The Englishwoman in America

by Isabella L. Bird

I considered Quebec quite the goal of my journey, for books, tongues, and poetry alike celebrate its beauty. Indeed, there seems to be only one opinion about it. From the lavish praise bestowed upon it by the eloquent and gifted author of 'Hochelaga' down to the homely encomiums pronounced by bluff sea captains, there seems a unanimity of admiration which is rarely met with. Even commercial travellers, absorbed in intricate calculations of dollars and cents, have been known to look up from their books to give it an enthusiastic expression of approval. I expected to be more pleased with it than with anything I had seen or was to see, and was insensate enough to rise at five o'clock and proceed into the saloon, when of course it was too dark for another hour to see anything. Daylight came, and from my corner by the fire I asked the stewardess when we should be in sight of Quebec? She replied that we were close to it. I went to the window, expecting that a vision of beauty would burst upon my eyes. All that I saw might be summed up in very few words—a few sticks placed vertically, which might be masts, and some tin spires looming through a very yellow, opaque medium. This was my first view of Quebec; happily, on my last the elements did full justice to its beauty. Other objects developed themselves as we steamed down to the wharf. There were huge rafts, some three or four acres in extent, which, having survived the perils which had beset them on their journey from the forests of the Ottawa, were now moored along the base of the lofty cliffs which, under the name of the Heights of Abraham, have a world-wide celebrity. There were huge, square-sided, bluff-bowed, low-masted ships, lying at anchor in interminable lines, and little, dirty, vicious-looking steam-tugs twirling in and out among them; and there were grim-looking muzzles of guns protruding through embrasures, and peripatetic fur caps and bayonets behind parapets of very solid masonry.

Above all, shadowing all, and steeping all, was the thickest fog ever seen beyond the sound of Bow-bells. It lay thick and heavy on Point Diamond, dimming the lustre of the bayonets of the sentinels as they paced the lofty bastions, and looked down into the abyss of fog below. It lay yet heavier on the rapid St. Lawrence, and dripped from the spars and rigging of ships. It hung over and enveloped the town, where, combined with smoke, it formed a yellow canopy; and damp and chill it penetrated the flag of England, weighing it down in heavy folds, as though ominous of impending calamity.

Slowly winding our tortuous way among multitudinous ships, all vamped in drizzling mist, we were warped to the wharf, which was covered with a mixture of mud and coal-dust, permeated by the universal fog. Here vehicles of a most extraordinary nature awaited us, and, to my great surprise, they were all open. They were called calashes, and looked something like very high gigs with hoods and C springs. Where the dash- board was not, there was a little seat or perch for the driver, who with a foot on each shaft looked in a very precarious position. These conveyances have the most absurd appearance; there are, however, a few closed vehicles, both at Montreal and Quebec, which I believe are not to be found in the civilized world elsewhere, except in a few back streets of Lisbon. These consist of a square box on two wheels. This box has a top, back, and front, but where the sides ought to be there are curtains of deer-hide, which are a very imperfect protection from wind and rain. The driver sits on the roof, and the conveyance has a constant tendency backwards, which is partially counteracted by a band under the horse's body, but only partially, and the inexperienced denizen of the box fancies himself in a state of constant jeopardy.

In an open calash I drove to Russell's Hotel, along streets steeper, narrower, and dirtier than any I had ever seen. Arrived within two hundred yards of the hotel, we were set down in the mud. On alighting, a gentleman who had been my fellow-traveller politely offered to guide me, and soon after addressed me by name. "Who can you possibly be?" I asked—so completely had a beard metamorphosed an acquaintance of five years' standing.

Once within the hotel, I had the greatest difficulty in finding my way about. It is composed of three of the oldest houses in Quebec, and has no end of long passages, dark winding staircases, and queer little rooms. It is haunted to a fearful extent by rats; and direful stories, "horrible, if true," were related in the parlour of personal mutilations sustained by visitors. My room was by no means in the oldest part of the house, yet I used to hear nightly sorties made in a very systematic manner by these quadruped intruders. The waiters at Russell's are complained of for their incivility, but we thought them most profuse both in their civility and attentions. Nevertheless, with all its disagreeables, Russell's is the best hotel in Quebec; and, as a number of the members of the Legislative Assembly live there while Parliament meets in that city, it is very lively and amusing.

When my English friends Mr. and Mrs. Alderson arrived, we saw a good deal of the town; but it has been so often described, that I may as well pass on to other subjects. The glowing descriptions given of it by the author of 'Hochelaga' must be familiar to many of my readers. They leave nothing to be desired, except the genial glow of enthusiasm and kindliness of heart which threw a couleur de rose over everything he saw.

There are some notions which must be unlearned in Canada, or temporarily laid aside. At the beginning of winter, which is the gay season in this Paris of the New World, every unmarried gentleman, who chooses to do so, selects a young lady to be his companion in the numerous amusements of the time. It does not seem that anything more is needed than the consent of the maiden, who, when she acquiesces in the arrangement, is called a "muffin"—for the mammas were "muffins" themselves in their day, and cannot refuse their daughters the same privilege. The gentleman is privileged to take the young lady about in his sleigh, to ride with her, to walk with her, to dance with her a whole evening without any remark, to escort her to parties, and be her attendant on all occasions. When the spring arrives, the arrangement is at an end, and I did not hear that an engagement is frequently the result, or that the same couple enter into this agreement for two successive winters. Probably the reason may be, that they see too much of each other.

This practice is almost universal at Montreal and Quebec. On the fine, frosty, moonlight nights, when the sleigh-bells ring merrily and the crisp snow crackles under the horse's feet, the gentlemen call to take their "muffins" to meetings of the sleighing-clubs, or to snow-shoe picnics, or to champagne-suppers on the ice, from which they do not return till two in the morning; yet, with all this apparent freedom of manner, the Canadian ladies are perfectly modest, feminine, and ladylike; their simplicity of manners is great, and probably there is no country in the world where there is a larger amount of domestic felicity.

The beauty of the young ladies of Canada is celebrated, and, though on going into a large party one may not see more than two or three who are strikingly or regularly beautiful, the tout ensemble is most attractive; the eyes are invariably large and lustrous, dark and pensive, or blue and sparkling with vivacity. Their manners and movements are unaffected and elegant; they dress in exquisite taste; and with a grace peculiarly their own, their manners have a fascination and witchery which is perfectly irresistible. They generally receive their education at the convents, and go into society at a very early age, very frequently before they have seen sixteen summers, and after this time the whirl of amusement precludes them from giving much time to literary employments. They are by no means deeply read, and few of them play anything more than modern dance music. They dance beautifully, and so great is their passion for this amusement, probably derived from their French ancestors, that married ladies frequently attend the same dancing classes with their children, in order to keep themselves in constant practice.

At the time of my visit to Quebec there were large parties every night, most of which were honoured with the presence of Lord Elgin and his suite. One of his aides-de-camp was Lord Bury, Lord Albemarle's son, who, on a tour through North America, became enamoured of Quebec. Lord Elgin's secretary was Mr. Oliphant, the talented author of the 'Russian Shores of the Black Sea,' who had also yielded to the fascinations of this northern capital. And no wonder! for there is not a friendlier place in the whole world. I went armed with but two letters of introduction, and received hospitality and kindness for which I can never be sufficiently grateful.