"As we neared the banks of Newfoundland a most extraordinary phenomenon was produced by the dashing of the salt water against the bow of the ship in the evening. The water seemed on fire and produced a very fine effect. The next day a mass of ice appeared about two hundred yards distant. It was almost half a mile in length, and was moving south-east. Soon after we found the channel between Cape Breton and Cape Ray, and got into the ice. The captain sent eight men to the bow with fenders. One piece knocked splinters off the bow and threw us all down. About five days later we reached the Island of Anticosti, but I was too ill to see it. We saw porpoises in shoals plunging about the ship, while the sailors tried to harpoon them beneath the bow. About two hundred and eighty miles below Quebec the pilot came on board. His number was painted in large characters on his sail as well as on his boat. He had a cask of fresh water and some maple sugar, which he sold at an extortionate price to the passengers.
"Near Bic Island we saw whales spouting water at a great height, and a habitant came out in a boat with a large basket of eggs, which he disposed of at a shilling per dozen, and so we continued on until the domes and towers of Quebec came in sight and I began to realize the inexpressible joy of being at home once more."*
* Diary of Rev. Robert Bell and letters of R. Wright.
Rug was a young man of great executive ability, a young man whose word could be relied upon with absolute certainty, a young man who proved himself the very soul of honor in all his business transactions.
The rare, practical, common sense shown in the expenditure of twelve thousand dollars in the Mother Land inspired the Chief with such confidence in his son that when, a few years later, he appealed for funds for the construction of timber slides at the Chaudiere and the Chats, of which he was the inventor, his father had no hesitation in entrusting him with over one hundred thousand dollars.
CHAPTER XVII.
A DOUBLE TRAGEDY.
1819.
Hull was en fête. There was not a mill, shop, or dwelling but had its display of bunting and evergreens, for the new Governor-General and Commander-in-Chief of Canada, Charles, fourth Duke of Richmond, Lennox and Aubigny, had sent a courier through the woods from Richmond to inform the Chief of his intention of spending an afternoon and night in Hull, before embarking on the steamer for Montreal.
The announcement had thrown the whole population into a state of great excitement, for there were not many places in the backwoods settlement in which a duke could reasonably expect hospitality. It therefore fell to Mr. Wright's lot to have the honor of entertaining His Grace, and great and costly had been the preparations.