The Indians are very successful in their duck-shooting: they fill a canoe with green boughs, so that it resembles a sort of floating island; beneath the cover of these boughs they remain concealed, and are enabled by this device to approach much nearer than they otherwise could do to the wary birds. The same plan is often adopted by our own sportsmen with great success.
A family of Indians have pitched their tents very near us. On one of the islands of our lake we can distinguish the thin blue smoke of their wood fires, rising among the trees, from our front window, or curling over the bosom of the waters.
The squaws have been several times to see me; sometimes from curiosity, sometimes with the view of bartering their baskets, mats, ducks, or venison, for pork, flour, potatoes, or articles of wearing apparel. Sometimes their object is to borrow “kettle to cook,” which they are very punctual in returning.
Once a squaw came to borrow a washing tub, but not understanding her language I could not for some time discover the object of her solicitude; at last, she took up a corner of her blanket, and, pointing to some soap, began rubbing it between her hands, imitated the action of washing, then laughed, and pointed to a tub; she then held up two fingers, to intimate it was for two days she needed the loan.
The people appear of gentle and amiable dispositions; and, as far as our experience goes, they are very honest. Once, indeed, the old hunter, Peter, obtained from me some bread, for which he promised to give a pair of ducks; but when the time came for payment, and I demanded my ducks, he looked gloomy, and replied with characteristic brevity, “No duck—Chippewa (meaning S——, this being the name they have affectionately given him,) gone up lake with canoe—no canoe—duck by-and-by.” By-and-by is a favourite expression of the Indians, signifying an indefinite point of time; may be, it means to-morrow, or a week, or month, or it may be a year, or even more. They rarely give you a direct promise. As it is not wise to let any one cheat you if you can prevent it, I coldly declined any further overtures to bartering with the Indians till my ducks made their appearance. Some time afterwards I received one duck by the hands of Maquin, a sort of Indian Flibberty-gibbet. This lad is a hunchbacked dwarf, very shrewd, but a perfect imp: his delight seems to be tormenting the brown babies in the wigwams, or teazing the meek deer-hounds.
The forest trees are nearly all in leaf. Never did spring burst forth with greater rapidity than it has done this year. The verdure of the leaves is most vivid. A thousand lovely flowers are expanding in the woods and clearings. Nor are our Canadian songsters mute: the cheerful melody of the robin, the bugle-song of the blackbird and thrush, with the weak but not unpleasing call of the little bird called thitabebee, and a wren, whose note is sweet and thrilling, fill our woods.
For my part, I see no reason or wisdom in carping at the good we do possess, because it lacks something of that which we formerly enjoyed. I am aware it is the fashion for travellers to assert that our feathered tribes are either mute, or give utterance to discordant cries that pierce the ear, and disgust rather than please. It would be untrue were I to assert that our singing birds are as numerous or as melodious, on the whole, as those of Europe; but I must not suffer prejudice to rob my adopted country of her rights, without one word being spoken in behalf of her feathered vocalists. Nay, I consider her very frogs have been belied; if it were not for the monotony of their notes, I really consider they are not quite unmusical. The green frogs are very handsome, being marked over with brown oval shields on the most vivid green coat; they are larger in size than the biggest of our English frogs, and certainly much handsomer in every respect. Their note resembles that of a bird, and has nothing of the croak in it.
In conclusion, though Canada might not seem a paradise to town-bred gentlemen, or modern fine ladies, it possesses advantages to persons of sober, industrious habits, which are not to be found in England. If the emigrant and his family can but struggle through the hardships and privations of a first settlement in the backwoods, there is little doubt that they will in time secure a moderate independence, and be above want, though not above work.
View on the frontier line, near Stanstead plains.
(Upper Canada.)