LETTER VII.
All journeys to and from the Bush are prosecuted under such difficulties, that it is very fortunate they are few and far between. Indeed, few of the better class of settlers would remain, but for the near prospect of Government granting roads in the township, and the more distant one of the different companies for buying the pine-wood bridging over the deep gullies on the lots to facilitate their taking away the timber. When one of the expectant members for Muskoka paid us, in the course of the summer, an election visit, this was the point on which we mainly insisted. Our courteous visitor promised everything; but as his subsequent election was declared null and void, we have as yet reaped no benefit from his promises.
Towards the end of August, I was compelled to pay my half-yearly visit to B——e, for the purpose of getting my pension-lists signed and duly forwarded. Your brother likewise had to take in two settlers in the vicinity, to swear off some land before taking it up. At first we thought of making our way to the post-office, three miles off, and from thence taking places in the mail-cart; but as we had to take in our settlers, and to pay all their expenses to and from B——e, your brother thought it best to send to the town for a wagon and team expressly for ourselves. This arrived; but, alas! in the afternoon instead of the morning, which had been specially mentioned.
On this day we fully proved the glorious uncertainty of the Canadian climate. The morning had been lovely, but towards three p.m. a soft, drizzling rain began to fall, which increased in volume and power till it became a drenching torrent.
Your brother-in-law took charge of me, and assisted me in scrambling over the different gullies; but by the time I considered it safe to get into the wagon, I was already wet through. The horses were so tired, having come from a distant journey, that we travelled very slowly, and it was dark when we drew up at the half-way house, where we were to have tea and to rest the poor animals. Here we remained for two hours; and when we again started it was pitch dark, with torrents of rain still falling, and the addition of occasional peals of thunder and flashes of lightning.
I have heard and read much of the tropical rains of India and other southern countries, but it would be impossible to imagine a more persistent drenching than we got on this unlucky afternoon. The whole eight miles from the half-way house the horses could only walk very slowly, the night being unusually dark. We greatly need in this country such a law as they have in France, where it is enacted, under a heavy penalty, that no carriage, cart, or wagon shall travel after dark without carrying a good and sufficient light to prevent dangerous collisions. I should have been very nervous but for my implicit faith in the sagacity of the horses, and the great care of the driver, whom we only knew under his sobriquet of “Canadian Joe.” He was a quiet, careful man, a French Canadian, who beguiled the way by singing very sweetly, and with whom it was pleasant to converse in the language we loved so well. He took us safely into B——e, with the addition to our party of two travellers we overtook on the road, and upon whom we had compassion.
When we got in, the hotel was about closing for the night; the fires were out, and the landlady had gone to bed ill; but the master bestirred himself, showed me to a comfortable bedroom, and made me some negus, which your brother, himself wet to the skin, soon brought me, and which at least warmed me a little after so many hours of exposure to cold and wet.
The next morning, as soon as we could get into thoroughly-dried clothes, we went to see our invalids. Your poor sister-in-law was still suffering much, but her dear baby (a very minute specimen of humanity) was improving, and, after more than two months’ absence, I was thankful to see your sister only looking very pale, and not, as I expected, utterly worn out by her arduous duties and compulsory vigils and anxieties. Your brother was obliged to return to the Bush on Saturday; but I remained to come home with your sister and sister-in-law the next week.
In the meantime, having been to the magistrate’s office and transacted all our business, I greatly enjoyed with your brother walking about the neighbourhood. It was, indeed, a treat to walk on a good road, and to see signs of life and progress everywhere, instead of the silent monotony of the forest.
We noticed an amazing change for the better in this “rising village of the Far West,” which we had not seen for six months. The hotels and stores seemed to have quadrupled themselves, good frame-houses were springing up in every direction, and a very pretty little church, since opened for Church of England service, was nearly finished. These lumber-houses are very ugly at first, on account of the yellow hue of the wood; but this is soon toned down by exposure to the weather, and climbing-plants and pretty gardens soon alter their appearance, and make them picturesque.
The dull, primitive life of the Bush certainly prepares one to be pleased with trifles. I revelled like a child in the unwonted stir and hum of life about me, and felt half ashamed of the intense amusement I derived from the lordly airs of an old gander, who marshalled his flock of geese up and down the road all day long. I felt quite angry with a young man at the breakfast-table of the hotel, who complained loudly that this old gentleman’s cackling and hissing had kept him awake all night. I too, in the intervals of sleep, had heard the same sound, but to me it was sweet music.
On Sunday morning I had a treat for which I was quite unprepared. The Rev. Morley Punshon, head of the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Canada, came to B——e, to lecture on the “Life and Writings of Lord Macaulay.” On Sunday morning he preached in the open air, to accommodate the many who could not have found room in the Wesleyan Chapel. A little secluded dell, some distance from the main road, was thoroughly cleared of wood and underbrush, and rough benches were placed in profusion for seats. I was astonished at the numbers assembled—six hundred I was afterwards told. After the benches were full, the hill-sides were densely packed; and it was impossible not to go back in thought to the Scotch Covenanters and the heathery hills, so often sprinkled with their blood. All here was calm and peaceful; it was a lovely Sabbath morning, the air indescribably balmy and fragrant, the service very simple and impressive, the singing singularly sweet, and the discourse delivered by the gifted minister full of fervid eloquence.
He preached from Psalm xlii. 4. My feelings nearly overcame me; it was the very first time since I left England that I had had the opportunity of publicly joining in worship with my fellow-Christians; and it appeared to me a matter of very small importance that most of those present were Wesleyans, while I was Church of England. The lecture on “Macaulay” was duly delivered the next day, and was much liked; but I did not go, preferring to pass the time with our poor invalid.
On Tuesday, September 2nd, your brother Charles came in and made arrangements to take his wife, child, and your sister, back on the following day. I made up my mind to go back with them, and again we took care to secure Canadian Joe and his team. It was a perilous journey for one in so much physical suffering, but it was admirably managed. We laid a soft mattress in the bottom of the wagon, with plenty of pillows, and on this we placed your sister-in-law with the baby by her side. Charles sat with them to keep all steady; your sister and I sat with the driver. Canadian Joe surpassed himself in the care he took of the invalid; every bad piece of road he came to he walked his horses quite softly, looking back at Charles with a warning shake of the head, as much as to say, “Take care of her now!”
We travelled slowly, but by his great care arrived safely, and at the cleared farm nearest to mine we were met by your brother and brother-in-law, who had skilfully arranged a ship’s hammock on a pole, and made of it a very tolerable palanquin. Into this your sister-in-law was carefully lifted, and two of the gentlemen carried her, the third relieving them at intervals. They got her safely over all the gullies, and carried her past my log-house to her own home, where she was at once put to bed, and in a very few days began to recover. Your sister and I took charge of the dear little baby, and after a most fatiguing walk and much dangerous scrambling with such a precious load, we got him safely here, where he has remained our cherished nursling ever since, and has thriven well. His dear young mother, having quite recovered, comes every day to be with her little treasure.
We only just arrived in time; the rain began again and continued for some days. We had much trouble with the rain drifting in through the clap-boards of the roof. What would Mr. Punch have said could he have seen two ladies in bed with a baby between them, and a large umbrella fixed at the head of the bed to save them from the roof-drippings!
We had two visits this autumn from which we derived much pleasure. One from our old friend C. W., and one from a friend and connection of your sister-in-law’s family, her eldest brother having married one of his sisters. H. L. was quite an addition to our working party. More than six feet high, strong and active, he fraternised at once with your brothers, and cheerfully helped them in their daily labours. Your brother hired a team of oxen for some days, and had the remaining trees lying in our clearing logged up, and watched for the first fine dry day to complete the burning begun in spring. Our two young friends assisted him in his labours, and they managed so well that the regular day’s work was not interfered with. Every evening they set fire to some of the log-heaps, and diligently “branded” them up till they were reduced to ashes. As we could not admit our friends into the house after a certain hour in the evening, and as their vigils extended far into the night, your brother used to provide the party with plenty of potatoes, which they roasted in the ashes and ate with butter and salt, with a large pot of coffee and an unlimited supply of tobacco—they being all inveterate smokers. As they had all fine voices and sang well together, the gipsy party was not a dull one, and the forest echoed with their favourite songs. Fortunately there was no one in our solitary neighbourhood to be disturbed from their slumbers, and provided they did not wake the baby, we rather enjoyed the unwonted noise, knowing how much they were enjoying themselves. Perhaps the most amusing time of all was the Saturday afternoon, when what we ladies called the “Jew trading” invariably took place. I really think that every article belonging to our young men changed hands at these times, and the amusing manner in which the stores of each were laid out for public admiration and regularly haggled for, cannot be forgotten. In this manner your eldest brother’s celebrated chassepot gun, picked up on the field of Sedan, gave place to a Colt’s revolver and a small fowling-piece; his heavy gold seal (a much-coveted article) took the more useful form of corduroy trousers and heavy boots; in like manner both your brothers gladly bartered their fine dress shirts, and handkerchiefs, and satin ties, for coarser garments better fitted for the Bush, of which both C. W. and H. L. had a good stock now quite useless to them, as neither could make up his mind to a Bush life. These amusing transfers of property came to a close at last, after some weeks of incessant trafficking, with your brother’s solemnly asking my permission to hand over to H. L., as a make-weight in the scale, a large woollen comforter which I had knitted for him. Some of the bartering went on at “Pioneer Cottage,” your brother Charles’ place, a name most appropriately given, as he was the first of our party in the settlement. I called my log-house “Cedar Lodge” at first, and headed some of my letters to England with that elegant name, understanding that I was the happy owner of a number of cedar trees, but finding that my riches in cedar consisted in a small portion only of a dirty cedar-swamp, from which not one tree fit for building could be extracted, I dropped the grandiloquent nomenclature, and simply put for heading to my letters, “The Bush—Muskoka.”
We felt quite dull when our friends left, but they correspond with both your brothers, and H. L. is not far from us, having married and settled at Toronto.
A very grave subject of consideration has arisen among us on the subject of domestic servants. Should any providential improvement in our circumstances take place, or our farms become even moderately thriving, we should certainly once more require these social incumbrances, but where to find them would be a question. Certainly not in the settlement to which we belong. Not one of the ladies in our three families has a special vocation for cooking and house-tidying, though all have done it since we came here without complaint, and have done it well. Indeed, a most respectable settler, who, with other men and a team of oxen, was working for some days on our land to help your brother, remarked to his wife that he was quite astonished that a young lady (meaning your eldest sister), evidently unaccustomed to hard work, could do so much and could do it so well. He had noticed how comfortably all the different meals had been prepared and arranged. Your sister F——e too, in spite of the hindrance of three little children, has always given great satisfaction to the workmen employed by her husband. We should of course hail the day when we could have the help in all household matters we formerly enjoyed; but we must surely seek for it at a distance from here.
The children of the settlers, both boys and girls, know well that on attaining the age of eighteen years, they can each claim and take up from Government a free grant of one hundred acres. They naturally feel their incipient independence and their individual interest in the country, and this makes them less inclined to submit to the few restrictions of servitude still sanctioned by common sense and general observance. They serve their temporary masters and mistresses under protest as it were, and are most unwilling to acknowledge their title to these obnoxious names. They consider it their undoubted right to be on a footing of perfect equality with every member of the family, and have no inclination whatever to “sit below the salt.”
When your sister-in-law returned from Bracebridge, her health was for some time too delicate for her to do any hard work, and we, having charge of the baby, could give her no assistance. Your brother Charles looked about the settlement for a respectable girl as a servant. He found one in every way suitable, about sixteen, and apparently healthy, strong, willing, and tolerably competent. He liked her appearance, and engaged her at the wages she asked. She entered upon her place, did her work well, and gave entire satisfaction. Everything was done to make her comfortable, even to the extent of giving her the whole Sunday to herself, as she was in the habit of attending the church some miles off and also the Sunday-school. In little more than a week she suddenly left, assigning no reason but that she was “wanted at home,” which we knew to be a falsehood, as she had two or three sisters capable of assisting her mother. We were greatly puzzled to find out her true reason for leaving. After a time it was made clear to us by a trustworthy person who had it from the family themselves. The young lady had found it intolerably dull, and it was further explained to us that no settler would allow his daughter to be in service where she was not allowed to sit at the same table with the family, and to join freely in the conversation at all times!
