Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 1

by Sir Richard Henry Bonnycastle

"For," said he, "in the London or Western districts of Upper Canada, the land is equal to any in the United States, the climate better, and by and by it will supply all Europe with grain. Settling there, an Englishman will not always be put in mind of the inferiority of the British to the Americans, will not always be told that kings and queens are childish humbugs, and will not have his work hindered and his mind poisoned by constant elections and everlasting grasping for office.

"While," says John to Jonathan, "I am in Canada, just as free as you are; I pay no taxes, or only such as I control myself, and which are laid out in roads, or for my benefit. I can worship after the manner of my fathers, without being robbed or burnt out, and I meet no man who thinks himself a bit better than myself; but, as I shall take care to settle a good way from republican sympathizers for the sake of my poor property, I shall always find my neighbours as proud of Queen Victoria as I be myself."

Jonathan replied that he had no manner of doubt that Miss Victoria was a real lady, for every female is a lady in the States; the word being understood only as an equivalent for womankind, and that John might like petticoat government, but, for his part, he calculated it was better to be a king one's-self, which every citizen of the enlightened republic was, and no mistake.

And kings they are, for all power resides there, in the body of which he was a favourable specimen, but which does not always show its members in so fair a light.

I do not know any coach ride in British America more pleasing than that from Niagara to Queenston. You cross a broad green common, with the expanse of Lake Ontario on one side, the forest and orchard on the other; and, after passing through a little coppice, suddenly come upon the St. Lawrence, rolling a tranquil flood towards the great lake below.

High above its waters, on the edge of the sharp precipitous bank, covered with trees—oak, birch, beech, chestnut, and maple—runs the sandy road, bordered by corn-fields, by orchards, and occasionally by little patches of woodland, looking for all the world like Old England, excepting that that unpicturesque snake fence spoils the illusion.

Now, bright and deep, rolls the giant flood onward; now it is hidden by a turn of the bank; now, glittering, it again appears between the trees. Thus you travel until within a couple of miles or so of Queenston, when, the road leaving the bank, and the river forming a large bay-like bend, a splendid view breaks out.

You catch a distant glimpse of that narrow pass, where a wall of rock, two hundred feet high on each side, and somewhat higher on the American shore, vomits forth the pent-up angry Niagara. Above this wall, to the right and left, towers the mountain ridge, covered with forest to the south, and with the greenest of grass to the north, where, stately and sad, stands the pillar under whose base moulder the bones of the gallant Brock, and of Mac Donell, his aide-de-camp.

Rent from summit to base, tottering to its fall, is Brock's monument, and yet the villain who did the deed that destroyed it lives, and dares to show his face on the neighbouring shore.

I cannot conceive in beautiful scenery any thing more picturesque than the gorge of the Niagara river: it combines rapid water, a placid bay, a tremendous wall of rock, forest, glade, village, column, active and passive life.