the calm waters, which are illuminated for yards with a bright track of
light, by which we may distinctly perceive the figure of the spearsman
standing in the centre of the boat, first glancing to one side, then the
other, or poising his weapon ready for a blow. When four or five of
these lighted vessels are seen at once on the fishing ground, the effect
is striking and splendid.
The Indians are very expert in this kind of fishing; the squaws paddling
the canoes with admirable skill and dexterity. There is another mode of
fishing in which these people also excel; this is fishing on the ice,
when the lakes are frozen over—a sport that requires the exercise of
great patience. The Indian, provided with his tomahawk, with which he
makes an opening in the ice, a spear, his blanket, and a decoy-fish of
wood, proceeds to the place he has fixed upon. Having cut a hole in the
ice, he places himself on hands and knees, and casts his blanket over
him, so as to darken the water and conceal himself from observation; in
this position he will remain for hours, patiently watching the approach
of his prey, which he strikes with admirable precision as soon as it
appears within the reach of his spear.
[Illustration: _Indian Scene on the St. Lawrence._]
The masquinougé thus caught are superior in flavour to those taken later
in the season, and may be bought very reasonably from the Indians. I
gave a small loaf of bread for a fish weighing from eighteen to twenty
pounds. The masquinougé is, to all appearance, a large species of the
pike, and possesses the ravenous propensities of that fish.
One of the small lakes of the Otanahee is called Trout Lake, from the
abundance of salmon-trout that occupy its waters. The white fish is also
found in these lakes, and is very delicious. The large sorts of fish are
mostly taken with the spear, few persons having time for angling in this
busy country.
As soon as the ice breaks up, our lakes are visited by innumerable
flights of wild fowl; some of the ducks are extremely beautiful in their
plumage, and are very fine flavoured. I love to watch these pretty
creatures, floating so tranquilly on the water, or suddenly rising and
skimming along the edge of the pine-fringed shores, to drop again on the
surface, and then remain stationary, like a fleet at anchor. Sometimes
we see an old duck lead out a brood of little ones from among the
rushes; the innocent soft things look very pretty sailing round their
mother, but at the least appearance of danger they disappear instantly
by diving. The frogs are great enemies to the young broods; they are
also the prey of the masquinougé, and I believe of other large fish that
abound in these waters.
The ducks are in the finest order during the early part of the summer,
when they resort to the rice-beds in vast numbers, getting very fat on
the green rice, which they eagerly devour.
The Indians are very successful in their duck-shooting: they fill a
canoe with green boughs, so that it resembles a sort of floating island;
beneath the cover of these boughs they remain concealed, and are enabled
by this device to approach much nearer than they otherwise could do to
the wary birds. The same plan is often adopted by our own sportsmen with
great success.
A family of Indians have pitched their tents very near us. On one of the
islands of our lake we can distinguish the thin blue smoke of their wood
fires, rising among the trees, from our front window, or curling over
the bosom of the waters.
The squaws have been several times to see me; sometimes from curiosity,
sometimes with the view of bartering their baskets, mats, ducks, or
venison, for pork, flour, potatoes, or articles of wearing apparel.
Sometimes their object is to borrow “kettle to cook,” which they are
very punctual in returning.
Once a squaw came to borrow a washing tub, but not understanding her
language I could not for some time discover the object of her
solicitude; at last, she took up a corner of her blanket, and, pointing
to some soap, began rubbing it between her hands, imitated the action of
washing, then laughed, and pointed to a tub; she then held up two
fingers, to intimate it was for two days she needed the loan.
The people appear of gentle and amiable dispositions; and, as far as our
experience goes, they are very honest. Once, indeed, the old hunter,
Peter, obtained from me some bread, for which he promised to give a pair
of ducks; but when the time came for payment, and I demanded my ducks,
he looked gloomy, and replied with characteristic brevity, “No
duck—Chippewa (meaning S——, this being the name they have
affectionately given him,) gone up lake with canoe—no canoe—duck
by-and-by.” By-and-by is a favourite expression of the Indians,
signifying an indefinite point of time; may be, it means to-morrow, or a
week, or month, or it may be a year, or even more. They rarely give you
a direct promise. As it is not wise to let any one cheat you if you can
prevent it, I coldly declined any further overtures to bartering with
the Indians till my ducks made their appearance. Some time afterwards I
received one duck by the hands of Maquin, a sort of Indian
Flibberty-gibbet. This lad is a hunchbacked dwarf, very shrewd, but a
perfect imp: his delight seems to be tormenting the brown babies in the
wigwams, or teazing the meek deer-hounds.
The forest trees are nearly all in leaf. Never did spring burst forth
with greater rapidity than it has done this year. The verdure of the
leaves is most vivid. A thousand lovely flowers are expanding in the
woods and clearings. Nor are our Canadian songsters mute: the cheerful
melody of the robin, the bugle-song of the blackbird and thrush, with
the weak but not unpleasing call of the little bird called thitabebee,
and a wren, whose note is sweet and thrilling, fill our woods.
For my part, I see no reason or wisdom in carping at the good we do
possess, because it lacks something of that which we formerly enjoyed. I
am aware it is the fashion for travellers to assert that our feathered
tribes are either mute, or give utterance to discordant cries that
pierce the ear, and disgust rather than please. It would be untrue were
I to assert that our singing birds are as numerous or as melodious, on
the whole, as those of Europe; but I must not suffer prejudice to rob my
adopted country of her rights, without one word being spoken in behalf
of her feathered vocalists. Nay, I consider her very frogs have been
belied; if it were not for the monotony of their notes, I really
consider they are not quite unmusical. The green frogs are very
handsome, being marked over with brown oval shields on the most vivid
green coat; they are larger in size than the biggest of our English
frogs, and certainly much handsomer in every respect. Their note
resembles that of a bird, and has nothing of the croak in it.
In conclusion, though Canada might not seem a paradise to town-bred
gentlemen, or modern fine ladies, it possesses advantages to persons of
sober, industrious habits, which are not to be found in England. If the
emigrant and his family can but struggle through the hardships and
privations of a first settlement in the backwoods, there is little doubt
that they will in time secure a moderate independence, and be above
want, though not above work.
[Illustration: _View on the frontier line, near Stanstead plains._
(Upper Canada.)]
-----
[1] These concession-lines are certain divisions of the townships; these
are again divided into so many lots of 200 acres. The concession-lines
used to be marked by a wide avenue being chopped, so as to form a road
of communication between them; but this plan was found too troublesome;
and in a few years the young growth of timber so choked the opening,
that it was of little use. The lately-surveyed townships, I believe, are
only divided by blazed lines.
CHAP. VII.
NEW BRUNSWICK.
* * * * *
The Province of New Brunswick holds an important position amongst the
colonies of Great Britain. To the political economist it presents a
tract of country 27,704 square miles in superficial extent,—blessed
with a salubrious climate,—a rich and productive soil, capable of
receiving the whole tide of British emigration, should it turn in that
direction, and of contributing to the comfort and happiness of the
surplus of our industrious population. To the trader and capitalist the
advantages this colony offers are equally great:—the whole area of this
vast territory is intersected by innumerable navigable rivers and lakes;
its shores are indented with safe and commodious harbours; its seas and
rivers stored with excellent fish; its fertile plains and valleys, that
are now covered with timber, require only the industry of man to make
them yield corn and the fruits of the earth in prodigal abundance; its
mountains teem with various mineral productions—iron, copper, zinc,
manganese; gold and silver have been found in various parts of the
province; coal of superior quality is abundant in several localities,
and gypsum forms a principal article of the exports of the country to
the United States. In short, whether we regard this old but much
neglected colony in a social or commercial point of view, it possesses
much to recommend it to the attention of every thinking Englishman.
It is not my intention, however, to do more than allude briefly to these
or other topics which might be considered irrelevant to the object of a
work purporting to illustrate the scenery of the country.
The history of New Brunswick is closely connected with that of the
adjoining province of Nova Scotia, of which it formed a portion until
the year 1785. Its first settlers were a few families from New England
in 1762, who planted themselves on the River St. John, about fifty miles
from its mouth. After the peace with America in 1783, upwards of four
thousand persons from Nantucket came also to seek a home in those almost
untrodden wildernesses.
The difficulties of settling in any new country are sufficiently
numerous and formidable; but the hardships which these poor people had
to endure were of more than ordinary severity. On their arrival late in
the autumn, they found a few wretched hovels where St. John now stands;
the surrounding country presenting a most desolate aspect, which was
peculiarly discouraging to people who had just left their homes in the
beautiful and cultivated parts of the United States. As they proceeded
up the river St. John, the country wore a more pleasing aspect. At St.
Ann’s, where Fredericton is now built, they met a few scattered huts of
the old French settlers, the country around being a perfect wilderness,
uninhabited save by wild beasts or more savage Indians. The winter,
which was at that time more rigorous than it is at present, surprised
the unfortunate settlers before they had time to complete the
construction of their cabins; added to which, they were frequently
reduced to the direst extremities for food and clothing to preserve
their existence. Frequently had they to travel from fifty to one hundred
and fifty miles with hand-sleds, through trackless woods, or on the
ice-bound rivers, to procure a scanty supply of provisions for their
families at the Government stores: and in the piercing cold of winter, a
part of the family had to remain up during the night to keep the fire in
their huts, to prevent the other part from freezing. Some of the more
destitute settlers made use of boards instead of bedding; the father, or
some of the elder members of the family, remaining up by turns, and
warming two pieces of board, which they applied alternately to the
smaller children to keep them warm, with many similar expedients. By
patience and endurance, almost unexampled, they struggled through their
sufferings; and, by unremitting exertions, subdued the wilderness, and
covered the face of the country with thriving towns, and villages, and
habitations, where peace, plenty, and industry have fixed their abodes.
My route to New Brunswick from Canada was by the Grand Portage, about
thirty-six miles across. The roads, though bad, were better than I
expected. On my way I passed through some new settlements on reclaimed
swamps, near the Rivière du Loup and crossed two or three high
mountains, which form part of the Alleghany chain, lying between New
Brunswick and the River St. Lawrence. The greater part of the country
here is a complete bed of rocks, and the whole way through the woods
offers little encouragement for settlers. Having passed the Portage, I
reached Lake Tamisquata or Témiscouata a wild and solitary piece of
water, twenty-eight miles in length. The land upon its banks is
generally inferior, but upon its western side there are several swells
of fruitful ground. From this lake the River Madawaska takes its rise,
and winds for thirty miles through an almost boundless forest. The
country on either side is exceedingly fertile; and the scenery is of the
most wild and magnificent description. A few Acadians[2], the
descendants of the original French settlers, are located on the banks of
this lonely river; they are exceedingly simple in their manners, and
have little intercourse with the rest of the world, except when at
distant intervals they visit Fredericton to dispose of the surplus
produce of their little farms. Their wants are few, and they live a
quiet pastoral life, retaining a strong attachment to the dress, habits,
language, and religion of their forefathers.[3]
This settlement is comprehended in the disputed territory claimed by the
Americans on the Maine frontier; which, in point of fertility, valuable
timber, and beautiful rivers and streams, is equal to any part of
America.
The season at which I entered New Brunswick was May, the most favourable
period in the year for seeing the country to advantage. It is then that
summer bursts at once from the cold embrace of winter; for the few days
intervening between the rigorous cold of winter, and the genial heat of
the weather such as we experience in England in the month of June, can
scarcely be called a spring. To persons who have only witnessed the
tardy advances of summer through the months of March, April, and May, in
Great Britain, the sudden change which takes place at this season in
Canada and the adjoining colonies is especially surprising; in the
course of three or four days, the fields and deciduous trees put on
their verdant liveries, innumerable garden and field flowers burst into
full blow, the birds of summer make their appearance and enliven the
woods with their glad songs, and the American nightingales, as the frogs
are called, commence their singular evening concerts. In short, nothing
can be imagined more delightful than the astonishing quickness with
which the face of nature becomes clothed with all the charms of summer.
The forests, which cover the greatest part of the province of New
Brunswick, are unequalled in magnificence in any other part of the
world. The banks of the river St. John are remarkable for the magnitude
and abundance of the timber with which they are overgrown. Many
varieties of the red, yellow, and pitch pine, intermingled with the
graceful larch, the picturesque beech and maple, birch, elm, oak, and
numerous other tribes of forest timber, grow down close to the water’s
side, spreading in stately grandeur over the broad plains, or stretching
proudly up to the summits of the mountains that descend precipitously to
the river. In summer the bright and cheerful green of the forests is
exceedingly beautiful and refreshing to the eye, the dark pines alone
forming a sombre contrast to the vivid freshness of the deciduous trees;
but it is in autumn that an American forest wears its most enchanting
colours;—two or three frosty nights in the decline of the season
transform the rich and boundless verdure of a vast tract into brilliant
scarlet, rich violet, and every possible tint of blue and brown, deep
crimson and golden yellow. The fir tribes alone maintain their
unchangeable dark green hue; all others on mountain and in valley burst
into glorious beauty, and exhibit the most splendid and enchanting
picture that earth can produce. It is from these immense forests that
New Brunswick now draws its principal wealth. The timber trade,[4] which
has hitherto almost wholly engaged the attention of settlers, is of
great importance, and employs a vast number of people, whose manner of
living, owing to the nature of the business they follow, is altogether
different from that of the inhabitants who are occupied in agricultural
pursuits.
Throughout all New Brunswick, the wood fellers, or “lumberers,” as they
are there termed, bear a very indifferent reputation, being generally,
and I fear with too much justice, regarded as men of dissolute and
extravagant habits, and whose moral character, with few exceptions, is
dishonest and worthless. The curious manner in which these people
associate themselves for the purpose of cutting timber is so well
described by a modern writer, that I cannot do better than transcribe
his account of it. “Several men,” he says, “form what is called a
lumbering party, composed of persons who are either hired by a master
labourer, who pays them wages, and finds them in provisions; or of
individuals, who enter into an understanding with each other to have a
joint interest in the proceeds of their labour: the necessary supplies
of provisions, clothing &c., are generally obtained from the merchants
on credit, in consideration of receiving the timber which the lumberers
are to bring down the rivers the following summer. The stock deemed
requisite for a lumbering party consists of axes, a cross-cut saw,
cooking utensils, a cask of rum, tobacco and pipes, a sufficient
quantity of biscuit, pork, beef, and fish; pease and pearl barley for
soup, with a cask of molasses to sweeten a decoction usually made of
shrubs, as of the tops of the hemlock tree. Two or three yokes of oxen,
with sufficient hay to feed them, are also required to haul the timber
out of the woods. When thus prepared, these people proceed up the rivers
with the provisions to the place fixed on for their winter
establishment, which is selected as near a stream of water, and in the
midst of as much pine timber, as possible. They commence by clearing
away a few of the surrounding trees, and building a camp of round logs,
the walls of which are seldom more than four or five feet high; the roof
is covered with birch bark or boards. A pit is dug under the camp, to
preserve any thing liable to injury from the frost. The fire is either
in the middle or at one end; the smoke goes out through the roof; hay,
straw, or fir branches are spread across, or along the whole length of
the habitation, on which they all lie down together at night to sleep,
with their feet next the fire. When the fire gets low, he who first
awakes or feels cold springs up, and throws on five or six billets; and
in this way they manage to have a large fire all night. One person is
hired as cook, whose duty it is to have breakfast prepared before
daylight; at which time all the party rise, when each takes his
“_morning_,” the indispensable dram of raw rum, immediately before
breakfast. This meal consists of bread, or occasionally potatoes, with
boiled beef, pork, or fish, and _tea_ sweetened with molasses. Dinner is
usually the same, with pease soup instead of tea; and the supper
resembles the breakfast. These men are enormous eaters; and they also
drink great quantities of rum, which they scarcely ever dilute.
Immediately after breakfast they divide into three gangs, one of which
cuts down the trees, another hews them, and the third is employed with
the oxen in hauling the timber, either in one general road leading to
the banks of the nearest stream, or at once to the stream itself. Fallen
trees and other impediments in the way of the oxen are cut away with the
axe.”
Such is the toilsome life of a lumberer from October until the month of
April; amidst forests covered with snow, and exposed to all the severity
of the winter, without experiencing any of its comforts. But it is when
the snow begins to dissolve in April, and the “freshets” come down the
rivers, that the lumberer’s most trying labours commence. The timber
which has been cut during the winter is now thrown into the stream, and
floated down to some convenient place for constructing a raft. The water
at this period, owing to the snow water in the freshets, is more
intensely cold than in the depth of winter; the lumberers are obliged to
be immersed in it from morning till night, and it is seldom less than
six weeks from the time the floating the timber commences, till the
rafts are delivered into the merchant’s hands. This course of life, it
is evident, must undermine the constitution; and the sudden transition
from the extreme cold of winter in the backwoods to the scorching heat
of the summer sun, must tend still farther to weaken and reduce the
system. In order to sustain the cold, and stimulate the organs, these
men are in the habit of swallowing immoderate quantities of ardent
spirits; we cannot, then, wonder that premature old age and shortness of
days should form the almost inevitable fate of a lumberer. Should one of
them, more prudent than his fellows, save a little money, and be enabled
for the last few years of his life to exist without labour, he only
drags out a miserable existence—the victim of rheumatism, and all the
miseries of a broken down constitution.
[Illustration: _Falls on the St. John River._]
A few miles above the Acadian settlements, the St. John receives the
waters of the Madawaska; and inclining to the westward, flows in a deep
and sluggish stream through a wilderness of rich and fertile lands,
until it reaches the Grand Falls of the St. John, which for romantic
beauty are perhaps unequalled by the most celebrated falls in the world.
Mr. McGregor, who visited them, asserts, that, though they cannot be
compared with Niagara in point of magnitude, the _tout ensemble_ of the
tremendous rocks, the gigantic woods, and the continuity of the
cataracts and rapids below the St. John Falls, is finer than any thing
that the otherwise unparalleled Niagara can boast of. _Bateaux_ and
other craft navigating the river at this point, are carried across a
narrow neck of land, from a small cove immediately above the falls, to
another little creek at some distance below them. The river, which a
short way above the falls is broad and placid, becomes suddenly
contracted between high and rocky banks, overhung with trees of immense
growth, and rushes along a descent of several feet with prodigious
impetuosity, until the interruption of a ridge of rocks, close to the
edge of the grand falls, changes the turbulent stream into one vast
sheet of broken foam, thundering over a precipice, fifty feet in
perpendicular height, into a deep vortex filled with huge rocks, amongst
which the immense body of waters is for a moment partially lost.
Re-appearing, it continues its course through a narrower channel, pent
in by rugged overhanging cliffs, and dashing with extraordinary velocity
over a succession of lesser falls, more than half a mile in length,
forms a picture of terrific grandeur and sublimity. The scenery after
passing the grand falls is of the wildest and boldest character
imaginable; and the rocky bed of the river is exceedingly dangerous for
rafts and _bateaux_, which, however, are dexterously navigated through
the broken waters and foaming rapids.
[Illustration: _A first Settlement._]