"A thousand welcomes back, old lad," exclaimed H., heartily shaking the hand of his old associate. "Why, my dear fellow, I've come over to bid you good bye, as I heard to-day that you are going to the Cannibal Islands."
Mr. Charlston and the others laughed heartily at the expression.
"It is only to Canada that I intend to ship myself," replied Frederick somewhat shyly.
"Worse, and worse!" retorted H. "Why, what do you expect to get there?"
"Get a farm for nothing, and make a fortune in five years," said Frederick.
"If the farm is to be given away for nothing I may venture to say, it will be worth nothing," replied H., and continued, "I had an acquaintance who went to Canada a few years ago with £500; and having lived three years upon one of those 'nothing farms' or rather, living upon his money during that time, he returned to England utterly worth nothing. Why, Fred! such farms may be suitable enough for men of iron muscles and wooden stomachs, and who can work whether they eat or not;—men who have nothing to lose except their life, and would even sacrifice that for a small amount. But for either you or I to go there in search of a living, or anything else, except death and horror, would be worse for us than hanging; it would eventually result in strangulation by starvation. And besides, as my acquaintance informed me, the woods are infested with wild animals; and if a fellow attempted to venture out at night very possibly his carcass would be very soon deposited in the inside of a dozen of wolves. He further told me that the trees during summer rained down myriads of mosquitoes as large as beetles, with stings like hornets and in the shape of a tube, by which means a dozen of them could suck up a fellow's blood in a night; and were by far a greater plague than the grasshoppers of Egypt. To prevent them from settling upon himself he covered his head and neck with a mask made from deer-skin, in which he cut holes to inhale air and see through; but despite of such precautions they would sometimes force their way through these orifices, and one dart, said he, into a fellow's eye was sufficient to cause a myriad of stars to fly from his winker."
"Well, but that is really horrifying," exclaimed Mrs. Charlston.
"Awful, awful!" shouted Amelia.
"'Tis really so indeed," added Eliza.
"Oh! it is all bosh," ejaculated Fred.