Mr. Broadstreet, not knowing how to act, applied to one of his superior officers—Capt. Doyle (subsequently Genl. Doyle, who married at Quebec, a Miss Smith), for advice, saying: "How can I fight a girl?" to which Capt. Doyle rejoined, "I will act as your second. If Nesbitt is a girl, you shall not fight him, and I engage to prove this fact." He then drove out to Holland House, and found the gay Lothario Nesbitt flirting with the young ladies. He observed him attentively, and having tried an experiment, calculated to throw light on the mysterious foreigner, he went to complain direct to the Governor and Commander in Chief; Lord Dorchester, who, on hearing the perplexity caused by Mr. Nesbitt, sent for Dr. Longmore, the military physician, and ordered him to investigate of what sex Nesbitt might be.
Mr. Nesbitt stormed—refused to submit—vowed he would go direct to England and make a formal complaint of the indignity with which he was threatened.
Hon. Jonathan Sewell,—later on Chief Justice, by persuasion, succeeded in pouring oil on the troubled waters. Nesbitt confessed, and Quebec was minus of a very handsome but beardless youngster, and the English Court journals soon made mention of a fashionable marriage in high life.
HAMWOOD.
How sweet it is, when mother Fancy rocks
The wayward brain, to saunter through a wood
An old place, full of many a lovely brood,
Tall trees, green arbours, and ground-flowers in flocks
And wild rose tiptoe upon hawthorn stocks,
—Wordsworth.
How many vicissitudes in the destinies of places, men, families, nations! See yonder mansion, its verdant leaves, with the leafy honours of nascent spring encircling it like a garland, exhaling the aroma of countless buds and blossoms, embellished by conservatory, grapery, avenues of fruit and floral trees. Does not every object bespeak comfort, rural felicity, commercial success!
When you enter that snug billiard-room, luxuriously fitted up with fire place, ottomans, &c., or when, on a balmy summer evening, you are seated on the ample verandah, next to the kind host, do you not my legal friend, feel inclined to repeat to yourself "Commerce, commerce is the turnpike to health, to affluence, the path to consideration." But was the scene always so smiling, and redolent of rustic enjoyment.
If so, what means yon stately column, [276] surmounted by its fat, helmetted Bellona, mysteriously looking round as if pregnant with a mighty unfathomable future. Ask history? Open Capt. Knox's Journal of the Siege of Quebec, and read therein how, in front of that very spot where you now stand, along that identical road, over which you emerged from the city, war once threw her sorrows, ask this brave British officer to retrace one of those winter scenes he witnessed here more than one hundred years ago: the howling blast of the north sighing through the few remaining gnarled pines and oaks spared by Albion's warriors; add to it tired teams of English troops, laboriously drawing, yoked eight by eight, long sledges of firewood for Murray's depressed, harassed garrison, and you have something like John Knox's tableau of St. Foye Road on the 7th December, 1759.—
"Our garrison, now undergo incredible fatigue, not only within but also without the walls, being obliged to load and sleigh home firewood from the forest of St. Foy, which is near four miles distant, and through snow of a surpassing depth, eight men are allowed to each sleigh, who are yoked to it in couples by a set of regular harness, besides one man who guides it behind with a long stout pole, to keep it clear of ruts and other obstructions. We are told that M. de Lévis is making great preparations for the long-meditated assault on this place (Quebec) with which we are menaced. Christmas is said to be the time fixed for this enterprise, and Monsieur says, 'if he succeed he shall be promoted to be Maréchal de France, and if he fail, Canada will be lost, for he will give it up.'" [277]
Do not, dear reader, however fear for the old rock, it is tolerably secure so long as Fraser's Highlanders and British Grenadiers garrison it.