Life in the Clearings versus the Bush

by Susanna Moodie

On New-Year's day all the gentlemen in the place call upon their friends, to wish them a happy new year, and to exchange friendly greetings with the ladies of the family, who are always in readiness to receive them, and make them a return for these marks of neighbourly regard, in the substantial form of rich cakes, fruit, wine, coffee, and tea. It is generally a happy, cheerful day; all faces wear a smile, old quarrels are forgotten, and every one seems anxious to let ill-will and heart-burnings die with the old year.

A gentleman who wishes to drop an inconvenient acquaintance, has only to omit calling upon his friend's wife and daughters on New-Year's day, without making a suitable apology for the omission of this usual act of courtesy, and the hint is acknowledged by a direct cut the next time the parties meet in public.

It is an especial frolic for all the lads who have just returned from school or college to enjoy their Christmas holidays. Cakes and sweetmeats are showered upon them in abundance, and they feel themselves of vast importance, while paying their compliments to the ladies, and running from house to house, with their brief congratulatory address--"I wish you all a happy New Year!"

It would be a thousand pities if this affectionate, time-honoured, hospitable custom, should be swept away by the march of modern improvement. Some ladies complain that it gives a number of vulgar, underbred men the opportunity of introducing themselves to the notice and company of their daughters. There may be some reasonable truth in this remark; but after all it is but for one day, and the kindly greetings exchanged are more productive of good than evil.

The evening of New-Year's day is generally devoted to dancing parties, when the young especially meet to enjoy themselves.

The Wesleyan Methodists always "pray the old year out and the new year in," as it is termed here, and they could not celebrate its advent in a more rational and improving manner. Their midnight anthem of praise is a sacred and beautiful offering to Him, whose vast existence is not meted out like ours, and measured by days and years.

Large parties given to very young children, which are so common in this country, are very pernicious in the way in which they generally operate upon youthful minds. They foster the passions of vanity and envy, and produce a love of dress and display which is very repulsive in the character of a child. Little girls who are in the constant habit of attending these parties, soon exchange the natural manners and frank simplicity so delightful at their age, for the confidence and flippancy of women long hacked in the ways of the world.

For some time after I settled in the town, I was not myself aware that any evil could exist in a harmless party of children playing together at the house of a mutual friend. But observation has convinced me that I was in error; that these parties operate like a forcing bed upon young plants, with this difference, that they bring to maturity the seeds of evil, instead of those of goodness and virtue, and that a child accustomed to the heated atmosphere of pleasure, is not likely in maturer years to enjoy the pure air and domestic avocations of home.

These juvenile parties appear to do less mischief to boys than to girls. They help to humanize the one, and to make heartless coquets of the other. The boys meet for a down-right romping play with each other; the girls to be caressed and admired, to show off their fine dresses, and to gossip about the dress and appearance of their neighbours.

I know that I shall be called hard-hearted for this assertion; but it is true. I have frequently witnessed what I relate, both at my own house and the houses of others; and those who will take the pains to listen to the conversation of these miniature women, will soon yield a willing assent to my observations, and keep their little ones apart from such scenes, in the pure atmosphere of home. The garden or the green field is the best place for children, who can always derive entertainment and instruction from nature and her beautiful works. Left to their own choice, the gay party would be a bore, far less entertaining than a game of blind-man's buff in the school-room, when lessons were over. It is the vanity of parents that fosters the same spirit in their children.