Every assessed inhabitant is, in proportion to the estimate of his
real and personal property on the Roll, liable to work on the
highways, as follows:--Under £25 two days; under £50 three days; from
that to £75 four days; from that to £100 five days; and
For every £50 above £100, up to £500, one day;
" 100 " 500, " 1000, "
" 200 " 1000, " 2000, "
" 300 " 2000, " 3500, "
" 500 " 3500, one day;
the fractional part between the different sums being always reckoned
as a whole, and giving one day.
Every person possessed of a waggon, cart, or team of horses,[1] oxen,
or beasts of burthen or draft, used to draw the same, is liable to
work three days.
Indigent persons, oppressed by sickness, age, or having a large
family, can be exempted at the discretion of the town warden.
Any person liable can commute at 2s. 6d. per day, if he thinks
proper.
[Footnote 1: Team is called in Canada and in the States a span of
horses, and means two.]
THE GENERAL ASSESSMENT.
By the 59th Geo. III., chap. 7, sect. 2nd, the following is deemed
rateable property at the given valuation:--
Every town-lot in Toronto, Kingston, Niagara, and Queenston, £50;
every town-lot in Cornwall, Sandwich, Johnstown, and Belleville,
£25; every town-lot on which a dwelling is erected in Brockville,
£30; do. in Bath, £20; every acre of arable, pasture, or meadow
land, 20s.; every acre of uncultivated land, 4s.; every house
built with timber, squared or hewed on two sides, of one story in
height, and not two stories, with not more than two fireplaces, £20;
for every additional fireplace, £4; every dwelling-house built of
squared or flatted timber on two sides, of two stories in height,
with not more than two fireplaces, £30, and for every additional
fireplace, £8; every framed house under two stories in height, with
not more than two fireplaces, £35, and for every additional
fireplace £5; every brick or stone house of one story in height, and
not more than two fireplaces, £40; every additional fireplace, £10;
every framed, brick, or stone house, of two stories in height, and
not more than two fireplaces, £60; every additional fireplace, £10;
every grist-mill wrought by water, with one pair of stones, £150;
every additional pair, £50; every sawmill, £100; every merchant's
shop, £200; every storehouse owned or occupied for the receiving and
forwarding of goods, wares, or merchandize, for hire or gain, £200;
every stud-horse, kept for hire or gain, £100; every horse of the
age of three years and upwards, £8; oxen of the age of four years
and upwards, per head, £4; milch cows, per head, £3; horned cattle,
from the age of two years to four years, per head, £1; every close
carriage with four wheels, kept for pleasure, £100; every phaeton,
or other open carriage, with four wheels, kept for pleasure only,
£25; every curricle, gig, or other carriage, with two wheels, kept
for pleasure only, £20; every waggon kept for pleasure only £15;
every stove in a room where there is no fireplace to be considered
a fireplace.
All lands are rateable, held in fee-simple, or promise of
fee-simple, by the land board certificate, order of council, or
certificate of any governor of Canada, or by lease. The sum levied
in no case to be greater than one penny in the pound for any one
year.
The Queen, should she be possessed of, or in occupation of any
property in the province, is exempted from the payment of taxes.
Each township of a district elects its own officers; at meetings held
annually, on the first Monday in January, and called by the township
clerk, after he has obtained a warrant from two or more justices of
the peace. All freeholders above twenty-one years of age are entitled
to a vote, and choose the undermentioned officers, viz.--one assessor
and a collector, with pound-keepers and path-masters, or overseers of
highways, three town-wardens, and from three to eighteen
fence-viewers, whose duty it is to regulate fences. These
town-officers are liable to penalty for refusing to serve, but cannot
be elected oftener than once in three years: they have cognizance of
all matters relating to cattle, height and nature of enclosures, and
nuisances. Their duties are regulated by the district council's
by-laws.
Each district has an inspector of licenses, deputy clerk of the crown,
judge and clerk of District Court, a judge and a registrar of the
Surrogate Court, and one or two registrars for deeds, with coroners,
according to the extent, at all the principal towns or villages.
In each district is also a sheriff, a clerk of the peace, a treasurer,
and, in some of the district towns, a board of police, with president,
clerk, treasurer, and street-surveyor.
The officers of the incorporated cities or towns are similar to those
at home.
Justice is administered by the courts of Queen's Bench,
Quarter-Sessions, District Courts, and the Town Court, with Division
Courts.
The terms of the Court of Queen's Bench are four; and in Western
Canada, at these times, the judges sit at Toronto to hear counsel on
law questions.
Easter term commences on the first Monday in February, and ends on the
Saturday of the following week.
Trinity term, second Monday in June, and ends Saturday of the
following week.
Michaelmas term, first Monday in August, until Saturday of the
following week.
Hilary, first Monday in November, until Saturday, as before.
The Quarter Sessions are held throughout the province on the 7th of
January, 1st of April, 1st of July, and 18th of November.
The District Courts are held at the same time as the Quarter Sessions.
This court has jurisdiction in all matters of contract from 40s. to
£15; and, when the amount is liquidated or ascertained, either by the
act of the parties, or the nature of the transaction, to £40. Thus a
promissory note under £40 can be sued in this court before the
district judge, who is usually a barrister: and an open or unsettled
account under £15, but none above that amount; also, all matters of
wrong, or, as the lawyers please to call it, _tort_, respecting
personal chattels, when title to land is not brought in question, and
the damages are under £15. The judge of the District Court, by a late
Act, presides also at Quarter Session.
The ordinary costs of a suit before him are from £5 to £10; and in the
Queen's Bench, before a _real_ judge, from £10 to £30.
The Division Courts are a sort of non-descript Courts of Conscience
for recovery of small debts under £10; and here the district judge has
his hands full, for he comes into play as president again, and has to
hold courts in six divisions of his district once in two months.
The Court of Chancery is the _summum bonum_; its costs are, of course,
very great, and its decisions, though not quite so protracted as those
of England, nor involving such stakes, plague many a poor suitor who
comes to _equity_, when he can no longer get justice. I should most
strongly advise him to ponder deeply, after wading through Division,
District, and Queen's Bench, through judges without a wig and gown to
judges in full paraphernalia, and barristers and attorneys without
end, before he encounters a Master in Chancery. It may be such a
lesson as he will never forget, for Canada is rather a litigious
country--it is too near the States to be otherwise, and lawyers, as
well as all other trades and professions, must live. Young settler,
stick to your farm, get a clear title to your land, and never get into
debt.
I left Kingston in autumn, as aforesaid, with the farm stock and
implements, and embarked on board the Prince Edward steamboat,
Captain Bouter, for the mouth of the river Trent, in the Bay of
Quinte.
First you steam along the front of the famous city of Kingston, which
now presents something of an imposing front, from the waters of the
St. Lawrence, which here leave Lake Ontario and contract into two
channels between which are Long Island and some others. The channel
nearest to the United States is very narrow, or about a mile; that on
the Canada side is very broad, being from three to five or six, with
an islet or rock in the centre of the mouth or opening of Lake
Ontario, called Snake Island, having one tree upon it, and visible
from a great distance.
A few miles above Kingston, you enter the Bay of Quinte by passing
between the main land and Amherst Isle, or the Isle of Tanti, owned by
Lord Mountcashell, on which are now extensive and flourishing farms.
At the east end of the Isle of Tanti are the Lower Gap and the
Brothers, two rocky islets famous for black bass fishing and for a
deep rolling sea, which makes a landsman very sick indeed in a gale of
wind. After passing this Scylla, the bay, an arm rather of Lake
Ontario, becomes very smooth and peaceable for several miles, until
you leave the pleasant little village of Bath, where is one of the
first churches erected by the English settlers in Western Canada, and
the beginning of the granary of the Canadas.
After passing Bath, the Upper Gap Charybdis gives you another
tremendous rolling in blowing weather, and the expanse of Lake Ontario
is seen to the left, with the tortuous bay of Quinte again to the
right; this arm of the lake being made for fifty or sixty miles more
by the fertile district of Prince Edward, an island of great extent,
and one of the oldest of the British settlements in Upper Canada,
where Pomona and Ceres reign paramount; for all is fertility.
The Bay of Quinte, in fact, on both the main shore and on Prince
Edward, is one unvaried scene of the labours of the husbandman; for
the forest is rapidly disappearing there, and the luxuriance of the
scenery in harvest can only be compared with the best parts of
England. It is indeed a glad and a rich country.
The Lake of the Mountain and the Indian village of Tyandinaga are the
lions of this route: the former, a singular crater full of the purest
water, on the summit of a hill of some altitude, without any apparent
source, but overflowing in a stream sufficient for mill purposes and
very deep; the latter the seat of a portion of the Mohawks already
mentioned.
The vessel calls at several small settlements, and stops for the night
at Hallowell or Picton, for the village has both names. This is a most
picturesque locality, in a nook of the bay, with undulating hills and
sharp ravines, a handsome church and other public edifices, and a
large and thriving population. But we must for the present keep on
board the steamer, and, after sleeping there, go on to Belleville,
leaving Fredericksburgh, Adolphus Town, and many others in the
Midland, to coast the Victoria district, and enter the charming little
retreats in this pleasant bay to be described more at leisure.
Belleville, the county town of the Victoria district, is situated on
the shores of this bay, and, from an insignificant village in 1837,
has risen in 1846 to the rank of a large and flourishing town, the
main street of which surprised me not a little by its extent, the
beauty of its buildings, and the display of its shops. I mounted the
hill-side which overlooks it, and there saw three fine churches, the
English, Roman Catholic, and Scotch places of worship, a large well
built court-house and jail, and some pretty country-houses. I should
think that Belleville has nearly four thousand inhabitants; and, as it
is the outlet of a rich back country, and on the main road from
Kingston to Toronto, it will increase most rapidly. The worst feature
about Belleville in 1837 was that it was the focus of American
saddle-bag preachers, teachers, and rebelliously disposed folks; but I
am told that most of these uneasy loafers have left it, and that its
character has improved wonderfully. What a nuisance are peddling,
meddling, politicians of the lowest grade? Wherever they plant their
feet, a moral pestilence follows. These fellows won't work, for the
voluntary principle in preaching or teaching pays better, and does not
cost so much trouble. It is surprising with what facility, in England,
as well as in Canada, a saddle-bag doctor of divinity takes his
degree, and becomes possessor of the secrets and director of the
consciences and household of the small farmer. I once knew a family, a
most respectable family of yeomen, of ancient descent and of excellent
hearts, devoured by a locust of this kind in Buckinghamshire. In
Canada they are devoured every day, and not unfrequently made disloyal
into the bargain, although deriving their lands and support originally
from the British government.
They travel to the most remote settlements, where no such
opportunities as church or chapel of any kind exist for public
worship; and, after gaining the good opinion of the simple settler by
an exterior sanctity and a snuffling expression of it, they soon slide
into the recommendation of the superior chances of salvation that
offer themselves, by forgetting the Divine command of "Render unto
Cæsar the things that are Cæsar's," and of the Apostolic doctrine of
"Honour the King." I have always been surprised that a democratic
Bible retains such highly improper translations of the original
tongue, as _prince_, _king_, _queen_, and conceive that there should
be a special Act of Congress to declare that henceforward the words of
the English language should be abolished and the American tongue
substituted, under pains and penalties, omitting the aforesaid and all
other similar _obnoxiosities_ from dictionary, grammar, and book. The
Americans have just discovered that they have a prior claim to Oregon,
and therefore must be an older nation than the British, the separation
being a mere trifle, and the sway of England over the thirteen
colonies and her ancient settlement of America a dream; ergo, the
American language is the primitive tongue. A very excellent worthy
gentleman of New York wrote to a friend in Kingston lately, stating
that he was sorry that England was going to such an expense in
fortifying that town, as it and all Canada would soon be American, and
then the money thrown away would be missed.[1]
[Footnote 1: In crossing the Atlantic in an American packet with a
highly-gifted American, he told me one day that he was really glad to
observe that such excellent dockyards were making at Bermuda, as in a
few years they would no doubt belong to the Union. This was not said
boastingly, but seriously.]
It is actually astonishing, and will scarcely be credited at home,
that all except the most reflecting people in the United States have,
within the last five years, become really and seriously impressed with
the notion that the whole continent of the New World is a part of
their birthright, and that it is about to pass under their dominion,
as a matter of course, as well as that all the powers of the Old World
cannot hinder this consummation one day, or even exist themselves much
longer, as a political millennium is speedily coming on.
As an example of the self-sufficiency of this feeling, I quote a
letter from a governor of a State, lately written to his constituents,
perhaps on the strength of re-election, but really developing the
national notion. In reply to a letter addressed to him by the whigs of
Chautauque county, desiring his consent to stand as one of their
candidates for the delegates to the Constitutional Convention,
ex-Governor Seward wrote a reply of which the following is an
extract:--
"I want no war--I want no enlargement of territory sooner than it
would come if we were contented with a masterly inactivity. I abhor
war, as I detest slavery. I would not give one human life for all the
continent that remains to be _annexed_.
"But I cannot exclude the conviction that the popular passion for
territorial aggrandizement is irresistible. Prudence, justice,
cowardice, may check it for a season, but it will gain strength by its
subjugation. An American navy is hovering over Vera Cruz. An American
army is at the heart of what was Mexico. Let the Oregon question be
settled when it may, it will, nevertheless, come back again. Our
population is destined to roll its resistless waves to the icy
barriers of the north, and to encounter oriental civilization on the
shores of the Pacific. The monarchs of Europe are to have no rest,
while they have a colony remaining on this continent. France has
already sold out. Spain has sold out. We shall see how long before
England inclines to follow their example. It behoves us then to
qualify ourselves for our mission. We must dare our destiny. We can do
this, and can only do it by early measures which shall effect the
abolition of slavery, without precipitancy, without oppression,
without injustice to slaveholders, without civil war, with the consent
of mankind, and the approbation of Heaven. The restoration of the
right of suffrage to free men is the first act, and will draw after it
in due time the sublime catastrophe of emancipation."
It is with nations as it is with individuals; a boy very soon fancies
himself a man; he takes a switch in his hand, rides a muck against
thistles and stinging nettles, cuts off their heads, might and main,
and then fancies himself a Wellington or a Nelson. Young nations have
the same notions, and age tames both the one and the other.
Texas was easily tampered with; it was peopled only to be the
People's: but Mexico may be a harder bone to pick. Already is a
newspaper published there, named _El Tiemps, The Times_, to advocate a
return to monarchy, in order to save the Spanish race from the Stars
and the Stripes; and the besotted and wretched Republics of the South,
conceived in folly, and born of the splendid dream of Canning, are
falling to pieces from internal wars. Will his Ophirian Majesty, the
Emperor of Brazil, humbly lay his crown at the feet of the Eagle, and
are all our West India islands to be sipped up in the spoon of the
President?
Let the United States be a great, a free, and an enlightened Republic;
no one in England desires otherwise. Let it hold the balance, to curb
the semi-barbarous States of South America, and let it spread the
gospel of peace, and the literature and laws of Britain to the
uttermost parts of that benighted region; but also let it curb itself
in time, before it seeks to overthrow all order, all rule, all right,
and all reason, under the feet of its mere fancied might.
There is not in England that hatred of its American offspring, which
exists so largely towards the Parent State in the Union; on the
contrary, there is an earnest, a sincere desire for the well-being and
advancement of its best interests; but it is useless to conceal, and
it would be unmanly also to attempt to do so, that the British pulse
does not beat in unison with Lynch law, or with mob-rule, any more
than it would with the tyranny of a despotism; neither will the honest
pride of the English, the Irish, or the Scotch, permit that mob
dominion, the might of the mass, to dictate a line of conduct upon any
question, territorial or gubernative. Many master-minds at home admire
the principles of the American constitution, as established by
Washington; but they deeply regret the gulf that has opened since the
era of that lawgiver; and there are few indeed who would dream even
of exchanging the freedom of England for the freedom of the United
States.
The Reformers of British origin in Canada are, no doubt, very
numerous; and, owing to misconception and other causes, with which
the public are now acquainted, were once desirous of hoisting a new
flag; but time and reflection have been at work since, and the term
reformer in Canada is no longer one with which a word of fewer
syllables is synonymous. Even during the rebellion, as it was called,
of 1837, but which more properly should be called the border troubles,
there were very few Upper or Western Canadians concerned, as the
brigands were chiefly American borderers; the real rebellion being
confined to Lower Canada. I commanded a very large body of militia,
much of which had been gathered from the districts and counties where
the Reformers had their strongholds, and in the ranks there were full
as many Reformers as there were Tories, as the other party were then
called.
These subjects force themselves upon my attention, from the voyage
near the shores of Sydney, Thurlow, and other townships, where
Reformers and the really disaffected were very numerous in 1837; but,
notwithstanding all this, it may be freely and fairly asserted again
and again, that, let an invading force appear on their soil, the
people of Canada will fight for home, for liberty, and for Queen
Victoria.
We steamed on to the Trent river through a glorious corn and apple
country, and arrived there in time to meet my young friend, and to
proceed in our waggon to Brighton, a few miles westward on the Toronto
road, where we slept.
Trent Port, or Trent village, is situated on both banks of the exitus
of the Trent river into the Bay of Quinte, and is remarkable for two
things: as being the intended outlet of one of the finest back
countries in Canada, by a gigantic canal, which was to open Lake Huron
to Ontario, through a succession of inland lakes and rivers, but which
noble scheme was nipped in the bud after several of the locks had been
excavated, and very many thousands of pounds expended. It is now
remarkable only for its long, covered wooden bridge, and the quantity
of lumber, _i.e._, in the new American Dictionary, deals, plank,
staves, square timber, and logs floating on the tranquil water for
exportation.
Brighton is a little pleasant high-road hamlet, with two inns, and no
outs, as it is not a place of trade, excepting as far as a small
sawmill is concerned; but this will change, for it is near
Presqu'ile, the only natural harbour on Lake Ontario's Canada shore,
from Toronto to Kingston, or from one end to the other. Here the Bay
of Quinte approaches the lake so close, that a canal of four or five
miles only is requisite, through a natural level, in order to have a
safe and sheltered voyage from Kingston without going at all into the
real and dangerous lake, which is every where beset with "ducks and
drakes," as its rocky and treacherous islets are called.
This canal, which may be constructed easily for about five and twenty
thousand pounds, must soon be made, and the bar of Presqu'ile Harbour
deepened, so as to ensure a shelter for vessels in the furious gales
of October and November.
The canal is always traced on maps, and called Murray Canal, I
presume, after the late Master-General of the Ordnance, during his
government of the province. It is, without doubt, one of the most
important and necessary works in Canada West; and, as it will lead
into the Trent navigation, when that shall be finished, will be the
means of adding some millions of inhabitants to the fairest portion of
the land, now known only to wretched lumbermen.
The River Trent is a large stream, full of shallows, and rapids, and
beautiful lakes, taking its rise north of the township of Somerville,
in the Colborne District, not very far from a chain of lakes, which
reach the Ottawa on the east, and the Black River, a feeder of Lake
Simcoe, and a tributary of Huron and the Severn, on the west.
The river Trent is strangely tortuous, but keeps almost entirely
within the Colborne district, named after Lord Seaton, and at Rice
Lake afforded a site for the Colonial Office to establish a
flourishing colony a few years ago at Peterborough, and to open an
entirely new and very rich portion of Canada West.
This river, placed, as it were, by Nature as the connecting link of a
great chain of inland navigation, embracing the expanse of Huron,
Ontario, and the Ottawa, opens a field of research both to the
agriculturist and the forester. The woods abound with the finest kind
of untouched timber; the land is fertile in the extreme; and the
rivers, streams, and lakes abound with fish. In short, had the Trent
Canal been finished, instead of the miserable and decaying
timber-slides, which now encumber that noble river, another million of
inhabitants would, in ten years more, have filled up the forests,
which are now only penetrated by the Indian or the seeker after
timber.
A private individual has, however, put a steamboat upon the centre of
the river's course; and Mr. Weller, no doubt, finds that it pays him
well, for the portion of Colborne district near Rice Lake is settling
rapidly.
The Trent Canal, or a railroad, in the same direction, would lead to
the Georgian Bay of Huron, and thus render a journey to the far West
easy of accomplishment, as it is the most direct route from Oswego and
New York.
But I must journey on, and, after resting at Brighton, start by
daylight, and penetrate into the bowels of the land by a sandy road,
which, after passing that village, stretches into the forest due
north.
Away the waggon went, not at a hand-gallop, for the sand was too deep
for that, and, passing through woods by a tolerably good road for so
new a settlement, we, every now and then, at intervals few and far
between, saw a new farm or a new log-hut.
The day was fine, and so, having carried our provision with us, we
halted in the deep woods, upon the muddy banks of the Cold Creek, to
breakfast. A Tartar camp was visited by an English traveller somewhere
in the dominions of the Grand Lama, and he was treated to London
porter. So were we in the deep forest of Central Canada, for London
porter appears to travel everywhere; and, discussing it with much
relish, we fed the horses, and gave them what they liked much better,
clear and pure water--which indeed I now think would have been quite
as good for us--and waggoned on, until we came to a surprising new
settlement in the Bush, the villages of Percy and Percy Landing,
where, there being mill "privileges," as a sharp running water-stream
is called in the United States, flour and saw-mills have been
established, and a very thriving population is rising both in numbers
and in means. Here we dined in a new inn, or rather tavern, kept by a
French Canadian, and then pursued our journey for a few miles on a
decent new road, amidst fine settlements and good farms, and, crossing
a beautiful stream, plunged into the undisturbed forest by a road in
which every rut was a canal, and every stone as big as a bomb-shell at
the very least. How the waggon stood it, and the roots and stumps of
the trees with which these boulders were diversified, I am still
unable to explain; for my part, I walked the greater part of it, for
the bones of my body seemed as if they were very likely, after a short
trial, to part company with each other.
At length, after jolting, jumping, complaining, and comforting, we
came to a bridge near Myer's Mills. Our _conducteur_, my young friend
aforesaid, who was more used to the road, saw at a glance that
something had gone wrong with the said bridge; for it exhibited a very
disorderly, drunken sort of devil-may-care aspect.
He was too far advanced upon it to retreat, when he discovered that a
beam or two had departed into the lively current below. With true
backwoodsman's energy, he pulled his horses up sharp, reined them well
up, and then, with a tremendous shout, applied the whip, and actually
leaped horses, waggon, and passengers over the chasm, the remainder of
the bridge groaning, and saying most plainly, "I will not bear this
any longer." Next morning, we heard that the whole structure had
fallen in and disappeared.
I have been in some danger in the course of my life; but a visit
afterwards to this spot convinced me that one's existence is often a
sort of size-ace throw; and whether the six or the one comes up or
goes down, is a miracle. I never had a nearer leap for clearing Styx
than this, excepting one shortly afterwards upon the timber-slides of
the Trent, at Healy's Falls.
A vast timber canal or way had been constructed here by the Board of
Works, to convey timber down a rapid without danger, the slide being
alongside of that rapid. It was an interesting work; and, with my
young friend and two naval officers, settled in Seymour, I went to
examine it. At the sluice-way, or timber-dam, was a sort of bridge,
composed of parallel pieces of heavy square joists and a platform; we
walked along this Mahomet's railway, where Azrael seemed to have
established pretty much the same sentry as Cerberus, having two or
three mouths ready to devour the adventurous passenger.
The parallel pieces were about two feet distant from each other; I
walked on one, and my companions on the other, until a good view of
the whole work and the splendid rapids was attained. Under our feet,
at some distance, was the water of the slide running on an inclined
plane of woodwork, at a great angle, and with enormous power and
velocity into a pitch or cauldron far below.
The day was bright, and the shadow of the parallel logs left between
the space no view of the water underneath. They called me suddenly to
look at the rapid. I jumped, as I thought, over the space between us;
but my jump was into the shadow. One of the naval officers, a powerful
man, six feet and more in height, saw me jump; and, just as I was
disappearing between the timbers, caught me by the arm, and, by sheer
muscle and strength, held me in mid-air. The other immediately
assisted him, but my young friend became deadly pale and sick. I did
not visit either the slide or the cauldron; in either, instantaneous
and suffocating death was inevitable. Reader, never leap in dark
places, and look before you leap. My young friend looked before he
leaped over the bridge with his span of horses, and, like a gallant
_auriga_, guided his van without fear; but he told me afterwards that
the cold sweat sat on his brow, when the chasm was cleared, as much on
the bridge as it did at my Quintus Curtius venture. By the by, did
Quinte Curce, as the French so adroitly call him, ever leap--I doubt
the fact--into the chasm which closed over him?
After passing this bridge, and a slough of despond beyond it, we again
plunged into the woods, and, mounting over boulders, sinking into
bog-holes, and fairly jolted to jelly, on a sudden turned into an open
space of near a hundred acres, round which the solemn and stately
forest kept eternal guard. Here, in the space of ten or twelve years,
our pioneer friends had laboured through weal and through woe, through
Siberian winters and West Indian summers, through ague and fever, to
create a little modern paradise.
My young friend commenced in this secluded region, where the outer
barbarian was never seen and seldom heard of, where even the troubles
of 1837-8 never showed themselves, his location upon one hundred
acres. He had received the very best education which a public
institution in England could afford; but circumstances obliged him, at
the early age of twenty-five, to turn his thoughts, with a young wife,
to "life in the Bush," as a sole provision. The partner of his cares,
equally well educated, and of an ancient family, by the death of her
father, who was high in office in his country's service, was left
equally unprovided for.
With youth and good constitutions, a determination to make their own
way in life spurred them on to the most disheartening task, a task
which thousands of young people from Britain have, however, daily to
encounter in Canada, and the progress of which I relate simply from a
desire to show that "life in the Bush" is not to be entered into
without solemn and serious reflection.
Their first undertaking was to clear an acre or two of the forest, and
crop it with grain and potatoes; then to build a log-house. In all
this they were assisted by friends and neighbours as far as the
limited means of those friends and neighbours, who were all similarly
engaged, and the settlement containing not more than four or five
families, would admit of.
My young friend really set his shoulder to the wheel, and did not call
upon Hercules whiningly. He had a fondness for carpenter's work, and,
having cut down the huge pine trees on his _lot_, for so a property is
called in Canada West, he hewed them, squared them, and dovetailed
them; he quarried stone with infinite toil, burnt lime, and in the
short space of two years had a decent log-palace, consisting of two
large rooms, and a kitchen and cellar, with an excellent chimney, a
well which he dug himself, and a very large framed barn, which he
built himself, the only outlay being for nails, shingles to cover his
roofs, and boards. These he had to bring with oxen and a waggon from
the saw-mills at Percy, many miles off, and by the most hideous road I
ever saw, even in Canada. He split his own rails, made his own fences,
and cleared his own forest. This first settlement was commenced in
1840, and, when I saw it in 1845, he had nearly thirty acres cleared,
and this clearance and his really good house let to a settler just
arrived.
By one of those freaks of fortune unforeseen and unaccountable, a
connexion, who occupied the adjacent farm of two hundred acres, and
had had the command of money, died, and his property was left to the
young couple.
This gentleman, in the course of six or seven years, from the first
settlement of this portion of Canada, had built an excellent house,
had cleared a hundred acres, had a good garden, and everything which a
settler could desire, with a well-stocked farm-yard, and a
well-furnished house, into which my young friend stepped from his
log-palace and became monarch of all he surveyed.
But money, the sinews of war, was wanted; for, although the land,
house, goods, and chattels became his, the funds went to another
person, all but a trifling annual sum.
The young couple had now a family growing about them, and, as they
were very old friends of mine, they asked me to come and see "life in
the Bush."
Farmer Harry, as we will call my young friend, had now three instead
of two hundred acres to attend to, but he had a flock of sheep, a pair
of oxen, the _span_ of horses I brought for him, several cows, much
poultry, and a whole drove of pigs, with barns full of wheat, peas,
hay, and oats; an excellent garden, a fine little brook full of trout
at his door, plenty of meadow, and his harvest just over.
To help him, he had a hired man, who drove the oxen and assisted in
ploughing; and to bring in his harvest there were three hired
labourers, at two shillings and sixpence a day each, and their food
and beds, with two maid-servants, one to assist in the dairy. Labour,
constant and toilsome labour, was still necessary in order to make the
farm pay; for there is no market near, and everything is to be bought
by barter.
Salt, tea, sugar, and all the little luxuries must be had by giving
wheat, peas, timber, oats, barley, the fleeces of the sheep, salted
pork, or any other exchangeable property; and thus constant care and
constant supervision of the employed, as well as constant personal
labour, are requisite in Canada on a farm for very many years, before
its owner can sit down and say, "I will now take mine ease."
The female part of the family must spin, weave, make homespun cloth,
candles, salt the pork, make butter for sale, and even sell poultry
and eggs whenever required; in short, they must, however delicately
brought up, turn their hands to every thing, to keep the house warm.
The labour of bringing home logs for fuel in winter is not one of the
least in a farm, and then these logs have to be sawed and split into
convenient lengths for the fireplaces and stoves.
But all this may be achieved, if done cheerfully; and, to show that it
can, I will add that, amidst all this labour, my young friend was
building himself a dam, where the beavers, in times when that politic
and hard-working little trowel-tailed race owned his property, had
seen the value of collecting the waters of the brook. He was repairing
their decayed labours, for the purpose of washing his sheep, of
getting a good fish-pond, and of keeping a bath always full for the
comfort of his family.
What a change in ten years! The forest, which had been silent and
untrodden since the beavers first heard afar off the sound of the
white men's axes, was now converted into a smiling region, in which a
prattling brook ran meandering at the foot of gently swelling
hill-sides, on which the snowy sheep were browsing, and the cattle
lowing.
A field of Indian corn was rustling its broad and vivid green flaggy
leaves, whilst its fruit, topped by long silky pennons, waving in the
breeze, seemed to say to me, "Good Englishman, why do your countrymen
despise my golden spikes? do they think, as they do of my ugly,
prickly friend the oat, that I am not good enough for man, and fit
only for the horse or the negro? You know better, and you have often
eaten of a pound-cake made of my flour, which you said was sweeter and
better than that of wheat. You have often tasted my puddings; come
now, Mr. John Bull, were they not very good?"
"Certainly they were, Mr. Maize, and hominy and hoe-cake and all that
sort of thing are good too; but pray don't ask me to devour you in the
shape of mush, molasses and butter. Take any shape but that, and my
firm nerves will never tremble."
Jesting apart, the flour of Indian corn, or maize, is as much
superior, as nutritive food, to potatoes, as wheat flour is to Indian
corn. I wish the poor Irish had plenty of it.
The farmers in Upper Canada use it much, but in that wheat country it
cannot of course be expected that it supersedes flour, properly so
called. They also use buckwheat flour largely in the shape of
pancakes, and a most excellent thing it is.
My friend's life was diversified; for, during the season that the
crops are ripening, he had time to spare to go out on fishing and
shooting excursions on the Trent, and occasionally in winter a little
deer-hunting, with, _longo intervallo_, a bear-killing event.
I went to a combined fishing and shooting pic-nickery, and travelled
from Rainey's mills and Falls all along the valley of the Trent to
Healy's Falls.
The Trent is a beautiful and most picturesque river, rushing and
roaring along over a series of falls and rapids for miles together,
and expanding in noble reaches and little lakes.
Rainey's Falls I have faintly sketched, to show the soft beauty of
some parts of this river; at Healy's Falls it is more broken.
We went to Crow Bay, just above which the Crow River, from the iron
mine country of Marmora, runs into the Trent. Here we found two
friends, brothers, settled in great comfort. They had been about ten
years in the "Bush," and had excellent farms and houses equal to any I
have seen so far in the interior, with every comfort around them. In
one of their pleasure-boats, we embarked for the junction of the
rivers, on which it is intended to place a town when the country
becomes more settled.
All is now forest, excepting a very extensive and very flourishing
settlement of twelve hundred acres, undertaken by a retired
field-officer in the army, which was a grant about ten years ago for
his services, and is now worth two thousand pounds, or perhaps more,
since a bridge has been built by the provincial legislature over the
Trent, in order to connect the mail route between the townships of
Seymour-East and Seymour-West, as both are filling up rapidly, and
land becomes consequently dear and scarce.
The price of land in Seymour at present is, improved farm, if a good
house and barns are on it, at least two pounds an acre, including
clearance and forest; Canada Company's land, from fifteen to twenty
shillings an acre; wild land, in lots of one hundred or two hundred
acres; Clergy Reserve, or College land, called School land, according
to situation, from twenty-five shillings an acre upwards to thirty,
all wild land. Private Proprietors' wild land, in good situations,
twenty shillings an acre, and very little for less. Along the
river-banks, none, I believe, is to be had, unless at very high
prices.
It is intended, no doubt, to complete the navigation of this splendid
river by and by, and thus holders of land are not very anxious to sell
at a cheap rate; and as the Board of Works has constructed, at an
expenditure of upwards of twenty thousand pounds, timber slides, along
all the worst rapids by which the lumber is taken to the mouth of the
Trent, a certain importance is now attained for this river which did
not before exist; but this is of very little use to Seymour, in which,
new as the township is, all the best pine has already been culled and
cut down by the lawless hordes of lumberers, who, of course, no
longer consume any of the farm produce; yet it adds to the importance
of the river generally.
The first settlers in Seymour were lumber merchants, who, seeing the
wealth of the country in pine, and oak, and ash, the great fertility
of the soil, and the facilities afforded everywhere for erecting
mills, established themselves permanently, and, before the
agriculturists were induced to think of it, had removed from all land
within miles of the river the only valuable timber that the township
contained. Thus one source of profit, and that a very great one to the
farming settler, has been destroyed, and the enterprising
timber-merchant has established at convenient distances several
saw-mills, where his lumber is converted into plank and boards for the
lower markets, and where he is at all times ready to saw whatever
timber the farmer has left into boards and planks for him, receiving
so many feet of timber, and giving so many feet of lumber, as sawed
timber is called, taking care of himself, of course, in the exchange.
The flour-mills at Percy proceed upon the same principle: a farmer
brings sacks of grain and receives sacks of flour in exchange, said
exchange being of course three to one, or more, against him.
Throughout Canada is this truck or barter system pursued, and very
little money finds its way either into or out of the back townships,
unless it be the receipts of the lumber-merchant from Quebec or the
lakes. The lumber-merchant is, therefore, the lord of the Trent, or of
any other great internal river, whereon are new settlements; and many
of them have amassed large fortunes.
Thus came timber-slides, instead of canal, upon this splendid river,
which must, as soon as the Murray Canal, on the Bay of Quinte, is
undertaken, be also opened to navigation, as by it the richest part of
Western Canada, both in soil and in minerals, will be reached, and a
direct communication had in war-time from Kingston, the great naval
key of the lakes, with Penetangueshene, and Lakes Huron and Superior.
I have not time now, nor would it amuse the reader, to give a detail
of the project for canalling the Trent, part of which was well
executed before the troubles of 1837; but the money was voted, and is
not so enormous as to justify the non-performance of so important a
public work. The timber-slides I look upon as mere temporary
expedients.
But let us launch upon Crow Bay, and, stealing silently along, get
near the wild rice which grows so plentifully on its shallows, and
where is found the favourite food of the wild duck, which, by the by,
is no inconsiderable addition to a Canadian dinner-table in the Bush.
I do not mean, reader, the wild duck, but the wild rice, which said
duck eats; for, when well made into a rice pudding, I prefer it, and
so do many who are greater epicures, to either Carolina or East India
rice.
The wild ducks suffered not from me, for I had no gun, and, after
crossing the rapid current of the junction of the rivers, we landed
on the isthmus formed by them, where, striking a light, and making a
fire, we bivouacked, and one of the party went in search of a deer,
whose tracks were seen. This is a singular place, covered with dwarf
oaks, on a sandy soil, and looking for all the world like an English
park in Chancery.
Almost every oak bore the marks of bears' claws, as it was a favourite
place for those hermits, who live on acorns, blackberries, wild
gooseberries and currants, and I dare say raspberries, strawberries,
and whortle-berries, with which the place abounds in their seasons.
The boughs of the oaks were also broken by the repeated climbings of
Bruin, and it must be somewhat dangerous, when he is very hungry, to
land here and traverse the Bush alone: but we saw none, although we
walked through it, admiring the rushing river, and occasionally going
down the steep banks to fish in the rapids for black bass, of which
several were caught, and, with several wild ducks, formed the day's
sport, which day's sport was twice or thrice repeated, until I had
seen as much of the beauty of the wild river and the nature of the
soil and country as was desirable.
It was somewhat melancholy, on reaching Healy's Falls, which are
turbulent rapids of the most picturesque character, with an immense
timber-slide, or broad wooden sloping canal alongside of them, to see
the clearance in this far solitude formed by the workmen. They had
built houses, shanties, and sheds, and had lived and loved together
for many a month, with their families, on this charming spot. Nothing
was in ruin: all was new, even to the window-glass; and when our
party, after toiling away through the forest, reached the opening, and
saw below us the foaming rapids, the grand forest, the rugged banks,
the timber-slide, and the little wooden town, we thought, here at
least, is a well chosen hamlet, at which we may rest awhile.
No smoke rose from the chimneys; not a soul appeared to greet us; the
eagle soared above; the cunning fox, or the murderous wolf, the snake
and the toad, alone found shelter, where so many human beings had so
recently congregated, where, from morn till dewy eve, the hum of human
voices had been incessant, and where toil and labour had won support
for so many.
Occasionally, the rude and reckless lumberman halts here, whilst his
timber is passing the slide; the coarse jest and the coarser oath are
alone heard at the falls of the Trent, save when the neighbouring
farmer visits them, to procure a day's relaxation from his toils, and
to view the grandeur of creation, and, we trust, to be thankful for
the dispensation which has cast his lot in strange places. What must
be the occasional thoughts of a man educated tenderly and luxuriously
in England, when he reflects upon the changes and the chances which
have brought him into contact with the domain of the bear, of the
snake, and of the lumberer? Dear, dear England, thy green glades, thy
peaceful villages, thy thousand comforts, the scenes of youth, the
friends, the parents, who have gone to the land of promise--will
these memories not intrude? No where in this wonderful world do they
come upon the mind with more solemn impressiveness than in the wild
woods of Canada.