_Goderich Hotels—Eagle’s Nest—Doctor Dunlop—Cheap Dinner—Search for an
East Lothian Farmer—Goderich—Poverty of Settlers—Canada
Company—State of Goderich Settlement—Journey to London—Mr T***—Aux
Sable Creek—Ship-builder from Essex—Negro Settlement—Notices of
Nature—Robinson Hotel—Mode of Travelling—Huron Track Roads—London—St
Thomas—Port Stanley—Emigrants from Argyleshire—Dirty
Beds—Agricultural Notices._
On arriving at Goderich, we could not get admittance to Reid’s hotel,
unless my friend and I would occupy half a bed, which induced us to
drive to that of Mr Fisher, where we slept uncomfortably on the floor,
the landlady telling us, while preparing the pallet, that Goderich was a
poor place. While partaking of tea, served up after the fashion of the
States, I imagined the sugar had been put into the pot, as there was
none visible in the apartment, but next morning I discovered it was
mixed with the cream. Fisher’s hotel was crowded with workmen of all
descriptions, and by way of kindness, I suppose, we were invited to
breakfast with the family. My shoes had long remained uncleaned, and I
got them blackened here by paying 3d. sterling, which was unprofitably
spent money, as a few minutes’ walking in dewy grass rendered them as
brown as before.
After breakfast, we walked in the direction of Dr Dunlop’s new cottage,
on the north side of the river Maitland, and named the Eagle’s Nest. The
situation seems happily chosen, and the name is characteristic of the
owner. We spent a considerable time in examining the vegetable
productions of the large islands formed by the river, which, at the time
we saw it, was a mere brook, until overtaken by a shower, which
compelled us to return to Goderich without reaching the Nest. I
understood the islands at the mouth of the Maitland and the adjoining
banks, had been granted as a common to the inhabitants of Goderich. The
grass was very limited in quantity as well as variety of species, but
tall growing weeds of great beauty covered the surface. I do not know
whether these plants flavoured dairy produce; but the butter we got at
Goderich was so nauseous, that neither my friend nor I could eat this
substance for some days afterwards. The butter of Upper Canada was
generally of the worst quality.
On returning from our walk we called on Dr Dunlop, at the office of the
Canada Company, who introduced us to his brother the captain, recently
arrived in the country. I had been furnished with an introductory letter
to the Doctor, from a _well-known character_, both in Scotland and
Canada, and which I left with Mr Jones at York. The Doctor seemed busy,
and our conversation was limited, which I did not much regret, as I
visited America with a determination to judge of matters more from what
I saw than what might be told me, and there appeared nothing in the
circumstances of the Goderich settlement requiring much explanation.
As Mr Fisher’s establishment did not appear of the first order, we
determined on dining at the principal hotel, where we were admitted to
what Mr Reid termed a family dinner. The table seemed surrounded by all
the inmates of the houses twelve or fourteen in number, including
boarders and travellers of all descriptions. Mr Reid presided, and
amused me by distributing a tureen full of Scotch broth, with a tea-cup
for a divider, and from the shortness of the handle, his fingers were
immersed in stirring up the liquid. The entertainment was poor enough,
and cost the moderate sum of sixpence sterling.
Having promised, on parting at Montreal with Mr D——, to endeavour to
visit, if possible, a friend of his in the neighbourhood of Goderich,
who once farmed in one of the finest situations in East Lothian, I felt
anxious to witness the proceedings of an East Lothian farmer in so new a
settlement as this; and immediately after dinner set out in search of Mr
K——, who, we were told, lived about four miles from Goderich, on the
shores of Lake Huron. We at first attempted to walk along the margin of
the lake; but the quantity of drift and fallen timber which lined the
shore, joined to the surge which was rushing from the west with the
violence of a tempestuous ocean, rendered this route impracticable. On
regaining the banks above the lake, I approached a cottage, and enquired
the way. A young gentleman asked me to walk into his house, and he would
furnish a hand-sketch of the road. He was employed in mapping for the
Canada Company, and his productions did him credit. He told me he was
from Edinburgh, and brother to ——, a well-known engraver there, and
whose name was quite familiar to me. On enquiring the way a second time,
a mile or two farther on, I was astonished at a gentleman mentioning my
name, when he said he had seen me in Edinburgh, where he was a
brassfounder in the Grassmarket, and had only been a few weeks is the
country. Notwithstanding the assistance of a sketch of the road, and
minute directions received regarding it, we could not find the object of
our search, and must have passed the night in the woods, had not the
light of the moon, which was fortunately within a night of being full,
enabled us to reach Goderich. The road on which we travelled is termed a
concession line, and was marked by a blaze or axe-chip on the bark of
trees. From this concession line, the different lots of property
diverged, and were distinguished by marks which old countrymen could not
readily notice; and I have no doubt we passed over the property of Mr
K——, without discovering the tract leading to his abode. The concession
line, a mile from Goderich, was almost an undistinguishable path, on
which a horse or sleigh seemed never to have travelled. The cleared
spaces on the different lots seldom exceed a few acres; and while
conversing with my friend, I compared our route through the forest to a
hare-path in an East Lothian wheat field, and the openings around the
dwelling places to the forms of that animal.
Goderich is situated on the margin of Lake Huron, at the mouth of the
river Maitland, and consists of about forty mean wooden houses,
scattered irregularly over a considerable space. With exception of
half-a-dozen of houses, near what is termed the pier, the rest of the
village is about 200 feet above the level of the lake, partly on a cedar
swamp, through which there is a street of corduroy. The Maitland river,
when seen by me, on 28th August, was incapable of floating a canoe, and
a vessel, a few tons burden, could not enter the mouth of the harbour.
I found the Canada Company very unpopular at Goderich, although Dr
Dunlop is a favourite amongst the settlers, who are of the poorest
class, and seemingly without industry or energy of any kind. Indeed,
when men despair of overcoming their pecuniary difficulties, which must
have been the case with most of the first settlers, they are apt to
become both indolent and dissipated. The Canada Company charge 7s. 6d.
per acre for land, payable, with interest, by instalments; and when a
specified extent is taken, part of the settler’s travelling expenses are
allowed him out of the second instalment. This is a most disadvantageous
regulation for emigrants, being a premium to purchase beyond their means
of paying, and an unprofitable locking up, or perhaps rather transfer of
capital, which cannot by possibility fail of ending in ruin, as it hath
been proved by the whole history of American wood settlers, that they
find it difficult, for the first three years, with the utmost industry,
to do more than maintain their families. In this case, the interest on
the unpaid instalments is more than the cleared part of the farm will
yield of profit at the end of five or six years, where a person trusts
alone to his personal labour for improving. When all the instalments are
duly paid, the price of the forest land, which seldom yields a blade of
grass, and is totally unproductive, remains an overwhelming burden on
what is cleared. Dr Dunlop told me, that only one of the original
settlers continued to hold his land at the time of my visit to Goderich,
and alluded to a cause for their removal, which I did not think likely
to have produced the effect. The first settlers at Goderich were people
of limited means, the majority of them paupers, and they soon became so
involved to the Company, as to induce them to leave the district. Many
of the recent purchasers, perhaps forty or fifty of them, were working
on the Company’s roads while I was present, which the Doctor told me was
the only means by which they could render payment.
It seem bad policy in a nation overflowing with population to sell a
large though distant tract of land to speculators, like the Canada
Company, who must seek immediate gain, without regard to the ultimate
welfare of settlers, and only pursue revenue without aiming to develope
the permanent resources of the district. Such an extent of territory as
the Canada company possess, gives a monopoly of land, and a power of
enhancing price, operating on the emigrant as a tax, which is
transferred to the shareholders in England, instead of being employed on
the spot. The affairs of the Company are not likely to be soon wound up,
as the lands of insolvent purchasers will, from time to time, return to
its management, and the price of land will be raised beyond the demands
of the population, as well as let on lease. The political power of the
Company will soon be felt, and its minions thrust into the legislature
of the country, to the retarding of every local improvement affecting
the finances of the Company. The shareholders will ultimately occupy the
position of absentee landlords, and become the most avaricious of
taskmasters.
The first settlement in the Huron tract having been made in 1829, it
would be unreasonable to expect any thing like luxury or old-country
comfort in the neighbourhood of Goderich. The habitations of the farmer
are generally of the meanest description, and often quite equal in
wretchedness to the worst hovels of Ireland and Scotland, and perhaps
the notions of many of the settlers lead them to desire no better
accommodation. It has already been noticed, that only one of the
original farmers retains his possessions, and their successors are an
improved race. A change proceeding in this manner may have benefited
society, but at present there is a coarse rawness about men and things
at Goderich which I felt far from being agreeable.
We left Goderich at seven in the morning of the 28th of August, and
about seventeen miles distant, met Mr T—— and his friends journeying to
Goderich, and resting on the wayside till their horse had fed, and I
enjoyed highly a piece of bread which he presented to me. This gentleman
had one of his horses stolen by an Indian the night preceding, and which
was seen by us grazing with a halter on its head a few miles distant. I
had become acquainted with Mr T—— in travelling from Montreal to York,
and we regretted missing him at Goderich, where his local knowledge,
joined to his sound sense, would have rendered him a most desirable
companion.
It had rained pretty heavily in the afternoon, and we reached an inn at
Aux Sable creek, hungry and wet. In a miserable log-house of two
apartments, ten travellers passed the night, partly in beds and partly
on the floor. The door was a collection of open boards, and the walls
and roof admitted air and light in all directions. The bed which I
occupied, in common with my friend, was hard and uneven, and I arose
from it unrefreshed. The morning was so cold that I could hardly warm
myself by walking, and the rays of a cloudless sun were courted for
warmth at midday. After travelling nearly seven hours we made seventeen
miles, at the end of which I enjoyed the company of an old Irishwoman,
cooking pork, potatoes, apples, and tea to breakfast, for a party which
had travelled together from Aux Sable creek. This old lady and her
husband had been thirteen years on a farm of 150 acres, eighty of which
were cleared, and every thing around them looked comfortable. I joined
two reapers, and cut a few sheaves in a very fine field of oats, which I
was told had been cropped for twelve successive years without an
application of manure. After resting the horses, we proceeded on our
journey to London.
About noon of the preceding day, I had some conversation with a
ship-builder from Essex, in England, settled on the London road in the
Huron tract, and at whose dwelling I made an unsuccessful application
for something to eat. Like most settlers, he was full of hope, and
extolled the fertility of his soil. On remarking to him that his wheat
crop, which had been sown in spring, was destroyed by mildew, he
reluctantly admitted the fact, and added that he was assured mildew did
not visit the district above once in twenty years; not perhaps being
aware that I knew the district had only been inhabited three or four
years, and not even visited by a white person more than six years
previous to the time of our conversation. Some of this person’s family
had a sickly appearance, and on questioning him if any of them ever had
ague, he told me several caught the complaint while residing at
Hamilton, on Lake Ontario, but it was quite unknown in his present
situation. I record these anecdotes as two of the thousand instances
which occurred, of settlers lessening the evils, or rather magnifying
the advantages, of their situation, and how necessary it is to sift, by
reflection, the grain from the chaff of common conversation.
On the boundary of the Huron tract, next to the London district, we
passed a negro settlement. The houses of the coloured people appeared of
a particular construction, having the chimney-stack on the outside of
the log-house, and which stack is composed of thin sawn timber, placed
horizontally, and mixed with clay. Their chief crop was Indian corn,
well cultivated. Before my departure from Britain, I had heard this
settlement instanced as a complete failure, and used as an argument
against the emancipation of slaves, then a general topic of
conversation. The houses, barns, fences, and general appearances of this
settlement are certainly mean enough, but I considered it in most
respects equal, and in some superior, to settlements of whites in the
Huron tract of the same standing of three years. But admitting, for
argument’s sake, that this negro settlement had been a failure, the
circumstance could not form a good reason of expediency against
emancipation generally. When individuals attain maturity in a state of
slavery, they will become so demoralized as to be incapable of acting
with the feelings and aspirations of freemen and moral agents, and it is
the rising and not the risen generation that much improvement is to be
expected from. Perhaps the neglected and depressed state in which the
poor Irish are reared in their native country is the chief cause of
their making improvident settlers in Canada, and continuing hewers of
wood and carriers of water over so great a portion of the globe.
The land in the Huron tract is truly excellent, with exception of a few
miles around Goderich, which is sandy or gravelly, and some small cedar,
ash, and larch swamps, being fine clay with a covering of black
vegetable mould. The soil on the road leading from Van Egmont’s tavern
to London, is particularly fine clay, especially near the Bayfield
river, and the whole surface is perfectly level, with exception of the
margins of the creeks. The London district is gently undulating, the
soil greatly inferior to the Huron tract, and near the village becomes
barren sand.
The wood on the road from Goderich to London is chiefly maple,
interspersed with beech and elm, the latter being of considerable size.
White clover is seldom seen on the waysides, red never, timothy
plentiful, and a few plants of cocksfoot. Alder was growing in every
place where the forest had been cut down, and put forth shoots of
uncommon luxuriance, which seemed to die yearly, as I never observed a
trunk or branch of a former year’s growth. The species appeared the same
as that common in Britain, and perhaps the young shoots cannot withstand
the rigours of a Canadian winter.
I observed a wasp-nest in the ground on the Goderich road, where swarms
of the insects were passing out and in. They appeared similar to the
wasp of Britain; but my friend was not philosopher enough to be
prevailed on to try their stinging powers.
On reaching London we stopped at the Robinson hotel, christened a few
days previous to our arrival, in compliment to the chief justice of the
province, who had honoured the house by his presence while on the
circuit. The landlord told us the dinner was over, but that he would
prepare something for us immediately. In the meantime we retired to
wash, and at the end of an hour and a half discovered it was intended to
put off our eating till the arrival of tea hour. We had been treated in
the same manner at Brantford; and after remonstrating with the landlord
on the impropriety of promising dinner without furnishing it, we removed
to the Mansion House hotel, where we experienced civility and attention.
This evening we parted with our waggoner, Francis Packet, who had
brought us from Brantford. Unlike his countrymen, he possessed little
wit or humour, but he was very good-natured, strictly sober,
accommodating, and an excellent driver. He seemed disposed to accompany
us throughout the remainder of our tour, and I confidently recommend him
and his chestnut horses, John and Charlie, to all who may require their
services. Francis was seldom disposed to talk much, but he invariably
accosted every person on the road, by saying, in broken English, “How
far tavern?”
At Brantford we engaged a waggon in preference to horses, under an idea
of its being an easier mode of conveyance, but I am now satisfied our
opinion was erroneous, as horseback would have been more expeditious,
and less fatiguing than our waggon, over such roads as we travelled. The
roads formed by the Canada Company in the Huron tract have been styled
good by the Backwoodsmen, and so puffed off in every British newspaper,
that Englishmen may be apt to imagine they are Macadamized. They are
simply straight lines, formed by felling trees, the branches and trunks
of which have been burnt, or formed into corduroy, and the stumps, from
two to three feet in height, left standing. I have already alluded to
the extent of corduroy, a description of roads which most travellers
speak of with horror, and, without meaning to praise it, I must say it
was by far the best and smoothest portions of the Goderich roads. The
roots projecting from the stumps in a slanting direction kept the wheels
and axles of our waggon moving up and down with the regularity of the
beam of a steam-engine, and were alike annoying to us, and fatiguing to
the horses, and more especially when travelling between Van Egmont’s
tavern and London. In the neighbourhood of Goderich people were engaged
in burning out the stumps, and throwing the earth from the sides into
the middle of the road, giving it a convex form, which, in American
phraseology, is called turnpiking, and this operation will be extended
in time, if settlers have not cash to discharge their engagements to the
Company.
London is situated at what is termed the Forks of the Thames, and when
the forest is a little more cleared away than at present, few situations
will be accounted more beautiful. At present a number of houses are
being erected, and the village is rising rapidly into importance. It
contains three or four large hotels, many well-filled stores, and a
court house, of which the inhabitants feel proud.
On the 30th August we left London for St Thomas and Port Stanley, in a
waggon belonging to St Thomas, and enjoyed our drive after the jolting
snail pace we had experienced on the horrid roads of the Huron tract.
Dining at St Thomas, we walked to Port Stanley, where we remained for
the night. Next morning we returned to St Thomas, in the midst of a
heavy ran, which confined us to the house for the greater part of the
day.
St Thomas seems healthily situated on a bend of Kettle creek, about 200
feet above its waters. Three years ago it consisted of thirteen houses,
now there are about fifty. Mr Gregory, at whose hotel we stopt, then had
four beds, now he has twenty-five, and is engaged in enlarging his house
to twice its present size. There are other two good hotels in the
village.
Port Stanley is situated at the mouth of Kettle creek, and has a
tolerably good harbour, formed by wooden piers jutting into the lake.
This is almost the only port at present on the north side of Lake Erie,
and from its proximity to London and St Thomas, its trade will greatly
increase. A steam-boat commenced this season to ply regularly from
Buffalo, by which a number of British emigrants reach the London
district by way of New York and the Erie Canal. Steam-boats also touch
in passing from Chippaway to Sandwich and Chatham.
Kettle creek is a small stream running in a deep channel, the banks
being clay, and nearly 200 feet high at its mouth on the shores of the
lake, from the bosom of which we saw the moon rise majestically, while
examining the banks. On Kettle creek there is a carding, grist, and
saw-mill, a distillery and brewery, situated between St Thomas and Port
Stanley.
At Port Stanley I conversed with a party of emigrants encamped on the
wharf, from Argyleshire, Scotland, who had come by way of New York, and
seemed in comfortable circumstances. The males of the party had gone
into the country in search of relations, who had settled some years
before, and the females were anxiously looking for their return. Several
women, apparently on the verge of seventy years of age, and infant
children, were amongst the number. A middle-aged woman complained to me
of the dirtiness of the beds at Port Stanley, and the extravagance of
the charges. On the preceding night she had been charged 1s. for a bed.
Water to wash her children’s faces could not be obtained, and the party
preferred lying in the open air to the nasty beds. This was a sensible
and well-informed woman, although she had not got quit of her home
prejudices in some little matters. The difficulty of obtaining water to
wash her children might soon have been got over, by going for it herself
to the lake or creek, neither of which were seventy yards distant; and
if a vessel for holding water had been denied her, she might have taken
the children to the water. People brought up in an artificial state of
society must often wonder at their own helplessness on first arriving in
Canada. I quite agree with my countrywoman in the dirtiness of the beds
in some parts of western Canada. My friend C—— much oftener slept on the
floor than in the beds; but long before this time my notions of delicacy
in this respect had been overcome by reflection, if not blunted by
habit, and I reposed as soundly while in Canada, as ever I did in the
most luxurious night of my life.
The surface between the village of London and Lake Erie is undulating,
varying from clay to sand, and a very small portion can be termed rich.
Three miles from Port Stanley the soil is oak openings of the poorest
sand. There is a scarcity of running water, Kettle Creek being the only
instance seen in a distance of thirty miles. Many orchards are to be met
with, and soil and climate seem highly congenial to the apple-tree.
The settlers on what is known by Talbot road, running through St Thomas,
and at no great distance from Lake Erie, live in mean log-houses, with
miserable barns and fences. The clearances extend from thirty to sixty
acres, and improvement of every description seems at a stand amongst
them. Labourers’ wages were stated at $120 a-year, with bed and board.
Wheat, crop 1832, was 2s. 9d. cash, and 3s. sterling, store-pay, per
bushel. Mr Gregory told me he had purchased good wheat at St Thomas at
1s. 9d. per bushel, and it has been known as low as 1s. sterling.