QUEBEC AND MONTMORENCI.
About six o’clock we started for Quebec, one hundred and eighty miles
distant by the river; gliding past Longueil and Boucherville on the
right, and _Pointe aux Trembles_, “so called from having been originally
covered with aspens,” and _Bout de l’Isle_, or the end of the island, on
the left. I repeat these names not merely for want of more substantial
facts to record, but because they sounded singularly poetic to my ears.
There certainly was no lie in them. They suggested that some simple,
and, perchance, heroic human life might have transpired there. There is
all the poetry in the world in a name. It is a poem which the mass of
men hear and read. What is poetry in the common sense, but a string of
such jingling names? I want nothing better than a good word. The name of
a thing may easily be more than the thing itself to me. Inexpressibly
beautiful appears the recognition by man of the least natural fact, and
the allying his life to it. All the world reiterating this slender
truth, that aspens once grew there; and the swift inference is, that men
were there to see them. And so it would be with the names of our native
and neighboring villages, if we had not profaned them.
The daylight now failed us, and we went below; but I endeavored to
console myself for being obliged to make this voyage by night, by
thinking that I did not lose a great deal, the shores being low and
rather unattractive, and that the river itself was much the more
interesting object. I heard something in the night about the boat being
at William Henry, Three Rivers, and in the Richelieu Rapids, but I was
still where I had been when I lost sight of _Pointe aux Trembles_. To
hear a man who has been waked up at midnight in the cabin of a
steamboat, inquiring, “Waiter, where are we now?” is, as if at any
moment of the earth’s revolution round the sun, or of the system round
its centre, one were to raise himself up and inquire of one of the deck
hands, “Where are we now?”
I went on deck at daybreak, when we were thirty or forty miles above
Quebec. The banks were now higher and more interesting. There was an
“uninterrupted succession of whitewashed cottages” on each side of the
river. This is what every traveller tells. But it is not to be taken as
an evidence of the populousness of the country in general, hardly even
of the river banks. They have presented a similar appearance for a
hundred years. The Swedish traveller and naturalist, Kalm, who descended
this river in 1749, says: “It could really be called a village,
beginning at Montreal and ending at Quebec, which is a distance of more
than one hundred and eighty miles; for the farm-houses are never above
five arpens, and sometimes but three asunder, a few places excepted.”
Even in 1684 Hontan said that the houses were not more than a gunshot
apart at most. Erelong we passed Cape Rouge, eight miles above Quebec,
the mouth of the Chaudière on the opposite or south side, New Liverpool
Cove with its lumber rafts and some shipping; then Sillery and Wolfe’s
Cove and the Heights of Abraham on the north, with now a view of Cape
Diamond, and the citadel in front. The approach to Quebec was very
imposing. It was about six o’clock in the morning when we arrived. There
is but a single street under the cliff on the south side of the cape,
which was made by blasting the rocks and filling up the river.
Three-story houses did not rise more than one fifth or one sixth the way
up the nearly perpendicular rock, whose summit is three hundred and
forty-five feet above the water. We saw, as we glided past, the sign on
the side of the precipice, part way up, pointing to the spot where
Montgomery was killed in 1775. Formerly it was the custom for those who
went to Quebec for the first time to be ducked, or else pay a fine. Not
even the Governor General escaped. But we were too many to be ducked,
even if the custom had not been abolished.[1]
Footnote 1:
Hierosme Lalemant says in 1648, in his relation, he being Superior:
“All those who come to New France know well enough the mountain of
Notre Dame, because the pilots and sailors, being, arrived at that
part of the Great River which is opposite to those high mountains,
baptize ordinarily for sport the new passengers, if they do not turn
aside by some present the inundation of this baptism which one makes
flow plentifully on their heads.”
Here we were, in the harbor of Quebec, still three hundred and sixty
miles from the mouth of the St. Lawrence, in a basin two miles across,
where the greatest depth is twenty-eight fathoms, and though the water
is fresh, the tide rises seventeen to twenty-four feet,—a harbor “large
and deep enough,” says a British traveller, “to hold the English navy.”
I may as well state that, in 1844, the county of Quebec contained about
forty-five thousand inhabitants (the city and suburbs having about
forty-three thousand); about twenty-eight thousand being Canadians of
French origin; eight thousand British; over seven thousand natives of
Ireland; one thousand five hundred natives of England; the rest Scotch
and others. Thirty-six thousand belong to the Church of Rome.
Separating ourselves from the crowd, we walked up a narrow street,
thence ascended by some wooden steps, called the Break-neck Stairs, into
another steep, narrow, and zigzag street, blasted through the rock,
which last led through a low massive stone portal, called Prescott Gate,
the principal thoroughfare into the Upper Town. This passage was
defended by cannon, with a guard-house over it, a sentinel at his post,
and other soldiers at hand ready to relieve him. I rubbed my eyes to be
sure that I was in the nineteenth century, and was not entering one of
those portals which sometimes adorn the frontispieces of new editions of
old black-letter volumes. I thought it would be a good place to read
Froissart’s Chronicles. It was such a reminiscence of the Middle Ages as
Scott’s novels. Men apparently dwelt there for security. Peace be unto
them! As if the inhabitants of New York were to go over to Castle
William to live! What a place it must be to bring up children! Being
safe through the gate we naturally took the street which was steepest,
and after a few turns found ourselves on the Durham Terrace, a wooden
platform on the site of the old castle of St. Louis, still one hundred
and fifteen feet below the summit of the citadel, overlooking the Lower
Town, the wharf where we had landed, the harbor, the Isle of Orleans,
and the river and surrounding country to a great distance. It was
literally a _splendid_ view. We could see six or seven miles distant, in
the northeast, an indentation in the lofty shore of the northern
channel, apparently on one side of the harbor, which marked the mouth of
the Montmorenci, whose celebrated fall was only a few rods in the rear.
At a shoe-shop, whither we were directed for this purpose, we got some
of our American money changed into English. I found that American hard
money would have answered as well, excepting cents, which fell very fast
before their pennies, it taking two of the former to make one of the
latter, and often the penny, which had cost us two cents, did us the
service of one cent only. Moreover, our robust cents were compelled to
meet on even terms a crew of vile half-penny tokens, and bung-town
coppers, which had more brass in their composition, and so perchance
made their way in the world. Wishing to get into the citadel, we were
directed to the Jesuits’ Barracks,—a good part of the public buildings
here are barracks,—to get a pass of the Town Major. We did not heed the
sentries at the gate, nor did they us, and what under the sun they were
placed there for, unless to hinder a free circulation of the air, was
not apparent. There we saw soldiers eating their breakfasts in their
mess-room, from bare wooden tables in camp fashion. We were continually
meeting with soldiers in the streets, carrying funny little tin pails of
all shapes, even semicircular, as if made to pack conveniently. I
supposed that they contained their dinners,—so many slices of bread and
butter to each, perchance. Sometimes they were carrying some kind of
military chest on a sort of bier or hand-barrow, with a springy,
undulating, military step, all passengers giving way to them, even the
charette-drivers stopping for them to pass,—as if the battle were being
lost from an inadequate supply of powder. There was a regiment of
Highlanders, and, as I understood, of Royal Irish, in the city; and by
this time there was a regiment of Yankees also. I had already observed,
looking up even from the water, the head and shoulders of some General
Poniatowsky, with an enormous cocked hat and gun, peering over the roof
of a house, away up where the chimney caps commonly are with us, as it
were a caricature of war and military awfulness; but I had not gone far
up St. Louis Street before my riddle was solved, by the apparition of a
real live Highlander under a cocked hat, and with his knees out,
standing and marching sentinel on the ramparts, between St. Louis and
St. John’s Gate. (It must be a holy war that is waged there.) We stood
close by without fear and looked at him. His legs were somewhat tanned,
and the hair had begun to grow on them, as some of our wise men predict
that it will in such cases, but I did not think they were remarkable in
any respect. Notwithstanding all his warlike gear, when I inquired of
him the way to the Plains of Abraham, he could not answer me without
betraying some bashfulness through his broad Scotch. Soon after, we
passed another of these creatures standing sentry at the St. Louis Gate,
who let us go by without shooting us, or even demanding the countersign.
We then began to go through the gate, which was so thick and
tunnel-like, as to remind me of those lines in Claudian’s Old Man of
Verona, about the getting out of the gate being the greater part of a
journey;—as you might imagine yourself crawling through an architectural
vignette _at the end_ of a black-letter volume. We were then reminded
that we had been in a fortress, from which we emerged by numerous
zig-zags in a ditch-like road, going a considerable distance to advance
a few rods, where they could have shot us two or three times over, if
their minds had been disposed as their guns were. The greatest, or
rather the most prominent, part of this city was constructed with the
design to offer the deadest resistance to leaden and iron missiles that
might be cast against it. But it is a remarkable meteorological and
psychological fact, that it is rarely known to rain lead with much
violence, except on places so constructed. Keeping on about a mile we
came to the Plains of Abraham,—for having got through with the Saints,
we come next to the Patriarchs. Here the Highland regiment was being
reviewed, while the band stood on one side and played,—methinks it was
_La Claire Fontaine_, the national air of the Canadian French. This is
the site where a real battle once took place, to commemorate which they
have had a sham fight here almost every day since. The Highlanders
manœuvred very well, and if the precision of their movements was less
remarkable, they did not appear so stiffly erect as the English or Royal
Irish, but had a more elastic and graceful gait, like a herd of their
own red deer, or as if accustomed to stepping down the sides of
mountains. But they made a sad impression on the whole, for it was
obvious that all true manhood was in the process of being drilled out of
them. I have no doubt that soldiers well drilled are, as a class,
peculiarly destitute of originality and independence. The officers
appeared like men dressed above their condition. It is impossible to
give the soldier a good education, without making him a deserter. His
natural foe is the government that drills him. What would any
philanthropist, who felt an interest in these men’s welfare, naturally
do, but first of all teach them so to respect themselves, that they
could not be hired for this work, whatever might be the consequences to
this government or that;—not drill a few, but educate all. I observed
one older man among them, gray as a wharf-rat, and supple as the Devil,
marching lock-step with the rest who would have to pay for that elastic
gait.
We returned to the citadel along the heights, plucking such flowers as
grew there. There was an abundance of succory still in blossom,
broad-leaved golden-rod, buttercups, thorn bushes, Canada thistles, and
ivy, on the very summit of Cape Diamond. I also found the
bladder-campion in the neighborhood. We there enjoyed an extensive view,
which I will describe in another place. Our pass, which stated that all
the rules were “to be strictly enforced,” as if they were determined to
keep up the semblance of reality to the last gasp, opened to us the
Dalhousie Gate, and we were conducted over the citadel by a bare-legged
Highlander in cocked hat and full regimentals. He told us that he had
been here about three years, and had formerly been stationed at
Gibraltar. As if his regiment, having perchance been nestled amid the
rocks of Edinburgh Castle, must flit from rock to rock thenceforth over
the earth’s surface, like a bald eagle, or other bird of prey, from
eyrie to eyrie. As we were going out, we met the Yankees coming in, in a
body, headed by a red-coated officer called the commandant, and escorted
by many citizens, both English and French Canadian. I therefore
immediately fell into the procession, and went round the citadel again
with more intelligent guides, carrying, as before, all my effects with
me. Seeing that nobody walked with the red-coated commandant, I attached
myself to him, and though I was not what is called well-dressed, he did
not know whether to repel me or not, for I talked like one who was not
aware of any deficiency in that respect. Probably there was not one
among all the Yankees who went to Canada this time, who was not more
splendidly dressed than I was. It would have been a poor story if I had
not enjoyed some distinction. I had on my “bad-weather clothes,” like
Olaf Trygesson the Northman, when he went to the Thing in England,
where, by the way, he won his bride. As we stood by the
thirty-two-pounder on the summit of Cape Diamond, which is fired three
times a day, the commandant told me that it would carry to the Isle of
Orleans, four miles distant, and that no hostile vessel could come round
the island. I now saw the subterranean or, rather, “casemated barracks”
of the soldiers, which I had not noticed before, though I might have
walked over them. They had very narrow windows, serving as loop-holes
for musketry, and small iron chimneys rising above the ground. There we
saw the soldiers at home and in an undress, splitting wood,—I looked to
see whether with swords or axes,—and in various ways endeavoring to
realize that their nation was now at peace with this part of the world.
A part of each regiment, chiefly officers, are allowed to marry. A
grandfatherly, would-be witty Englishman could give a Yankee whom he was
patronizing no reason for the bare knees of the Highlanders, other than
oddity. The rock within the citadel is a little convex, so that shells
falling on it would roll toward the circumference, where the barracks of
the soldiers and officers are; it has been proposed, therefore, to make
it slightly concave, so that they may roll into the centre, where they
would be comparatively harmless; and it is estimated that to do this
would cost twenty thousand pounds sterling. It may be well to remember
this when I build my next house, and have the roof “all correct” for
bombshells.
At mid-afternoon we made haste down _Sault-au-Matelot_ street, towards
the Falls of Montmorenci, about eight miles down the St. Lawrence, on
the north side, leaving the further examination of Quebec till our
return. On our way, we saw men in the streets sawing logs pit-fashion,
and afterward, with a common wood-saw and horse, cutting the planks into
squares for paving the streets. This looked very shiftless, especially
in a country abounding in water-power, and reminded me that I was no
longer in Yankee land. I found, on inquiry, that the excuse for this
was, that labor was so cheap; and I thought, with some pain, how cheap
men are here! I have since learned that the English traveller,
Warburton, remarked, soon after landing at Quebec, that everything was
cheap there but men. That must be the difference between going thither
from New and from Old England. I had already observed the dogs harnessed
to their little milk-carts, which contain a single large can, lying
asleep in the gutters regardless of the horses, while they rested from
their labors, at different stages of the ascent in the Upper Town. I was
surprised at the regular and extensive use made of these animals for
drawing, not only milk, but groceries, wood, &c. It reminded me that the
dog commonly is not put to any use. Cats catch mice; but dogs only worry
the cats. Kalm, a hundred years ago, saw sledges here for ladies to ride
in, drawn by a pair of dogs. He says, “A middle-sized dog is sufficient
to draw a single person, when the roads are good”; and he was told by
old people, that horses were very scarce in their youth, and almost all
the land-carriage was then effected by dogs. They made me think of the
Esquimaux, who, in fact, are the next people on the north. Charlevoix
says, that the first horses were introduced in 1665.
We crossed Dorchester Bridge, over the St. Charles, the little river in
which Cartier, the discoverer of the St. Lawrence, put his ships, and
spent the winter of 1535, and found ourselves on an excellent
macadamized road, called _Le Chemin de Beauport_. We had left Concord
Wednesday morning, and we endeavored to realize that now, Friday
morning, we were taking a walk in Canada, in the Seigniory of Beauport,
a foreign country, which a few days before had seemed almost as far off
as England and France. Instead of rambling to Flint’s Pond or the
Sudbury Meadows, we found ourselves, after being a little detained in
cars and steamboats,—after spending half a night at Burlington, and half
a day at Montreal,—taking a walk down the bank of the St. Lawrence to
the Falls of Montmorenci and elsewhere. Well, I thought to myself, here
I am in a foreign country; let me have my eyes about me, and take it all
in. It already looked and felt a good deal colder than it had in New
England, as we might have expected it would. I realized fully that I was
four degrees nearer the pole, and shuddered at the thought; and I
wondered if it were possible that the peaches might not be all gone when
I returned. It was an atmosphere that made me think of the fur-trade,
which is so interesting a department in Canada, for I had for all
head-covering a thin palm-leaf hat without lining, that cost twenty-five
cents, and over my coat one of those unspeakably cheap, as well as thin,
brown linen sacks of the Oak Hall pattern, which every summer appear all
over New England, thick as the leaves upon the trees. It was a
thoroughly Yankee costume, which some of my fellow-travellers wore in
the cars to save their coats a dusting. I wore mine, at first, because
it looked better than the coat it covered, and last, because two coats
were warmer than one, though one was thin and dirty. I never wear my
best coat on a journey, though perchance I could show a certificate to
prove that I have a more costly one, at least, at home, if that were all
that a gentleman required. It is not wise for a traveller to go dressed.
I should no more think of it than of putting on a clean dicky and
blacking my shoes to go a-fishing; as if you were going out to dine,
when, in fact, the genuine traveller is going out to work hard, and fare
harder,—to eat a crust by the wayside whenever he can get it. Honest
travelling is about as dirty work as you can do, and a man needs a pair
of overalls for it. As for blacking my shoes in such a case, I should as
soon think of blacking my face. I carry a piece of tallow to preserve
the leather, and keep out the water; that’s all; and many an officious
shoe-black, who carried off my shoes when I was slumbering, mistaking me
for a gentleman, has had occasion to repent it before he produced a
gloss on them.
My pack, in fact, was soon made, for I keep a short list of those
articles which, from frequent experience, I have found indispensable to
the foot-traveller; and, when I am about to start, I have only to
consult that, to be sure that nothing is omitted, and, what is more
important, nothing superfluous inserted. Most of my fellow-travellers
carried carpet-bags, or valises. Sometimes one had two or three
ponderous yellow valises in his clutch, at each hitch of the cars, as if
we were going to have another rush for seats; and when there was a rush
in earnest, and there were not a few, I would see my man in the crowd,
with two or three affectionate lusty fellows along each side of his arm,
between his shoulder and his valises, which last held them tight to his
back, like the nut on the end of a screw. I could not help asking in my
mind, What so great cause for showing Canada to those valises, when
perhaps your very nieces had to stay at home for want of an escort? I
should have liked to be present when the custom-house officer came
aboard of him, and asked him to declare upon his honor if he had
anything but wearing apparel in them. Even the elephant carries but a
small trunk on his journeys. The perfection of travelling is to travel
without baggage. After considerable reflection and experience, I have
concluded that the best bag for the foot-traveller is made with a
handkerchief, or, if he study appearances, a piece of stiff brown paper,
well tied up, with a fresh piece within to put outside when the first is
torn. That is good for both town and country, and none will know but you
are carrying home the silk for a new gown for your wife, when it may be
a dirty shirt. A bundle which you can carry literally under your arm,
and which will shrink and swell with its contents. I never found the
carpet-bag of equal capacity, which was not a bundle of itself. We
styled ourselves the Knights of the Umbrella and the Bundle; for
wherever we went, whether to Notre Dame or Mount Royal, or the Champ de
Mars, to the Town Major’s or the Bishop’s Palace, to the Citadel, with a
bare-legged Highlander for our escort, or to the Plains of Abraham, to
dinner or to bed, the umbrella and the bundle went with us; for we
wished to be ready to digress at any moment. We made it our home nowhere
in particular, but everywhere where our umbrella and bundle were. It
would have been an amusing circumstance, if the Mayor of one of those
cities had politely asked us where we were staying. We could only have
answered, that we were staying with his Honor for the time being. I was
amused when, after our return, some green ones inquired if we found it
easy to get accommodated; as if we went abroad to get accommodated, when
we can get that at home.
We met with many charettes, bringing wood and stone to the city. The
most ordinary looking horses travelled faster than ours, or, perhaps
they were ordinary looking, because, as I am told, the Canadians do not
use the curry-comb. Moreover, it is said, that on the approach of winter
their horses acquire an increased quantity of hair, to protect them from
the cold. If this be true, some of our horses would make you think
winter were approaching, even in midsummer. We soon began to see women
and girls at work in the fields, digging potatoes alone, or bundling up
the grain which the men cut. They appeared in rude health, with a great
deal of color in their cheeks, and, if their occupation had made them
coarse, it impressed me as better in its effects than making shirts at
fourpence apiece, or doing nothing at all; unless it be chewing slate
pencils, with still smaller results. They were much more agreeable
objects, with their great broad-brimmed hats and flowing dresses, than
the men and boys. We afterwards saw them doing various other kinds of
work; indeed, I thought that we saw more women at work out of doors than
men. On our return, we observed in this town a girl with Indian boots,
nearly two feet high, taking the harness off a dog. The purity and
transparency of the atmosphere were wonderful. When we had been walking
an hour, we were surprised, on turning round, to see how near the city,
with its glittering tin roofs, still looked. A village ten miles off did
not appear to be more than three or four. I was convinced that you could
see objects distinctly there much farther than here. It is true the
villages are of a dazzling white, but the dazzle is to be referred,
perhaps, to the transparency of the atmosphere as much as to the
whitewash.
We were now fairly in the village of Beauport, though there was still
but one road. The houses stood close upon this, without any front-yards,
and at any angle with it, as if they had dropped down, being set with
more reference to the road which the sun travels. It being about
sundown, and the Falls not far off, we began to look round for a
lodging, for we preferred to put up at a private house, that we might
see more of the inhabitants. We inquired first at the most promising
looking houses, if, indeed, any were promising. When we knocked, they
shouted some French word for come in, perhaps _entrez_, and we asked for
a lodging in English; but we found, unexpectedly, that they spoke French
only. Then we went along and tried another house, being generally
saluted by a rush of two or three little curs, which readily
distinguished a foreigner, and which we were prepared now to hear bark
in French. Our first question would be, _Parlez-vous Anglais?_ but the
invariable answer was, _Non, monsieur_; and we soon found that the
inhabitants were exclusively French Canadians, and nobody spoke English
at all, any more than in France; that, in fact, we were in a foreign
country, where the inhabitants uttered not one familiar sound to us.
Then we tried by turns to talk French with them, in which we succeeded
sometimes pretty well, but for the most part, pretty ill. _Pouvez-vous
nous donner un lit cette nuit?_ we would ask, and then they would answer
with French volubility, so that we could catch only a word here and
there. We could understand the women and children generally better than
the men, and they us; and thus, after a while, we would learn that they
had no more beds than they used.
So we were compelled to inquire: _Y a-t-il une maison publique ici?_
(_auberge_ we should have said, perhaps, for they seemed never to have
heard of the other), and they answered at length that there was no
tavern, unless we could get lodgings at the mill, _le moulin_, which we
had passed; or they would direct us to a grocery, and almost every house
had a small grocery at one end of it. We called on the public notary or
village lawyer, but he had no more beds nor English than the rest. At
one house there was so good a misunderstanding at once established
through the politeness of all parties, that we were encouraged to walk
in and sit down, and ask for a glass of water; and having drank their
water, we thought it was as good as to have tasted their salt. When our
host and his wife spoke of their poor accommodations, meaning for
themselves, we assured them that they were good enough, for we thought
that they were only apologizing for the poorness of the accommodations
they were about to offer us, and we did not discover our mistake till
they took us up a ladder into a loft, and showed to our eyes what they
had been laboring in vain to communicate to our brains through our ears,
that they had but that one apartment with its few beds for the whole
family. We made our _a-dieus_ forthwith, and with gravity, perceiving
the literal signification of that word. We were finally taken in at a
sort of public-house, whose master worked for Patterson, the proprietor
of the extensive saw-mills driven by a portion of the Montmorenci stolen
from the fall, whose roar we now heard. We here talked, or murdered
French all the evening, with the master of the house and his family, and
probably had a more amusing time than if we had completely understood
one another. At length they showed us to a bed in their best chamber,
very high to get into, with a low wooden rail to it. It had no cotton
sheets, but coarse, home-made, dark colored, linen ones. Afterward, we
had to do with sheets still coarser than these, and nearly the color of
our blankets. There was a large open buffet loaded with crockery, in one
corner of the room, as if to display their wealth to travellers, and
pictures of Scripture scenes, French, Italian, and Spanish, hung around.
Our hostess came back directly to inquire if we would have brandy for
breakfast. The next morning, when I asked their names, she took down the
temperance pledges of herself and husband, and children, which were
hanging against the wall. They were Jean Baptiste Binet, and his wife,
Geneviève Binet. Jean Baptiste is the sobriquet of the French Canadians.
After breakfast we proceeded to the fall, which was within half a mile,
and at this distance its rustling sound, like the wind among the leaves,
filled all the air. We were disappointed to find that we were in some
measure shut out from the west side of the fall by the private grounds
and fences of Patterson, who appropriates not only a part of the water
for his mill, but a still larger part of the prospect, so that we were
obliged to trespass. This gentleman’s mansion-house and grounds were
formerly occupied by the Duke of Kent, father to Queen Victoria. It
appeared to me in bad taste for an individual, though he were the father
of Queen Victoria, to obtrude himself with his land titles, or at least
his fences, on so remarkable a natural phenomenon, which should, in
every sense, belong to mankind. Some falls should even be kept sacred
from the intrusion of mills and factories, as water privileges in
another than the millwright’s sense. This small river falls
perpendicularly nearly two hundred and fifty feet at one pitch. The St.
Lawrence falls only one hundred and sixty-four feet at Niagara. It is a
very simple and noble fall, and leaves nothing to be desired; but the
most that I could say of it would only have the force of one other
testimony to assure the reader that it is there. We looked directly down
on it from the point of a projecting rock, and saw far below us, on a
low promontory, the grass kept fresh and green by the perpetual drizzle,
looking like moss. The rock is a kind of slate, in the crevices of which
grew ferns and golden-rods. The prevailing trees on the shores were
spruce and arbor-vitæ,—the latter very large and now full of fruit,—also
aspens, alders, and the mountain-ash with its berries. Every emigrant
who arrives in this country by way of the St. Lawrence, as he opens a
point of the Isle of Orleans, sees the Montmorenci tumbling into the
Great River thus magnificently in a vast white sheet, making its
contribution with emphasis. Roberval’s pilot, Jean Alphonse, saw this
fall thus, and described it, in 1542. It is a splendid introduction to
the scenery of Quebec. Instead of an artificial fountain in its square,
Quebec has this magnificent natural waterfall to adorn one side of its
harbor. Within the mouth of the chasm below, which can be entered only
at ebb tide, we had a grand view at once of Quebec and of the fall. Kalm
says that the noise of the fall is sometimes heard at Quebec, about
eight miles distant, and is a sign of a northeast wind. The side of this
chasm, of soft and crumbling slate too steep to climb, was among the
memorable features of the scene. In the winter of 1829 the frozen spray
of the fall, descending on the ice of the St. Lawrence, made a hill one
hundred and twenty-six feet high. It is an annual phenomenon which some
think may help explain the formation of glaciers.
In the vicinity of the fall we began to notice what looked like our
red-fruited thorn bushes, grown to the size of ordinary apple-trees,
very common, and full of large red or yellow fruit, which the
inhabitants called _pommettes_, but I did not learn that they were put
to any use.
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