Letters from Muskoka

by Mrs. Charles Gerrard King

Towards the end of June I entered upon an entirely new phase of Bush-life, which was anything but pleasant to a person of a nervous, susceptible temperament. This was my being in perfect solitude for many hours of every day. Your sister-in-law expected her first confinement, and we were so anxious that she should have proper medical advice, that it was thought advisable to place her in lodgings at B——e till the important event took place. Her brother coming to pay her a visit entirely agreed in the necessity of the case, and as he kindly smoothed away the money difficulty it was carried into execution. She could not go alone, and therefore your eldest sister accompanied her, and thus I lost for a time my constant and only companion.

I undertook now to keep house for both your brothers, as in his wife’s absence Charles could have little comfort at home. I only saw them at meal-times, and though your eldest brother came home always before dusk, yet I could not but be very nervous at being so much alone.

The weather became so hot, that the stove was moved into the open air at the back of the house, and to save me fatigue your brother cut a doorway at the back, close to where the stove was placed. Unfortunately there was a great press of work at this time, and moreover no lumber on the premises, and therefore no door could be made, and the aperture, which I had nothing large enough to block up, remained all the summer, to my great discomfiture.

At first I was not so very solitary, for a settler’s daughter, who had worked for your sister-in-law, came to me three times a week, and went on the alternate days to your sister F——e. We liked her very well, were very kind to her, and under our training she was learning to be quite a good servant, when an incident occurred which occasioned our dismissing her, which gave me great pain, and which has never been cleared up to my satisfaction.

Our poor dog Nero, who was an excellent guard, and quite a companion, was taken ill, and we fancied that he had been bitten by a snake in Charles’ beaver meadow, where he had been with your brothers who were hay-making. We nursed him most tenderly, you may be sure, but he got worse and worse suffered agonies, and in less than a week I was obliged to consent to our old favourite dog being shot. He was taken from my bed well wrapped up, so that he knew nothing of what was coming, while I walked far away into the wood, and your brother with one shot put the faithful animal out of his pain. Two days before he died a large piece of poisoned meat was found near the pathway of our clearing, and as from before the time of his being ill no one but this servant girl had gone backwards and forwards, as her father had a kind of grudge against your brother for driving his cattle off the premises, and as she never expressed the slightest sympathy for the poor beast, but seemed quite pleased when he was dead, we could not but fear that she had been made the medium of killing him. We found that he had been poisoned with blue vitriol, but we knew this too late to save him.

We buried him honourably, and I planted a circle of wild violets round his grave, and was not ashamed to shed many tears besides, which was a well-deserved tribute to our old and faithful friend.

After the girl was dismissed I found more than enough of occupation, for though your brother made and baked the bread, which I was not strong enough to do, yet I cooked, washed for them, and did the house-work, which I found sufficiently fatiguing, and was very glad after dinner to sit down to my writing-table, which I took good care to place so as to face the open door, never feeling safe to have it at my back.

Your dear sister F. was so kind, that at great inconvenience to herself, on account of the heat and the flies in the forest, she managed to come nearly every day at four p.m. with the children, and remained till your brother came back for the night.

He was occupied for many weeks in making hay with your brother and brother-in-law in the beaver meadow, a large one and very productive. They make a great deal of hay, and put it up in large cocks, but a great deal of it was lost by rotting on the ground, from not being carried away in proper time. The delay was occasioned by none of us having oxen of our own, and from not having the means of hiring till the season was passed.

The not getting money at the proper epochs for work is the greatest drawback to the new settler. If it comes too soon it is apt to melt away in the necessities of daily life; if it comes too late he must wait for another year.