From these woods we emerged, after five or six miles of travelling, and arrived at Springfield, a little village we had passed through in the depth of winter—how different its appearance now!—and diverging from the road, a beautiful path along the high banks above the river Credit, brought us to Erindale, for so Mr. M * * *, in fond recollection of his native country, has named his romantic residence.
Mr. M * * * is the clergyman and magistrate of the district, beside being the principal farmer and land proprietor. His wife, sprung from a noble and historical race, blended much sweetness and frankheartedness, with more of courtesy and manner than I expected to find. My reception was most cordial, though the whole house was in unusual bustle, for it was the 4th of June, parade day, when the district militia were to be turned out; and two of the young men of the family were buckling on swords and accoutrements, and furbishing up helmets, while the sister was officiating with a sister's pride at this military toilette, tying on sashes and arranging epaulettes; and certainly when they appeared—one in the pretty green costume of a rifleman, the other all covered with embroidery as a captain of lancers—I thought I had seldom seen two finer-looking men. After taking coffee and refreshments, we drove down to the scene of action.
On a rising ground above the river which ran gurgling and sparkling through the green ravine beneath, the motley troops, about three or four hundred men, were marshalled—no, not marshalled, but scattered in a far more picturesque fashion hither and thither: a few log-houses and a saw-mill on the river-bank, and a little wooden church crowning the opposite height, formed the chief features of the scene. The boundless forest spread all around us. A few men, well mounted, and dressed as lancers, in uniforms which were, however, anything but uniform, flourished backwards on the green sward, to the manifest peril of the spectators; themselves and their horses, equally wild, disorderly, spirited, undisciplined: but this was perfection compared with the infantry. Here there was no uniformity attempted of dress, of appearance, of movement; a few had coats, others jackets; a greater number had neither coats nor jackets, but appeared in their shirt-sleeves, white or checked, or clean or dirty, in edifying variety! Some wore hats, others caps, others their own shaggy heads of hair. Some had firelocks; some had old swords suspended in belts, or stuck in their waistbands; but the greater number shouldered sticks or umbrellas. Mrs. M * * * told us that on a former parade day she had heard the word of command given thus—"Gentlemen with the umbrellas, take ground to the right! Gentlemen with the walking sticks, take ground to the left!" Now they ran after each other, elbowed and kicked each other, straddled, stooped, chattered; and if the commanding officer turned his back for a moment, very coolly sat down on the bank to rest. Not to laugh was impossible, and defied all power of face. Charles M. made himself hoarse with shouting out orders which no one obeyed, except, perhaps, two or three men in the front; and James, with his horsemen, flourished their lances, and galloped, and capered, and curveted to admiration. James is the popular storekeeper and postmaster of the village, and when, after the show, we went into his warehouse to rest, I was not a little amused to see our captain of lancers come in, and, taking off his plumed helmet, jump over the counter to serve one customer to a "pennyworth of tobacco," and another to a "yard of check." Willy, the younger brother, a fine young man, who had been our cavalier on the field, assisted; and half in jest, half in earnest, I gravely presented myself as the purchaser of something or other, which Willy served out with a laughing gaiety and unembarrassed simplicity quite delightful. We returned to sit down to a plain, plenteous, and excellent dinner; everything on the table, the wine excepted, was the produce of their own farm. Our wine, water, and butter were iced, and everything was the best of its kind.
The parade day ended in a drunken bout and a riot, in which, as I was afterwards informed, the colonel had been knocked down, and one or two serious, and even fatal accidents had occurred; but it was all taken so very lightly, so very much as a thing of course, in this half-civilised community, that I soon ceased to think about the matter.
The next morning I looked out from my window upon a scene of wild yet tranquil loveliness. The house is built on the edge of a steep bank (what in Scotland they term a scaur), perhaps a hundred feet high, and descending precipitously to the rapid river.[4] The banks on either side were clothed with overhanging woods, of the sumach, maple, tamarisk, birch, in all the rich yet delicate array of the fresh opening year. Beyond, as usual, lay the dark pine-forest: and near to the house there were several groups of lofty pines, the original giant-brood of the soil; beyond these again lay the "clearing." The sky was without a cloud, and the heat intense. I found breakfast laid in the verandah: excellent tea and coffee, rich cream, delicious hot cakes, new laid eggs—a banquet for a king! The young men and their labourers had been out since sunrise, and the younger ladies of the house were busied in domestic affairs; the rest of us sat lounging all the morning in the verandah; and in the intervals of sketching and reading, my kind host and hostess gave me an account of their emigration to this country ten years ago.
Mr. M. was a Protestant clergyman of good family, and had held a considerable living in Ireland; but such was the disturbed state of the county in which he resided, that he was not only unable to collect his tithes, but for several years neither his own life nor that of any of his family was safe. They never went out unarmed, and never went to rest at night without having barricadoed their house like a fortress. The health of his wife began to fail under this anxiety, and at length, after a severe struggle with old feelings and old habits, he came to the determination to convert his Irish property into ready money, and emigrate to Canada, with four fine sons, from seven to seventeen years old, and one little daughter. Thus Canada has become an asylum, not only for those who cannot pay tithes, but for those who cannot get them.
Soon after his arrival, he purchased eight hundred acres of land along the banks of the Credit. With the assistance of his sons and a few labourers, he soon cleared a space of ground for a house, in a situation of great natural beauty, but then a perfect wilderness; and with no other aid, designed and built it in very pretty taste. Being thus secure of lodging and shelter, they proceeded in their toilsome work—toilsome, most laborious, he allowed it to be, but not unrewarded; and they have now one hundred and fifty acres of land cleared and in cultivation; a noble barn, entirely constructed by his sons, measuring sixty feet long by forty in width; a carpenter's shop, a turning-lathe, in the use of which the old gentleman and one of his sons are very ingenious and effective; a forge; extensive outhouses; a farmyard well stocked; and a house comfortably furnished, much of the ornamental furniture being contrived, carved, turned, by the father and his sons. These young men, who had received in Ireland the rudiments of a classical education, had all a mechanical genius, and here, with all their energies awakened, and all their physical and mental powers in full occupation, they are a striking example of what may be done by activity and perseverance; they are their own architects, masons, smiths, carpenters, farmers, gardeners; they are, moreover, bold and keen hunters, quick in resource, intelligent, cheerful, united by strong affection, and doating on their gentle sister, who has grown up among these four tall, manly brothers, like a beautiful azalia under the towering and sheltering pines. Then I should add, that one of the young men knows something of surgery, can bleed or set a broken limb in case of necessity; while another knows as much of law as enables him to draw up an agreement, and settle the quarrels and arrange the little difficulties of their poorer neighbours, without having recourse to the "attorney."
The whole family appear to have a lively feeling for natural beauty, and a taste for natural history; they know the habits and the haunts of the wild animals which people their forest domain; they have made collections of minerals and insects; and have "traced each herb and flower that sips the silvery dew." Not only the stout servant girl, (whom I met running about with a sucking-pig in her arms, looking for its mother,) and the little black boy Alick,—but the animals in the farmyard, the old favourite mare, the fowls which come trooping round the benignant old gentleman, or are the peculiar pets of the ladies of the family,—the very dogs and cats appear to me, each and all, the most enviable of their species. There is an atmosphere of benevolence and cheerfulness breathing round, which penetrates to my very heart. I know not when I have felt so quietly—so entirely happy—so full of sympathy—so light-hearted—so inclined to shut out the world, and its cares and vanities, and "fleet the time as they did i' the golden age."
Mr. M. told me, that for the first seven or eight years they had all lived and worked together on his farm; but latterly he had reflected that though the proceeds of the farm afforded a subsistence, it did not furnish the means of independence for his sons, so as to enable them to marry and settle in the world. He has therefore established two of his sons as storekeepers, the one in Springfield, the other at Streetsville, both within a short distance of his own residence, and they have already, by their intelligence, activity, and popular manners, succeeded beyond his hopes.
I could perceive that in taking this step there had been certain prejudices and feelings to be overcome on his own part and that of his wife: the family pride of the well-born Irish gentleman, and the antipathy to anything like trade, once cherished by a certain class in the old country—these were to be conquered, before he could reconcile himself to the idea of his boys serving out groceries in a Canadian village; but they were overcome. Some lingering of the "old Adam" made him think it necessary to excuse—to account for this state of things. He did not know with what entire and approving sympathy I regarded, not the foolish national prejudices of my country, but the honest, generous spirit and good sense through which he had conquered them, and provided for the future independence of his children.