[1] The above may be freely translated thus—"Protestants and Catholics shall be treated by me with no invidious distinction."
CHAPTER III.
ARRIVAL OF THE SETTLERS IN M'NAB—THEIR LOCATION.
On the 23rd of June, 1825, the settlers all arrived safely in the township, and pitched their camps at the present Arnprior steamboat landing. As many as could be crowded into Kennel Lodge, where the Laird resided, proceeded thither; the remainder occupied the camps until all the luggage had safely reached its destination. The Laird then called them together and informed them that the township was given to him as a grant by the Government, because he was a Highland Chief—that they could go and select their lands—that he would send the Campbells (of the lake), the Goodwins and Arch. Stewart along with them to point out the most eligible locations, and as soon as they had chosen their respective lots, he would locate them in due form. They accordingly proceeded to prospect and select their lands: The three McIntyre families, James McFarlane (Kier), James McDonald and Donald McNaughton went up the Madawaska a distance of seven miles, and selected lands in what is now called the Flat Rapid Settlement. James McLaren went to the borders of Horton, in what is now known as the Lochwinnoch settlement, and the rest of the emigrants pitched upon lands in the neighborhood of what is now Arnprior, and along the banks of a small brook which they named the Dochert, after a river of the same name which flowed through the Kennel estate in Scotland. Having made this selection they removed their families to the wild woods, in the very depth of the primeval forest, and erected small shanties. The heads of families repaired to the Chief's house to get their locations.
The Chief, through Dr. Hamilton, of Leney, promised that the settlers were to be transported to their lands without any trouble or expense, and were to be furnished by the Chief with three months' provisions after they arrived, out of a store that was kept at the mouth of the Madawaska river, by Mr. Ferguson (Craigdarrach). When the settlers arrived, all that was in the store was a large puncheon of whiskey and some clothes, nothing in the provision line whatever. They resolved then, as soon as they got their locations, to go out in the neighboring Township of Fitzroy to work for food for themselves and families. The Chief accordingly sitting in solemn state at Kennel Lodge, having these memorable and remarkable documents prepared in duplicate, forthwith proceeded to seal and sign.
I subjoin a copy of this remarkable document given to the first settlers. They are all of the same form, and in transcribing one I give you a copy of each settlers' location ticket. All of them were written in red ink, with the exception of two, and these two settlers had given some offence to the Chief on their way up, and to evince his displeasure he wrote theirs in black ink.
[copy of location ticket.]
I, Archibald McNab, of McNab, do hereby locate you, James Carmichael, upon the rear half of the Sixteenth Lot of the Eleventh Concession of McNab, upon the following terms and conditions, that is to say: I hereby bind myself, my heirs and successors, to give you the said land free of any quit rent for three years from this date, as also to procure you a patent for the same at your expense, upon your having done the settlement duties and your granting me a mortgage upon said lands, that you will yearly thereafter pay to me, my heirs and successors for ever one bushel of wheat or Indian corn, or oats of like value, for every cleared acre upon the said Lot of Land in name of Quit Rent for the same, in month of January in each year.
Your subscribing to these conditions being binding upon you to fulfil the terms thereof.
Signed and sealed by us at Kennell Lodge, this twelfth day of August, 1825.
Signed,Archibald McNab, (L.S.)
Signed,James Carmichael, (L.S.)
I have interlined the above document, which indicates the first attempt to establish and fix firmly a system of feudal dependence upon the Chief. All the first settlers signed their original location tickets. Now, McNab held them under him by two instruments—the bond executed at Leney House in Callander, and the location ticket which bound themselves and their lands to the Chief and his heirs and successors forever. The reader will direct his attention to the Order in Council for the settlement of the Township of McNab, passed in 1823, and contrast it with the terms the Laird of McNab imposed upon his settlers. They were ignorant. They had implicit confidence in their Chief. His word was law, and they imagined that the land was his, as he had represented it, and they conceived that they could easily pay the bushel of wheat to the acre. They had no experience and they really and conscientiously believed that the lands in Canada were as fertile as those in the straiths of their own native country—the land they had so lately left and where they paid high rents, and this small tax of a bushel for every cleared acre was a mere nothing, which could be easily met.