THOMAS CONANT.

Life
in
Canada

by
Thomas Conant,
Author of “Upper Canada Sketches.”
Toronto
William Briggs
1903

Entered according to Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year one thousand nine hundred and three, by Thomas Conant, at the Department of Agriculture.

“If a book comes from the heart, it will contrive to reach other hearts; all art and author’s craft are of small account to that.”

Preface.

In the following pages will be found some contributions towards the history of Canada and of the manners and customs of its inhabitants during the hundred years beginning October 5th, 1792. On that date my ancestor, Roger Conant, a graduate of Yale University, and a Massachusetts landowner, set foot on Canadian soil as a United Empire Loyalist. From him and from his descendants—handed down from father to son—there have come to me certain historical particulars which I regard as a trust and which I herewith give to the public. I am of the opinion that it is in such plain and unvarnished statements that future historians of our country will find their best materials, and I therefore feel constrained to do my share towards the task of supplying them.

The population of Canada is but five and one-third millions, but who can tell what it will be in a few decades? We may be sure that when our population rivals that of the United States to-day, and when our numerous seats of learning have duly leavened the mass of our people, any reliable particulars as to the early history of our country will be most eagerly sought for.

As a native resident of the premier Province of Ontario, where my ancestors from Roger Conant onwards also spent their lives, I have naturally dealt chiefly with affairs and happenings in what has hitherto been the most important province of the Dominion, and which possesses at least half of the inhabitants of the entire country. But I have not the slightest desire to detract from the merits and historical interest of the other provinces.

Thomas Conant.

Oshawa, January, 1903.

Contents.

Illustrations.

LIFE IN CANADA.

CHAPTER I.

Roger Conant—His position in Massachusetts—Remained in the United States two years without being molested—Atrocities committed by “Butler’s Rangers”—Comes to Upper Canada—Received by Governor Simcoe—Takes up land at Darlington—Becomes a fur trader—His life as a settler—Other members of the Conant family.

The author’s great-grandfather, Roger Conant, was born at Bridgewater, Massachusetts, on June 22nd, 1748. He was a direct descendant (sixth generation) from Roger Conant the Pilgrim, and founder of the Conant family in America, who came to Salem, Massachusetts, in the second ship, the Ann—the Mayflower being the first—in 1623, and became the first Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony under the British Crown. He was graduated in Arts and law at Yale University in 1765. At the time of the outbreak of the Revolution in 1776 he was twenty-eight years old. His capacity and business ability may be judged from the facts that he owned no fewer than 13,000 acres of land in New England, and that when he came to Canada he brought with him £5,000 in British gold. He appears to have been a man of keen judgment, of quiet manners, not given to random talking, of great personal strength, and highly acceptable to his neighbors. In after days, when he had to do his share toward subduing the Canadian forest, they tell of him sinking his axe up to the eye at every stroke in the beech or maple. The record is that he could chop, split and pile a full cord of wood in an hour.

Although he became a United Empire Loyalist and ultimately came to Canada, leaving his 13,000 acres behind him in Massachusetts, for which neither he nor his descendants ever received a cent, Roger Conant’s decision to emigrate was not taken at once. The Revolution broke out in 1776, but he did not remove from his home until 1778. Even then he does not appear to have been subjected to the annoyances and persecution which some have attributed to the disaffected colonists. What the author has to say on this point comes from Roger Conant’s own lips, and has been handed down from father to son. He has, therefore, no choice in a work of this kind but to give it as it came to him. It has been the rule among many persons who claim New England origin to paint very dark pictures of the treatment their forefathers received at the hands of those who joined the colonists in revolt from the British Crown. For instance, words like the following were used soon after the thirteen colonies were accorded their independence and became the United States:

ROGER CONANT.

Born at Bridgewater, Mass., June 22, 1748.
Graduated at Yale University in Arts and law, 1765.
Came to Darlington, Upper Canada, a U. E. L., 1792.
Died in Darlington, June 21, 1821.

“Did it serve any good end to endeavor to hinder Tories from getting tenants or to prevent persons who owed them from paying honest debts? On whose cheek should have been the blush of shame when the habitation of the aged and feeble Foster was sacked and he had no shelter but the woods; when Williams, as infirm as he, was seized at night and dragged away for miles and smoked in a room with fastened doors and closed chimney-top? What father who doubted whether to join or fly, determined to abide the issue in the land of his birth because foul words were spoken to his daughters, or because they were pelted when riding or when moving in the innocent dance? Is there cause to wonder that some who still live should yet say of their own or their fathers’ treatment that persecution made half of the King’s friends?”

Roger Conant, however, during the two years he remained at Bridgewater after the breaking out of the Revolution, was free from these disagreeable experiences. He frequently reiterated that such instances as those of Foster and Williams were very rare, and maintained that those who were subject to harsh treatment were those who made themselves particularly obnoxious to their neighbors who were in favor of the Revolution. Persons who were blatant and offensive in their words, continually boasting their British citizenship and that nobody dare molest them—in a word, as we say, a century and a quarter after the struggle, forever carrying a chip on the shoulder and daring anybody to knock it off—naturally rendered themselves objects of dislike. It must be borne in mind that, right or wrong, the entire community were almost a unit in their contention for separation from Great Britain. Yet Roger Conant, who did not take up arms with the patriots, was not molested. His oft-repeated testimony was that no one in New England need have been molested on account of his political opinions.

As a matter of fact, he frequently averred that he made a mistake when he left New England and came to the wilds of Canada. To the latest day of his life he regretted the change, and said that he should have remained and joined the patriots; that the New Englanders who were accused of such savage actions towards loyalists were not bad people, but that on the contrary they were the very best America then had—kind, cultivated and considerate. Nor was he alone in this conviction. He was fond of comparing notes with other United Empire Loyalists with whom from time to time he met. He was always glad to meet those who had come to Canada from the revolted colonies. And he again and again averred that their opinion tallied with his own, viz., that they were mistaken and foolish in coming away. He entertained no feelings of animosity against the new government who appropriated his 13,000 acres. Neither does the author. Such feelings were and are reserved for Lord North, whose short-sightedness and obstinacy were the immediate cause of the war. A man who could say that “he would whip the colonists into subjection” deserves the universal contempt of mankind, especially when it is remembered that at the very moment of his outbreak of ungoverned and arbitrary temper the colonists were only waiting for an opportunity to consummate an entente cordiale with the Mother Country, and to return to former good feeling and peace.

On the other hand, Roger Conant had that to tell regarding some of the British forces which does not form pleasant reading, but which the author feels impelled to set down in order to present a faithful picture of Great Britain’s stupendous folly, viz., her war with the American colonies in 1776. The first body of irregular troops of any sort that he saw who were fighting for the King were Butler’s Rangers, which body, to his astonishment, he found in northern New York State when wending his way to Upper Canada. For some time he tarried in the district where this force was carrying on its operations. It would seem as if the very spirit of the evil one had taken possession of these men. Acts of arson by which the unfortunate settler lost his log cabin, the only shelter for his wife and little ones from the inclemency of a northern winter, were too common to remark. Murder and rapine were acts of everyday occurrence. Manifestly these atrocious guerillas could not remain in the neighborhood that witnessed their crimes. They found their way in various directions to places where they hoped to evade the tale of their villany. In after years one of these very men wandered to Upper Canada, and, as it happened, hired himself to Roger Conant to work about the latter’s homestead at Darlington. An occasion came when this man, who was very reticent, had partaken too freely of liquor, so that his tongue was loosed, and in an unbroken flow of words he unfolded a boastful narrative of the horrid deeds of himself and his companions of Butler’s Rangers. One day, he said, they entered a log-house in the forest in New York State, and quickly murdered the mother and her two children. They were about applying the torch to the dwelling, when he discovered an infant asleep, covered with an old coverlet, in the corner of an adjoining bedroom. He drew the baby forth, when one of the Rangers, not quite lost to all sense of humanity, begged him to spare the child, “because,” as he said, “it can do no harm.” With a drunken, leering boast he declared he would not, “for,” said he, as he dashed its head against the stone jamb of the open fireplace, “Nits make lice, and I won’t save it.”

It is no wonder that Roger Conant said that many times his heart failed him when these terrible acts of Butler’s Rangers were being perpetrated, and that he felt sorry even then, when in New York State and on his way to Upper Canada, that he had not remained in Massachusetts and joined the patriots. It is to be remembered that these persons were burnt out, murdered, and their women outraged, simply because they thought Britain bore too heavily on them, and that reforms were needed in the colonies. Nor could these acts in even the smallest degree assist the cause of Britain from a military point of view.

On October 5th, 1792, Roger Conant crossed the Niagara River on a flat-bottomed scow ferry, and landed at Newark, then the capital of Upper Canada. Governor Simcoe, who had only been sworn in as Governor a few days previously, came to the wharfside

GOVERNOR SIMCOE.

(From the tomb in Exeter Cathedral, England.)

(By permission from the J. Ross Robertson collection.)

to meet the incoming emigrant, who, with his wife and children, his waggons and his household stuff, had come to make his future home in Upper Canada.

“Where do you wish to go?” said the Governor.

“I think of following the north shore of the lake eastward till I find a suitable place to settle in, sir.”

“But the land up there is not surveyed yet. Should you not prefer to go up to Lake Simcoe? That is where I would like to see you take up your abode.”

But Roger Conant shook his head. He had made up his mind to go to the north shore of the lake, eastward, and there he ultimately went. When Governor Simcoe found that he was determined, he told him that when he had fixed on a location he was to blaze the limits of the farm on the lake shore he would like to have. When the survey was completed, he, the Governor, would see that he got his patents for the area so blazed. And in justice to the Governor, the author is pleased here to set down that he faithfully kept his word. The patents for the land blazed by Roger were duly and faithfully made out. But the author must express strong disapproval of his ancestor’s ultra modesty in not blazing at least a township in Durham County to compensate him and his heirs for the 13,000 acres which he had lost in Massachusetts.

Roger blazed but some 800 acres. For one thing, blazing involved a large amount of very heavy work. The intervening trees of the unbroken forest had to be cut away. A straight line must be made out from blaze to blaze. Besides, the emigrant to those silent and pathless forests appears to have had small thought of any future value of the land thus acquired, and as he would have said, colloquially, he was not disposed to bother with blazing over eight hundred acres.

Realizing the difficulty the incomer would have in getting across the fords at the head of Lake Ontario, between Niagara and Hamilton, Governor Simcoe sent his aide-de-camp to pilot the cavalcade. No waggon road had been constructed along the shore. But the sand was the only obstruction, and after several days’ travel he arrived at Darlington, where was the unbroken forest, diversified only by the many streams and rivers of undulating central Canada. It was a fine landscape that lay around the emigrant, with the divine impress still upon it. The red man had not changed its original features. He had contented himself with the results of the chase among the sombre shades of the forest, or, floating upon the pure blue waters in his birch-bark canoe, he took of the myriads upon myriads of the finny tribe from the cool depths below.

The whites had only just begun to obtain a livelihood in the broad land. Not more than 12,000 persons of European descent then dwelt in all Upper Canada, now forming the peerless Province of Ontario, with its 3,000,000 of inhabitants. Roger Conant had chosen a beautiful location, and here with a valiant heart he started to hew out a home for himself and his family. Although he had brought to this province from Massachusetts £5,000 in British gold, he was unable at the first to make any use of it, simply because there were no neighbors to do business with, and manifestly no trade requirements.[A] But we find him, about the year 1798, becoming a fur trader with the Indians. He invested some of his money in the Durham boats of that day, which were used to ascend the St. Lawrence River from Montreal, being pulled up the rapids of that mighty river by ropes in the hands of men on shore. Canals, as we have them now around the rapids, were not then even thought of. Nor was the Rideau Canal, making the long detour by Ottawa, which did so much afterwards to develop the western part of the province. With capital, and possessing the basis of all wealth robust health, Roger Conant pursued the fur trade with the Indians to its utmost possibility. Disposing of the goods he brought from Montreal in his Durham boats, he accumulated, by barter, large quantities of furs. To Montreal in turn he took his bundles of furs, and gold came to him in abundance, so that he rapidly accumulated a considerable fortune. While doing so, and pursuing his trading with the red men, his home life was not neglected. Rude though his log-house beside the salmon stream at Darlington was, it was spacious and comfortable, and in its day might even be termed a hall. It had the charm of a fine situation, and it had Lake Ontario for its adjacent prospect. Conant had brought a few books from his Massachusetts home at Bridgewater, and while he conned these ever so faithfully over and over again, the great book of nature was always spread before him in the surpassingly beautiful landscape that included the shimmering waters of the lake, the grass lands upon the beaver meadow at the mouth of the salmon stream, and the golden grain in the small clearings which he had so far been able to wrest from the dark, tall, prolific forest of beech, maple and birch, with an occasional large pine, that extended right down to the shingle of the beach. Of his sons it may be said that, although capable men, they were handicapped in the race with the incoming tide of settlers so soon to come to the neighborhood of that rude home at Darlington, in the county of Durham, Upper Canada. They were at a grievous disadvantage because of their lack of education. Education could not be obtained in Ontario in the early days of the nineteenth century. There were no schools, and had there been schools there would have been no pupils. Consequently we find Roger’s sons possessing grand physical health, and pursuing the vigorous life of that day, with but little education. They felled the forest, and obtained from the soil the crops that in its virginity it is always ready to give. Eliphalet, who was only a very small boy when his father brought him from Massachusetts, attended to the business affairs of the family as his father got older, and we find him making, after Roger Conant’s death, a declaration as to his father’s will, in which he states that he is especially cognizant that the will should be so and so. That instrument was admitted as a will by the court of that day, 1821, the date of Roger’s death. To us such proceedings seem crude, particularly as the document referred to conveyed an estate of great value.

With regard to this will a singular circumstance must be noted. Roger died a very large real estate owner. This part of his possessions is duly scheduled. But of his hoard of gold no mention is made. The author’s paternal uncle, David Annis, who lived with the family till his death in 1861, frequently said in the author’s hearing—it was a statement made many times—that Roger Conant had gold and buried it. Why he did so is a mystery. It is also certain that no one has yet unearthed that gold. On the farm at Darlington on which he resided, a few days before his death he took a large family iron bake-kettle, and after placing therein his gold he buried it on the bank of the salmon stream of which mention has already been made. The bake-kettle was missed from its accustomed position by the open fireplace, but search failed to reveal its whereabouts. Thereafter, and many times since, persons with various amalgams and with divining rods and sticks have searched for this buried treasure, but always in vain.

Of Eliphalet, the son, who did the business of the family, being the elder son, all trace is lost, and there is no one known to-day who claims descent from him.

Abel, another son, had an immense tract of land in Scarborough, on the Danforth Road, near the Presbyterian Centennial Church of that township. His son, Roger, left a most respectable and interesting family in Michigan, of whom the best known and most intelligent is Mrs. Elizabeth West, of Port Huron, in that State. It does not appear that Abel Conant ever disposed of his Scarborough estate by deed or by will, but simply lost it, so lightly in those days did the inhabitants value accumulated properties.

Barnabas, another son of Roger, disappeared, and all trace of him is lost. Jeremiah—still another son—died about 1854 in Michigan. Of him, also, nothing is known. Lastly Thomas, the youngest son—grandfather of the author—as will be seen later in this volume, was assassinated when a young man during the Canadian Revolution of 1837-8.

Roger Conant’s daughter, Rhoda, became the wife of Levi Annis. From this union sprang a numerous and most progressive family, who are to-day, with their descendants, among the foremost of our land.

Polly, another daughter, married John Pickel and left a small family, descendants of which still reside in Darlington in the vicinity of the ancestral home.

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.

COLONEL TALBOT’S ARMCHAIR.

From the J. Ross Robertson collection.

The foregoing is, however, by the way. We are pursuing the fortunes of Roger Conant, and we find him from 1792 to 1812 struggling among the forest trees to gain a livelihood, or his labors on land occasionally diversified by his work on the lake, the waters of which, perhaps, yielded the most easily obtainable food. Mention has been made of the beaver meadow, and at this date the settler would often come across the traces of this industrious animal. The beaver is the typical unit or emblem of the furs of Canada. All other values of furs were made by comparison with the value of a beaver skin. In intelligence the beaver surpasses any of the fur-bearing animals. In the quality of his workmanship he is the mechanic of the animal tribe, and easily and far-away outstrips all his fellow-brutes, domestic or wild. He can fell a tree in any desired direction, and within half a foot of the spot on which he requires it to fall. One beaver is always on guard and vigilant while the others work. A single blow of the tail of the watching beaver upon the water will cause every other of his fellows to plump into the water and disappear. To carry earth to their dam they place it upon their broad, flat tails and draw it to the spot. While his home is always in close proximity of water he is sometimes caught on land, while proceeding from one body of water to another. Should you meet him thus at disadvantage upon the land, he does not even attempt to run away, nor to defend himself, for he well knows that both attempts would be utterly useless. Another defence is his; he appeals to one’s sympathy by crying—crying indeed so very naturally, while big tears roll from his eyes, with so close an imitation of the human, that it startles even the hunter himself. Many a beaver has been magnanimously given his life out of pure sympathy for the poor defenceless brute when caught at an unfair advantage away from his habitable element of water.

Salt-water salmon, too, swarmed at that date in our Canadian streams in countless myriads. In the month of November of each year they ascended the streams for spawning, after which they were seen no more until the summer of the following year. While we have no positive evidence that they return to the salt water, we know they must do so, because they are so very different from land-locked salmon or ouananiche. They were never caught in Lake Ontario after spawning in the streams in November, until June of the next year. Nor were they found above Niagara Falls, being unable to ascend that mighty cataract. Roger Conant said that his first food in Upper Canada came from the salmon taken in the creek beside his hastily built log-house. To help to realize how plentiful these fish were at the annual spawning time, we may adduce Roger Conant’s endeavor to paddle his canoe across the stream in Port Oshawa in 1805, when the salmon partly raised his boat out of the water, and were so close together that it was difficult for him to get his paddle below the surface. A farm of 150 acres on the Lake Ontario shore, that he acquired just previous to the War of 1812, he paid for by sending salmon in barrels to the United States ports, where they brought a fair cash price. Increasing population, no close seasons by law, nor any restrictions whatever, have been the causes which have resulted in almost destroying

SHOAL OF SALMON, NEAR OSHAWA, 1792.

these kings of fish that once came in uncountable swarms.

It will be gathered that up to the War of 1812, the settler, homely clad, axe in hand, subdued the forest, and spent happy, even if wearisome, days, with his dog generally as his only companion. It was during these years that he exhibited that skill in wielding the axe of which mention has been made. To-day, our few remaining woods being more open, and the timber being smaller, such feats would be impossible.

The first beginnings of public utilities were being made. Roads were being cut out of the forest. Some of these grew into forest again so little were they used.

In the last chapter it was noted that Roger Conant lost all his lands in New England by expropriation after the war of 1776. On arriving in Upper Canada he felt the great necessity of bestirring himself to make a fortune again here. Side by side with his clearing operations he carried on his fur-trading, and soon his desires in regard to wealth were gratified, but he never reconciled himself to being so far from his Alma Mater, Yale University (New Haven, Conn.), from which he had been graduated (in Arts and Law) in 1765.

Notwithstanding all the sacrifices made by the United Empire Loyalists to maintain British connections, many of them were asked to take the oath of allegiance on reaching their respective localities when they sought to make their home in Canada. Annexed is a photographic document of evidence, being a copy of the certificate of the oath of allegiance taken by one of the author’s relatives before the famed Robert Baldwin. One of the very earliest court summonses of Upper Canada is also reproduced (page 35) and it will be found very interesting. The reader will notice the absence of all printing on this document.

Obviously the title to all lands in Canada, after the conquest of 1759, and not previously granted by the king of France, was vested in the British Crown. There were a few lots of land so granted by the king of France in Upper Canada, but only a few. In Quebec, or Lower Canada, much of the land had already been so granted along the St. Lawrence River. These grants had, as a matter of course, to be respected by Great Britain. The French grants in Upper Canada were only a few along the Detroit River and at the extreme western boundary of the province. The easy accessibility of the lands by water will no doubt account for these grants having been located so remote from all neighbors, the nearest being those in Lower Canada from whence these grants came. Certain lands were also set apart for the Protestant clergy, viz., one-seventh of all lands granted. After a time, instead of taking the one-seventh of each lot granted, they were all added together and formed a whole lot—the “Clergy Reserve” lands, which became afterwards such a bone of contention. In these deeds gold and silver is reserved for the Crown. All white pine trees, too, are reserved, because naval officers had passed along the shore of

FAC-SIMILE OF CERTIFICATE OF OATH OF ALLEGIANCE.

I CERTIFY that [signature] has taken and subscrbed the Oath of Allegiance as required by Law, before me, this 15 day of Jan___ in the year of our Lord 1801 [signature]

Lake Ontario, about the time of the war of the Revolution, and saw the magnificent white pines. These officers were all searching for suitable trees to make masts for the Royal navy, and here they found them; hence the reservation of these trees in all Crown deeds. All deeds of realty to-day in Upper Canada make the same reservations, viz., “Subject nevertheless to the reservations, limitations and provisions expressed in the original grant thereof from the Crown.”

In Australia and New Zealand the governments make reservations so very binding that they can resume possession of lands at any time, as the author found when travelling there in 1898. Our antipodes have not deeds in fee simple as we have. No instance has ever been known in the locality of middle Ontario, in which the author’s home is, and that of his forefathers since 1792, of the Crown ever exercising its right to make use of the reservations.

Time-honored big wax seals were attached to all Crown grants. These seals were quite four inches in diameter, one-third of an inch thick, and secured to the parchment by a ribbon, while the Royal coat-of-arms was impressed on either side of the seal. To the honor and respect of the Crown, be it said, its treatment of the struggling settler was always generous and fair.

The Clergy Reserve lands, which, we have seen, were set apart, soon began to command purchasers, being mainly along the waters of Lake Ontario, as were the other patented lands. In the Act creating

FAC-SIMILE OF COURT SUMMONS, 1803.

the Clergy Reserve Trust, gold and silver were reserved, but not white pine, because there simply was none there to reserve.

The University of Toronto received odd lots here and there in Upper Canada for its support. This created another source from which tithes came. There were no reservations in the University deeds of 1866. They cited the Act which gave the University these lands.

Lastly came the Canada Company, the last remaining source of tithes. While the Crown, the Clergy Reserves and the University of Toronto were always fair and considerate to the settler, this company always demanded its full “pound of flesh,” and got it, too. It may be observed that the arrangements with regard to these deeds were made by the Imperial Government at home wholly. We were not consulted. By virtue of the Canada Company’s grant, thousands and thousands of acres of lands in Upper Canada were withheld from settlement for many years. To-day the grievance has passed, because they have next to no lands remaining. Perhaps, as Upper Canada has nearly three millions of population now (from 12,000 in 1792), we ought not to grieve. It did us harm, it is true, but it was no doubt unthinkingly originated in London, in 1826, and without sufficient consideration.

CHAPTER III.

The War of 1812—Canadian feeling with regard to it—Intolerance of the Family Compact—Roger Conant arrested and fined—March of defenders to York—Roger Conant hides his specie—A song about the war—Indian robbers foiled—The siege of Detroit—American prisoners sent to Quebec—Feeding them on the way—Attempt on the life of Colonel Scott of the U. S. army—Funeral of Brock—American forces appear off York—Blowing up of the fort—Burning of the Don bridge—Peace at last.

In twenty years from the time Governor Simcoe established his capital at Newark, on the Niagara River, after being sworn in as Governor of western Canada (his incumbency being the real commencement of the settlement of Upper Canada), began the War of 1812 between Great Britain and the United States. Our peaceably disposed and struggling Canadians, trying to subdue the forest and to procure a livelihood, were horrified to have a war on their hands. They could ill afford to leave their small clearings in the forest, where they garnered their small crops, to go and fight. Not one of them, however, for a single moment thought of aiding the United States or of remaining neutral. Canada was their home, and Canada they would defend. From 12,000 in 1792 in Upper Canada, 40,000 were now within its boundaries, endeavoring to make homes for themselves. We have the fact plainly told that, although at least one-third of all the inhabitants in 1812 were born in the United States, or were descendants of those who were born there, not one of them swerved in his loyalty to Canada, his adopted country. This is saying a very great deal, for it was in no sense Canada’s quarrel with the United States. If Great Britain chose to overhaul United States merchantmen for deserting from the Royal navy, it is certain that Canada could not be held responsible for any such high-handed act. Canadians generally at the breaking out of the war, whether of United States origin or from the British Isles direct, felt that Great Britain had been very assertive towards the United States, and had also been rather inclined to be exacting. Such was the feeling generally. No one, however, for a moment wavered. All were loyal and all obeyed the summons to join the militia and begin active service. Britain’s quarrel with the United States, in obedience to the mandate of some Cabinet Ministers safely ensconced in their sumptuous offices in London, worked incalculable hardships to the struggling settlers in the depths of our Canadian forests.

To vividly realize how very intolerant of any discussion of public matters of that day the Family Compact was, a personal narrative will be found interesting. Roger Conant, one day in the autumn, went from his home in Darlington to York. He had been requisitioned by the British officers just out from England (and whom he respected) to take an ox-cart

NEWARK (NIAGARA), 1813.

(From the J. Ross Robertson collection.)

load of war material along the Lake Ontario shore to York. Now at home, his neighbors being very sparse, he had but few opportunities to converse and compare opinions about the war. Once at York the desired opportunity came. When sitting at a hotel fire, with a number of civilians about, opinions were quite freely expressed by those present. Roger Conant remarked that he was sorry for the war, and that although he would fight for Britain and Canada, he felt that Britain should arrange the differences with the United States and not drag Canada into a war in which she had not the least interest. He further remarked to the assembled civilians about the fire, that he thought Britain, too, very arbitrary in searching vessels of the United States indiscriminately and taking seamen from them without knowing them to be deserters from the British navy. Some one of the assembly quickly reported that remark to the commandant of the fort at York. Roger was arrested in an almost incredibly short time, brought before a court-martial next morning and fined eighty pounds (Halifax), being about $320 of our money. Hard as this was, he paid the fine, held his peace, and went off home, until called to serve in the ranks, which he did duly and faithfully. Family Compact rule was answerable for such treatment, as it certainly was for the responsibility for the Revolution which followed in 1837. To the honor of Roger Conant be it always said, however, that he turned out, donning his best suit, and made for the nearest commanding officer. No settler ever refused to turn out, although when

BRITISH MILITARY UNIFORMS, 1812.

AN OLD SPINNING-WHEEL.

CIVILIAN COSTUMES, UPPER CANADA, 1812.

once turned out, they seemed so ludicrously weak that they felt themselves only a handful. There were a few British soldiers in red coats, but the defenders that made their way to York along the shores of Lake Ontario were a motley throng. There was no pretence at uniforms, nor was there indeed during the war, or very little of it. Let us realize if we can that these poor fellows had to walk along the lake shore. Here and there only were roads to be found cut out of the dense dark forest and back from the lake shore. Very few were fortunate enough to possess boats or canoes in which to row or paddle to York. Some, however, were able to adopt this mode of transit, and thereby hangs a tale. On one occasion a party of militiamen, accompanied by one or two soldiers—among them a drummer—were to be seen with their boats ashore, one of their craft being turned bottom upwards, and having the carcase of a fine porker “spread-eagled,” as sailors say, on either side of the keel. It appears that on their way to York the party had “commandeered” a pig they had come across, and being sharply pursued by its owner, they had taken this means of concealing their booty. No one thought of pulling the boat out of the water and turning it up to find the pig. At the same time they had requisitioned a fine fat goose, wrung its neck, and were carrying it away. In this case, with the pursuers at heel, the task of hiding the loot had fallen to the drummer. He speedily arranged matters by unheading his drum and placing the coveted bird inside, and the story goes that on the favorable opportunity arriving, both pig and goose formed the basis of an excellent feast on the lake shore, in which, if tradition is to be believed, one officer, at least, joined with considerable readiness.

Roger joined the rank and file of the militia, but afterwards, having blooded and fleet saddle-horses in his stables on Lake Ontario shore in Darlington, the commanding officers employed him as a despatch bearer. In turn in the militia and then as despatch bearer, when nothing seemed doing, his time was fully occupied at the business of war. He was then sixty-two years of age, but so pressed were the authorities for men, that age did not debar from service, but physical inability only.

Having accumulated wealth both in lands and specie, Roger’s first thought, on the breaking out of war, was for the safety of his specie. Mounting his best saddle-horse he rode some thirty miles west from his home in Darlington to Levi Annis’s, his brother-in-law, in Scarborough, in order that this relative might become his banker, for in those days there were no banks, and people had to hide their money. Entering his brother-in-law’s log-house, he removed a large pine knot from one of the logs forming the house wall. He placed his gold and silver within the cavity, and the knot was again inserted and all made smooth. Levi Annis gave no sign, and no one that came to the inn ever suspected the presence of this hoard of wealth. But when the war was over, Roger Conant again visited Levi Annis in Scarborough. Three years had passed away since, in his presence,

ROGER CONANT HIDING HIS TREASURE.

the treasure had been inserted in the wall. In his presence also the pine knot was now removed, and the bullion—about $16,000 in value—was drawn forth intact.

Among the records that have come down to the author from Roger Conant, and along with fragmentary papers left by him, by Levi Annis, David Annis, and Moode Farewell, various scraps of songs of the time 1812 to 1815 are garnered. Perhaps the song of the greatest merit and widest celebrity was “The Noble Lads of Canada,” the beginning of which was:

“Oh, now the time has come, my boys, to cross the Yankee line,
We remember they were rebels once, and conquered old Burgoyne;
We’ll subdue those mighty democrats, and pull their dwellings down,
And we’ll have the States inhabited with subjects of the Crown.”

It is just as well for the present generation to know this jingle, absurd as it may be. There were many verses in it, but all much to the same tenor, and while they pleased Canadians who sang the song, they were certainly harmless, and to-day we can afford to laugh at them. It is so very ridiculous to think of our handful of men going over to the United States and “pulling their dwellings down.” Our defence at home was quite another matter, but we are proud of it nevertheless. Human nature is much the same here as elsewhere, and was also in 1812-15. Thus would the author illustrate how he applies the inference; there were over a half of the inhabitants who came directly from the British Isles, or were descended from those who came. The greater part of the settlers were poor. Generally the U. E. Loyalists and their descendants were fairly well-to-do. If not well-to-do they were far better off than the others. Consequently some mean-spirited among the settlers from Britain or their descendants, who were so poor, would depreciate the U. E. Loyalists if possible. Roger Conant said that one envious neighbor set the Indians upon him, during a lull in the war, while he was at home, by telling them he was a Yankee, and that they might rob him if they chose. For the object of plunder, they came upon him because he had an abundance of stock, the best in the land, as well as goods of various sorts for Indian fur trading, while his money, as we have seen, was safely banked in a pine log in Scarborough. One night there came to his home in Darlington, in the year 1812, a single Indian who asked to rest before the open fire for the night. Permission was given, and he squatted before the blazing wood fire of logs. On watching him closely, a knife was seen to be up his sleeve of buckskin, but not a word was spoken of the discovery. Shortly another Indian came in and squatted beside the first on the floor, and in utter silence. Now came a third Indian, who, in his turn, crouched with the two former ones.

No doubt now remained in Roger Conant’s mind as to their purpose, and he roused himself to the occasion. They meant robbery, and murder, if necessary, to accomplish it. An axe at hand being always ready, he seized it, and drew back to the rifle hanging upon the wall, never absent therefrom unless in actual use. His family he sent out to the nearest neighbors, a mile away, along the lake shore.

“None of you stir. If you do, I’ll kill the first one who gets up. Stay just where you are until daylight.”

And now a squaw came in and sat beside the three crouching bucks, and cried softly. Very generally Indian squaws’ voices are soft, and naturally their crying would be soft, as was this squaw’s. Entreating with her crying, she began to beg for the release of the Indians, assuring the vigilant custodian “that they no longer meditated injury, nor theft, but would go away if they could be released.”

In this manner, with their nerves at high tension, the night passed, and not until the light of the next day did the guard dare to release his Indian prisoners. Then, one by one only, he allowed them to walk out of doors. It is very probable that this was an extreme case, but it occurred just as narrated. Not again during the war was Roger Conant molested by the Indians.

Not yet had the first year of the war (1812) dragged its slow length along. About the Niagara River the fighting had been most active at all points. Rumors of the clash of arms came from the West to those in central Upper Canada. General Hull thought himself secure at Detroit with a broad and deep river rolling between him and his opponents in Canada. Neither

FAREWELL’S TAVERN, NEAR OSHAWA, AS IT APPEARS TO-DAY.

depth of river nor width, however, kept our men away from Detroit. No Canadian can contemplate this exploit of our arms without a swelling of pride. Detroit became ours on the 15th of August, 1812, when General Hull surrendered the whole command of 2,500 men, without terms, and Michigan was our lawful conquest. Immediately on the surrender of so many men to us, it became a serious question what to do with so many prisoners of war. We possessed no place in Upper Canada where they could be securely kept, and at old Quebec only could we depend upon them being safely retained. Consequently to Quebec they were sent. They were sent thither in boats and canoes in which they assisted in rowing and paddling. In this manner they went to Quebec, and were apparently well content with their lot. So very meagre, however, were our resources that we could not furnish boats for all of them, and many were compelled to walk along the lake shore. They were fed at various places along the route, among others at Farewell’s tavern, near Oshawa, an engraving of which as it stands now is given on opposite page. From the author’s tales of his forbears he gets the story of these prisoners coming to their home to be fed. Guards, indeed, they had, but they outnumbered them ten to one, and even more, simply because we had not the men to guard them. From what can be learned, however, none ran away.

Coming to the Conant family homestead to be fed, without warning, a big pot of potatoes was quickly boiled. A churning of butter fortunately had been done that day, just previous to their coming, and a ham, it so happened, had been boiled the day preceding. All was set before them, and copious draughts of buttermilk were supplied. Guards and prisoners fared alike. There were no evidences of ill-feeling or rancor, but good nature and good humor prevailed, even if some shielded ministers in far-away London at that day forced the combat upon them.

Perhaps the most curious and picturesque instance of the fighting in and about this part of Canada was the taking of General Scott a prisoner at Queenston, and the occurrences subsequent to his capture. It seems that General Scott had been particularly active all day during the engagement of October 13th, 1812. Being a large man, and dressed in a showy blue uniform, although not then so high in rank as he afterwards became, he gained the attention of the Indians in our army. Nothing came of that immediately, but near evening his part of the United States forces were surrounded, and Colonel Scott (as he then was) was compelled to surrender. On the final conclusion of the day’s engagement, General Brock having been killed early in the day, he was invited to dine with General Sheaffe, then commanding our forces. Our prisoner, Colonel Scott, had given his parole not to attempt to escape, until regularly exchanged, so it was quite in order for him to accept the general’s invitation to dine. Just as they were in the act of sitting down at the table an orderly came to the diningroom, and said some Indian chiefs were at the door and wished to see Colonel Scott. Excusing himself, the Colonel went to the door, and in the narrow front hall met three Indians, fully armed and in all proper Indian war-paint and feathers. One Indian then asked Colonel Scott where he was wounded. When Scott replied that he had not been wounded, the questioning Indian said he had fired at him twelve times in succession, and with good aim, and that he never missed. Presuming on Colonel Scott’s good-nature, he took hold of his shoulder, as if to turn him around for the purpose of finding the wounds. “Hands off,” Scott said, “you shoot like a squaw.” Without more ado or warning the three Indians drew their tomahawks and knives, and essayed to attack the Colonel, although then a prisoner of war. As they were in the narrow hall, the plucky United States prisoner could not effectually use his sword arm for his defence, and his life was consequently in danger. But he backed them by quick thrusts of the sword out of the door, where he had more room for the play of his weapon, and then stood at bay. It was indeed a fight to the death, and even so good a swordsman as Colonel Scott must have succumbed, had not the guard of our army, seeing at a glance what was up, rushed to Scott’s rescue and helped him to drive the Indians off.

Not many days after this unseemly encounter, Colonel Scott was brought to York in one of the small gunboats which we had then on Lake Ontario for the defence of the lake ports. These boats, it is true, were not very elegant in their lines, nor were they formidably armed. All haste had been made to construct them; only a few weeks before the timber of which they were constructed was growing in the parent trees. Green timber and lumber, as any one will know, must make a very indifferent boat, and not a lasting one. It is a fact, nevertheless, that the single swivel gun which each boat carried did good service when called upon and was no mean antagonist. Be that as it may, we should not look in contempt on these mean gunboats, or compare them with the monster fighting ships of this day. These were the ships our fathers used, and the people of the United States also, and well they served their day. An engraving of York at this early day will be found on the opposite page, the little town which has become imperial and palatial Toronto, with more than a fifth of a million of people, and the change has been wrought in eighty-nine years.

Following, however, the fortunes of Colonel Scott until he came to Quebec, we shall find him a prisoner in the cabin of a large ship lying at anchor at the foot of the cliff on which that ancient city stands. Not among a lot of other prisoners from the United States do we find the Colonel on this ship—for there were many of them on board—but aft in the cabin with the officers. One day his quick ear heard the prisoners being interrogated on deck. With a few eager strides he ascends the cabin steps and is on deck. He finds many of the United States prisoners drawn up in line and an officer questioning them. Those who showed by the burr on their tongues to be unmistakably of Irish or Scotch origin were

VIEW OF YORK. FROM THE OLDEST EXTANT ENGRAVING.

(By permission from the J. Ross Robertson collection.)

called out and sent away to an adjoining man-of-war, there to serve in the Royal Navy, although protesting they were American citizens.

Five of those in the line Colonel Scott heard called, and saw them sent away.

“Silence!” he cried. “Men, not another word out of you. Don’t let them catch you by the tongue”; and every man’s mouth closed like a trap.

It was Britain’s old contention, “Once a British subject, always a British subject,” and no latitude was allowed for transference of citizenship to the United States with residence in that country. To-day we never cease to wonder that Great Britain could be so impolitic as to take such a high-handed course. Time, however, has changed all that, and a war such as that of 1812 will never again stain the escutcheons of Great Britain, Canada or the United States.

Very soon after this Colonel Scott was exchanged, and quickly shook the dust of Canada from his feet and found his way back to the United States.

Let us turn to a little pleasanter phase of this early stage of the war. General Brock, as before mentioned, was killed early in the day at the battle of Queenston, on October 13th, 1812. That his high character and bravery were not overestimated the sequel will show. Thompson, who fought on our side, and who wrote of the war in 1832, being an eye-witness, says he was held in such high esteem, even by the enemy, that “during the movement of the funeral procession of that brave man, from Queenston to Fort Niagara, a distance of seven miles, minute guns were fired at every American post on that part of the line, and even the appearance of hostilities was suspended.” From some relative of the author who fought on our side the word has come down to him, that the Americans fired on their side of the Niagara River an answering shot for every one our men fired, all the time they were marching the seven miles down the river in the funeral procession. And the relative in the ranks added that every voice was hushed, not a word was spoken, grief was apparent in every man’s face, and every one seemed sorry because we had such a war on hand, and because we were engaged in the business of war with our kinsmen.

And now the second year of the war had come with its attendant vicissitudes and dangers.

Very few of the militia had been allowed to leave the ranks during the past winter, for an attack was expected just as soon as the ice should break up in the bays on Lake Ontario. In the early spring of 1813 the ice seems to have left the bays very early, for on April 26th the American forces were enabled to appear off York, in gun-boats and transports, and eager for the fray. Now, it has always been asserted that Great Britain availed herself of all the savages she could get, both in the War of 1812, as well as in the War of the Revolution in 1776. In a measure only is this true. We see them, however, at this time helping to oppose the landing of the Americans at York on April 26th, 1813. If the author speaks in positive terms he hopes to be forgiven, for his forbear, Roger Conant, was there, musket in hand, and by his own lips has given the record which by natural descent has come down to the author. He said Indians were placed along the lake bank, one Indian between two white men, to repel the advance of the Americans from their boats on landing. That is to say, two white men were supposed to be able to keep one Indian up to his duty. But they couldn’t do it, for when the Americans really did land, and began the attack, many of the Indians got up and fled back from the shore of the lake to the forest beyond. And it is further told to the author by the same descent of lip service, that some of our militiamen were so incensed at the Indians for running away that they turned their muskets around from the Americans and fired at the fleeing Indians. Very probably their aim was faulty, for so far as is known no Indians fell, and more than likely our men did not aim to kill.

The result of the landing of the American forces we all know only too well, for our few men could not stay the hands of the assailants, who landed at will, and took possession of the country about. Near where the monument of the old French fort is, in the Industrial Fair grounds, near also to the York Pioneers’ log cabin, was the scene of this Indian running and the American landing. On the next day we find the Americans advancing upon the old fort to the east of the scene of the landing place. For a time, we know, our men made a stand for defence around and about that old fort. It is not at all probable we could have held it permanently, for the Americans outnumbered us, and were just as brave as our men were when at their best. Just how it was done my ancestor did not seem to know, but the word somehow, by very low whispers or signs, was passed around that the fort would be blown up, and that it was better to get out. Such a word came to Roger Conant, as he always stoutly maintained, and, acting upon it, in the very nick of time, he dropped out of the fort, when it blew up and killed so many Americans. He said that to his startled vision the air appeared full of burnt and scorched fragments of human bodies, and that they fell about him in a horrifying manner.[C] It is not in the province of the author to express an opinion as to the expediency of this act, but it was done no doubt for the best, and we to-day find no fault with our general in command who gave that terrible order.

Yet York and its neighborhood were still at the mercy of the American conquering army, and General Sheaffe began to think intently of his own safety. Mounting his horse he rides eastward, down King Street towards Kingston, and leaves his troops to follow more leisurely on foot. It is twelve miles from Toronto to Scarborough, where Levi Annis lived at his hotel. His testimony was that General Sheaffe appeared before his hotel door with his horse quite done up, and covered with foam. On going to the door and asking as to the trouble, General Sheaffe explained to Levi Annis that he had ridden from York, without drawing rein, and that it was most important that the Americans should not catch him. There certainly is room for excuse for General Sheaffe at this juncture, although Levi Annis was naturally much astonished at the state of nervousness in which he saw him. We must not forget that the General had only 1,500 men, all told, with which he had to defend all Upper Canada, and with this very small support no doubt he felt as he said, “that it was most important that he should not be captured.” Just as quickly as possible after the blowing up of the fort, some 150 men of the British regulars and Canadian militia got together and made their way to Kingston. At this time the first Don bridge had been built. It was of logs, mainly pine, which were cut near to the last approach to the bridge. A considerable causeway extended over the mud flats, on the east side, to the span of the bridge proper. It was very crude, and had been built in 1800 without the aid of experienced men or mechanics. It stood well enough, nevertheless, and did its work well, until that memorable day when our men retreated over it and burnt it as they went—April 27th, 1813. It was done as a

BURNING THE DON BRIDGE.

(From a sketch by Isaac Bellamy.)

precautionary measure in order to impede the progress of the victorious Americans, should they choose to follow in pursuit.

To those who did military service in this war 200 acres of the public lands were due. Roger Conant did not receive his 200 acres, although most justly entitled to them. To know the cause why he did not receive his land grant it will be necessary to go back a little. After the conquest of Canada and the Treaty of Paris (in 1763) which followed, some British officers were given appointments and places in Canada—no doubt to provide for them. When Upper Canada was made a separate province in 1791, more of these officials were given places. These persons seemed to have nothing in common with the people. On the contrary they seemed to seek to rule and get good livings out of them, and essayed to keep their places, becoming in time the Family Compact. It was their acts and those of their successors that caused the outbreak in 1837 which led to the Canadian Revolution. To these pampered office-holders it did not appear that the U. E. Loyalists, who had made most magnificent sacrifices for our country, were worthy of even civil treatment. So to Roger Conant they never gave the military land grant, and this treatment was meted out to most of the U. E. Loyalists who so faithfully served through that most unfortunate and deplorable war.

Peace! peace! Peace tardily came at last in 1814, the Treaty of Ghent having been signed on the 24th day of that year. The author realizes that, to-day, Canadians in their well-appointed and refined homes fail to enter into the feelings of our forefathers whose hearts leaped for joy as they thanked the great God for that inestimable blessing of peace. Fond mothers told it to the infants at the breast as they bounced them aloft and reiterated again and again, “Peace, darling, peace!” The gray-haired sire, whose days were numbered, dropped unchecked, unbidden tears of joy, silently and without a voice, as he too thanked his Maker again and again for that peace between neighbors and kindred that never should have been broken. No more would the neighborless settler fear peril as the darkening shadows of evening came about his log cabin in the great forest, or dread that before the light of another dawn armed foemen might come and take him prisoner, and drive his wife and little ones into an inclement winter night by the application of the torch. Strong men grasped each others’ hands, and shook, and bawled themselves hoarse in simple exuberance of spirits, and in the intensest feeling of thankfulness that peace had come to them once again. Nor was this outburst of feeling mere exultation over the Americans. All felt that we had honorably acquitted ourselves in a military point of view, but the Americans at the same time had fought with valor, and we really had not much to taunt them with.

It would perhaps be superfluous to record many of the particular charges which our people laid at the door of the Americans during the war. It is in evidence equally that the Americans laid quite as many sins to our people for their acts, while making forays on United States soil. So far as one may judge there is not any preponderating weight of evidence for either side. It is true we do accuse the Americans of burning the public buildings in York after the taking of the place, when the fort blew up on April 27th, 1813. The author is inclined to think that the Americans should not have applied the torch. On the other hand, we blew up the fort and utterly destroyed many hundreds of Americans in an instant, including their general.

The testimony of the great General Sherman, who, in 1865, marched with an army of 70,000 men through Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas and Virginia, destroying everything in a belt fifty miles wide, and than whom no one was better qualified to judge, was this: “War is hell.” It would have been futile for our people to expect humane war. There are no recriminations to make. In closing the records of the War of 1812 let us realize with our forefathers that peace, blessed peace, came to them and has ever since been with us. God be thanked.

CHAPTER IV.

Wolves in Upper Canada—Adventure of Thomas Conant—A grabbing land-surveyor—Canadian graveyards beside the lake—Millerism in Upper Canada—Mormonism.

Turning to ordinary affairs, we find that at this date our Government helped the settler to exterminate wolves by paying a bounty of about $6 for each wolf head produced before a magistrate. In reference to these ferocious animals, once so plentiful in Canada, an anecdote of the author’s grandfather will be found both interesting and instructive, giving us a true glimpse of the county in 1806. Thomas Conant, whose portrait is found on opposite page, and who was assassinated during the Canadian Revolution on February 15th, 1838 (vide “Upper Canada Sketches,” by the author), lived in Darlington, Durham County, Upper Canada. In the fall of 1806 he was “keeping company” with a young woman, who lived some three miles back from Lake Ontario, his home being on the shore of that great lake. Clearings or openings in the forest were at this time mostly along the lake shore. Consequently, to pay his respects to the young woman, he had to pass through some forest and clearings in succession. It was in November of that year. Snow had not yet fallen, but the ground

THOMAS CONANT.

Was born at Bridgewater, Mass., in 1782; came to Darlington, Canada, with his father, Roger Conant, in 1792. On February 15th, 1838, during the Canadian Revolution, he was foully massacred by one Cummings (in Darlington), a despatch bearer, of Port Hope, Ont. The assassin was applauded for the act by the Family Compact.

was frozen. Tarrying until midnight at the home of the object of his affections, he left, alone and unarmed, to walk the three intervening miles to his home. Getting over about one-half the distance, he heard the distant baying of wolves. Fear would, it may be supposed, lend speed to his feet, but thinking rightly that he could not outstrip the wolf on foot, he walked quietly along, watching for a convenient tree for climbing. In a very few minutes the wolves were upon him, in full cry, eyes protruding, tongues lolling, and ready to devour him. A near-by beech tree, which his arms could encircle, furnished him with the means of escape. He climbed, and climbed, while the wolves surrounded him and watched his every motion, never ceasing their dismal howls the live-long night. Thus he kept his lonely vigil. To lose his hold for a single second meant instant death. Great, however, as was the tension upon his strained muscles, they held on. Morn tardily came at last, and with its first peep the wolves left him and were seen no more. When they were really gone, he said he for the first time began looking about him, and found, with all his climbing, he had ascended a very few feet from the ground, and but just out of reach of the wolves’ jaws as they made frantic jumps to reach him. We may, however, be safe in assuming that the scare and involuntary vigil did not do him much harm, for in the March following (1807) he married the girl he went to visit that night, and made no complaints of having been maltreated by wolves.

In dismissing Thomas Conant at this time, the author digresses to say that he was born in the United States, and was only a small lad when Roger Conant, his father, brought him here. He was a generous, industrious citizen, and was always noted for being one of the best natured men in Canada, and possessed ability of a very high order. He was liked universally by all who knew him, and he pursued the ordinary avocations of life, such as Canadians then pursued, up to the time of his assassination (as before mentioned) during the Canadian Revolution, on February 15th, 1838. He went down to the grave from the stroke of a sword, wielded by a dragoon, and without any provocation other than accusing the dragoon of being drunk, as he was and had been many times previously when on duty as despatch bearer. But such was the state of affairs in Canada in 1837-8 that no investigation was held, nor was the murderer ever punished even in the mildest degree. The author asks the reader’s indulgence when he says he is very certain that only his grandfather’s (Thomas Conant) untimely death prevented him from leaving a name after him high up in Canadian annals, for he was a man of grand physique (6 feet 2 inches in height) and of commanding talents. He had a well-balanced mind and had wealth at his command.

Surveyors were now at work plotting out the townships, and settlers were coming very rapidly to occupy the lands which were surveyed. Readers will bear in mind that the Family Compact was still in full power. All grants for lands had to come through them. A story of a famous old land surveyor is in order in this place. He had been surveying for many seasons, and, about quarterly, came to York to make his reports and show the plots of the new townships laid out. It so happened that an uncle of the author’s was chain-bearer (whose office Fenimore Cooper, the novelist, has immortalized) to this long-winded surveyor. At the time of his service as chain-bearer this uncle was only a lusty young man, and was not supposed to know the very first elements of surveying. Among other things it was his duty to erect the tent for the nightly bivouac, and make a fire at the tent mouth. Before the dancing, fitful flames, lights and shadows in the forest primeval, he nightly sat with the lordly surveyor, and saw him prepare rude maps of the past day’s work. And, without any sort of knowledge of surveying, he saw him just touch a parallelogram here and there (which would represent 100 acres) with the point of his red pencil; but ever so light was the touch. Night after night he saw dots go down on the parallelograms, and when the quiver was full of sheets of survey, to York he went with the surveyor, to report at the Crown Lands office. He said that in the office he noticed the officials in charge scanning very intently for the red but faint dots. We all now know the result: friends of the government officials had secured hundreds and hundreds of acres of the best lands in the region surveyed, while the surveyor became a mighty land-owner of most choice lands, and died a very, very wealthy man. As may be surmised, he had marked the choicest 100-acre lots with faint red dots, and he and the officials grabbed the very choicest lands in that surveyor’s district. Should a would-be purchaser ask for any certain lot, he was put off for a day in order that they might see in the surveyor’s map if it really was a choice one, as they surmised, since he asked to buy it, in which case some friend immediately entered for it, and consequently that choice lot the settler could not purchase. Using a fictitious name to illustrate, it is said, and truly, too, that Peter Russell, Governor, deeded to Peter Russell, Esquire, many choice lots of 100 acres each of the public domain in Canada, in the days of the Family Compact. But here one can justly remark that the eternal fitness of things comes pretty nearly correct after all, for, although that surveyor was fabulously wealthy, none of the property to-day is in any of his descendants’ possession, nor are there offspring of any of the Family Compact with enough pelf to-day, severally or collectively, to cause any comment. “The mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small,” in Canada just as they did in Greece and Rome in days of yore.

This travesty of the conveying of public lands was one very just cause of complaint on behalf of the people, and the refusal of the authorities to correct it helped materially to cause the Canadian Revolution of 1837-38.

The settlements in central Canada were at this time for the most part close to the edge of the lake. Many very worthy, hard-working, law-abiding men and women of Canada found their last resting places in places of sepulture, as they had found their homes, beside the waters of Lake Ontario. Most pathetically all such graveyards appeal to the tender side of any Canadian who loves his country and his fellows. When we stop to consider all the hardships they had gone through, with unremitting days, weeks, months and years of the hardest and most strenuous muscle-aching toil, and remember, too, that they fought and conquered the forests of Canada, it would not be human to pass by the memory of such a noble race. Their fight had not the spur of excitement to keep up their courage, as in war, but it was a fight, nevertheless—silent, monotonous, trackless, soundless and alone, in forests greater than which earth presents few examples if any.

Noble men and women, pioneers of Canada, who gave us our birthright, you merit our regard and ungrudgingly you shall have it! On earth is no greater or more glittering example of a better, more prudent, loyal, law-abiding, religious and industrious people than were those now asleep in the soil of Canada, and from whom we sprang.

Old Ontario generally is placid and beautiful, ultra-marine blue, and shimmering. But he is not always so. When rude Boreas awakes the slumbering giant, he frets, and froths, and spumes, and roars. As he is in his might he becomes awful to look upon, and doubly so if one ventures upon his bosom. And while he is spurring and warring, his waves continually come upon the shore, each time a little higher and higher, searching each nook, cranny and fissure along the bank of the water’s edge. Many such storms, you can easily understand, you who live distant from navigable and great waters, tend to undermine the foundations of the banks, which after a few more beatings fall with a plunge, a roar, and a cloud of densest dust, into the waters below. In this manner does old Ontario encroach at points upon the land. The sequel may be readily seen. Those in their graves must give them up, while their bones whiten the shingle for many a sunshiny day. This is no fanciful picture. With a fowling-piece upon his shoulder the author has passed along the foot of the bank, where a graveyard is, and seen skulls, long hair, ribs, femurs and other larger bones of the human body bestrewing the beach. And he has seen also where the bank has fallen away, only one-half the length of the grave, and where only one-half of the skeleton went down with the submerged bank, while the other half remained in the grave, and the point of severance of the bones was plainly observable on the bank above the beholder’s head. Flesh, of course, there is none. Time has long since decayed and changed that.

Noble men and women, the pioneers of Canada, you deserve better graves, and cushions to lie on of the softest and most enduring velvet!

Pursuing this subject a little further, the author may observe that he personally owns a graveyard on a large farm which has been used by whites since 1798 and by red men before that on Lake Ontario

OLD GRAVEYARD NEAR OSHAWA, THE PROPERTY OF THE AUTHOR.

Graveyard on a bluff beside Lake Ontario, at Port Oshawa, overlooking the surrounding country for a radius of ten miles. The red man, with an eye to beauty, first used this for his place of sepulture, and now my tenants plough out skulls, stone pipes, thigh bones, and iron tomahawks with a star on them, which were given to the Indians by the French before the English Conquest of Canada. The waves of Lake Ontario perform a perpetual requiem to the memory of Indians and whites here interred.

shore, where the waves produce a perpetual lullaby and a requiem to the sainted memories of the dead.

In this case there is no particular danger of the graves being washed into the lake, but it seems hardly meet that any private owner should have absolute control of the remains of the forefathers of so many now dwelling in Canada. During his life no one shall be allowed by him to meddle with the spot, but to save it for all time he has made a standing proposition to deed it to any properly organized church that would receive it and look after it. No such body has yet been found to receive the gift in trust, but the author hopes that his only son, Gordon, may keep it and hand it down to his son, and his son, in order that it may never be disturbed.

About the year 1833 Millerism found a lodgment in Canada from the New England States, where one Miller, by his preaching, proved very clearly, to some minds, that on a night in February of that year the earth would pass away. Now, quite as great a proportion of the people in Canada embraced this doctrine as did those of the United States, when populations are compared. These persons had not the slightest doubt that the world would really burn up on the date announced. Hence there were many who during that winter, up to the time, failed to provide themselves with wood for heating their houses. The old Virginia snake fences being all about, they proceeded to take rails from off the fences and burn them in their own houses, for they surely would have enough from this source to last until the 15th February of that winter. But even though they were to die so soon they could not well do without food, and they had failed to provide any. John B. Warren at that time kept a large general store in Oshawa, and was noted for his wide dealings. And we accordingly find that good Millerite farmers came to him with their sleighs and offered him their own notes, endorsed by good neighbors, for as much as $300 per barrel for flour, which they would take home in their sleighs. It was then worth generally $5 per barrel. John B. Warren, to his honor be it said, always refused to trade with them on such terribly unequal terms, but explained to them that they could have the flour and could pay for it if they found themselves alive after 15th February. Warren, it will be understood, did not become a Millerite. Again, it is related that a husband who had for his second wife, Jane, lived near the graveyard in which slumbered his first wife, Elizabeth. As the hands of the long “grandfather’s clock” of those days got around to midnight, this husband said to his wife, “Jane, put on your things and let’s go over to the burying-ground, for I want to die beside my first wife, Elizabeth, so as to meet her the very first one after the great fire.” Jane’s faith, it seems, was not so strong, and she flashed fire at his manifest preference for her predecessor in her husband’s affections, and replied, “If that’s your game, you may go, and I won’t live with you any longer.” And it is added that she did not live under his roof again for several months after the great fire that was to be. Several different dates have been assigned since that first dread day, and no doubt some earnestly looked-for date is regarded as now approaching by this small but earnest body of people.

One Hoover believed the Millerite doctrine so very strongly that he gradually fancied himself more than human, and not amenable to nature’s laws. He announced that one day in the fall of 1832 he would walk on the water from Port Hoover, across Scugog Lake, seven miles to the mainland. The faithful gathered, and hundreds besides from curiosity. Hoover entered the water, slowly waded from the shore, and sought refuge behind an old pile of the dock, where he remained a few minutes. There were boxes like big boots upon his feet. Soon the crowd called vociferously for him to come out. When he did emerge from behind the pile he turned his face shoreward and gained solid land. The boys began to hoot and laugh at the would-be miracle-worker. Then Hoover made an explanation nearly in these words:

“My friends, a cloud rose before my eyes and I cannot see. I cannot walk upon the water to-day while this cloud is before my eyes. Soon it will be announced when the cloud has been removed, and I will do it.”

The crowd went away, never again to assemble at Hoover’s bidding. Millerite farmers who were usually good husbandmen, as the day approached, failed to turn their stock out of their pens, or to feed their animals, and actually nearly starved them. To-day all that is past, and in almost every instance those who embraced Millerism, and those who then opposed it, have gone to the great silent majority. Millerism is not now known in Canada.

One other sect now, so far as I know, is extinct in central Ontario; it may be worth mention. I say extinct, but I am not quite so certain of that, as there yet may be some isolated persons of that faith here and there in Ontario. I refer to the Mormons. During the summer of 1842 Joseph Smith, the founder of the Latter-Day Saints, came to central Ontario and spoke at open-air meetings, camp-meeting-like, as well as in houses. He even attempted to perform miracles by curing sick persons. I get it from persons on the stage of action this day, who heard Joseph Smith in Upper Canada in 1842, and they say he was a good talker and had a very insinuating manner, and they naively add that it is almost beyond belief that any one could fall in with him. It is only fair, however, to say in favor of the sincerity of those who joined him, that polygamy was not then announced. We ought, I think, to make this admission to let off those who did join as easily as possible; and from central Ontario there were Seeleys, McGahans, Lamoreaux and others, with their families, who sold their farms and gave the money to Joseph Smith, and went off to Nauvoo, Ill. It is a little singular, too, that these people were never again heard of directly from their new Mormon homes at Salt Lake, where they no doubt removed after the break up at Nauvoo. All these Mormon converts vanished from their neighbors with Joseph Smith, and never again sent any word to their friends and relatives left behind. I was at Salt Lake City for a short sojourn in 1879, and upon passing a stonecutter who was at work upon a square building stone for the new great Mormon tabernacle, asked the workman, “Do you know any one called McGahan about these parts?” Instantly the stonecutter dropped his tools and looked me very intently in the eye and replied, “Yes, I do. What do you know about them?” I explained that they came from Ontario, their former home, when the stonecutter urged me to go and see them; said they lived only fifteen miles down the valley south from Salt Lake, were wealthy, and would be pleased to see me, and most earnestly urged me to go. But my faith in Mormon integrity in those days was too low, and I dared not leave Camp Douglas and the protection of United States soldiers as far as fifteen miles away. Never since has any kind of trace been heard of our Mormon converts or their descendants.

CHAPTER V.

Abolition of slavery in Canada—Log-houses, their fireplaces and cooking apparatus—Difficulty experienced by settlers in obtaining money—Grants to U. E. Loyalists—First grist mill—Indians—Use of whiskey—Belief in witchcraft—Buffalo in Ontario.

Among the doings of the first parliament of Upper Canada there is none on which we can look back with greater satisfaction than the abolition of slavery in this country. Persons who have not looked closely into our early history may be almost disposed to express surprise that such a piece of legislation was passed. The subject is so interesting that I will speak more fully on the point. Great Britain abolished slavery in the British West Indies as late as 1833, and paid twenty millions of pounds for the slaves to their owners. It is difficult at this time to tell why our forefathers in Ontario were so much in advance of the Mother Country as well as the United States, for we find that they abolished slavery from Upper Canada in July, 1793. Of course, there were not many slaves in Upper Canada at the time, still there were some, but it seems that no compensation was ever paid to the owners for such slaves. Just think at what a fearful cost of treasure and precious lives the United States was called upon in the War of Secession to stand in order to rid their country of slavery. Had they abolished slavery at the time our forefathers did, no doubt the great war of the rebellion would have been averted, and besides, in 1793, when we abolished slavery, they could not have had very many slaves at the most, and even if they were paid for, they would not have cost anything like so great a sum as Great Britain paid for her West India slaves in 1833.

Then I maintain that our forefathers in Upper Canada in 1793 were far in advance in public spirit and true philanthropy of our American cousins, for we do not find that the Americans at this time made any great agitation to rid their country of the curse of slavery. If there were no other fact to be proud of in our early history, this act of our forefathers is one on which we may justly feel gratification. I will insert the Act abolishing slavery in full. In July, 1793, the first parliament of Upper Canada at its first session, called together at Niagara by the Lieut.-Governor, John Graves Simcoe, passed an Act as follows:

“CHAPTER VII.

“Section 1—Hereafter no person shall obtain a license for the importation of any negro or other person who shall come or be brought into this province after the passing of this Act, to be subject to the conditions of a slave; nor shall any voluntary contract of service be binding for a longer term than nine years.

“Section 2—This clause enables the present owners of slaves in their possession to retain them or bind out their children until they obtain the age of twenty-one years.

“Section 3—And in order to prevent the continuance of slavery in this province the children that shall be born of female slaves after the passing of this Act are to remain in the service of the owner of their mother until the age of twenty-five years, when they shall be discharged.

“Provided that in case any issue shall be born of such children during their servitude or after, such issue shall be entitled to all the rights and privileges of free-born subjects.”

By this simple Act of our first parliament our country was effectually rid of this pest without the shedding of a drop of blood or the expenditure of a single dollar in money. All honor to our forefathers for their wise act, and a cheer for our banner free province.

Our forefathers at this time, and long after, had no stoves in their log-houses. All cooking, as well as heating, was done by the fireplace. A crane swung on hinges into this great fireplace and could be swung out from the fire at pleasure. Attached to this crane was an iron, having notches therein, and fitting over this pendant iron rod was another shorter iron, with a link as of a chain on the end thereof. This link fitted into the notches on the first-mentioned iron. By this means the lower iron could be raised or lowered into or above the fire at pleasure. Thus our forefathers did their first cooking in Upper Canada. The corn cake, or wheaten cake, when they had it, was baked in the ashes, and wonderfully sweet old persons thought it. The fact that it was covered with some loose ashes did not detract from its sweetness, as they were soon brushed away, leaving the toothsome cake within.

The first improvement in the culinary art of our forefathers came with tin bake-ovens. These were tin trays, as it were, open on one side. They would be set before the fire-place, with the open side fronting the fire. Thus the rays of heat would be collected, and in a measure confined within the oven, and the bread or cakes within were soon nicely browned and baked. It was considered an immense stride by our forefathers when they got these bake-ovens, and for years they did not aspire to anything better.

Ovens out of doors were built by some of stones. They were generally conical in shape and open in the centre. An immense fire would be built in this out-door oven, and when burnt down to real live coals, would be all drawn out. Its stones would thus be thoroughly heated. Into the cavity in which the fire had been, the bread would be inserted and the door stopped up. Enough heat would remain in the stones to thoroughly bake at least two batches of bread. But this was done at a fearful waste of wood, which, of course, was of no account at that time. The advent of stoves changed all that, and now a fireplace of wood in an Ontario home is more a luxury than a necessity, and but few are to be found. But many of my more elderly readers will remember the huge gaping fireplaces of the past when a great “back-log,” two feet or more in diameter, would be drawn in with a horse into the house, and the horse unhitched, leaving the log before the fireplace. Once at the fireplace it was an easy matter, with handspikes, to

FIREPLACE AND HOUSEHOLD EFFECTS IN USE IN UPPER CANADA IN 1813.

(By permission from the J. Ross Robertson collection.)

KITCHEN UTENSILS. UPPER CANADA, 1813.

(By permission from the J. Ross Robertson collection.)

roll it to the back side of the fire. Since matches were not then invented, the fire was something to be closely guarded, lest it might go out. But this big back-log would usually keep a fire on for some three or four days, being covered up at night with the ashes and embers that it might smoulder all the night.

Wild leeks were then used as an article of food. As soon as the snow disappeared in the spring they would be found in abundance in the forests, and were gathered as the first spring vegetable. Their unsavory smell, or that imparted to the breath of the eater thereof, seemed to be no bar to their use. When all partook of the leek not one could detect the odor from the other. Likewise the cowslip, a little later in the season, which grew in shallow ponds, furnished a dish of greens to our forefathers.

To show how difficult it was at this early day for the poor settler to obtain money, I will relate an anecdote of about 1807. Levi Annis was living at this time with his father, in the county of Durham. During the summer and fall of 1806 they had chopped and burnt a fallow of thirty-one acres, which they sowed with fall wheat. As a preparation for sowing, the land was not ploughed at all, but it was loose and leafy and ashy from the burning. The wheat was sown broadcast by hand among the stumps. It was covered by hitching a yoke of oxen to the butt end of a small tree, with the branches left hanging thereto. The oxen drew this to and fro over the fallow among the stumps, and thus covered the wheat. This was called “bushing in,” and was the first harrow used by our forefathers among the stumps. However, the fallow upon which the wheat was so brushed in produced as fine a crop of fall wheat as ever grew, falling not much below thirty bushels per acre. Now this wheat could be exchanged for store goods at will, but not for money. Levi Annis, however, took the first load of it to Bowmanville, and was told by his father that he must get $5.50 on account of the whole crop to pay his taxes, for he must have the money to pay his taxes, but the rest he would take store pay for. The merchant with whom he dealt actually refused to advance the $5.50, saying he could get all the wheat he wanted for goods. The young man had to drive to another merchant and state his deplorable case to him and his urgent need of $5.50, and that if he would advance him the money he should have the whole crop of thirty-one acres. Finally the second merchant took pity upon the young man in his dilemma and advanced the money. Thus it was with the utmost difficulty that he could get $5.50 in cash out of thirty-one acres of wheat. This shows us to-day how difficult it was for our forefathers to get money.

Most of the refugees from the United States at the time of the American Revolution of the last century, who sided with Britain, and came to Canada and this section, came by way of Niagara. This north shore of Lake Ontario was then a wilderness, with no clearing or settlements at all. Where Toronto now is was an Indian camp when some of those refugees came through and over its present site. Of course, such refugees are termed “United Empire Loyalists,” and right well they deserve the name, for many of them left lands and houses and goodly heritage in Massachusetts to come over here and live under the old flag. The Royal grants which they received were given to them ostensibly for their loyalty to the Crown, but I sometimes think that our Royal governors at those times used them as a means of peopling the country, and it would almost appear that this consideration had as much to do with the grants for loyalty as for real bona fide settlers. The United Empire Loyalists came around the head of Lake Ontario, and stopped first beside the various creeks which flow into Lake Ontario, for two reasons: one, to enable them to catch the plentiful salmon in those creeks; and the other, that they might cut marsh grass for their cattle at the marshes formed at the streams’ mouths. There was no grist-mill nearer than Kingston, and these refugees had to go in bateaux with their grists (when they had any) all this way. They skirted close along the shore, and pulled their boats up at night and slept in them. Twice per year was, for many years, the greatest number of times they would go with the grist. Rather hard lines for those who had left the comforts and civilization of the Eastern States for the wilds of Canada.

John D. Smith, at Smith’s Creek, now Port Hope, erected a grist-mill some time after 1800 came in, and his was the first grist-mill between Toronto and Kingston. The boon which this conferred upon the sparse settlers can hardly be realized at this day. Many of these settlers became Indian traders, for the Indians at this time far outnumbered the whites; and semi-annually all the Indian tribes came to Lake Ontario to fish. Their trading was done by barter. A party of traders would set out into the woods with their packs of goods and fire off three guns in succession, which was the signal to the Indians that traders were there. Next morning the Indians would invariably come to the rendezvous to trade their furs for ammunition, blankets and trinkets. The furs were sent by bateaux to Montreal, and were for many years the only commodity which would command the cash in the market.

The next commodity which brought cash was black salts and potash. This was before the square timber began to be exported from this locality.

Just about the time that the settlers began to subdue the forests, the War of 1812 broke out and sadly disarranged all the plans of the settlers. Some of the sparse settlers, known for probity and reliability, got contracts under the Government as despatch bearers between certain stations, and for this received weekly, during the unfortunate time, Spanish milled dollars, in which they were then paid. The military impressment law was, of course, in full force during the war. The cannon and military stores were hauled along the shores from Montreal to Toronto, as the war progressed, as it was not safe to trust them on vessels on the water for fear of capture by the Americans. The mouths of streams had to be forded. The writer can call to mind many anecdotes of his forefathers of that interesting time in our history. The straggling settler would be ploughing among the stumps with his yoke of oxen, when a squad of British soldiers would come along and make him unhitch from the plough, and hitch on to the cannon without any waiting or time even to go in for his coat. Usually two yokes of oxen were attached to each of the small cannon. On arrival at the garrison at Toronto the owners of the oxen were invariably well paid in cash for their services. Two persons with oxen from this locality were once pressed into the service. One yoke happened to be tolerably fat, and the owner sold them to the military authorities in Toronto for a good price in money, for beef for the troops. The money obtained for that yoke of oxen enabled the owner to buy and pay for 200 acres of as fine land as to-day can be found under the sun.

Nor was it infrequent for the passing soldiers to be billeted upon the inhabitants for a night.

Indians used to spear fish when the first settlers came here, along the lake shore and off the headlands. No matter if the water was rough, the Indian would stand in the prow of the dug-out log canoe, holding some sturgeon oil in his mouth. Now and again he would spit this oil out upon the water, which would so calm it for a moment or two that he could see the fish and spear them. By such sleights the Indian invariably succeeded in procuring food from the forest and flood, while the white man could hardly do so until he learned from the Indian how to take game and fish. It was always the policy of the first settlers to treat the Indians kindly. They did this because the Indians gave them like treatment in return, and also because they far outnumbered the whites and could easily have destroyed them. An Indian was never to be refused something to eat if he came along hungry. My forefathers have told me that an Indian came along one day nearly famished and asked for food. Through some mishap he had been a week without food. A lot of cold meat was set before him and a quantity of corn bread. The old settler sat beside his fireplace and saw with surprise the eagerness and dexterity with which he managed to appropriate this cold meat. And still the Indian ate on, without apparent flagging, until at last the four pounds or so of cold meat was gone. Then he gave a grunt of satisfaction and sat before the fire. Soon he appeared in great distress and began rolling on the floor. To cure the surfeit the settler knew no better way than to grease his abdomen and pull him about. Just what virtue the grease had the settler did not know, but thinking that his body must necessarily stretch to master all that meat, he knew no better way to produce the stretching than by greasing him. And grease him he did, with the Indian all the time roaring with agony. However, after sundry greasings, rollings and groanings, he got relief, and sat once more beside the fire. On going away he told the old man what a good meal he had had, and that he ever would remember him. It is a fact that the Indian in his forest home used many times to be for days without food, when game was not secured. When he did get game he gorged himself, but of the manner of relieving a surfeit in the woods the white man does not seem to know whether it was by grease or otherwise.

At a logging bee in those old times whiskey was ever present. All the settlers in the locality would invariably turn out and help at the logging. Wonderful stories they tell of logging an acre of land in an hour and a half by three men and a yoke of oxen. Old men to-day tell me that they were mere lads then, and were the “whiskey boys” at these loggings. Whiskey was partaken of by the bowlful, and no ill effect seemed to follow from it. If a man were to drink one-half the quantity of whiskey to-day he would be more than drunk, and sick on the morrow. It must be that the whiskey of those days was better than the modern stuff. It was not supposed to be at all wrong to drink whiskey in those days, and they tell of an Irish immigrant who settled in Pickering, who had no cows, and had to provide food for his family during the winter. He procured two barrels of whiskey, which he and the family used with the cornmeal porridge during that winter. There were young children in the family at the time. It was not maintained that the whiskey was as nutritious as milk would have been, but yet they all came out in the spring in good condition, none the worse of the thrice daily consumption of whiskey.

Barns were sometimes moved from the manure pile about them. Manure was not considered of any value upon the land, for the land was rich enough without it. In a series of years the manure would accumulate about the barns, impeding access thereto, and they were actually moved away to get away from the manure, and then the manure burnt. Of course, we would not think of such a proceeding now, but there are farmers in Darlington, in the county of Durham, who burn their straw even now. When threshing, the straw is spread over a field, as delivered from a machine, by a boy with a horse-rake. It is then burned, relying for manure upon the ashes which the straw makes. This is not told as an example of good farming, but it illustrates the exceeding richness of Ontario soil.

Since the early American colonists burnt witches at Salem, their descendants, who came to Upper Canada as U. E. Loyalists, brought the belief of witchcraft with them; and many of them who came here about 1800, and before, really did believe in witches. I have heard my forefathers relate a witch story in all seriousness which I think worth repeating, as showing to us that the New England people who burnt witches were really sincere in the belief. About 1800 a settler in the spring of the year did not enjoy very good health. Nothing serious seemed to be the matter with him but a general inertia, or seediness. There was no medical man to consult, so he did the next best thing by consulting his nearest neighbor. The neighbor upon being told his symptoms at once pronounced him bewitched. An old woman in the locality was at once picked out as the bewitcher. Now for the remedy to break the spell of the witchery. A ball must be made of silver, and they melted a silver coin and made a rifle ball of it. An image of dough must be made to as closely resemble the supposed witch as possible. And it was made. Just as the sun rose the bewitched must fire at it with his rifle and the silver ball, and the dough image was set up on a top rail of the fence, and as the sun rose he fired and just grazed the shoulder of the dough image. In about an hour the old witch came to the house in great haste, and wanted to borrow some article. Were they to lend her the article desired the spell would come on again, but refusing, the spell was broken; of course, like sensible men, they did not lend the article. Even they went on to say further that the witch was hit and wounded slightly on the shoulder, where the dough image was struck by the silver ball. However, be that as it may, they asserted that the sick man speedily got well and was never again bewitched by the witch in question nor any other. Of the efficacy of the unerring aim of the silver ball I do not vouch, but I do vouch for the real bona fide belief of the old narrators of the whole tale.

There were buffalo in Ontario once, without a doubt, and I think I can prove it. When my people first came here, their own and two other families for some years were the only settlers between Toronto and Port Hope. They had cows, but by some fatality their only bull died. Somehow, three cows strayed away one summer and did not return until late in the fall or approach of winter. Next spring these cows had a calf each, and these calves partook partly of the mother, with the head and foreshoulders of the buffalo. Having a shaggy mane and long hair on their foreshoulders like the buffalo, they were without a doubt part buffalo. The progeny of this half-buffalo stock increased, but they never became thoroughly domesticated, and when a bull, some years after, could be obtained, they had to be killed on account of their viciousness.

CHAPTER VI.

A manufactory of base coin in the Province of Quebec—A clever penman—Incident at a trial—The gang of forgers broken up—“Stump-tail money”—Calves or land?—Ashbridge’s hotel, Toronto—Attempted robbery by Indians—The shooting of an Indian dog and the consequences.

I referred in the last chapter to the Spanish milled dollars in which military services were paid for. Mexican dollars were also in vogue, and a few years previous to the American War of 1812, some enterprising New England counterfeiters, fancying the densely-wooded portion of Lower Canada, near the state lines, would afford a secure base for their operations, emigrated to our lower province. These Mexican silver dollars were used as a currency for small moneys almost to the exclusion of British coins. The reason for this was because these Mexican unmilled dollars were of pure silver, almost without alloy, and were worth, intrinsically, rather more than their face value. In these forests the counterfeiters set up their presses and dies, and succeeded in making Mexican dollars so very nearly like the genuine ones that they passed unquestioned. Indeed, there was no limit to the amount these fellows could produce, or as to the amount of wealth they could accumulate thereby; that is to say, so far as wealth could be accumulated in those early days among forest fastnesses. However, this band had good houses constructed, and as well furnished as they could be at that early day. One of the traditions about them is that they were in the habit of throwing a dollar into the spittoon when they wanted it cleaned, which perhaps shows they had all the hired help that money could in those days give them. They appear to have lived a free-booting sort of life and to have enjoyed such luxuries as money could command. So expert had they become at the business that paymasters in the American army actually crossed over the lines by stealth, through the woods, and bought these Mexican dollars from the counterfeiters to pay the American troops with. This is a fact, anomalous as it may seem, and no doubt these paymasters reaped rich harvests by these transactions. As an illustration of the cleverness of these counterfeiters I will note that at one time they actually passed four thousand of their coins on one of the banks in Montreal.

We may, therefore, assume that as counterfeiters they had arrived at considerable perfection. The flooding of the Province of Quebec with these Mexican dollars somewhat disarranged the even flow of trade transactions.

On the close of the American war, however, these Mexican dollars were gradually taken out of circulation. The genuine ones were mostly taken to England to be recoined into British shillings and sixpences. This altered state of affairs caused these counterfeiters to pause in their career, and they ceased to produce the Mexican dollars for fear they might be traced out. Counterfeiting bank-notes was what they next turned their hands to. In those days the “greenback” had not been invented, the engravings on the bills were not very elaborate, and they found some one among them who could cut the die plate of a bill. Thus far they had got on well, but the signatures to the bills presented an almost insuperable obstacle. That oft-repeated remark, that “the old fellow always helps his own,” was true in their case at least. One of their number was found so clever with the pen that he could imitate the signatures to perfection. It is asserted that this signer claimed as his share for affixing the signatures a full share in all the band’s proceeds, and he was to do nothing else at all. The other members were to do all the work and he only did the writing, and lived like a gentleman in what had then become a small village in Quebec, near the province line. He had a fine house, carriages and servants; held several offices of trust, and had even rare and costly bound books in his library. Indeed, he seemed to be a person of culture in every way, and no one for a moment suspected him of any complicity in such a nefarious business as counterfeiting.

To show how clever he was as a penman, I will tell this anecdote by way of illustration. Some twenty thousand dollars’ worth of promissory notes had been sued in some court in the State of Vermont. The signature on these notes was disputed by the reputed maker, and a defence set up that they were forgeries. This important case was thoroughly defended by the ablest counsel of the day, and yet the case seemed likely to go against the maker of the notes. Happening to get a hint, this attorney for the defence quietly asked all the attorneys in the court to write their names on a half-sheet of foolscap, which he produced, torn carelessly from the other half-sheet.

Each one wrote his name. Then this attorney for the defence brought the signatures to this person who did the bank-note signing in Quebec. On the other half-sheet of foolscap this more than expert penman reproduced in exact fac-simile the attorneys’ names. Back into court he came with the two half-sheets of foolscap, one containing the genuine signatures and the other the forged ones, but both sheets alike in every respect, even as to jagged edges, where torn asunder, and every other particular.

Each signing attorney was then put in the witness box and asked to swear to his signature. Not one of them could do it. This fact threw doubts in the minds of the jury as to the genuineness of the signature of the notes, and the defendant got a verdict of “not guilty.”

As the country continued to be flooded with these notes, the Government finally began tracing their issue to the fountain head, and suddenly and without warning made a descent upon this respectable citizen’s fine house. Not a scrap could be found to incriminate him, and the searchers were about to leave with apologies, when, happening to look in the attic, they found a single unused die, which one of the gang had thoughtlessly left there.

The finding of this die of course caused his arrest, and he and two others were put on trial for their lives. Forgery in that day in Quebec merited the death penalty of the law. They had moved to Canada, however, for protection, and even in this instance Canada did not fail to protect them still. They had forged only notes of the state banks of the United States, and it seems that our law could not fairly get hold of them for forging the notes of a foreign country, and they got off scot-free. But the prosecution broke them up and they fled, having lost their pseudo-respectability.

It is asserted that this expert penman and cultivated man afterwards migrated to the United States, became an inmate of nearly all the penitentiaries the United States then possessed, and finally died in one of them. So, in this instance, as ever, the way of the transgressor was hard, although seemingly so fair for so long a time.

“Can you tell me where I can buy shingles?” for many years after the breaking up of the gang was one of the formulas which strangers used when coming into the former counterfeiters’ locality to buy counterfeit money. A man of sixty-five now tells that when a lad he once in the spring packed his bundle in his handkerchief, swung it over his shoulder on a stick, and sallied out looking for work. A stylish team passed him, driven by two men, whom he asked for a ride. And they gave him a ride, and asked him while on the way “where they could buy some shingles?” Not knowing, he could not tell them, but his curiosity was aroused to know what men, dressed as they were, and with so fine a team and so light a rig, should want with shingles. Finally, after repeated inquiries, some one on the way told them to turn off the road, and back in the woods they would find “shingles.” It is asserted that for some years after the close of the American War of 1812 this counterfeit money had, among those who dealt in it, a certain market value. Sometimes the dollar was worth as much as forty cents, and at other times it had a greater value. Other catch words were used and known among those who dealt in this commodity besides “shingles,” but this term seems to have been most used and most generally known.

A long time it took to rid that part of Quebec of the remaining stamps and dies, and to stamp out the counterfeiting entirely. But as the country became more settled up and the roads improved it was gradually stopped. So far as I can ascertain, this narrative contains an account of the most systematized and successful series of forgeries our country at that time had.

Some of these clever New England forgers knew when to stop. One of them, it is said, moved away to New Jersey and bought a fine farm there from the proceeds of his forgeries in Canada, and lived the life of a country gentleman until his death.

The strangest part of this tale is yet to follow. I got it from the lips of a resident in the West, a close observer and likely to know.

In the early settlements of the Western States bordering on the Mississippi River, each state issued bills which were almost valueless in any other state. All sorts of forgeries were committed on these state bank bills. This money came to be known as “stump tail money,” and amidst the general confusion of currencies and hasty settlements the forgers were enabled to reap rich harvests. The forgers began to be caught and driven still further west to the Missouri River, as the States became better settled and things settled down generally. Nearly all of those forgers who were caught acknowledged that they were descendants of the gang of forgers whom I have been speaking of on the province line in Quebec. And more, they said in their confessions, that those who got away were likewise of the same descent. From this it would appear that in the guild of forgers the faculties are transmitted to succeeding generations, like those of caste in India.

I have said that in the early days of the century the settlers in Ontario did not entertain very correct ideas as to the prospective value of lands. The following anecdote of that time will illustrate this: Levi Annis, descended from Charles Annis, already alluded to, when about eighteen years of age had made a little money on his own account by trapping. He had saved enough money to buy himself a couple of bull calves six months old, and calculated to secure them. Just before he got to buying them, it came to his knowledge that for the same sum which he would pay for the calves he could buy outright 100 acres of land. For some days he was in doubt whether to buy the calves or the hundred acres. He asked his friends, and they reasoned that there was lots of land, and land he could buy any time, but calves were scarce and he had better buy them when he could. Consequently he bought the calves and let the land alone. To show how lightly land was valued in those days I make the comparison. But this is not at all in relation to the bargain. Had he bought the 100 acres of land, which he thought of doing, even before his death he would have seen a part of the town of Oshawa built upon it. To-day there is upon this land a large manufactory and numerous dwellings, and its value at this time is almost beyond estimating. Had he bought the land and simply kept it, and literally done nothing else, it would have made a rich man of him. But he chose the calves, and it is evident in the light of the subsequent events that his choice was a poor one.

An Indian tale of 1800 comes to my mind which my forefathers have told to me. In the early days the settlers had to devise plans to keep their sheep from the wolves. As their flocks increased their next great difficulty was to keep their sheep from the Indians’ dogs. The first settlements were, of course, along the shores of the great lakes, Ontario and Erie. Twice a year, spring and fall, the Indians would come out from the woods to fish in those lakes and marshes, and at the outlets of the streams. So numerous were the Indians at that time that they far outnumbered the whites, and when they came for the semi-annual fish they would form a regular village, as they congregated in their tents beside the shore of some marsh or bay upon the great lakes.

The settlers’ policy was one pre-eminently of conciliation to the Indians. But they would at every visit be accompanied by a lot of half-starved, ill-favored curs, which would worry the settlers’ sheep. At one visit they had a particularly large gaunt brute of a dog, which badly worried a sheep of my forefather. He remonstrated with the chief, and desired him to keep the dog at the camp, which he promised to do. Nightly he penned his sheep as usual, to keep off the wolves, but during the day this dog continued to worry them when out of sight among the log and brush on the partially cleared fields, and finally killed one. My people resolved to suffer it no longer, and at great risk of their lives and property shot the Indian dog—dead as they supposed. Then they took the dog that the Indians might not find him, and know that they had shot him, and put him in a hollow pine stub, the top of which stood some ten feet from the ground, and which was hollow to the bottom. Bury the dog they dared not, because the sharp-eyed Indian would discover the newly-turned earth and fish it out, and they knew they could not otherwise hide him successfully. That evening about forty Indians came looking for the animal, and searched every place, probable and improbable, indoors and out, and my people dared not refuse them admittance. Without a doubt my forefather will be pardoned for “telling a white one” when he averred that he had not got the dog. At this juncture it became by far too serious to jest or prevaricate, for their lives literally depended upon the Indians’ successful search for that canine. Search as they would, however, they did not find it, and darkness gratefully set in and put an end to their investigation for that day. But little sleep the settlers were able to take that night through dead fear that the Indians might possibly find the cur. Next morning, just at the first peep of day, my forefather was up and out to the stump, when to his intense astonishment and disgust the dog was barking and scratching within the stub to get out. He had not been effectually killed, and had come back again to life. Now here was a dilemma, and what was to be done? To get up on the stub and fire at the dog again was more than he dared, for it would arouse the Indians only half a mile away.

An expedient he soon hit upon, however, and he resolved that day to go to logging that he might burn the stub without arousing the keen suspicion of the Indians. Yoking his oxen, a pile of logs was soon gathered about the stub and set on fire. The dog’s cries grew fainter and to him beautifully less, and finally ceased. But he did not dare to stop the logging for the day, and worked at it faithfully all day, whether he wished to or not, that no suspicion might rest upon him for the burning of the pine stub. It is needless to add that the Indians did not get the dog, and that they never found out what became of him. At this time this may seem a simple story to tell, but to the participants it was a life-and-death matter, and I have heard my forefathers say that the old man would have gladly given all his sheep, dearly as he prized them, could he have recalled that shot, when he heard the dog howling the next morning in the stub.

CHAPTER VII.

The Canadian Revolution of 1837-38—Causes that led to it—Searching of Daniel Conant’s house—Tyrannous misrule of the Family Compact—A fugitive farmer—A visitor from the United States in danger—Daniel Conant a large vessel owner—Assists seventy patriots to escape—Linus Wilson Miller—His trial and sentence—State prisoners sent to Van Diemen’s Land.

That uprising of 1837-38 in Canada is now generally termed the Canadian Revolution. Most worthily does it deserve to be called a revolution, for the people who were its supporters afterwards got all they asked for. It was not a rebellion but a revolution, and it did great good for this country in the end. The fact of the very narrow and selfish rule of the Family Compact again comes to us, for having goaded the people to resort to extraordinary measures, they also persecuted persons who came, or whose fathers came, from the United States. All hail to those who, in a prominent or lesser way, took part in this rising on the side of the patriots. It is an honor to-day for any Canadian to be descended from one who took part and bore the burden and danger of service in the Canadian Revolution of 1837-38. It is not to be argued but that the patriots went rather too far, but no less could be expected when the people once were aroused for such just causes. Those who fought on the other side were equally as brave, and did their duty manfully and bravely as they then saw the light. It was, nevertheless, the efforts of the few patriots (whose fortunes we shall follow in part) that gave us our liberties in Canada, and likewise brought about constitutional government. Likewise were the effects of this revolution good for the Motherland, for every colony since that time has been free to carry on its own domestic concerns at will, which Canadians could not possibly do before the Canadian Revolution. The day is now here when those alive are proud of the part their forefathers took in the struggle, and the disposition of many writers to try to gloss the disturbances over, and make them appear small and puny in the way of concerted efforts, are not pleasant to us nor true in their spirit. In a word, no one can be found in Canada to-day who would dare to champion the cause of the Royalists and the Family Compact on that occasion, and assert that the patriots had not sufficient causes for their uprising. Only recently has this been the case, for it has been fashionable heretofore for every one to make light of the Revolution and to disclaim any connection with it.

The patriots were only trying to get wrongs redressed and a constitutional government inaugurated. They had no wish to uprise against Great Britain. Particularly is it true that the great bulk of the patriots were not uprising against the Motherland, for the author’s forbears, who knew well from actual contact with the patriots, have frequently told him so. The rule of the Family Compact they would not endure longer. They were goaded to exasperation by the infamous acts of that clique, and they were careless of what consequences might follow.

It was “Junius” who said, “The subject who is truly loyal will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary acts.” In accordance with that sentiment the patriots sought only to have the wrongs redressed, and not to take up arms against Great Britain in any sense. In the following pages some of the terribly arbitrary acts of the Family Compact will be given, for but very few Canadians to-day have the least inkling of the high-handed manner which this tyrannous power made use of in venting its private hatred on the patriots, both individually and collectively. It is, however, a matter of strong congratulation that though the Family Compact was victorious in the revolution, its rule was but short after it. The patriots secured all the privileges they asked for, and the Family Compact shrunk into nothingness.

The hanging of Lount and Matthews was really judicial murder, and the exportation of 232 Canadians to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania), where nearly all of them lost their lives, was an infamous deed; also the persistence with which the Compact pursued the patriots is enough to bring tears to the eyes of every thinking Canadian to-day who really loves his country. When the Southern States revolted and fought from April, 1861, to April, 1865, and brought about the most terrible war on record, wherein more men were killed than in any war the world has ever known, no one was hanged at its close. Nor was any leader imprisoned or exported, nor was the private property of the leaders confiscated, save that only of Jefferson Davis, the leader, and only a part of his private property withal. Whereas, here in Canada, because our patriots had the manliness to be men and stand up for their rights, though committing no overt acts, they were hanged, imprisoned, driven to the United States, or transported for life. In the case of the author’s own grandfather and parents he can bring out some features exactly. One Colonel Ferguson, who lived a mile and a quarter north of Whitby, considering his measure of loyalty to be so far in excess of that of all others about, took it upon himself to pay domiciliary visits to the homes of many with the troops under his command. He had the command of a few militiamen whose homes were in the locality of his visits. There were no overt acts being committed during the winter months of 1837-38, but it made no sort of difference to Colonel Ferguson. As a tool of the Family Compact he never ceased to annoy his neighbors. Very vivid impressions come to the author from the tales of his own father of Colonel Ferguson coming at midnight of a winter night with his men, surrounding the family residence and turning all the inmates out in the snow while he ransacked and searched at will. Many times during that memorable winter was the search repeated, but the author could never learn what Colonel Ferguson expected to find as a result of his

THE OLD CONANT HOMESTEAD AT PORT OSHAWA, BUILT IN 1811.

Here United States prisoners from General Hull’s army, which surrendered at Detroit, were fed while proceeding on their way by boats under guard to Quebec. Here also domiciliary visits were paid on several occasions during the Canadian Revolution of 1837-38, the house being surrounded by troops at midnight, and my people turned out in the snow while the house was being searched.

diligent searches. Daniel Conant’s New England descent would very probably go far to account for Colonel Ferguson’s insane suspiciousness. In this part of Canada the inhabitants generally were in favor of the movement. Not to be so was to be singular. That is to say, they were in favor of having the wrongs committed by the Family Compact redressed, but not one in 10,000 asked for a change of the political connection of Canada. To effect such a sweeping change as that would be was not the object of the agitation, and at this day of writing it seems very hard that the inhabitants should have been persecuted simply because they loved their country; but so it was. It would be well to instance another case of the tyrannous misrule of the Family Compact and their persecution of unoffending persons. A farmer living near Oshawa, being the son of a United Empire Loyalist, seemed to have all the Compact’s hate and suspicion centred upon him, simply because his father came from Massachusetts. The suspected man had done absolutely no act to place him in the eye of the law. Like nearly all others, he sympathized with the patriots, not for a moment supposing it to be a crime to love his country and its people. But Colonel Ferguson thought differently, and made a sally to capture the farmer. Now, capture meant almost certain death, for it would mean being incarcerated during the very cold weather in unheated guardhouses and gaols here or in Toronto. Knowing this, he avoided capture by changing his quarters every few days and never sleeping in a house. Usually he slept in the granary of a barn, burrowing into the bin of grain until almost or quite concealed, with the grain effectually covering him. One may rightly conjecture the terrible hardships of this poor farmer, exposed as he was to the inclemency of a Canadian winter. Fires in a barn are, of course, out of the question, and therefore he had no comfort of a house and a fireside the whole winter long. Such ill-usage could possibly have only one ending, viz., death, which followed in the fall of 1838. Nor is this an isolated case, for there were many such, but purposely we follow its details in order to present a faithful picture of life in Canada during the Canadian Revolution of 1837-38.

One more instance we must narrate before the indictment of the Family Compact is complete. David Trull, a resident of New York State, and a relative of the author, happened to come to visit his relatives about Bowmanville and Newcastle in the fall of 1837. While here on this visit the uprising took place, for the fight at Montgomery’s was on the 3rd of December, 1837. His visit having come to an end, he started for home the same way he came. On to Toronto, then, went David Trull, to get on board a small steamer running from the Queen’s wharf to Niagara. As he stepped upon the gang-plank a uniformed sentry presented a bayonet and cried “Halt!” threatening to run him through. He turned back from the wharf, frightened and amazed, proceeding to his hotel, which he had only that morning left. Telling the hotel-keeper of his trouble the worthy Boniface befriended him. He was warned that he must not on any account whatever, as he valued his life, let any one know that he hailed from the United States, for, said the hotel-keeper, “If you do they’ll put you in prison and hang you.” He was further advised to put on working clothes and act as hostler about the hotel, with a view of slipping away on the steamer later, when suspicion had been allayed. For many days he put in the time at watering and grooming horses for young would-be military satraps, who ordered him about, and whom in his own country he would have treated with contempt. But he got away on the steamer at last, and almost vowed when once on United States soil never again to set foot in Canada. Realizing, however, in after years that only a very small portion of the Canadian people were disposed to misuse a guest, as they had done in his case, he overlooked it, and came back on visits in after years. To his dying day, however, he never forgot the arbitrary treatment of the Family Compact, and his hate for them went with him to his grave.

Daniel Conant, the author’s father, was a very large vessel owner at the time of the Canadian Revolution. At the earnest requests, entreaties and tears of some seventy patriots, whose lives and liberties were unsafe in Canada, he took them in midwinter across Lake Ontario in his ship Industry to Oswego, N.Y. During the inclement weather of that voyage his ship was lost, while all got over safely (vide “Upper Canada Sketches,” by the author). But Daniel Conant and his officers and sailors dared not come back home, even without their ship. To be caught meant transportation to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania), or death by hanging at home, according to the mood of the authorities. To gain home and friends once more they walked back to Niagara in the spring of 1838, and crossed the Niagara River at its mouth, landing boldly at the wharf in the village of Niagara, where was a garrison and guards always on the watch. To get past the guard was the point at issue. John Pickel, who had been mate on the lost ship, has the credit of getting them out of the difficulty. Making for the canteen he hilariously began treating every one who came in sight. Being plentifully supplied with cash by the author’s father, he persistently kept at the treating, giving many most loyal toasts, “and was glad to get back again on Canadian soil.” These words to-day, after an intervening sixty-three years, seem, no doubt, tame and hardly worth preserving. Let us, however, remember the time and the terrible risk then run. As the shades of evening came on they quietly, one at a time, dropped out of the canteen, the garrison, the village, the clearing, and into the darkness of the forest. Hamilton was reached in due time, but a detour around to the north of Toronto was made, and justly proud of having saved the lives and fortunes of seventy patriots, whose only crime was that of loving their country, and wishing for reform and good government, they got home at last. It would scarcely be within the scope of this volume to follow

DANIEL CONANT.

in detail the events of the Canadian Revolution. To do so would make too bulky a volume. We may, however, notice the case of one who was transported, along with several others, to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania).

Linus Wilson Miller had come over from New York State, having relatives in Canada, and through sympathy had endeavored to help the patriots. He was apprehended, and in order to get a true inside view of the workings of the Family Compact we will give the court scene when he was brought up for trial at Niagara, July, 1838.

Having been brought under guard to the court room he was asked:

“Linus Wilson Miller, what say you—guilty or not guilty?

“I shall not plead to my indictment at present.

“Solicitor-General—But you must.

“I choose to be excused.

“Solicitor-General—But you cannot be excused.

“I tell you, I am not prepared to stand my trial now.

“Chief Justice—Answer you, prisoner at the bar, the question put to you by the Court—what say you, Linus Wilson Miller, guilty or not guilty?

“My Lord, that is a question which, as I before said, I am not now prepared to answer.

“Chief Justice—You must say, guilty or not guilty.

“Your lordship must excuse me.

“Chief Justice—“You shall answer either guilty or not guilty—it is only a mere matter of form.

“Doubtless your lordship considers hanging by one’s neck until dead only mere matter of form.”

“Chief Justice (in a rage)—Do you mean, sir, to insult this court?

“My Lord, I mean only what I say, that I must have time to prepare for my trial.

“Chief Justice—Will you or will you not plead to your indictment—what say you, prisoner at the bar, guilty or not guilty?

“My Lord, I cannot plead now.

“Chief Justice—You shall by G——

“My Lord, I will not. (Great sensation.)

“The Attorney-General—How dare you insult his lordship? You must answer at once; it will be better for you to do so. I advise you to plead not guilty; after which the Court will take into consideration your claims to have your trial postponed, and order you counsel, if you wish it. The Court are disposed to be just and merciful.

“I repeat what I said before, I will not.

“Attorney-General—You are a desperate fellow.

“And not without reason, for if I am to judge of the intentions of this Court, from external appearances, I am in desperate circumstances. But the word ‘fellow’ which you just applied to me is significant.

“Attorney-General (with a sneer)—Pray, sir, what are you?

“A victim chosen for the slaughter; but you are mistaken if you think to coax or drive me to plead at present; I understand your wishes and my own interests too well.

“Chief Justice—Prisoner at the bar, three weeks have passed since your capture, and you have had sufficient time to prepare your defence. This Court has been convened for the express purpose of trying you, and the Government cannot be put to so much expense for nothing. I have taken care myself that all witnesses which you can possibly require in your defence should be present to-day, and they are here. You can have, therefore, no excuse whatever for wishing to postpone your trial, and your only object is to give the Government and this Court unnecessary trouble; but your stubbornness shall avail you nothing, for the Court will order the usual course in case of stubborn and wilful prisoners, who refuse to plead, to be pursued in this case. I now ask you for the last time—what say you, Linus Wilson Miller, to the charges preferred against you: are you guilty or not guilty?

“My Lord, I am informed by your lordship that I have had sufficient time to prepare for my trial, having been in custody three weeks. How was I to prepare my defence before I had been indicted—how know what charges, if any, would be preferred against me? I have but now heard them read, and am required, without one moment’s warning, to plead to charges of the most serious nature, affecting my life! I am likewise informed by your lordship that all the witnesses requisite for my defence are present in Court, that in the present enlightened age, a judge, in a British Court of Justice, will tell a prisoner arraigned under such circumstances, that the witnesses for his defence are all present by order of the Court, and that too in the presence of a jury empanelled to try him. Is a Chief Justice of a British Court thus to sit upon a bench and pre-judge a case of life and death? Have I consulted any legal gentleman in this Province upon my case whereby by any possibility your lordship could have been apprised of the witnesses I may require, or of the nature of the defence which in so serious a case I may deem it necessary to make? How long have I known that charges were preferred against me which require either a defence or the surrender of my life without a struggle? And yet I am told by your lordship that I shall abide my trial upon the testimony of witnesses of your lordship’s own choosing, in a defence predetermined by your lordship long before a grand jury had found a true bill against me. Is this your boasted British justice? Am I indeed within the sacred walls of a court, a British Court, the pride and boast of Englishmen? Shame, my l——

“Chief Justice (in a great rage)—Silence, you d—d Yankee rebel! Not another word or—

“My Lord, I will not keep silence when my life is at stake.... A jury did I say? They are all strangers to me, but from the proceedings I have witnessed to-day, I have no doubt they are mere tools of the Government, pledged to render a verdict of guilty and perjure their own hearts.

“A Juryman, from the box—My Lord, are we honest men to be insulted and abused in this manner?

“No doubt the gentleman is an honest man.... My Lord, I have done—but I again demand from your lordship the full time allowed by law for my defence.... At present I have only to request to be furnished with a copy of my indictment.

“Chief Justice—The Court will not allow you a copy.”

There is no reason to infer that this is misquoted in a single letter. In fact current testimony will bear out all that Miller says, and the reading of this court scene will give us a very true insight into life in Canada in 1838, and will be quite new to the present generation of Canadians. The author gets this court scene from “Notes of an Exile, on Canada, England and Van Diemen’s Land,” by Linus Wilson Miller, and it is probable that the copy of Miller’s book that I possess is the only one in Canada to-day.

“On August 5th, 1838, Linus Wilson Miller was again tried at Niagara, and here follows the scene in court when the jury brought in a verdict of ‘Guilty, with an earnest recommendation of the prisoner to the extreme mercy of the court.’

“Chief Justice (in a great rage)—Gentlemen of the jury, do you know that your verdict is virtually an acquittal? How dare you bring in such a verdict in this case?...

“The Foreman—My Lord, the jury regard him as having been partially deranged some months since, but of sane mind when he invaded this province.

“Chief Justice—Then retire, gentlemen, and reconsider your verdict. You cannot recommend him to mercy.

“In a few minutes they returned with a verdict of ‘guilty, with a recommendation of the prisoner to the mercy of the court.’

“Chief Justice—Gentlemen of the jury, I’ll teach you your duty, how dare you return such a verdict?...

“A Juryman—My Lord, we recommend him on account of his youth.

“Chief Justice—That is no excuse for his crimes, ...

“Another Juryman—My Lord, we believe him to be an enthusiast in the cause in which he was engaged; that his motives are good, and his conduct honorable and humane.

“Chief Justice—Your duty is to pronounce the prisoner guilty or not guilty.