It will be noted as a singular fact that even the most ordinary emigrants from Great Britain, seeking a home here in those early days, were in some respects better equipped than the sons of Roger Conant, with their prospect of becoming heirs of large property. For, coming from Great Britain, the land of schools, the poor emigrant generally possessed a fair education, which the young Conants did not. Also, they had, besides, the prime idea of gaining a home in the new land and keeping it. Not so the Conant sons, who so easily secured an abundance from the plethoric returns of the virgin soil of that day. Books were denied them. Of the diversions of society, the theatre or the lecture room, they knew nothing. Consequently they found their own crude diversions as they could. “Little” or “Muddy” York, the nucleus of Toronto, began to become a settlement, and to that hamlet they easily wended their way to find relief from the humdrum life among the forests at home. It is told that frequently, when they were short of cash, they would drive a bunch of cattle from their father’s herd to York and sell them, spending the proceeds in riding and driving about the town. That in itself is not very much to remark, seeing that they were the sons of a rich man, and their doings were no more than compatible with their conceded station in life. And so far as is known in an age when everybody consumed more or less spirituous liquors in Upper Canada, the Conant sons were not particularly remarkable either for their partaking or their abstemiousness. Their loss of properties cannot be attributed to their convivial habits, but rather to a want of appreciation of their possessions.
Daniel Conant, the author’s father, unmistakably inherited the vim and push of his grandfather, Roger. Thus we find him as a young man owning fleets of ships on the Great Lakes, as well as being a lumber producer and dealer in that commodity second to none of his day.[B] It may be observed, in passing, that Roger Conant during the whole of his life never seemed to care for office. Offices were many times offered to him by the British Government, but he steadily refused, and died without ever having tasted their sweets. His own business was far sweeter to him, and he was far more successful in it than he could have been in office. His grandson, Daniel, had this family trait. He did not spend an hour in seeking preferments, and office to him had no allurements. His education was meagre. It was, however, sufficient to enable him to do an enormous business. He not only amassed wealth, but by his efforts in moving his ships and pursuing his business generally, he did much for the good of his native province, and for his neighbors. While his lumber commanded a ready sale in the United States markets, it was also used very largely in building homes for the settlers in his locality. The poor came to him as to a friend, and never came in vain. At his burial in 1879 hundreds of poor men, as well as their more fortunate neighbors, followed his bier to the grave. Perhaps no more striking token of the regard in which he was held by the poor can be cited, and the author glories in this tribute to his memory by the meek and lowly.
COLONEL TALBOT.
(By permission from the J. Ross Robertson collection.)
CHAPTER II.
Colonel Talbot—His slanderous utterances with regard to Canadians—The beaver—Salmon in Canadian streams—U. E. Loyalists have to take the oath of allegiance—Titles of land in Canada—Clergy Reserve lands—University of Toronto lands—Canada Company lands.
Thomas Talbot, to whom the Government gave—presumably for settlement—518,000 acres near London, Ont., began to reside on the tract soon after the emigrant whose fortunes we are following arrived in Upper Canada, in 1792. Talbot had previously been Secretary to Governor Simcoe, and was consequently stationed at Newark, the capital, where the settlers were seen as they came into the country from the United States. Why so great a grant was made to him is inexplicable. But it was nevertheless made, and the author proposes to tell how he repaid it. He appeared all the time he was alive, and living in Upper Canada, to thoroughly despise us. Among the other utterances which he sent from Canada to Great Britain was that concerning the origin of Canadians, and although his words are calumniatory, we must have them, for he incorporated them in his book about Canada. Thus he speaks of us: “Most Canadians are descended from private soldiers or settlers, or the illegitimate offspring of some gentlemen or their servants.” He penned these words somewhere about the year 1800. They cannot refer to persons of United States origin—the incomers from the thirteen revolted colonies, which were now independent—because these were not born in Canada. He must therefore have referred to those Canadians and their descendants who were living in Canada in 1792, when he was the Secretary of Governor Simcoe. It is not within the province of the author to defend from Talbot’s calumnies that portion of our fellow-Canadian subjects. His calumny is foul, mean, untrue, and very unjust. Of New England origin himself, the author leaves this insult to be avenged by the pen of some fellow-Canadian who claims descent from old Canadians who were in the country when the war of the Revolution was about closing. So foul an aspersion should never have been passed over in silence.
