This letter found its way into all the provincial journals, and made no little talk. The Kingston Whig says, “Among many other endearing epithets he calls Mr. Commissary-General Routh an empty-headed, arrogant, insolent coxcomb. Now the gallant ex-Colonel, according to his own confession, stands six feet high and is proportionately broad across the shoulders, and Mr. Commissary is an aged and feeble man, altogether past the prime of life; would a duel therefore be fair between the parties? We think not; and yet according to the absurd notions of modern honour what else can Mr. Commissary do than fight, unless, indeed, one of his younger and subordinate officers equally insulted by the gallant ex-Colonel takes up the cudgels in his own and his chief’s behalf.” But there was no duel. Dunlop had a sovereign contempt for what he called a lobster-coated puppy, and took his grievances straight to Colonel Maitland, Commandant at London. There are always wheels within wheels. The Doctor’s requisitions for food and drink had been on a generous scale; an assistant commissary had peremptorily brought things under different conditions, with an amount of unnecessary red tape which aggravated the Doctor beyond endurance. A stop was put to the whiskey in toto, not on temperance but on military principles, and that he could not thole. He reached London at night. Next morning, instead of reporting himself in an ordinary way, he arrived at morning parade of the 32nd, and there accosted the Colonel on horseback. Dressed in his usual homespun shepherd’s plaid and blue bonnet, the Doctor is reported to have delivered himself thus:
“Good-mornin’ to ye, Maitland. Hoo air ye this mornin’?’
“Why, Dunlop, is this you?”
“Yes, ’tis I myself. I’ve just come over from Port Sarnia to lay a wee mather before ye. I was in command of the volunteers from my own neighbourhood, farmers and farmers’ sons, who are in the habit of being well fed and well found in their ain hames, and I generally supplied them in all they needed at Sarnia, and tried to make things comfortable for them by givin’ them plenty to eat and plenty to drink; when a Commissary fellow by the name of Robinson came there, took the mather in hand, cut off pairt o’ the supplies and disregarded my orders when I gave requisitions. Now, Maitland, I am here an old army officer, and I know what it is to feed men, and I’ve come to lay this mather before you that you may set it right, because I’ve never been in the habit, and I never will be subjected, to take my orders from a dom pork-barrel.” Upon which the Colonel nearly fell off his horse. He knew the Doctor, and enjoyed the originality of the whole complaint.
Why should the good Tiger’s memory be too heavily assailed for his fondness and capacity for liquids. Maréchal Saxe, in his hale youth, could toss off a gallon of wine at a draught; and when Wolfe’s men reached the crest of the hill he had grog served out to them, while he spoke kind and encouraging words after their terrible climb. Why should not Goderich and the Tiger appear in these tales oscillating between history and myth? It was called a Goderich custom to conceal the glass in the hand while the liquid was poured in; but Whiskey Read, teamster and trader, earned his sobriquet because his load to Goderich was so many barrels of the terrible liquid.
In time Dunlop was advised that ten thousand dollars lay to his credit at the Bank of Upper Canada in Amherstburg. Thus were unnecessary miles added to a journey already delayed and cruelly long. Doctor and aides made their way there—that place renowned for loyalty, rattle-snakes and turkeys—astonishing all Windsor on his way through it by the display of a half-crown piece which had turned out from some forgotten pocket corner. So much specie had not been seen there for a long time; they knew no money but the wild cat shin-plaster. From Windsor they proceeded by water; and after further adventures, immersions and escapes, there was the final discovery of Jamie Dougall in a little low-ceilinged shop, manager of the Bank of Upper Canada. But there was no money yet for Huron, and they must wait some days for its possible arrival. So, with as much patience as might be, they established themselves at Bullock’s Hotel, and after five days’ waiting the money did arrive. The Doctor in the meantime had intended to divert an hour by calling upon the officers at Fort Malden; but the dress suit of claret-coloured cloth, the coat tails lined with pink silk, with which he had provided himself, was now all too small, and when arrayed in it he looked and felt so much like the letter T, that he called lustily, “Kydd, Kydd, come and let me out.” In his dirty homespun and Tam the visit had to be made, and the straight-jacket was never seen again.
On leaving the village with their precious load a sudden panic took the person to whose special keeping the sum had been given, and at the moment of departure he could nowhere be found. The Doctor could only suppose that both man and money had been kidnapped, and, as consolation, had recourse to horns with every friend he met. And the Doctor’s friends were many, and the horns were potent. At length Doctor, money and aides were all got together and a start was made for Sarnia. Then followed further adventures, impassable roads, frequent halts and scanty fare. Just as they were watching the manœuvres of the migrating fish, and admiring the dexterous way in which they helped their passage by hugging the shore, they came upon an old walnut dug-out, abandoned on account of a crack in its side. The bullion convoy was at this time enjoying the hospitality of Mr. and Mrs. Sutherland, from whom they procured rags instead of oakum, and with pitch made a good job of the canoe. Mrs. Sutherland provided them with what she called a week’s supply of provisions, and following the example of the fish they began their coasting journey. The provisions turned out to be ample for double the time, fortunately for them, for it took them all of that to reach the brave Huron First, by then all at home and anxiously awaiting the pay so dearly earned on the frontier. At Sarnia the convoy debarked to pay outstanding dues. At Point Edward there was a further delay, where the rapids proved a barrier. Ben Young was left in the boat to fend it from the shore, while the Doctor, Captain Kydd and James Young, pulling on a stout rope, did tow work. No sooner were the rapids safely passed than an accumulation of half-rotten ice stopped the way, honeycombed and soft in the centre—“for all the world,” as the Doctor said, “like a woman’s baking of tea-tarts, with a spoonful of jelly in the middle.” They beached the boat as best they could, and soon had a roaring fire of drift-wood, the warmth of which made them forget many discomforts. This last delay was too much for the Doctor’s patience, and by morning it was found that he had struck off on his way home alone—no doubt feeling independent when on his feet in these pathless woods, even in the winter. James Young was sent after him, and the other three, with the money in their keeping, stuck by the canoe. Fresh accumulations of ice, storms, a rescue by a party of five or six men off Kettle Point, were next in the list of adventure, until, the water journey becoming impossible, they camped on shore and turned inland for help, the man with the money being left with the unhappy canoe and its load of their united belongings. A poor enough kit it was—dirty blankets and underwear. Mr. Sayers and his two sons entertained them with their best, and helped shoulder the load as far as Bayfield. There another stop was made; and the weary five, with their ten thousand dollars’ worth of pay money, reached Goderich the following night. The Companies’ pay-lists were then compared, checked off, and approved by the Commanding Officer, and many hearts were made glad after another fortnight had been spent in settling all matters of detail.
Such delays and martyrdoms to red-tapeism read not unlike the record of the Crimean campaign. It is not unnatural that Captain Strachan, the Military Secretary, should be spoken of with severity by such as remember those days and hand down the tale, as he was the middleman through whom much was suffered.
Meantime, although Goderich had been written of “as more completely out of the world than any spot which it has been attempted to settle,” it found it incompatible with dignity and safety to be without a Home Guard. In the townships there was another class of home guard; for the old men and the lame, or lads under sixteen, were left in charge to cut the wood, water cattle and attend to the women’s chores. This help, such as it was, had to be spread over a large area, one man, lame or not, having to attend to several farms.
The remembrance of the Home Guard’s duty is that it was a peaceful performance, a sinecure as far as aggression or resistance went. Although Goderich was credited by several governors and military commanders as being a capital natural vantage for defence, the fortification of the Baron’s Hill never went on, for it was estimated the point was too far removed from the rest of the world ever to be attacked.