TRAVELS IN CANADA, 
 
 AND 
 
 THROUGH THE STATES 
 
 OP 
 
 NEW YORK AND PENNSYLVANIA. 
 
 BY 
 
 J. G. KOIIL, 
 
 AUTHOR OF “RUSSIA AND THE RUSSIANS,” “AUSTRIA,” &C. &C 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 MRS PERCY SINNETT. 
 
 REVISED BY THE AUTHOR. 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 GEORGE MANWARING, 
 
 8, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND. 
 
 MDCCCLXI. 
 
JOHN CHILDS AND SON, PRINTERS. 
 
AUTHOR’S PREFACE. 
 
 A much esteemed friend of mine, Mrs Percy 
 Sinnett, thought that the English public would 
 take an interest in a book which relates to some 
 parts of the New World recently traversed by 
 the Prince of Wales. She had the goodness to 
 inform me, that she had found it worth her 
 while to translate my impressions de voyage on 
 Canada and Pennsylvania. At the same time 
 she caused each proof-sheet to be sent to me, so 
 that I had an opportunity of convincing myself 
 of the most able and faithful manner in which she 
 had interpreted the contents of the book in ques¬ 
 tion. 
 
 Thinking that first impressions of foreign coun¬ 
 tries may always be of some value, I venture to 
 
IV 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 offer the book to the English reader, though, 
 having made a longer stay in the United States, 
 having formed there many agreeable connections, 
 and having written several other books on the 
 same subject—published or not yet published—1 
 would not subscribe to every sentiment contained 
 in it. 
 
 J. Gr. KOHL. 
 
 Bremen , Nov. 21, 1860. 
 
 
PREFACE 
 
 BY THE TRANSLATOR. 
 
 The numerous translations into English of the 
 writings of M. Kohl, and the frequent notices of 
 them in our critical journals, seem to render any 
 further introduction superfluous—his name being 
 nearly as well known to the reading portion of 
 the public in England as in his own country, or, 
 as may now be added, on the other side of the 
 Atlantic. 
 
 The translator has, therefore, merely (at the 
 request of the publisher) to state that the present 
 work has been selected from those in which the 
 author has described his extensive travels in the 
 
VI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 North‘American Continent, on account of the su¬ 
 perior and increasing interest of the subject to 
 this country. The recent visit of the Prince of 
 Wales to Canada will serve, it is believed, to mark 
 the commencement of a new era in the history of 
 that valuable portion of the British Empire,— 
 valuable, not on account of any direct material 
 advantage that England derives at present from 
 the connexion, but from the bright prospect it 
 now more than ever holds out to those who have 
 no prospect at home but that of increasing poverty 
 —that struggling portion of the community which 
 often approaches so nearly the confines of what 
 have been truly called the “ dangerous classes.” 
 
 Canada may be regarded in its relation to Eng¬ 
 land as a happy and prosperous child, married 
 and settled, and capable of managing its own 
 affairs, as well as of lending a helping hand to its 
 younger brothers and sisters; and the bonds that 
 connect it with the mother-country are rather those 
 of affection and respect than those of material 
 interest; but there are, nevertheless, social benefits 
 to an old country in seeing its youth thus renewed 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Vll 
 
 in its offspring, and there must be political ad¬ 
 vantage in her maintaining in the New World a 
 counterpoise to the immense and increasing power 
 of a people which, with all its high and admirable 
 qualities, has not been nationally so free from re¬ 
 proach, or so “clear in its great office,” that its 
 gigantic advance can be watched without some 
 feeling of apprehension mingling with our sympathy. 
 
 England is probably the only European power 
 that could maintain its position by the side of 
 the United States, or hold out attractions to set' 1 
 tiers that could bear comparison with those of 
 the great republic; but we have here the testimony 
 of an impartial observer, that the freedom enjoyed 
 by the inhabitants of Canada is practically much 
 more unrestricted than that of their neighbours; 
 that their taxation is lighter; that their independ¬ 
 ence and liberty of self-government are scarcely, if 
 at all, less; and that no less ample provision is 
 made for education, that first necessity of social 
 life. 
 
 With the completion of the system of railway 
 communication, the greatest, perhaps the only, ob- 
 
Vlll 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 stacle to the progress of Canada has been removed; 
 for whilst the severity of its climate, healthy 
 though it be, is certainly a drawback to its attrac¬ 
 tions, the worst effect of this was the interruption 
 it occasioned to social and commercial intercourse, 
 and this has now happily been overcome. 
 
 Regarding the subject, therefore, as of strong 
 and permanent interest, on which all reliable in¬ 
 formation is acceptable, the translator cannot but 
 hope that the account of so experienced, impartial, 
 and eminently truthful a reporter as M. Kohl will 
 be welcomed here as it has been elsewhere. 
 
 JANE SINNETT. 
 
 London , December , 1S60. 
 
7 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 OP 
 
 VOLUME I. 
 
 CIIAP - PAGE 
 
 I. ALONG THE HUDSON . \ 
 
 II. WEST POINT 9 
 
 III. THE POSITION OF WEST POINT.21 
 
 IV. THE UPPER HUDSON .28 
 
 V. IN ALBANY. 33 
 
 VI. VERMONT.. 
 
 VII. BURLINGTON .. 
 
 VIII. LAKE CHAMPLAIN.. 
 
 IX. MONTREAL.. 
 
 X. THE "ROYAL MOUNTAIN ” 96 
 
 XI. CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS.104 
 
 XII. THE ST LAWRENCE.122 
 
 XIII. QUEBEC .139 
 
 XIV. CAPE DIAMOND .. .. 144 
 
 XV. BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY .. .. 158 
 
x CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 CHAP. 174 
 
 XVI. THE INDIANS OF ST LORETTE .. . 
 
 184 
 
 XVII. THE QUEBEC SEMINARY. 
 
 .. 195 
 
 XVIII. MISCELLANIES . 
 
 XIX. FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL • • • • ' * 
 
 . 211 
 
 XX. THE OTTAWA. 
 
 OQf) 
 
 XXI. A PORTAGE. 
 
 XXII. BYTOWN OR OTTAWA.®46 
 
 XXIII. THE FALLS OF THE OTTAWA . . . 253 
 
 XXIV. THE LUMBER-MEN.260 
 
 XXV. VISIT TO THE INDIANS IN THE FOREST . . . . .. 270 
 
 XXVI. THE BARRACKS HILL .• • • • • 279 
 
 XXVII. HOAR-FROST.286 
 
 XXVIII. THE CATARAGUI.303 
 
 XXIX. THE niSTORY OF A PIECE OF LAND .313 
 
 XXX. IMMIGRANTS.321 
 
 XXXI. THE THOUSAND ISLANDS.331 
 
TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ALONG THE HUDSON. 
 
 * • 
 
 The sudden changes, and especially the sudden 
 brightenings, of the atmosphere in this country are 
 truly wonderful! A few hours ago it seemed as if 
 INew Aork and its sky were floating away together 
 in murky cloud and storm, and now, just as I am 
 setting off, a sudden glory lights up land and water, 
 the clouds vanish—the houses and every object 
 stand out in clear, sharp outline, and the deep 
 bnght blue sky, smiling like a child after a brief 
 shower of tears, shows the beautiful shores and the 
 silvery river stretching far away in unclouded 
 splendour. 
 
2 
 
 
 » 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 The Hudson looked as tempting to me as it 
 once did to the world-renowned captain of that 
 name, its discoverer, and I had been told that the 
 steamer Alida would afford me the means of grati¬ 
 fying my wishes, but when I proceeded to the 
 place where she was lying at anchor, I perceived 
 that she was making no sign of preparation, and 
 had not even begun her travelling toilette. On 
 inquiry, I was told “ Yesterday she has ceased to 
 run. 
 
 It was the beginning of October, and travellers 
 visiting the Hudson for its own sake were becom¬ 
 ing scarce. Men of business indeed were still 
 coming in crowds, but they consider the night the 
 best time for the passage. In daylight they think 
 they can find something better to do than to look 
 at scenery, and they utilise their time on board 
 the steamer by getting their sleeping done. While 
 they are being carried from one market to another, 
 and moon and stars are shining, they are probably 
 dreaming, by command of Queen Mab, of dollars 
 and cents. 
 
 As no day-boat was to be had I determined on 
 proceeding by rail, and I did not lose much by the 
 change, for the line runs along the very margin of 
 the stream, and it and its beautiful valley are never 
 out of sight. As we shot past through the last 
 
ALONG THE HUDSON. 
 
 3 
 
 houses of one of the suburbs of New York, I saw 
 a group of boys standing on the top of a broken 
 fragment of rock, and amusing themselves by 
 throwing stones at the carriages. They seemed to 
 be experimentalizing, to try whether they could hit 
 a train going at full speed, and the stones came 
 whistling through the air in rapid succession. The 
 fingers of many of the passengers itched to give 
 the little rascals what they deserved, but how were 
 they to be got at ? 
 
 I found the company in the carriage by no means 
 disagreeable, though they would have been among 
 us divided into three or four classes. I did not see 
 a single individual whose exterior was in the least 
 offensive, and instead of the police-officers and 
 other officials who are the plagues of Austrian rail¬ 
 roads, there were here, running about from carriage 
 to carriage, only little boys, who offered for sale, * 
 apples, peaches, and confectionery; a much more 
 suitable and convenient refreshment than beer or 
 wine, which you can hardly drink without risk of 
 spilling it over your neighbours ; or the hot coffee 
 or soup with which you burn your mouth at the 
 stations in Germany. 
 
 I was much interested too by the way in which 
 the railway public was supplied with literary spirit¬ 
 ual refreshment. The little news-boys were not 
 
J 
 
 4 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 content with displaying their goods to the^ pas¬ 
 sengers as they took their places, but shipped them¬ 
 selves along with us. A traveller before he is seat¬ 
 ed has little time to buy and pay for newspapers, 
 but the probability of custom for them^ is much 
 greater when all are quietly placed. Ennui too 
 is sure to create before long an appetite for mental 
 aliment, which is not felt in the excitement of de¬ 
 parture. 
 
 The news-boys have, in the mean time, arranged 
 their little stock of political, commercial, serious, 
 and humoristic literature in some convenient cor¬ 
 ner, and then from time to time undertake an ex¬ 
 cursion through the flying community, and when¬ 
 ever they see anybody yawn, immediately apply 
 the remedy; and since their goods are moderate in 
 price, and reading is here as customary as alternate 
 * talking and sleeping among us, they generally do a 
 good deal of business. 
 
 It is quite usual for them to bring a selection of 
 new books with these newspapers, and they afford 
 no contemptible assistance in the diffusion of lite¬ 
 rary productions. American books are published 
 ready cut, and in a convenient form for a traveller s 
 use. Even English books are not altogether as 
 well adapted to this sort of use; and as for our 
 German books, we get them in mere loose leaves, 
 
ALONG THE HUDSON. 
 
 5 
 
 and then have to wait the pleasure of the binder. 
 Here in America people expect to have no more 
 trouble in reading a book than in smoking a 
 cigar. 
 
 One little literary Ganymede came rushing past 
 our carriage with flying; hair, and distributing right 
 and left a number of printed sheets that he had 
 hanging over his arm, and threw into the laps of 
 the passengers. I read the paper, and found that 
 it contained a number of critical remarks, or rather 
 panegyrics, on a certain well-known authors Tra¬ 
 vels in Africa, extracted from various periodicals. 
 They were merely variations on the one theme, 
 namely, that no more interesting employment could 
 be found in the whole world than to read this gen¬ 
 tleman’s books all through, and I had scarcely got 
 through them than the same little flying messenger 
 appeared again at the opposite door of the carriage, 
 but moving with rather more difficulty than before. 
 He was bearing a pile of these African Travels, freshly 
 bound and profusely gib, and presenting them right 
 and left, as he had before done the “criticisms ; im¬ 
 pressing on the passengers at the same time the 
 fact that each of these splendid volumes cost only 
 half a dollar. 
 
 We Germans are regarded as par excellence a 
 reading people, but we arc apt nevertheless to fin d 
 
G 
 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 our literary food ratlier hard to get at. Our books 
 are dear, often scarce, unbound and uncut, and 
 withdraw themselves moreover far from the rail¬ 
 ways and the great lines of traffic, into comparative 
 retirement at Leipsig and Frankfort. 
 
 In America they are continually throwing them¬ 
 selves in your way, and you have but to stretch out 
 your hand to reach them. It may easily be ima¬ 
 gined that when publishers can command the ser¬ 
 vices of thousands of such active and energetic 
 assistants as I have described, they can sell their 
 productions at low prices, and in quantities other¬ 
 wise incredible. 
 
 I had not on setting off a place near a window, 
 but a young man, who afterwards told me he was 
 a steamboat steward returning from California, 
 civilly resigned his to me when I explained that I 
 had never made the journey before; and I had 
 then an opportunity of enjoying the beauty of the 
 landscape. 
 
 We were passing the remarkable high precipi¬ 
 tous rocks called the “ Palisades,” which extend for 
 twenty miles along the western bank of the river. 
 They are full of stone quarries, and a fellow-pas¬ 
 senger informed me that the materials for the recon¬ 
 struction of the Mexican fortress of San Juan de 
 Ulloa after the French bombardment, had been 
 
ALONG THE HUDSON. 
 
 7 
 
 taken from them, and that afterwards in the Mexican 
 war, the Americans had found themselves shooting 
 down their own native granite. 
 
 The Palisades occasion a slight contraction of the 
 bed of the river, and when they cease to offer it 
 any obstruction, it spreads out into a kind of lake 
 called Tappan Bay, but in the wide as well as in 
 the narrow part it is of great depth. On this ac¬ 
 count, as well as from its almost imperceptible cur¬ 
 rent, it is more like an arm of the sea than a river ; ' 
 and for a considerable distance up, the water is salt 
 or brackish. Several kinds of sea animals ( Cirri- 
 pedia) are found as much as seventy miles above 
 New York, and even at West Point cover the bot¬ 
 toms of vessels and floating timber, as in a sea-port. 
 Since also the river has so slight a fall, in fact 
 almost none at all, the tide is felt two hundred miles 
 from New York as strongly as at New York itself. 
 It goes as far as Albany, and is there only three feet 
 lower than at New York; so that it appears doubt¬ 
 ful whether the Hudson falls into an arm of the 
 sea at New York or at West Point, or even 
 higher. 
 
 The sea-like river now contracted its channel — 
 mountains appeared again, and when the evening 
 was pretty far advanced we reached West Point, 
 
8 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and a small steamer received us, and took us over 
 to the other side. 
 
 The moon rode bright and high in the heavens, 
 and shone down on the beautiful landscape, the 
 richly-wooded hills, the not very numerously scat¬ 
 tered dwellings, the lofty forest-clad shores, and 
 the calm waters, fifty fathoms deep. How gladly 
 would I have gone on for many miles thus, but 
 my enjoyment of the scene was very brief. We 
 were soon seated in a carriage, and driving up to 
 the high plateau, on which the hotel is the only 
 house besides the long row of buildings which con¬ 
 stitute the celebrated Military Academy of West 
 Point. 
 
WEST POINT. 
 
 9 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 * 
 
 WEST POINT. 
 
 Travellers in our beloved Germany may 
 often, it seems to me, find opportunities of becom¬ 
 ing tolerably weary of military conversation upon 
 the buttons worn by this or that regiment, the forms 
 of epaulettes, the facings, &c., and other minutiae 
 of military toilette, which are “regulation” for 
 certain uniforms; but in America the case is dif¬ 
 ferent. After hearing the whole day about dollars 
 and cents — of how much one has gained and 
 another lost, and a third still thinks to “ make, 
 till one’s ears tingle again, it is really a pleasant 
 relief to find oneself at AVest Point in the company 
 of American officers—or perhaps of British ones 
 come over from Canada, listening to the discussions 
 about sword-hilts and tassels, and the interesting 
 
10 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 points aforesaid, and getting rid of the never-ending 
 talk about dollars and cents. One feels quite 
 anxious to know whether the moustache is “ regu¬ 
 lation ” in Canada; what is, in the Union, the pre¬ 
 cise form of the salute to be given by a soldier to 
 a passing officer, and the complete descrip don of 
 the uniform of a grenadier from head to foot, is 
 quite a treat. The little Military Establishment of 
 West Point appeared to me like an oasis in the 
 desert, and it is really in many respects unique. 
 While I was still under the influence of this newly- 
 discovered charm in military affairs, I took the 
 opportunity of visiting the Educational Establish¬ 
 ment for young American officers. 
 
 The land of this oasis belongs to the Federal 
 Government of the United States. It owns about 
 3000 acres of land in the mountains round it, and 
 has in this district not only the right of property, 
 but also of police and jurisdiction, so that it is 
 entirely withdrawn from the legislative influence of 
 the State of New York. There are many such spots ( 
 in various States, which are thus, for military pur¬ 
 poses, reserved to the Federal Government. 
 
 West Point, at a position commanding the 
 Hudson, and well adapted to fortification, played 
 a conspicuous part in the American War; and 
 there arc here several “Revolutionary Forts,” as they 
 
WEST POINT. 
 
 11 
 
 arc called—that is, forts existing from the time of 
 the Revolution, such as Fort Clinton, Fort Putnam, 
 which are now indeed partly lying in ruins, but 
 formerly, when in possession of American 
 troops, did good service. The junction of an 
 English army on the south of the Hudson with 
 another on the northern half of the river was pre¬ 
 vented by them, and several actions took place in 
 their vicinity. A locality associated with such re¬ 
 membrances is specially well adapted to an Insti¬ 
 tution of which the object is to train defenders 
 for their country; and to this is added the con¬ 
 sideration of its fine healthful position, and the 
 beauty of the mountain scenery around it; and the 
 environs offer every variety of formation—plain, 
 table-land, mountain masses, peaks, declivities, and 
 streams—that coidd be desired by an instructor in 
 military engineering. 
 
 All these circumstances probably determined 
 the choice of West Point by the Government for 
 the establishment of a Military School. It was 
 begun in 1802, with very small means, and only 
 ten cadets; but since then, and in spite of the 
 opposition of the violent democratic party, which 
 had to be encountered at every proposal for im¬ 
 provements or financial support, the revenue and 
 the number of cadets has considerably increased. 
 
v 
 
 12 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Jefferson, Munro, and other enlightened men, sup¬ 
 ported it by their influence; and the number of 
 cadets is at present 224, a number, however, which 
 has been for a long time stationary, and which 
 appears small enough, when it is considered that 
 this is the only establishment of the kind for a 
 country which is about as large as all Europe. ; 
 The young people are of course educated at the 
 cost of the State, and enjoy, besides, a handsome 
 allowance of pocket-money; the cadetships are, 
 therefore, much sought after, and every vacancy be¬ 
 comes the object of keen competition. 
 
 The President of the United States has ten of 
 them in his gift; and it is, doubtless, often a 
 matter of great' perplexity how to distribute them 
 so as to satisfy, as far as possible, his followers and 
 dependents. The other places are divided among 
 the members of Congress, so that every one has 
 one appointment, and about half a dozen cadets, on 
 the average, are taken from each State. 
 
 The Congress grants an annual sum of about 
 70,000 dollars for the support of this Institution, 
 and it also derives some revenue from the 8000 
 acres belonging to it, and the officers of the insti¬ 
 tution, as well as the cadets, receive pay from the 
 military chest; but every time that further ad- 
 avnees are required, even of small sums from Con- 
 
WEST POINT. 
 
 13 
 
 gross, they are not obtained without a struggle as 
 for life and death. The democratic party, which is 
 averse to all military establishments, and regards 
 even the small army of the United States as much 
 too large and altogether superfluous, considers the 
 school at West Point as a mere product of aristo¬ 
 cratic luxury, and would rather do away with it 
 altogether than give it any further support. It is 
 sure to put its veto upon all such grants, and much 
 difficulty is therefore experienced in effecting any 
 improvements in the Institution, and it is necessary 
 to be extremely moderate in all requests, in order 
 to avoid raising an outcry in the country. “ Our 
 members of Congress are downright tyrants and 
 misers,” said a young cadet to me; “ they grudge 
 us a few dollars for the purchase of books and 
 instruments that we really cannot do without, and 
 our officers have to snatch every trifle from them 
 * as brands from the burning.’ ” 
 
 That may perhaps be true, but I can easily 
 imagine that the things that I saw were not to be 
 obtained without trouble. I saw only the results, 
 and certainly I discovered in them no trace of par¬ 
 simony ; and if the means of the Institution were 
 really so scanty as they were represented to me, 
 they must have been wonderfully well employed. 
 Others may have more knowledge of this subject 
 
14 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 than I have, but assuredly I have never seen any 
 military academy that impressed me so favourably 
 as this of West Point. The halls of instruction 
 and dwelling-houses of the professors, the museums, 
 arsenals, stables, &c., form a group of most tasteful 
 and handsome buildings. Even the library has an 
 elegant house devoted exclusively to it, and the 
 whole establishment, in its beautiful well-wooded 
 and park-like grounds, has the aspect of the resi¬ 
 dence of a great English nobleman. It is a hun¬ 
 dred times pleasanter than our military schools 
 enclosed within their high massive walls and all 
 under one roof. It does not appear to be the 
 custom either here or in England to concentrate 
 much in the same building, and the separation into 
 different portions explains in some measure the 
 history of the Institution, and the way in which 
 one sum after another has been wrung from the 
 hands of Congress. 
 
 The library contains 20,000 volumes placed in 
 a spacious temple-like rotunda, and its regulations 
 are extremely liberal. The loan of books may 
 sometimes be obtained from it for as much as two 
 months, which is not the case in any other library 
 that I am acquainted with, either in England or 
 America. It is also open to visitors, who are in 
 summer very numerous, partly from the attractions 
 
WEST POINT. 
 
 15 
 
 of the spot itself, and sometimes from their having 
 sons and relatives in the school. 
 
 Similarly excellent accommodation is afforded 
 for the pictures, engravings, and other examples 
 furnished for the draughtsmen, and for the ad¬ 
 mirably executed prize-drawings of the cadets 
 themselves. Their copies from Raphael, Horace 
 Vernet, and other artists, really astonished me, and 
 I doubt whether any other military academy can 
 exhibit such specimens in the aesthetic department 
 of art, which can only be regarded as a luxury for 
 tacticians, engineers, &c. I was struck by the 
 fact that all the examples and models for the use 
 of the pupils are from France, and I was told that 
 in the method of teaching drawing, as well as in 
 other branches of instruction, wherever the system 
 is not an original American one, it is taken from 
 the French. In the earliest period of the Institu¬ 
 tion, from 1802 till about 1812, this does not seem 
 to have been the case. General Steuben, and other 
 Germans in the American service, were living then, 
 and probably from their influence the Prussian 
 system was chiefly followed; but the enormous 
 power and success of Napoleon, the signal defeat 
 of the Prussians in 1803, and the renown and vic¬ 
 tories of the French army, led to the introduction 
 of the Gallic system. It is not followed slavishly. 
 
16 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 however, and the plan may on the whole be re¬ 
 garded as an eclectic one. 
 
 A visit to the halls in which are deposited the 
 models and other abundantly supplied apparatus 
 for teaching fortification, also interested me ex¬ 
 tremely, for there are here preserved many his¬ 
 torical curiosities sent by the Federal Government, 
 as, for example, the flags taken from those Hessian 
 mercenaries of mournful memory, with the Hessian 
 arms on them. There were Mexican standards 
 too, and some most admirably cast, but badly- 
 served, Mexican guns, of which the Americans in 
 the last war took more than a hundred. Most of 
 the American officers employed in that war had 
 been educated at this Institution. 
 
 Since these last trophies have been placed here, 
 the Mexican language—the Spanish that is—has 
 been introduced as a subject of study, a circumstance 
 that appears significant. It would seem to be re¬ 
 garded as certain that new collisions with the Spanish 
 race, new victories over them, and new spoils and 
 trophies, may be confidently anticipated. r lhe 
 German language is not taught, which surprises 
 me a little, not only because a knowledge of it 
 would open so many sources of excellent instruc¬ 
 tion on military subjects, but because one-third of 
 the American army still consists of Germans. 
 
I 
 
 WEST POINT. 17 
 
 On a model of a fortress during a siege which is 
 displayed in one of these halls, there were formerly 
 20,000 very prettily executed small figures of sol¬ 
 diers, as all the troops engaged were thus repre¬ 
 sented ; but all these figures have been in the 
 course of years carried off by fair visitors as souve¬ 
 nirs, and most likely attached to their watch chains 
 and worn as trinkets. I could not but acknow¬ 
 ledge with a sigh, that it is “ tout comme ches 
 nous.” Glittering epaulets and slender martial 
 figures have their attractions for republican beau¬ 
 ties as well as for the daughters of a monarchy, 
 and it would seem that they have here no less than 
 20,000 silent admirers. 
 
 Ample space and perfect order, the freshest air, 
 and the most exquisite cleanliness, rejoiced one 
 everywhere in the bed-rooms and sitting-rooms of 
 the pupils. They all stood open, and might be 
 inspected at any moment. I mention this because 
 it might be supposed that the republican military 
 discipline was somewhat more lax than elsewhere. 
 This is so little the case, that some of the officers 
 and teachers are expected every night to make 
 unlooked-for visits from room to room, so as to 
 exercise control over the cadets even in their 
 sleep; and in general the treatment of the young 
 men in their personal relations with their teachers 
 
 VOL. I. 2 
 
18 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and superiors appeared to be gentlemanly and 
 considerate, but not less strict than w itli us. 
 Should they however break any ol the regulations, 
 these young republicans are punished quite as 
 severely as they would be in Germany. I have a 
 whole volume of the rules and regulations of this 
 Academy, and some of them occasioned me not a 
 little surprise. 
 
 I attended some of the “ recitations ” and mili¬ 
 tary exercises of the cadets, and particulaily ad¬ 
 mired their proficiency in mathematics. They 
 were all tall, fine young fellows of from 16 to 22, 
 none younger. They wore a grey uniform with 
 black stripes on the trowsers, and many silver 
 buttons on their jackets, which were something like 
 those worn by our Hussars. 
 
 In summer they occupy a camp pitched on a 
 fine plateau in the neighbourhood, and for three 
 or four months never come under a roof. All the 
 instruction and all the exercises are carried on in 
 the camp, and from this place sham military expedi ¬ 
 tions are made for the sake of practice. The season 
 when the cadets are in camp brings many visits 
 from parents and friends, who like to look on at 
 the little military spectacles, so that it is regarded 
 as a time of gaiety and recreation; and at their 
 riding lessons, their artillery practice, &c., the 
 
 _ 
 
WEST POINT. 
 
 19 
 
 young men are sure of a numerous assembly of 
 spectators, also comme cliez nous. The American 
 public in general seems to be of opinion that, since 
 it lias, with whatever reluctance, put its hand in 
 its pocket for the dollars and cents required for 
 books and guns, it may as well, at least, have a 
 sight for its money. 
 
 One thing I saw that certainly did not remind 
 me of Germany, namely, a sort of retired terrace 
 in a beautiful spot among the rocks on the banks 
 of the Hudson, which was set apart for the young 
 people to settle their personal differences with their 
 fists. Duels with swords or fire-arms are forbid¬ 
 den here, as at every other institution of the kind, 
 but fist-duels, though not expressly permitted, are 
 not expressly forbidden. For those little knots 
 and entanglements in personal intercourse, which 
 cannot be made straight in any other way, it is 
 thought better to wink at this method of settle¬ 
 ment, especially as it affords an exercise of courage; 
 in English schools similar principles are acted on. 
 This Academy is furnished with a most able body 
 of teachers, the “ Academy Staff,” and as many of 
 my readers may be unacquainted with this re¬ 
 markable and little-known Institution, I may be 
 permitted to mention a few other particulars con¬ 
 cerning it. There are forty-two teachers (for only 
 
20 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 224 pupils), divided into professors and assistant 
 professors, seven of them for mathematics, and no 
 less than three native Frenchmen for their own 
 language, as well as three for drawing. Many of 
 the teachers are highly distinguished in their par¬ 
 ticular department, and some arc renowned in the 
 world as the authors of scientific works. For ex¬ 
 ample, Bailey, one of the first chemists in the 
 United States, is the professor of chemistry and 
 geology; Bartlett, the author of widely diffused 
 works on mechanics, optics, and acoustics, is the 
 professor of physics ; Mahan, a celebrated military 
 writer, is the professor of engineering, &c.; the com¬ 
 mandant and superintendent of the whole estab¬ 
 lishment, Colonel Lee, is one of the most distin¬ 
 guished men and officers in the United States. I 
 believe if there were in different parts of the Ameri¬ 
 can Union a dozen institutions like this, they would 
 exercise a most beneficial influence on the state of 
 education in the country at large, for even young 
 men who might not afterwards adopt a military 
 life, could hardly fail to carry with them from such 
 academies many qualities that would be highly 
 serviceable to them in any other career. A Eu¬ 
 ropean traveller will find few places in the United 
 States from which he will carry away more pleasing 
 recollections than from West Point. 
 
THE POSITION OF WEST POINT. 
 
 21 
 
 t 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE POSITION OF WEST POINT. 
 
 The mountain country on which you look from 
 the heights of West Point is one of the most 
 beautiful districts in the United States. The 
 mountains are of very graceful forms, with many 
 terraces and gradations, and they are covered far 
 and wide by woods and meadows of richest ver¬ 
 dure, through which flows majestically the broad 
 tranquil river. These advantages are perceived at 
 once, but the geographical and historical importance 
 of the position is not so immediately obvious, 
 though it is readily admitted when pointed out. 
 
 One of the principal ridges of the Appalachian 
 system, called by the New Yorkers their High¬ 
 lands, is cut through by the Hudson, and the 
 mountains to the east and west are of precisely 
 similar geological structure. It is evident that the 
 
22 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 same series of elevations lias taken place, and that 
 the same formations exist, from the western side of the 
 Hudson to the mouth of the St Lawrence. Probably 
 at one time this geological connection was also a geo¬ 
 graphical one, that is to say, the two mountain-ridges 
 were united. At that time the waters on the north¬ 
 west declivity must have flowed towards the St 
 Lawrence and its lakes, or rather these lakes must 
 have extended to the foot of the declivity. Only 
 when the chasm through which the Hudson now 
 flows was formed, did a part of the water of those 
 lakes burst forth and find an outlet to the south, 
 and thus constitute the present system of the Hud¬ 
 son and its tributaries. That this chasm was the 
 work of the river, such as may be seen in many 
 other passes of the Alleghanies, is more than doubt¬ 
 ful. In the midst of the chasm the bed of the river 
 is extremely deep, as much as 200 feet, and at the 
 same time its current is unusually tranquil, and it 
 glides along its whole line with a scarcely percept¬ 
 ible motion. In the whole 150 miles from New 
 York to Albany, it has not a fall of more than three 
 or four feet. 
 
 The case is quite 'different, not only at Niagara, 
 where a river is cutting through a rock before our 
 eyes, but at the many other gaps and breaks in the 
 districts of the Susquehannah, the Delaware, and 
 
THE POSITION OF WEST POINT. 23 
 
 the other rivers of Eastern North America. All 
 these rivers have a perfectly different character, and 
 the Hudson may be said to be quite unique among 
 them. They mostly take an excessively winding 
 course, while the Hudson flows as straight as a canal 
 from north to south. They are only deep at a very 
 short distance from the sea, while the Hudson is 
 navigable for large' ships more than a hundred 
 and fifty miles from its mouth, up to which dis¬ 
 tance the tide reaches, whilst it is never felt above 
 50 miles up in any of the other streams. They have 
 almost all a deep fall and a rapid course, and form 
 cataracts and rapids, whilst the Hudson along its 
 whole course has neither one nor the other. Those 
 rivers and their branches must have flowed first 
 through the long valleys between the two Alleghany 
 chains, but afterwards turned aside and slipped 
 through gaps or clefts, hurrying rapidly on through 
 beds which it is almost certain they themselves 
 hollowed out; but the Hudson shoots like an arrow 
 through the mountains, apparently in no way af¬ 
 fected by their conformation, and flows among them 
 as deep and as tranquilly as in the plain. 
 
 Prom all this we may, I think, conclude that the 
 bed of the Hudson was not hollowed out by itself, 
 but that it existed before the river. Probably some 
 
24 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 great rent or chasm was formed by volcanic forces, 
 and then the river, or rather some little springs 
 found their way into it, the sea entering at the 
 same time at the opposite extremity, and both 
 together have rather choked up than enlarged the 
 chasm. 
 
 From these circumstances, which, as I have said, 
 are quite exceptional on the whole eastern coast of 
 North America, result the peculiar advantages for 
 the harbour of New York. The Hudson appears 
 as a canal, which, beginning at the north-west in 
 the region near the Canadian lakes, flows right on 
 to the Atlantic, forming a grand water communica¬ 
 tion between plain and plain. Westward and 
 northward from Albany all is level, and to this 
 point roads, canals, and railways may easily be led, 
 and there intrust their treasures to the longer 
 watery arm. The level country near Albany is only 
 the south-eastern corner of the immense plains, 
 which do not even terminate at the sources of the 
 Mississippi, and which in their broad and numerous 
 lakes possess such a system of water communica¬ 
 tion as scarcely any other country in the world 
 can boast. They may be regarded as one con¬ 
 nected fresh-water sea, but in its own natural 
 outlet the St Lawrence this inner sea has hither- 
 
TIIE POSITION OF WEST POINT. 
 
 25 
 
 to had a very inconvenient connection with the 
 ocean. 
 
 This way is too a very long one; it turns far to 
 the north, is interrupted by rocks and rapids, and 
 is much encumbered and deteriorated for naviga¬ 
 tion by ice. 
 
 The Hudson valley rivals the St Lawrence as a 
 natural outlet for those plains and lakes; it is the 
 horn of plenty, the artery through which the rivers 
 of those regions are poured into New York. They 
 are sent down to Albany by many channels from 
 Ontario and Erie, and at New York they are de¬ 
 livered to the great reservoir the ocean. 
 
 It is the wonderful natural formation of the cleft 
 or gate at West Point that wc have to thank for the 
 possibility of this combination. Here was the grand 
 difficulty of the route, and human hands would 
 never have succeeded in overcoming it in so grand a 
 manner as nature has done. It was much more 
 than the cutting through Mount Athos, and were 
 the New Yorkers of the mind of the old Greeks, 
 they might erect at this beautiful gate of their High¬ 
 lands, on the summit of these Hercules Pillars, a 
 temple to Volcano, as well as to Neptune, and 
 celebrate here their Olympic games and their Eleu- 
 sinian mysteries. But as matters stand they are 
 
26 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 rarely good enough geographers to admire spe¬ 
 cially the work of nature at this point, and to per¬ 
 ceive its advantages—far less to offer up a portion 
 of the wealth it brings them in sacrifices. 
 
 Immediately aboveWest Point you enterinto quite 
 a different region of Nature. The climatic effects 
 of the ocean cease at the New York Highlands, and 
 are replaced by those of the interior continent, by 
 the sky of Canada. Thus far do the winds and' 
 other weather phenomena of the north-west prevail 
 —and thus far from the other side do the eastern 
 clouds and fogs come up from the ocean—as well 
 as the more equable oceanic temperature. 
 
 In winter, when the Upper Hudson is sometimes 
 covered with ice as far as the gate,’of West Point, 
 and you travel in sledges over land and water, the 
 vessels below West Point move about freely, 
 the streets in New York are deep in mud, and 
 the people are rejoicing in alternate sunshine and 
 rain. 
 
 As the atmospheric conditions so do the plants 
 and animals of the north-west find at West Point 
 and along the mountain-range the end of their 
 vast territory. Very important geological differ¬ 
 ences are also found on the two sides, if not in the 
 internal structure of the mountains, at all events, 
 
 
THE POSITION OF WEST POINT. 
 
 27 
 
 in the more modem and superficial structure of the 
 lowlands and plains. 
 
 The ocean and continent are both in a hydrogra¬ 
 phical and commercial relation here connected and 
 confounded together, whilst they are separated by 
 the still in a great measure undisturbed mountain 
 dykes. 
 
 #• 
 
- 1 —■ ■ 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE UPPER HUDSON. 
 
 The railroad runs close to the water-side as far 
 up as Albany, and it is an extremely pleasant and 
 varied route. Sometimes there was between the 
 rocks on the right and the river on the left only 
 just room enough for our locomotive to slip through. 
 Sometimes the line runs on dykes and bridges 
 fairly into the water, and as the tide was in when 
 we passed, the water was up to the level of the 
 dykes, and it seemed as if the carriage were rolling 
 along its surface. Sometimes the rocks opened to 
 the right into a wide valley watered by a smaller 
 stream, and we obtained a glimpse into the interior 
 of the country, over meadows, swamps, wooded 
 declivities, and here and there a little town; but 
 the fine, broad, brimming river on our left proved 
 the most attractive. 
 
 
 _ 
 
THE UPPER HUDSON. 
 
 29 
 
 It was not a bright Canadian day; the clouds 
 and mists of the ocean had forced their way 
 through the Hercules Pillars of West Point, and 
 hung low and heavy over the landscape. The Hudson 
 at this part, too, again resembled an arm of the 
 sea, and we could scarcely see the opposite shore ; 
 but it was a pleasant surprise when it sometimes 
 emerged suddenly from the mist, and revealed a 
 town or a headland surrounded and set in clouds. 
 There was, of course, no lack of sails and shipping, 
 innumerable small craft glided up and down, and 
 vessels of considerable size were moving along with 
 a fresh breeze and full sails, and, as if they had been 
 at sea, without any anxious soundings; and occa¬ 
 sionally a steam-tug would appear with a whole 
 fleet in tow. A different method seems to be 
 adopted by tugs from that in use with us. Instead 
 of dragging the ships along slowly by long ropes, one 
 after another, the steamers here have them close to 
 her on her right and left, and moves along in the 
 midst of them. The motive power is said to be 
 more efficient by this method. 
 
 If only one ship is to be towed, the little tug docs 
 not take it behind her, but attaches herself to its 
 side, so as to form an acute angle with it. Her prow 
 seems to pierce the hull of the large vessel, as a little 
 narval does the belly *of the whale, and she rather 
 
30 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 pushes than drags it along. With wonderful ra¬ 
 pidity too does the little snorting energetic steamer 
 propel the unwieldy mass, like an ant running 
 away with a twig; but it is quite natural that this 
 river, on which steamers were first seen, should 
 first attain to improvements in the application of 
 their power. 
 
 Many of the villages and localities on this part 
 of the Hudson still bear the names bestowed on 
 them by its discoverers the Dutch, who first opened 
 it to the world of commerce. The Dutch possessed 
 the river and its shores about sixty years, and 
 when the English conquered both, they changed 
 the names of the principal places,—•“ New Amster¬ 
 dam” became New York, and “Fort Orange” 
 Albany; but the Dutch had sown so many little 
 settlements over the country, and so filled it with 
 local appellations, that it seemed impossible to 
 root them all out from the intercourse of daily life, 
 and they are therefore mostly still in use. One 
 place we passed was called Rhynbeck; another, 
 Stugoesondt; a third, Schodack; and on the other 
 side of the river we saw Malden, Catskill, &c. 
 Near New York are Hoboken and Brooklyn, and 
 the beautiful and celebrated group of blue moun¬ 
 tains that stretched northwards from West Point 
 and to the west of the river bears still its old name 
 
THE UPPER HUDSON. 
 
 31 
 
 of the Catskill Mountains. The Dutch kill, or 
 spring, has been retained as a generic name for 
 little tributary streams,—such as “ Norman’s-kill,” 
 “ Fish-kill,” &c., such as the English in Australia 
 call creeks. Besides these names, many other 
 traces and reminiscences of the Dutch time are 
 observable. Many landed estates are still held 
 according to the provisions of the Dutch law; and 
 many of the old Dutch, though now Anglicised 
 families, are still in possession of the same lands as 
 at that time. Such, for instance, as the family of 
 Reusselaer—the most distinguished one in Albany 
 and its neighbourhood—which has even retained 
 an old Dutch rather aristocratic title through all the 
 vicissitudes of the times. Down quite to the present 
 day the head of that family was known as the 
 “ Bat room” There are other families of similar 
 descent in Albany and New York, who form the 
 kernel of society. They are the oldest families of 
 the town, and a certain air of dignity and solid 
 opulence distinguishes them. Dutch steadiness 
 and English enterprise are the two chief elements 
 in the character of the true New York merchant; and 
 it is but lately that they have become thoroughly 
 amalgamated. The history of the old Dutch 
 colonies on the Hudson, and the investigation of 
 their institutions and manners, are not objects of 
 
32 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 mere antiquarian curiosity; on the contrary, they 
 become more important and interesting with the 
 growth of the city, that still, in many respects, 
 moves in the grooves of “ New Amsterdam.” 
 Many of the customs and habits of the few hundred 
 Dutchmen who first founded the city have now 
 become those of millions. Even the Dutch lan¬ 
 guage has not quite died out, but is stdl spoken 
 in the old colonies of Long Island and New Jersey, 
 and in some of the domestic circles of the above- 
 mentioned old families. It is not, however, modem 
 Dutch, but that which was spoken at the period 
 of the settlement. In confirmation of this fact it 
 was mentioned to me on good authority, that when 
 a few years ago an American from Albany was 
 sent as ambassador to the King of Holland, and the 
 king at his first audience addressed him in French, 
 the ambassador apologized for his inability to reply 
 in that language, and spoke Dutch. 
 
 King William listened to him for a while in 
 great surprise, and then exclaimed that he spoke 
 exactly as people did two hundred years ago in 
 Holland. 
 
IN ALBANY. 
 
 33 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 IN ALBANY. 
 
 A powerful steamer came to fetch us from our 
 last railroad station over to Albany. A forest of 
 ships of all kinds and a labyrinth of houses met 
 our eyes as we approached it; and ships, quays, 
 and streets were all swarming with people. What 
 may be the present population of this great over¬ 
 grown “ Fort Orange ” I do not know exactly, for 
 in America it is really not worth while to burden 
 one’s memory with figures and statistical details, 
 which are like shifting sand, and have become ob¬ 
 solete before you have well got them into your 
 head. The census of last year will be found this 
 year quite inaccurate. 
 
 The great steamer delivered us at a still more 
 colossal hotel, which rose like a mountain not far 
 from the shore. It was tea-time ; the gong was 
 
 VOL. I. 3 
 
34 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 sounding far and wide, and from all the innumer¬ 
 able doors and staircases came trooping the guests— 
 ladies and gentlemen, old and young, and taking 
 their places at some one of the long tables. The 
 attendants at table are all of the feminine gender, 
 and a little army of waitresses was drawn up in 
 rank and file awaiting us. We charged into the 
 room at speed, and in much the same tumultuous 
 throng which in London invades the House of 
 Lords when Her Majesty has spoken the words 
 
 “ Call the Commons in.” 
 
 The troop of maidens was immediately in mo¬ 
 tion, pushing chairs into their places, and distribut¬ 
 ing cups of tea and coffee, sandwiches, cakes, 
 mutton-chops, &c., with the celerity of a practised 
 player dealing cards. To my astonishment they 
 were commanded, and all their movements directed, 
 by a negro, who was the head-waiter. I say to 
 my astonishment, for, according to my notions of 
 the prejudices of American whites against blacks, 
 I should have thought it impossible that these 
 white republican damsels could have been induced 
 to submit to such a rule; though, under different- 
 circumstances, the same thing may be seen in the 
 harems of Oriental grandees. I did see too a few 
 little tossings of the head, and saucy faces, which 
 
35 
 
 IN ALBANY. 
 
 reminded me of the well-known picture of a girl 
 mocking a eunuch in a seraglio. 
 
 This negro appeared, however, born to be a 
 head-waiter ; he did the honours of the room with 
 a skill, politeness, and tact that was really surprising. 
 He had nothing of the noisy, obtrusive manner of 
 head-waiters in our country. He received every 
 guest at the door with a decorum and even dignity 
 which was equally remote from too great obsequi¬ 
 ousness and too much self-assertion; just the true 
 mean which a gentleman is accustomed to ob¬ 
 serve. He seemed like some lord of the castle 
 with a black mask on. He gave each party of 
 guests in a few words the directions necessary for 
 their comfort, and for their obtaining proper places, 
 and administered, at the same time, to his subor¬ 
 dinate ministering spirits quiet reproof, praise, or 
 command, with the most perfect composure and 
 tranquillity, keeping an eye too all the while on the 
 long line of guests, and divining their wishes by 
 their looks and gestures. Occasionally he would 
 murmur a few words—“ Don’t contradict; Do as 
 I tell you; That’s right,” &c., but in general he 
 exercised his authority so quietly that it was scarce¬ 
 ly perceptible. 
 
 After tea I walked through the town of Albany, 
 
 3 * 
 
36 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 from one enrl to the other, to pay a visit to a cele¬ 
 brated geologist of New York, Professor Hall. A 
 little Irish boy accompanied me, and amused me 
 not a little. “Do you know the way to Delaware 
 turnpike?” I asked. “ I know it first-rate, sir,” was 
 the reply; he supposed I was going westward, 
 and would like to go himself. I asked why, and 
 what he knew of the West? “ Oh, sir, the West is 
 a good money-making place, I guess.” On the way 
 I was much struck by the extent and importance 
 of the bookselling establishments : they were larger 
 and filled with a greater number of handsomely 
 bound books than I had ever seen at any in Ger¬ 
 many, and there were at least half-a-dozen, any one 
 of which would have been remarkable in Dresden 
 or Munich. Albany is, it appears, a great staple 
 place for the literary productions of New York, 
 Boston, and other book-producing places of the 
 Eastern States ; and as the line of the great immi¬ 
 grant march to the West passes through it, it pro¬ 
 vides also for the spiritual wants of the wayfarers. 
 
 The appearance of the apothecaries’ shops, too, 
 both here and in New York, make it seem quite a 
 pleasure to be ill, so gaily and elegantly were they 
 decorated. Ours in Germany look like old chemists’ 
 laboratories. All this external splendour is how¬ 
 ever, it must be owned, somewhat deceitful. These 
 
IN ALBANY. 
 
 37 
 
 gorgeous shops are often mere whited sepulchres, 
 where I am told the most ignorant quacks pursue 
 their nefarious trade. 
 
 The streets of the suburbs, as we proceeded on 
 our walk, gradually became wider, darker, and more 
 desolate, until at last we found ourselves in an en¬ 
 tirely houseless region. The so-called streets ter¬ 
 minated in broad, deep, seemingly bottomless 
 streaks of mud, along the side of which a few 
 boards w r ere laid by way of pavement. You go 
 on for miles along these planks, keeping your bal¬ 
 ance as well as you can in the darkness; right and 
 left no houses are to be seen, and nevertheless you 
 are still inside the town. After a while we again 
 came to some human habitations, and I knocked at a 
 door to ask my way, for my little Irishman, in spite 
 of his “ first-rate ” knowledge, had lost his way. I 
 had chanced upon the dwelling of a countryman; the 
 people of the house "were Germans from Cobourg, 
 and I stopped with them for a short rest. They 
 had lived here fourteen years, and were, they said, 
 extremely content, though the father of the family 
 was still only what he had been in Cobourg, a day 
 labourer. Even as such he had been able to make 
 some savings, and to buy a piece ot land. He had 
 a house of his own, a horse, a few cows, and pigs, 
 and he would assuredly never have attained to such 
 
TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 OMM 
 
 38 
 
 opulence as that in Cobourg. A whole quarter of 
 Albany is inhabited by Germans, amongst whom 
 are many Jews, and other towns and stations on 
 the great emigrant line, Buffalo, Detroit, Chicago, 
 &c., have districts similarly inhabited. The further 
 you go West, the larger proportionably these dis¬ 
 tricts become, until at Chicago and St Louis the 
 towns are half German. In the Eastern States, 
 and the cities of New England, the Germans are 
 comparatively few. 
 
 The Americans have instituted a government 
 office, which even we Germans, inventive as we are 
 in that department, have not yet hit on, namely, a 
 “ State geologist.” Geology is in the States a very 
 favourite study, great attention is devoted to it, 
 and in many cases appeal is made to the opinion of 
 the officer, whose special duty it is also to super¬ 
 intend the preparation of maps of the State {Kar¬ 
 tographie), and improve them to the utmost attain¬ 
 able degree of perfection. The geological museums 
 too, which are found in all the capital cities, arc 
 under their care. The State of New York, in par¬ 
 ticular, has been at great expense for the cultiva¬ 
 tion of this science, and its formation and soil fias 
 been so studied and investigated in every corner, 
 that it is one of the best known and best under¬ 
 stood in the Union. 
 
1 
 
 k 
 
 j5>,xp^V s tc v* :waHf 
 
 IN ALBANY. 39 
 
 In no other department of nature, neither in the 
 zoology, the botany, nor the ethnology of America, 
 did the feeling that I was in a new continent so 
 force itself on me as in its paleontology. 
 
 The gentleman to whom I was paying my respects 
 on the evening in question had just completed the 
 second part of his magnificent and admirable work 
 on the Silurian system, and was now engaged on the 
 third. All the shells and organic remains of a former 
 world, which have ever been found in the State of 
 New York—his adopted country—which are here 
 represented with wonderful fidelity to nature, had 
 been previously formed into a collection that for 
 order and completeness is probably unequalled. 
 There are several thousands of species, and yet 
 three-fourths of them are new and peculiar to this 
 continent; only about a fourth of them are at all 
 known in Europe, and even these have undergone 
 some American modification. Of each of these 
 species Professor Hall has collected an astonishing 
 number of individuals, in many cases thousands, 
 and I quite revelled in the sight of all these new 
 unaccustomed and often surprisingly elegant and 
 fantastic forms. 
 
 We talk daily of the riches of nature and the 
 manifold variety of her productions, but hoi\ little 
 do we really understand her boundless profusion. 
 
40 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 On the whole, and to some extent, we are aware of 
 the contents of the last horn of plenty that has 
 been poured out over the surface of the earth, but 
 the new and noble science of paleontology enables 
 us to perceive more and more that the outpourings 
 of this inexhaustible horn have been countless. 
 
 Among the various scientific discoveries and re¬ 
 sults that Professor Hall has made known in the 
 above-mentioned work, is one whose history he 
 illustrated to me Avitli the specimens before us. 
 He had, namely, found among the New York 
 fossils, first one, and then several species of vi¬ 
 viparous mussels {muscheln). It had never before 
 been an ascertained fact that there were or had 
 been any viviparous conchylia, but on examining 
 a large fossil mussel, he one day discovered a young 
 one of the same species within it, and immediately 
 conjectured that he was here introduced to a new 
 variety in the operations of nature. He then 
 sought for other specimens of the same species ; he 
 procured thousands and examined them all, and in 
 great numbers of them the same phenomenon pre¬ 
 sented itself. Sometimes the young mussel was in a 
 quite embryo state, but in many cases fully formed, 
 and the mother had then burst and was half de¬ 
 cayed. At length he obtained in this “testimony 
 of the rocks ” such a complete series of the condi- 
 
IN ALBANY. 
 
 41 
 
 tions and stages of the existence of the young ani¬ 
 mal from the first moment to its birth and the 
 death of the mother, that he understood the whole 
 as well as if it had passed before his eyes. 
 
 The combination of observations which lead the 
 paleontologist to his results are often as interesting 
 as the chain of calculations and inferences from 
 which the astronomer derives his knowledge; and 
 it is no less a duty than a valuable privilege for a 
 traveller to visit men of science living in remote 
 parts of the civilized world, and as far as possible 
 furnish reports of their discoveries in the often 
 obscure field of their labours. 
 
42 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 VERMONT. 
 
 As we proposed to start again at five in the 
 morning, we were called at three; and though 
 I was down at the first cock-crow, I found the 
 whole house up and every room full. The luxu¬ 
 rious reception-rooms were lit up as if for an even¬ 
 ing party, and ladies and gentlemen in elegant 
 travelling costume were lounging on the sofas and 
 rocking chairs, or laying in at the blazing fires a 
 stock of warmth for the journey on this cold October 
 morning. Two richly-dressed ladies were even 
 playing a polka on the piano, and a young pair in 
 the next room were availing themselves of the 
 music to take a few turns of a dance. It seemed 
 as if I had come in at the last stage of an expiring 
 ball; and yet it was only an ordinary scene at an 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 43 
 
 American hotel on the morning of departure, as I 
 had subsequently often enough occasion to know. 
 At half-past four the gong sounded, the black 
 head-waiter appeared at the door of the dining¬ 
 room with his fair chorus, and complimented us 
 into our places. Early as it was, the breakfast, 
 with all kinds of additions of pastry and savoury 
 viands, stood in perfect readiness, and we discussed 
 them in about two minutes, that we might have 
 time to conquer and take possession of our places 
 in the train. All the necessary manoeuvres were 
 punctually executed, and with the stroke of five 
 the cars rushed off in a northerly direction. This 
 was not exactly the plan I had proposed to myself. 
 I had intended to go to Whitehall, at the southern 
 end of Lake Champlain, so that I might traverse 
 this interesting lake from one end to the other; 
 but this plan of mine was frustrated by an official 
 intrigue. 
 
 I had asked at the railway station for a ticket to 
 Whitehall. “ Very good, sir,” said the railway 
 official, “ here is your ticket; but what do you 
 want at Whitehall ? ” 
 
 “ To go on by the steamer up Lake Champlain.” 
 
 “ Are you sure any steamer goes ? 
 
 “ Why, good heavens, I have been told so often 
 enough ; and here it is printed in the Railway and 
 
44 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Steamboat Guide: but you yourself are the best 
 man to tell me.” 
 
 “We? oh, no! We are Vermont and New 
 York railway men. We have nothing to do with 
 steamers; we know nothing about them, in fact. 
 Here, Taylor, can you tell this gentleman whether 
 a steamer goes northward from Whitehall ? ” 
 Taylor. “ Not that I know of.” 
 
 Traveller. “No matter, I will go to Whitehall 
 nevertheless. I must see Lake Champlain.” 
 
 \st Vermont and New York Ilailtvay man. 
 “ Very good, sir. Here is your ticket: but take 
 notice, if you find no such steamer as your Guide 
 talks about; and if you have to lose your time and 
 your money in waiting for it in this changeable 
 cloudy weather, it’s not our fault. Don’t make us 
 responsible. We have warned you! ” and he 
 washed his hands in innocency. 
 
 2nd Railway man. “ But it’s quite nonsense, 
 sir, to think of seeing Lake Champlain from a 
 steamer in such weather as this. It’s a mere loss 
 of time and money. You had much better go by 
 us. We’ll carry you in six hours right through 
 Vermont to Burlington, and there you’ll find Lake 
 Champlain again: ” and so the Yankees talked 
 over the German; and, as I said, at five o’clock I 
 was off for Burlington. 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 45 
 
 We passed through the pleasant country lying 
 on either bank of the Hudson to beyond Troy. In 
 the neighbourhood of that town, its hitherto mag¬ 
 nificent channel decreases rapidly in breadth and 
 depth; and whilst at Albany there was room 
 enough and water enough for ships of the largest 
 size, here, twenty miles higher up, there is hardly 
 enough for the smallest. At times in the summer 
 you may here wade through the Hudson : in fact, 
 to speak correctly, we should say that the Hudson 
 terminates a few miles above Troy, where two 
 smaller rivers fall into it and feed it with fresh 
 water. One called the Mohawk comes from the 
 west, and the other, to which the name of the Hud¬ 
 son is given, from the north. This, as I have said, 
 you can in many places drive through and walk 
 through. We passed quite close to the confluence 
 of these two streams, and I regretted much not being 
 able to examine it more closely. As the streams 
 of the Upper Hudson and the Mohawk unite here 
 (which latter I could see falling over a rocky ledge), 
 so do also the two principal channels of traffic for 
 North America. Following the little Hudson to 
 the north, and proceeding towards Lake Cham¬ 
 plain, you find a whole web of roads, canals, and 
 railways, bv which you may reach Canada and the 
 St Lawrence, and they mark the most direct route 
 
__ 
 
 from the great central organ of vitality in the 
 Union to the valley of the lower St Lawrence. 
 A still more important web of the same kind 
 stretches along the valley of the Mohawk to Lake 
 Erie, Upper Canada, and the Ear West; and 
 both groups of roads begin here at the term¬ 
 ination of the great Hudson. Among these the 
 most famous work of human art is the Erie canal, 
 of which I only saw the two extremities, but I 
 heard much of this Herculean work, and especially 
 from a gentleman in New York who had been one 
 of the chief promoters of it, and who gave me 
 briefly its political history. I say political, for 
 almost all great public works in America, canals, 
 railroads, bridges, &c., have to overcome not only 
 engineering and other physical difficulties, but also 
 the political obstacles thrown in their way. We 
 Germans are accustomed to think that if a canal or 
 bridge is wanted the government will perceive the 
 necessity, take the necessary steps, and that then 
 the work will proceed in a quiet and regular man¬ 
 ner. But it is quite otherwise in the United States. 
 The matter has to be discussed by a few millions 
 of people, besides those supposed to be concerned, 
 and is made the object of long and vehement strug¬ 
 gles and stonny debates in the political forum. 
 
 A history of the Erie canal would throw much 
 
 r 
 
 \ 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 47 
 
 light on the mode of managing these transactions 
 in America, and we will therefore take a glance 
 at it. 
 
 A small shallow canal from the Hudson to Lake 
 Erie existed as early as 1800 . It was only capable 
 of carrying small vessels and light cargoes, but at 
 the beginning of the present century a great deal 
 was thought even of that. Since however passen¬ 
 gers and goods came streaming from east and west 
 in unexpected abundance (in America results often 
 exceed all previous calculation ajid expectations), it 
 began to be perceived after a few years that this 
 Erie Canal was a very poor affair and quite unequal 
 to the increasing traffic. It was therefore unanim¬ 
 ously agreed, that the old work must be improved, 
 the channel deepened, the basins enlarged, and, in 
 fact, the canal entirely new-modelled. That the 
 thing must be done all were agreed, but how it 
 should be done gave occasion to great difference of 
 opinion and the formation of various parties. 
 
 The so-called democratic party, which is always 
 disposed to be extremely saving, and, like most very 
 saving people, takes somewhat narrow views, and 
 guards the national purse sometimes too jealously, 
 was of opinion that in the execution of so colossal 
 a work, which would cost many millions of dollars, 
 it was necessary to go to work very cautiously. 
 

 48 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 They proposed that the canal dues should be 
 raised a little, that the revenue resulting from the 
 increase should be saved, and that with these 
 savings the undertaking should be begun, and ex¬ 
 ecuted bit by bit. The work, they argued, would 
 then be self-supporting, would remodel itself by 
 its own strength, and without laying fresh burdens, 
 and perhaps even debts, on the people. 
 
 The conservative party, on the other hand, the 
 whigs, as they are called, who always take more 
 comprehensive view,s, and are inclined to a thorough 
 carrying out of great reforms, and mostly make a 
 truer estimate of future events, was of opinion that 
 the work should be executed forthwith, and with 
 the utmost energy. Even the incurring a debt, if 
 necessary, need not be feared. The development 
 of the trade to the West was proceeding at such a 
 rate, that the canal would soon be in a position not 
 only to discharge it, but to repay twice and three 
 times over every advance made upon it. By the 
 method proposed by the democrats half a century 
 might elapse before the work would be completed, 
 and the narrow old canal would be all that time a 
 hindrance and a fetter to trade. But let the gate 
 only be thrown wide open, and the fertilising flood 
 of commerce would pour in, and richly reward 
 them for all that they might do. 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 49 
 
 The discussion was continued hotly for several 
 years, in newspapers and periodicals, in the legis¬ 
 lative sessions, on platforms, and at electioneering 
 meetings. For awhile the democrats had the ad¬ 
 vantage ; they terrified the people with the amount 
 of the sum required by their opponents, and the 
 canal works were begun in the way they had pro¬ 
 posed. Since however they went on very slowly, 
 since the traffic continually increased, and the 
 wishes of the commercial world were more and 
 more loudly expressed, public opinion begun to 
 turn in the direction of the opposite party, and at 
 length the whigs seized the helm. The works now 
 went on at a great rate, money was borrowed 
 freely, and in the course of six years, when this 
 party remained at the head of affairs, a considerable 
 portion of the canal was completed. 
 
 The democrats in the mean time laboured inces¬ 
 santly to undermine their rivals; they accused them 
 of being spendthrifts and wasters of the public 
 money, and prophesied the speedy ruin of the 
 State finances. They showed that though the 
 traffic had increased more than had been expected, 
 the cost of the works had also exceeded all calcula¬ 
 tion, and that the burdens on the people were in¬ 
 creasing instead of diminishing with their progress. 
 Once more the democrats succeeded in creating an 
 
 4 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
50 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 alarm, and they gained the upper hand at the 
 elections, throwing their opponents into a minority ; 
 and by the help of this Erie Canal cry they raised 
 themselves again into the saddle. Again for eight 
 years the canal works now crept on at their former 
 slow pace; as little as possible was done, that their 
 rule might appear as easy and as economical as 
 they could make it. The conservatives, now seeing 
 that the commerce not only of New York but of all 
 America would suffer, raised a general storm, and 
 succeeded, not only by dint of arguments taken 
 from the Erie Canal, but by the employment of 
 every means in their power, in gaining a signal 
 victory, and placing themselves again at the head 
 of affairs. They even obtained at the same time 
 some alterations in the mode of elections, and other 
 constitutional changes in the Government of New 
 
 York. 
 
 This time they remained long enough at the 
 helm to see the great work nearly completed. There 
 
 was now no longer any talk about debts; in all 
 
 ways, direct and indirect, all that had been ex¬ 
 pended on the canal was returning into the pockets 
 of the people, and, let who would be rt the head of 
 affairs, the work must be immediately completed 
 without loss of time. 
 
 We traversed nearly the whole length of the small 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 51 
 
 State of Vermont. It is not quite 200 miles long, 
 and about 60 miles broad, and is included be¬ 
 tween Lake Champlain on the west and the Con¬ 
 necticut river on the east, and corresponds pretty 
 exactly with its eastern neighbour, New Hampshire, 
 which stretches north and south along the Connec¬ 
 ticut river. It may even be considered as a daugh¬ 
 ter colony of the old province, as settlers from New 
 Hampshire crossed the Connecticut about the mid¬ 
 dle of the last century, and took up their abode in 
 the valleys beyond the “ Green Mountains,” Vertu 
 Monts; the word is very old, and is found in the 
 earliest French maps of the beginning of the 17th 
 century. Very likely it was bestowed by the cele¬ 
 brated Canadian governor and traveller, who first 
 discovered and navigated the lake that bears his 
 name. As these mountains were then covered with 
 green woods, the name must have appeared very ap¬ 
 propriate to distinguish them from the higher moun¬ 
 tains to the east of Connecticut, whose snow-crown¬ 
 ed summits had been seen from the ocean, and 
 which had been called the “ White Mountains.” 
 
 The whole little State of Vermont is mountainous, 
 and resembles a Swiss canton lying at the foot of 
 the Alps ; and as the Pays de Vaud and Ticino had 
 their powerful neighbours from whose oppressive 
 authority they had to free themselves, so the settlers 
 
 4 * 
 
52 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 in these Green Mountains, when they had fonned 
 themselves into little communities, had to struggle 
 against the pretensions of the mother State, and 
 the still more powerful New York. Before the 
 time of the American Revolution, while New York 
 was still an English province, the inhabitants put 
 forward claims to the territory of Verm on., assert¬ 
 ing that it lay within the boundaries marked out 
 for them by the English kings, and that the settlers 
 from New Hampshire were mere unauthorised in¬ 
 truders, who had still to purchase from the New 
 Yorkers the lands they had long been cultivating, 
 as well as to subject themselves to their jurisdiction 
 and authority. The mountaineers of Vermont now 
 prepared to defend their natural rights, and the 
 fields which their labour had won from the wilder¬ 
 ness. They formed themselves into a sort of con¬ 
 federacy, and bid defiance at once to the claims of 
 the New Yorkers and the grants of the English 
 kings. Armed men crossed the frontiers from New 
 York, and the mountaineers offered armed resist¬ 
 ance, and many sanguinary skirmishes took place. 
 This state of affairs lasted till the time of the Ame¬ 
 rican Revolution, when New York and the other 
 former English provinces were raised into sove¬ 
 reign States. 
 
 The Vermonters, who, during the hostilities with 
 
VERMONT. ' 53 
 
 New York, had become more united, now de¬ 
 clared themselves independent; but their sove¬ 
 reignty was acknowledged neither by England 
 nor the United States. At Congress the voice 
 of the powerful New York preponderated greatly 
 over that of little Vermont; and for a long time 
 the view taken by the former, that the Vermonters 
 were mere rebels against their lawful authority, 
 was generally received. The struggle went on 
 with the same bloodshed as before; prisoners 
 were made on both sides — those sent to New 
 York being treated as rebels, and those to Ver¬ 
 mont as rapacious invaders. Little Vermont, never¬ 
 theless, maintained its independence twenty years 
 longer, managed its affairs without the help of Fe¬ 
 deral Government or Congress, and, to avoid New 
 York, was even inclined to annex herself to Canada 
 and the British; but as the number of settlers in 
 Vermont had greatly increased since the covetous 
 desires of New York had diminished, and Congress 
 earnestly desired the settlement of a dispute which 
 might be dangerous in the immediate neighbour¬ 
 hood of Canada, deputies from Vermont were in 
 the year 1791 admitted to Congress, and that 
 mountaineer confederacy received as one of the 
 United States.* Since the restoration of tranquillity, 
 
 * Whoever desires to know more of the remarkable history of 
 
54 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 all the valleys and slopes of Vermont, have become 
 filled with settlers. Numerous small towns have 
 sprung up, some of which, in consequence of the 
 increasing number of passengers to Canada, have 
 greatly increased in proportion, but less so than in 
 other parts of the United States. Its remote posi¬ 
 tion, mountainous character, and comparative want 
 of fertility, have prevented the rise of any of the 
 great thronged marts which are found elsewhere. 
 The towns are pretty, clean, peaceful little places, 
 which contrast strikingly with the tumultuous 
 crowded cities of the West, but each one has its own 
 special branch of industry. The State also contains 
 many stone quarries, and has furnished a great 
 part of the stone from which the magnificent houses 
 of the Broadway and the Fifth Avenue in New 
 York have been constructed. Great blocks of mar¬ 
 ble too are obtained from these mountains, to build 
 the palaces of the commercial aristocracy in that 
 city and Philadelphia; and Rutland, one of the 
 smallest of the chief towns of the State, was quite 
 surrounded, when I saw it, by vast piles of beautiful 
 
 Vermont, which so strikingly resembles that of one of the Swiss 
 cantons, may be referred to the excellent work of Professor Zadock 
 Thompson, “ History of Vermont, natural, civil, and statistical.” 
 Burlington, 1853. After I had once taken it up, I could not put it 
 down again till I had finished it. 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 55 
 
 white freestone and many coloured marbles, some 
 of a light bluish tint, some red, some yellow, flesh- 
 coloured, or variegated. These marble quarries were 
 for a long time very inadequately worked, but the 
 railroads have had a magical effect on them; the 
 mountains have opened their hidden treasures, and 
 the “ marble-business ” is destined evidently to be¬ 
 come one of the most important resources of the 
 State. 
 
 Of late years, when, since the discoveries in Calb 
 fornia, people have been searching for gold in all 
 directions, a gold-bearing district has been found in 
 Vermont, but the discovery is of interest more in a 
 geological than in a commercial point of view, as 
 the precious metal is so thinly scattered that it does 
 not pay for the working. 
 
 It is now, however, a well-ascertained fact that a 
 peculiar thin gold-bearing formation runs like a 
 vein, not merely through the “ Green Mountains,” 
 but through the Great Eastern mountain-system of 
 the United States. It is composed of serpentine, 
 steatite, and soap-stone, and runs northward several 
 hundred miles through Canada in the direction of 
 Quebec; and southward across the Hudson to 
 New York, and on through the Alleglianies to 
 South Carolina. In Vermont nuggets have been 
 found weighing several ounces (one of 8-j ounces ); 
 
56 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 in Canada, others still larger and more numerous, 
 which are preserved at the Geological Museum in 
 Montreal. In South Carolina similar discoveries 
 have been reported in the newspapers, and mention 
 also made of silver. In Vermont it is thought that 
 the matrix of the gold, the beautiful steatite and 
 serpentine, will prove more useful and valuable than 
 the metal it contains. 
 
 As we left Rutland, a young man of about 30 
 came and sat down by me, and began a conversa¬ 
 tion with the regulation questions. “Who are 
 you?” “Where do you come from?” “Where 
 are you going to ? ” “ How do you like our coun¬ 
 
 try ? ” &c. He was a long-legged, long-armed, 
 long-fingered, stooping figure, with head and back 
 bent like some one going against the wind ; with 
 prominent nose, small eyes, hollow cheeks, short 
 breath, open mouth, and lank muscular develop¬ 
 ment; in short, a genuine New England Yankee of 
 the Vermont species. When it came to my turn 
 to put questions, he related to me with true Yankee 
 readiness, and almost gossiping communicative¬ 
 ness, his whole biography. He was bom in Ver¬ 
 mont, of poor parents, and was one of nine sons, all 
 now scattered about the world. He had worked 
 his way through his youth, carrying on first one 
 occupation and then another, till at last he had 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 57 
 
 made his way to Iowa, in the far West, and settled 
 as a squatter in a beautiful wilderness, where he 
 had cut down, and grubbed up, and cleared to his 
 heart’s content, and made so many “ betterments ,” 
 that he had obtained a right of pre-emption to a 
 few hundred acres, and finally acquired them at a 
 moderate price as his property. He told me all this 
 in a rapid and impetuous manner, and with the 
 peculiar American nasal twang, rolling off his story 
 as if from a spinning-wheel, without ever asking 
 whether I understood him, which indeed at last, 
 when he got very enthusiastic in describing the fer¬ 
 tility of his land and of the Par West in general, 
 I did not, and only made out the often-recurring 
 words, “ crops, farms, manure, cattle, big onions, 
 fat porkers, &c.,” and with the help of a little guess¬ 
 ing put them together, so as to make out that the 
 crops in Iowa are enormous, the farms “ first-rate,” 
 the pigs as fat as any in the whole world, and the 
 onions as big as your head, and after seven years’ 
 planting, propagating themselves. My companion 
 looked at the somewhat meagre swine that we saw 
 here and there on the road, the stone quarries, 
 and the thin covering of vegetable soil from which 
 his countrymen cam their bread, and said the 
 whole population coidd do nothing better than 
 pack up their goods and be off to-morrow to the Far 
 
58 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 West, where there was room enough for a hundred 
 such States and populations as those of Vermont. 
 He concluded by saying that he was come to see 
 the only person he cared about in the country—his 
 mother, wbo lived in Middleburg, and to bring her 
 over to his farm in Iowa. I was about to express 
 my approval of the good disposition herein mani¬ 
 fested, but he gave me no time. The moment he 
 had done speaking, he rose, stamped his feet, 
 stretched himself, yawned a little, and then went 
 over and sat down by a pretty young girl on the 
 other side of the carriage, whom he had been look¬ 
 ing at several times. She had a sweet little face 
 and figure, and was dressed very fashionably, but 
 I could not guess to what class of society she belong¬ 
 ed, for these things are not so easy to make out in 
 America as with us. Most likely she w r as a farmer’s 
 daughter, but she might have been of much higher 
 rank. A wreath of Parisian artificial flowers made 
 a very ornamental frame-work for her pretty deli¬ 
 cate features, and she was clad from head to foot in 
 those light rosy tints that are so much in favour 
 with the American women. We should think they 
 looked like butterflies, but here these gay colours 
 are quite customary, and the fair damsels certainly 
 know how to arrange and combine them in a very 
 skilful and becoming manner. Rose-colour and 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 59 
 
 all possible shades of red are the most prevailing, 
 and are probably chosen to give' relief to their 
 rather pale complexions. 
 
 As my Yankee spoke in a very loud tone, I had 
 no difficulty in hearing that he was going over 
 his private history again for the benefit of the Ver¬ 
 mont beauty, and he appeared to describe the fat 
 pigs and big onions with still more animation than 
 to me. His young countrywoman listened with 
 evident sympathy, asked some friendly questions, 
 which were answered with great readiness, and 
 when he came to “ the only person he cared about,” 
 exclaimed with great warmth, “ You are going for 
 your mother ? Oh, that is quite right of you.” I 
 thought perhaps there might be after a time a 
 second person that my Yankee friend “ cared 
 about.” Perhaps indeed there was already. He 
 was holding in his long lean fingers the basket in 
 which she carried her small travelling effects, his 
 “ Guide ” lay open on her lap, and when we got to 
 Middleburg, where they were both to alight, her 
 arm, when he had helped her out of the carriage, 
 was drawn within his, and as they departed I per¬ 
 ceived that he had engaged some one to carry his 
 own trunk, and that he was laden with her shawl 
 and mantle, umbrella, and carpet-bag. The lion 
 
60 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 seemed to be tamed, and about to bend his neck 
 to the yoke. 
 
 It is very possible, however, that the affair was 
 not so romantic, for, in the perfect freedom of man¬ 
 ners that prevails between young people in America, 
 you cannot always tell whether they have been en¬ 
 gaged for ten years like a pair of German lovers, 
 or whether the acquaintance dates from the last 
 five minutes. The attentions which we suppose to 
 indicate a tender passion may be merely such as 
 any man here would pay to any woman; only in 
 support of my romantic hypothesis, it may be re¬ 
 membered that young farmers from the Far West 
 do often come back to the Eastern States with 
 other views than merely to fetch their mothers, for 
 pretty girls are very scarce in the West, and here, 
 where all the boys of the family have generally 
 wandered away somewhither, they are rather super¬ 
 abundant. 
 
 Soon after we left Middleburg four young pairs 
 entered the carriage, appearing to form a merry 
 party, and all eight consequently desiring to sit 
 together. The young men in the name of their 
 ladies drove out me and the two other men near me, 
 and we willingly resigned our places—indeed, ac¬ 
 cording to the privileges of ladies here, we could not 
 
 \ 
 
VERMONT. 
 
 61 
 
 do otherwise. But there was a poor fellow coming 
 probably from the West, and evidently ill of a fever. 
 He was not in quite so gay a mood as these squires 
 of dames, on the contrary he looked very wretched 
 and dejected. He had arranged his seat so as to 
 make himself tolerably comfortable, and, to my 
 great satisfaction, had at length fallen into a quiet 
 refreshing sleep. I was in hopes that when the 
 gay ladies noticed his illness they would respect 
 his sleep, and they did for a moment seem inclined 
 to do so, and looked hesitatingly at him, but when 
 it appeared that they could find no other places 
 they liked so well, one of the gentlemen unmerci¬ 
 fully shook up the poor sick man and pointed to 
 his pretty lady. The poor fellow started as if he 
 had seen something frightful, bundled up his things 
 as fast as he could, and moved off to find another 
 place. It does appear to me that American ladies 
 are rather tyrannical in the assertion of their rights. 
 The sick man was not very likely iu his feverish 
 state to win again the sleep from which he had 
 been so roughly awakened, especially amidst the 
 jokes and laughter of the privileged ladies. 
 
62 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 BURLINGTON. 
 
 Burlington is by far the largest and most im¬ 
 portant of the small towns of Vermont. It has 
 now above 6000 inhabitants, and there is only one 
 among the others of which the population amounts 
 to 4000. After the example of the United States, 
 a smaller town, that of Montpellier, has been chosen 
 for the seat of Government of the State, the parlia¬ 
 ment, and the authorities, though the same reason 
 for this choice cannot exist as in New York and 
 other large States, namely, that the multitudes of 
 people might render the factious violence of parties 
 dangerous to the Government. In little Burling¬ 
 ton the “ mob ” can be hardly more formidable 
 than in the still less Montpellier. Perhaps the 
 explanation may be found in the simple fact that 
 the rise of Burlington has been more recent, and 
 
 
 \ 
 
BURLINGTON. 03 
 
 chiefly in consequence of the steam navigation on 
 Lake Champlain, and the greatly increased and 
 increasing intercourse with Canada. Burlington 
 lies in a beautiful situation on the shore of the lake, 
 and is said to be excelled in this particular by no 
 town in New England. The bay on which it is 
 built forms an excellent harbour, about midway be¬ 
 tween the two extremities of the great basin, and is 
 constantly covered with small vessels, as Burlington 
 is the chief trading town on the lake, and the central 
 valley of Vermont, that of Montpellier, has also here 
 its outlet. This is the valley of the “ Onion River,” 
 as it has been called, though it has now fortunately 
 been restored to its much prettier Indian appella¬ 
 tion, the “ Winuskiand even in this out-of-the- 
 way little place there are commercial houses that 
 do business to the amount of 300,000 dollars a 
 year. 
 
 In the hotel where I quartered myself I found 
 again, as in Albany, a negro as head-waiter. I 
 admired the quiet and even dignified manner in 
 which he conducted his business, and spoke of him 
 to the proprietor, who told me that he esteemed 
 him very highly as a thoughtful and able man. 
 He had introduced his own system and his own 
 regulations into his department, and was always 
 considering how it could be still further improved. 
 
G4 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 He left him entirely to himself, the landlord said, 
 and he had never had occasion to regret doing so. 
 
 “Is he a fugitive from the South?” I asked. 
 
 “ I do not know,” was the reply, “ I have never 
 asked him. His origin and antecedents are a 
 mystery to me, but I never touch on the subject. 
 I have another negro too, who is a real Uncle Tom, 
 though he only performs the lowest services in the 
 house, cutting wood, cleaning shoes, and so forth. 
 
 His name is T-, would you like to see him ? ” 
 
 We went down to the yard and found T—— 
 busily engaged cutting wood. He spoke a little 
 Spanish, so was, in all probability, from the South. 
 
 “How do you do, T-,” said the master. “Very 
 
 well, sir.” “You seem busy?” “Yes, I have a 
 good deal to do to-day, and these logs are abomin¬ 
 ably tough; and then I have a number of little 
 things to see to in the evening.” “ Well, take your 
 time,” said the master. “ Oh yes, that ’s very easy 
 to say, but I must get my work done,” was the 
 answer, “ leave it to me.” 
 
 “ And I can leave it to him,” said the landlord. 
 “ He has been a long while in my service, and I 
 have never found any fault in him. He does his 
 work very willingly, and if there is none for him to 
 do he is sure to make some. He is always as quiet 
 as you see him now, never disagrees with any one, 
 
BURLINGTON. 
 
 05 
 
 and obeys me like a child. He is very religious, 
 often goes to church, and has always a text at hand. 
 I am convinced that while he is cutting his wood 
 he is always thinking of those subjects. Many 
 people do not believe in the possibility of an Uncle 
 Tom, but I do; for, as I said, I have one in 
 him.” 
 
 I must own I gave some weight to this testi¬ 
 mony, for the hotel keeper, though seemingly a good 
 and intelligent man, was a regular Yankee, and by 
 no means given to enthusiasm. 
 
 In the evening I went to pay some visits, taking 
 a little boy of fourteen to show me the way. I 
 noticed that he was chewing tobacco, and asked 
 how long he had been addicted to that indulgence; 
 and was told four years, and that he also smoked 
 cigars. “ The first time a boy gave me a bit I spit 
 it out,” he continued, “ and the second too, but he 
 said*I should try again, and at last I learned to 
 like it.” 
 
 “ Does your mother allow you to do this ?” 
 
 “ Oh, she don’t know ! Some people told her; 
 and she sometimes smells me, but when she asks me 
 I deny it right out.” 
 
 “ What! you tell lies ?” 
 
 “ Why yes, to be sure; you wouldn’t have me 
 tell her the truth ? She would beat me.” 
 
 5 
 
 YOL. I. 
 
06 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 “ What light is that?” I asked of this hopeful 
 youth, “is it a bonfire?” 
 
 “ No; it’s a house a fire I guess.” 
 
 “ Where is it ?” 
 
 “ I don’t know, and I don’t care. There was a 
 ship wrecked on the lake this afternoon. The masts 
 blew right out, and all the cargo was lost.” 
 
 “Was the crew lost too?” 
 
 “ I don’t know, but I guess they were.” 
 
 “Who does that large house belong to?” 
 
 “ It did belong to Mr H., but he has gone off 1 to 
 the West, and has taken a lot of money with him.” 
 
 “ He was very rich, I suppose ?” 
 
 “ No; but he had a good many debts, and he 
 didn’t want to pay them, so he sold a lot of his 
 property quietly, and then went off himself.” 
 
 When I got to the house I was going to I met 
 with a cordial reception, as did also my small and 
 by no means elegant-looking attendant. The‘mas¬ 
 ter of the house himself gave him a chair when he 
 perceived that he belonged to me, and let him, in 
 true republican fashion, make one of the company; 
 in fact, he had entered the room just as if he thought 
 he was, and afterwards, as it was cold, he brought 
 his chair near the fire and made himself quite com¬ 
 fortable. 
 
 All this was still rather new to me. With us a 
 
BURLINGTON. 
 
 67 
 
 little attendant sprite of this sort would have 
 waited outside the door or have gone into the 
 kitchen: but I had afterwards often occasion to 
 notice that here people of this class would, not 
 exactly in an impudent manner, but quite uncon¬ 
 sciously, go in everywhere with me, and introduce 
 me, and were everywhere treated with the greatest 
 friendliness, without any apparent effort or con¬ 
 descension on the part of the master of the house. 
 
 I found the ladies here engaged in needlework ; 
 they were making clothes for poor French-Cana- 
 dians in the neighbouring province. These people 
 often come from their less busy country (Lower 
 Canada) to seek for work in Vermont, and when 
 they do not find it, get into distress and constitute 
 the greater part of the pauper population of the 
 State. They also go further into New England, ex¬ 
 tend their excursions all along the shores of Lake 
 Champlain and even to Albany, where you may see 
 poor Canadians going about like gypsies. Some 
 go down the Hudson to New York, where the 
 Canadians are now greatly on the increase. 
 
 The fine large steamers on Lake Champlain, which 
 are famous for the excellence of their structure and 
 appointments, have usually a French Canadian crew 
 and attendants. For attendants these polite and 
 obliging people are especially adapted, and they 
 
68 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 arc, too, willing workmen, and more modest in their 
 pretensions than the Americans. Canadian In¬ 
 dians also sometimes find their way down the lake 
 to Albany and New York; formerly it was a war 
 path, by which, under the guidance of the French, 
 they came down upon the south, but now they 
 bring their little baskets, embroidered slippers, and 
 other produce of their peaceful industry. 
 
 On the following day a friend drove me about 
 the environs in a gig, and we also climbed the lofty 
 tower of the university, from whose summit we 
 looked over a magnificent panorama. 
 
 On the east we saw the whole range of the 
 “ Verts Monts',' from which the State has its name, 
 at a distance of from 20 to 30 miles. They rise to 
 a height of 4000 feet, and have a very imposing 
 aspect. Their highest points have English names, 
 the Chin, the Nose, the Camel’s Hump, and so 
 forth. 
 
 A gentleman in Vermont told me that many 
 lovers of Indian antiquities and history had given 
 themselves much trouble to find out the old Indian 
 names, and the Canadian Indians had been con¬ 
 sulted about their traditions. Probably there are 
 also French appellations for them. Between the 
 mountains and the lake lies a beautiful hilly coun¬ 
 try, and beyond the lake to the west rise other high 
 
BURLINGTON. 
 
 09 
 
 mountains, the Aderondag chain in the northern 
 part of the State of New York. They are mostly 
 wild and desolate in appearance, but their declivi¬ 
 ties towards the lake are cultivated and peopled. 
 Beyond those mountains lies an extensive table¬ 
 land almost 3000 feet high, which is little culti¬ 
 vated, and indeed known to few but hunters and 
 fishers. It is the least visited and most thinly in¬ 
 habited part of the State of New York. Here and 
 there it presents small lakes and spots of exquisite 
 scenery, but few travellers come to enjoy it. The 
 great routes, that of Lake Champlain to the east, of 
 the Mohawk, the Erie Canal, &c., on the south, 
 and the great St Lawrence on the north, lead round 
 this terra incognita, but no great road passes 
 through it. 
 
 The land of the “ Green Mountains ” and that of 
 the Aderondag range are entirely separated from 
 each other. The long cleft of the Champlain, and 
 its continuation to the St Lawrence, makes a 
 striking distinction in the animals, plants, and other 
 natural phenomena; and an entirely different Fauna 
 and Flora is found on the western side from that of 
 the eastern. In the former are the species of both 
 known on the great lakes—the Ontario, Erie, &c.; 
 but Vermont belongs in an ethnographical point of 
 view, as well as in its natural history, as do the 
 
70 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 New England States, to the same great province. 
 The valley of the far-stretching lake is, to a certain 
 extent, a continuation of that of the Hudson from 
 south to north, and both together form a deep 
 channel, through which southern life flows north¬ 
 ward. I was told, for instance, that every year a 
 very elegant kind of Colibri (humming-bird) finds 
 its way up this route. I was told in Burlington 
 on the 5th of October, that its golden gleam had 
 been seen in the gardens only a week ago, and it 
 proceeds still further northward to the St Lawrence, 
 and even the interior of Canada, and builds its nest 
 in the woods near Hudson’s Bay, as well as on the 
 other side of the river, as far as Nova Scotia. 
 
 That I should hear all this on the top of the 
 tower of the University of Burlington was what I 
 certainly had not expected, for who in Germany 
 ever heard of such an Alma Mater ? The most re¬ 
 markable thing about it is its history, which may 
 be found in the already-mentioned excellent work 
 of Professor Thompson. It is incredible what dif¬ 
 ficulties it has had to contend with, from the first 
 voluntary subscription at the close of the last cen¬ 
 tury, when a few thousand dollars were expended in 
 the purchase of 300,000 bricks, down to the most 
 recent period. Half a dozen times was the little 
 light nearly extinguished; but when the year 1833 
 

 BURLINGTON. 71 
 
 brought the sum of 26,000 dollars, the whole was 
 placed on a more solid footing. 
 
 Now, first, was a real library procured, and, as 
 every professor wrote down the names of the books 
 required for his department, the catalogue was 
 ready even before the library. 
 
 A well-informed agent was then despatched to 
 Europe with the money (10,000 dollars) in his 
 pocket; and the books were then purchased at 
 German auctions, and other places where they could 
 be obtained advantageously. In this way a good 
 collection of 10,000 volumes was got together— 
 many of them still bearing the names and traces of 
 the studies of their former owners—as Blumenbach, 
 Jacobs, Wustemann, or Grimm. 
 
 The other scientific institutions of the little de¬ 
 mocratic State of Vermont seem also to have had 
 a difficult and thorny path to tread. The proposal, 
 for instance, for a grant of money for a geological 
 survey of the country, for the appointment of a 
 state geologist, and the preparation of a geological 
 map, lay a long time before the State Legislature, 
 and was rejected year after year as unnecessary, till 
 in 1844 it was carried by a majority of 96 over 92. 
 Probably the over-democratic constitution of Ver¬ 
 mont is in fault, that if not popular education, at 
 least the higher branches of science, are somewhat 
 
72 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 neglected. Of all the States of the Union Vermont 
 has laid the broadest foundation for its political 
 constitution. Every male of 21 years of age, and 
 good character, is a citizen, and has the suffrage. 
 Even negroes, who are treated here more liberally 
 than elsewhere, have a right to vote, and no more 
 is required of them than of the whites, though in 
 New York and some other States they require a 
 certain amount of property. Like individuals, cor¬ 
 porations, as for instance towns, have all equal 
 rights, and in this way, by pursuing the democratic 
 principle to an extreme, they have created a kind of 
 aristocracy. The small towns would not endure 
 that the large ones should have any superiority over 
 them, and towns of a hundred inhabitants, of which 
 there are plenty in Vermont, send the same num¬ 
 ber of representatives to parliament, as, for example, 
 Burlington, which has 6000 ; and consequently an 
 inhabitant of one of those towns has 60 times thö 
 influence of one of 6000. Three of the larger 
 towns have long since protested against this privi¬ 
 leged inequality, but the little ones have hitherto 
 been able to maintain their ground. 
 
LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 
 
 73 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 
 
 The storm which had raged on Lake Champlain 
 the day before our arrival, with such violence as to 
 occasion some shipwrecks, had passed away when 
 w T e reached it, and the little fury now lay peaceful, 
 and smiling, and smooth as glass before us. A north¬ 
 west wind, here called the “fine weather wind,” 
 had swept the sky clear of clouds, and one of the 
 beautiful steamers, w’hite painted and exquisitely 
 clean, was floating like a swan on the water at 
 Burlington, and ready to carry us away to the 
 north. The Americans are certainly the cleanest 
 people in the world, and a traveller who has not 
 yet convinced himself of the fact, may do so by 
 inspecting one of these steamers. There is not a 
 place in them which the most elegant passenger 
 could hesitate to enter; throughout the drawing- 
 
74 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 rooms, dining-rooms, sleeping cabins, lie will find 
 everything in the most perfect order, and brilliantly 
 clean. The washing and bathing rooms, perfumery 
 and hair-dressers’ shops (for all these things are to 
 be found on board), are as elegant and as well 
 kept as in the streets of New .York or Boston. 
 They save the busy passenger much time, and allow 
 him to attend to many things which his engross¬ 
 ing occupations may have left him no time for on 
 shore. 
 
 For the enjoyment of the air and scenery too 
 these steamers are admirably adapted. A broad 
 high platform called the “ Promenade Deck ” rises 
 in the midst, floored like a dancing-room, and afford¬ 
 ing a free view all round, and you have plenty of 
 room for pacing about it, for these spacious vessels 
 afford a dozen times as much room for each person 
 as our Rhine and Danube steamers. If the wind 
 is cold you descend to the floor below, where you 
 find open verandas and wide balconies, and where 
 you are protected from the wind without being 
 hindered in the enjoyment of the scenery; or you 
 may go lower, and find a still more sheltered seat 
 under the colonnade that runs round the apartments 
 of the ladies. It was really no trifling enjoyment to 
 navigate this glorious lake in such a vessel as this. 
 
 The Frenchman Champlain was the first man 
 
 r 
 
LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 75 
 
 who ever fired a gun upon these waters. In 1609, 
 when he came here from Canada, he had but three 
 musketeers with him, but with these he struck 
 terror into the country, and gained many victories 
 over the wild tribes round the lake. That a man 
 who must be regarded as the real founder of 
 Canada, and who did more to spread European 
 civilization and authority here than any other, 
 should have given his name to the lake, is what no 
 one can object to, especially as he has scarcely any 
 other geographical monument here in the North. 
 It is certain, however, that the Indians would long 
 since have found a much better one.* In the 
 language of one of the tribes it is called “ Petawa 
 bougue,” or “ Change of land and water,” which 
 on account of its numerous islands is very suitable. 
 Another called it “ Camaderi guarunte” which sig¬ 
 nifies “ Mouth or Gate of the Country.” The small 
 lake connected with it to the south, which we call 
 Lake George, the Indian natives called by a name 
 that signifies “ water attached to the great lake.” 
 The appellation “ Mouth of the Country ” particu¬ 
 larly pleased me, for Lake Champlain, and its con¬ 
 tinuation, the river Richelieu, which runs into the 
 St Lawrence, is the only natural entrance to the 
 wide mountain district around it. It is doubt- 
 
 There is in Canada a County of Champlain. 
 
76 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 less an old Indian road, and in the time of the 
 French dominion in Canada it was the mouth 
 through which the hostile nations, the French and 
 English, spoke to one another continually with mus¬ 
 ket and cannon thunder. For a period of more 
 than a century, regularly every year the Cana¬ 
 dians marched southward through the valley of the 
 lake, to attack the British possessions and lay waste 
 their settlements, and just as often did the British 
 burst out through the gate to the north, at the 
 head of the wild Iroquois, and exercise retaliation 
 on the French. Even in the subsequent contest 
 between England and her colonies. Lake Champlain 
 still retained the strategic significance marked by 
 the Indian appellation; but now for forty years 
 past this mouth happily no longer pours forth 
 armed soldiers and ferocious Indians, guns and 
 blood and scalps, but steamers and locomotives 
 and peaceful traders, and bales of goods from New 
 York and Montreal—between which two great 
 marts it forms the chief if not the only direct con¬ 
 nection. On the line four hundred miles long 
 between New York and Montreal, Lake Champlain, 
 with the Hudson, is the principal channel of com¬ 
 munication. It offers a hundred miles of water 
 navigable for the largest ships ; but, unfortunately, 
 its outlet, the Richelieu, is hindered by rocks and 
 
LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 
 
 77 
 
 rapids. There remained, therefore, an isthmus be¬ 
 tween the northern extremity of the lake and the 
 St Lawrence, as between the southern and the 
 Hudson; but canals and railways have now re¬ 
 moved this difficulty, and made of it a single un¬ 
 interrupted line. 
 
 In early, that is, pre-historic, times there was, 
 doubtless, a period when the whole line was filled with 
 water, and an arm of the sea passed from the St 
 Lawrence through Lake Champlain and the Hud¬ 
 son, round New England, and made an island of 
 it. The recent discovery of the skeleton of a whale 
 on the shore of the lake puts it almost beyond a 
 doubt that the lake was once connected with the 
 sea, and contained sea-water as well as a kind of 
 whale, which at the present day is found in the 
 neighbouring seas. 
 
 Sea-shells and brackish water and the sea-tide 
 reach, as I have said, as far up as Albany; and 
 here on Lake Champlain I learned that seals come 
 up the lake, along the path of the whales of old 
 times. They come through the mighty St Law¬ 
 rence, and wriggle their way among the rocks and 
 cataracts of the Richelieu to the land-locked water, 
 where in the winter they are often killed on the 
 ice. I found several cases of the kind mentioned 
 in the work of Professor Thompson before alluded 
 
78 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 to; and on talking the subject over with the cap¬ 
 tain of the steamer, I learned that it was by no means 
 uncommon, and that two or three seals were found 
 every year as far south as Whitehall. Between 
 Whitehall and Albany, where the last oceanic 
 movement from the south is felt, is a tract of about 
 eighty miles of land ; and since whales have been 
 in our own time followed as far up the St Law¬ 
 rence as Montreal, we may consider that marine 
 animals swim nearly round the peninsula of New 
 England, and this may perhaps explain why many 
 of the oldest maps represent it as an island, as 
 the first settlers supposed it to be. They heard 
 in many places of deep navigable waters west of 
 them, and naturally imagined a connection between 
 them. There is also much of the islander in the 
 character of the New England men. It is more 
 narrow, compact, and solid than that of the people 
 of the other States. 
 
 The whole northern part of Lake Champlain is 
 filled with larger and smaller islands, some covered 
 with forest, some cultivated and inhabited, and 
 some even with little towns or villages, and others 
 again mere rocks rising out of the w r ater. There is 
 one of them that bears the name of Kelton’s Prize, 
 because, according to the Americans, the com¬ 
 mander of an English ship, during the war, took 
 
LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 
 
 79 
 
 it for an enemy’s vessel, and poured a broadside 
 into it. 
 
 It was a beautiful evening on which we were 
 steaming through these islands, the sun went down 
 behind the Aderondag mountains in a flood of light, 
 passing into a thousand glorious tints, till the moon 
 rose and melted them all into her silvery splendour. 
 The crew of our steamer consisted entirely of French- 
 Canadians, the first whom I had seen, and they 
 made a very favourable impression on me. They 
 were all lively, well-behaved, agreeable men, and 
 they still retained so much of the spirit of la Idle 
 France , as to find perpetual amusement in gossip¬ 
 ing and joking with one another, when there was 
 nothing else to be done; and the captain declared 
 he preferred them to the Americans, who were too 
 
 independent, and would not do all kinds of 
 work. Here also I met with Indians for the first 
 time. As they sat in silence, wrapped in dark 
 mantles, I took them for a group of poor German 
 emigrants, until one of them, to whom I had in 
 vain spoken in French, German, and English, re¬ 
 peated several times, “ I am savasch ,”—that is, 
 “ savage.” 
 
 At Rouse’s point, at the northern extremity of 
 the lake, I first, on a beautiful moonlight night, 
 touched Canadian soil, and for the first time in my 
 
80 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 life I was treated by custom-house officers as honest 
 passengers ought to be treated. 
 
 “ Gentlemen, have you anything that pays 
 duty?” 
 
 We answered in unison, “ No,” and were then 
 passed with bag and baggage, without the officers 
 making any examination to discover whether we were 
 or were not liars and cheats. On the quay was a post 
 with a board, on which was inscribed, “No smoking 
 allowed west of this board;” and I have often had 
 occasion to notice how completely this wandering 
 people must have the compass by heart to profit by 
 such directions. Even in the labyrinth of streets in 
 a great city they seem never at a loss, and on the 
 addresses of letters you will see, “ Two doors east 
 or north of such a street.” 
 
 Though in a railway train and at night, I im¬ 
 mediately perceived indications of being in a dif¬ 
 ferent country. There were differences in the ar- 
 «/ 
 
 rangements of the carriages, different figures and 
 costumes, and from time to time I heard French, or 
 rather Canadian, spoken. The mountains and hills 
 of Vermont and New York had now entirely disap¬ 
 peared, and the moon shone over a wide plain, in 
 which we could distinguish tracts of forest, of 
 stony heath, or grass-land, intermingled with corn¬ 
 fields and thinly scattered villages. At some of 
 

 LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 81 
 
 these we stopped, and I could see'that the outlines 
 of the houses differed widely from those of the 
 United States;—girls with their hands stuck in the 
 pockets of their aprons, and young peasants with 
 long nightcaps were talking to them as they lounged 
 against the wall. We were passing through the 
 counties of Acadie and Chambly, and at the last 
 station, St Lambert, we came in sight of the mighty 
 St Lawrence, its broad flood gleaming in the moon¬ 
 light ; the steam ferry-boat took us up as the steam 
 carriage set us down, and we were soon again afloat. 
 In former days, when steam did not toss people 
 this way head over heels from one place to another, 
 we should have passed the night in St Lambert, 
 and have had time the next day before the “boteau”* 
 came, to have duly considered the situation, and 
 made many philosophical reflections upon it; but 
 there is now only time for this in winter, when the 
 river is covered with ice, and the two shores are long 
 separated from one another. We proceeded in a 
 straight line across the river, but we had neverthe¬ 
 less several miles to go before we saw anything of 
 the handsome “ Silver Town.” At last something 
 glimmered silvery through the mist, namely the tin- 
 covered houses and churches of Montreal. This 
 
 TOL. L 
 
 * Canadian for bateau, 
 6 
 
metal, un-precious as it is, nevertheless preserves its 
 white brightness a long time without rusting, and 
 when the moon or the setting sun plays on the roofs 
 and cupolas they produce an effect that Canaletto, or 
 Quaglio, or any other painter of cities and houses, 
 would be enchanted with. When I saw Montreal 
 by common day-light, indeed, I could not help 
 thinking the epithet of “ Silver Town ” far too com¬ 
 plimentary ; but, subsequently, when I saw the 
 church towers under the rosy light of evening, they 
 seemed to glow with internal fire, and I became of 
 a different opinion. 
 
 The Americans regard Montreal and Quebec 
 much as we do Memphis or Thebes, as places of 
 the highest antiquity, and go thither if they desire 
 to see something very old-world and European. The 
 carriages in wduch we and our effects were received, 
 on our arrival at Montreal, were certainly adapted 
 to support this view. One cannot imagine how a 
 coach-builder could hit on such a contrivance, and 
 
 still less how such an old-fashioned, inconvenient 
 
 i • ill __non 4 -a flio urooonf 
 
LAKE CHAMPLAIN. 
 
 83 
 
 behind, and then away it jolts, you and your trunks 
 and hat-boxes and carpet-bags tumbling about to¬ 
 gether, and settling your respective places as you 
 can. For the use of this contrivance, too, you have 
 to pay very dearly, at least if you get an impudent, 
 extortionate Irishman to drive you, instead of a 
 modest, good-tempered, honest Canadian. 
 
 In certain departments of social life,—hotels, rail¬ 
 roads, river-steamers, and newspapers,—Canada is a 
 good deal Americanized, and the great hotel at 
 which we alighted, “ Donnaganna’s,”* was quite on 
 the plan of those of the United States; it was, too, 
 very republican in its spirit, according to which, while 
 the great mass of the guests are admirably served, 
 each individual appears neglected. When the mul¬ 
 titude, summoned by the loud tones of the gong, 
 comes crowding into the vast dining-room, they 
 find a whole army of waiters ready to do their bid¬ 
 ding, and supply every possible want; but if as an 
 individual he requires out of the regular time as 
 much as a cup of broth, he may starve before he 
 gets it. Society at large finds saloons fitted up 
 with princely splendour, but when you withdraw 
 your individuality into your private room, you find 
 
 * Donnacona was the name of the first Indian Chief met with by 
 Cartier, at his discovery of the St Lawrence, in the neighbourhood 
 of the present Montreal. Probably the French Canadian family of 
 Donnaganna derives its name from him. 
 
84 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 yourself shut up in a mere cell, with four white 
 walls, with a gas-pipe sticking out from the wall, 
 at which you must yourself kindle a light, and 
 where you may ring and stamp and call yourself 
 hoarse even for a glass of water, and probably at 
 last find that the only way to get it is to fetch it 
 yourself. 
 
MONTREAL. 
 
 85 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MONTREAL. 
 
 Montreal is certainly the largest and most 
 thriving town in America, northward of New York 
 and Boston. In trade, wealth, and population, it 
 is in advance of all other towns of Canada, and it 
 has become the chief mart and metropolis of the life 
 of the St Lawrence. With its 80,000 inhabitants, 
 it may be considered a great city, and this number 
 will, before long, be immensely increased. The 
 advantages of its geographical position are such as 
 to insure its advance. 
 
 The circumstance that immediately above the 
 city the St Lawrence ceases to be navigable, and 
 is interrupted by many rocks and rapids, doubtless 
 gave occasion to the earliest settlement, as it was 
 the furthest point to which Cartier, the discoverer, 
 proceeded unhindered. He found, too, near the 
 
86 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 
 cataracts, an Indian settlement called Ilochelaga, 
 which must have been a sort of capital, as its name 
 was so long current, and was even sometimes used 
 to designate the whole country. After Cartier 
 French ships often came so far, and the place was 
 already well known, when M. de Maisonneuve in 
 1641 planted here the little pallisaded town, “ Ville 
 Marie,” which was the germ of the present great 
 city of Montreal. 
 
 The large island where this seed was sown is 
 formed by the vast arms of the St Lawrence and 
 Ottawa, and is on the whole a very flat and fertile 
 country, certainly a rich Delta, formed by the de¬ 
 posits of the two rivers. It has on its eastern 
 side a very striking natural object, a hill lying on 
 the level ground like a large monument, which 
 catches from afar the eye of any one who sails up 
 the St Lawrence, and at whose foot Cartier and 
 the founder of Montreal both probably landed. 
 The fertility of this Montreal island (it is as large 
 as a small German principality) tended of course to 
 encourage settlement, and is still very advantageous 
 for supplying the wants of a large town. 
 
 It is seldom that the sea-navigation of a river 
 ceases only where its rocks and cataracts begin, but 
 this is the case with Montreal. Ships of consider¬ 
 able burthen could sail right up to the town, but 
 
 
MONTREAL. 
 
 87 
 
 had there to be exchanged for Indian bark canoes. 
 Marine animals, and even whales, sometimes come 
 up the St Lawrence as far as Montreal, which 
 therefore, though 400 miles from the sea, may be 
 regarded as a sea-port. 
 
 The line of traffic along the cataracts and on the 
 higher part of the river has now been improved by 
 blasting rocks, and making canals and railroads; 
 and the numerous countries and harbours of the 
 interior, the towns and states on the great Cana¬ 
 dian lakes, are thus placed in close connection with 
 Montreal. 
 
 Another circumstance that contributed to the 
 growth of Montreal was, that the Ottawa, the great 
 tributary of the St Lawrence, mingles its waters with 
 it at this point, and formed from the first a channel 
 of communication with the west and north-west. 
 It flows through a well-wooded and fertile coun¬ 
 try ; brings down vast quantities of timber to 
 Montreal, and takes from it the various products of 
 civilisation. The woods are being rapidly cleared 
 along its banks, land is being brought into cultiva¬ 
 tion, small towns are springing up, and steamers 
 and railroads have made their way a hundred miles 
 up its stream. It is often called in the country 
 “ Montreal’s backbone.” 
 
 The third line leading to Montreal is that of 
 

 Lake Champlain and the Hudson, by which we 
 reached it, and this line has been now completed 
 by railroads and canals. 
 
 Montreal appears, therefore, as the meeting-point 
 and centre of four great natural high roads tending 
 to various directions—that from the ocean of the 
 north-east by the great stream of the St Lawrence,— 
 of the upper river and the lakes,—of the river 
 Ottawa,—and of Lake Champlain, which is the main 
 link between Lower Canada and the United States. 
 When, favoured so far by Nature, social life has 
 thus been fairly kindled and bums so strongly at 
 one point, capital and enterprise will soon open a 
 w r ay in other directions, w'hicli at first could not so 
 powerfully influence it, and this has been recently 
 exemplified in the line of railroad constructed be¬ 
 tween Montreal and the American town of Portland 
 on the sea. 
 
 The geographical position and the importance of 
 this line, and its organic connection with Montreal, 
 will be easily understood if we consider first that 
 the St Lawrence turns northward from Montreal, 
 and reaches the ocean, from which at that city it 
 is not far distant, by a great circuit. In those cold 
 regions to which it flows it is often for a long time 
 covered with ice and closed to navigation ; and it 
 is also at its mouth surrounded by great peninsu- 
 
MONTREAL. 
 
 89 
 
 las and islands. Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, New 
 Brunswick, Labrador, surround and block up its 
 entrance, and cold habitual fogs, and frequent 
 changes of wind, make the navigation among these 
 islands slow and perilous. The free open ocean is 
 not reached without a passage of nearly a thousand 
 miles. The open ocean is practically much nearer 
 to the Upper St Lawrence, namely, on the long 
 sea-board of the American State of Maine. T his 
 coast, however, runs, like the St Lawrence, from 
 south-west to north-east, leaving between it and 
 the river an isthmus of about 200 miles broad. 
 
 The crossing of this isthmus, either by passen¬ 
 gers or goods, was, of course, before the railway 
 time a more difficult and expensive undertaking 
 than the longer water passage by the St Lawrence; 
 but the railroads have removed these difficulties, 
 and made it possible to cut off that inconvenient 
 country about its mouth, and connect Montreal, 
 the centre of the commercial life of that country, 
 more closely and intimately with the ocean. The 
 fine harbour of Portland in the State of Maine has 
 been found to be the point most easily reached, 
 and the so-called “ Grand Trunk Railroad ” has 
 been constructed between that port and Montreal. 
 This remarkable railway will, however, only be 
 completed when it shall have been found possible 
 
90 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 to bridge over the mighty St Lawrence.* Then 
 only will it have become the actual artery of the 
 Upper St Lawrence traffic. Vessels which find 
 themselves on the banks of Newfoundland can then 
 reach the end of the line at Portland by a much 
 shorter, safer, and more convenient route than even 
 Quebec—the port nearest the mouth of the St 
 Lawrence—and this at all seasons of the year, even 
 in winter when Quebec is inaccessible. Por timber 
 and other bulky and heavy goods the river by 
 Quebec will remain the chief road, but all kinds of 
 lighter goods will go by Portland, and the post 
 will also naturally take this direction. Letters and 
 information, often as important for transmission as 
 goods, will, with the assistance of the telegraph 
 line, be forwarded to Montreal with the utmost 
 possible rapidity. 
 
 The whole line of coast, and the ports between 
 Quebec on the north, and New York on the 
 south, inclusive of these two cities, as well as 
 Boston, Portsmouth, &c., may be regarded as the 
 natural vents and outlets for the whole great system 
 of the St Lawrence and the lakes, through which 
 the connection is to be maintained between those 
 fertile regions and the countries beyond the Atlantic. 
 
 * Victoria Bridge was opened by the Prince of Wales, in the pre¬ 
 sent year, 1860 .—Tn. 
 
MONTREAL. 
 
 91 
 
 Quebec maintained a connection with those re¬ 
 gions from the earliest times by its river ; and New 
 York and Boston have long since established a 
 communication by canals and railroads. Their 
 youngest rival, Portland, with its recently-con¬ 
 structed road to Montreal, will probably in time 
 become the most important of all,—for this reason, 
 among others, that it occupies exactly the central 
 point between the two extremes of Quebec and New 
 York. The “ Grand Trunk Railroad ” seems to 
 have had a prophetic inspiration in adopting this 
 name. It is proposed, too, to carry this most di¬ 
 rect line from the sea still further westward through 
 the whole system of lakes. Lake Superior, it is 
 supposed, will soon be reached, and many Canadian 
 Britons prolong the line in thought as far as the 
 Pacific Ocean ; they have even represented it on 
 maps with this prolongation, and as they lay down 
 Portland for its eastern termination, place its op¬ 
 posite extremity on the Strait of Fuca, in the neigh¬ 
 bourhood of Vancouver’s Island. 
 
 The commercial advantages with which Montreal 
 has been thus endowed both by nature and art, 
 have called forth a vigorous life in the city at which 
 the traveller is really astonished. At every step 
 you find a building or an institution just begun or 
 just completed; and not only in the streets, but 
 
92 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 far and wide over the country round, you might 
 think yourself in a newly-founded city, rather than 
 in one of 200 years old. The colossal Montreal of 
 the future is now in the period of its infancy, and 
 the small old Montreal of the present and the past, 
 is opening wide its arms and making all possible 
 room for the reception of its great progeny. Every¬ 
 thing new is constructed on a scale that far exceeds 
 present wants, and every effort is made to enlarge 
 and extend what is old. In the long narrow old 
 Erench main street for instance, the Rue Notre 
 Dame, the new houses are being placed many yards 
 further back on either side, so as to make a regular 
 broadway like that of New York; and at the same 
 time another main street of the grandest propor¬ 
 tions, such as may become the capital of the St 
 Lawrence, is in course of construction. This is 
 the broad handsome St James’s Street, which now 
 wants only some additional length, and will soon 
 stretch itself out like a pine tree. The public 
 buildings, the bank, the post-office, &c., that already 
 adorn this street, cannot readily be equalled for 
 taste and solidity, and the new court-house is like 
 a Greek temple, only larger and more massive than 
 ever Greek temple was. The ground where 30 
 years ago snipes and partridges were shot in bush 
 and swamp, is now covered with comfortable dwell- 
 
MONTREAL. 
 
 93 
 
 ings and churches of various denominations. Even 
 the old French Catholics, who were formerly con¬ 
 tent with little dark chapels, having now under 
 British rule attained to greater opulence and been 
 kindled by British enterprise, have built them¬ 
 selves a new and stately cathedral capable of con¬ 
 taining 10,000 persons. A new spirit seems to have 
 been breathed into these long stagnant Canadian- 
 French, and the great majority of them have 
 frankly associated themselves with their English 
 fellow-subjects, have cordially joined in all their 
 speculations and industrial undertakings, contribute 
 zealously to industrial exhibitions, and take an active 
 part in committees and companies. The vast and 
 solid quays of freestone which have been carried 
 along the bank of the river are grand and useful 
 public works, for the like of which London itself 
 sighs in vain. Three millions of pounds sterling 
 have passed for these improvements into the hands 
 of architects, engineers, labourers, builders, and 
 speculators, who are continually bringing some 
 beautiful and useful work to a conclusion, and 
 two millions’ worth of stone is to be thrown into 
 the great river to make a bridge that will not have 
 its equal in the world, a fetter wherewith to bind 
 the wildest and most gigantic of river gods. With 
 another million the Canadians are hollowing out a 
 
94 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 terrace of the Montreal hill above the town for the 
 basin of a magnificent reservoir, to receive the water 
 brought from the Ottawa for the supply of the whole 
 city. I witnessed some of the remarkable blasting 
 operations for this basin, and I certainly never saw 
 any work of the kind carried on on so grand a scale. 
 
 Holes of from fifteen to twenty feet deep and 
 five or six inches in diameter were bored in the 
 rock with a chisel worked by a horse, and filled 
 with 110 pounds of gunpowder, and every blast 
 rent away a piece of a rock as large as a house. 
 
 The great Market Hall of Montreal is another of 
 the marvels exhibited to strangers as not having 
 its equal in America; but there are certainly a good 
 many things which have not their like in the whole 
 American continent. 
 
 According to the custom of London and New 
 York, and generally of all Anglo-Saxon cities, labour 
 and pleasure occupy different quarters here. Busi¬ 
 ness is carried on near the river, and the handsome 
 half-rural residences of the merchants are in the 
 suburbs. The business quarter contains only ware¬ 
 houses and country-houses, with the addition, re¬ 
 cently, of some large manufactories, for the city 
 possesses in the St Lawrence Falls an admirable 
 water-power, which is now applied to machinery, 
 and which I forgot to mention amongst the geo- 
 
MONTREAL. 
 
 95 
 
 graphical advantages of Montreal. The suburban 
 villas encircle the whole town, extending to the foot 
 of the mountain, where they have often very lovely 
 positions. The kernel of all these fine and spacious 
 • new buildings is, however, formed by the old French 
 town, with its narrow streets, which cannot be 
 entirely remodelled, and its little old-fashioned 
 houses, very like those in our smaller continental 
 towns; and some suburbs consist entirely of old 
 wooden houses and sheds built close to and almost 
 one upon the other, which seem expressly arranged 
 to be burnt down altogether in the first fire. 
 
The long and finely-wooded hill, which is, as I 
 
 
 have said, the only elevation to be seen for far and 
 wide upon the flat island between the Ottawa and 
 the St Lawrence, was called by Cartier the “ Royal 
 Mountain ” long before a town existed here, and 
 the first little settlement was called “ Ville Marie,” 
 a name which is still retained for the Episcopal See. 
 Gradually, however, the name of the hill was trans¬ 
 ferred to the town. Why the Spanish termina¬ 
 tion “ real ” should have been adopted instead of 
 “ Royal,” I do not know, but some Canadians 
 have informed me that that and not “ royal is the 
 old form of the word in Normandy and Canada. 
 The French peasants here corrupt the name still 
 further and call it “Morreal.” Since the name 
 has been adopted for the town, the mountain has 
 
 r 
 
V 
 
 THE ROYAL MOUNTAIN. 97 
 
 lost its royalty, and is called not “ Montreal,” but 
 simply the mountain, and the city has already began 
 to include it within her territory. The villas and 
 the reservoir already touch its foot and its lowest 
 spurs in the plain, and about half-way up there is a 
 broad platform, or natural terrace, passing a con¬ 
 siderable way round it, which it is proposed to 
 make into a public walk, and it will certainly be 
 one of the finest in the world. Another part has 
 been taken possession of for the dead, and an ex¬ 
 tensive churchyard laid out, where the monuments 
 are grouped in the most picturesque manner, though 
 they are at present far less numerous than the 
 trees. 
 
 We fairly lost ourselves in wandering about the 
 terrace, where there are many cottages and small 
 farm-houses, and from which there are magnificent 
 views. You look first over the fertile island of 
 Montreal, and beyond it, to the south, on the mighty 
 St Lawrence, bounded to the east by a long range 
 of mountains. All the features of a Canadian land¬ 
 scape, the rivers, the forests, the mountains, are 
 bounded by such far-stretching lines, that the whole 
 horizon appeared to be more extensive than I had 
 ever seen it elsewhere. But the most attractive 
 part of the landscape was the Ottawa river, wind- 
 
 VOL. I. 7 
 
98 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 ing away to the north, through massive forests, 
 and the Lake of the Two Mountains, of which I 
 could just obtain a glimpse. One has scarcely got 
 into a country before what has been once seen be¬ 
 gins to appear old, and the restless soul turns again 
 with longing to the distant arid the unknown. 
 
 We descended the mountain on its north-western 
 side, which is probably much exposed to snow¬ 
 storms, as the little French village lying there at its 
 foot is called the Cote de Neige, its principal cha¬ 
 pel, Chap eile de Notre Dame de Neige, and its chief 
 hotel, Hotel de Neige. This was the first French, 
 or rather Canadian, village I had seen. The people 
 never call themselves French, and seem desirous of 
 being regarded as aborigines of the St Law T rence. 
 A stranger is often inclined to say, “ \ou are a 
 Frenchman, Sir, are you not ? ” and will then re¬ 
 ceive for answer, “ Monsieur, je suis Canadien ; 
 and throughout America, a “ Canadian means a 
 person of French descent in the colony. Their 
 English fellow-subjects are called “ British Cana¬ 
 dians.” 
 
 The French Canadians have almost taken the 
 place of the Indians, from whom they have derived 
 many traditions and customs, and they speak of 
 themselves as the original inhabitants. I hey arc 
 mostly regarded by us as horribly stupid, idle, and 
 
THE ROYAL MOUNTAIN. 
 
 99 
 
 superstitious people—several centuries behind the 
 rest of the world—a dead weight upon the march 
 of progress, a black spot on the splendour of intel¬ 
 ligence by which they are surrounded. The tra¬ 
 veller is therefore agreeably surprised when he en¬ 
 ters one of those “ seats of darkness,” a Canadian 
 village. 
 
 It was Sunday when we descended into the Cöte 
 de Neige. The road was enlivened by gay pro- 
 menaders, and pretty little one-horse chaises, in 
 which some inhabitants of the village were return¬ 
 ing from visits that they had been paying to rela¬ 
 tions and friends—for in their celebration of the 
 day the French Canadians take the continental 
 view, and consider that it was given for recreation 
 as well as for prayer. In the pretty quiet cottages, 
 and before the doors, we saw groups of the villagers 
 engaged in friendly talk, and we ventured to enter 
 one of the most humble looking, and were imme¬ 
 diately understood and welcomed. The ancient 
 mother, or grandmother, of the house set a chair 
 for me by the fire, and turned to the other mem¬ 
 bers of the family as if explaining, “ Eh hien, je com- 
 pi-end. Monsieur est voyageur, et il veut voir comme 
 on vjt en Conodo.” The French of these good 
 people would have been very agreeable if they 
 
 7 * 
 

 
 
 would not have called voir, savoir, and croire war, 
 savoar, and croare, &c. A broad o is constantly 
 substituted for a —Canada is Conodo, chats are 
 chots, and les basses classes, les bosses closses. This 
 not very pleasing change proceeds, I understand, 
 from Normandy, whence most of the Canadians are 
 descended; and other peculiarities of the Canadian 
 dialect are traced to that province and to Brit¬ 
 tany and La Vendee, the difference being that here 
 that dialect is spoken by all classes, and there only 
 by the most uncultivated. Even well-educated 
 Canadians are quite unconscious of the difference, 
 and a pretty young Canadian lady once informed 
 me, as of something quite comic, that the Parisians 
 pretended the Canadians did not speak the purest 
 Erench. She told me this in the most regular Conodo 
 dialect, and then appealed to me as to whether she 
 had the slightest provincial accent. She said she 
 had once made a tour in Prance, and found that 
 the peasantry spoke a much coarser and less intel¬ 
 ligible dialect than any in Canada, and this I could 
 confirm, but I really could not reconcile my con¬ 
 science to telling her she had no provincial accent. 
 
 In most colonial countries it may be noticed 
 that the language of the higher classes, when^they 
 do not keep up any communication with the refined 
 society and the literature of the old country, tends 
 
 
THE ROYAL MOUNTAIN. 
 
 101 
 
 to degenerate, while the peasantry, who lead a less 
 narrow and stagnant life than in then’ original homes, 
 lose something of their coarseness. 
 
 The present Canadian peasants are descended 
 from soldiers, fur hunters, travellers, squatters, and 
 all sorts of miscellaneous adventurers; and that such 
 simple, honest, well-behaved people should be the 
 offspring of such parents is a proof that human 
 nature is just as prone, under certain circumstances, 
 to improve and refine itself, as under others to grow 
 degenerate and depraved. 
 
 As Romulus and his robbers became honourable 
 Quirites, the progeny of voyageurs and scamps of 
 various species has produced as primitive and inno¬ 
 cent a people as Virgil could have desired for his 
 Idyllic inspirations. 
 
 I found myself quite at my ease in this cottage. 
 Besides the old woman who understood me so im¬ 
 mediately, there was a man of middle age, a few 
 boys, a very pleasing, neatly and even tastefully 
 dressed young girl, and a bunch of little things of 
 various sizes, but all clean and merry. You never 
 forget for a moment the French descent of these 
 people. Their features, their manners, their taste 
 in dress, remind you continually of it. The lively, 
 saucy boys, and the naive and amiable little coquette 
 of a girl, were genuinely French, and probably if we 
 
102 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 had had more time for observation we should have 
 perceived the same or other traits of character, but 
 all were considerably softened; the boys were not 
 quite so saucy as the true gamins, the coquetry was 
 not quite so gross; and all these qualities were 
 mingled and blended in one tone of bonhommie and 
 hospitality which is by no means characteristic of 
 France. The cottage was in the most exquisite 
 order, and its inhabitants were quite dazzling in the 
 cleanliness of their snow-white linen. It was Sun¬ 
 day to be sure, but the every-day costumes that I 
 afterwards saw did no discredit to the holiday one, 
 in the Cote de Neige —and I could not help express¬ 
 ing to my old woman the pleasure their neatness gave 
 me. “ Vous <§tes bien bon, Monsieur,” she replied, 
 “ mais l’ordre et la propretd ce sont des qualitds tr^s 
 naturelles. Une famille malpropre ! Ah Dieu pre¬ 
 serve, une famille malpropre serait bien remarquee 
 dans notre village. Et je croäi e’est le cas dans tous le 
 Conodo!” 
 
 We were driven out of the cottage by the heat of 
 the stove, the only thing in it that we did not find 
 agreeable. The Canadians are noted in this coun¬ 
 try for the high temperature at which they keep 
 their abodes. They have great Dutch-tile stoves, 
 in which they keep up the fire the whole winter, 
 and then enjoy themselves with heat and tobacco 
 
THE ROYAL MOUNTAIN. 
 
 103 
 
 to such an extent, that when they come out in the 
 spring they look quite pale, yellow, and withered. 
 Now, in the autumn, their appearance was quite 
 fresh and healthy. 
 
104 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 The Americans of the United States, now so 
 numerous in Canada, who have founded so many 
 various establishments in the towns, take, as 
 merchants, contractors, engineers, road-makers, an 
 active part in all its affairs. By the recent reci¬ 
 procity treaty they have obtained the same rights of 
 fishing and drying fish in the St Lawrence and on 
 the Canadian coasts as the British inhabitants them¬ 
 selves ; and besides these motives for visiting the 
 country, the more opulent and idle classes of Ame¬ 
 rican citizens have begun to make a tour through 
 the principal towns of Canada, its waterfalls and 
 rivers, a fashionable excursion. Whole flocks of 
 American tourists come from New York and more 
 southerly places, by Lake Champlain, to the St 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 105 
 
 Lawrence, linger a few days in Montreal and 
 Quebec, and then go up or down the river in the 
 steamers. 
 
 To travellers of this class, the old Catholic in¬ 
 stitutions—the schools, hospitals, and convents—are 
 generally objects of special curiosity; they are 
 scarce in the Protestant South, and belong to the 
 regular stations, at which an American tourist, 
 obedient to his “ Murray,” is sure to stop. I con¬ 
 fess I share this taste. 
 
 The old French convents and other public insti¬ 
 tutions of Montreal and Quebec have a remarkable 
 history. A whole crowd of ecclesiastical orders in 
 Prance used to look to Canada as to a field where 
 an abundant harvest of Christian laurels was to be 
 reaped. Jesuits, Franciscans, Dominicans, Bro¬ 
 thers of Christian Doctrine and Sisters of Mercy, 
 Soeurs grises, and Filles de la Providence —all sent 
 out members of their societies, and scattered the 
 seeds of their orders on the shores of the St Law¬ 
 rence. 
 
 American historians sometimes speak of Canada 
 as a military colony, whilst to the settlements of 
 New England and Pennsylvania is ascribed a spe¬ 
 cially ecclesiastical and Christian character. In 
 fact, the idea of a religious conquest—a conquesta 
 spiritual, as the Spaniards say, was just as promi- 
 
106 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 nent as in any of the Spanish, English, or Portu¬ 
 guese establishments of America. 
 
 Sword and cross entered here into close partner¬ 
 ship, and it would be hard to say whether the 
 soldiers of the king, the agents of the trading com¬ 
 panies, or the preachers and missionaries of the 
 various orders, were most successful in discovering, 
 conquering, and retaining the country. In the 
 oldest maps, by the side of the representations 
 of discoverers and conquistadors, we see those of 
 monks and nuns. The wide field opened among 
 so many heathen nations, and the possibility of a 
 glorious martyrdom among the Indians, attracted so 
 many champions of the faith, that at one time the 
 Canadian towns had more monastic orders than the 
 provincial towns of Prance itself; and of the 60,000 
 inhabitants which formed for a long time the whole 
 population of the country, a very considerable part 
 were shut up in convents. These old Catholic in¬ 
 stitutions of the French have just as little become 
 extinct under the British rule as the Catholic 
 Church itself; indeed, the Canadian Catholics ex¬ 
 isting at the time of the conquest, 1760, have in¬ 
 creased under the protection of England to almost 
 a million, and now, when all property has increased 
 so much in value, the institutions formerly very 
 poor have become wealthy and important. Their 
 

 
 M3 
 
 CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 1 07 
 
 spirit, too, seems to be improved. In the Jesuits’ 
 time these frequent wranglings between Jesuits and 
 Franciscans — between the regular and secular 
 clergy—and the question, who was to stand at the 
 head of the missions ? often led to vexatious colli¬ 
 sions. Every new order arriving from France, 
 and for which spare lands and endowments had to be 
 provided, awakened envy and uncharitableness. 
 Now, under the English rule, these various societies 
 live peacefully by the side of one another, and 
 quietly occupy themselves with their schools, their 
 sick, or their poor, according to the sphere of ac¬ 
 tivity assigned them. A visit that I paid to these 
 remarkable institutions, in company with a friend 
 extremely well informed on all Canadian affairs, in¬ 
 terested me much. My friend, who was of an old 
 Canadian family, and had at one time been Mayor 
 of Montreal, was the author of several elaborate 
 treatises on some subjects connected with the his¬ 
 tory of the province, and had just concluded a re¬ 
 markable work on the monastic orders of the city. 
 He had even had drawings made for it by skilful 
 artists of the costumes of the monks, nuns, and 
 secular clergy; but the world will not profit by it, 
 as it is in MS. and only intended as a present to a 
 distinguished person, to whom it has been presented. 
 
 Our first visit was to the suffragan Bishop of 
 
108 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Montreal, in whom we found a handsome, agreeable, 
 cultivated man, who conversed with cosmopolitan 
 freedom on the affairs of the world at large. There 
 was nothing provincial or Canadian about him, 
 unless indeed that the clergy assembled round the 
 stove in his anti-chamber, were smoking hard out 
 of short clay pipes, like so many Canadian peasants. 
 I hardly thought that the passion for smoking 
 amongst the Canadians, which the English had 
 often mentioned to me, would be allowed to display 
 itself in these quarters ; but there were these rever¬ 
 end gentlemen blowing clouds, knocking out the 
 ashes, cleaning, and re-filling their pipes without 
 being at all disturbed by the presence of their 
 venerable superior. It may perhaps be partly ex¬ 
 plained from the circumstance that the missionaries 
 on their journeys have frequent occasions to smoke 
 the pipe of peace with the Indians, and may so have 
 acquired the habit so inveterately that they cannot 
 lay it aside even in their convents and episcopal 
 palaces. 
 
 From the Bishop we drove to the Jesuits’, who 
 occupy a long new building called St Mary’s 
 School, and are employed more in the education 
 of the young than in missions among the Indians 
 or to distant countries. Protestant societies and 
 the members of other orders do more now than the 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 109 
 
 Jesuits in a field where they formerly achieved so 
 many wonders, of which glorious time the St Mary’s 
 College is itself a monument. The learned Father 
 Martin had the goodness to lay before me the 
 original of a map celebrated among geographers— 
 that of the Jesuit Father Marquette, which is the 
 first ever made of the Upper and Lower Mississippi 
 and the adjacent regions, of which Marquette was 
 the discoverer. I had often heard of it, and was 
 much pleased to get it into my hands. 
 
 The oldest nunnery in Montreal is the convent 
 of the Hotel Dieu, which dates from 1044—that 
 is, three years after the foundation of the town. It 
 is devoted to the care of the sick and infirm, to 
 which, as ivell as to education, the Miles de la Pro¬ 
 vidence devote their time. 
 
 They have rapidly and energetically extended 
 their sphere of action, and afford an example of the 
 influence on America of the Catholic Church of 
 Canada, and its flourishing establishments of the 
 Lower St Lawrence. Several of the Filles de la 
 Providence have been sent on missions of education 
 and charity to the United States, and even to 
 Oregon and Chili, and undertakings of this kind 
 produce an effect, not only in distant countries, but 
 in the strengthening and elevation of the minds of 
 those left behind. 
 
110 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Of course we found establishments of the Sceurs 
 de Charite, and the equally self-devoted Soeurs 
 Grises; and the same cheerfulness, the same bright 
 activity in works of charity, the same fresh, bloom¬ 
 ing, joy-beaming faces that I have seen on sisters 
 of charity all over the world, also met me here. 
 One of them, a handsome young sister, dressed like 
 a Parisian, who showed us through a range of class¬ 
 rooms and sick wards, I shall never forget. She 
 was so zealous that we should see everything quite 
 exactly—all the departments of the hotiment —the 
 rooms for the aged and infirm—for the young chil¬ 
 dren, et cetera, ct cetera —that I became quite charm¬ 
 ed with the coarse dialect in which so much piety 
 and goodness were expressed. 
 
 Every one in Montreal is full of praises of the 
 Sceurs de Charite and the other benevolent sister¬ 
 hoods ; their zeal, their devotion, their Christian 
 courage before the fear of death, which has been 
 signally tried on two occasions,—in the year 1830, 
 when the cholera raged in Canada; and ten years 
 afterwards, when a pestilential ship-fever broke out 
 among the numerous British and Irish immigrants, 
 and destroyed many hundreds, including many of 
 the brave nuns ; and the Catholic matrons of the 
 city also deserve high honour for their zeal in 
 things which are above the praises of a traveller. 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Many of them associated themselves with the nuns 
 in those perils, and in one of the convents there is 
 one department filled entirely by these ladies, who 
 spare a part of their time from other occupations 
 to make clothes for children and the sick. These 
 convents often maintain themselves entirely by 
 their labour, or with the assistance and contribu¬ 
 tions of such friends as these. In one of these I 
 was led through a series of under-ground rooms, 
 mostly devoted to household purposes; the doors, 
 of the kitchen were opened, and afterwards those 
 of the wash-house, where many hands were actively 
 employed. At last one was opened that had neither 
 lock nor bolt; it was dark, but I could just dis¬ 
 tinguish a row of crosses on the wall, and a few 
 stone monuments. “ C'cst notre cimetiere, Monsieur,” 
 said my guide. The wooden crosses were for the 
 nuns, the monuments for some benefactresses of the 
 institution. Certainly a peculiar effect must be 
 produced on the inhabitants of the house by having 
 the chambers of the dead thus included in the 
 same suite as their work and bed-rooms. 
 
 Among the Catholic educational establishments 
 under the charge of men, the one that struck me 
 most was that of the Freres des ecoles clirehennes. 
 This order, which is widely diffused through the 
 Catholic world, has in Montreal an admirably ar- 
 
112 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 ranged school building, in which no fewer than 
 1800 boys are instructed by the monks. 
 
 The school-rooms were unusually spacious and 
 well arranged, and at the two lessons at which I 
 was present (those of writing and. drawing), the 
 performances of the pupils, the very judicious selec¬ 
 tion of copies and examples, the perfect order and 
 cleanliness, and the remarkable excellence of. some 
 of the arrangements, made me wish I could send the 
 directors of some European schools I know of to 
 Canada, to study that of the Freres chrctiennes. I 
 must repeat, however, that I was personally present 
 only at the two lessons above mentioned. 
 
 The establishment of the “ brothers of the Chris¬ 
 tian Schools” is maintained by the wealthy “Semi- 
 naire de St Sulpice,” which also supports several 
 others solely from its own funds; besides a semi¬ 
 nary or college, where several hundred young men 
 are brought up, it has schools for the humbler 
 middle-classes of children of both sexes. This in¬ 
 stitution dates from a very few years after the 
 foundation of Montreal, being at first a branch of 
 the Sulpiciens of Paris, and afterwards an independ¬ 
 ent society. They undertake the divine service in 
 several churches of the city, and eleven other mem¬ 
 bers of the body devote themselves to instruction 
 in the college; some serve an Indian mission on 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 113 
 
 the Lake of the Two Mountains; and the poor, the 
 sick, and the orphan are in many ways assisted. 
 
 I closed my instructive day with a visit in which 
 I had a second and private motive. Like most 
 Canadian travellers, I had heard since I crossed the 
 frontier of much talk of two unaccountable beings, 
 denominated in Canadian Lozevan and Shanseran, 
 but what on earth they were, whether men or evil 
 spirits, or what else, I could by no means make out, 
 but I heard both English and French people ex¬ 
 press themselves with respect to them in a manner 
 that showed they were considered very important. 
 You cannot help wishing to make out a riddle that 
 meets you at every turn, and as I knew that the 
 Seminaire de St Sidpice is one of the greatest 
 “'Seigneurs ” in Canada, I thought I might gain from 
 it some information concerning these mysterious 
 beings, and accordingly I applied to the treasurer 
 of the institution, who was good enough to fill up 
 the gap in my Canadian knowledge. 
 
 Lods et ventes and Cens et rentes, for this is the 
 written form of the words that had puzzled me, are 
 the two principal still existing old seignorial rights 
 appertaining to the possession of the fiefs or seign- 
 euries into which Canada was divided by the 
 French. By the first is signified the fine that a^ 
 lord is entitled to claim from a vassal who desires 
 
114 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 to sell the land he holds of him, and there was pro¬ 
 bably a two-fold motive for the imposition; first, 
 the lord naturally wished to keep old and faithful 
 vassals and their families as much as possible at¬ 
 tached to the soil, and to prevent the property from 
 too frequently changing owners; and, on the other 
 hand, the lord doubtless did not like to lose so 
 favourable an opportunity of filling his pockets. 
 
 The vassal who had just disposed of his fief for 
 hard cash was worth taxing, and the Lods et ren¬ 
 tes amount to no less than one-twelfth of the price 
 of sale. The Gens et rentes consist of certain annual 
 dues, and are very trifling ; at first they were only 
 two sous the acre, and they are not much more 
 even now. 
 
 Besides these two rights, the Seigneur in Canada 
 has the mill-privilege, that is, he alone has the 
 right of building a mill, and all his vassals must, 
 for a certain fixed rate, have their corn ground at it. 
 
 Formerly the Canadian Seigneur exercised also 
 the rights of haute, moyenne, et hasse justice, but 
 these rights, which were at no time frequently 
 exercised, have become entirely obsolete since the 
 English conquest, and all the much-talked-of 
 seignorial rights are now confined to the three I 
 have mentioned. It is nevertheless curious to find 
 feudal institutions which have long since become 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 115 
 
 extinct in France and Germany still keeping their 
 place on American soil, and under the eegis of the 
 English constitution. It may be that their ap¬ 
 parent unimportance has prevented any great op¬ 
 position being offered to them, but people have 
 lately become aware that claims of this sort, even 
 when they do not involve any very burdensome 
 service, may be an obstacle to progress and act 
 prejudicially on the country. In 1854, accordingly, 
 a proposal was made in the Canadian parliament 
 for their abolition, and for sweeping away altogether 
 the old Canadian seigneuries; but the majority of 
 the classes immediately affected, namely, the vas¬ 
 sals and peasants, showed so little desire for the 
 change, that it was evident it could only be effected 
 in the course of many years, and that the greatest 
 opposition it would have to encounter would be 
 from the vassals and not from the Seigneurs. 
 
 The Canadian peasants are no Yankees. If the 
 latter were affected by any of these ancient feudal 
 restraints, they would not lose a moment in getting 
 rid of them, and they would be always ready to 
 make a present sacrifice for the sake of the future. 
 They would find it perfectly intolerable that the 
 Seigneur and his old-fashioned com mills should 
 occupy and block up water-privileges that could be 
 
 turned to such good account for saw mills, paper 
 
 8 * 
 
116 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 mills, and similar works; and they would not 
 endure for a moment his meddling in the sale of 
 their property, and taking a lion’s share of the 
 produce. Since they are continually improving 
 their land and then turning it into money, the 
 Seigneur might be coming in with his claim every 
 four or five years, and in the course of fifty would 
 have drawn a sum equal to its whole value. 
 
 With the French Canadians, however, the case is 
 quite different; they are fond of making savings 
 from their little income, but their plan is to put it 
 by, dollar by dollar, in a box, and they would greatly 
 object to paying out a large sum all at once, if they 
 were promised ever so large a future profit. 
 
 As they trouble their heads very little with in¬ 
 dustrial speculations, they find little to object to 
 in their Seigneur’s old mills, they pay willingly 
 enough a few pence for each sack of flour, and re¬ 
 joice greatly that it is their lord, and not they, who 
 are called on for the large occasional outlay for the 
 repair of the works. They do not regard even 
 loch et ventcs, and cens et rentes, as such words of 
 fear. Their rents have been settled according to 
 an old estimate of the value of the land, and are 
 exceedingly low; their farms have risen so much 
 in worth that they can well bear the tax of a few 
 shillings, and if they were to get rid of it all at once 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 117 
 
 by a single payment they would think they were 
 exchanging a slight, almost imperceptible, evil for a 
 very serious one. As for the lods et ventes, the 
 case is still clearer. “ Our fathers and grand¬ 
 fathers,” they say, “ lived upon this land, and our 
 children and grandchildren will remain quietly 
 upon it when we are gone. Our good Seigneur 
 will never come in with his demand for a twelfth of 
 the price of sale. Why should we pay a large sum 
 to avoid a misfortune that, as far as we see, will 
 never happen ? ” 
 
 Notwithstanding these objections, however, and 
 the additional difficulties about the sums to be 
 agreed on, and the mode of payment,—for if it were 
 to be made in one sum the peasant would be ruin¬ 
 ed, and if in small instalments, the Seigneur em¬ 
 barrassed,—the Canadian Parliament, influenced by 
 the spirit of the time, has resolved on the aboli¬ 
 tion of these dues, and the only question is about 
 the mode of effecting the purpose. I heard it said 
 that Parliament would assist the peasants by a 
 special grant, and that abolition courts and banks 
 would have to be organized. 
 
 In the meanwhile, a long time must, at all events, 
 elapse before this change can take place, and the 
 peasants will go on in their old way for many years, 
 before they find themselves being carried along by 
 
118 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 the stream of improvement, so that there is not 
 merely an antiquarian, but a practical, interest in 
 inquiring into these old relations. 
 
 The whole of Lower Canada does not lie, even to 
 this extent, under the oppression of the old feudal 
 system, but only the part which was cultivated and 
 inhabited in the time of the French, though it is 
 certainly the best and most fertile part, extending 
 over the best land on the St Lawrence, between 
 the frontier of Upper Canada and the sea, and over 
 the lower sections on the Ottawa. 
 
 The interior of the country, however, both to the 
 north and south, but especially the latter, belongs 
 to the Crown or the Provincial Government; and 
 a great company, called the British-American Land 
 Company, owns vast tracts. Both the Crown and 
 this Company are constantly selling land to immi¬ 
 grants and speculators in the same way as the Go¬ 
 vernment of the United States, and a great part of 
 the land has therefore found its way into private 
 hands. New settlements have been made, and new 
 manners and customs introduced all round the 
 French holdings, by people amongst whom there 
 is no question of feudal rights. 
 
 Most of the French seigneuries are still in the 
 possession of the families endowed with them by 
 the king of France. They live in what are called 
 
CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 119 
 
 Manoirs, or Manor-houses, often in the midst of 
 their peasants, and seldom in anything like what we 
 should regard as a chateau, but in a habitation 
 little superior to that of the peasants themselves. 
 Most of the seigneuries yield only a very modest 
 income, but there are a few larger, and I heard of 
 one that had been sold for 150,000 Louis dors. 
 Many of the seigneuries are in the hands of con¬ 
 vents or other corporations, and many, since the 
 conquest, have passed to English families. I have 
 been told, but I do not know whether truly, that 
 the rule of these English Seigneurs—perhaps be¬ 
 cause it is more systematically carried out—is often 
 felt as more oppressive than that of the old French. 
 
 I have read, too, in an historical work on Canada 
 that, since the time of the English Government, the 
 feudal rights have been exercised with much more 
 severity than formerly, and that the old French 
 Government was milder to the vassals, and oftener 
 considered what was fair and reasonable, instead of 
 merely what was law. 
 
 As I was somewhat curious on the subject of 
 these feudal tenures, I was favoured at the Semi¬ 
 nary of St Sulpice with a sight of a printed state¬ 
 ment of the receipts and expenditure of this body, 
 lately published at the desire of the provincial Go¬ 
 vernment, and from this document I take the fol- 
 
120 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 lowing particulars :—The seminary possesses three 
 of the largest seigneuries in Canada. First, the 
 finest of all, namely, the fertile island of Montreal, 
 bestowed on it at the earliest period, secondly, the 
 seigneurie of St Sulpice, and, thirdly, that of the 
 “ Lake of the Two Mountains,” on the Ottawa. 
 On the thickly-peopled island of Montreal, every 
 village holds its land of the seminary, sometimes, 
 however, not immediately, but of intermediate vas¬ 
 sals. Besides these seigneuries the seminary pos¬ 
 sesses several farms and allodial estates, and a great 
 number of houses from which it receives rent. The 
 whole brings in a revenue of 11,000 Louis dors. 
 The lads et ventes and the cens et rentes on the 
 island of Montreal alone bring in from £1800 to 
 £2000 a year, but the two sources were unfor¬ 
 tunately not distinguished in this memoir, nor 
 was it stated from what population this sum was 
 derived. From the seigneurie of the “ Lake of the 
 Two Mountains ” the lord’s mills have brought in 
 four or five hundred a year, but it is not stated 
 how many mills there are. The expenditure for 
 the building and service of these mills seems to 
 amount on an average to £300. In years when 
 very thorough repairs have had to be made, £500 
 has been expended on them, but in others not more 
 than £50. Before the proposal for the public aboli- 
 

 CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. 121 
 
 tion of these seignorial rights had been made, there 
 were frequent voluntary abolitions, and it ap¬ 
 peared that the seminary had received for these 
 commutations in the year 1840 only £700, but in 
 1849, £5196; but in order to avoid any mistake 
 as to the desire for this abolition in these seigneuries, 
 or in Canada in general, it must be remembered 
 that the seminary holds as Seigneur a great part of 
 the land in the suburbs of the city of Montreal, 
 and that the desire to get rid of these sort of 
 troublesome privileges is much greater in the towns 
 than in the country. It must also be borne in 
 mind that of the ten thousand a year enjoyed as 
 revenue by the institution, by far the greater part 
 is again expended in the costs of administration, 
 in the repair of mills, churches, and other buildings, 
 in the maintenance of colleges and schools, and in 
 the support of the poor, of orphans, and of invalids, 
 so that at the end of the year a very trifling balance 
 remains. The members of the seminary, according 
 to the statement now before me, live in community, 
 and receive no salaries or emoluments, beyond 
 their board, lodging, and clothing, and what may 
 be otherwise indispensable, as, for instance, in sick¬ 
 ness. 
 
 I strongly advise every traveller proceeding from 
 Montreal down the St Lawrence, and seeing, ne- 
 
122 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 cessarily, so many of these old French villages, to 
 inquire as much as possible into the peculiar po¬ 
 litical conditions under which these people live. 
 Even the little that I learned concerning it made 
 m y journey and my visits to their villages far more 
 interesting and intelligible. 
 
THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 123 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 In all Canada there are, in a certain sense, only 
 two villages—that is, two lines of village houses 
 one along the northern, the other along the south¬ 
 ern, shore of the great river. The whole French 
 population, at least, is divided among these two 
 rows of almost uninterrupted water-side houses. 
 They are indeed supposed to be divided into various 
 villages—each with its own church; but the di¬ 
 vision is scarcely perceptible, for where one ceases 
 another begins. There are certainly few countries 
 in the world where the entire organization, and all 
 divisions and sub-divisions, are so intimately de¬ 
 pendent on a water-channel as French Canada. 
 The three great political districts or governments 
 into which the whole is divided—Quebec, Mon¬ 
 treal, and the Trois Rivieres, each of them as large 
 
124 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 as the kingdom of Prussia—have their central por¬ 
 tions on both sides of the river, and extend their 
 wings, south-east and north-west, into the wilder¬ 
 ness, and their lines of demarcation are drawn per¬ 
 pendicularly to the river, and therefore run south¬ 
 east and north-west, as do also the boundaries 
 of the subordinate divisions, the districts and 
 counties. 
 
 Nay, the seigneuries, and even the little farms, 
 are rooted in the low fruitful land on the river-bank, 
 and then cut their way south-east and north-west 
 into the rocks and woods—which begin at no great 
 distance from the stream. Still further; since 
 these farms are held according to the French 
 custom which prevailed among the colonists of 
 Canada, the land has to be divided equally among 
 all the children; the farms are again cut up into a 
 number of still narrower strips—all divided on the 
 same principle as the great political districts. All 
 the fields present a front to the river; eveiy child 
 must have a bit of the bank, a little marsh, a little 
 quarry, a little bit of forest and meadow; and the 
 Canadians have carried this principle so far, that 
 the strips of land look at a distance like the boards 
 of a floor. The river appears to rule the whole 
 country, like a long magnet amidst a mass of 
 needles, all attaching themselves to it by their heads. 
 
 r 
 
THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 125 
 
 Considering French Canada apart from the rest, 
 one may say that it consists of two strips of cul¬ 
 tivated land; one north the other south of the St 
 Lawrence, and extending from Montreal to the 
 sea. Each of these is six or seven hundred miles 
 long, and only a few miles broad; and the mildest 
 climate, as well as the most fertile soil, is found along 
 the river bank; a few miles inland it is much cold¬ 
 er, and more inclement. The river runs straight 
 on its course, does'not divide itself into arms, and 
 its tributaries, excepting perhaps the Ottawa, can¬ 
 not bear the most distant comparison with it, in 
 relation either to the volume of water or the ad¬ 
 vantages they offer for commerce. On the Ottawa 
 merchant ships could, at the first settlement of the 
 country, pass up as far as the inhabited countiy 
 extended, and ships of war afford protection to its 
 shores, and the first colonists naturally clung to the 
 river which afforded them in case of necessity such 
 a refuge from the Indians; so that it is easy to sec 
 how the country came to be laid out as it is. In 
 the rear of the French, who had established them¬ 
 selves along the river, have come recently a second 
 line of colonists, Scotch, Irish, and American, who 
 have taken possession of the lands before unoccu¬ 
 pied, and founded a few scattered villages; but 
 the settlement of the country has proceeded most 
 
126 
 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 rapidly to the south of the river, yvhere the climate 
 is milder, and where Canada borders on the active 
 states of the Union, which has sent forth her super¬ 
 fluous population and her entei-prising pioneers, 
 who have founded industrious little towns. But 
 even this class of the population has been unwill¬ 
 ing to go far from the river, as in Upper Canada 
 from the Lakes which form its continuation; and 
 they are seldom found further than fifty or sixty 
 miles from its shores. 
 
 The inhabited portion of this northern half of 
 Canada may therefore be considered to extend 
 only to that breadth, but to eleven hundred miles 
 in length, along the whole water-line from the 
 western point of Lake Erie to the sea; although 
 the Ottawa crosses this line, and there the settle¬ 
 ments stretch out to the neighbourhood of Labra¬ 
 dor, but they are much closer in the south-west¬ 
 erly direction. 
 
 I passed down the great river from Montreal 
 by the night-steamer (as on the Hudson there were 
 now no longer any day-boats); but as w r e had but 
 a few hours’ light, I could now see little more of 
 the peculiar character of its shores than could be 
 perceived by the faint moonbeams, which, when we 
 neared the land, shone on small rows of houses be¬ 
 longing to those far-stretching river-villages, on 
 
THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 127 
 
 the mouth of the river Richelieu, by which I had 
 entered the St Lawrence, and on the tops of the 
 towers of some old French churches at a distance. 
 It marked out with uncertain lines of light the dark 
 hulls of large ships that were moving past us on the 
 broad river, and at last glittered on the wide sur¬ 
 face of St Peter’s Lake, the last of the numerous 
 lakes of the St Lawrence, which spreads itself out 
 about mid-way between Quebec and Montreal, and 
 which we were now crossing diagonally, in the 
 bright moonlight night. The traces of the ocean 
 tide are lost in this wide basin—four hundred miles 
 from the river’s mouth; without the lake they pro¬ 
 bably would be felt as far as Montreal. The tide 
 and the river seem to be here in conflict with one 
 another, and it is perhaps from this cause that the 
 St Peter’s is the shallowest of all the lakes of the 
 St Lawrence. The latter does not bring down any 
 very large deposit of mud or other matter; but 
 what it does bring it is mostly compelled to leave 
 here, and thus have probably arisen the sand-banks 
 found at the bottom of the lake. 
 
 In recent times a remarkable work has been 
 nearly completed in the lake—a deep channel has 
 been hollowed out in it along its whole length by 
 means of steam dredges, so as to enable ships of 
 large size to pass through it, and in this work they 
 
128 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 have come to a bed of such compact and solid ma¬ 
 terial, that there seems to be little fear of the side 
 walls falling in again; or at all events they will sub¬ 
 sist for some time without any further help from 
 art. It appears probable also that there are in the 
 broad St Lawrence many natural channels which 
 have not yet been discovered, at least the captain of 
 a ship mentioned to me one, very fine and deep, that 
 had been, until lately, entirely unknown. Should 
 this be thought improbable in the case of a river 
 so much navigated as the St Lawrence, it may be 
 remembered that the same thing took place a few 
 years ago in the case of one far more frequently 
 traversed, namely, at the mouth of the Hudson, 
 near New York. A channel of great depth and of 
 the greatest utility to the navigation, hitherto quite 
 unknown, was discovered in the labyrinth of par¬ 
 allel canals of which the bed of the river consists. 
 
 Though I could, as I have said, see during that 
 night-passage but little of Canada outside the ves¬ 
 sel, I could learn a good deal of it on board. We 
 had as passengers a number of members of the 
 Quebec parliament, at that time sitting, ladies and 
 gentlemen from the counties on the neighbouring 
 shores, French priests and landowners, and govern¬ 
 ment officers, who altogether formed a very agreeable 
 and instructive society. There were also members 
 
THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 129 
 
 of parliament from Upper as well as Lower Canada, 
 of both French and British origin, and the two na¬ 
 tionalities seemed to harmonize as well here on the 
 
 BhetT eDCe ’ Tl hey lmd d0ne JUSt before on the 
 Black Sea and tins was the more pleasing as there 
 
 is not perhaps another river in the world on which 
 they have shed each others blood more frequently 
 m morta conflict. In the century preceding the 
 fina conquest of Canada there were at least a dozen 
 mghsh warlike expeditions sent to the mouth of 
 tne fet Lawrence. 
 
 "U hen the English at last got possession of the 
 country, they found a population of only 60 000 
 and those living m great poverty. At first it ap¬ 
 peared as if it were intended that these new sub¬ 
 jects should be exterminated, as the French had 
 been m Nova Scotia, and since also, very shortly 
 after this conquest, the American revolution broke 
 out, and I ranee, in revenge for the loss of Canada 
 eagerly took part with the Americans, the position 
 of he French subjects of England did not seem 
 hkely to improve speedily. They rose in revolt 
 mi l the assistance of the Americans, and after the 
 latter had been driven from Canada, the country 
 remained for many years under a military reign of 
 error, and even when this ceased (in 1784) an 
 English party was formed, and continued to the 
 
 VOL. I. Q 
 
130 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 end of the century, whose object was the entire 
 and forcible Anglicising of the French inhabitants, 
 and the uprooting of their language; but notwith¬ 
 standing this their numbers increased during the 
 industrial and commercial development of the re¬ 
 sources of the country made under the protection 
 of England. They seeiA to have multiplied like the 
 children of Israel, since for the original 60,000 
 we now find nearly a million. 
 
 The notion of rooting them out, or even forcibly 
 Anglicising them, was indeed given up at the be¬ 
 ginning of the present century, but a great number 
 of restrictive regulations were left for thirty years 
 longer. “We were treated politically as children, 
 sir,” said a French Canadian to me, “ and till 1837 
 were kept in a kind of slavish condition. Then we 
 rebelled, and after that there followed what we call 
 our Canadian revolution, for since then affairs have 
 taken quite a different turn. The restrictions I 
 allude to often affected the British colonists, as well 
 as ourselves, and consequently in the revolt of 1837 
 and 1838, many of them took part with us, and 
 Quoique nous etions battus, ca nous a fait du bien. 
 
 “ The victorious British government, whose troops 
 had beaten us, by no means laid heavier fetters upon 
 us, as it mostly happens in such cases, but it al¬ 
 lowed its eyes to be opened, and did us justice. 
 
THE ST LA WHENCE. 
 
 131 
 
 j of which we complained were acknow. 
 
 (edged and remedied. I» the first place, the French 
 colon,sts were by degrees raised to the level of the 
 •nghsli; they obtained the same political rights 
 and the government took care more and more that' 
 m the appointments to public offices, no regard 
 should be had to nationality; many of the first and 
 ugliest offices of the country are now filled by 
 French Canadians. The population at large also 
 was now admitted to a much higher degree of 
 liberty and self-government. 
 
 “ Not only have our town corporations, our coun- 
 tiy communes and counties, the same kind of half¬ 
 republican constitution as in England-they choose 
 thm loca! magistrates on extremely independent 
 pnndplcs and have their local legislation quite in 
 them own hands. Our Provincial Legislature and 
 xecutive too has attained to a degree of inde¬ 
 pendence such as scarcely any British, or indeed 
 < ) co ony in the world, has ever possessed. Our 
 Governor-General, the organ of the British govem- 
 ment in our country, is as limited in his authority 
 as the Queen is m England. He has his responsi- * 
 hie ministers at his side, whom he can certainly 
 according to law, choose as he pleases, but whom, in 
 act, he must choose as public opinion in the pro¬ 
 vince requires. They are offered to him, and even 
 
 Q * 
 
132 
 
 TRAVELS IN AMERICA. 
 
 forced upon him, just as Queen Victoria s Premier 
 sometimes is; for if he should defy public opinion, 
 and insist on taking his own favourites, he would 
 find himself unable to carry on the government. 
 They would not be admitted to parliament, where 
 they should have a seat and a vote, and they would 
 be unable to carry any measure, and be opposed in 
 everything they undertook. One present excellent 
 Governor-General has even accepted as ministers 
 some of the leaders of the revolt of 1837, and men 
 are sitting in our parliament, and even playing an 
 important part there, who at that period had a price 
 put on their heads, and would, had they been taken, 
 have been put to death. Our ministry and our go¬ 
 vernment, our Parliament and our legislation, are all 
 modelled after those of England ; but their inde¬ 
 pendence and capacity for self-government has re¬ 
 cently been manifested in the most satisfactory 
 manner. On several occasions, when matters relat¬ 
 ing to Canada were brought before the British 
 parliament, they declined to decide on them, and 
 have referred to that of Canada, declaring that on 
 the St Lawrence they were free to act as they 
 thought best. AH the money raised for the sup¬ 
 port of the government and the public expenditure 
 here, is entirely under our own control; not a penny 
 of it goes to England; it is laid out here for the 
 
1 
 
 
 THE ST LAWRENCE. J 33 
 
 benefit of the country itself, and an exact account 
 rendered of every farthing. The connection with us 
 is really rather an expense than a profit to England; 
 and since the introduction of free trade, England 
 (ocs not enjoy any peculiar commercial privileges 
 The recent Reciprocity Treaty places even "the 
 Americans almost on a level with the'English and 
 with ourselves. England has no other benefit from 
 us than our friendship and brotherly feeling towards 
 her and the circumstance that we keep open a de- 
 sirable field for emigration for her. 
 
 1 lie result of all this is a wonderful reconciliation 
 of all parties, including the French and British co- 
 onists, and an extremely favourable and friendly 
 eeling between the young colony and the old 
 country. There are no traces now of any leaning 
 towards our great neighbour republic, now that 
 while enjoying royal protection we have as many 
 public and private rights as if we were republicans. 
 
 n er these circumstances we, of course, desire the 
 continuance of the connection with England—a 
 connection from which we have no disadvantage 
 whatever, but, on the contrary, many essential and 
 important advantages. With respect to us French 
 Canadians, the leaf has been completely turned, 
 m inist formerly Great Britain had in us a domestic 
 enemy, always ready to conspire with foreigners 
 
134 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 against her, it now possesses in us the most import¬ 
 ant counterpoise of foreign influence; that is to say, 
 against the possible longings of our republican 
 neighbours. There exists indeed among our young 
 men a small party whom we call £ Rouges ,’ who are 
 extravagant admirers of republican institutions; but 
 the mass of the French population is essentially con¬ 
 servative, and wishes, as far as possible, to maintain 
 the status quo. I heard once of an American who 
 when he was travelling through our country, and 
 observing the antiquated ways of our French pea¬ 
 sants, observed that if they, the Americans, got the 
 country into their hands, they would soon improve 
 the old-fashioned French off the face of the earth 
 and this is just what our people dread— they think, 
 and I believe rightly, that a union with the Repub¬ 
 lic would bring on the rapid decline of their lan¬ 
 guage, their customs, and their nationality, which 
 would melt away and disappear before those of the 
 Americans, as formerly those of the aborigines of 
 the country did before theirs. This fear keeps us 
 French attached to old Europe, even though it is 
 represented to us by Great Britain; and Great 
 Britain on her side is doubtless influenced by it, and 
 among other liberal proceedings allows the French 
 clergy all desirable freedom. 
 
 “ Have you old-fashioned French,” said I, “ drawn 
 
 r\ 
 
 
THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 135 
 
 closer to the English in social relations; for in¬ 
 stance, do you take any part in their industrial 
 speculations ?” 
 
 Ca commence, Monsieur, $a commence,” was 
 the reply. “ On the whole, it cannot be denied that 
 our old Canadian population, if not in moral charac¬ 
 ter, does certainly stand far behind the English in 
 knowledge and education. It is but lately that 
 we have formed any of the literary societies which 
 have existed so long amongst them; but we have 
 now in the suburbs of Montreal and Quebec lec¬ 
 ture and reading-rooms for French young men as 
 well as for English. Even the French merchants, 
 though mostly only small dealers (for almost all 
 the first houses in Montreal and Quebec are of 
 British origin), have gradually adopted the more 
 energetic and practical methods of their fellow- 
 colonists. Most of the French houses have adopted 
 the English as their language of business, not merely 
 in their correspondence, but also in their counting- 
 houses and private books, and this not only be¬ 
 cause it is more convenient in Canada, but because 
 they consider it generally preferable for commercial 
 purposes. The well-educated French here write 
 and read English as well as their own language, 
 though there are certainly many remote Canadian 
 villages where my good countrymen neither read 
 
136 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 nor write that or any other language., Mats ca 
 commence aussi, Monsieur , f# commence . 
 
 The worthy Canadian M. P. who made me 
 these and other communications, was here called 
 away; and a young Briton, who had been listening 
 to our conversation as we talked, leaning over the 
 bulwark on the deck of the steamer, now took his 
 place, and as the Frenchman had touched last on a 
 topic that specially interested him, that of the state 
 of education amongst the lower class of the French, 
 he began to inform me of his views on the subject. 
 
 »I can confirm,” he said, “all that that gentle¬ 
 man said of the gross ignorance of our French rural 
 population. I have lived long among them and 
 like them very much; they are the most inoffensive 
 people in the world, but in many parts of the coun¬ 
 try they are densely ignorant and superstitious, and 
 that chiefly because they are wholly under the con¬ 
 trol of their priests. In all their doubts and per¬ 
 plexities they go to him and ask him what is to be 
 done, and if he is content with anything, all is right. 
 That they cannot read and write is very agreeable 
 to the priests, for they read and write for them. 
 When one of them gets a letter he goes straight to 
 the priest with it, and he reads it, and answers it; 
 or, if he cannot, he sends the peasant with it to the 
 village notary, who always has an understanding 
 
THE ST LAWRENCE. 
 
 137 
 
 With the priest, and both together settle everything 
 as they think proper. If you only do not in any 
 way interfere with their priests, you will find them 
 the most peaceable and sociable people in the world, 
 ami it is really delightful to watch them in their 
 daily quiet ways, and in their homes among their 
 families. If you do not interfere with them they 
 never will with you, there is only one nation that 
 they cannot get on with, but that is the fault of the 
 nation in question.” 
 
 1 robably, said I, “you mean the newly-arrived 
 Irish. It seems to me that no one in America 
 agrees very well with them.” 
 
 Yes, sir, said the Briton (who was a Scotch¬ 
 man), “ and in the American States the Irish disagree 
 just as much with the Germans. Out here in Canada 
 they come into competition with the people of the 
 country in many little occupations, as petty dealers, 
 as servants, or cab drivers, or in the hotels and 
 steamers, and then there are conflicts between the 
 two nationalities, which in Europe, on account of 
 their common religion, their common origin (the 
 Celtic), and their common Anti-British sympathies, 
 so ostentatiously proclaim their friendship for each 
 other.” 
 
 I had myself heard Canadians express aversion 
 to the Irish, especially on account of their quarrel- 
 
some ways and their tendency to fight on every 
 occasion. It is sometimes thought indeed that the 
 Trench-Canadians carry their peacefulness to excess. 
 «« I never fight,” said one of them to the above- 
 mentioned Scotchman, “I run away” (je me sauve). 
 And yet it is these very French-Canadians who 
 encounter so many dangers, and support so many 
 hardships, throughout all north-western America, 
 and who make the bold and indefatigable voy- 
 
QUEBEC. 
 
 139 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 QUEBEC. 
 
 On board an American steamer it is necessary 
 o ose no time m entering your name in the large 
 book which lies open for the purpose in the chief 
 cabin, and m placing beside it the number of the 
 state-room you mean to occupy. If you do not at¬ 
 tend to this you run the risk of being put off as I 
 was with what no one else will have. The sleeping- 
 rooms farthest from the engine are naturally the 
 most sought after, but the one allotted to me was 
 exactly between the engine and one of the paddle- 
 wheels, so that I was between fire and water. The 
 walls were merely board partitions, so that I heard 
 on one side all the creaking, thumping, groaning, 
 and squeaking of the machinery; and on the other, 
 the rush of the perpetual cataract down the side of 
 my cabin, in addition to every manoeuvre of the 
 
140 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 
 stokers, every bang of an oven-door, every blow of 
 the poker on the coals, and a temperature that 
 seemed to me very little below that of the boiler 
 itself. All which circumstances had this advan¬ 
 tageous result, that I was one of the first upon deck 
 
 on the following morning. 
 
 We were already in the neighbourhood of Quebec, 
 and near the remarkable narrows above that city 
 at Cape Rouge. It is here with the St Lawrence 
 as with the Hudson at West Point, the river is 
 hemmed in by heights, which it has probably 
 broken through. These narrows may be regarded 
 as the pointed extremity of the long, broad ravine 
 filled by the lower St Lawrence. Near the island 
 of Anticosti, at the mouth of the river, the ravine is 
 thirty or forty miles wide. It is contained between 
 two mountain-ranges that run to the south-west, 
 and becomes continually narrower and narrower as it 
 proceeds in that direction, till at Quebec and Cape 
 Rouge it terminates with the ordinary dimensions 
 of a river. Quebec * lies therefore at the end of 
 the middle and the beginning of the lower St 
 Lawrence. The tide, which in the Lake of St 
 Peter’s rises only two or three feet, has at Cape 
 Rouge a rise of several fathoms, and in the spring 
 
 • The word Quebec is said to be derived from an Indian one, sig- 
 nifying “ narrow part of a river. 
 
QUEBEC. 
 
 141 
 
 an enormous mass of ice is formed here, which 
 blocks up the river, and lies longer than in any 
 other part of the St Lawrence. It seems likely that 
 the river was once blocked up here by rocks and 
 mountains, as it occasionally is now by ice, and that 
 these mountains surrounded a great bay, which we 
 now call the Lower St Lawrence. The Upper St 
 Lawrence at that time flowed in a quite different di¬ 
 rection, or it formed great inland seas without visible 
 outlet, like the Caspian, until at last it broke 
 through the barrier, and poured itself out probably 
 in cataracts like that of Niagara. There are stiff 
 cataracts enough near Cape Rouge, namely, that of 
 the well-known river Chaudfore coming from the 
 south, and immediately below Quebec the Faffs of 
 Montmorency, and of the Rivfore St Charles. It is 
 the region of cataracts, such as are not seen ao-ain 
 between here and Montreal. 
 
 The view was striking in the highest degree, the 
 mighty river being hemmed in by long curved waffs 
 and masses ol rock, with only a very narrow level 
 strip of shore near the water’s edge, and that strip 
 covered by housesthere are, as I said, houses all 
 along the banks of the St Lawrence,—and you might 
 imagine on seeing these endless lines that Canada 
 was one of the most populous countries on the face 
 of the earth. Of the three millions of inhabitants 
 
142 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 of Canada, at least 900,000 live on the banks of 
 this river, and are likely enough to be seen by the 
 traveller from the water, so that you are pretty 
 sure not to feel lonely on the St Lawrence, but at 
 Cape Rouge and Quebec it is more lively and busy 
 than elsewhere. The whole St Lawrence round 
 the rocky heights of Quebec, and several miles 
 above it, as far as Cape Rouge, is one harbour, and 
 on the rocky shore are several deep bays called 
 Coves. These small bays, which are surrounded 
 by rocks and forests, are filled by enormous 
 stores of wood, and the rafts which come down 
 from Ottawa and Montreal, as they are there pro¬ 
 tected from the effects of the tide and from the 
 ice. The trade in timber forms the principal com¬ 
 merce of Quebec. Wood is a very bulky article, 
 requiring many vessels to fetch it, and causing 
 therefore much animation in the places where it is 
 shipped, and Quebec is surrounded for miles with 
 busy scenes of this kind. Even the little wood 
 harbours in Norway look important with their 
 massive wares and the bustle of getting them 
 shipped, but there would be little interest for the 
 spectator in such a spot if gold, or indigo, or silk, 
 to the same value, were exported. 
 
 The common phrase of a “ forest of ships ” would 
 not suit Quebec, and, indeed, a wood of long mo- 
 
 r 
 
QUEBEC. 
 
 143 
 
 notorious masts, like so many gigantic bean-stalks, 
 would be neither picturesque nor poetical, but the 
 harbour of Quebec, where the vessels lie scattered 
 about in groups, is so in a high degree. Some lie 
 in the middle of the river, others before one or other 
 of the little coves; here and there is one anchored 
 alone like an arctic explorer by the side of a rugged 
 mass of rock. Just before the navigation closes for 
 the season is the liveliest time, and Quebec has then 
 nearly half as many inhabitants again as usual 
 namely, 100,000 instead of 00,000, in consequence 
 of the flocking thither of wood-dealers of all kinds 
 sailors, and others. As the river below is adorned 
 v s ips and rocks, so is the lofty terrace above it 
 by handsome villas, which appear among groves and 
 w oods, pleasantly looking down on the river below. 
 Amongst them is the celebrated Spencer Wood, 
 the residence of the Governor-General of Canada* 
 Lord Elgin. * 
 
 It was a brilliantly beautiful autumn morning 
 when we came in sight of this attractive scene, and 
 passed through it for several miles, until we an¬ 
 chored at the foot of the bold and loftv Cape Dia¬ 
 mond (on whose declivities Quebec is built), and 
 ion made our way through the narrow and crooked 
 streets of the lower town to the upper mountain 
 eirace, and the hotel to which we were destined. 
 
144 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 I have in vain searched through old maps, his¬ 
 tories, and chronicles of Canada, in vain, as we Ger¬ 
 mans say, “ broken my head ” to find out who first 
 bestowed on the remarkable rock that serves as the 
 foundation of Quebec, the name of Cape Diamond. 
 It may have been the founder of the city, the often- 
 mentioned Champlain, or it may have been Cartier, 
 who first navigated the St Lawrence, but whoever 
 it was, the name is not without meaning. Stand¬ 
 ing on the extreme point of the promontory occu¬ 
 pied by the renowned citadel, and looking round 
 you, you.will acknowledge that you have at your 
 feet a real gem of the country—the Koh-i-noor of 
 Canada, set a jour in grand ranges of mountains, 
 far-stretching plains, and long bright streams, which 
 issue from it like rays. 
 
CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 145 
 
 This diamond is cut on one side bv the great 
 St Lawrence, which washes its cliffs on the south, 
 and, unfortunately, sometimes washes them off In 
 quite recent times, a whole wall of rock was loosen¬ 
 ed by it, and fell, burying houses, men, and ships 
 in its rrnn. On the east side, the setting is formed 
 by the small river St Charles, which turns at a 
 nght angle from the St Lawrence, and has worked 
 out a similarly steep and lofty wall from the rocks 
 It forms at its mouth a wide valley, or level, of more 
 
 than eight miles broad, which is covered by houses 
 and villages. 
 
 The rocky headland itself rises into a bold and 
 lofty promontory of 300 feet high, and presents a 
 most imposing appearance to any one approaching 
 it from the sea; and Champlain must have been 
 blinder than the old Byzantians, who overlooked the 
 Golden Horn, if he had failed to notice this diamond 
 of the country, or to perceive that it was the true 
 site for the capital of New France. Here was a 
 natural harbour, a natural fortress, and immediate 
 connection between the ocean and the interior, 
 and moreover an abundance of most fertile soil* 
 concentrated into one focus. The question where 
 the Europeans were to sow the seed of the capital 
 
 of the St Lawrence must have been at once de¬ 
 cided. 
 
146 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 From the summit of the promontory you enjoy a 
 prospect almost unequalled in its kind, and see 
 below you the remarkable old town, with its houses 
 covering two sides of the mountain, gathered here 
 and there upon level masses of rock, adapted for 
 markets or other public places, and connected with 
 one another by crooked ascending streets. Some¬ 
 times the houses run in streets at various heights 
 round the mountain, and sometimes drop down to 
 the level of the river, and form narrow lines between 
 it and the rocks. Finally, they climb up to the 
 brow of the Cape, and there spread out to the very 
 walls of the citadel. 
 
 The river, which has been considerably narrowed 
 from Cape Rouge, opens out again widely after 
 passing Cape Diamond, and forms, in sight of the 
 town, two great arms which clasp the Isle of 
 Orleans—like the Island of Montreal, one of the 
 paradises of the St Lawrence. It is extremely fer¬ 
 tile, well peopled, and adorned by several pretty, 
 quiet villages. At the earliest period the French 
 called it the Isle of Bacchus, because they found 
 its woods full of wild grapes. To the right of 
 Cape Diamond, opposite on the other side of the 
 narrow, lies its twin-brother, Cape Point Lewis, also 
 covered with houses, churches, and country houses, 
 which together constitute a sort of suburb to the 
 
CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 147 
 
 capital. It looks like Quebec reflected in a mirror 
 •id beyond it appear long ranges of hills and 
 mountains one above another, which form the 
 boundary between Canada and the United States 
 
 the last summits being those which rise from the 
 forest state of Maine. 
 
 1° the left instead of frowning rocks, lies a 
 pleasant lowland covered with farms and villages 
 -the mouth of the St Charles-and behind°it 
 again mountains, as in the south. There is a 
 range of still wilder mountains which runs north¬ 
 eastward along the St Lawrence, throwing out 
 blanches to Labrador, and south-west to Ot¬ 
 tawa and the neighbourhood of Montreal. Far- 
 ther west, branches of the same craggy range sur¬ 
 round the basin of the Ottawa and the Upper 
 anadian lakes, and separate their waters from 
 those flowing into Hudson’s Bay. This remarkable 
 system of mountains has as yet received no name 
 ™' n ° ll J geographers, unless we admit for such— 
 The Mountains North of the St Lawrence,” or 
 the Mountains of Lower Canada; ” but a Cana- 
 
 (ian hlstomn has christened them the Laurentides 
 a very suitable appellation, for they accompany 
 it river with fidelity and perseverance, and stand 
 like watch-towers along its whole line. The name 
 
 lerefore, has been quickly adopted by Canadian 
 10 * 
 
TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 148 
 
 geographers and historians, and deserves to be 
 generally introduced. Among English geologists 
 the name of the St Lawrence has already been 
 turned to account in this way, for they have called 
 a certain extensive formation of sand and clay, 
 
 “ The Laurencian Deposit.” 
 
 This deposit is a modern product of the ocean, 
 and is filled with the remains of molluscs and other 
 marine animals, of genera and species still living 
 in the neighbouring seas. It fills, although much 
 broken and interrupted, all the lower interior of 
 the basin of the lower St Lawrence, surrounds 
 Lake Ontario, and ends near the Ealls of Niagara. 
 The St Lawrence and its arteries are quite em¬ 
 bedded in it, and the river is, therefore, the fittest 
 sponsor for it, and no less for the above-mentioned 
 mountains. 
 
 The many-peaked Laurentides, rising out of a 
 sea of forest, mark out not only the boundaries of 
 inhabited Canada, but also of the whole of cultivated 
 America; beyond these bare and desolate summits is 
 nothing to the “ end of the world ” but a measure¬ 
 less wilderness. Beyond the limits even of the 
 Quebec panorama, whole provinces contain but 
 a few scattered Indians; so that this panorama 
 may be regarded as an oasis—an extremely animat¬ 
 ed, thickly peopled, and well-cultivated oasis—in a 
 
 n 
 
 \ 
 
CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 149 
 
 desert of primeval forest, rock, and sea. Thus far, 
 and no further, does American civilization reach 
 towards the north, and, like an expiring light, blazes 
 up once more into a brilliant flame. 
 
 W hat struck me most in this view, as in that by 
 ; ontreal > " T as the colossal proportion of every ob¬ 
 ject-mountain, river, and plain, the vast extent 
 seen at once from a comparatively so low point of 
 view. You may climb with immense toil many an 
 Alpine peak which rises far above the clouds, 
 without being so much impressed with the elevating 
 feeling that you have a vast portion of the creation 
 at your feet as when you look from this Quebec 
 diamond of only a few hundred feet in height, and 
 it is not to be obtained only from the summit of 
 the rock. You may get the same, with countless 
 pleasing variations, from many points outside and 
 inside the town ; from “ Durham Terrace,” a superb 
 platform, where the old French castle of St Louis 
 formerly stood, and which is now being levelled, 
 and laid out as one of the most beautiful public 
 walks in the world. Another view is obtained 
 from the ramparts, also an attractive promenade, 
 seeming high in the air; or from the esplanade; 
 and it surprises you from many public places and 
 corners of the city, as well as when you drive along 
 the heights, but perhaps best of all from the walls 
 
150 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and bastions of the mighty citadel by which they 
 are crowned. 
 
 This citadel of Quebec, which I took occasion to 
 visit, is one of the greatest fortifications of the 
 New World. It has been enlarged and improved 
 down to the most recent period. When you con¬ 
 template these massive formidable walls of free¬ 
 stone, and wander through the elaborately and 
 systematically complicated labyrinth they form, 
 fancy them well manned by stout Englishmen, and 
 notice the heavy cannon commanding every point 
 of the mountain and valley of the St Lawrence, 
 you feel induced to think very little of all the talk 
 you hear about the indifference of England to her 
 Canadian possessions, and her perfect willingness 
 to leave the provinces to themselves, and allow them 
 either to establish an independent state, or to join the 
 American Republic, as they may think proper. On 
 the contrary, you seem to see here a bit of the paws 
 of the lion, which has his teeth and claws perfectly 
 ready, and in case of need could give a good account 
 of any one who offered to meddle with his property. 
 
 How and in what way the military recollections 
 of Quebec might be renewed, is what one scarcely 
 likes to inquire in the midst of so fair a peace as 
 now shines over the country. There are enough 
 of such recollections; but you cannot help seeing 
 
mm 
 
 CAPE DIAMOND. jgj 
 
 that, while the rock presents a threatening and 
 almost impregnable front to the water, there lies a 
 field where such laurels might be reaped, at the 
 back of the head where the promontory stretches 
 out into a wide level surface where alone an ascent 
 of the position, an assault, and a battle would be 
 practicable. These are the “ Plains of Abraham,” 
 celebrated for more than one engagement, and 
 which extend from the walls of the citadel, like 
 the high fields before Prague, on which Frederick 
 the Great and others fought the “ Battles of the 
 White Mountains.” The city of Quebec has been 
 indeed often enough shot at from the water, set 
 on fire, and destroyed ; but only once, as far as I 
 know, was an attempt made to storm the rock itself 
 and the whole position from the water, and then 
 it was by a daring officer, who, knowing the insuf¬ 
 ficiency of the force at his disposal, was obliged to 
 attempt some extraordinary exploit. This was 
 General Montgomery, during the time of the 
 American Revolution, when the troops of the new¬ 
 born republic had revolutionized almost all Canada, 
 and the country appeared just as much lost to 
 imgland as the rest of her North American colonies. 
 
 In the year 1774 he found himself, with a small 
 body of 1300 men, before Quebec—at that time 
 almost the only spot remaining to the Royalists in 
 
152 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 all Canada. The fewness of his troops made it 
 impossible for him to attempt a regular siege, or 
 an attack on the strong fortifications and bastions 
 towards the “ Plains of Abraham, and he was in¬ 
 duced to try something unexpected. He deter¬ 
 mined to surprise the fortress in the night, by 
 climbing up the precipitous rocks, where an attack 
 could be least expected; but his enterprise failed. 
 The small bodies of men whom he had sent to dif¬ 
 ferent points for a feint were cut oft or beaten back, 
 after they had advanced a little way; but Mont¬ 
 gomery himself, who led the main assault, met a 
 speedy death. He had not advanced far upon a 
 rocky path covered with ice and snow, when he sud¬ 
 denly discovered a masked and well-placed battery 
 of the English, which immediately opened fire upon 
 him, and stretched the greater part of the gallant 
 little band, himself included, in their blood upon 
 the snow. The death of Montgomery, who was as 
 much esteemed for his humanity and moderation 
 as for his energy and valour, put an end to the 
 whole attempt upon Quebec, and was the begin¬ 
 ning of a turn in the tide of affairs, by which the 
 Americans finally lost all their positions in Ca- 
 nada. 
 
 No monument has been erected to the general, 
 esteemed as he was by friend and foe, but the nu- 
 
CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 153 
 
 merous visitors from the United States do not fail 
 to point out the rocky path on which he was inarch¬ 
 ing, the spot where he was shot down on the fatal 
 night, and the hole whence his body and those of 
 his adjutant were drawn out of the snow. 
 
 This case alone excepted, the struggles for the 
 possession of Quebec have mostly taken place on 
 the level ground to the rear of the fortress; for in¬ 
 stance, that decisive battle between the French and 
 English, under generals Montcalm and Wolfe, 
 which resulted in the conquest of Quebec, and ul¬ 
 timately of all Canada, for the English. The con¬ 
 figuration of the battle-field is not much altered to 
 the present day, and the principal points of the 
 memorable engagement of the 13th September, 
 1750, may still be recognized. We looked down 
 on the little wooded river-bay, by which the British 
 general, Wolfe, with the main body of his army, 
 landed in the night between the 12th and 13th. 
 
 It is one of those small coves that I have already 
 described, and was at that time called by the French 
 “ Anse du Foulon.” It is now “ Wolfe’s Cove.” The 
 shores are here not quite so steep as at some other 
 places, and whoever climbs them finds himself at 
 once before the fortifications to the rear of the cita¬ 
 del. General Wolfe, who had long had his head¬ 
 quarters in the plains below Cape Diamond, where 
 
154 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 his ships were anchored, had, by a skilfully mask¬ 
 ed manoeuvre, succeeded in surrounding the Cape 
 and the whole peninsula of Quebec, and of throw¬ 
 ing a part of his army in ships into the waters 
 above the town. The French general command¬ 
 ing in the city and fortress believed this was only 
 a small detached corps, and had his attention 
 specially directed to the points below Quebec; but 
 in reality Wolfe himself, with the main body of his 
 army, had crept round the promontory, landed at 
 the little wooded bay, ascended the heights, sur¬ 
 prised the feeble French out-post, and suddenly 
 appeared in full force on the “ Plains of Abraham.” 
 
 Besides that little bay, which can never be ef¬ 
 faced by human hands, with its historical interest, 
 we find on the field itself a lasting memorial of the 
 conflict, in a natural hollow or trench, where the 
 young commander when he had received his mortal 
 wound was brought to die. 
 
 Montcalm, still under the idea that the attacking 
 force could not be the main army of the English, 
 had advanced from the citadel with half his troops, 
 and thoughtlessly begun the battle, which soon 
 turned in favour of his enemies, but which at the 
 same time removed their chief for ever. 
 
 Wolfe was leading his grenadiers to a bayonet 
 charge, when he received a shot in the breast and 
 
CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 155 
 
 fell. The spot where it happened is not exactly 
 known, but his friends carried him a little to the 
 rear to the above-mentioned hollow, and just as he 
 was breathing his last, a voice near him exclaimed, 
 “ They fly! ” With a last effort he asked, “ Who? ” 
 The answer was, ‘‘ The French !” and then the dying 
 hero fell back smiling contentedly, and expired. The 
 place is marked by a monument, and every one 
 knows West’s picture of the Death of Wolfe, which 
 I have myself often seen; but here on the spot I 
 discovered that the painter had drawn on his fancy, 
 and not on his knowledge, for the scenery and back- 
 ground of his picture. 
 
 The whole spot, up to the walls of Quebec, offers 
 much the same aspect that it must have done in the 
 year 1759. It is a desolate, houseless, treeless spot, 
 lull of holes and inequalities, and here and there 
 of the remains of the old French batteries. 
 
 Probably it was near one of these,” says the 
 historian of Canada, Professor Garneau, “ that the 
 French leader Montcalm met his death, a few mo¬ 
 ments later than the fall of Wolfe. Like Wolfe, he 
 had before been slightly wounded, and, like him, was 
 s lot in the body while fighting bravely, and thrown 
 down under his horse; and his men, cursing the 
 mischance, carried him from the field into the town. 
 The lallen heroes, opposed to each other in mortal 
 
156 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 conflict during their lives, have been reconciled in 
 death; for a common monument has been erected 
 to them in the public garden at Quebec; and it is 
 still more gratifying to find that the two nationali¬ 
 ties, Avho carried on so long and bloody a conflict 
 with one another, are now so completely in harmony 
 that the French have subscribed as willingly to the 
 monument to Wolfe as the English to that of Mont¬ 
 calm. The latter is easily intelligible, for Montcalm 
 was a brave and esteemed man, though unfor¬ 
 tunate as a general; and it is easy for the victorious 
 to show generosity to the memory of a respected 
 though vanquished foe; but that the Canadian 
 French should have contributed to a monument to 
 their conqueror Wolfe, and even regarded it as a 
 duty to do so, this I saw explained in a Canadian 
 Journal. “ Wolfe,” it is said, “ did not by his victory 
 so much bring the French under a foreign yoke as 
 free them from an antiquated one, extremely unfa¬ 
 vourable to progress. He and his Britons founded a 
 new era for Canada, and the 60,000 poor colonists 
 who have been raised by his means to a million of 
 prosperous artizans have much to thank him toi. 
 
 After leaving the “ Plains of Abraham,” I had 
 a delightful excursion along the heights, past many 
 most beautiful villas and country seats which lie 
 on the elevated banks of the river, to the magnifi- 
 
CAPE DIAMOND. 
 
 157 
 
 cent park of Spencer Wood, the residence of 
 the Governor General. The villas belong to rich 
 merchants and the French would certainlv never 
 have established such comfortable and luxurious 
 dwellings m the midst of the Canadian woods if 
 ie nglish had not shown them the way The 
 old French Manoirs, in which some of the Seigneurs 
 sü 1 live, bear the same relation to them that the 
 ° ( 10nc< bateaux” still occasionally seen on 
 
 he St Lawrence, do to the luxurious steamers of 
 the Anglo-Saxons. 
 
158 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 the village OE BEAUPORT and the falls of 
 
 MONTMORENCY. 
 
 Prom the heights of Quebec you can see again 
 to the north-east part of that long row of houses 
 which you have already observed above the city. 
 This is the village of Beauport, which runs for 
 miles along the shore parallel with the river. 
 
 We had engaged one of the little jolting, incon¬ 
 venient Quebec droshkies, and were rumbling 
 along over stock and stone through the principal 
 streets of this village, to reach the Falls of Mont¬ 
 morency, which are about six miles off. 
 
 I never passed through a Canadian village with¬ 
 out keeping my eyes wide open, that I might 
 look through doors and windows at the pretty in¬ 
 teriors, and watch the groups of peaceful inhabit¬ 
 ants at work, or gossiping about their fires, or 
 
BEAUFORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 159 
 
 passing from house to house among their neigh- 
 bours. ° 
 
 Here at Beauport they seemed now to be en¬ 
 gaged in some important affair. A long procession 
 o men and women in gala dress was moving on 
 before us, and entering now this house, now that • 
 and completely filling it. We alighted from our 
 carnage and peeped anxiously through an open 
 door, but one of the peasants seemed to disapprove 
 of this and said, “ What do you want, gentlemen ? 
 What business have you here ? ” 
 
 As we were convinced that a Canadian peasant 
 is never rude unless he thinks he has good cause, 
 and that even then he is easily appeased, we did 
 not allow ourselves to take offence, but said, “ We 
 are strangers, Sir; this is our first day in your 
 country, and we are a little curious to see the 
 people and the happy couple, for you are, doubt- 
 less, celebrating a wedding.” 
 
 Ah c est ca ! Tres Ken, Messieurs ; descendez, 
 descendez toujours, et entrez: Soijez les Kenvenus. 
 Out, sans doute ce sont des noces” 
 
 We accepted the invitation, and looked in at the 
 cheerful assembly, and I think I never saw so 
 many handsome, well-dressed, well-behaved people 
 at a peasant’s wedding. There were healthy and 
 mc -made young men, good-tempered old men and 
 
IGO 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 matrons, lively blooming girls, and, in tlie midst, 
 the be-garlanded and happy, but mute and em¬ 
 barrassed, bridal pair. Pictures and novels tell us 
 often in England of the “ good old times,” but here 
 in Canada you may see them in living reality 
 before you, not in ink or on canvas, but in flesh 
 and blood. 
 
 “ This is only a little visit, sir, that our young 
 pair are making to their friends,” said the man 
 whom I had first addressed; “they are going through 
 the whole village to one relation and neighbour 
 after another. ‘ This is the season for weddings 
 among us. At the beginning of October every 
 one gets married who is not married already, that he 
 may get settled, warm, and comfortable for the win¬ 
 ter. We had to-day in our village four weddings, 
 four bridal pairs going about to pay their visits.” 
 
 Wherever a wedding is going on, nobody has 
 eyes and ears for anything else, and the whole 
 body of villagers accordingly went flocking after 
 these, like a swarm of bees after their queen; and 
 though we would gladly have heard something 
 more of Canadian wedding customs, it was quite 
 impossible to obtain the services of a cicerone who 
 might have instructed us in them. Since we had 
 alighted, however, we loitered a little to look about 
 
BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 161 
 
 us, and in order to make our experience as varied 
 as possible, we entered first a very humble and 
 afterwards an opulent dwelling. 
 
 .I*!“ C0 “ a f SmaU butra y»‘ and 
 
 prettv httC « “ S r ed Witl ' and « 
 
 I tty little flower-garden outside. This love of 
 
 «Z h , u , lmiversal ‘ mon ^ «“> French 
 ■ b "‘ milch !ess so amongst those of British 
 origin, '-orne little coloured prints of Catholic 
 saints hung on the walls, and some large shells lay 
 as ornaments on the press. It seemed to me as i! 
 
 I were entering a cottage at Ostend or Boulogne 
 ad never seen in America anything in such "old 
 European style. Three plump, almost too plump 
 women—mother, daughter, and daughter-indaw- 
 u ere seated round a large rough wooden table with 
 tuo female neighbours, and all industriously at 
 o °r ’ makl "g a holiday gown for one of the party, 
 ome nice healthy-looking children were also en¬ 
 gaged in stuffing something with large needles, 
 e company were all very friendly and polite, and 
 
 We totdr^ 111 the ]CaSt diBtU1 ’ bed b ? 0ur visit - 
 We told them we intended to visit also one of their 
 
 eighbours, named Bienville. “ Ah via Monsieur 
 
 Bienville Oh oui, Messieurs, la vous verrez quelque 
 
 ° TI. T lCZ n ° US fa ne vaut P as la P ei >u- Nous 
 
162 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 riavons que de petits cmplacemens. Mais Monsieur 
 Bienville cest un gros habitant! m des plus gros 
 
 messieurs dans le village ! ” 
 
 The word paysan appears to be scarcely ever 
 used here. Habitant has quite taken its place, and 
 has spread over the whole of what was formerly 
 Trench America. In Louisiana, and on the lower 
 Mississippi, the Trench colonists are also called 
 habitant , and their settlements habitations. 
 
 We found the gros habitant busy at a lime-kiln 
 situate on the side of his house near the river, and 
 we noticed these lime-kilns scattered about every¬ 
 where among the houses of the district. Monsieur 
 Bienville brushed the lime-dust from his clothes as 
 soon as he learned our wishes, and accompanied us 
 to his abode, where we found everything very nice, 
 neat, and pleasant. We were introduced to the 
 madame and mademoiselles habitantes, charming 
 Trench women, who, by their simple, unpretending, 
 and amiable manners, made a very favourable im¬ 
 pression on us. They entertained us with milk 
 and excellent snow-white bread, which had been 
 “blessed by the priest,” and was specially intended 
 to be given to strangers. During the conversation 
 we certainly perceived that these people were de¬ 
 ficient in knowledge and education, but not m 
 natural intelligence or good will. Their rooms 
 
 \ 
 
BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 163 
 
 were very spacious; to an American they would 
 have appeared old-fashioned in their furniture; but 
 they had a much gayer and more original effect 
 than those of Yankee settlers. On the wall hung 
 several pictures, and amongst them one of Napoleon* 
 who, although they never fought under him is 
 almost as popular with the Canadians as amongst 
 the peasantry in France. There was also a « Sen 
 tence for the month of October,” in a gilt frame 
 and at the side of it an « Application or Pratique ” 
 and my hosts informed me that they received one 
 
 f Ti °l the ?f from their P ri est eveiy month. 
 J® Sen i te I 1Ce was a well-chosen text from the 
 Fib e, and the exposition showed the mode of its 
 application to peasant-life in Canada. Some people 
 
 2 ?°^ t0 SGe in these fences another 
 proof of peddling priestcraft; but do they think 
 
 that if the priest did not give the sentence the 
 peasant would choose it for himself, or would he 
 esteem it so highly if he did ? 
 
 Our host was a temperance man, and had re¬ 
 nounced every sort of alcoholic drink, and he pointed 
 to us a lemperance Column,” which stood on 
 an elevated spot in the village. Tt was an elegant 
 structure, inscribed with temperance precepts, and 
 prayers and vows to the Virgin Mary. Almost die 
 
 10 e VllIa 8 e > 1 was informed, had a few years be- 
 11 * 
 
164 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 fore gone over to the society, and most of the 
 habitants had taken the pledge for themselves and 
 their children, and wore the “ Temperance Cross. 
 Some have even black temperance crosses hanging 
 up in their houses. The Catholic clergy of Canada 
 have promoted this movement very zealously, an 
 partly by their influence, partly because a majority 
 of the Canadian parliament was favourable to it, it 
 has happened that restrictive regulations, similar 
 to those of New England and many States of the 
 Union, have been passed here in Canada. 
 
 Canada bears in many respects the same relation 
 to the great Republic that Belgium does to France, 
 and every movement and reform that takes place 
 there is echoed on the St Lawrence. An enemy ot 
 the Catholic priests, with whom I afterwards spoke, 
 explained their zeal in the cause of temperance, by 
 saying, that they made it a new means of influence 
 and “meddling in people’s houses and families. 
 
 “The peasants have a great deal more to confess 
 to them—that they have broken the pledge and 
 got drunk; that they have vexed the Holy Virgin 
 Mary, &c.—and then the priests have to inflict 
 penances and punishments upon them.” 
 
 Our complaisant habitant led us through a ns 
 farm-buildings and stables, and over his fields 
 He cultivated, like his neighbours everywhere about 
 
BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 165 
 
 Quebec mu ch barley, oats, and rye, and but little 
 wheat, though there was some, and even some In¬ 
 dian corn. Probably this is to be seen nowhere 
 else m the world where the climate is as severe as 
 m Quebec, where not seldom the temperature is so 
 low that even quicksilver is frozen. In Vermont 
 on Lake Champlain, indeed, much Indian corn is 
 grown, and many African negroes are living, and 
 yet there, though the latitude is that of Florence 
 quicksilver has frozen twice within the last forty 
 years. Some few negroes are also to be found in 
 Quebec, and that these children of the Sahara desert 
 can endure such a climate is evidence of the extra- 
 ord,nary elasticity of nature in all human races. 
 
 I hat Indian corn will grow here must be attributed 
 to the heat of the short summer, which makes all 
 vegetation as rapid as in Russia. 
 
 Monsieur Bienville, as a gros habitant, had every¬ 
 thing on rather a grand scale, but most of the 
 people have very miniature possessions, — little 
 narrow strips of fields, on which they raise a little 
 
 ° •„ <AOry ! hUlg ’ a lla y> a little wood, a little 
 milk and butter from a cow; and all these little 
 productions they carry themselves to the market in 
 ^ ie town sitting there patiently till they sell them. 
 
 ion they have sat twelve hours and earned 
 " 0 shl in 8 s th ey are quite content. “ We,” said 
 
166 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 a British colonist, “ have not as much patience as 
 is wanted for these petty dealings. We get a good 
 large piece of land, and plough, and sow, and reap 
 on steadily till we have a good load, and then we 
 sell it all at once without losing much time or many 
 words about it.” Occasionally you hear in these 
 Canadian villages of a stray German who has found 
 his way here; I was told, for instance, of a certain 
 Monsieur Janquin, the English called him Master 
 Jenkins, and most likely his name was really 
 Zinken; and there were some Germans whose 
 names were given up in despair by both krench 
 and English as unpronounceable, and who were 
 distinguished as “ le petit Allemcmd” or John the 
 German. These people are said to be descendants 
 of the notorious Hessian regiment which England 
 called to her assistance in the revolutionary war, 
 and whose fate can be traced in many parts of 
 America over which they were scattered. Many 
 of them came back to Europe, some remained in 
 the Union, as, for instance, in Pennsylvania, where 
 they sometimes exchanged the sword for the pen 
 or the pedagogue’s sceptre, and some were settled 
 by the English Government in Canada, and found 
 their way into the Erencli villages, where they and 
 their names became both Gallicised. 
 
 “ Northshire,” that is, the north of the St Law- 
 
 n 
 
 \ 
 
ßEALPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 167 
 
 rcnce. is much more purely French than “ South- 
 shra,” as it is called. In the south, the old French 
 villages are mixed with British and American • or 
 aß the Canadians say, “European” settlements (as 
 if they themselves were aborigines of the country). 
 On the northern shore of the river everythin» is 
 much more in the old Canadian style, but "to 
 wards the west the Canadian element declines as 
 well as towards the south. This difference is seen 
 also in the population of the two cities. In Quebec 
 more than the half of the inhabitants are of French 
 descent. According to the census of 1847 there 
 were 22,000 French out of 37,000 inhabitants, and 
 m society the French element is predominant; but 
 in Montreal it does not play by any means so im¬ 
 portant a part. There the French are scarcely more 
 than a third of the population, and the British are 
 politically, commercially, and socially, preponderant! 
 Upper Canada is almost wholly Anglo-Saxon, and 
 the whole province does not contain more French 
 Canadians than the], town of Quebec alone, that is 
 about 20,000, and these have been mostly only 
 earned along with the great tide of Anglo-Saxon 
 immigration. 
 
 I lie most completely French portion of all Ca¬ 
 nada is the north-eastern shore of the St Lawrence, 
 from Quebec quite down to Labrador, and this is 
 
168 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 confirmed by the fact that the colonies lately carried 
 from the St Lawrence to the great Saguenay river, 
 and lake St John, were all French Canadians. 
 
 They have been hitherto much better acquainted 
 with this country than the British, and it may be 
 said that in the French time it was better known 
 to the world at large than it has been since. The 
 British have not yet quite re-discovered it, and in 
 many of the localities of the lower St Lawrence, in¬ 
 habited by pure Canadians, the state of things is 
 described as quite that of the golden age. On the 
 Isle aux Coudres, for example, which lies on the 
 northern side of the river, sixty miles below Que¬ 
 bec, and is inhabited only by Canadians, there 
 has never been a theft or any other crime known; 
 and the people never fasten their doors, and live in 
 the most perfect peace with one another. Even the 
 cultivated French of Quebec live in a much more 
 simple and primitive manner than the English, 
 rise early, dine at noon, and go to bed with the 
 fowls. Luxury and extravagance, as well as com¬ 
 fort, have been brought into the country by the 
 English. 
 
 At the western extremity of Canada, on Lake 
 Superior, and near the source of the Mississippi, and 
 on the Upper Ottawa, the Canadians are also at 
 home. Where steamers and stage coaches cease, 
 
 
BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 169 
 
 Canadian Voyageurs and Coureurs des Bois supply 
 their place, and undertake the post and carrying- 
 trade over this fine wilderness. In general the 
 British are more, at home in the fertile and culti¬ 
 vated districts—the French Canadians in the wilder 
 and more remote. 
 
 After being further entertained by our friendly 
 host with some “ gdteaux ” and gossip, and some 
 stories of the Botoilles que Napoleon avait gognees, 
 we took leave of him, and continued our excursion 
 to the Montmorency Falls. These celebrated Falls 
 have the disadvantage of lying rather too near the 
 high road, almost in its very dust. You drive along 
 a level or very gradually ascending plateau from 
 Quebec, alight in the middle of a village, and come 
 immediately behind the houses on the ledge from 
 which the river falls; this is rather prosaic° You 
 w ish to see a cataract come thundering down amidst 
 wild and unknown mountain or forest regions, fall- 
 ' n £’ possibly, from the clouds, or from some inacces¬ 
 sible glaciers, which feed it, though invisible, but 
 the illusion is much diminished when you have gone 
 down and examined it, and know the roads, and 
 villages, and fields that are lying about it. Other¬ 
 wise this Fall of Montmorency is a beautiful, lofty, 
 abundant, concentrated mass of water and foam. 
 
 A little girl, completely deaf and dumb, and who 
 
170 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 conversed with us in pantomime, accompanied us 
 as our guide, and with her silent, but expressive 
 and poetical language, increased our enjoyment, as 
 much as the chatter of an ordinary guide would 
 have diminished it. She took me gently by the 
 arm, and placed me on the summit of the rock, 
 close to where the water leaps over it; then she 
 pointed with her long out-stretched finger below, 
 to where the clouds of white foam were tinted by 
 the sun with glorious hues of blue, red, and yellow, 
 accompanying with light gestures their movement 
 as they floated away in the air. 
 
 With the same quiet but earnest manner, spring¬ 
 ing over the rocks like a chamois, and watching 
 and sharing our enthusiasm, she led us to several 
 other points, and waved her arms upwards to the 
 clouds, and downwards to the bottom of the fall, and 
 then she tripped along a narrow foot-path, along 
 which we followed her, as soon as we had divined 
 her intention, which was to show us the fall from 
 below. This is the principal scene. You follow 
 the path for about half a mile down to the shores 
 of the St Lawrence, turn to the left, and find your¬ 
 self in a little river, bay, or cove, surrounded by 
 rocky walls, and filled by the waters of the St 
 Lawrence, like a tranquil little lake. At the bottom 
 of this cove, which is filled and emptied by the 
 
 \ 
 
BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY". 171 
 
 tide, you see the fall. It is said that this is most 
 beautiful in the winter; the little bay then freezes 
 completely over, and you can walk on the ice 
 quite up to the fall. In that season, which is in 
 general in Canada the season of leisure, of enjoy¬ 
 ment, and social pleasure (the short summer, when 
 the navigation is open, must be used for 
 something better) in the winter this rocky valley 
 is filled with brilliant sledges, skaters, and prome- 
 naders from Quebec, who enjoy the fresh air and 
 the beautiful scenery in their favourite fashion. 
 Even the cataract itself is then partly frozen, and 
 makes with its immense icicles and columns an 
 imposing appearance. 
 
 Exactly opposite the fall in the bay, lies a great 
 black mass of rock, which has been thrown down 
 in some convulsion, and round this the gorgeously- 
 coloured clouds were forming a rainbow with most 
 picturesque effect. In winter the spray settles as 
 ice upon it, and then the block grows into a huge 
 !°fty glacier, and is sometimes turned to account 
 by a gay party from Quebec, as a montagne Russe, 
 or we might say Canadian—for this pleasure is 
 just as much in vogue on the St Lawrence as at 
 Moscow. The name it bears here is Toboggcning, 
 from an old Indian word, for the practice is also 
 probably an Indian one. Small sledges made in 
 
172 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 the Indian fashion are called a Toboggan; they are 
 made like their canoes, out of one piece, and barely 
 afford room for a lady and gentleman. 
 
 I was surprised to hear, too, that the Europeans 
 here have adopted another Indian invention, that 
 of snow-shoes—though they may be regarded in 
 some measure as a natural necessity of the country. 
 The Indians and Canadians manage this inconve¬ 
 nient chaussure best, and can not only run but leap 
 in it, and in the Canadian villages they have snow- 
 shoe races. The snow falls here sometimes to such 
 a depth, and remains so long on the ground, that 
 even English ladies are obliged to accustom them¬ 
 selves to their troublesome method of locomotion, 
 if they are not willing entirely to renounce fresh 
 air and exercise. Many of them attain to great 
 excellence in the art, and then they undertake long 
 excursions and pleasure parties on snow-shoes, and 
 not unfrequently something very much like a 
 stecple-chase, when they display as much boldness 
 and skill in crossing snow-covered hedges and 
 ditches as their countrywomen in England in riding 
 and hunting. 
 
 The Montmorency Fall may, on the whole, be re¬ 
 garded as a specimen of a kind very common here. 
 At many points round the edge of the great rocky 
 table-land of Labrador, similar waterfalls are 
 
 
 \ 
 
BEAUPORT AND FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. 173 
 
 found, pouring their streams into the sea, as here 
 into the deep basin of the St Lawrence. Even to 
 the north of Labrador and Hudson’s Bay, on the 
 coast of Melville Island, and other arctic regions of 
 America, there are found rivers which fall from a 
 height of three or four hundred feet into small deep 
 ravine-like bays, and form-to judge from the 
 descriptions of Parry, Franklin, and other arctic 
 navigators—scenes precisely like that of the Falls of 
 Montmorency. The geological formation which 
 prevails so extensively in the north, might lead 
 one to expect a similar geographical configuration 
 of the country. 
 
 1 he YV ater Privilege ” of Montmorency formerly 
 belonged to a French Seigneur, but now it and the 
 Seigneurie have passed into the hands of an English¬ 
 man, who turns away a great part of the falling 
 water to set a saw-mill in motion. We visited his 
 establishment, which employs no less than 1500 
 people, who, besides the boards and planks, make 
 doors and window-frames, and other component 
 parts of houses, and are also occupied with the 
 shipping of the vast piles of wood that come down 
 to the lumber yard. 
 
174 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 \ 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE INDIANS OF ST LORETTE. 
 
 We now turned aside from the great road, and 
 crossed the fields through several Canadian villages, 
 to visit the Indian village of St Lorette. At St Pierre 
 we heard that they had lately shot a large bear 
 quite close to the houses. At St Michel we met 
 a hunter, who had just come down from the moun¬ 
 tain (the Laurentides), bringing with him on a cart a 
 large elk, and two of the small Canadian hares, called 
 here wild cats (chats deforets). He had no other 
 weapon than a clumsy old flint gun. The French 
 peasants, whom we saw, were going about their 
 houses in great, thick, heavy sabots, like those seen 
 in Champagne and Westphalia, and thick woollen 
 night-caps hanging down long over their backs; even 
 those whom we met in carts or on horse-back had 
 not laid aside their beloved night-caps; and it must 
 
175 
 
 THE INDIANS OF ST LORETTE. 
 
 be owned that these wooden-shoed and night-capped 
 Canadians do in America look very anti-progressive, 
 ihe Germans have mostly laid aside their old 
 European dress, so that it would seem that the 
 rrench are more wedded to old customs than any 
 other nation settled here. 
 
 I have often had occasion to mention Indian cus¬ 
 toms and material objects, the Pipe of Peace, the 
 canoe &c., which have been introduced among the 
 Canadian French; and I found that the old Indian 
 national dish called Sagamite, so often mentioned 
 in the earliest reports of the Jesuits, is a favourite 
 among the Canadian peasants. What the word 
 means I have in vain inquired, but the dish consists 
 o maize boiled in milk; though the poor Indians 
 probably boiled it for their Jesuit Fathers in water; 
 and since it formed for a hundred years the daily 
 bread of so many pious missionaries in the wilder¬ 
 ness, there is a kind of historical interest attached 
 to it. It is often met with at the tables of respect¬ 
 able citizens in Montreal and Quebec. 
 
 In these Quebec villages the trees were almost leaf¬ 
 less, though in the island of Montreal they still 
 >ore a rich, many-coloured foliage; and in the 
 more feebly developed fruit trees in the gardens the 
 same influence of the northern climate was observ¬ 
 able. The fine fruit of Montreal is not found here, 
 
TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 176 
 
 and of the magnificent apples called fameuses, which 
 grow there, we had brought with us on the steamer 
 
 a whole cargo to Quebec. 
 
 As we approached the village of Lorette, and the 
 wind blew rather cold from the mountains, we met 
 two men in an open cart sitting with their backs to 
 the horse, and leaving him to find his way as he 
 best might. “Those are queer drivers,” I re¬ 
 marked to my Trench coachman. 
 
 “ Yes, sir, they are Irishmen,” he answered la¬ 
 conically, as’if that accounted for anything. These 
 two Paddies were returning from the city to their 
 village, one of the Irish back settlements that ex¬ 
 tend behind those of the French into the interior 
 of the country. 
 
 At St Lorette we first went to visit the school¬ 
 master, whom we found on duty, that is, in the 
 midst of his brown pupils. He himself was, as he 
 told us, a Huron, and I was rather surprised that 
 he, a cultivated man, so readily acknowledged Ins 
 savage origin. It would have been quite another 
 thing if he had come of an African race. A mu¬ 
 latto 3 or a quadroon will only mention his white 
 blood, but no one in Canada has any hesitation in 
 saying, “lama Huron, an Iroquois, or a Mohawk.” 
 These races were destroyed or driven out by the 
 Europeans, but never reduced to slavery, and only 
 
THE INDIANS OF ST LORETTE. 
 
 the submitting to a yoke of this kind seems to be 
 everywhere regarded as the forfeiture of national 
 onour No one blushes for being merely wild 
 and barbarous and in civilized China, for example, 
 t nobles think a descent from the Mantchoo 
 lartars a cause for boasting. 
 
 The sight of the little Indian school-children 
 interested me m the highest degree. We had 
 before us the most various mixtures of European 
 and Indian blood, and although the children were 
 all called Indians, some of them were as fair and 
 rosy-cheeked as Europeans. Some however had 
 the brown faces and harsh coal-black hair of the 
 pure roquois. The boys were mostly much 
 andsomer and better made than the girls, and 
 they as well as their masters, were always able to 
 tell irom what race they were descended. Most of 
 them were Hurons, as nearly the whole colony of 
 
 7, L ° l rette 1S ’ but s ome were Algonquins, some 
 Abenakis, and others Iroquois, and there were also 
 a fow Amalekites, or Micmacs from New Bruns¬ 
 wick All these once powerful and dreaded tribes 
 have dwindled almost to atoms, and it is remark¬ 
 able that these atoms are still so well informed as 
 to their character and origin. The school-master 
 told me that among the Indian villages in 
 Canada, few and widely scattered as they are a 
 
 VOL. I. * ’ 
 
 
 12 
 
178 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 tolerably active intercourse is maintained. An 
 Indian of Upper Canada, or New Brunswick or 
 Nova Scotia, should liis affairs bring lnm to Quebec, 
 seldom fails to pay a visit to the men of his race 
 at St Lorette, and thence arise frequently marriages 
 or other connections, which account for the cir¬ 
 cumstance that the offspring of so many other 
 
 tribes are to be found here. 
 
 The little Indians, at our request and the com¬ 
 mand of their master, now set up a song, am it 
 was really a terrific performance. It seemed as 
 they were all going to fly at us at once, it was -a 
 regular storm, and the impression made on us 
 was very much what other travellers have described 
 from the war-whoop, and yet it was intended lor 
 a pious French hymn. They certainly kept time, 
 however, and if it had not been for the very 
 war-like character of their religious exercise there 
 would have been no fault to find with it. The free 
 and bold attitude of the youngsters also struck me, 
 most of them stood erect with folded arms, an 
 trumpeted out their hymn with all the strength o 
 their lungs. The instruction is given m French, 
 and their books and the pupils’ copies seemed all 
 
 very orderly and neatly kept. 
 
 The schoolmaster had the kindness afterwards to 
 take us to some of the families in the village, an 
 
1HE INDIANS OF ST LORETTE. 179 
 
 I was not a little astonished at the order and clean 
 mess I found in the houses. Many a farmers 
 house France and England could not be com 
 pared «nth those of the Hurons, and in many parts 
 of Scotland and Germany the comparison might 
 put the Europeans to shame. g 
 
 The hirst Chief” of the village was not at 
 home, so we visited the “ Second Chief,” who had a 
 whole house full of children, and introduced 
 
 aged, hut still quite active father, whom we 
 found digging m his garden. 
 
 I ZriTadT “ dUStri0US in } ' 0,lr 8“*».” said 
 
 i, wjien 1 had been presented. 
 
 Pooh ! pooh! said he smiling, but throwing 
 away his spade contemptuously “ I mils + f i- 
 worh in the fields now.'hut foLr^ltnt 
 
 ng, and shot moose deer, and beam. That was 
 much better. Mats m, i pr hmt jc ™ 
 
 Th « *> not 
 
 . ,IC of , the optnion of the Iiomans, who rc- 
 „arded agriculture as a noble occupation, even for 
 the conquerors of the world. Their whole „enius 
 
 and“m„t "“'"T* with the life of the forests 
 and hunting-grounds, and though they have now 
 
 been cultivating the ground for so many yearn 
 their dreams am still of the wilderness. 
 
 e were now led into Hie house and presented 
 
ISO 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 by our host to his wife, an old Noma-like figure, 
 wrapped in a large black shawl, and sitting silent 
 and motionless by the fire. He mentioned her 
 name, but I have forgotten it; he himself was, lie 
 informed us, called by an Indian appellation sig¬ 
 nifying “ I have a river in my mouth,” given to 
 him by flatterers in his younger days because he 
 had shown some signs of eloquence. These people 
 were in their dress and persons, as well as in their 
 habitations, as clean and orderly as could be de¬ 
 sired They showed us some pretty embroidery with 
 elk’s hair upon elk’s leather, &c., and with porcu¬ 
 pine quills upon birch bark, which was really very 
 tasteful, and which they offered for sale. Mr - 
 have-a-river-in-my-mouth” seemed indeed to carry 
 on quite a wholesale trade in them, for he had great 
 tuns and chests full of mocassins embroidered with 
 flowers, cigar-cases, purses, &c„ all made by the 
 women in the village, and which were, I believe, 
 destined to be sent to Montreal, and thence pro¬ 
 bably to Niagara and New York. This interesting 
 little branch of industry flourishes, I believe, in 
 the Indian colonies of Canada. 
 
 These Indians, educated and civilized as they 
 are, do not yet devote themselves wholly to the 
 peaceful occupations of the garden and the field. 
 « Our restless young men,” said our host, w an er 
 
the INDIANS OF ST LORETTE. 181 
 
 every year, for four or five weeks, to the north, live 
 
 I? h ! I S f °J . tents ; n the -oods, go hunting in 
 old fashion, and return with their game at an 
 appointed time to the village. Many of us are in 
 he service of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and 
 O ow the chase in the regions round Hudson’s 
 ay and these do not perhaps return to the village 
 till they feel themselves growing old.” 
 
 He mostly spoke of the people of the village of 
 St Lorette as “The Huron nation,” as if these 
 few hundred men were all the remains of that once 
 mighty race “Our nation,” he said, “receives- 
 every year from the Queen of England certain 
 presents of weapons, powder, and provisions, and 
 when my son and a brother-chief goes to receive 
 them from the Commissioner, he always presents 
 himself m his full costume as an Indian chief and 
 
 imBon’” n TL bU T SS “ thC name ° f the * Huron 
 nation. The old man showed us this official full 
 
 dress of his son, but he himself, like all peaceful 
 Hurons, was dressed like a Canadian peasant, minus 
 e night-cap and the wooden shoes, which the In¬ 
 dians have not adopted. Not far from St Lorette 
 «nd near the limits of the cultivated valley of the St 
 Lawrence, scarcely sixty miles from Quebec, there 
 
 v * ®° me ( l uite wild Indians, called by the 
 liench Montagnois, but they are few, poor! and 
 
182 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 widely scattered. They live by hunting and fish¬ 
 ing, and are mostly found in isolated family groups 
 in°the forests, which they leave as seldom as the 
 bears. A few years ago I was told nine of these 
 Montagnois took the resolution of coming for the 
 first time to see St Lorette and Quebec, and pitched 
 their tents near their countrymen, going from time 
 to time to the city, where they were regarded as 
 almost as much curious novelties as they would 
 have been thought in Europe, although, as I have 
 said, their usual habitations are not sixty miles off. 
 
 On our return to Quebec, when some of the most 
 distinguished naturalists in America were in our 
 company, we heard, during a conversation relating 
 to whites and red-skins, that the American wild 
 plants disappear before European weeds, just as 
 the aborigines do before the immigrants. Wher¬ 
 ever the Europeans come, they say, there imme¬ 
 diately springs up a European vegetation, which 
 takes root energetically, and drives out that native 
 to the country. In many cases, of course, this ad¬ 
 mits of explanation, as when Europeans sow various 
 kinds of corn from the old world, it is very conceiv¬ 
 able that they may also sow the seeds of many weeds; 
 but sometimes there does really appear something 
 almost mysterious in the process. When, for ex¬ 
 ample, Europeans pass only once through the forest 
 
THE INDIANS OF ST LORETTE. 183 
 
 or district previously peopled only by Indians, and 
 make their bivouac fire and their night quarters 
 there, the place is thenceforward marked by the 
 springing up of European wild plants. Railroads 
 have been carried across regions hitherto untrodden; 
 and along the line sprouted forth, not American’ 
 but new European weeds. 
 
 “The Indians,” said my esteemed informant,“ have 
 long made the same remark, and have given to a 
 weed commonly appearing under such circum¬ 
 stances (the English Plantain, or Plantago Major) 
 the name of ‘ the White Man’s Footstep.’ ” 
 
 I he last rays of the sun were shining on the tin- 
 covered roofs when we got back to Quebec—those 
 roofs which have procured for Montreal the name 
 of the “ Silver Town,” and produced a most magi¬ 
 cal effect. Many of the towers which were halfln 
 shadow glowed as if ignited, and I am convinced 
 that if an old Spanish Conquistador had seen them 
 he would have sent off the most glowing accounts 
 
 of a city on the St Lawrence, built entirelv of cold 
 and silver. 
 
184 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE QUEBEC SEMINARY. 
 
 I passed an instructive and interesting morn¬ 
 ing in the Catholic College of Quebec, one of the 
 oldest and most remarkable institutions of the 
 country, which has been, for 200 years, with the 
 « Seminary,” at the head of the education of the 
 Canadian clergy, and the Catholic youth in general. 
 It was founded in 1663 by Francois de Laval, the 
 first Bishop of Quebec, its original destination being 
 merely for the clergy, and it was as richly endowed 
 as the Seminary of Montreal. A tax of one-thir¬ 
 teenth on all the produce of the earth was imposed 
 for its support, but, as this was thought exorbitant, 
 and excited great discontent in the colony, it was 
 after a time lowered to a twenty-sixth. Like the 
 Montreal Seminary, it is divided into a Grand and 
 Petit Semimire—in the first of which study about 
 
the QUEBEC SEMINARY. 
 
 185 
 
 40 young theologians, and in the second 400 young 
 people, receive general education. 
 
 The greater part of the pupils are Pensionnaires 
 and reside in the institution; the rest are externes 
 and receive only instruction. The great majority 
 of them are of French origin, but there are also 
 English, Irish, British Canadians, and even Ame¬ 
 ricans from the United States. The fewest are 
 from Quebec itself, and it cannot therefore be con¬ 
 sidered as a mere town school, but as an institution 
 for America at large. I found half 'a dozen young 
 men from Boston alone, many from Upper Canada, 
 and some from New Brunswick. There were some 
 Englishmen among the heads of the Seminary and 
 teachers, and altogether about sixty of British 
 families. Probably the good education given, and 
 the low charge made for it, may induce the English 
 to send their children to this old French establish¬ 
 ment ; for a young man can, I was told, be main¬ 
 tained and instructed for from thirty to forty 
 guineas. The school is divided into an upper class 
 for “ Rhetoric and Philosophy,” a lower “ Classe 
 Preparatoire,” and between these there are six 
 otlieis. Besides these the scholars are assembled 
 in many private classes and societies, which exist 
 in addition to the official ones, and which are con¬ 
 ducted under the superintendence of the teachers. 
 
186 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 by the pupils themselves, who seek to excite each 
 other’s emulation. 
 
 Among these is an Academic dc St Denys, found¬ 
 ed in 1822, “to animate zeal, and reward industry 
 and progress.” It consists 1st of 20 Academicians, 
 chosen from the philosophy and rhetoric classes— 
 2nd, of the so-called Candidates from the middle; 
 and 3rdly, of Aspirants who may be taken from 
 the lowest and most elementary. The qualifications 
 for the members of this Academy are, that they 
 shall have gained some principal prize —“premier 
 prix d’ excellence / ”—or have been in general re¬ 
 markably successful; and, secondly, that they shall 
 be of pious and blameless conduct. 
 
 The second Private Society among the pupils is 
 the Societe Laval, founded in 1851, in honour of 
 the bishop of that name. It is especially for the 
 middle classes, and the President, Vice-President, 
 and Secretary of it are pupils; and their sittings 
 are devoted to the communication of written essays, 
 to discussion, declamation, and the solution of 
 grammatical and literary questions. The third is 
 the Societe Typoyraphique, dating from 1848, and 
 choosing its officers from the upper classes. It 
 publishes a journal which has two editors, and ap¬ 
 pears twice a week in small folio; and which is 
 written, composed, printed, and sold by the 
 
THE QUEBEC SEMINARY. 
 
 1S7 
 
 scholars. It bears the title of the “Bee,” with 
 the motto, “ Je suis chose legbre, et vais de fleur en 
 fleur” and has already existed six years, and fills six 
 volumes. It contains a series of excellent and use¬ 
 ful extracts from good writers—for instance, one 
 from Lord Bacon, “On Conversation;” “On Early 
 Education,” from L’amie de la Religion; a little ar¬ 
 ticle by the “Modeste Abeille,” “ Centre VOurs du 
 Nord, et sa griffe meurtriere qu'il fond vers Con¬ 
 stantinople, a good little paper in which the 
 Bee, “ pareeque son foible bourdonnement ne pourra 
 pas faire taire la guerre ,” undertakes (long before 
 the battles near Sebastopol) to register the Wars 
 of the Giants; a Eulogium on Silvio Pellico; 
 geographical and historical essays ; replies to ques¬ 
 tions mooted within the Quebec Seminary; and, 
 lastly, a touching nccrologe on the death of two dis¬ 
 tinguished pupils of another Canadian Seminary, 
 Hyacinth College, on the Yamaska (a small tri¬ 
 butary of the St Lawrence, eastward of Montreal), 
 to which the students of Quebec had recently paid 
 a visit during their vacation. 
 
 I he Journal contained a very ample and well- 
 written account of the journey, the description of 
 one half of Canada, by a young Canadian patriot. 
 The visitors had been addressed at the college on 
 the Y amaska by a Monsieur Adolph Jaques, one 
 
188 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 of the most distinguished students, in the name of 
 1ns fellows, and replied to by a M. Marmet for the 
 guests. He was at that time Editor of the “ Bee, 
 and the former one of its most zealous correspond¬ 
 ents ; and it happened that both these promising 
 young men were carried off by death, nearly at the 
 same time,—“ tous deux charges de la meine mission, 
 tous deux honores et cheris de leurs confreres, tous 
 deux doues de talents remarquahles, et couronnes de 
 lauriers ala fin de chaque annee scolaire.” 
 
 What a store of recollections must this little Bee 
 be laying up for the later years of the students: 
 the history, not only of their early lives, but of 
 their youthful ideas. At the end of the present 
 century, some grey-haired man who had been 
 brought up here, need only ask for a yearly volume 
 of this little periodical, to transport himself back to 
 the days of his youth. And what enjoyment, 
 what useful, practical, and encouraging hints may 
 not the young people engaged in it at present 
 receive! 
 
 The idea of a typographical society alone, for 
 the practice of an art so intimately connected with 
 literature and science, is excellent and suitable. 
 Should not every scholar have some knowledge of 
 the art of printing, as well as of writing ? 
 
 I should like to hear what our German school- 
 
189 
 
 THE QUEBEC SEMINARY. 
 
 men would say to these Canadian institutions. The 
 name °f Canada awakens in our minds ideas of 
 wdd barbarians rather than of educational institu- 
 10 ns. What good thing can come out of Canada ?” 
 might they ask. Quebec, situated at the extreme 
 limit of the civilised world, seems little likely to be 
 a centre of intellectual movement; and we Pro¬ 
 testants of Saxony and Prussia would not be in- 
 c ined to look to a Seminary under the guidance 
 
 of the Catholic clergy for new and valuable ideas 
 oi reform. 
 
 Have we Saxons and Prussians, with our much- 
 praised school-system, which assuredly is in many 
 respects good, yet set in motion the lever so much 
 employed at Quebec-that of private emulation 
 among the scholars,—the lever of free and voluntary. 
 association for the glorious objects of education — 
 the lever of voluntary effort, and of non-official’re- 
 wards? The praise, the rewards, the prizes dis¬ 
 tributed by the authorities for appointed tasks, are 
 certainly good, necessary, and indispensable; but 
 do they not tend in some measure to encourage 
 servi it\ ? How delightful is the free acknowledg¬ 
 ment of our merit from equals of our own class 
 and standing—our “ Peers.” 
 
 How encouraging and beneficial must such mo¬ 
 tives and such a field for free exertion be to young 
 
190 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 men of sturdily independent character, who are so 
 apt to get into collision with school regulations and 
 school tasks, arbitrarily imposed, and in conse¬ 
 quence of such collisions often become unruly and 
 idle, but who are not irreclaimable. Many a head¬ 
 strong spirit of this sort has, by being enabled first 
 to distinguish himself in these private voluntary 
 associations, been ultimately reconciled to the regu¬ 
 lar school-system. They may even serve a useful 
 purpose to the teachers themselves, who must 
 naturally be a little inclined to despotic authority, 
 and to an obstinate persistence in their own plans; 
 even to them it may serve as a wholesome opposi¬ 
 tion, and call their attention to much that they 
 might otherwise overlook. 
 
 When they find perhaps some young genius,— 
 of whom they have made little account, or even 
 rejected,—recognised and distinguished by his 
 fellows, they may be led to take him by the hand 
 and bring him forward for his own and others’ good. 
 
 I feel that I am expressing myself awkwardly, 
 but the reader may perceive my meaning, to deve- 
 lope which fully would require a more lengthened 
 discussion. He will see that I wish to suggest the 
 inquiry, whether we German Protestants might 
 not in ’some things take example by the Roman 
 Catholic college of Canada, and encourage at our 
 
the QUEBEC SEMINARY. jgj 
 
 Ingli schools similar private societies, and courts of 
 onoui—at least in some modified form ? I will not 
 
 urn crtakc to decide the question, but I could not 
 elp feel, ng al„„ g with npprova , ^ 
 
 .on of what I saw of the students and their teach- 
 
 rfthe “ cm0ti °" 0f re « rct that "»thing 
 
 ol the kind had existed at the institutions at which 
 I Avas myself educated. 
 
 -pr, llC Presidents” of these societies, and the 
 Editors of the Bee, showed us with great zeal over 
 icu typographical establishments, and the Pro- 
 fessors led us through the various departments of 
 die extensive buddings, in which there are apart- 
 ments for emporea, and mental exercises, a libraiy 
 o 12.000 volumes, and » richly.fumishcd cabinet 
 of physical science, such as I should be glad to see 
 m every German gymnasium. Many of the im¬ 
 provements are still recent, but they are makin- 
 
 shall fi P 7r.’ and “ n0t b0 lo "« ***> « 
 shall find that wc might get many good hints on 
 
 the«, things from both Lower and Upper Canada 
 In one department of this old Seminary I f 0 „„d 
 c remainder of the lately burnt library of the Ca¬ 
 nadian parliament. Fires are throughout Canada 
 as well as the United States, a real plague, and not 
 only stores and private dwellings, but literary and 
 cientific collections are constantly threatened by 
 
192 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 them. The Quebec Seminary has twice suffered 
 much from fire, and of the Quebec Parliament li¬ 
 brary more than 9000 volumes were burnt out of 
 18,000, and amongst them the celebrated Relations 
 des Jesuites —the most complete collection ever 
 made of them. In Montreal, wehere also the Par¬ 
 liament House was burnt down some years ago, 
 30,000 volumes were consumed, and both these 
 fires took place a short time before the conflagra¬ 
 tion which destroyed the Congress Library at Wash¬ 
 ington. A very complete collection of objects of Ca¬ 
 nadian natural history were also consumed in the fire 
 of Quebec, and I saw in a small room all that was 
 saved, a few stuffed animals and other objects, pre¬ 
 sented by the Quebec Historical Society. I could 
 never fully understand the causes of the extraor¬ 
 dinary prevalence of this scourge, which in those 
 countries is more inimical to scientific collections 
 than moths or rust. 
 
 I sought in vain in the libraries of Quebec (in¬ 
 cluding the small one of the Historical Society) for 
 ancient maps of the country, or original documents 
 bearing on the oldest history of Canada. They do 
 not exist here: everything of interest is a copy 
 from Paris; so my researches in this department 
 proved somewhat futile. I was, however, glad to 
 see that here, as well as throughout America, much 
 
THE QUEBEC SEMINARY. 
 
 193 
 
 more attention is now devoted to these subjects 
 than formerly. 
 
 Very lately the Canadian government sent a 
 young man to Paris, and he returned with a num¬ 
 ber of excellent copies of ancient maps of Canada; 
 and old Jaques Cartier, the Columbus of Canada, 
 the first discoverer and navigator of the great St 
 Lawrence, who bestowed names on it, and the 
 country, I found now held in universal honour. To 
 this the Literary and Historical Societies of Que¬ 
 bec have doubtless contributed; under their direc¬ 
 tion was published in 1843 a new critical work 
 on the first arrival of Europeans in Canada, (Voy¬ 
 ages de decouvertc au Canada entre les annees 
 1534 1542,) and the learned Canadian historians 
 
 MM. Eariboult and Gamcau have contributed much, 
 by their admirable works, to promote the study of 
 history. 
 
 Particular points of antiquarian interest, such as 
 at what part of the river Cartier first landed, 
 where he wintered, &c.,—have been treated in 
 pamphlets published by the above societies; and 
 an old gun found near Quebec, on the often men¬ 
 tioned river St Charles, the rudder of an old ship’s 
 boat, &c., gave occasion to some curious discus¬ 
 sions ; a particular Memoir of the said cannon was 
 issued under the name of “ Le Canon de Brome” 
 
 VOL. I. 13 
 
TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 194 
 
 The old and almost forgotten names of Cartier, 
 Stadacone (the Indian name for Quebec), lloche- 
 laga (the Indian name for Montreal), Agouhanna (a 
 Chief near Quebec), Donnacona (an Indian Cacique 
 near Montreal,) &c., were as if raised from the 
 grave, and became so current in Canada, that a 
 popular and esteemed author could bestow the name 
 of Ilochelaga on his work, and be everywhere un¬ 
 derstood. Many hundreds of copies were made of a 
 representation of the old French habitation on the 
 site of the present citadel of Quebec, and, in 1847, 
 the town of St Malo sent to Canada a copy of the 
 well-preserved portrait of the brave old knight 
 Cartier, which was engraved, and the engravings 
 sold by thousands. There came also from France 
 a drawing of the ancestral abode in Ilretagne 
 the habitation of this remarkable man, the house 
 in which he was born and died, and a copj of a 
 picture of his first arrival in Canada. Since then 
 his name has penetrated everywhere; streets and 
 « Places ” have been named after him in Mont¬ 
 real and Quebec, and a steamer I lately saw was 
 called the “ Jaques Cartier.” A popular biography 
 however, like that of Columbus by A\ ashington 
 Irving, has not yet been written of the Canadian 
 Conquistador. 
 
MISCELLANIES. 
 
 195 
 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 MISCELLANIES. 
 
 Mr friends were kind enough to take me some¬ 
 times to the Canadian Parliament, and I found 
 there at all times of the day life, movement, and 
 society. It seemed to me as if its doors stood 
 open the whole day, like the approaches to the old 
 Forum llomanum, where some kind of discussion 
 was always going on, even when “ Senatus Popu- 
 1 usque ” were not assembled. 
 
 Early in the morning 1 found many members 
 already in their places, corresponding, reading, 
 turning over papers, and taking notes, and always 
 some groups engaged in conversation. A large 
 reading-room, in which all the political journals of 
 Canada, England, and the United States, were to be 
 found, is as inseparable a part of this political ex¬ 
 change as of the commercial in another part of the 
 
 13 * 
 
196 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 town. Here people are going in and out the whole 
 day, making appointments, forming committees, &c., 
 and in the evening there was a sitting which I was 
 allowed to attend. On the table of the House 
 lay a Mace, precisely like that of the EnglisluPar- 
 liament; will any American Cromwell ever cry 
 “ Take away that bauble ” ? The members here, as 
 in England, bow to the Speaker, called V Orateur, 
 when they pass his table, and the official attend¬ 
 ants, the sergeant-at-arms, ushers, &c., are similar; 
 but it struck me as peculiar that the trifling 
 services of the Parliament, the carrying messages, 
 letters, &c., or waiting on the commands of the 
 Speaker, were performed by young half-grown lads. 
 They were dressed in black, and contributed some¬ 
 thing to the picturesque effect of the scene, as they 
 sat or lay, when they were not wanted, on the 
 carpeted steps leading to the Speaker’s chair. 
 
 Of the debates which were carried on, partly in 
 English, partly in French, I did not understand 
 much. So much however I made out, that there 
 were present a lately fallen ministry, and a triumph¬ 
 ant present one (nothing uncommon in Canada), 
 and that the fallen one was exposed to a vehement 
 and bitter attack from a very zealous but crotchety 
 member on the extreme left. They were accused 
 of want of economy in the management of the 
 
MISCELLANIES. 
 
 197 
 
 public money, and a committee of inquiry was 
 appointed. This committee, and the mode of its 
 formation, appeared suspicious to that ultra-de¬ 
 mocratic member. In a long and violent speech 
 he declared it a “ White-washing Committee,” and 
 endeavoured to show that it was so constituted as 
 to make the acquittal of the ministry a matter of 
 course. He did not hesitate to cast on gentlemen 
 present the coarsest accusations of appropriating 
 money to their own private advantage, and painted 
 their whole conduct in the blackest colours. Of 
 this phrase, “ White-washing Committee,” he ap¬ 
 peared so enamoured that he repeated it about 
 once a minute, in a speech of two hours’ length. 
 The passionate little gentleman had no sooner 
 ceased than he was attacked on all sides. lie had 
 been, I heard, driven from several Canadian Parlia¬ 
 ments, but always managed somehow to slip in 
 again, and he was given to understand, with all sorts 
 of piquant variations, that, as a journalist, he vilified 
 every mortal but himself; that he lived in enmity 
 with God and man; that he was the very incarna¬ 
 tion of selfishness, and that his little pug nose was 
 always scenting out something dirty, except in 
 himself, where it was oftencst to be found. I was 
 astounded at the uncompromising hard words with 
 which he was pelted, but they seemed to trouble 
 
198 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 him very little. lie sat at his desk looking per¬ 
 fectly unconcerned, turning over some papers, ap¬ 
 parently engaged, like a little god of love, in sharp¬ 
 ening fresh arrows, and now and then looking with 
 a malicious smile over his shoulder in the faces of 
 his angry assailants. I could not help thinking 
 however, from his physiognomy (if Lavater is at all 
 to be trusted), that, should he ever attain to power, 
 he might need a “ White-washing Committee cpiite 
 as much as those whom he had been denouncing. 
 
 A pleasant contrast is afforded by passing from 
 such a parliamentary debate as this to a gay Soiree 
 Dansante, where the very men who have just been 
 standing front to front on the field of apparently fero¬ 
 cious conflict, now appear pacified and smiling, de¬ 
 porting themselves to one another like gentlemen, in 
 a kind of half-glorified state, as we may hope it will 
 be in that world where we shall have left our earth¬ 
 ly quarrels, grudges, and angry passions behind us. 
 Long live soirees, for they certainly help to “ strew 
 life’s path with fragrant flowers.” 
 
 It was the first large party of the winter, what 
 one might call the opening of the season, that I had 
 thus the good fortune to attend, and all the “ beauty 
 and fashion ” of Quebec was assembled on the oc¬ 
 casion ; but one of my chief pleasures was to see 
 the cordial intermingling of the two great West 
 
 r\ 
 
MISCELLANIES. 
 
 199 
 
 European nationalities, which had lately been so 
 chivalrously maintaining the freedom of Europe be¬ 
 fore Sebastopol. Erench grace and Anglo-Saxon 
 manliness, or, if I may be allowed the word, gentle- 
 manliness, [danced and jested, and hovered from 
 room to room; and in the midst of the guests ap¬ 
 peared, well pleased, the noble-minded and highly 
 cultivated man who then ruled the country from 
 Lake Superior to Newfoundland and Labrador. 
 
 The society of Quebec is really, in animation, 
 spirit, and refinement, inferior to that of no other 
 capital in the world, and I wish I could convey to 
 the reader some idea of the sparkling and even in¬ 
 structive conversation that this pleasant evening 
 afforded me, but it would be like attempting to 
 catch and paint the bubbles in a foaming glass of 
 champagne. The “ wise,” for whom “ halt a word 
 is sufficient, will easily understand that I carried 
 home with me most agreeable recollections of the 
 Quebec opening soiree, and retired to an excellent 
 night’s rest to the before-mentioned little wooden 
 cell in which I, and some more distinguished travel¬ 
 lers, had to deposit our individuality in the first 
 hotel of Quebec. 
 
- • ;‘>v yy.?-y 
 
 
 
 
 200 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL. 
 
 On our return passage up the river night covered 
 the beautiful part of the St Lawrence that we had 
 previously seen by daylight; but, on the other hand, 
 the sun showed us much that had been previously 
 hidden in darkness. Both passages together af¬ 
 forded us a complete view of the whole renowned 
 and glorious water. The whole evening through 
 we saw both shores lit up by the lights in the long 
 rows of houses in the St Lawrence villages; it was 
 like a hundred miles long street illumination. 
 Among the passengers was a young priest, with 
 whom I soon got into talk. He had been hitherto 
 the pastor of a little flock in the neighbourhood of 
 Gaspt; Bay, in the district of Gasp^siü at the mouth 
 of the St Lawrence, and he gave me a lively and 
 touching description of the simple lives of the poor 
 
 
 
FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL. 201 
 
 fisher population, and of their doings on land and 
 ocean, which last is their granary and store-room, 
 and, from the accounts of my informant, I was led 
 to infer that the part of Lower Canada that I had 
 not seen, the part below Quebec, and on both sides 
 of the vast sea-like river, was one of the greatest 
 interest for an ethnographer and a philanthropist. 
 But what I could not see I was glad to hear of. A 
 traveller more favourably circumstanced who may 
 think to make this journey, must take notice that 
 he will have to land at Gaspd, and make his way 
 for 200 miles along the rough, iron-bound south 
 coast, from village to village, to Quebec, and then 
 back again for 500 miles, along the still more rugged 
 northern coast to Bellisle, where the last French 
 settlements are lost in the country of the Montag- 
 nois and Esquimaux. This he must do if he wishes 
 to boast that he knows anything of true Lower 
 Canada. 
 
 My good companion, I learned, had lately been 
 transplanted from the region of the cod-fishes, where 
 he had so long been fishing for souls, to another part 
 of Canada, a settlement in a valley beyond the first 
 range of hills in the neighbourhood of Trots Rivi¬ 
 eres. He expected to find a mixed flock of French 
 and Irish, and was, he said, quite prepared for the 
 contingency, as he could preach in English as well 
 

 
 
 I 
 
 r u 
 
 202 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 as in his native language. The French clergy here 
 generally find a knowledge of English quite neces¬ 
 sary on account of the great numbers of Irish emi¬ 
 grants, who do not bring with them a correspond¬ 
 ing number of priests ; and it is therefore taught at 
 the seminary of Quebec in preference to all other 
 languages. I did nevertheless meet with several 
 French priests who did not speak a word of Eng¬ 
 lish, and I need hardly say that very few of the 
 French peasants do. 
 
 My companion spoke with great interest of the 
 old songs and hymns that the French Canadians 
 preserved among them, and which they were in the 
 habit of singing at their social gatherings. I had 
 heard before of these popular poems, hymns, and 
 Romances, that had been brought hither from Nor¬ 
 mandy, Brittany, and La Vendee, and which in 
 France itself had been in a great measure forgotten. 
 Even the Canadian boatmen on the Upper Missis¬ 
 sippi, are acquainted, as a gentleman living among 
 them informed me, with many pretty chansons, 
 refrains, barcaroles, rondes, &c., which they give 
 with precisely the same airs and the same words 
 as their ancestors of 300 years ago. I afterwards 
 gave myself a good deal of trouble to procure some 
 of these boasted popular melodies in Montreal, and 
 bought all the printed collections I could find, but 
 
 r \ 
 
FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL. 203 
 
 they did not equal my expectations; I did not find 
 in them the treasure of popular poetry I looked for, 
 on the contrary, few of them bore the genuine 
 stamp of antiquity, or of a popular origin; they 
 were unfortunately of a very mixed character. 
 There were some collections, called by such names 
 as La Lyre Canadicnnc, that contained French 
 poems of the present day, the “ Parisienne “ Var- 
 sdvienne,” &c .; and some of those specially entitled 
 “ Chansons Canadien ” were only so called because 
 they referred to Canada, or were by some young 
 Canadian priest. . 
 
 It was, nevertheless, interesting to me to find 
 that the poetical blossoms springing up on the soil 
 of France were immediately transferred to the St 
 Lawrence, as it showed that the sympathies of the 
 people are still with the mother-country, as those of 
 the Germans in the Baltic provinces of Russia are 
 with Germany. 
 
 The class of Canadians most devoted to poetry 
 and song are the Voyageurs —hunters and fur- 
 traders, who pass the greater part of their lives in 
 wandering through the most distant regions of Ca¬ 
 nada ; and I found in my collections that the songs 
 distinguished as “ Chant de Voyageur Canadien ,” 
 had more originality and a more popular charac¬ 
 ter than the rest. They are easily recognised, and 
 
204 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 almost all begin with the idea of a return to their 
 father’s farm-yard, their sister’s flower-garden, or 
 their mother’s room. I have, for example, three now 
 lying before me, one of which begins : 
 
 “ Par derriere, chez mon pure, 
 
 Vole mon cceur, vole, vole, vole, 
 
 Par derriere, chez mon pure, 
 
 11 y a un pommier doux, &c.” 
 
 The second: 
 
 “ Par derriere, chez ma tante, 
 
 II y a un bois joli, 
 
 Le rossignol y chante, 
 
 Et le jour et la nuit, &c.” 
 
 And the third in the same fashion : 
 
 “ Derriere, chez nous y a un etang, 
 
 Derriere, chez nous y a un etang, 
 
 Trois beaux canards s’en vont baignant 
 Legerement—legerement, &c.’’ 
 
 This Derriere chez nous does not mean, I presume, 
 “ behind our house,” but rather “ down there in our 
 country; ” a Voyageur of the North-West might be 
 supposed to look back fondly to his far-off Cana¬ 
 dian home. 
 
 When we parted for the night I had almost a 
 quarrel with my good Canadian priest because I 
 could not understand his last remark. He said, 
 “ Lo nuict ä Men noaere —which phrase, though he 
 
 t 
 

 FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL. 205 
 
 repeated it several times, I could by no means 
 make out. At last he naturally got impatient, and 
 could not see why his pronunciation made the 
 darkness of his remark equal to that of the night; 
 to which, as the reader will perceive, he meant 
 to point my attention. 
 
 The morning that followed too, though certainly 
 not black or noaere, was at least dark grey. A 
 thick mist had settled on the river, so that we had 
 to come to anchor in the middle of it, near the 
 town of Trots Rivieres, which lies exactly midway be¬ 
 tween Quebec and Montreal, atthe entrance to Lake 
 St Peter’s, and at the mouth of the great St Maurice 
 river, and is in popidation and general importance 
 the third town of Lower Canada. I found here, 
 too, one German settler, and it appeared to me that 
 this one German settler was as standing a figure in 
 the small places in Canada as the “ one Cossack 
 killed ” in the Russian War bulletins. In Quebec 
 and Montreal the number of my countrymen was 
 rather more considerable; in the former there are 
 fifty, in Montreal twice as many, but they are 
 mostly only German Jews, engaged in the fur trade. 
 
 I visited some of them, and found, to my great 
 surprise, that they dealt not only in Canadian, but 
 also in Polish, Russian, and Siberian furs, which 
 they imported from the Leipsig fair. One would 
 
206 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 certainly suppose Canada had enough of this article, 
 and needed not to buy it from Russia and Ger¬ 
 many. In Russia I had been formerly struck by 
 the fact that they import and highly esteem the furs 
 of Canada, and that the Hudson’s Bay Company 
 find Russia, herself so rich in furs, its best custom¬ 
 er. Perhaps the explanation may be found in this, 
 that though the wearing of furs is in these coun¬ 
 tries a necessity, it is also a matter of luxury and 
 taste; and that two fur-producing countries may 
 value and wish to possess each other’s goods, just 
 as two others may desire to exchange their respect¬ 
 ive productions in literature and art. 
 
 The delay from the fog had at least this advan¬ 
 tage for us,—that it enabled us to see the St 
 Lawrence from Trots Rivieres upwards by day¬ 
 light ; and I was most interested by Lake St 
 Peter’s, here formed by the St Lawrence. It 
 spreads out into a broad delta, with a countless 
 number of arms, and between them an equal num¬ 
 ber of flat longish islands. In proportion as the 
 islands are flat, the branches of the river arc shal¬ 
 low ; and as this is the flattest region on the whole 
 St Lawrence, this is the place where the first ice 
 forms in the winter. 
 
 Pirst there comes a ring round each of the 
 islands; then the smaller channels close, and by 
 
FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL. 207 
 
 degrees the whole delta is frozen fast, and the 
 bridge of ice is usually complete before Christmas. 
 As soon as it is solid, it increases rapidly, as it 
 stops the ice drifting down the river, and the 
 freezing process then goes on backwards to Mont¬ 
 real, and it takes generally but a few days for the 
 whole St Lawrence, from Lake St Peter’s to Mont¬ 
 real, to become solid ice. Whoever wishes to 
 know more of the winter phenomena of the St 
 Lawrence may consult the works of the deservedly 
 celebrated Canadian geologist, Mr W. E. Logan. 
 The various reports concerning the building of 
 the great Montreal railway bridge (the Victoria 
 Bridge), contain some very interesting observations 
 and results, concerning the character of the St 
 Lawrence. 
 
 There is scarcely any other river in the world 
 that exhibits such a variety of conditions in the 
 water, and in the configurations of its bed. The 
 Mississippi, the Danube, the Wolga, and most of 
 the gigantic rivers of the world, are monotonous 
 compared with it. They form broader or narrower 
 channels, and the water flows in different parts 
 with a more or less rapid current; but in the St 
 Lawrence you scarcely find fifty miles that main¬ 
 tain the same character, and do not differ essen¬ 
 tially from other sections of the river. It 
 
208 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 spreads out sometimes into a smaller, sometimes 
 to a larger, lake, and these lakes are very numer¬ 
 ous, and all various in depth and other circum¬ 
 stances. Some are like great deep ravines; others 
 resemble broad inundations of a low country ; some¬ 
 times the river rushes along in a cataract, at others 
 creeps languidly through a wide marshy delta; is now 
 a calm river, and now a gigantic mountain-torrent 
 foaming for miles over a rocky bed. Several times 
 along its course it divides into many branches, 
 always under different circumstances, and its long 
 trumpet-shaped mouth, which is half river half sea, 
 is like that of no other river. 
 
 As soon as we had passed Lake St Peter’s, we 
 began to make up for lost time by racing with 
 another steamer. It is very exciting sport, and 
 though it may be dangerous, every passenger is so 
 eager about it, and so strongly interested for his 
 own boat, that one would think the most insignifi¬ 
 cant of them had a hundred dollars at stake in it. 
 In British Canada these races are, I believe, for¬ 
 bidden, and occasionally punished; and they cer¬ 
 tainly do not cause so much mischief as in the 
 United States. But, probably, they cannot be al¬ 
 together prevented, any more than duels. 
 
 It must not be imagined that in these contests 
 the vessels remain at a proper distance from each 
 
FROM QUEBEC TO MONTREAL. 209 
 
 other, and leave each other room for manoeuvring : 
 if this were done the race would be prolonged, and 
 many a good opportunity of distancing your rival 
 lost. They come at the very beginning of the race 
 quite close to each other, like two knights 
 who want to tilt each other out of the saddle. 
 Their two jib-booms make an acute angle, as 
 though watching for an opportunity to pierce each 
 other’s sides, and the chimneys, instead of the usual 
 black smoke, send forth a thick yellow vapour—for 
 the captains have given orders to strew on the fire 
 some pulverized colophonium, which is kept ready 
 for the express purpose. This substance when 
 sprinkled on the coals makes them burn more 
 fiercely, and occasions a greater production of steam 
 and greater motive power. 
 
 The two boats go tearing on for miles side by 
 side, as if they were fastened together, and some¬ 
 times one or the other falls a little back. The 
 channel is perhaps not broad, and then it may 
 be you can manage to push your rival aside, and 
 that he slackens a little for fear of running on 
 rocks, or on a sand-bank. You instantly pursue 
 your advantage, get up all your steam, on with 
 some more colophonium, and make a spring under 
 the very nose of your rival—who must now give 
 in somewhat, for fear of a collision. You then get 
 
 VOL. I. 14 
 

 
 210 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 I 
 
 before him, and cut him off, and when he has once 
 seen the stern of your vessel, he need no longer 
 think of overtaking you. The affair is over, and 
 away you go, soon far in advance, and triumphantly 
 enter as winner the harbour of Montreal. 
 
 * 
 
THE OTTAAVA. 
 
 211 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE OTTAWA. 
 
 The Ottawa is the largest tributary of the St 
 Lawrence, anti it is also, from its geographical 
 position, the most important. The east and west 
 course of the main stream is continued by it, Avhile 
 the upper St LaAvrence bears more to the south. 
 The Ottawa is the shortest Avater route to the great 
 upper lakes, and has, therefore, served from the 
 earliest times more than the upper St Lawrence as 
 the high-road to the West. Lake Superior, Lake 
 Huron, and the Georgian Bay were discovered by 
 means of the valley of the OttaAva, and most of the 
 Jesuit missionaries passed up this valley, and 
 readied thus the Avestem branches of those inland 
 seas. 
 
 The canal route of the OttaAva was, as early as 
 the first quarter of the seventeenth century, one of 
 
 14 * 
 
TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 212 
 
 the best known navigation lines of Canada, though 
 subsequently it was from various causes much 
 neglected; so much indeed that at the present 
 moment many parts of it, and especially its sources, 
 arc nearly unknown, but steamers and railroads 
 are now active in restoring the Ottawa country to 
 its natural importance. It will become once more 
 what it was at first—a great road to the West— 
 but in a much higher degree. 
 
 That it is at the same time a new country, and 
 the scene of old and primitive undertakings, made 
 it so attractive to me that I determined on an ex¬ 
 cursion to Bytown,* the capital of the country. 
 
 I went first to “La Chine,” the principal port of 
 Montreal for all vessels going up the Ottawa. The 
 rapids of St Louis interrupt the navigation, at least 
 for upward-bound vessels, and you make a circuit 
 by land to reach La Chine, where the water is 
 again deep and tranquil. A railroad and a canal 
 lead thither by the most direct route, but we pre¬ 
 ferred taking a carriage and driving along the old 
 road, in order to enjoy the sight of the water-falls. 
 
 The whole mighty river here divides itself be¬ 
 tween rocks and islands into a number of wildly 
 foaming torrents, but with high water the steamers 
 
 * Since named Ottawa, where the Prince of Wales, on his recent 
 visit, laid the first stone of the House of Parliament. 
 
213 
 
 THE OTTAWA. 
 
 coming down venture the passage, and a very in¬ 
 teresting one it is said to be. In our little chaise 
 however we got so close to the rapids that it was 
 nearly as good. The road was very lonely and ran 
 on the very edge of the water, and we often had, 
 before and behind and on either side of us, roar¬ 
 ing waves, black foam-covered rocks and wooded 
 islands, with here and there glimpses of distant 
 water, and at last the church tower and the 
 white cottages of the Indian village of Koknawaga, 
 or St Louis, which lies exactly opposite to La 
 Chine. That Indians should have remained so 
 long at this point, is probably to be ascribed to 
 the existence of the cataract. The Indian natives 
 were the first guides of European ships through 
 this dangerous labyrinth, and they are still the 
 best pilots to be found here. They are not only 
 acquainted with eveiy rock and shallow, and the 
 state of the river at various seasons of the year, 
 out they have peculiarly the quick eye and the 
 energetic hand required to turn the arrow-like 
 course of a ship from a danger which is perhaps 
 only indicated by a spot of rather darker colour in 
 the water. Many of the pilots on these waters 
 are to this day Indians of Koknawaga. 
 
 La Chine, though only a village, is one of the 
 oldest and most famous places in Canada. Its 
 
214 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 name is a memorial of the time when it was still 
 supposed that the St Lawrence was one of the 
 shortest ways to China, and that Montreal and 
 Quebec were destined to become the chief staple 
 places for Chinese goods, and the little harbour of 
 La Chine was to be the place where they were first 
 deposited. These hopes were not fulfilled, but the 
 extraordinary name of the village has remained as 
 a memento of the geographical error. During the 
 flourishing period of the old French fur trade, La 
 Chine was the rendezvous of the voyageurs and 
 Canadian hunters, and their little fleets of canoes, 
 in which they brought down their furs from the 
 north-west. Here was the end of their journey, 
 for their wares were here unshipped for Montreal. 
 Here the Indian chiefs were received and rewarded, 
 and hither came the “ Ononthios,” or French go¬ 
 vernors, to listen to their speeches, say something 
 pretty in return, and conclude treaties of peace or 
 commerce with them, and much the same thing is 
 going on at the present day. 
 
 A great number of the French raft-men on the 
 Ottawa come from La Chine, and you see loitering 
 about, along with the Indian pilots of Koknawaga, 
 voyageurs from the north-west, for whom La Chine 
 is a home or an exchange, and Franklin and other 
 explorers took from here their Canadian guides. 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 215 
 
 A great Ononthio has also now taken up his abode 
 at La Chine, namely, Sir George Simpson, the 
 Governor-General of the Hudson’s Bay countries, 
 so that one may say that the affairs of almost one- 
 half of North America arc conducted from this 
 village. 
 
 The Hudson’s Bay Company has indeed now 
 only a few establishments or forts on the upper 
 Ottawa, and the quantity of fur or other produce 
 of the chase now brought here is very inconsider¬ 
 able ; for the whole produce of the country round 
 Lake Superior is not as might be expected brought 
 down the St. Lawrence or the Ottawa, but is 
 mostly taken to Moose Factory and other ports on 
 Hudson’s Bay; and it has been so arranged because 
 the goods can in this way, though by a great cir¬ 
 cuit, be shipped at once on the Company’s own 
 vessels, which assemble at certain times of the year 
 in Hudson’s Bay. It is probably not worth their 
 while to send a ship to the St. Lawrence for the 
 small quantity of fur it now yields. 
 
 It has been arranged, I am told, that the Go¬ 
 vernor of the Company’s gigantic territory should 
 reside at a point so far from the central places of 
 their trade in those territories, because he is there 
 nearer to Europe, and midway betw'een England and 
 most of the Hudson’s Bay country; from there he 
 
216 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 can communicate quickly with Europe, and send 
 his own or the Company’s orders to the \ arious 
 forts and stations. The former Erench and Eng¬ 
 lish governors, who lived near Hudson s Bay, were 
 cut off from Europe for eight or nine months in 
 the year. 
 
 The renowned and highly respected Sir George 
 Simpson has been himself a promoter of most 
 of the modern Arctic voyages of discovery, and 
 as he has also made a voyage round the world, 
 and published an interesting account of it with 
 which I was well acquainted, I took the liberty of 
 waiting on him. His residence, Hudson’s Bay 
 House, as it is called, is a small and modest abode, 
 strikingly contrasting with the palace of another 
 Governor-General of an English land-owning com¬ 
 pany in the East, and I was interested in its details, 
 the reception-rooms, the rooms of business, the 
 courts for the fur magazines, and canoe-houses, 
 probably because (detractis detrahendis) they af¬ 
 forded me an idea of the arrangement of “ Cumber¬ 
 land House,” “York House,” and the other nu¬ 
 merous Houses, which the Hudon s Bay Company 
 have scattered over the whole of North-Western 
 America, and where their sub-governors’ chief 
 traders and agents reside. 
 
 In the canoe-liouses of La Chine I found a whole 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 217 
 
 fleet of quite new birch bark canoes, and was able 
 to study the structure of this remarkable vehicle. 
 A traveller of the north-west might well devote to 
 them a whole chapter, as one in Arabia might to 
 the camel, for without these birch bark canoes 
 those wide regions would have been neither dis¬ 
 covered nor turned to use. Birch bark is an ex¬ 
 tremely light material, and a canoe that will hold 
 twenty men only weighs a few hundred-weight, 
 and can be carried by three or four men, and is so 
 elastic, that it more often yields than breaks when 
 it receives violent blows among the rocks and 
 cataracts. It is thoroughly soaked in oil that it 
 may not imbibe water, and it is extremely easy to 
 repair. The holes arc sewed up with wire, you 
 may dam it like a stocking, and patch it like a 
 shoe, and stop up every little chink and opening in 
 the most easy and expeditious manner. Only with 
 such craft as this could it have been possible to 
 navigate the labyrinth of streams in the north-west 
 of America, where all the rivers are interrupted by 
 innumerable cataracts and rapids, and a vessel 
 meets with rough treatment at every step, and 
 where a boat has to be drawn out of the water and 
 carried several times in one day. 
 
 These canoes look something like long sausages, 
 as they have no keel, and the ribs are bent in a cir- 
 
218 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 cular form as affording a better resistance. Their 
 lading and ballast must therefore always be care¬ 
 fully distributed and balanced, or they will roll over 
 in the water like a round trunk of a tree. The 
 ribs and timber are of course as narrow and thin as 
 possible. 
 
 Sir George Simpson had on his table a small 
 silver model of a canoe, in which every part was 
 made of the precious metal, and this was certainly 
 an appropriate place for so pretty a symbol of the 
 whole floating traffic of the American north. 
 
 A steamer carried us from La Chine, first on the 
 broad bosom of the Lake of St Louis, which con¬ 
 sists still entirely of the greenish water of the St 
 Lawrence. The brown-coloured Ottawa rolls the 
 greater part of its waters through a long channel to 
 the north of the Montreal island, and this is indeed 
 recognised as its mouth by Canadian geographers. 
 The great and fertile island of Montreal may in¬ 
 deed be regarded as the product of the confluence 
 of these two streams. Its flat fields have certainly 
 been often inundated by them, and covered with 
 rich mud. They are as fruitful as a Delta country, 
 and as the island is in a geological point of view, so 
 is the city of Montreal in a political and economical 
 one also, the product of their union. 
 
 From the Lake of St Louis, the steamer slipped 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 219 
 
 through a narrow pass and a group of islands into 
 another lake. It is rather remarkable that this 
 mighty St Lawrence has not yet worn down the 
 rocky steps over which it flows, and hollowed out 
 its rocky passes into a regular channel, but consists, 
 like all the other rivers of the northern half of 
 North America, of an endless chain of lakes, cata¬ 
 racts, rapids, and river-straits or narrows. In the 
 Mississippi territory and the Alleghanics the charac¬ 
 ter of the rivers is quite changed. 
 
 When we got higher up the lake near the term¬ 
 ination of the island of Montreal we saw the two 
 streams, the brown or red-brown Ottawa and the 
 greenish St Lawrence, flowing by the side of each 
 other. At first sight one is inclined to prefer the 
 lighter coloured water to the dark fluid that almost 
 looks as if it came out of a tan-yard, but in Mont¬ 
 real it has been decided that the Ottawa water is 
 the better. The St Lawrence contains particles of 
 lime and various salts in solution, and is therefore 
 less available for domestic and culinary purposes; 
 but the Ottawa has nothing of this kind, and re¬ 
 ceives its colour probably from plants which never¬ 
 theless do not affect its taste. In a glass its water 
 is as clear as crystal, and it has therefore been de¬ 
 termined to feed the new water-works of Montreal 
 from the Ottawa instead of the St Lawrence. One 
 
220 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 becomes at last indeed reconciled even to the colour 
 of the latter; it sometimes looks like melted amber, 
 or a stream of pure coffee, and in the whirlpools and 
 cataracts, the dark brown masses of water make a 
 new and pleasing contrast with the snow-white 
 foam. 
 
 A great raft of wood was floating over the lake 
 down the Ottawa, which is the chief forest plank 
 and beam river in Canada, and supplies most of 
 the timber for the trade of Quebec. On account of 
 the manifold difficulties of the navigation, these 
 rafts cannot be constructed like ours on the Rhine 
 and Danube. They consist of a number of small 
 rafts called cribs, which on broad lakes or tranquil 
 parts of rivers move altogether; but where cata¬ 
 racts and rapids interrupt the navigation, they are 
 divided, according to circumstances, into halves, 
 sixths, or even their smallest constituent parts, 
 cribs, and a few bold canoe-men seat themselves 
 upon them and shoot with them down through the 
 open channels into the fall. Below it the various 
 members of the raft are collected again, and they 
 then glide all together smoothly down to the next 
 cataract, where they have to be taken to pieces 
 again. The pilots or raftsmen are a strong and 
 hardy class, and display a great amount of courage 
 and contempt of death. Most of them are French- 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 221 
 
 Canadians, as they seem to understand the business 
 best, and are the teachers of the Scotch and Irish, 
 who come into the country as novices. They are 
 nevertheless apt scholars, and occasionally surpass 
 their teachers in boldness and skill. I was assured 
 by a person well acquainted with these things, that 
 in critical cases, when the Canadian himself loses 
 courage, the appeal will be made successfully to a 
 Briton who has not been two years on the Ottawa. 
 
 There are now above a dozen larger or smaller 
 steamers on the Ottawa, but they navigate it only 
 in a fragmentary manner. Between every two ca¬ 
 taracts are stationed a few of these boats, which 
 carry you over the lake or smooth part of the river, 
 but you then go ten or twelve miles by land, till 
 you come again to smooth water and more steamers, 
 and the higher you go up the river the smaller they 
 become. Our present one was as large and as 
 luxuriously fitted up as the river steamers of Ame¬ 
 rica mostly are. The tables were covered at the 
 appointed hours with a superabundance of all kinds 
 of viands, and handsome and convenient little rooms 
 were provided for our repose at night. I could not 
 help thinking as we glided along in this floating 
 palace, of the Jesuit fathers and their canoe voyages, 
 and the numerous hardships and privations they 
 underwent, and it was precisely on the river Ottawa 
 
_ _- 
 
 
 222 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 that they made most of these adventurous journeys, 
 of which they have left many descriptions. I had 
 read them all, and at the sight of the shores and 
 the thick woods, a hundred reminiscences came 
 hovering before me, of the cataracts where Father 
 A had lost his Bible and all his books; of the island 
 where Father B, pursued by the Indians, had knelt 
 down to pray, and so received his death-stroke; of the 
 lakes along whose banks the Fathers C and D jour¬ 
 neyed alone with their God among these wild men, 
 to carry the tidings of the gospel to yet unknown 
 regions; of the points and headlands where they 
 had landed to cook their “ Sagamitd,” or maize por¬ 
 ridge, often the only food they tasted for long years, 
 and over which they uttered their pious thanks¬ 
 givings ; of the hills on which they erected a wooden 
 cross, or perhaps a little chapel, and collected the 
 Indians around it to worship. How would they 
 have rejoiced had they been able to see in prophetic 
 vision their favourite river as it appears now, the 
 towns arising out of its forests, the steamers foam¬ 
 ing along its waters, the bridges spanning them 
 from shore to shore. 
 
 The bridge beneath whose magnificent arches we 
 passed out of the Lake of St Lawrence to that of 
 the “Two Mountains,” is a work worthy of the 
 Homans. It is built of vast blocks of dark grey 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 223 
 
 limestone, and has an aspect of solid grandeur 
 worthy of its destination, namely, to form part 
 of the Grand Trunk Railway, which is to con¬ 
 nect the whole St Lawrence system from east to 
 west. I w r ondered not a little to find so superb a 
 work in so thinly inhabited a region; but here in 
 Canada, as I have said, they build for the future, 
 and on a grand scale; they give the child a wide 
 garment, and leave it to grow up to it. There will 
 soon be people enough to avail themselves of all 
 these things. 
 
 Among the things that the Fathers would have 
 rejoiced to see are also some neat, clean, and civil¬ 
 ized Indian villages; but, unfortunately, there are 
 not many of them, for civilization has acted on 
 them rather as a destructive than as a regenerative 
 force. The fragments of half a dozen tribes, which 
 formerly wandered over wide regions, are now often 
 collected in a single village, and gathered into one 
 church. We saw an example of this near the bridge 
 on the above-mentioned “ Lake of the Two Moun¬ 
 tains.” It is the mission of the same name, and is 
 inhabited by a few Algonquins, Iroquois, and others, 
 but each of these fragments has a separate quarter 
 of the village, and I was assured they never inter¬ 
 marry. Their language, at least those of the Al¬ 
 gonquins and Iroquois, are as different as French 
 
. 224 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and English, and though they have but one church, 
 they have several priests, who preach to them in 
 their own tongue. As we were approaching one of 
 these Indian villages, I noticed a strikingly tall man 
 who was preparing to leave the vessel. He was 
 very well dressed, like a rather opulent farmer, and 
 as I took him for a French Canadian, I addressed 
 him in French. But he shook his head, Not un¬ 
 derstand, un petit brin Francais “ Oh, you are an 
 Englishman, are you ? ” said I. “ I should not have 
 thought so from your brown complexion and coal- 
 black hair.” But the head was shaken again— 
 “Not understand, aus si un petit brin Anglais. 
 
 “Ah, indeed! so you are German? Welcome, 
 fellow-countryman ; we can understand each other 
 all the better.” This I said in German, shaking 
 my brown fellow-passenger’s hand, and expected a 
 genuine Black Forest or Harz Mountain salut¬ 
 ation in return. But to my astonishment the 
 stranger now looked completely puzzled, and re¬ 
 mained dumb. 
 
 “ Why, who in the world are you then, man ? ” 
 said I, returning to my French—for I had never 
 heard any other language in the country than these 
 three. 
 
 “ I Savats,” was the reply,—“ Irolca ”—that is 
 to say, I am a savage, or Iroquois. 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 225 
 
 I now looked more closely at him, and had no 
 difficulty in recognising the serious and angular 
 features of an Indian; and since he was much more 
 accessible and courteous than many a European, who 
 would have to look much higher up his genealogical 
 tree for his anthropophagic ancestors, I had a very 
 interesting conversation with him. We got on as 
 well as we could with a little “bit of English ” and a 
 little “bit of French,’’ and he told me that he came 
 from a Canadian village many hundred miles to the 
 west, and that he had journeyed hither to visit this 
 Algonquin and Iroquois village, at the Lake of the 
 Two Mountains, where he had some relations, and 
 that he had also business to transact. He pro¬ 
 posed to remain for the Sunday with his relatives, go 
 to church with them, and return on the Monday. 
 
 When I questioned him concerning his sympa¬ 
 thies towards the various European nationalities 
 he answered : “ Of all white what is—the Savats 
 like Scotch most. Scotch most like the savages. 
 Scotch language also like Savats, they say; but 
 I speak them—I not understand.” (The Scotch 
 language is most like that of the savages; but 
 though I speak to them, I do not understand 
 them.) 
 
 It was rather curious to me, to see before me 
 
 VOL. I. 15 
 
226 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 a man as neat and well-dressed as any one of 
 us, and whose agreeable, and even gentlemanly 
 manner led you to infer a certain amount of 
 inward culture, who yet did not hesitate to say 
 —“ I am a savage.” ,1 perceived that the word 
 could not carry with it the levis notoe macula 
 that it has with us ; and the notion of the Iroquois 
 that the Scotch were most like his countrymen, 
 was at that time quite new to me. By degrees, 
 however, I learned that that opinion is very widely 
 diffused here, and the French Canadians, in order 
 to distinguish the Highlanders from others, call 
 them “ les Ecossais sauvages .” The idea, too, that 
 the language of the Scotch and Welsh is most like 
 those of the Indians, is very prevalent. In the 
 early times of American history, the people from 
 Wales and Scotland used to say they recognised words 
 of their own among the languages of the Indians of 
 the South and West; and it was interesting to me 
 to meet this idea again on the Ottawa. Whether 
 it be in consequence of the real or supposed affinity 
 that the Scotch have associated more intimately 
 with the Indians than any other Britons, I know 
 not; but it is a fact that the half-breeds in America, 
 who are not the offspring of Frenchmen, are nearly 
 all of Scotch descent — much less frequently of 
 either English or Irish. 
 
 
THE OTTAWA. 
 
 227 
 
 The Highlanders have not, indeed, much to com¬ 
 plain of in being compared with the present Iro¬ 
 quois and Algonquins of Canada. To say nothing 
 of the old barbarous system of Clanship, and of the 
 Highland costume, which is exactly what would 
 please an Indian chief, and of other things that 
 might be mentioned, there is so much barbarism, 
 poverty, dirt, and disorder to be found in the 
 island and mountain villages of the Scotch 
 highlands, that it would be a vast improvement, 
 and a blessing for the country, if they could be 
 raised to the level of the Iroquois villages of 
 Canada, and exhibit the same amount of order, 
 cleanliness, and humanity. 
 
 There are sometimes rich heiresses to be found 
 among these savages, and to them the Britons do 
 not fail to pay their court, as the young gentlemen 
 in our German cities do to the daughters of wealthy 
 peasants. On the “ Lake of the Two Mountains ” 
 a handsome country-seat was pointed out to me, 
 whose mistress, a squaw, or Indian woman, had 
 brought her English husband a fortune of £20,000 
 sterling. 
 
 French seigneuries and French villages are still 
 to be seen, though rather thinly scattered, for about 
 70 miles up the Ottawa, but beyond this all the 
 settlements are new and British. The woods along 
 
 15 * 
 
228 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 the shores seemed endless, and now showed therm 
 selves in all the varied tints of their beautiful au¬ 
 tumn foliage. Sometimes they and the hills whose 
 sides they clothed, were interrupted by a valley and a 
 river which flowed into the Ottawa,—and we mostly 
 had a few passengers, or some chests and bales of 
 goods, to send up each of these tributary streams. 
 I inquired everywhere about the nature and as¬ 
 pect of the valleys and rivers towards the north, 
 and I was told that at the mouths of these rivers 
 there are often to be seen handsome European 
 settlements, whilst their sources are still unknown, 
 and are hidden somewhere in darkness and cold in 
 the forests and mountains of Labrador. 
 
 One of these rivers, especially, is called “ La 
 Riviere du Nord Its course is so little knoAvn 
 that it is drawn differently on every map; but at 
 its mouth there already lies a town called St An¬ 
 drew’s, which has no fewer than six different 
 churches, religions, and nations. 
 
 “ Are there any Germans ? ” I asked of an in¬ 
 habitant of this town, whom we had on board. 
 
 “ Oh, yes, some,” was the reply ; “ my wife is a 
 German. The Germans are industrious people, 
 and do very well. The richest man in our place is 
 a German. We English call him Allbrelc, but his 
 

 THE OTTAWA. 229 
 
 real name is Aollenbreekten (Albrecht ?). I wonder 
 more Germans do not come. We have some French 
 Canadians too in the town.” 
 
 “ How do you like them ?” said I, for I was 
 curious to know whether these people kept the 
 same good name on the Ottawa that they have else¬ 
 where. 
 
 “ Oh, those Canadians, sir,” replied the English¬ 
 man, “they are a fine, honest, mannerly set of 
 people. It is true there are some among them 
 like other people, but, upon the whole, the Cana¬ 
 dians are most honest and genteel. There are 
 neither liars, thieves, drunkards, nor blackguards 
 among them. When I came here first, no Cana¬ 
 dian would ever care to shut his door, and if you 
 bought a cow or a piece of land from them they 
 would never think about an oath or a paper. Since 
 the revolution of 1837 the custom of shutting 
 doors is become more general, but still their houses 
 are always open for the poor and the stranger. If 
 you ever, sir, have lost your way or feel tired, go to 
 a Canadian house if you can find one, and you will 
 see how they will receive you. They will make 
 you as comfortable as they possibly can. That’s 
 what the Canadians are, sir.” 
 
230 
 
 TRAVELS IX CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 « 
 
 A PORTAGE. 
 
 The first division of our steam-boat journey 
 carried us as far as a French place called Carillon, 
 where we found a whole crowd of Canadian stage 
 coaches with four horses, waiting to convey us 
 further, but both the vehicles and the cattle had a 
 very ancient and broken-down appearance. 
 
 As it rained and a very cold wind was blowing, 
 the male part of the company were soon at the 
 coach doors, and about to take the seats by storm, 
 but at the door of each conveyance stood the coach¬ 
 man as sentinel, and placed himself and his whip 
 unceremoniously across the entrance, and stopped 
 the advancing tide, with “ Halt, gentlemen! the 
 ladies have not yet chosen their places !” and there¬ 
 upon the masculine crowd drew back respectfully, 
 and stood quietly in the rain till the ladies had 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 231 
 
 slowly advanced, and placed themselves to their 
 liking, and then the gentlemen slipped in and took 
 what was left for them. I had myself, according to 
 my custom, taken an outside place by the coachman 
 without regard to the rain, and since it soon cleared 
 up and the sun shone again, I could enjoy the 
 prospect of the country as well as the conversation 
 of my fellow-passengers. There were two of them, 
 and the usual battery of questions soon began to 
 play upon me. “ Are you a stranger ? Where do 
 you come from ? How long have you been in the 
 country ? How do you like the country ? Where 
 are you going to settle ?” «fee. And when I had an¬ 
 swered all these inquiries punctually, one of my 
 interrogators began again from the point of my 
 country. 
 
 “ You say you are a German ? ” 
 
 “Yes.” ‘ 
 
 “ Tell me, have you got an Established Church 
 in Germany ? ” 
 
 “ No.” * 
 
 “ Have you both Protestants and Catholics ? ” 
 
 “ Both.” 
 
 “ Have you most Protestants or Catholics ? ” 
 
 “ I think the two parties must be pretty equally 
 balanced.” 
 
 “ How many are there on each side ? ” 
 
232 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 “ I think perhaps sixteen or seventeen millions.” 
 
 “ Seventeen millions ! By Jesus, there would be 
 a famous battle if they were going to fight one 
 another.” 
 
 “ Yes,” said the other, “ and what a profitable job 
 it would be to furnish the shillelahs.” 
 
 So without my asking any questions, I saw that 
 I had by me a genuine son of Erin, and a regular 
 Yankee. Only an Irish fancy would so instantly 
 have boded forth a fight as the consequence of 
 having seventeen millions of Protestants and 
 Catholics “ on each side; ” and only Yankee asso¬ 
 ciations have suggested immediately how to make 
 a profit out of it. 
 
 The roads along which we drove were much 
 more primitive than our carriages, and it required 
 all the skill of a Canadian coachman,“ and all his 
 practice in bad roads, to carry us pretty quickly, 
 and in a good state of preservation, through all the 
 holes and quagmires, and over all the blocks of 
 stone and stumps of trees, that lay in our way. 
 
 The Canadian horse seems, in the course of 
 centuries, to have acquired excellent qualities for 
 this purpose. It is a most patient, persevering, in¬ 
 defatigable animal, and when I saw these courage¬ 
 ous, willing, and much-harassed creatures, toiling 
 over rocks and through morasses, I was often re- 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 233 
 
 minded of the almost indestructible horses of Po¬ 
 land and Russia. 
 
 “ You are right,” said the coachman; “ our 
 Canadian horses are the best for hardship and 
 hunger, and very easy to feed. They are next to 
 the mule for this.” They resemble a good deal 
 their Canadian peasant masters, I think, as indeed 
 domesticated animals generally reflect many of the 
 qualities of those who have trained them. 
 
 “ The American horse is different,” continued 
 our driver; “ it can’t bear half as much, and wants 
 better food and more care, but it is very light on 
 the feet, and runs without a heavy load a great dis¬ 
 tance ; ” and thereupon he went into many minute 
 details, and gave me more information than I am 
 able to repeat; but, as I listened to him, it some¬ 
 times seemed to me as if he were describing the 
 biped rather than the quadruped inhabitants of 
 these regions. 
 
 The Canadian horses are said to be chiefly of the 
 Norman race. They are spread through the whole 
 St Lawrence territory, and still further to the West; 
 they are much sought for their excellent qualities, 
 and are sent to the Southern States, even as far as 
 Virginia, and I afterwards saw many of them in 
 Pennsylvania. The Canadian is one of the most 
 strongly characterised and most widely diffused 
 
234 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 races of horses in America, and is only excelled 
 by the Spanish horse which has reached the North 
 by the way of Mexico. 
 
 These Spanish or Mexican horses may be said 
 to have conquered the whole wide prairie lands 
 towards the North, where they have multiplied so 
 surprisingly, and have taken possession of the great 
 pastures, north-west of Lake Superior, before one 
 of their white masters could get so far. Such a 
 wide distribution and return to a wild state has 
 not taken place with the French Canadian horses, 
 and no wild Indian tribe has been mounted by 
 means of them, and the cause of the difference is, 
 doubtless, the character of the country and the 
 system of rivers, amongst which the French settled, 
 and which made the ship and the canoe more 
 necessary than the horse. All the French travels 
 and excursions in Canada were foot journeys, whilst 
 all the excursions and expeditions into the interior 
 were equestrian. 
 
 The country through which we were travelling 
 was almost as primeval in its aspect as the road. 
 The ground on each side was covered by masses of 
 rock and boulderstones, and fragments of limestone, 
 gneiss, granite, and slate were as thick as tomb¬ 
 stones in a church-yard; indeed they made the 
 whole country look like a church-yard, and the 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 235 
 
 same appearance was presented in various regions 
 of the Ottawa, namely, at the portages, where the 
 river has had to break through a rocky dam. 
 Far in the interior of Canada and Labrador, too, 
 these church-yard landscapes arc said to be quite 
 common. 
 
 I could hardly understand how it was worth any 
 one’s trouble to settle and cultivate the soil here, 
 and yet all these stone-bearing fields were carefully 
 hedged in with trunks of trees. “ Why, sir, from 
 amongst all these lumps of rock comes some of our 
 finest and fattest beef,” said my neighbours. “ Look 
 at that ox there, look at his ribs, look at his flanks, 
 look at his broad chine; he don’t look starved, does 
 he? These stones that annoy you are particularly 
 good for our meadows. In the spring the first 
 tender young grass shoots up about their edges, 
 and in the summer these stones retain the moisture, 
 and nourish fresh grass, when the meadows with¬ 
 out stones are all withered up, and now in the late 
 autumn they keep it longer than it stays anywhere 
 else. Just compare that stoneless spot there where 
 all the plants have been long dead, with these block 
 meadows, where the beasts still get plenty to eat 
 and I was obliged to confess that in regions where 
 the artificial irrigation of meadows is unknown, 
 there may be some advantage in blocks. Some 
 
236 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 of the fields where it has been desired to raise crops 
 of com, have been cleared with spade and pick-axe, 
 and gunpowder, but it must be a colossal under¬ 
 taking, and I can easily imagine that our German 
 emigrants, when they hear of the clean, rich, and 
 stoneless lands of Iowa and Minnesota, are much 
 inclined to pass by the mouth of the Ottawa. 
 
 The Ottawa has nevertheless a right to complain 
 that the German immigrants have bestowed so little 
 attention on this country. There is seldom more 
 than one, or perhaps two Germans in a village; 
 and even in the capital, Bytown, now called Ottawa, 
 there are only some half dozen, who appear to have 
 been flung there by chance. The great emigrant 
 march goes straight to “the West,” where alone 
 success and fortune seem to beckon. 
 
 The Ottawa country is hardly known even by 
 name to the Germans, and yet it seems to open a 
 wide field for their industry, and offers many ad¬ 
 vantages besides these rock meadows, which, when 
 the stones are once removed, yield very good crops. 
 
 Tine level fertile islands, with extremely rich soil, 
 are common in the valley of the Ottawa. They are 
 often large, and resemble in their main features the 
 island of Montreal, and the Isle of Orleans at Que¬ 
 bec, which are renowned for their productiveness. 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 237 
 
 The demand for labour is as great here as anywhere 
 in America. “ Wanted 500 labourers to work on a 
 canal in the Upper Ottawa; wages, 1-j dollar a day, 
 and lodging.” “ Wanted, 300 labourers to work on a 
 Bridge,” &c. on similar conditions. Announcements 
 of this kind met the eye everywhere, and in Bytown, 
 the capital of Ottawa, you could not look into a 
 tailor’s, shoemaker’s, or any other shop without 
 seeing a bill in the window notifying “ the want of 
 five or six workmen.” Among the raftsmen, pilots, 
 foresters, and wood-cutters of the Ottawa, there are 
 no Gcnnans to be found; and yet our country 
 could furnish so many individuals well practised in 
 these occupations. Can our men not maintain the 
 competition with 'these strong and hardy races, or 
 have our Black Forest raftsmen and wood-cutters 
 still enough to do at home ? It cannot be the cli¬ 
 mate that keeps Germans from Ottawa. It is 
 rough and cold indeed,'but, as every one admits, 
 incomparably more healthy than the valleys of the 
 Mississippi and the Missouri. 
 
 “ 1 ’ll tell you what it is that frightens our coun¬ 
 trymen away from the Ottawa, and from all Canada,” 
 said a German colonist of the Ottawa to me. “ It is 
 Queen Victoria of England! I have often puzzled 
 myself, as you are doing, to make out why there 
 

 23S TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 should be, by the latest census, only 15,000 Ger¬ 
 mans settled in Canada, when as many as that pass 
 through the country every year.” 
 
 “ I have talked with a good many of them when 
 I went down the St Lawrence, and recommended 
 them to stay with us, but they almost all gave me 
 the same answer,‘ No, we did not come to America 
 to be again the subjects of a crown. We have had 
 enough of princes in our own country, and we left 
 Europe to become free republican citizens.’ It is 
 their rooted prejudice against monarchy that makes 
 the Germans pass, and indeed fly through this 
 country. They do not know that the monarchy 
 is with us merely a name, that we are as free and 
 as self-governing as the Americans themselves, and 
 have fewer taxes. Do, when you go home, tell our 
 countrymen that they cannot live more freely any¬ 
 where in the whole world than they can here on 
 the Ottawa. But they will soon find it out them¬ 
 selves, and then the stream of emigration will flow 
 towards our country, but whoever comes first will 
 be first served.” 
 
 The conviction that the emigrants would soon 
 arrive in crowds, and that the young Ottawa coun¬ 
 try is destined before long to play a great part, was 
 one I found very generally diffused here. Pro¬ 
 bably these anticipations are chiefly founded on the 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 239 
 
 present- great extension of railways. The roads 
 have been hitherto as rugged and as expensive as 
 the one above described, and now we saw a loco¬ 
 motive rushing through the forest, and whistling 
 among the labyrinth of rocks and boulders. It was 
 making a trial trip on a piece of the Ottawa line that 
 had been just finished, and which was to be opened 
 in a few days, so the dragging of canoes in the old 
 Jesuits’ fashion, and the stage coach torture, may be 
 considered to be all over at this portage. 
 
 “ But can such a costly undertaking as a railroad 
 possibly pay in a still unpeopled country?” The 
 question showed that I came from Germany, where 
 a new road is seldom opened till a number of pass¬ 
 engers arc standing waiting for it, and where no¬ 
 body makes a railroad on speculation. 
 
 “ We hope and expect that the railroad will 
 bring us the passengers and the population it is 
 intended to carry,” was the reply. “They will 
 come, though we do not yet know where from nor 
 how. They will shoot up like weeds out of the 
 ground when the railroad has touched and fer¬ 
 tilized it. Railroads with us arc magic wands, horns 
 of plenty, from which we scatter the seeds of a 
 population, and they spring up and fill the place 
 we have made for them as water docs when you dig 
 a canal in a moist country.” 
 
240 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 As the faith in the magic power of railways is 
 one very generally held here, people are very will¬ 
 ing to assist in their construction. An opulent 
 landowner, who was one of my travelling com¬ 
 panions, informed me that many farmers along the 
 whole line had hastened to offer the Company all 
 the land they required without any compensation. 
 His own estate, he said, was cut into two halves by 
 this line, but the only remuneration he had asked 
 was that the Company would make him a tunnel 
 under the line to connect them. This would afford 
 him a most ample compensation, besides the ad¬ 
 vantage of the line itself, for the people here are as 
 eager to get a line running over their land as in a 
 desert they might be to get a canal. 
 
 It may easily be supposed that the prevalence of 
 such views diminishes very much the expenses of 
 railroads; and also that the Railway Companies, 
 being generally encouraged and supported in this 
 way, make short work with the obstinate indi¬ 
 viduals they occasionally meet with. We noticed 
 an example of this as we went along. The line at 
 one point passed right across a place where a 
 farmer had begun to build himself a large bam, 
 and as he had demanded a very large condensa¬ 
 tion, the impatient Railway Company, without fur¬ 
 ther ceremony, sent a number of men armed with 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 241 
 
 saws and axes, to pull down the buildings, and 
 throw the great beams and other building mate¬ 
 rials on each side on the farmer’s land, leaving him 
 to go to law if he thought proper. But if the 
 powerful companies are sometimes thus despotic in 
 their proceedings, private individuals are also vio¬ 
 lent, revengeful, and inconceivably reckless. A 
 case of this kind appeared lately in the papers, of a 
 farmer, who, not having received what he thought 
 adequate compensation, did everything in his power 
 to obstruct the line where it passed over his land, 
 and when he could not succeed, at last hit on a truly 
 infernal project. He built one night a kind of hut 
 or scaffolding across the rails, placed a barrel of 
 gunpowder inside it, and planted himself in readi¬ 
 ness with a match. In the morning when the train 
 came up the engine-driver fortunately discovered 
 the contrivance in time, and stopped to parley. The 
 man declared the land was his, and he had a right 
 to order off any one he pleased, and that if the 
 train dared to approach, he would blow it up and 
 himself with the rest. There was a long delay and a 
 great many contrivances to get hold of the mad¬ 
 man, and at last his antagonists succeeded in en¬ 
 gaging him in negotiation, while some of the men 
 crept round unperceived, got possession of the 
 powder, and disarmed him. 
 
 VOL. I. 16 
 
242 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Carillon, which lies at the beginning of our 
 twelve-miles-broad isthmus, is the last french 
 village. All beyond this are new British settle¬ 
 ments, filled with Irish, Scotch, &c., and they do 
 not wear by any means so pleasing an aspect as 
 the old French ones. The first of these is Grenville, 
 the opposite pole of the Portage; but it consists 
 merely of wooden log-houses, among the rocks and 
 tree stumps. The place seems, however, to be well 
 provided with churches ; indeed, to have nearly as 
 many as houses. There was a little Presbyterian 
 Church of stone, with two windows; an English 
 High Church with three; a Methodist Chapel, 
 built of wood, and not larger than a log hut; and 
 a Catholic Church, with a cross made of two laths 
 nailed together, and probably quite after the model 
 of the first chapels that the Jesuits erected in the 
 country. 
 
 From Grenville, where by degrees all the four- 
 horse coaches came in, w r e glided like swans down 
 a beautiful smooth part of the Ottawa river, which 
 here again assumes a majestic appearance, consist¬ 
 ing of a long broad expanse of w r ater, like a rapidly 
 flowing lake, bordered on either side with wooded 
 hüls. 
 
 Several of these straight, regularly formed por¬ 
 tions occur as exceptions to the usually winding 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 243 
 
 and irregular course of the Ottawa, but the most 
 remarkable is that which is found about the middle 
 of its course, above Bytown, and which bears a 
 special name among the Canadians, though I have 
 unluckily forgotten it. At this part of the river 
 the current seems to have cut through the rocks, 
 like a cannon-ball, and formed a broad channel of 
 from 30 to 40 miles in length, between high per¬ 
 pendicular walls of stone. You can look through 
 it with a glass, from one end to the other; the 
 depth of water is everywhere equal, and it flows 
 quite smoothly. Canal digging would be most 
 superfluous if Nature had formed rivers in general 
 like this part of the Ottawa. 
 
 A section of somewhat similar character had oc¬ 
 curred at Grenville, and our steamer glided pleasantly 
 over its brown, glassy surface. The mountains were 
 here higher and grander than further down the 
 river, and not entirely uninhabited. As it grew 
 dark we could see lights twinkling here and there 
 out of the woods, occasionally showing faint out¬ 
 lines of windows and houses, and as Carillon was 
 the last village, we here reached the last “ Seigneu- 
 rie de la petite nation” as it was called. Here 
 dwells, in complete retirement, M. Papineau, whose 
 name was so conspicuous in the Revolution of 1837, 
 
 and who has been called the Mirabeau of Canada; 
 
 16 * 
 
244 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 but I only saw his habitation from afar, as circum¬ 
 stances unfortunately did not permit of my paying 
 him a visit. 
 
 Saw-mills, and board and plank cutting estab¬ 
 lishments, little harbours and bays filled with rafts 
 of the rudest construction, made of colossal trunks 
 of trees, and ballasted with lumps of rock, piers or 
 bridges for landing,—these were the chief features 
 of this portion of the river, as of the former. These 
 piers often issue straight from the forest into the 
 river, without any road or even any habitation 
 being discoverable near them, and yet there must 
 be such in the interior, for small one-horse carts 
 were tied under the trees, in readiness to receive 
 the goods,—sacks of salt, chests, and bales of 
 cottons, axes, spades, pick-axes, &c., which we had 
 brought, and which we piled up as quickly as pos¬ 
 sible on the piers. Where all that was to go to, and 
 who was to use it, remained a mystery hidden in the 
 forest; but it was evident that here, where I often 
 thought myself on the very outermost limits of civil¬ 
 ization, there were, as our German proverb says, 
 “ More people living behind the hills.” 
 
 We brought, to my surprise, very few living 
 creatures up the river with us, and a single sheep, 
 with long fleece, constituted, I believe, the whole 
 of our live cargo; and, consequently, the poor 
 
 r\ 
 
 
A PORTAGE. 
 
 245 
 
 animal had an immense amount of criticism and 
 complimenting to undergo. He was tied Tip at the 
 fore-part of the vessel, and formed, during the 
 whole Ottawa journey, a central point of interest 
 for the passengers, who gathered round him smoking 
 and gossiping, and since they had nothing else to 
 do, examining his wool, and his teeth, and his flesh 
 and fat, and making him the subject of everlasting 
 discussions. Every ten minutes came up a few more 
 gentlemen who had just finished their cigars, and 
 did not know what to be at: and then down they 
 sat by the poor bleating sheep, and began pulling 
 and feeling, and poking him about, and instituting, 
 like their predecessors, curious inquiries into the 
 character of his wool, fat, &c. If ever a sheep was 
 thoroughly investigated, it was that one, and I was 
 quite glad when I at last heard his bleating from 
 one of the pier-heads, and knew that he had reached 
 the place of his destination, and that for the time 
 his troubles were over. 
 
 So were not ours, as yet, for about midnight we 
 landed on a high shore, where the navigation of the 
 river terminates, and had then half an hour s race 
 over marsh and corderoy roads, before we found 
 ourselves safely lodged in the capital, Bytown, in 
 one of the large crowded hotels, of which, in the 
 youngest towns of Canada, there is never any lack. 
 
246 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 BYTOIVN OR OTTAWA. 
 
 It is little more than 25 years since the first tree 
 was felled on the spot where now stands Bytown, 
 and it is a very few years since there existed here 
 anything that could be called a town, and yet it 
 already covers as much ground as Boston, and 
 though its inhabitants did not, when I visited it, 
 exceed 10,000, it was as grand in its pretensions as 
 Quebec or Montreal. As yet it was only called a 
 tmvn, but as soon as its inhabitants should exceed 
 the number above mentioned, it was to be declared 
 a city, and, as a corporation, would attain to a 
 greater amount of independence, and it was pro¬ 
 posed that its name should then be altered. Its 
 present one is taken from that of a Colonel By, and 
 signifies merely By’s Town; but it awakens an asso¬ 
 ciation of ideas, by which the vanity of the citizens 
 
BYTOWN OR OTTAWA. 
 
 247 
 
 is not flattered, for whoever is unacquainted with 
 the historical derivation of the name considers it 
 equivalent to “ Out-of-the-way Place,” and this the 
 Bytowners do not at all approve of. Half a dozen 
 other names have been proposed, and amongst them 
 that of Ottawa City, which has been adopted as 
 well sounding and significant of its situation and 
 dignity as the metropolis of the young Ottawa 
 country. Other Canadian settlements have changed 
 their names w T hen they rose to the civic rank, as, 
 for instance, Toronto, which was before called York. 
 
 The first occasion of building a town here was 
 this. Both shores of the St Lawrence are Canadian, 
 or British, as far up as a little way above the mouth 
 of the Ottawa, but from that point the southern 
 one begins to be American; and since this part of 
 the river is also difficult to navigate on account of 
 the number of cataracts, the British Government 
 was desirous of finding a more inland water-com¬ 
 munication between East and West Canada, by 
 which the transport of troops, or other operations, 
 could be undertaken without disturbance or ob¬ 
 servation from the Americans. They therefore 
 passed up the Ottawa as far as its confluence with 
 the Rideau, a small river which, by means of a 
 series of lakes, has a pretty direct communication 
 with the important town and fortress of Kingston 
 
248 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 on Lake Ontario; and it was determined to perfect 
 the communication by canalling, and so obtain a 
 much safer and more convenient route for soldiers 
 and munitions of war than that of the St Lawrence. 
 Colonel By,‘of the Engineers, was commissioned to 
 undertake the work, and this was the origin of the 
 Rideau Canal, and thence also arose in the midst 
 of the forest, at the mouth of the Rideau, where the 
 chief supplies were received in the Ottawa, a little 
 settlement of labourers, boatmen, engineers, &c.; 
 and since in Canada you cannot drop a spark but 
 that forthwith arises a forest conflagration, so from 
 this little collection of huts sprang up the present 
 city with its numerous houses, shops, magazines, 
 churches, schools, colleges, and other buildings, 
 varying in size and style, that now cover so wide 
 an extent of ground. The man who gave his name 
 to the city is still living in the “Old Country;” 
 nay, the woodman who cut down the first tree, and 
 the stone-mason who hewed out the first block of 
 stone for its foundations, are still extant, and their 
 fortunes have run parallel with those of the city. 
 They are rich land-owners, “ Honourables, and 
 Senators;” but the town still bears traces of its 
 recent forest-birth, and presents a singular aspect. 
 
 There has been as yet no time to pave the 
 streets, and in bad weather they are in a desperate 
 
BYTOWN OR OTTAWA. 
 
 249 
 
 state; only near the houses, as in most of the 
 youngest towns of Canada, there run what are 
 called “plank-roads,” that is, footpaths made of 
 boards. As for gardens, fruit-trees, or flowers, no 
 one has had time so much as to think of them, and 
 the old rough boulders and masses of rock are 
 lying abont still among the groups of houses, and 
 firs and other forest trees are springing up again 
 out of the stumps. Here and there amongst 
 elegant colleges and churches are to be seen 
 fragments of the primeval forest, lofty pines and 
 firs, and thick underwood that occasionally may 
 give shelter to a bear. Many spots still covered 
 with these moss-grown rocks, roots, and stumps, 
 are nevertheless enclosed, and serve sometimes for 
 keeping cattle. By and by they will be changed 
 into gardens, but as yet the unbroken mass of the 
 primeval forest fences in the town on all sides, up to 
 its very streets, and if you get a view of it from a 
 high point you see for miles and miles nothing but 
 a sea of woods, in which the town lies like the nest 
 of a heathcock. 
 
 The grand pretensions of By town tend to no¬ 
 thing less than to be made the seat of Govern¬ 
 ment and Parliament, and the residence of the 
 Governor-General- of all Canada, an honour for 
 which no less than four cities have been contending. 
 
250 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Quebec first put in its claim, on account of its 
 position nearest the mouth of the St Lawrence, and 
 its being the political centre of this great empire. 
 According to the letter of the law hitherto, Quebec 
 on the east, and Toronto on the west, were to share 
 the honour between them, and each city receive the 
 preference every four years. But this perpetual 
 change is found, as may be supposed, very incon¬ 
 venient, and the Quebec people think that as the 
 Government is now in their city, it ought to remain 
 there. 
 
 Montreal, the largest and most populous town in 
 the country, the centre of its commerce, and the 
 most like a metropolis in appearance, was for a long 
 time the seat of Government, but in a popular in¬ 
 surrection the Government buildings and Parlia¬ 
 ment houses were burnt, and the authorities left 
 the place. Montreal hopes nevertheless to be re¬ 
 stored to its former dignity. 
 
 Toronto, the capital of the whole British West, 
 which looks on Lower Canada as a very antiquated, 
 unprogressive, and half Frenchified country, desires 
 to remove the Parliament and the seat of Govern¬ 
 ment quite out of the influence of the French at¬ 
 mosphere of Quebec, and to have it established in 
 the centre of the hopeful rapidly advancing western 
 country; and Toronto has so little doubt of its sue- 
 
BYTOWN OR OTTAWA. 
 
 251 
 
 cess, that the sites for the Government buildings are 
 already pointed out. 
 
 At last comes Bytown, a city of scarcely more 
 than twenty years of age, throwing its sword into 
 the scale, and maintaining its claim to the character 
 of a metropolis. At first I was rather astounded at 
 this pretension, but on further consideration it did 
 not appear to me altogether unfounded. In the 
 first place, as the Bytowners have calculated, their 
 city has geographically the most central position in 
 all Canada, and is, on the average, nearer to the 
 most important places in the country than Quebec, 
 Toronto, or even Montreal, and so many telegraph 
 lines, canals, and railroads are making, or made, 
 that Bytown is already intimately interwoven with 
 the whple network by which the traffic of Canada 
 is carried on. The persons forming and connected 
 with the Government who would have to reside 
 here, and who are accustomed to the enjoyments 
 and luxuries of civilization, would find indeed no 
 theatres, concert-rooms, &c., but what is there that 
 cannot be quickly procured in America; and, on the 
 other hand,,they would not find here violent party 
 discord among the inhabitants, and an unruly 
 mob, such as that which burnt the Parliament 
 Houses in Montreal. In the United States it is an 
 old and judicious custom to place the centres of 
 
252 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Government out of the more populous towns, in 
 comparatively by-places, where it can act w r ith less 
 fear of disturbance and better provide for the wel¬ 
 fare of the country. The relation of Bytown to 
 Montreal is in this point of view the same as that 
 of Albany to New York. 
 
 Finally, Bytown has the advantage, at least over 
 Montreal and Toronto, of being more secure from 
 attack by an external enemy. Each is nearer to 
 the frontier than Bytown, and cannot be made so 
 secure in a military point of view; they are more 
 exposed to coups de main. Bytown lies more in 
 the interior—has an excellent natural site for an 
 Acropolis and citadel, and its enabling military 
 preparations to be carried on without approaching 
 the frontier, was, as I said, the very occasion of 
 its origin. The rivalry between the three large 
 cities of Canada is also in favour of the claims of 
 the future Ottawa city, and, it is said, it really has 
 the best chance, so that the matter is very likely to 
 end like the Presidential Elections in the United 
 States, where the mutual jealousies of the powerful 
 parties have the effect of keeping a Webster, Scott, 
 or Clay out of the chair, and raising to it a Filmore 
 and other inferior men. 
 
THE FALLS OF THE OTTAWA. 
 
 253 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE FALLS OF THE OTTAWA. 
 
 The most remarkable feature of Nature in the 
 neighbourhood of Ottawa is the renowned cataract, 
 called by the Jesuits, its discoverers, “La Chaudiere” 
 or “ Kettle Fall,” and it is this which has fixed the 
 town precisely on the spot which it occupies, and 
 made some of its arrangements possible and others 
 necessary. 
 
 There occurs here one of the most considerable 
 joints or knots of the Ottawa river, a sudden deep 
 depression, hollow, or cauldron, into which fall from 
 lofty, rocky banks, three separate rivers ; first, the 
 Ottawa, in its far-stretched fall, the Chaudiere; 
 secondly, the Rideau, or Curtain, so named from its 
 falling in a veil-like sheet or curtain from a rocky 
 ledge; and thirdly, from the north, the Gatineau, 
 which also has its cataracts and Salto-mortale. 
 
 The whole mass of the water of the Ottawa 
 
254 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 throws itself over a rocky precipice along a line of 
 half a mile in length, and the scenery is in many 
 respects worthy a comparison with Niagara,—the 
 height of the fall is indeed much less, but the 
 volume of water is, at least at times, fully equal. 
 
 It has been calculated that at Niagara 500,000 
 tons shoot down the fall every minute, and this 
 quantity remains pretty much the same all the year 
 through, as the lakes by which it is fed undergo little 
 change; but the Ottawa is very variable, having high 
 water in the spring, and low in autumn; the aver¬ 
 age quantity however is, according to calculation, 
 equal to that of Niagara—namely, 500,000 tons a 
 minute. 
 
 The cataract lies immediately above, almost in 
 the town, and a fine suspension bridge crosses the 
 river from shore to shore, in full sight of the foam¬ 
 ing fall, and affords a superb view of it. The rocky 
 cliff forms here a many-curved line, with numerous 
 projections and indentations, and a number of flat 
 table-rocks that break the line. The water was so 
 low when I reached it, that it could not be called 
 one fall; there were a hundred streams falling in 
 separate niches, and this circumstance gives an 
 original character to the Chaudiere. Many of its 
 divisions form separate scenes, like a drama in five 
 acts, and the fate of these separate streams is after- 
 
THE FALLS OF THE OTTAWA. 
 
 255 
 
 wards very various. Some of them are turned off 
 artificially, and used to drive saw-mills and other 
 works ; one falls into a quite separate rocky bottom, 
 where it whirls round for a while and then disappears 
 in the earth, and it has not yet been discovered where 
 it goes to, or where it returns to the light of day. 
 
 As in the Horse-shoe Fall at Niagara, there is here 
 a place where the falling mass has worn away the 
 rock more than elsewhere, where the cliff retires 
 farthest back, and the greater part of the river 
 throws itself over a single point; but this great 
 scene is, alas, also the most inaccessible, as it often 
 happens that the true kernel of a matter is hard 
 to get at. This is the spot that really looks like a 
 cauldron, and from which the whole receives its 
 name. The clear brown floods come rushing in 
 here from all sides, as if poured out of so many 
 urns, into one and the same hole, and the dark 
 transparent outpourings look like dark columns in 
 a snow-storm. Out of the very centre of these 
 rises a black table-rock, which alone would give a 
 most picturesque effect to the scene, but that un¬ 
 luckily, as I have said, you cannot get near enough to 
 obtain a proper point of view. Above, at the real be¬ 
 ginning of the fall, were sticking in among the rocks 
 some half-decayed timbers from a raft that made 
 shipwreck here and could not be got out again. 
 
256 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 If you leave the suspension bridge and proceed 
 along the thickly-wooded banks of the river, you 
 get from various points surprising views of the 
 whole scene. 
 
 What an ancestor for a future great and wealthy 
 family might some one of those old Canadian 
 Seigneurs have become, if he had got possession in 
 time of this picturesque and powerful fall. He might 
 now have disposed of all manner of “ water privi¬ 
 leges,” at what prices he pleased; but these old 
 Seigneurs who halted near the Petite Nation dreamed 
 not of a Bytown and Ottawa metropolis. 
 
 The ingenious arrangements for turning off and 
 employing separate streams of water for the various 
 machinery of the works, now springing up in such 
 numbers round the falls, contributes not a little to 
 enhance the interest of the locality. 
 
 Formerly the great masses of timber which 
 came down the Ottawa were sent on in their rough 
 state to Quebec, and there cut up into planks, and 
 otherwise prepared for shipment to Europe. But 
 since the rise of Bytown this work has been mostly 
 performed on the spot, and the trunks of trees 
 have been cut up directly into the required 
 forms at sawing and planing mills, and so a con¬ 
 siderable saving in transport is effected. 
 
 American immigrants from New England have 
 
 r\ 
 
 
THE FALLS OF THE OTTAWA. 
 
 257 
 
 given the first impulse to these undertakings, and, 
 indeed, you find them everywhere in Canada, 
 where there is anything new going on. Like the 
 wild swans or swallows of the spring, they precede 
 the advancing tide of culture and colonization, and 
 if you miss them at Montreal, Quebec, and other old 
 towns, you are certain to find them at places which, 
 like Bytown, have just sprung into life. These 
 Yankees have lately discovered iron in this country, 
 and have set to working the mines; and to them 
 also belong the most important saw-mill and 
 wood-working establishments. 
 
 It is a real pleasure to go over such a well-man¬ 
 aged place, for the Americans in all their arrange¬ 
 ments do not merely attend to order and conve¬ 
 nience, but also to agreeableness and elegance. 
 They have introduced ornament and luxury even 
 into a saw-mill. Their machines are so beautifully 
 made, that they are quite pretty to look at, and the 
 cutting part of them, the chisels, the planes, the 
 saws, glitter like the finest steel. At other parts 
 the dark colour of the iron is relieved by a streak 
 of red or blue paint. The apartments are all 
 spacious and convenient, and air, light, and water 
 are distributed everywhere in abundance. 
 
 The thing that surprised me most, however, was 
 the dwelling-house which the American owners of 
 
258 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 these mills have fitted up for their workmen. It 
 is a most agreeable-looking boarding-house of quite 
 elegant architecture, and the interior is equal in 
 cleanliness to the quarter-deck of an English man- 
 of-war. The workmen have their common break¬ 
 fast and dining-rooms, as in the hotels of New 
 York and Boston, and in their sleeping-rooms the 
 most exact regulations were laid down for the linen 
 and other things supplied to them. I must con¬ 
 fess I delight in a country where wood-cutters and 
 workmen at a saw-mill can command such an 
 amount of comfort and decorum in their mode o 
 life. Perhaps the Americans had in this case been 
 desirous of showing the “ Britishers ” how such an 
 establishment ought to be managed. 
 
 I found here at Bytown at last the original of an 
 interesting picture I have seen somewhere, but I 
 cannot now tell where, of the remarkable works 
 and scenery of the sluices of the Rideau Canal. I 
 have said that the Rideau river falls from a very 
 high rocky plateau into the Ottawa, and a whole 
 chain of locks one above another has therefore 
 been found necessary in making the canal. They 
 form together a sort of water stair-case, on which a 
 vessel is raised up step by step, and which re¬ 
 semble together the renowned sluice-works of the 
 Trolhatta Canal in Sweden. It is a scene de- 
 
THE FALLS OF THE OTTAWA. 
 
 259 
 
 serving a better picture than the one I remember, 
 and if a German landscape-painter should ever 
 extend his excursions so far, he would find subjects 
 that would rejoice both himself and the civilised 
 world. 
 
260 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE LUMBER-MEN. 
 
 During the day a respected inhabitant of By¬ 
 town had been showing me about and entertaining 
 me in the most hospitable manner, and in the 
 evening he delivered me to a friend not less com¬ 
 plaisant. I passed it with a gentleman, who as 
 Crown Timber Agent has under his inspection 
 not less than sixty thousand square miles of forest 
 land, the whole wood and forest district of Ottawa. 
 He had a large map of this district, with all its 
 rivers and forests, hanging up in his office, and the 
 Scotch and Irish lumber-men who desire to under¬ 
 take a piece of forest come to him, and have pointed 
 out to them the portion on the map, on this or 
 that creek or lake, for which they desire to be 
 licensed, and for which they then pay their en¬ 
 trance tax. 
 
THE LUMBER-MEN. 
 
 261 
 
 A considerable attack has been made on the 
 forest, on the Ottawa, to the distance of about 150 
 miles above Bytown, but beyond this there are 
 immense thickly wooded tracts that have scarcely 
 been touched by the axe. There is work and the 
 reward of work for at least four hundred years to 
 come, without counting what might in the mean 
 while spring up again in the districts cut down. 
 This has been pretty closely calculated. Below 
 Bytown, near the river, the primeval forest has been 
 mostly cut down, and only here and there do you 
 see some giant fragments of the old world rising 
 up out of the newer bush. Even in those tracts, 
 however, which may be regarded in some measure 
 as used up, new discoveries are continually made, 
 or old treasures made more accessible. Every new 
 canal or road, every attempt to render navigable a 
 stream not before ventured on, leads to treasures 
 of timber which had been passed by, because they 
 could not be moved. In the woods of Ottawa it is 
 as in mines, where old forsaken veins of metal, or 
 gangways, that have been allowed to stand still, 
 are opened again and carried into the interior of 
 the mountain. 
 
 The lumber-men go spying about in all the side 
 valleys and tributary streams of the Ottawa, to find 
 out untouched pieces of forest, or the way to them. 
 
262 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and since all the woods belong, of course, not to the 
 finder, but to the whole Province of Canada, it is 
 then necessary for them to procure a licence, which 
 they obtain for a certain yearly ground-rent per 
 acre. They then begin to fell timber wherever they 
 like, and pay, when they bring it to market, a duty 
 of a halfpenny the cubic foot, to the Provincial Go¬ 
 vernment. They must, however, bring a certain 
 quantity to market out of every acre of forest, and 
 if they do not bring this minimum their ground- 
 rent is doubled, or their licence withdrawn. By 
 this system all interests are thought to be secured; 
 the ground-rent is a kind of fee or entrance-money 
 for the consolidation of the contract; the half¬ 
 penny per cubic foot regulates the tax according to 
 the better or worse harvest obtained, and the last- 
 mentioned regulation prevents a rich capitalist from 
 taking great tracts, and if it so please him leaving 
 them unemployed, thereby raising the price of wood 
 and injuring the revenue of the Government. 
 
 When people here speak of “ lumber-men,” they 
 do not mean merely the labourers in the woods, but 
 also the capitalists and speculators, the owners of 
 saw-mills, and other great traders in timber. For 
 example, the Gilmores of Glasgow, who have two 
 hundred ships of their own on the St Lawrence and 
 Ottawa, and possess numerous wood-cutting estab- 
 
263 
 
 THE LUMBER-MEN. 
 
 lishraents about Bytown, are a family of “ lumber¬ 
 men.” 
 
 Capitalists like these employ, at their own cost, 
 great numbers of workmen, whom they send up the 
 rivers into the woods, keeping them there winter and 
 summer. These woodmen arc known by their old 
 Trench name of “ Gens de Chantier” and the small 
 log-houses that they build for dwellings in the forest 
 are called chantiers —a word that the English have 
 adopted, but corrupted into shanty, and in the 
 same way they make shanty-men out of Gens de 
 Chantier. The word has emigrated to the United 
 States, where every poor hut or provisional dwelling 
 is called a “ shanty; ” as, for instance, a squatter’s 
 shanty—but they talk sometimes of axe-men in¬ 
 stead of shanty-men. 
 
 When a portion of forest has been marked out 
 for cutting, a party of ten or twenty shanty-men is 
 sent up to it, and they find out a spot where water 
 and other advantages are to be obtained, and there 
 set up their chantier , or log-house. In the Hudson’s 
 Bay Counties it would be called a “ Fort.’’ It is 
 without windows, and a good deal like an Esquimaux 
 hut. In the midst blazes a fire that is never let 
 out, and the smoke passes out through a hole in the 
 roof. The sleeping-places of the men are all round, 
 as in the cabin of a ship. Other little huts are 
 
264 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 built for their stores, and the trunks of trees the 
 men cut down piled up near them. In the winter 
 these are dragged hither over the snow, and in the 
 following spring sent down the water. 
 
 The axe-men are often of various nations, and 
 since they have their log-houses far in the forests, 
 hundreds of miles from civilization and the police, it 
 occurred to me that the shanties might often be 
 the scene of disorders and excesses; but I every¬ 
 where heard these woodmen praised for their order 
 and sobriety. No robbery or crime, I was assured, 
 is ever heard of among them, and in the midst of 
 the axe-men of Labrador and Hudson’s Bay, you 
 would be safer than in the streets of New York. 
 This, if true, is probably in some measure to be 
 attributed to the good organization and distribution 
 of the work, but also to the just and strict superin¬ 
 tendence of the employers. 
 
 Every shanty has its Foreman, who assigns to each 
 man his work, and also watches over his conduct. 
 The French call him “ le Conducteur ,” though some¬ 
 times also “ le Foreman,” and he makes his report 
 at the end of the winter to the “ Boorshaw.” What 
 kind of person a “Boorshaw” was, of Avhom I first 
 heard from an English axe-man, I could not guess— 
 but at length I made out that the word was an 
 Anglification of Bourgeois, as the French Gens de 
 
THE LUMBER-MEN. 
 
 265 
 
 Chantier had been in the habit, from old times, of 
 calling their employer or chief in the town. 
 
 “ Out, oui, Monsieur, soyez sur le Foreman dans 
 chaque chantier a son livre secret, dans lequel il note 
 cliaque manque de respect ou d’amitie, chaque effron- 
 terie ou combat, aussi chaque jour de maladie ou d’ 
 oisivete. A la fin d’ hiver il presente son livre au bour¬ 
 geois, et le bourgeois est juste, mais severe et sans 
 pitie. Il ne page quc les jours ou V on travaille, et 
 il degage de son service a V instant les personnes des- 
 agreablcs. 
 
 That these Foresters are, in general, so peaceful 
 and “ agreables ” * is doubtless in a great measure 
 attributable to the circumstance of their being, 
 whether voluntarily or not, Temperance Men. 
 Spirituous drinks never find their way to these re¬ 
 mote shanties, and formerly the men drank only 
 mock coffee made of toasted coni, but lately they 
 have had real coffee and tea. Their principal food is 
 salt meat and “ du hard ” (bacon). “ Oui, Monsieur, 
 du hard cest bon pour eux, $a leur donne beaucoup 
 de force. The only article of luxury or pleasure they 
 are allowed is tobacco, though in the beginning of 
 the spring, when the winter work is over and the 
 snow not yet melted, they sometimes manage to get 
 
 * Agreables does not here mean pleasant, but peaceable. It is de¬ 
 rived from agrees , to agree with. 
 
266 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 a little sugar by tapping the maple trees and boil¬ 
 ing down the juice. 
 
 “ What do the men do on Sundays ? ” I asked. 
 “Well, they mend their clothes and their tools, 
 or lie upon their buffalo skins and smoke and 
 talk.” 
 
 “ Have they no kind of religious instruction ? ” 
 “No, none! unless perhaps the foreman reads to 
 them a bit.” 
 
 I wonder that no wandering preacher or Mission¬ 
 ary has yet bethought himself of the case of these 
 thousands of woodmen, hidden in hundreds of little 
 settlements about the Ottawa forests, or endeavoured 
 to bring them into the fold of the Church, and 
 furnish them with some kind of spiritual food. They 
 live as neglected in these respects as the herdsmen 
 of the high Alps. But perhaps it is better so. It 
 is better that the Catholic Irish and French, and the 
 Protestant Scotch and English, should live thus as 
 sheep without shepherds, but at peace with one 
 another, than if the shepherds came and sowed 
 discord among them. 
 
 The foremen of the shanties are usually Scotch¬ 
 men, and indeed they are the leading men in all 
 “ lumbering ” operations. They are not only the 
 first men on the Exchanges of Quebec and Mont¬ 
 real, but the owners of most of the great timber 
 
THE LUMBER-MEN. 
 
 267 
 
 establishments of Bytown, and the chiefs and leaders 
 in the woods, and this may perhaps, in some mea¬ 
 sure, explain the good order that reigns in those re¬ 
 mote regions. 
 
 The Scotch are a sober, thoughtful, calculating 
 people, and make excellent advocates and judges; 
 and they understand, too, how to bring men toge¬ 
 ther, to guide them, and control their passions. The 
 admirable system of government in the Hudson’s Bay 
 Territory is, I believe, mainly of Scotch invention, 
 and all machinery is set in motion by Scottish heads 
 and Scottish arms. They may be said to rule the 
 whole of North America, and that without soldiers 
 or armed force of any kind, but with a few hundred 
 clever agents—“ Traders ” and “ Chief Traders, for 
 these are the modest titles taken by highly-respected 
 and influential men, who, in Russia, would be called 
 governors, or generals. Not by bayonets and can¬ 
 non, but by wise policy, and just and strict adminis¬ 
 tration, has this Hudson’s Bay Company attained 
 its almost irresistible power, which extends too over 
 many different races of Indians. It settles their 
 disputes, forbids their wars, determines the prices 
 of their goods, and conducts all their business. Its 
 information is so extensive and complete, that 
 throughout North America not a skin can be sold 
 without the Hudson’s Bay Company being aware 
 
268 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 of the fact; and it maintains so jealously its privi¬ 
 lege of exclusive dealing with the Indians, that no 
 one can hope to interfere with it with impunity. 
 Should, for instance, any speculator, thinking that 
 the Company’s territory is large, and its policemen 
 and gens d’ armes not very numerous, venture to 
 enter their country without a passport, and try to 
 trade on his own account with the Indians, it would 
 go ill with him. If the Company should refuse him 
 “ fire and water,” no Indian would venture to give 
 him shelter or food, far less to trade with him. He 
 would inevitably starve. 
 
 Here on the Upper Ottawa, indeed, the Company 
 has no such exclusive privilege, although it does, 
 de facto, rule and reign. On the second great se¬ 
 condary river, the Saguenay, the Company form¬ 
 erly farmed an extensive district from the Governor 
 of Canada, and paid £1500 a year for the hunt¬ 
 ing, trading, and general utilizing of a tract as 
 large as the kingdom of Saxony; but the lease has 
 not lately been renewed, and the Company’s exclu¬ 
 sive privilege has ceased; and since then no fewer 
 than 10,000 persons have emigrated and settled in 
 the district. 
 
 It is probable that on the Ottawa, also, the Com¬ 
 pany will soon have to retire before the flood of 
 immigration. “ We look forward to the time,” said 
 
TH E-LUMBER-MEN. 
 
 269 
 
 a Canadian to me, when our towns and villages 
 will reach to the shores of Hudson’s Bay. Between 
 the St Lawrence and James’s Bay there is a great 
 deal of good arable land, and that will some day 
 form part of the great Canadian Empire. 
 
270 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 VISIT TO THE INDIANS IN THE FOREST. 
 
 The quails of Canada are remarkably fine-fla¬ 
 voured, and no less so a certain kind of aromatic 
 wild plum, indigenous to the country. They are 
 found in the woods, and in the autumn are boiled 
 and preserved with sugar in Canadian households, 
 and then they may be presented by a fair hand to 
 a friend who is to be hospitably entertained. On 
 my expressing on such an occasion a wish to know 
 more of a plum-tree that deserves to be renowned 
 through the world, I was told by my host, “ There 
 grow plenty of them in a bit of forest belonging to 
 me, a few miles off the town, and just now there is a 
 party of Indians camping there, with my permission. 
 If it were not so late we would walk out there this 
 evening, and then you could make acquaintance with 
 the plum-tree and the Indians at the same time.” 
 
 I 
 
VISIT TO THE INDIANS IN THE FOREST. 271 
 
 My worthy host did not know what it was to 
 give such a hint to me—and he had to pay the 
 penalty. I begged him not to mind the lateness 
 of the hour, and we were soon setting out armed 
 with sticks and lanterns, to make a call on the Indians 
 in the forest in this dark autumn night. On 
 leaving the town we crossed a few fields, meadows, 
 and enclosures, and soon came to the wood. It 
 was a piece of the primeval forest, which seen by 
 the light of our lanterns had a strange and pictur¬ 
 esque effect. My friend carried his light round 
 the thick trunks of some elms and maples, to en¬ 
 able me to judge of their girth, and we then looked 
 up the long shafts, and saw their mighty boughs 
 rising up into the starry sky. 
 
 It is remarkable what peculiar forms these Ca¬ 
 nadian trees assume. Elms and beeches and pop¬ 
 lars all shoot up without a branch to an immense 
 height, and then spread out into a leafy roof or 
 cupola like palm trees. Oaks are, in our country, 
 thick and gnarled, but here there are tall slender 
 oaks. I saw many which, like pine-trees, could 
 have been taken at once from the forest to serve as 
 the masts of ships. 
 
 The part of the woods through which we 
 were walking formed a rich and beautiful fore¬ 
 ground, covered in the most wonderful manner 
 
272 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 with moss-grown stones, whole and half decayed 
 trees, shrubs, weeds, and copses of the wild plum, 
 and crossed by little brooks that we had to wade 
 through. We were rather anxious to know whether 
 we should find our Indians, for my friend had not 
 seen them lately, and was not sure that they were 
 not gone. But we soon perceived the glimmer of a 
 distant light among the trees, and ascertained that 
 this was from their watch-fire, which shone brighter 
 and brighter as we advanced, and at last lit up a 
 whole forest scene for us. 
 
 We advanced cautiously for fear of alarming the 
 poor people, and found two women—an elder and 
 a younger, mother and daughter, seated under a 
 very airy kind of tent, which consisted, indeed, of 
 nothing more than a large cloth spread over a few 
 boughs of trees tied together. The elder woman 
 was occupied in basket-making; the younger was 
 stirring the fire, made of great branches and roots 
 of trees, and both had their naked feet in the hot 
 ashes, so that they seemed to me to be roasting. 
 They remained quite undisturbed and busy at 
 their work, and when we wished them good even¬ 
 ing, answered our salutation very simply, without 
 asking us any question about what we wanted or 
 where we came from. 
 
 We expressed a hope that we had not frightened 
 
■■ ■ 
 
 VISIT TO THE INDIANS IN THE FOREST. 
 
 them, and they said, No ; they had heard us coming 
 when we were a good way off. We sat down by 
 the fire, and continued the conversation ; but their 
 answers were always shorter than our questions. 
 We learned that they were Iroquois, from a village 
 on the “ Lake of the Two Mountains,” that I had 
 passed the day before. The men of the family, 
 father and son-in-law, had gone further up the Ot¬ 
 tawa to hunt, some months ago; the women had ac¬ 
 companied them as far as By town, and were wait¬ 
 ing for them to return afterwards together to their 
 village on the lake, and in the mean time were 
 earning their living by basket-making. They 
 worked in the evening and at night, and in the 
 day-time the daughter carried their .little manu¬ 
 factures to the town, and the mother took care of 
 the tent, looked for berries, boiled maize, and got 
 something for the daughter to eat on her return. 
 The old woman spoke no word of English, but the 
 daughter, who also understood a few words of 
 French, made civil replies to our questions. 
 
 A hundred yards off there was another “ camp,” 
 as it was called, though it consisted, like this, of only 
 a single tent. To this, which was an Algonquin 
 camp, we scrambled over the rocks and other 
 natural barricades that had been left between the 
 two. The occupants were precisely as in the tent 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 18 
 
 — 
 
274 
 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 of the Iroquois, an old and a young woman, but 
 from certain whimpering sounds that proceeded 
 from under a sheep-skin, we perceived that the 
 younger woman had two children. Here also the 
 elder matron was deaf and dumb to European 
 language, and only the younger could speak a 
 little broken French. While we were talking, the 
 former sat still without granting us so much as a 
 look, though her fingers continued in busy motion 
 over the large basket that she had in hand; and 
 the elastic strips of wood were pushed hither and 
 thither, and the superfluous ends fell under her 
 knife almost with the rapidity of an American 
 steam saw-mill. We inquired, the daughter being 
 interpreter, whether she would not now allow her¬ 
 self a little rest, as it was now ten o’clock; but 
 she replied very briefly: “ The baskets bring in 
 very little. They must be ready to-morrow. We 
 work every night.” When we asked how old she 
 was, the daughter’s French arithmetic quite broke 
 down. She could count as much as ten, but was 
 puzzled how to express any higher number, and 
 therefore explained to her mother in Algonquin 
 what we wanted to know. 
 
 As soon as she had understood the question, the 
 old lady laid aside her basket, spread out her ten 
 fingers, and then struck her two hands at regular in- 
 
VISIT TO THE INDIANS IN THE FOREST. 275 
 
 tervals seven times together; she then snatched her 
 basket again, and went on plaiting as busily as 
 before. 
 
 I could not get out of my head the picture of this 
 grey-haired woman of seventy, sitting there on the 
 " bare damp ground in the comfortless forest, so hard 
 at work; and I could not help thinking that the 
 accusation of sloth, so commonly made against the 
 poor Indians should be received “ cum grano salts." 
 
 Nearly eighty years ago, that is, about the year 
 1780, an Englishman, named Alexander Henry, 
 travelled up the Ottawa, when as yet there was no 
 thought of Bytown or of steam boats. His report, 
 which was published in New York in 1809, con¬ 
 tains a statement, which he had derived from his 
 boatmen, that the Algonquin Indians of the lake 
 of the Two Mountains claim the whole country 
 on the Ottawa, as far as Lake Nipissing, as their 
 property, and that it is regularly divided among 
 them, a certain portion being assigned as hereditary 
 in each family, and that they are very strict in the 
 maintenance of these rights. “ Any infringement of 
 them is regarded as a gross insult, and the per¬ 
 petrator worthy of death.” 
 
 I should have liked to have translated this pass¬ 
 age to the ancient Algonquin woman, and to have 
 heard what she had to say on the subject. Very 
 
27(5 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 likely she was herself a great heiress, and regarded 
 the whole Bytowncrs together as invaders and 
 “ worthy of death.” These scanty relics of those who 
 were once the lords of the soil do, it must be own¬ 
 ed, profit too little by its present prosperity. They 
 make a most melancholy impression, sitting there " 
 in some out-of-the-way corner in the woods, and 
 seeing at a distance the towers of the invaders’ 
 city; and the great river, once their own, and 
 traversed only by the canoes of their bold sons, 
 ruled by the giant Steam. Truly may it be said 
 to them in the words of the Bible, “ I will cast thee 
 out of the land of thy fathers, and thou shalt be a 
 stranger in thine own land.” 
 
 I could not help noticing how even these feeble 
 remnants of tribes, almost entirely dispersed, still 
 preserve the names, the languages, and the pecu¬ 
 liarities of their forefathers, and the ancient en¬ 
 mities of their race still live in these atoms of the 
 tribe, as the heart of the sturgeon still moves in its 
 old fashion, when the blood and the whole organism 
 has perished. We noticed this when on our asking 
 these women whether they were Mohawks, they 
 answered with great eagerness and emphasis, “ Oh 
 no, sir, no! No! not Mohawks—Algonquins!” 
 
 My friend and companion, who had travelled 
 over all parts of Canada, informed me on this oc- 
 
VISIT TO THE INDIANS IN THE FOREST. '277 
 
 casion, that the tribe of Mohawks is held in horror 
 far and wide, even down to the present day. In 
 a village of Mickmacks, in New Brunswick, he had 
 noticed that they still frightened their children with 
 the name; and that the inhabitants of a Mickmack 
 village once actually took fright and ran ten miles, 
 on the report that there were Mohawks coming. 
 
 The cruelties practised by the Mohawks on their 
 neighbours must have been terrible indeed; or is 
 the imagination of the Indians so impressible, their 
 memory so tenacious, that after the lapse of a hun¬ 
 dred years they are still frightened by the phantom 
 of a race that scarcely exists any more ? 
 
 I got pretty well laughed at in Canada, for 
 having sought so .anxiously, even at night with a 
 lantern, the remains of the decayed Indian tribes ? 
 “ What can you learn from these people ? ” it was 
 said. “ It is not worth your while. You will see 
 nothing in them—they are the mere Canaille of 
 the Indians. Go to the Far West, there you will 
 find renowned races; proud fellows who look down 
 with great contempt on their poor countrymen in 
 Canada.” 
 
 This was often said to me, and probably it was 
 not altogether wrong; but it might be said in re¬ 
 ply, that though the still wild and savage sons of 
 the West had a peculiar interest of their own, 
 
278 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 which these half-tamed and often mongrel Cana¬ 
 dians have not, yet that these mongrels often afford 
 subjects for inquiry that the full-bloods do not. 
 In ethnography, as in all nature, mixed and mon¬ 
 grel races are often specially important to the 
 observer. Many questions can only be solved 
 among Indians who have come more or less into 
 contact with civilization. Of what degree of cul¬ 
 ture are they capable ? To what diseases, physical 
 and moral, are they most liable ? From which do 
 they remain free, &c. ? The comparisons and con¬ 
 trasts with Europeans are also more easily made, and 
 more striking, and thus the results of psychological 
 observation are often much more surprising. 
 
 That among the savages of the West, one race 
 should pursue another with bloody revenge and 
 inextinguishable hatred, no one will wonder; but 
 that this hatred should be found still burning on 
 in the peaceful and long since Christian villages of 
 the East, and that when its object has long since 
 descended into the grave, this is a much more re¬ 
 markable phenomenon. 
 
 I shall, therefore, not allow myself to be dis¬ 
 suaded from seeking out the last of the Mohawks, 
 Algonquins, Mickmacks, and Iroquois, wherever I 
 can find them, nor from communicating, as well as I 
 can, the residts of my observations to my readers. 
 
THE BARRACKS HILL. 
 
 279 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE BARRACKS HILL. 
 
 The mass of the houses of Bytown is divided 
 into two main groups, and between the two rises a 
 broad-topped rock or hill, from the summit of 
 which you command the whole position. 
 
 This rock, as well as the before-mentioned 
 Rideau Canal, belongs to the Imperial Government 
 of Canada, and has been taken possession of for 
 military purposes. This hill, indeed, and many 
 lands besides, arc considered as appendages to the 
 canal, and might help to defend it. The Provincial 
 Government, and especially the Bytowners, would 
 like to have this hill, which lies in the very middle 
 of their city, and offers the finest sites for building; 
 but though the Government might give up the 
 Rideau Canal to the province, it will not the hills, 
 rocks, &c., which are well adapted for military 
 
280 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 positions, and might be of importance for the de¬ 
 fence of the town itself. Hitherto, only some bar¬ 
 racks have stood upon this hill, and thence its 
 name; but they presented a very miserable aspect 
 when I saw them, as they had been almost burnt 
 to ruins. The panorama round the hill was remark¬ 
 able. The long line of the cataracts is in full view, 
 and right and left the far-stretching buildings of 
 the rapidly-growing “ Metropolitan city of the Ot¬ 
 tawa,” and the great sluice works and other im¬ 
 portant establishments; the whole set in a back¬ 
 ground of seemingly interminable forest. 
 
 The forest is the Jupiter, and the city the Miner¬ 
 va, that has sprung full-grown and ready-armed from 
 his head. The broad silvery-shining Ottawa, however 
 —losing itself in the far distance beyond the cata¬ 
 racts, attracted me more than anything else. How 
 gladly would I have followed it with more than 
 merely the eye. There is said to be much that is 
 interesting in that region, and it is not difficult of 
 attainment. First, after passing the Chaudiere 
 Falls at Bytown, you come to a whole series of 
 smaller cataracts or rapids,—the first portage, which 
 is traversed by a fine Macadamized road. At the 
 end of this you come to another broad tranquil 
 part of the river, like a lake, and go on board a 
 steamer that carries you quickly about five and 
 
THE BARRACKS HILL. 
 
 281 
 
 thirty miles further. Then the water is again 
 blocked up with rocks; but a little horse railroad 
 has been made along the shore, and this brings 
 you once more to smooth water. Near this place 
 are the celebrated falls called the Chats (the Cats), 
 but in good Canadian, the “ Ckoats,” and out of 
 this the Britons have made “ The Shaws ; ” after 
 this you once more find yourself on a steamer—but 
 this time a very small one—and then again in a 
 carriage. You pass the long flat and fertile islands 
 —“ Calumet ” and “ Allumette,” which will one 
 day, like that of Montreal, be turned into gardens, 
 but which now only serve to remind you of little 
 travelling adventures of the Jesuits,—of tire one, 
 “ Calumet,” where they smoked a pipe; of the 
 other, “ Allumette,” where a match suddenly gave 
 them light and safety. 
 
 At length there opens before you the long rocky 
 canal of which I have spoken. The Ottawa, here 
 350 miles from its mouth, is a broad and mighty 
 stream, and remains such a long way further, but 
 beyond this “ Long Road ” there are no vessels to 
 be met with but the birch-bark canoes of the In¬ 
 dians, and no inhabitants but a few Agents of the 
 Hudson’s Bay Company, and on either side in the 
 forest, and on the tributary rivers, the lumber-men, 
 who make their way everywhere. But traders, 
 
282 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 mechanics, and others soon follow them. In the 
 valleys opening from the river small stores are to be 
 seen, from which the neighbouring country can sup¬ 
 ply its wants—and there is no doubt that many of 
 these stores, where the lumber-men now buy their 
 tobacco, may be regarded as germs of future Ot¬ 
 tawa cities that perhaps before the end of the cen¬ 
 tury we shall find described in our Geography 
 books. 
 
 That it will be so may be safely assumed from 
 the position of Ottawa, and the fact that there is no 
 shorter natural road from Montreal and Quebec to 
 the upper part of Lake Huron, and to the entrance 
 of Lake Michigan and Lake Superior, than the river 
 and valley of the Ottawa. In a short time import¬ 
 ant lines of railway will be laid down, along the 
 Ottawa to the mouth of the tributary Mattawan, 
 from there along the valley of this river, the shores 
 of Lake Nipissing, and along the Trench river to 
 Lake Huron. This combination of rivers and 
 lakes is an ancient route, discovered and used by 
 the Indians from time immemorial and communi¬ 
 cated by them to the French Jesuits, who woidd 
 not have discovered it for themselves; they would 
 naturally have proceeded up the great channel of 
 the Ottawa, for how could they have hit on the 
 notion that they had to turn off to the left at the 
 

 
 THE BARRACKS HILL 
 
 283 
 
 mouth of the little Mattawan, in order to reach 
 through it the great Lakes and the most important 
 objects and races ? How could they have known 
 that the main stream of the upper Ottawa lost itself 
 with its sources in the cold wilderness of the Hud¬ 
 son’s Bay countries. I repeat that our European 
 discoveries in America rest almost wholly on the 
 ancient explorations and discoveries of the Indians, 
 who had tried these routes and pointed them out 
 to our people. 
 
 The upper Ottawa, above the mouth of the Mat¬ 
 tawan, is even to this day very little known, since 
 it opens the way to no important traffic. Up to 
 the year 1846 not more than half of the river had 
 been really surveyed, and according to this survey 
 it has been laid down on the maps as far as Fort 
 William. 
 
 The principal merit of the further examination of 
 this interesting stream belongs to the celebrated 
 Canadian State Geologist, Mr Logan of Montreal, 
 who for years together, on steamers, in bark canoes, 
 and on horseback, has travelled with his measuring 
 chains and compass up and down many branches 
 of the Ottawa, to learn and describe their character 
 and position. This excellent, amiable, and learned 
 man has also carried the survey 300 miles further 
 to the great Lake Temiscaming, through which the 
 
284 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 Ottawa flows, and at the same time determined the 
 course of several subordinate branches of the whole 
 labyrinth. 
 
 Concerning the remote sources, which he him¬ 
 self could not reach, he obtained information, and 
 had maps sent in by Indians, half-breeds, and 
 lumber-men, which they had drawn from their own 
 knowledge and experience. There is therefore a 
 great deal of valuable geographical material extant 
 for a description of the Ottawa river. One part of 
 this material has been already incorporated with 
 the Veil-known Labouchet’s Map of Canada; but 
 in the house of Mr Logan himself, and of the dis¬ 
 tinguished Mr Russel of Bytown, I saw manuscript 
 maps with very full details, which have not yet 
 been published. 
 
 From these maps and from the kind explanations 
 of their owners I found what I had not expected, 
 that a great part of the Ottawa river is still unsur¬ 
 veyed and unknown, although we see it on many 
 maps very precisely laid down in all its parts. 
 Above Lake Temiscaming it is only known to the 
 Gens du Chantier, and it is not yet decided which 
 of its branches is to be considered as the true source 
 or main Ottawa. The true Ottawa is said to come 
 from Grand Lake, but Grand Lake is still a hundred 
 miles from its source. 
 
 
THE BARRACKS HILL. 
 
 285 
 
 The sources of many of the tributaries of the 
 Ottawa, which are by no means inconsiderable, are 
 as much lost in obscurity as those of the Ottawa 
 itself. The great Gatineau, for instance, has been 
 explored for 300 miles, but the GO miles further 
 to its springs are unknown. The Kopowa river is 
 now being surveyed for the first time. 
 
 The maps drawn by Indians, half-breeds, and 
 hunters of the Hudson’s Bay Company are, how¬ 
 ever, not altogether to be despised. Mr Logan 
 had the goodness to show me a map of this kind 
 of a portion of a river, which he had received 
 before the survey, and when he afterwards com¬ 
 pared it with the results he had obtained by a more 
 scientific method, it appeared that the narrowing 
 of the channel, its angles and windings, the form 
 and position of its islands, its lake-like expansions, 
 &c., were laid down with wonderful fidelity. There 
 will however soon appear some most admirable 
 maps of Canada, on a large scale, and in these will 
 be revealed the geological features of the Ottawa first 
 discovered by Mr Logan, and this will be an occa¬ 
 sion for extending still further the fame and the 
 knowledge of this country through the world at 
 large. 
 
286 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 HOAR-FROST. 
 
 At midnight, on the evening when I proposed 
 leaving Bytown, I had gone on board the steamer, 
 and betaken myself quietly to bed in the hope of 
 making, during the night, a considerable portion of 
 my journey; and late the next morning when the 
 breakfast bell raised its accustomed clamour through 
 every corner of the vessel, I awoke, wondering not 
 a little that I should have slept so well in the 
 usually noisy steamer, and found that we Avere still 
 quietly at anchor, and the same shore and the same 
 Bytown lay before the windows as the night before. 
 “ What ’s the matter,” I asked of the Canadian 
 steward, for, to the joy of the traveller, the servants 
 on the Ottawa, as well as the St Lawrence, are 
 French or Canadians, that is to say, cheerful, po¬ 
 lite, and complaisant, in fact, perfect. “ Nous nous 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 ' 287 
 
 sommes arretcs toute la nuit. Monsieur, il fait un 
 temps boucaneux, ce quc nous appellons la brume. 
 Voila Bytown, voila les Ckandieres, et tout ce que 
 vorn avez quittc hier soir.” 
 
 Although I did not know before what a “ temps 
 boucaneux,” and “ ce que nous appellons la brume,” 
 signified, for the words are not to be found in the 
 Dictionary of the French Academy, I soon found 
 it out, for, as I went on deck to see what I could 
 see, I saw nothing, or at least only a thick fog, 
 which did not disperse before the sun till ten in the 
 morning. I did not regret the delay, for when at 
 last we got into motion, I was enabled to see many 
 parts of the river that we had passed in the night 
 when I came. I thought I could distinguish through 
 the still-hovering mist, the renowned Rideau Fall. 
 
 “ Is not that the Rideau cataract ? ” I asked of 
 an Englishman whom I saw also looking out. 
 “ No, sir,” he replied, “ that are Mr Mackay’s 
 water privileges.” Yes, quite right, then it is the 
 beautiful Rideau Fall,—I heard that Mr Mackay 
 used them for a saw-mill. He has put Pegasus 
 instead of an ox into the plough, but you should 
 not overlook this beautiful fall, sir, that delighted 
 the Christian missionaries 200 years ago. I had 
 long before noticed that the word “privilege,” is 
 here used in a sense peculiar to the country; that 
 
288 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 it does not mean the privilege or permission ob¬ 
 tained from the State, but rather the advantage 
 that nature affords, and which may be turned to 
 account for the acquisition of what we mean by a 
 privilege. A Canadian Briton at the sight of a 
 fine waterfall that might be easily applied to some 
 useful purpose, would exclaim, “ What a fine water 
 privilege! ” and in the same sense he would say, 
 “ Those privileges arc become my property.” 
 
 The hoar-frost or brume which had settled on the 
 trees, heightened their beauty and that of the 
 shores in an enchanting manner. We were only 
 in the middle of October, and the trees were still 
 mostly covered with golden-yellow, bright-red, and 
 dark-brown foliage with still a partial mixture of 
 green, and the sparkling hoar-frost scattered over 
 all these tints produced enchanting effects. The 
 colour,of the leaves gleamed through the delicate 
 white powder, and assumed thus many new shades ; 
 sometimes it seemed as if silver dust had been 
 sprinkled upon gold, and since the frost had settled 
 not like snow, but gently and equally on every 
 object, all the outlines were most perfectly defined. 
 On the islands of the river the trees stood thickly 
 covered with the glittering powder, and the white 
 crystallized branches hung low down over the brown 
 flood of the Ottawa, which reflected their image. 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 289 
 
 On the sides of the hills on the shore, all the rain¬ 
 bow dyes of the woods were veiled in delicate 
 white. I thought I could never grow weary of 
 such a lovely scene, but towards noon, when the 
 sun had been playing for hours with these millions 
 of crystals, his playthings began to be worn out 
 and to disappear. He had also completely dispersed 
 the lingering remnants of the fog that had hung 
 for some time over the water, and from which, as 
 our steamer passed, wild ducks and other fowl flew 
 screaming away. 
 
 A hoar-frost of this kind had come, I was told, 
 this year on the 1st of September, and there had 
 been but two months quite free from frost. In 
 general, our captain informed me, the navigation 
 ceases about the middle of November, and the 
 Ottawa mostly freezes over in the beginning of 
 December, and, at least in the lake-like and tranquil 
 portions, very smoothly and regularly, so that it 
 mostly makes a beautiful sledge path. The trans¬ 
 port of wood ceases then, of course, but from By¬ 
 town and from the lower part of the river come 
 little caravans of sledges with provisions, tools, 
 manufactured goods, &c., to supply the settlements 
 of the lumber-men in the woods. For four or five 
 months the river remains frozen hard and fast, and 
 it is not free again till the beginning of April, never 
 
 TOL. I. 19 
 
290 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 sooner than the 5th, and sometimes not till May, 
 and yet under this same degree of latitude the river 
 Gironde in France is flowing! 
 
 It is thought in Canada that the extreme cold of 
 the climate of this country is partly attributable 
 to James’s Bay, the most southerly portion of Hud- 
 son’s Bay. Into this Bay, which is without an out¬ 
 let, and which stood in ill repute with the first 
 discoverers, great masses of ice are driven by the 
 prevailing north and north-west winds, and are there 
 caught like fish in a net, and drive about the greater 
 part of the year without melting; so that James’s 
 Bay radiates cold on all the surrounding country. 
 
 The most useful forest tree of Canada, the sugar 
 maple, is also the most beautiful, at least in autumn, 
 and developes the richest golden hue on its leaves, 
 which also it retains longer than the other trees. 
 Its bright hues gleamed out everywhere around us, 
 from amidst the brown and frequently withered 
 leaves of its neighbours. As we were going to the 
 place where we were to make a halt, two kinds of 
 this remarkable tree were pointed out to me, the 
 “ hard” (which is the best) and the “ soft maple,” 
 from both of which sugar is obtained, but the best 
 from the first. It yields also the best wood for fuel, 
 and the most beautiful for cabinet work, and has in¬ 
 deed so many uses, that Minerva must have selected 
 
 r 
 
— 
 
 hoar-frost. 291 
 
 it expressly for Canada, as she did the olive for the 
 Athenians. The sugar of the soft maple, or “ plane- 
 tree,” as it is commonly but erroneously called in 
 the country, is blacker, and does not crystallize so 
 easdy as the other. There is also a third tree in 
 Canada from which sugar is obtained, namely, the 
 merisier, or wild cherry-tree, apparently something 
 like the “ marasque ” of Dalmatia, from which is 
 made the celebrated liqueur Maraschino, but the 
 sugar of the merisier is to be had only in small 
 quantities, and is mostly used at the druggists’ for 
 medicinal purposes. The plane or soft maple has 
 a white bark, with a fine silky skin-like covering, 
 finer even than that of the birch bark. It grows 
 on a marshy soil, and even in the water, while the 
 hard maple prefers high and dry ground. 
 
 I had a whole council of maple connoisseurs around 
 me, and they gave me a great deal of fresh informa¬ 
 tion concerning the tree, though I had read all that 
 had been written about it by Talbot, Hall, Bucking¬ 
 ham, and other Canadian travellers. I am not going, 
 however, to inflict it all on my readers. 
 
 The Canadian sugar is, it seems, obtained at the 
 end of the winter, while the ground is still covered 
 with snow, not like the West Indian sugar, for 
 which the poor negroes have to be almost suffocated 
 with heat. At the end of March, or the beginning 
 
 19 * 
 
292 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 of April, the sun gives for a few hours of the day a 
 burning heat; this sets the sap of the tree in motion, 
 and makes it sweet. May it not be, perhaps, the 
 extraordinary heat of this Canadian March sun 
 which produces sugar from the same tree that with 
 us yields only watery sap ? 
 
 When the appointed season arrives, the poor pea-, 
 sant families betake themselves to the woods, with 
 pots, and pans, and ladles, and there build them¬ 
 selves huts, and then set about their boring opera¬ 
 tions. Sometimes they merely make a cut with the 
 axe in the tree, and it immediately begins to weep 
 precious tears, which are caught in basins of birch 
 bark, and afterwards boiled in a very simple man¬ 
 ner to a thick syrup, and, on the operation being 
 repeated, ultimately to a solid brown crystallized 
 mass. Since women and children, young and old, 
 share in the labours of this sweet harvest, and find 
 suitable occupation in it, it gives rise often to very 
 pretty animated scenes, which, in Quebec and Mont¬ 
 real, you frequently see represented in pictures and 
 engravings. They reminded me of what I had seen 
 among the Tartar families of the Crimea, who also 
 camp out, at a certain time of the year, to obtain a 
 kind of syrup from their apple-trees, and also of the 
 children and daughters of the Letts in Courland, 
 who run into the woods in March to tap the birch- 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 293 
 
 tree, and obtain its fermenting sap for household 
 purposes. In the woods of the mountainous part of 
 Lombardy, and the Tyrol too, they get turpentine 
 in the same way, by tapping the pine-trees. 
 
 Fifty gallons of sap, or more, are often yielded in 
 Canada from a single maple, and it is said without 
 injuring the tree, which, on the contrary, grows all 
 the better for the operation, and produces harder 
 and better wood; but it is possible, nevertheless, 
 to carry the matter to excess. The older and 
 stronger the trees become, the more sap and sugar 
 they yield. Quite young trees yield only watery 
 sap, and it is therefore not usual to tap them till 
 they are at least three quarters of a foot in dia¬ 
 meter. For the discovery of this maple sugar, as 
 for most others, the Europeans are indebted to the 
 Indians, and in the collections of Indian antiquities 
 may be seen the stone utensils which the ancient 
 Indians used in obtaining it. I saw, for instance, 
 a long stone hollowed out and pointed at the end, 
 so that it could be stuck into the tree. 
 
 I had always imagined that this maple sugar 
 making was an antiquated Canadian branch of in¬ 
 dustry, which was now of little importance, but 
 this appears to be a mistake. On the contrary, 
 the occupation is increasing in importance; it is 
 carried on in a more regular and judicious manner, 
 
294 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and produces every year a greater result. Large 
 quantities of this maple sugar find their way into 
 commerce, and a great deal is exported to the 
 United States, where it is mixed with the West- 
 Indian sugar, and refined with it. In Canada the 
 maple sugar is not refined—“ Ca ne se paye pas” 
 but it is seen in its brown state, in which it has a 
 certain woody flavour, in every peasant’s cottage. 
 In the more opulent families, it is used as a kind of 
 sweetmeat, or for preserving fruit. 
 
 Since I drove through the isthmus between 
 Grenville and Carillon, not in the stage coach, 
 but in a little carriage of my own, I had an oppor¬ 
 tunity for examining the trees of the forest more at 
 my leisure, and also of driving down to the shore 
 to see the Rapids. We met a large party of Cana¬ 
 dian raftsmen, who were passing through the 
 forest, up the river, to make new rafts to send 
 down, with their foreman, a great, powerful-looking 
 man, at their head. They were all French Cana¬ 
 dians, without any admixture of “old country 
 folk ” (“ old country ” meaning England). They 
 looked very healthy and lively, showed full, round, 
 well-fed, cheerful faces, and passed quickly by, 
 gossiping and whistling as they went. 
 
 These people are, it is said, passionately attached 
 to their dangerous trade, as are also the lumber- 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 295 
 
 men of the forest, who prefer their occupation to 
 every other in the world. Novices, perhaps, find it 
 rather uncomfortable, but when they are once 
 “ naturalized to the axe ” they will never again be 
 anything but axe-men; and for this reason it is 
 sometimes difficult in these regions to get workmen 
 for other works, such as canals, roads, or railways. 
 Even the Irish and Scotch, when they have been 
 some time in the country, are very apt to make 
 their way into the woods, join a band of lumber¬ 
 men, and thenceforward earn their living by wield¬ 
 ing the axe, possibly thinking, like Schiller’s rob¬ 
 bers— 
 
 “ Ein freies Leben führen wir, 
 
 Ein Leben voller Wonne; 
 
 Der Wald ist unser Nachtquartier, <fcc.” 
 
 Between the rocks on this Rapid we saw the 
 fragments of a raft sticking, and men busy in try¬ 
 ing to get them out. They told us a whole 
 “ Bond ” of twenty cribs had got wedged in here. 
 A bond, it seems, is such a division of a raft as is 
 sent at once down a cataract, and may consist of 
 more or fewer “ cribs.” These cribs I now examined 
 more closely. They consist of a long quadrangular 
 frame, filled in with planks and masses of wood. 
 The lumber-men put the frame together on the 
 snow, launch it in the water as soon as the rivers 
 
296 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 are open, and then fill it up; and the cribs are 
 then fastened together with ropes made of wattle. 
 
 Our journey this time was rather a land than a 
 water one, for we found several opportunities for a 
 walk, and towards evening were again stuck fast in 
 a fog, and passed the night near the old French 
 seigneurie of Vaudrcuil, on the Lake of the Two 
 Mountains, and I took the opportunity of visiting 
 a German farmer, Mr Xmeier, on the shore ; for, as 
 I have said, German settlers are rather scarce here. 
 
 I found him a worthy, pleasant, and very' talk¬ 
 ative old gentleman, who, as I soon observed, was a 
 great favourite in his neighbourhood. Everybody 
 seemed to know “ Herr Xmeier,” and to like to 
 talk to him. He was, he informed me, the son of a 
 German soldier, who had come with the English 
 into the country, and, like many others, had re¬ 
 ceived a grant of land; and he showed me his 
 spacious, handsome house, and his numerous and 
 flourishing family. His son-in-law, a tall, well- 
 grown, and intelligent man, was also a German, 
 but had come later into the country, and had but 
 lately sent for his aged mother and his youngest 
 brother from the Black Forest. They had only 
 been a year in the country, and I was amused by 
 noticing the differences between them and the 
 Americanized members of the family. The young 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 297 
 
 German brother had large eyes, looked modest and 
 a little sheepish, smiled very pleasantly when you 
 spoke to him, but had altogether the air of what 
 people here call a “ Greenhorn.” He already spoke 
 a little English, however, and in ten years’ time will 
 be doubtless as serious and self-possessed as his 
 elder brother. 
 
 The good old mother from the Black Forest, an 
 emigrant at seventy years of age, spoke no word of 
 English, but sat in the corner and knitted away 
 industriously. She was the only one in the room 
 who was doing any work. I asked her whether 
 she did not miss the old Fatherland, and she sighed 
 and said she did, but that things were very differ¬ 
 ent here in this fine, large house of her son’s, and 
 down there in her old cottage. “ Yes, mother,” 
 broke in the son, “and you haven’t got the tax- 
 gatherers everlastingly bothering you.” “ Ah, to be 
 sure,” said the old lady, in the true Black Forest 
 dialect, “ there was always one or another at the door, 
 sometimes three of ’em ringing at a time. Ah, that 
 is true, here one has a little peace from them.” 
 
 " Here in Canada, sir,” said the host, “ we pay 
 almost no taxes at all, less than in the United 
 States. Our Seigneur gets for ninety acres, four 
 shillings and sixpence and 2^ bushels of wheat. 
 Besides that we pay a few shillings a year for the 
 
298 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 schools, and that’s all. That does not hurt us 
 much! ” 
 
 On the other side from the good old mother and 
 her knitting, two young ladies, her grand-daugh¬ 
 ters, in silk dresses, and decorated with ribbons, 
 sat or swung themselves in rocking-chairs, with 
 their arms folded. Some young Americans, who 
 had come with us from the steamer, were paying 
 court to them, and I heard French and English 
 words mixed together, “ You always talk with a 
 double entendre, Mister; ” “ Monsieur vous etes un 
 humbug, &c.” 
 
 “ Children, children, how can you talk so ? Have 
 you got nothing at all to do ? There you sit 
 dressed up like the angels, and never stir a finger 
 to do anything from morning till night.” This is, I 
 am sure, what the old grandmother from Germany 
 would have said, but she was quite bewildered, like 
 a hen who had hatched a brood of ducklings, and 
 who can do nothing but wonder at their ways. 
 Very frequently she cast a timid glance at me, as 
 much as to say, “ What must you think of these dear, 
 naughty, extravagant, American girls ? ” and I had 
 by words and gestures to give her to understand that 
 it was only the custom of the country, that farmers’ 
 daughters here were very different from what they 
 were in our old country, that there were advantages 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 299 
 
 and disadvantages on both sides the question, &c. 
 Taking the family group all together, however, the 
 pretty ladylike, but certainly rather idle girls—the 
 stout, healthy, but somewhat stupid young peasant 
 —the industrious, saving, careful old mother, and the 
 rather meagre but still active and erect father and 
 grand-father, and then the absence of the everlast¬ 
 ing tax-gatherer,—I certainly thought that, though 
 my sympathies were with the old country, Canada 
 had the best of it. 
 
 The rooms were very handsomely decorated with 
 the antlers of stags, elks, and rein-deer, a decoration 
 that with us is found only in the halls of nobles and 
 princes, for woe to the poor peasant who should 
 adorn his cottage in this way. The gun of the 
 Canadian settler need make no distinctions between 
 game and humbler animals. 
 
 “ When I first came here with my father,” said 
 Mr Xmeier, “it was all forest land and full of 
 game. We bought 160 acres very cheap, and 
 cleared it in the course of years. Now it is clear 
 all round, and the forest is far off. That’s a differ¬ 
 ence, but look here, sir, that’s a difference too,” and 
 he showed me a picture of Montreal as it was in 
 1803. The city really looked smaller and meaner 
 than now one of its own suburbs, and Mr Xmeier 
 showed me places now covered with handsome 
 
300 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 houses and churches, which were then marshy 
 spots where his father used to shoot snipes. 
 
 Late as it was we went out in the fields to look 
 for an old stem of a wild vine of which I had been 
 told. It was very" rough, three or four inches 
 thick, divided into two branches, one of which 
 had grown into a pear-tree, and the other into a 
 maple, and evidently very old, our host thought 
 not less than a hundred years, and therefore, 
 though it bore little fruit, he had always re¬ 
 spected it. Wild grapes not only grow here in the 
 woods, but you see them twining round all hedges 
 and enclosures like blackberries in Germany. The 
 vine is found in the forests all up the Ottawa, that 
 is to say, on the banks of a river which is frozen 
 five months in the year. It seems as if the vine 
 remembered what the latitude of the country was, 
 though air and water have forgotten it. 
 
 The first Trench discoverers of the country re¬ 
 joiced especially over these vines, and in their de¬ 
 light called, as I have said, one of the great river 
 islands the “ Isle of Bacchus.” On the old maps of 
 the St Lawrence vines and vineyards are very prettily 
 drawn along the shores. These wild grapes too 
 had astonished and charmed the old Northmen 800 
 years before the arrival of the French, and induced 
 them to name the American country after the pro- 
 
HOAR-FROST. 
 
 301 
 
 duct that they least expected to find there, “ Vine- 
 land.” Those who may be still inclined to doubt 
 of these discoveries of the old Northmen, should 
 read in the Danish accounts the passage in which 
 it is stated how the old German Tunker, the only 
 Gennan who accompanied the first Northmen to 
 New England, came running, quite in raptures, 
 out of a w T ood, with a great bunch of grapes in his 
 hand, crying out to his companions on the shore, 
 
 “ Grapes ! grapes ! just what we have in my coun¬ 
 try.” They will then see how entirely these re¬ 
 ports agree with those of the French subsequently, 
 who also brought, with joyful wonder, ripe grapes ^ 
 out of the woods of the St Lawrence. 
 
 In general, also, it is not to be denied that these 
 cold Canadian woods abound much more in all 
 kinds of fruit than ours do. The wild plums and 
 cherries I have already mentioned, and besides these 
 and gooseberries, which are very common, there 
 are currants, strawberries, mulberries, and many 
 others in real abundance, larger than with us, and 
 nearly as well flavoured. “ This old vine reminds 
 me, gentlemen, that I have not offered you a glass 
 of wine,” said my old /««//’-countryman, “ come 
 this way and take a glass of Rhine-wine, as good as 
 we can offer you here in Canada. The Germans,” 
 he continued, “have a very good name in this 
 
302 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 country, and are everywhere made welcome. Here’s 
 to all Germans who may find their way to our Ot- 
 tawa-land, and may they be as well content with it 
 as I am! ” 
 
 I inquired how matters stood with the Temper¬ 
 ance movement here. 
 
 “Well,” he said, “they are rather desperate 
 with it in some places, but, for my part, I am not 
 a Temperance man; I think every man should be 
 his own master in such things. I, indeed, am only 
 a German Canadian, but I like now and then a 
 good glass of our Rhine-wine.” 
 
 It was late in the night when we at last took 
 leave of our hospitable friend, and returned to the 
 steamer, which towards morning again got into 
 motion, and then carried us safely to La Chine, 
 whence we soon reached Montreal. 
 
THE CATARAGUI. 
 
 303 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 THE CATARAGUI. 
 
 The name of “ the St Lawrence” w r as first applied 
 by the French discoverer, Cartier, to a small bay 
 or harbour near the mouth of the great river, 
 which was known at first as the “ Great River of 
 New France,” or of Canada, as “ the Great Bay,” at 
 its mouth between Canada and Newfoundland, was 
 known in the oldest time as “ Golfo Quadrado,” 
 and then as “ the Great Bay of New France.” 
 
 By degrees the name of St Lawrence was ex¬ 
 tended, first over this bay, which we now call the 
 Gulf of St Lawrence, and then to the great river of 
 Canada. This happened in the time of Champlain, 
 at the beginning of the 17th century. During the 
 10th, the St Lawrence was usually drawn on the 
 maps only to Montreal, because it was only known 
 with certainty so far. The name remained, there- 
 
304 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 fore, peculiarly appropriated to this part of the 
 river, which also forms up to this point an un¬ 
 divided water channel, such as ought to be * 
 known by a single name. At the island of Mont¬ 
 real, however, the volume of water breaks into 
 many different branches, amongst which the first 
 discoverers did not for a long while find their way, 
 so as to make out that they were only parts of two 
 great rivers, one flowing from the north-west, and 
 the other from the south-west. The two rivers 
 were about equal in volume, and it was, therefore, 
 quite natural to suppose that neither of them was 
 the actual St Lawrence, and consequently two 
 names were given to them; the north-western 
 being the great river of the Ottovais (the Ottawa), 
 and the south-western, which flowed out of a lake 
 (the Ontario), that of the Cataragui, from an Indian 
 village or tribe of that name. 
 
 We find, therefore, during the 17th century the 
 idea prevailing that the St Lawrence was form¬ 
 ed by the junction of the Ottawa and Cataragui 
 near Montreal. Subsequently it was found that 
 this latter remained the whole year through of 
 more nearly equal volume than the Ottawa, and 
 that, in fact, it was the continuation of the great 
 body of the St Lawrence, and the name was there¬ 
 fore gradually extended to this part also, and that of 
 
> 
 
 y 
 
 CATARAGÜI. 305 
 
 Cataragui entirely forgotten, so that “St Lawrence” 
 reigns as far as the Ontario. I may perhaps, never¬ 
 theless, be sometimes permitted to use the old name 
 for the sake of brevity, to designate the part of the 
 St Lawrence between Montreal and Lake Ontario. 
 
 It is one of the most interesting sections of the 
 great river, renowned for its numerous rapids, its 
 lovely landscapes, its “ Thousand Islands,” as well 
 as for its canals and other remarkable works of art. 
 A3 on my journey to Ottawa the steamer first car¬ 
 ried me to La Salle’s old harbour, the often-men¬ 
 tioned La Chine,* and however much La Salle was 
 mistaken in the view that induced him to bestow 
 this name on it, he was quite right in his choice of 
 a locality, for now, as 200 years ago, every one go- 
 ing upwards from Montreal in any direction, ships 
 himseli at this point. The railroads from the south 
 4 and west also run to this point, this old knot of 
 roads, and the passengers cross the river in boats. 
 We traversed Lake St Louis along its whole length 
 in a pretty fast-running boat, and in the afternoon 
 reached the cataracts, by which the Cataragui pours 
 itseli into the lake. Here is again a whole series 
 of rushing whirlpools and rapids miles long, as in 
 many parts of the Ottawa. On many rocky reefs 
 almost the whole river is lashed into foam, and only 
 
 * Only goods are carried by the already-mentioned La Chine canaL 
 VOL. I. 20 
 
30C 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 a very narrow channel left free for the passage of 
 vessels. The old French colonists distinguished 
 three principal reefs as the Said du trou, the Saut 
 du buisson, and the Rapides des Cadres. 
 
 These rapids, as well as the before-mentioned 
 division of the river, favoured the idea that the St 
 Lawrence here came to an end. The river and its 
 name was lost in this series of cascades, and when 
 it had collected itself again it seemed as if new 
 born. It was from the same idea that the Romans 
 called the Danube, below the great cataracts of the 
 Iron Gate, not Danube but Ister. 
 
 These various “ Sauts or leaps, for a long time 
 interrupted the navigation, and allowed only of the 
 passage of small rowing-boats. In going up the 
 river it is still necessary to make a circuit through 
 artificial canals. In coming down, steamers ven¬ 
 ture into the labyrinth of rock and foam, since they 
 are able better than any other craft, to move side¬ 
 ways or backwards as well as forwards, but even 
 they have been only able to effect the passage within 
 these few years. Every year, however, removes 
 some of the rocky obstructions, and enlarges some 
 apertures, and we heard now as we passed down 
 exploding and thundering sounds from the shores, 
 which gave token that the engineers were engaged 
 in the long battle that they have here carried on 
 
CATARAGUI. 
 
 307 
 
 against the obstinacy of Nature—a battle that they 
 will certainly win. The passage up, by the canals, 
 is said by travellers to be rather tedious. The 
 steamer is locked in a dozen times, and when by 
 the filling of its prison it is lifted to a free height, 
 it is but to find itself, after a short run, once more 
 in gaol. I found the operation however interesting 
 in itself, and it seemed to be comparatively very 
 quickly executed, especially when I considered what 
 a great number of vessels we had met and passed. 
 The abundance of water in the St Lawrence does 
 indeed allow these canals to be constantly and 
 abundantly fed, and as often as a vessel approaches, 
 the whole series of locks are filled, without any fear 
 of exhausting the water. The St Lawrence canals 
 have too the advantage of never requiring to be 
 cleaned, for the water of the river gets so purified 
 in the lakes that it scarcely leaves any deposit. 
 
 When the distance between two sluice-gates was 
 not too great, we passengers sometimes employed 
 the time in taking a walk, and saw then often close 
 to us portions of the old wild, broad, and wooded 
 river on which Nature has not yet completed her 
 thousand years’ task. 
 
 I was told that on these canals vessels drawing 
 ten feet of water can now be admitted, and that 
 
 consequently even sea-going vessels of a tolerable 
 
 20* 
 
308 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 size can pass them. Equally deep canals are found 
 further up to pass round the Falls of Niagara and 
 St Marie, so that vessels whose size and cargo is 
 not too considerable, may now pass from Chicago, 
 and the most distant points of Lake Superior, to 
 Montreal, Quebec, and the Atlantic Ocean. Ves¬ 
 sels have for some .time frequently arrived at Mont¬ 
 real that have made an inland-water voyage of 
 1400 miles, and ships have been built on the On¬ 
 tario to go to Australia, and sent from these har¬ 
 bours to sail round the world. All this seems 
 extraordinary when it is compared with what was 
 possible a few years ago, but greater things are an¬ 
 ticipated. Children in America grow fast, and 
 scarcely has a garment been made before it is found 
 too small, and must be replaced by a larger. The 
 Erie canal was scarcely finished before people be¬ 
 gan to talk of enlarging it and doing away with its 
 old narrow locks. The case is just the same here. 
 The St Lawrence canals are to be made 14 feet deep 
 and twice their present breadth, and it is hoped 
 the work will be completed before long, and then 
 the larger vessels can do what only small ones can 
 at present, take in their cargo at Liverpool or other 
 distant harbours, and carry it what we may call up 
 to the doors of the Backwoodsmen and the Indians. 
 
 These rapids and cataracts, as they cause an in- 
 
CATAIIAGUI. 
 
 termption in the trade, had the same effect in the 
 colonization and political division of the country. 
 With them terminated Old French Canada, the pre¬ 
 sent province of Lower Canada. The last French 
 villages and seigncurics lay on this side of the 
 cataract and along our canal. The region is not 
 uncultivated; on the contrary, we saw field after 
 field stretching for miles. The old French popula¬ 
 tion ceases soon on the northern shore of the river, 
 but extends somewhat further on the southern. 
 Coteau du Lac and Longrcuil are the last French 
 villages, and from this point begin the British Colo¬ 
 nies and Upper Canada. The French had, indeed, 
 many little forts and small settlements connected 
 with them for some hundreds of miles further, and 
 doubtless here and there cultivated lands, but the 
 real connected and inhabited Canada of the French 
 peasants ceases near Montreal and these rapids. 
 Beyond this it was the Canada of the military and 
 of the voyageurs. 
 
 Towards evening we got out into the Lake of St 
 Francis, a broad expanse of water,—half river, half 
 lake, such as I have described on the Ottawa,—and 
 the night as it came on added many beauties to this 
 imposing sheet of water that lay darkly stretched 
 out before us, the outline of its shores being visible 
 by light-houses and other lights. Sometimes a light 
 
 
310 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 would hover like a Will-o’-the-Wisp out of the 
 deep obscurity before us, hanging in the rigging of 
 a ship whose hull had been invisible in the thick 
 darkness. Then a few specks of vivid light would 
 appear on the distant horizon—fires, I was told, in 
 the woods thirty miles off. At midnight we were 
 again obliged to slip into a canal, and found the 
 locks all brilliantly illuminated, and as much bustle 
 going on on the quays and on the water as in one 
 of our Elbe harbours in the middle of the day. The 
 opening of the canal was full of vessels, and some 
 pushed their way with us into the lock ; and a few 
 steamers were just rushing out of it into the wide 
 dark Lake of St Francis. 
 
 Though we were all lit up with yellow, blue, and 
 red lamps, we very nearly came into collision, but 
 we did escape somehow, and when we found that 
 the safe but tedious canal navigation, and the mov¬ 
 ing up the watery steps, began again, most of us 
 were glad to seek our sleeping cabins, or, as the 
 Americans say, our ** State Rooms ”—why so called 
 I know not. “We have just had a narrow escape,” 
 said I to the gentleman who occupied one of the two 
 beds in my said “ State Room,” as I entered. “ We 
 had very nearly ran our heads against another 
 steamer. It is a wonder we escaped.” 
 
 “Oh, yes, sir,” he replied, yawning; “that is no- 
 
CATARAGUI. 
 
 311 
 
 thing uncommon in this country. The vessels are 
 always running each other down, or blowing each 
 other up, but we get used to it.” 
 
 “ Well, I do not find it easy to get used to it,” 
 said I, as I crawled into my berth. 
 
 “ Oh, you must not think anything of it,” said 
 my companion—a fine young American—looking 
 down on me, for he had the advantage of position 
 in the upper one. “ Here in Canada they are care¬ 
 ful enough, though horribly slow. I can’t stand this 
 country, they don’t go a-head enough; but you 
 come to the Mississippi, there you will see some¬ 
 thing; there you never feel yourself safe in your 
 berth for a moment. The boats there are very flat 
 and thin, and such Snags as there are on the Mis¬ 
 sissippi will sometimes pierce right through the 
 bottoms of them and stab you in your bed. Then 
 it happens sometimes that the steamer takes fire, in 
 a hot summer when the wood-work is all as dry as 
 tinder, or at the time of year when they are all 
 stuffed as full as they can hold with cotton, that 
 catches so easily, you know—and then they and all 
 they contain burn down to the water’s edge in a 
 few minutes. 
 
 “ Sometimes, at a sudden turn, the water will run 
 out of one boiler into the other that happens to be 
 empty, and then it bursts, and up you go in the air. 
 
But the best of all is the racing,—that ’s the .way 
 most of the vessels in the Mississippi come to 
 grief.” 
 
 “ Good heavens ! you are drawing a terrible 
 picture,” said I. “ I will never make a voyage on 
 the Mississippi as long as I live.” 
 
 “ Oh, when you are once there you forget all 
 about it, except your imagination works itself up 
 into a fever; and then you sleep first-rate on board 
 one of those Mississippi steamers.” 
 
 However that may be, we certainly did on this 
 St Lawrence Canal, and when I chanced to inquir-e 
 the next morning for the name of the steamer, I was 
 told she was called the “ Phoenix,” and a picture 
 of that remarkable fowl, rising from the midst of 
 flames, hung near the entrance to the ladies’ cabin. 
 It seemed as if the ship-architect and painter had 
 intended to console the passengers with the as¬ 
 surance that in case they should find themselves 
 making a similar ascent, another steamer quite as 
 handsome would be built again directly, and that 
 they might transform themselves in the Phoenix 
 style in the other world. 
 
 V 
 
THE HISTORY OF A PIECE OF LAND. 313 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 TnE HISTORY OF A PIECE OF LAND. 
 
 The next morning we were steaming along be¬ 
 tween Canada and the United States, for we had 
 crossed during the night the boundary line of the 
 British dominions, which runs along the 45th parallel 
 of latitude. This degree separates the States of New 
 York, Vermont, and New Hampshire on the one side, 
 from Lower Canada on the other; and, to make the 
 frontier plainly visible, portions of forest are cut 
 down here and there to mark the line, and a fellow- 
 passenger pointed out other portions of it in the 
 night by certain lights and villages that we were 
 passing. 
 
 T his whole district, from Lake Ontario along the 
 St Lawrence to the 45th parallel, was once in the 
 preceding century sold to a single individual, and 
 formed a connected domain of three millions of 
 
314 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 acres, or about 5000 English square miles. It 
 may perhaps be interesting if I give a few details 
 concerning this domain, as it may throw a light on 
 the mode of distribution and disposal of land in 
 America. They were communicated to me by a 
 descendant of the first owner. 
 
 At about the time of the American Revolution, I 
 do not know the precise year, a certain Mr Macomb 
 made, with a few companions, a sporting and canoe 
 voyage on the St Lawrence, or rather the Cataragui, 
 and became acquainted with the great district that 
 we were now passing, the northern part, namely, of 
 the State of New York. It did not stand in very 
 good repute, for it had formed part of the land of 
 the six nations, or Iroquois, and had never been 
 completely subjected either by French or English, 
 but remained as a kind of neutral territory and 
 battle-field between the two. 
 
 On the maps of the time the district is left entirely 
 white, and it had no inhabitants but a few scattered 
 Indians, the poor remains of the old valiant race of 
 the Iroquois. The river Hudson and its unknown 
 sources are pointed very variously upon it, and in¬ 
 deed there are in the eastern portion tracts that are 
 not even yet thoroughly known, although it is con¬ 
 sidered with its lakes and mountains as a kind of 
 New York Switzerland. 
 

 THE HISTORY OF A PIECE OF LAND. 315 
 
 This sporting Mr Macomb, however, saw in it 
 something more. He saw fine forests, useful trees, 
 fertile fields, and fine sites for future villages and 
 towns, and he entered into partnership with another 
 man, and between them they raised a capital of 
 about 200,000 dollars, with which they set about 
 their speculation. 
 
 The financial condition of New York, as well as 
 of all the States of the Union, was in those first 
 years of the Revolution deplorable; the sum rais¬ 
 ed by Mr Macomb and his associate was, there¬ 
 fore, extremely welcome, and the Government had 
 little objection to give in return some of their use¬ 
 less land, not less than, as I have said, three mil¬ 
 lions of acres, at the rate of eight and a half cents 
 per acre—a square mile for about 50 dollars. (I 
 have seen the original of this remarkable contract.) 
 
 The 3,000,000 of acres were then for the first 
 time measured, and a grant made of them to Mr 
 Macomb, or rather three separate grants of a million 
 each. They are written upon parchment, with a great 
 waxen seal of the State of New York appended to 
 each. It shows on one side the sun rising among 
 mountains ; and on the other side a rock beaten by 
 the surf, with the motto, Frustra. This first armo¬ 
 rial bearing of the State has long since been re¬ 
 placed by another. With the territory thus ac- 
 
316 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 quired between Lake Ontario and Montreal, the 
 purchasers now began land speculation on a scale 
 that is not common even in the United States. Of 
 course they had their district described and made 
 known in all possible ways. They travelled to 
 Europe to find associates and colonists ; in Holland, 
 in England, in Prance, they formed small companies, 
 to which they sold portions of their land—one 
 Dutch company, for instance, took half a million of 
 acres; a French, I believe, a few hundred thousand, 
 and smaller parcels were sold to private individuals. 
 
 In the mean time the original mover of the pro¬ 
 ject somehow got into difficulties, and retired from 
 the concern, leaving his partner, the ancestor of a 
 highly-respected family in New York, as sole proprie¬ 
 tor of the land still unsold, namely, one million of 
 acres. He now devoted himself to getting this 
 tract settled and cultivated, and as many of the 
 farmers he placed on it gradually became proprie¬ 
 tors, his million of acres had, in the course of years, 
 much diminished ; but 200,000 is still left in posses¬ 
 sion of his descendants—that is, an estate about as 
 large as the Grand Duchy of Weimar. The present 
 proprietor thus explained in my hearing the prin¬ 
 ciples on which he has proceeded in its administra¬ 
 tion: “I let the people have my land,” he said, 
 “on very advantageous conditions, and I do not 
 
THE HISTORY OF A PIECE OF LAND. 317 
 
 care whether they have capital or not. I desire 
 to get healthy, vigorous men, willing to work, and 
 of unblemished character; and these are the cir¬ 
 cumstances according to which my agents are in¬ 
 structed to grant or refuse applications. I leave 
 the settler time to make himself a home in the 
 portion of wilderness allotted to him, and to make a 
 little profit, with which he may pay off the pur¬ 
 chase-money. IIow and when he will do this de¬ 
 pends entirely on himself, and I require no rent for 
 the land, and no interest on the money owing me. 
 The labour they bestow on the land is a rent they 
 pay me ; for of course until the purchase-money is 
 paid it remains my property, and is daily becoming 
 more valuable. This labour is in some measure 
 controlled by my agents, and if the tenant will 
 neither pay« nor work on it, we require him to clear 
 a piece of forest, or build a few small bridges or a 
 barn. , 
 
 “ Sometimes the settler goes off, after having lived 
 on the land ten years, without paying me a penny, 
 but since he has left me meadows for marshes, and 
 fields, stables, and cottages for wild forest, 1 find 
 my account in the transaction, and can now sell 
 the land for a higher price.” 
 
 I saw a curious collection of maps of these ex¬ 
 tensive estates. Every township, every section was 
 
318 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 represented upon them in detail, and every single 
 settler, and the extent of his property laid down. 
 I noticed in running over the book that some of 
 the properties were very small and close together: 
 others, on the contrary, very extensive and widely 
 scattered, and the difference was explained to me 
 by the difference of nationality. 
 
 The small thickly-set farms belong to German 
 peasants; the large and far-stretching ones to 
 Yankees. The German enters timidly on this un¬ 
 known country; he has no notion of helping him¬ 
 self so expeditiously as the Yankee does, and he 
 always dreams of making a new home—a little 
 Germany—wherever he is, and of being surrounded 
 by neighbours and countrymen, and he looks out 
 some small portion of twenty or thirty acres, that 
 he can easily manage, and honestly pay for, and 
 have friends and neighbours snugly settled near 
 him. 
 
 The Yankee, on the contrary, can make himself 
 at home anywhere; he is accustomed to do things 
 on a large scale, and to feel himself, when at large 
 in the fields and woods, as a true lord of creation. 
 He has no fear of marshes or forests, but keeps to 
 his “ go-a-head ” principles, and feels sure of get¬ 
 ting on. He has no hesitation in taking a square 
 mile of land if he can get it, or even twice as much; 
 
THE HISTORY OF A PIECE OF LAND. 319 
 
 then he builds for his wife and children a log-house 
 as comfortable as he can possibly make it; and 
 when he once has this warm nest ready, sets to 
 work vigorously to clear his land. He does not 
 concern himself about neighbours, he is self-reliant, 
 and not particularly sociable, and can remain con¬ 
 tentedly for years alone in the forest without ever 
 coming out of it, except on business. 
 
 Very often he detests neighbours, and if they 
 come too near him, moves off further to the West 
 to get out of their way. 
 
 “ Hills are the best neighbours,” is a Yankee pro¬ 
 verb, and even in the thinly-peopled regions of Mis¬ 
 souri, Arkansas, &c., it is not uncommon to find 
 farmers of even seventy years of age suddenly 
 packing up their goods and moving away westward, 
 for no other reason than that the country is getting 
 too populous and “ noisy ” for them. 
 
 The German settlers, this gentleman said, were 
 the most welcome to him; they were industrious 
 and persevering, and did not wish merely to work 
 up the land, but to make a home of it. “ They are 
 saving too, and like to lay by a little money in hard 
 cash; they abhor debts, and it is easy to see that 
 every dollar they pay is a weight off their minds. 
 
 “ As for the Yankee, he can bear a considerable 
 amount of debt without being at all uncomfortable; 
 
320 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 lie speculates on credit, lays out every farthing lie 
 gets on improvement, and at last very likely be¬ 
 comes a rich man, and pays off all at once the claim 
 that the German has been discharging slowly, bit 
 by bit.” 
 
' 
 
 
 IMMIGRANTS. 321 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 IMMIGRANTS. 
 
 I wish I had been acquainted with the gentle¬ 
 man above alluded to at the time I was making the 
 passage up the Cataragui, for our steamer was 
 swarming with German emigrants, all streaming 
 towards the West, and they might perhaps have ob¬ 
 tained what they sought without so. long a journey. 
 
 The St Lawrence steamers, I was told, had been 
 equally crowded all the summer, and every year 
 the number of immigrants is increasing. With 
 respect to Canada, however, they are merely birds 
 of passage, for nearly all of them are bound for the 
 rich prairies on Lake Michigan and the upper Mis¬ 
 sissippi. 
 
 The increase of the means of transport, the rail¬ 
 roads, the steamers, &c., on the St Lawrence line, 
 is probably the cause of this increase of passengers, 
 
 VOL. I. 21 
 
322 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 and great efforts are being made in Montreal and Que¬ 
 bec to strengthen still further the Canadian means 
 of transport. Four large new steamers have been 
 this year placed on the Quebec and England line, 
 and the passage is cheaper than that by New York 
 or Liverpool. It is now possible to reach Chicago, 
 the great central port of the West, without ever 
 leaving the ship, and this lake and river passage 
 offers several advantages over the long railroad jour¬ 
 neys by Philadelphia or New York. 
 
 The belief that the immigration by the St Law¬ 
 rence will now increase in an unheard-of manner is 
 pretty general in Canada, and also that it will not 
 have merely the transit trade, but retain some of 
 the labour in the country. 
 
 I made it my business, of course, to observe and 
 converse with the immigrants—for how much to oc¬ 
 cupy the understanding and interest the heart is 
 offered by the sight of 300 people leaving Europe 
 for America! The great majority of them too, namely, 
 193, were Germans, and there were 32 Swedes, 30 
 Dutchmen, and the rest Britons. They all looked 
 deplorable enough, poor things ! and seemed to have 
 suffered much from the hardships of the voyage; 
 they were very poorly clad too, and a few rather 
 tastefully costumed Indian women, whom we had 
 on board, were gazed at so respectfully by our Ger- 
 
IMMIGRANTS. 
 
 323 
 
 man peasant lads, that if they had had to speak to 
 them, I am convinced they would have addressed 
 them as “ Madame ” or “ Mademoiselle.” 
 
 By the appearance of the yellow flaxen heads of 
 the Scandinavians, it would seem that combs and 
 brushes were scarce among them, and the babies 
 that lay on their mothers’ laps would, I hoped, some 
 day consume more soap than had hitherto been ex¬ 
 pended on them. Germans, Swedes, and Dutch 
 were all alike in this respect, but they looked, never¬ 
 theless, judging from their marked and character¬ 
 istic physiognomies, as if something might be made 
 of them. 
 
 The Swedes are quite a new element in the immi¬ 
 gration, although formerly their Gustavus Adolphus 
 did send a few of them over to the New World. 
 Many of these our Scandinavian companions had 
 not yet used up all the coarse bread they had 
 brought with them from Sweden, and I saw more 
 than one Norna-like matron take out for breakfast 
 and dinner a large paper containing a collection of 
 pieces of this hard bread, and distribute them 
 sparingly to her children; and I noticed too that 
 every little crumb that was left was carefully packed 
 up again. I hope they have now long since been 
 eating good American wheaten bread. 
 
 One family, in particular, I would gladly know had 
 21* 
 
324 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 thus fared. I discovered them one day, just after 
 the luxurious breakfast that the first cabin passengers 
 obtain on the American steamers; and then heard 
 a second breakfast-bell ring, and a proclamation 
 made in a loud voice that “ Such of the ’tween- 
 deck passengers as wish to breakfast, are requested 
 to go into the cabin.” This was said several times, 
 and I was curious to see what effect this friendly 
 invitation would have on the poor wanderers. None 
 of them stirred, to my astonishment, at the moment, 
 for I had forgotten that the repast would have to 
 be paid for, and pretty highly. My Swedes re¬ 
 mained soaking their hard cmsts in a little tea, and 
 the Dutchmen munching their bread and cheese. 
 In the midst of the crowd, and seated upon chests 
 and bales of goods, I saw a family group, whom I 
 recognised at once as my country-people from the 
 Black Forest. It was a mother and five children, 
 who had nothing but bread and tea, without sugar, 
 milk, or butter. I was so fortunate as to be able 
 to procure them some of these articles, though not 
 all, and then we got into comfortable conversation. 
 I inquired after the place of their destination. “ Mo¬ 
 ther, what’s the place we ’re going to ?” said a half- 
 grown girl. “ Ah, I don’t know; father will know 
 the name of it!” “ Here, father, what ’s the name 
 
 of the place we’re going to?” and at these words 
 
IMMIGRANTS. 
 
 325 
 
 came forward an elderly, serious-looking man in a 
 long woollen coat or blouse, whom I had before 
 noticed on the deck. The question appeared how¬ 
 ever to puzzle him a little. “ What ’s the name of 
 it ? Well, I know there ’s a canal being made there 
 down in the West, and the agent said I could 
 work at that and get a little money, and then we 
 could go further. But wait a bit, sir, I have it 
 written down on a piece of paper, on the letter the 
 agent gave me. See hbre, sir, it ’s Hamilton, 
 that ’s the name of it.” And hereupon he handed 
 me a little piece of paper torn out of a pocket-book, 
 on which was written in pencil a short recommend¬ 
 ation of the family to an inhabitant of Hamilton. 
 They appeared to think a great deal of this pencil- 
 recommendation ; their reliance on this scrap of 
 paper was taking them to Hamilton. 
 
 “You see, sir,” he continued, “we meant to go 
 to Westconsiii (Wisconsin), and so first to Chicago, 
 where so many of our country-people go, but the 
 voyage cost a great deal more than we expected. 
 Instead of their giving us our food, and plenty of 
 it, as they promised, we had to pay for it dearly 
 enough, and hardly got as much as would keep 
 body and soul together. I had to pay a shilling 
 almost every day to the ship’s cook to let my 
 wife cook something warm for us, out of our 
 
326 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 own stores, and so it happens that I have now only 
 got five dollars left, and the journey for us to 
 Chicago would cost three times as much,” and he 
 showed me his five-dollar note, which, as his only 
 treasure, he had got carefully concealed. “ Do you 
 think we shall be able to manage with that till I 
 can earn something ? You see, sir, the fact is, that 
 I am a village doctor from the Black Forest, and I 
 have been practising there for thirty years, but, at 
 last, it would not do any longer; my family grew 
 larger and my practice less, and my hair, as you 
 see, has turned grey before my time. The people 
 in the Black Forest are all very badly off lately, 
 and in our village we were fairly starving. Those 
 who have not seen it would hardly believe what I 
 could tell them of what I have seen there.” 
 
 The poor man then pulled out a bunch of papers 
 to confirm the truth of what he had been telling 
 me. There were his student papers, thirty years 
 old,—the various testimonies to his having gone 
 through a course of medical study,—the permission 
 to emigrate from the authorities of the village, and 
 the declaration that neither debts nor any other 
 duties stood in the way of his intention,—good 
 wishes that a better fate might await him in the 
 New World, and finally his passport, and descrip¬ 
 tion of his person from head to foot. This pass- 
 
'~w.ll 
 
 IMMIGRANTS. 
 
 port was wrapped lip with especial care, although 
 when he had once got shipped at Rotterdam the 
 document was not very valuable, but we Germans 
 are brought up from our infancy with" such respect 
 for passports, that we often go dragging about the 
 precious articles for a long time even through the 
 wilds of America. The account these poor people 
 gave of their voyage was terrible. They had been 
 nine weeks out from Liverpool to Quebec, and cold 
 and storms had brought them to the verge of de¬ 
 struction, and the ill-treatment they had suffered 
 from men was worse than that inflicted by the 
 elements. The captain and the crew had been 
 extremely harsh, unjust, and even cruel. Accord¬ 
 ing to the agreement every passenger was to receive 
 good food, but they had lain fourteen days in the 
 harbour of Liverpool, waiting for the weather, and 
 during all this time the captain had said they must 
 feed themselves. He had only engaged to feed 
 them on the high seas. Lor the first few days 
 after they got to sea they used to get just enough 
 to satisfy their hunger, but after that there were 
 always quarrels with the Irish about the food, and 
 the British sailors naturally took part with their 
 countrymen, and the Germans got the worst of it. 
 Very often there was nothing left for them, and 
 “the Swedes and the Dutchmen were not any 
 
 
 
328 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 better off than the Germans ” (I think my patriot¬ 
 ism felt a little consolation in this). Some of these 
 poor creatures had brought a little cheese, or bread, 
 or sausages with them, others who had not, had to 
 pay away their last farthing, and some, who had 
 neither food nor money, died and were thrown over¬ 
 board. 
 
 l.es, sir, they died. We lost on the way 
 twenty-seven passengers, women, children, and in¬ 
 firm old people who could not bear the hardships, 
 and yet we had no cholera nor epidemic whatever 
 on board.” 
 
 “Ja well myn Heer,” broke in a Dutchman, 
 “ seven and twenty of us died of hunger and thirst.” 
 
 “ Could you not complain to the captain?” said I. 
 
 “ Ah, the captain, he was just the worst of all! 
 He had no mercy on us at all, and he used to 
 threaten to throw us overboard at once if we teased 
 him with our complaints. He and his men treated 
 us like slaves. The sailors used to come into our 
 sleeping-places with ropes’ ends and drive us up to 
 work at the pumps, or some other task. Some¬ 
 times they would pour cold water over the people, 
 as they said, to set them on their legs; and one 
 man, who really was very weak and ill, but whom 
 they thought well, they downright murdered. They 
 dragged him to the deck, though he sighed and 
 
IMMIGRANTS. 
 
 329 
 
 groaned, and kept pouring water upon him, to 
 make him fit for work, they said. One night we 
 saw him lying exhausted on the deck, and the next 
 morning he w r as gone; we suppose they threw him 
 overboard. It ’s a wonder we didn’t all die.” 
 
 “ Did not you complain of the captain when you 
 got to America?” 
 
 “ Yes, and the Sanitary officers when they came 
 on board, and found how many people had died, 
 saw there was something wrong, and called the 
 captain to account. He is in prison for it now in 
 Quebec, and they say it will go ill with him.” 
 
 “ Perhaps it will by and by in hell,” whispered 
 a bystander to me, “ but not in Quebec, I fancy; 
 most likely the man is not in prison at all, they 
 only tell the people these things to keep them 
 quiet.” 
 
 When I thought of what these people had suffer¬ 
 ed before they left the Black Forest, and of the 
 purgatory this Liverpool captain had carried them 
 through, I was grieved to know that a third time 
 of trial awaited them in their Backwoods’ life, their 
 canal and road making, but if they could only get 
 through this, 1 had little fear for their future. 
 
 I spoke with a great number of these German 
 emigrants, and heard the story of their adventures, 
 plans, and hopes. Many of the mechanics seemed 
 
330 
 
 TRAVELS IX CANADA. 
 
 to intend continuing their custom of wandering 
 from place to place, even after they had landed in 
 America. One of them, a potter, had already been 
 in New Orleans, whence he was driven by heat and 
 yellow fever, and also in Philadelphia, New York, and 
 Albany, where he found the cold intolerable, and was 
 now going to seek his fortune in Chicago. None of 
 them interested me or occupied my thoughts so 
 much as the poor old village doctor, and his numer¬ 
 ous family, with his slender purse, and his scrap of 
 a pencilled recommendation. But, unluckily, Ger¬ 
 many was not well enough represented in the cabin 
 to enable me to do much to help him, and Heaven 
 knows what became of the poor creatures after all! 
 
1 
 
 V 
 
 J 
 
 THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 331 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 The middle of that portion of the St Lawrence 
 which, as I have said, was formerly called Catara- 
 gui, has become, I scarcely know why, the chief 
 centre of traffic for this part of the country. The 
 two most important towns of the district here lie 
 opposite one another. Prescott on the Canadian 
 side, and Ogdensburg on the American. Railroads 
 from the interior terminate at both places, and there 
 is therefore a great deal of life and bustle on the 
 water. The St Lawrence is rather narrow at this 
 point, and nowhere can a comparison be made 
 more conveniently between a Canadian and an 
 American town. Prescott exhibits much darker 
 hues than Ogdensburg, where all looks brighter and 
 pleasanter ; the houses of the former are built in 
 solid style of grey stone, the same building material 
 
332 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 that has served for Montreal. The Americans have 
 a passion for white and green houses, and plant 
 willows and other elegant trees between them, and 
 the contrast might be continued to many other 
 particulars were it worth while. You have before 
 you at once a piece of the “ old country,” and one 
 of the quite new. 
 
 Ogdensburg is the capital of the tract of land 
 that I described a chapter or two back; some miles 
 beyond it lies another pretty river port, Brockville, 
 and then again some miles further begins the cele¬ 
 brated *• Lake of a Thousand Islands; ” but to have 
 a clear idea of the origin and configuration of this 
 lake, you must begin at Lake Ontario. 
 
 Lake Ontario forms on its western side a regu¬ 
 larly-drawn oval, with smoothly-cut shores, and no 
 considerable islands or appendages. On its north¬ 
 eastern side, however, where its waters have broken 
 through the obstacles that opposed their progress, 
 its hitherto broad smooth expanse is broken up 
 among numerous islands and peninsulas. 
 
 First comes the large peninsula of Prince Edward, 
 then Duck Island, and several others, as well as 
 long gulfs, bays, and inlets, breaking the land 
 right and left. Then near Kingston you have the 
 great Wolf Island, Amherst Island, and others; 
 rugged masses of land that the water could not 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 333 
 
 overcome, or possibly which rose above the surface 
 when the Ontario subsided into its present bed. 
 At length, beyond Wolf Island the lake contracts 
 to a breadth of six or seven miles, and here begins 
 the “ Lake of the Thousand Islands.” These islands 
 are, as the name indicates, extraordinarily numerous, 
 and the water is split up into a corresponding num¬ 
 ber of channels; but at length the river developes 
 itself again out of the labyrinth. For a distance 
 of thirty miles, reckoning from Kingston, the waters 
 contract more and more, hollow out a deeper and 
 deeper channel, and wear away more and more of 
 the islands, which gradually become less numerous, 
 and cease entirely some miles above Brockville. 
 The current now becomes stronger, the two shores 
 appear, the lake disappears, and the river takes its 
 place; but this is for any one coming down the 
 river, we were pursuing an opposite course. 
 
 The name of the locality, “ Thousand Islands,” 
 was probably bestowed by the Jesuits, or the cele¬ 
 brated Canadian traveller Champlain, who was the 
 first discoverer of Lake Ontario. The number of 
 the islands is of course only guessed at; some make 
 them 1500, and some as many as 3000, as they 
 perhaps may, if they bestow the name of island on 
 every separate bit of rock that sticks out of the 
 
334 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 water,—or every reef or sand-bank that lies just 
 under it. 
 
 Half of these islands lie along the American shore, 
 the rest nearer to Canada, and the frontier line has 
 been drawn between the two, and the channel for the 
 steamers keeps pretty closely to this line. The whole 
 scene is renowned as interesting and picturesque 
 both in the United States and in Canada, and par¬ 
 ties of pleasure, pic-nics, and sporting excursions 
 are made to it both from Kingston and Brockville. 
 People hire one of the elegant yachts or boats built 
 at Kingston, and sail about with their friends from 
 island to island, dine, camp under the trees, shoot 
 the water-fowl, fish, and amuse themselves in many 
 ways. Many remain for days together, for the 
 tours among these almost countless islands have 
 something of the charm of voyages of discovery. 
 One of the party, perhaps, declares he knows of an 
 island that has never yet been visited; another 
 tells of a deep, wooded bay, in whose clear, calm 
 waters no one has yet tried to anchor. 
 
 We reached the first of the islands, a little above 
 Brockville, and soon found ourselves surrounded by 
 them ; sometimes lying in a long string like a 
 row of beads; sometimes flung pell-mell together 
 in a heap. Some are large and covered with 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 335 
 
 thick woods; all have trees, and there are some so 
 small that they have only just room for one tree or 
 a bush. There is an infinite variety in the grouping 
 of the trees too, some being gathered into social 
 parties, some living as solitary hermits, so that 
 perpetually new combinations are formed in the 
 scenery. Some of the islands are just barely hid¬ 
 den under a thin covering of moss and other vege¬ 
 tation, and sometimes the crystal water is flowing 
 over a mass of naked rock that it barely covers. 
 
 The foundation of all these islands I believe to 
 be granite, and in general they are not high, 
 though picturesque pedestals are afforded for the 
 trees by banks of twenty feet deep. The larger 
 have hills and valleys, and arable land enough to be 
 worth cultivating, though hitherto little has been 
 obtained from them besides game, fish, and wood. 
 Villages there are none, and only a few scattered 
 dwellings or shanties for sportsmen, wood-cutters, 
 and lumber-men, with a few mechanical contrivances, 
 such as are seen on the Ottawa, for the collecting 
 and transport of the felled trees. The islands all 
 have owners, but, as everywhere in America where 
 land, wood, and water remain unused, they have 
 been to some extent invaded by squatters, whose 
 huts we saw here and there on the shores, and the 
 owners seldom offer any objection, as they consider 
 
336 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 that these people help to reclaim the land and make 
 some steps towards its cultivation. 
 
 The best time to visit the islands is in spring and 
 in the early summer, for then the trees and shrubs 
 are fragrant from every cliff; the woods are full 
 of birds and various animals ; and sometimes when 
 the air is very hot, the water is so deliciously cool 
 and fresh that it is a delight to plunge into it. 
 But in the cold autumn day when I visited the 
 lake the water is less attractive; Goethe’s fisher¬ 
 man could only have been enchanted by the Nixie 
 on a w r arm summer’s evening. 
 
 The autumn is, however, the loveliest time for 
 one of the greatest attractions of the islands, and 
 the green, red, yellow, brown, and golden leafage 
 was beautifully mirrored in the clear water be¬ 
 neath. Some of the islands, when the sunbeams 
 fell on them, seemed quite to flame, and, in fact, 
 this does sometimes happen in more than a me¬ 
 taphorical sense, and the burning woods produce, 
 it is said, a most magnificent spectacle. If you 
 chance to be passing in a steamer, you may enjoy 
 the sight nearer and more conveniently than a 
 similar scene elsewhere, as the intervening water 
 renders it safe. The boats there run very close in 
 shore, and the passengers can look deeply into the 
 recesses of the blazing woods and yet remain in 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 337 
 
 security. I was told this by a gentleman who had 
 enjoyed the sight; and another, who noticed the 
 interest I took in these Thousand Islands, men¬ 
 tioned some further particulars. In his youth, he 
 said, they were still inhabited by Indians, remnants 
 of the Iroquois or Six Nations, to whom the whole 
 north of the State of New York belonged. These 
 islanders were called Massassoga, a name that still 
 occurs in various localities on the St Lawrence; 
 their chief resided on one of the principal islands, 
 and the rest of the tribe was scattered about on 
 the others, in birch-huts or tents. Their canoes 
 were of the same material, and with these they 
 used to glide softly over the water, and, in the nu¬ 
 merous little bays or arms of the river, surprise the 
 fish, which, having never been disturbed by noisy 
 steamers, filled the waters in countless abundance. 
 The birds and other game were equally plentiful in 
 the woods; but now, when greedy squatters and 
 sportsmen with guns have exhausted the district, 
 the islands are comparatively devoid of animal life. 
 
 It was the practice among the Massassoga, at 
 certain times of the year, to leave the islands to 
 their young people, and make great hunting ex¬ 
 peditions, northward into the interior of Canada, 
 and southward to New York. My informant had 
 visited them once when he was a young man, and 
 
 vol. i. 22 
 
338 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 being hospitably received, had afterwards repeated 
 his visits, made acquaintance and friends among 
 them, lived with them for weeks, and shared the 
 joys and sorrows of the life of the hunter. Once 
 when he had been on a journey to Niagara and the 
 West, and had been a long time absent, he could 
 not desist when he passed the Thousand Islands 
 on his return to his native town, Brockville, from 
 making a call by the way on his Massassoga friends. 
 They recognized him immediately, gave him the 
 wannest reception, and carried him on their should¬ 
 ers to their chief, who made a great feast in his 
 honour, and canoes full of Indians came gliding in 
 crowds from the islands to see and welcome him. 
 He had to pass the night among them; the squaws 
 prepared his couch, and two of them insisted in 
 serving him as a guard of honour at his tent door, 
 where they camped out and kept up the fire. “ I 
 was almost moved to tears myself, sir, on seeing 
 my half-savage friends again. Believe me, it is a 
 race very susceptible to kindness, though, at the 
 same time, certainly very revengeful for injuries. 
 They never forget their friends, but are terrible and 
 even treacherous against their enemies. We have 
 very erroneous notions of the Indians. We call 
 them poor and miserable, but they appear quite 
 otherwise to themselves. They are proud of their 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 339 
 
 prowess and animal daring, and of the performances 
 of their forefathers. In fact, they think themselves 
 the first race in creation.” 
 
 “Are there now any remains of these proud 
 people on the islands ? ” 
 
 “ No. They have been scattered like chaff; 
 their fisheries and their hunting became continually 
 less productive; the villages and towns of the whites 
 grew up around them; they began to feel the pres¬ 
 sure of want ; their race died away like the fish in 
 their waters, and at last the few who remained ac¬ 
 cepted a proposal of the government, that they 
 should exchange these islands for a more remote 
 habitation,—I do not myself know exactly where.” 
 
 The only living being that appeared very com¬ 
 mon here now was the bird the English call the 
 “loon.” It is a water-fowl as large as a goose, 
 with a very thick head and long beak; its colour 
 black with white spots on the wings. This large 
 bird was swimming about everywhere among the 
 islands, and it was curious to see how exactly simi¬ 
 lar was the impulse of instinct in the numerous 
 specimens that we met in the course of thirty miles. 
 As long as our boat remained pretty far off, they 
 swam quietly about on the glassy water, attending 
 only to their own affairs, and busy in catching in¬ 
 sects or fish ; but as soon as we came within three 
 
 22 * 
 
 
340 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 hundred yards they shot up into the air, with their 
 long necks stretched out, and rolling about their 
 still longer heads, so as to look at us timidly, now 
 with the right, and now with the left eye. 
 
 In the second stage of their fear, this anxious 
 movement w’as communicated to their whole body, 
 and they steered alternately right and left, and at 
 last flew straight on before of us; but when they 
 noticed that our winged steam monster was soon 
 again within a hundred yards or so, they seemed 
 fairly to give it up,—rolled their heads about a 
 little more, and then threw a somersault, and went 
 down heels over head into the water and disappear¬ 
 ed. All these motions were repeated by every in¬ 
 dividual as exactly as if they had been previously 
 agreed upon. 
 
 These “ loons,” the “ wintergreens,” and the nu¬ 
 merous watch-towers among the islands, were the 
 only objects that specially attracted my attention. 
 This wintergreen, or pyrola, is a low plant or bush, 
 that does not at all, at least in the autumn, corre¬ 
 spond with its name—for it looked blood red, and 
 covered the ground under the trees with a red 
 carpet. Sometimes it ran as a border round the 
 islands, and then the groups of trees seemed to be 
 enclosed in a wreath of red flowers, as I have seen 
 them in an English park. The light houses, too. 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 341 
 
 tended to convey the impression that we were not 
 upon the mighty St Lawrence, but on the artificial 
 waters of some pleasure-ground,—for they were 
 elegant white buildings, like pavilions or kiosks,— 
 sometimes half hidden in a grove, sometimes rising 
 from a little island promontory. They are numer¬ 
 ous, and of course very necessary, as the winding 
 watery channel is continually changing its direction 
 in this labyrinth of islands. 
 
 By degrees—after you have breakfasted once, 
 and had one dinner—the garden comes to an end, 
 and you emerge upon the open field,—that is to 
 say, the broad water, and the approach of the 
 Ontario and the city of Kingston is announced. 
 On the Canadian shore to the north, close along 
 which w r e were moving, the houses, farms, and 
 villages were again numerous, and on observing the 
 dwellings closely, I discovered in some of them, to 
 my great satisfaction, a striking resemblance to 
 those of my worthy French Canadians of Lower 
 Canada; the houses lie along the river as closely a3 
 there, and in the midst of them is a church—from 
 its form and style evidently a Catholic one. 
 
 I turned to a country-looking man who was lean¬ 
 ing, like myself, over the bulwark of the vessel, look¬ 
 ing attentively at the houses, with an inquiry as to 
 whether they were really inhabited by French people. 
 
342 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 “ Oui, Monsieur ,” was the answer, “ c’est moi et 
 mes confreres, et nies voisins, nous demeurons la de- 
 puis dix, vingt, ou trente ans. Nous sommes tous 
 originaires du bas Canada, mais nous aeons suivi le 
 cours de Vemigration Anglaise.” 
 
 The man whom I had addressed was a simply 
 and cleanly dressed peasant, of very open and agree¬ 
 able countenance, and modest but quite self-pos¬ 
 sessed in his behaviour. His complexion was very 
 fresh and healthy and his aspect was good humour 
 personified. Although he was turned of forty, he 
 had still something youthful in his mode of speak¬ 
 ing, and the expression of his eyes was naive, I 
 might almost say innocent. Sometimes he seemed 
 to hesitate to speak about something, and then it 
 seemed to me that a slight blush passed quickly 
 across his face. His whole conversation was ex¬ 
 tremely characteristic of the true French-Canadian 
 type. 
 
 “ That is, I suppose, your Catholic Church?” said 
 I, “ Oui, Monsieur, c’est notre petite Chapelle Fran - 
 poise. File est asses grande pour nous, nous ne som¬ 
 mes que vingt families ici. Do you see there, behind 
 the chapel to the right, that is my little abode, and 
 all the fields behind it belong to me. That large 
 house up there is Monsieur Jacquelin’s, my cousin, 
 he has forty acres of excellent land, and up atop of 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 343 
 
 the hill there is Monsieur George, my uncle, he has 
 thirty-five acres all nicely cleaned and dressed, fields 
 without a stone in them, and the forest now driven 
 a long way back. When we came here, twenty years 
 ago, the place was nothing but trees, nothing but 
 firs, firs, firs! we had enough to do with them at 
 first, but now we are all well off and my property 
 is constantly growing. I have a good wife, a 
 daughter, and two sons. My girl has been work¬ 
 ing for some years at her trousseau , but I do not 
 fear but that she will find a use for it. My two 
 sons are both grown up, and are now away from 
 home, employed on board steam-boats.” 
 
 “ Are they good and industrious ? ” 
 
 “ Oh, sir, they are excellent fellows ! Every half 
 year they bring me punctually what they have 
 earned. But what a good education I gave them ! 
 1 had little enough myself, I barely learned to read 
 and write, it wasn’t the fashion at that time in 
 Lower Canada. But here in Upper Canada we 
 have very good schools, and I have taken care that 
 my children should learn both languages, English 
 and French, there’s no getting on without the two, 
 —I have been vexed with myself often enough for 
 being able to speak nothing but my Canadian. It’s 
 a fine thing to learn several languages, you make 
 yourself so agreeable to people. You see, sir, how 
 
344 
 
 TRAVELS IN CANADA. 
 
 you please me now by speaking to me in my own 
 language, as if you were bom in Canada, and how 
 ashamed I am that I cannot return your politeness. 
 Well, that shall not happen to my children, so I 
 have got them a good education.” 
 
 “ How do you manage with the money your sons 
 bring you ? ” 
 
 “ I put it by for them in a good strong box—the 
 eldest’s earnings in one place and the youngest’s in 
 another. Their capital is growing every year, and 
 the eldest has already 700 piastres. He may soon 
 leave off travelling and come and marry and settle 
 here. I have had my eye on a little farm for him 
 for a long time, the piece of land up there close to 
 my house. I have offered 600 for it, and if we put 
 a little more to that I dare say we shall get it in 
 time. Then my son will take a wife and come and 
 live near us, and my second will in time do just 
 the same, and if I cannot find anything suitable 
 for him, I will give him a piece of my own land.” 
 
 “ \ our children are not like the Americans then, 
 they leave their parents to set up for themselves, 
 and often never see them again.” 
 
 “Ah, Dieu preserve Monsieur; je deteste ce 
 Systeme lä. No! no, sir; I like to have my 
 children all round me, like a hen does her little 
 ones! ” 
 
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. 
 
 345 
 
 All that this worthy man said may, as I before 
 mentioned, be regarded as typical of the nation. 
 It was all truly Canadian. The French-Canadians, 
 in general, act and feel just like my travelling 
 companion, who accompanied us to Kingston, and 
 thence hastened home to his village, and to his 
 wife and daughter, uncle and cousins. 
 
 END OF VOL. i. 
 
JOHN CHILDS AND SON, PRINTERS. 
 

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