The Micmac Camp—Indian Church-warden and Broker—Interior of a Wigwam—A Madonna—A Digression—Malcolm discharged—An Indian Bargain—The Inn Parlor, and a Comfortable Night's Rest.
The threat had its effect: in a few minutes our boat ran bows-on up the clear pebbled beach before the Micmac camp.
It was a little cluster of birch-bark wigwams, pitched upon a carpet of greensward, just at the edge of one of the loveliest harbors in the world. The fog rolled away like the whiff of vapor from a pipe, and melted out of sight. Before us were the blue and violet waters, tinged with the hues of sunset, the rounded, swelling, curving shores opposite, dotted with cottages; the long, sweeping, creamy beaches, the distant shipping, and, beyond, the great waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Nearer at hand were "the murmuring pines and the hemlocks," the tender green light seen in vistas of firs and spruces, the thin smoke curling up from the wigwams, the birch-bark canoes, the black, brighteyes of the children, the sallow faces of the men, and the pretty squaws, arrayed in blue broad-cloth frocks and leggings, and modesty, and moccasins.
"Now, here we are," said Malcolm, triumphantly, "and wha d'ye thenk o' the Micmacs? Deil a wan o' the yellow deevils but knows Malcolm, an I'll introjewce ye to the hail o' em."
"Stop, sir," said Picton, sternly, "we want none of your company. You can take your boat back," (here I nodded affirmatively), "and we'll walk home."
It was quite a picture, that of our oarsman, upon this summons to depart. He had just laid his hand upon the shoulder of a fat, good-natured looking squaw, to commence the introjewcing; one foot rested on the bottom of an overturned canoe, in an attitude of command; his old battered tarpaulin hat, his Guernsey shirt, and salt-mackerel trowsers, finely relieved against the violet-tinted water; but oh! how chop-fallen were those rugged features under that old tarpaulin!
The scene had its effect; I am sure Picton and myself would gladly have paid the quadruple sum on the spot—after all, it was but a trifle—for we both drew forth a sovereign at the same moment.
Unfortunately Malcolm had no change; not a "bawbee." "Then," said we, "go back to the inn, and we'll pay you on our return."
"And," said Malcolm, in an unearthly whine that might have been heard all over the camp, "d' ye get me here to take advantage o' me, and no pay me my honest airnins?"
"What the devil to do with this fellow, short, of giving him a drubbing, I do not know," said Picton. "Here, you, give us change for a sovereign, or take yourself off and wait at the hotel till we get back again."
"I canna change a sovereign, I tell ye"——
"Then be off with you, and wait."
"Wad ye send me away without my honest airnins?" he uttered, with a whine like the bleat of a bagpipe.
Picton drew a little closer to Malcolm, with one fist carefully doubled up and put in ambush behind his back. But the boy interposed—"Perhaps the Micmac chief could change the sovereign."
"Oh! ay," quoth Malcolm, who had given an uneasy look at Picton as he stepped towards him; "Oh! ay; I'se tak ye tull 'im;" and without further ado he stepped off briskly towards the centre of the camp, and we followed in his wake. When our file-leader reached the wigwam of the chief, hewent down on hands and knees, lifted up a little curtain or blanket in front of the low door of the tent, crawled in head first, and we followed close upon his heels.
As soon as the eye became accustomed to the dim and uncertain light of the interior, we began to examine the curious and simple architecture of this human bee-hive. A circle of poles, say about ten feet in diameter at the base, and tied together to an apex at the top, covered with the thin bark of the birch-tree, except a space above to let out the smoke, was all the protection these people had against the elements in summer or winter. The floor, of course, was the primitive soil of Cape Breton; in the centre of the tent a few sticks were smouldering away over a little pile of ashes: the thin smoke lifted itself up in folds of blue vapor until it stole forth into the evening air from the opening in the roof. Through this aperture the light—the only light of the tent—fell down upon the group below: the old chief with his great silver cross, and medal, and snow-white hair; the young and beautiful squaw with her pappoose at the breast, like a Madonna by Murillo; Malcolm's battered tarpaulin and Guernsey shirt; and the two unpicturesque objects of the party—Picton and myself. Around the central fire a broad,green border of fragrant hemlock twigs, extending to the skirts of the tent, was raised a few inches from the ground. Upon this couch we sat, and opened our business with the aged sagamore.
Old Indian was very courteous; he drew forth a bag of clinking dollars, for strange as it may seem, he was a churchwarden: the Micmacs being all Catholics, the chief holds the silver keys of St. Peter. But venerable and pious as he appeared, with his silver cross and silver hair, the old fellow was something too of a broker! He demanded a fair rate of commission—eight per cent. premium on every dollar! Even this would not answer our purpose; it was as difficult to make change with the old churchwarden as with Malcolm: there was no money in the camp except hard silver dollars.
No change for a sovereign!
So we went forth from the wigwam again on all fours, and it was only by another promise of a sound drubbing that Malcolm was finally persuaded to drop off and leave us.
Aboriginal certainly is the camp of the Micmacs. The birch-bark wigwams; the canoes that lined the beach; the paddles, the utensils; the bows and arrows; the parti-colored baskets, are independent of, are earlier than our arts and manufactures. So far as these people are concerned, the colonialgovernment has been mild and considerate. Although there are game-laws in the Province, yet Micmac has a privilege no white man can possess. At all seasons he may hunt or fish; he may stick hisaishkunin the salmon as it runneth up the rivers to spawn, and shoot the partridge on its nest, if he please, without fine and imprisonment. Some may think it better to preserve the game than to preserve the Indian; but some think otherwise. For my part, when the question is between the man and the salmon, I am content to forego fish.
As we walked through the Micmac camp we met our semi-civilized friend with the lozenge eyes, and I made a contract with him for a brief voyage on le Bras d'Or. But alas! Indian will sometimes take a lesson from his white comrades! Micmac's charge at first was one pound for a trip of twenty-four miles on the "Arm of Gold;" cheap enough. But before we left the camp it was two pounds. That I agreed to pay. Then there was a portage of three miles, over which the canoe had to be carried. "Well?" "And it would take two men to paddle." "Well?" "And then the canoe had to be paddled back." "Well?" "And then carried over the portage again." "Well?" "And so it would be four pounds!" Here the negotiations were broken off; how much more it would cost Idid not ascertain. The rate of progression was too rapid for further inquiry.
So we walked home again amid the fragrant resinous trees, until we gained the high road, and so by pretty cottages, and lawns, and picket fences; sometimes meeting groups of wandering damsels with their young and happy lovers; sometimes twos and threes of horse-women, in habits, hats, and feathers; now catching a glimpse of the broad, blue harbor; now looking down a green lane, bordered with turf and copse; until we reached our comfortable quarters at Mrs. Hearn's, where the pretty chambermaid, with drooping eyes, welcomed us in a voice whose music was sweeter than the tea-bell she held in her hand. And here, too, we found Malcolm, waiting for his pay, partially sober and quiet as a lamb.
I trust the reader will not find fault with the writer for dwelling upon these minute particulars. In this itinerary of the trip to the Acadian land, I have endeavored to portray, as faithfully as may be, the salient features of the country, and particularly those contrasts visible in the settlements; the jealous preservation of those dear, old, splendid prejudices, that separate tribe from tribe, clan from clan, sect from sect, race from race. I wish the reader to see and know the country as it is, not forthe purpose of arousing his prejudices against a neighboring people, but rather with the intent of showing to what result these prejudices tend, in order that he may correct his own. A mere aggregation of tribes is not a great people. Take the human species in a state of sectionalism, and it does not make much difference whether it is in the shape of the Indian, proud of the blue and red stripes on his face, or the Scotchman, proud of the blue and red stripes on his plaid, the inferiority of the human animal, with his tribal sheep-mark on him, is evident enough to any person of enlarged understanding. Therefore I have been minute and faithful in describing the species McGibbet and Malcolm, and in contrasting them with the hardy fisherman of Louisburgh, the Micmacs of Sydney, the negroes of Deer's Castle, the Acadians of Chizzetcook, and as we shall see anon with other sectional specimens, just as they present their kaleidoscopic hues in the local settlements of this colony.
It is just a year since I was seated in that cosy inn-parlor at Sydney, and how strangely it all comes back again: the little window overlooking the harbor, the lights on the twinkling waters; the old-fashioned house-clock in the corner of the room; the bright brass andirons; the cut paper chimney-apron; the old sofa; the cheerful lamp, and the well-polished table. And I remember, too, the happy, tranquil feeling of lying in the snow-white sheets at night, and talking with Picton of our overland journey from Louisburgh; of McGibbet and Malcolm; and then we branched out on the great subject of Indian rights, and Indian wrongs; of squaws and pappooses; of wigwams and canoes, until at last I dropped off in a doze, and heard only a repetition of Micmac—Micmac—Micmac—Mic—Mac——Mic———Mac! To this day I am unable to say whether the sound I heard came from Picton, or the great house-clock in the corner.
Over the Bay—A Gigantic Dumb Waiter—Erebus—Reflections—White and Black Squares of the Chess-board—Leave-taking—An Interruption—The Aibstract Preencipels of Feenance.
Bright and early next morning we arose for an expedition across the bay to North Sydney and the coal-mines. A fresh breakfast in a sunny room, a brisk walk to the breezy, grass-grown parapet, that defends the harbor; a thought of the first expedition to lay down the telegraph line between the old and new hemispheres, for here lie the coils of the sub-marine cable, as they were left after the stormy essay of the steamer "James Adger," a year before—what a theme for a poet!
"Perhaps in this neglected spot is laidSome spark, now dormant, of electric fire:News, that the board of brokers might have swayed,Or broke the banks that trembled with the wire."
"Perhaps in this neglected spot is laidSome spark, now dormant, of electric fire:News, that the board of brokers might have swayed,Or broke the banks that trembled with the wire."
—and we take an airy seat on the poop-deck of the little English steamer, and are wafted across theharbor, five miles, to a small sea-port, where coal-schutes and railways run out over the wharfs, and coasters, both fore-and-aft, and square-rigged, are gathered in profusion. A glass of English ale at a right salt-sea tavern, a bay horse, and two-wheeled "jumper" for the road, and away we roll towards the mines. Now up hill and down; now passing another Micmac camp on the green margin of the beach; now by trim gardens without flowers; now getting nearer to the mines, which we know by the increasing blackness of the road; until at last we bowl past rows of one story dingy tenements of brick, with miners' wives and children clustered about them like funereal flowers; until we see the forges and jets of steam, and davits uplifted in the air; and hear the rattle of the iron trucks and the rush of the coal as it runs through the schutes into the rail-cars on the road beneath. We tie our pony beside a cinder-heap, and mount a ladder to the level of the huge platform above the shaft. A constant supply of small hand-cars come up with demoniac groans and shrieks from the bowels of the earth through the shaft. These are instantly seized by the laborers and run over an iron floor to the schute, where they are caught in titantic trammels, and overturned into harsh thunder. Meanwhile the demon car-bringer has sunk again on its errand; thesuspending rope wheeling down with dizzy swiftness. As one car-bearer descends, another rises to the surface with its twin wheel-vessels of coal.
"Would you like to go down?"
"How far down?"
"Sixty fathoms."
Three hundred and sixty feet! Think of being suspended by a thread, from a height twice that of Trinity's spire, and whirled into such a depth by steam! We crawled into the little iron box, just large enough to allow us to sit up with our heads against the top, both ends of our parachute being open; the operator presses down a bar, and instantly the earth and sky disappear, and we are wrapt in utter darkness. Oh? how sickening is this sinking feeling! Down—down—down! What a gigantic dumb-waiter! Down, down, a hot gust of vapor—a stifling sensation—a concussion upon the iron floor at the foot of the shaft; a multitude of twinkling lamps, of fiends, of grimy faces, and no bodies—and we are in a coal-mine.
There was a black, bituminous seat for visitors, sculptured out of the coal, just beyond the shaft, and to this we were led by the carboniferous fiends. My heart beat violently. I do not know how it went with Picton, but we were both silent. Oh!for a glimpse of the blue sky and waving trees above us, and a long breath of fresh air!
As soon as the stifling sensation passed away, we breathed more freely, and the lungs became accustomed to the subterranean atmosphere. In the gloom, we could see the smutted features only, of miners moving about, and to heighten the Dantesque reality, new and strange sounds, from different parts of the enormous cavern, came pouring towards the common centre—the shaft of the coal-pit.
These were the laden cars on the tram-ways, drawn by invisible horses, from the distant works in the mine, rolling and reverberating through the infernal aisles of this devil's cathedral. One could scarcely help recalling the old grandfather of Maud's Lord-lover:
——"lately died,Gone to ablacker pit, for whomGrimy nakedness, dragging his trucksAnd laying his trams,in a poisoned gloomWrought, till he crept from a gutted mineMaster of half a servile shire,And left his coal all turned into goldTo a grandson, first of his noble line."
——"lately died,Gone to ablacker pit, for whomGrimy nakedness, dragging his trucksAnd laying his trams,in a poisoned gloomWrought, till he crept from a gutted mineMaster of half a servile shire,And left his coal all turned into goldTo a grandson, first of his noble line."
Intermingled with these sounds were others, the jar and clash of gateways, the dripping and splashing of water, the rolling thunder of the ascending and descending iron parachutes in the shaft, the trampling of horses, the distant report of powder-blasts, and the shrill jargon of human speakers, near, yet only partially visible.
"Is it a clear day overhead?" said the black bust of one of the miners, with a lamp in itshat!
Just think of it! We had only been divorced from the aërial blue of a June sky a minute before. Our very horse was so high above us that we could have distinguished him only by the aid of a telescope—that is, if the solid ribs of the globe were not between us and him.
As soon as we became accustomed to the place, we moved off after the foreman of the mine. We walked through the miry tram-ways under the low, black arches, now stepping aside to let an invisible horse and car, "grating harsh thunder," pass us in the murky darkness; now through a door-way, momently closed to keep the foul and clear airs separate, until we came to the great furnace of the mine that draws off all the noxious vapors from this nest of Beelzebub. Then we went to the stables where countless horses are stalled—horses that never see the light of day again, or if they do, are struck blind by the apparition; now in wider galleries,and new explorations, where we behold the busy miners, twinkling like the distant lights of a city, and hear the thunder-burst, as the blast explodes in the murky chasms. At last, tired, oppressed, and sickened with the vast and horrible prison, for such it seems, we retrace our steps, and once more enter the iron parachute. A touch of the magic lever, and again we fly away; but now upwards, upwards to the glorious blue sky and air of mother earth. A miner with his lamp accompanies us. By its dim light we see how rapidly we spin through the shaft. Our car clashes again at the top, and as we step forth into the clear sunshine, we thankGodfor such a bright and beautiful world up stairs!
"Do you know," said I, "Picton, what we would do if we had such a devil's pit as that in the States?"
"Well?" answered the traveller, interrogatively.
"We would make niggers work it."
"I dare say," replied Picton, drily and satirically; "but, sir, I am proud to say that our government does not tolerate barbarity; to consign an inoffensive fellow-creature to such horrible labor, merely because he is black, is at variance with the well-known humanity of the whole British nation, sir."
"But those miners, Picton, were black as the devil himself."
"The miners," replied Picton, with impressive gravity, "are black, but not negroes."
"Nothing but mere white people, Picton?"
"Eh?" said the traveller.
"Only white people, and therefore we need not waste one grain of sympathy over a whole pit full of them."
"Why not?"
"Because they are not niggers, what is the use of wasting sympathy upon a rat-hole full of white British subjects?"
"I tell you what it is," said Picton, "you are getting personal."
We were now rolling past the dingy tenements again. Squalid-looking, care-worn women, grimy children:
"To me there's something touching, I confess,In the grave look of early thoughtfulness,Seen often in some little childish face,Among the poor;"—
"To me there's something touching, I confess,In the grave look of early thoughtfulness,Seen often in some little childish face,Among the poor;"—
But these children's faces are not such. A child's face—God bless it! should always have a little sunshine in its glance; but these are mere staring faces, without expression, that make you shudder and feelsad. Miners by birth; human moles fitted to burrow in darkness for a life-time. Is it worth living for? No wonder those swart laborers underground are so grim and taciturn: no wonder there was not a face lighted up by those smoky lamps in the pit, that had one line of human sympathy left in its rigidly engraved features!
But we must have coal, and we must have cotton. The whole plantations of the South barely supply the press with paper; and the messenger of intelligence, the steam-ship, but for coal could not perform its glorious mission. What is to be done, Picton? If every man is willing to give up his morning paper, wear a linen shirt, cross the ocean in a clipper-ship, and burn wood in an open fire-place, something might be done.
As Picton's steamer (probably fog-bound) had not yet arrived in Sydney, nor yet indeed the "Balaklava," the traveller determined to take a Newfoundland brigantine for St. John's, from which port there are vessels to all parts of the world. After leaving horse and jumper with the inn-keeper, we took a small boat to one of the many queer looking, high-pooped crafts in the harbor, and very soon found ourselves in a tiny cabin, panelled with maple, in which the captain and some of the men were busy over a pan of savorylobscouse, a salt-sea dish ofgreat reputation and flavor. Picton soon made his agreement with the captain for a four days' sail (or more) across to the neighboring province, and his luggage was to be on board the next morning. Once more we sailed over the bay of Sydney, and regained the pleasant shelter of our inn.
"Picton," said I, after a comfortable supper and a pensive segar, "we shall soon separate for our respective homes; but before we part, I wish to say to you how much I have enjoyed this brief acquaintance; perhaps we may never meet again, but I trust our short voyage together, will now and then be recalled by you, in whatever part of the world you may chance to be, as it certainly will by me."
The traveller replied by a hearty, earnest grasp of the hand; and then, after this formal leave-taking, we became suddenly estranged, as it were, sad, and silent, and shy; the familiar tone of conversation lost its key-note; Picton looked out of the inn window at the luminous moon-fog on the bay, and I buried my reflections in an antiquated pamphlet of "Household Words." We were soon interrupted by a stranger coming into the parlor, a chance visitor, another dry, preceese specimen of the land of oat-cakes.
After the usual salutations, the conversationfloated easily on, upon indifferent topics, until Picton happened to allude, casually, to the general banking system of England. This was enough for a text. Our visitor immediately launched forth upon the subject, and gaed us a twa-hours discourse on the system of banking in Scotland; wherein the superiority of the method adopted by his countrymen, to wring the last drop of interest out a shilling, was pertinaciously and dogmatically argued, upon the great groundwork of "the general and aibstract preencepels of feenance!"
It was in vain that the traveller endeavored to silence him by a few flashes of sarcasm. He might as well have tried to silence a park of artillery with a handful of torpedoes! On and on, with the doggedness of a slow-hound, the Scot pursued the theme, until all other considerations were lost in the one sole idea.
But thus it is always, when you come in contact with people of "aibstract preencepels." All sweet and tender impulses, all generous and noble suggestions, all light and shade, all warmth and color, must give place to these dry husks of reason.
"Confound the Scotch interloper," said Picton, after our visitor had retired, "what business had he to impose upon our good nature, with his threadbare 'aibstract preencepels?' Confound him andhis beggarly high cheek-bones, and his Caledonian pock-pits. I am sorry that I ever came to this part of the world; it has ruined a taste which I had acquired, with much labor, for Scottish poetry; and I shall never see 'Burns's Works' again without a sickening shudder."
The Bras d'Or Road—Farewell to Picton—Home sweet Home—The Rob Roys of Cape Breton—Note and Query—Chapel Island—St. Peter's—Enterprise—The Strait of Canseau—West River—The last Out-post of the Scottish Chiefs.
The road that skirts the Arm of Gold is about one hundred miles in length. After leaving Sydney, you ride beside the Spanish River a short distance, until you come to the portage, which separates it from the lake, and then you follow the delicious curve of the great beach until you arrive at St. Peter's. From St. Peter's you travel across a narrow strip of land until you reach the shore upon the extreme westerly end of the island of Cape Breton, where you cross the Strait of Canseau, and then you are upon the mainland of Nova Scotia. I had fondly hoped to voyage upon the Bras d'Or, instead of beside it; but was obliged to forego that pleasure. Romance, at one dollar per mile, is a dear piece of extravagance, even in so ethereal a vehicle as a birch-bark canoe. Therefore I engaged a seatin the Cape Breton stage, instead of the aboriginal conveyance, in which you have to sit or lie in the bottom, at the risk of an upset, and trust to fair weather and the dip of the paddle.
At day-break (two o'clock in the morning in these high latitudes) the stage drove up to the door of our pleasant inn. I was speedily dressed, and ready—and now—"Good bye, Picton!"
The traveller stretched out a hand from the warm nest in which he was buried.
"Good bye," he said, with a hearty hand-shake, and so we parted.
It was painful to leave such an agreeable companion, but then what a relief it was to escape from the cannie Scots! The first inhalation of the foggy air went tingling through every vein; the first movement of the stage, as we rolled westward, was indescribable happiness; I was at last homeward bound; in full health, in full strength; swift upon my sight came the vision of the one familiar river; the cottage and the chestnuts; the rolling greensward, and the Palisades; and there, too, was mybestfriend; and there—
"My young barbarians all at play."
"My young barbarians all at play."
Drive on, John Ormond!
Our Cape Breton stage is an easy, two-seated vehicle; a quiet, little rockaway-wagon, with a top; and although H. B. M. Royal Mail Coach, entirely different from the huge musk-melon upon wheels with which we are familiar in the States. In it I am the only passenger. Thank Heaven for that! I might be riding beside an aibstract preencepel.
But never mind! Drive on, John Ormond; we shall soon be among another race of Scotsmen, the bold Highlandmen of romance; the McGregors, and McPhersons, the Camerons, Grahams, and McDonalds; and as a century or so does not alter the old-country prejudices of the people in these settlements, we will no doubt find them in their pristine habiliments; in plaids and spleuchens; brogues and buckles; hose and bonnets; with claymore, dirk, and target; the white cockade and eagle feather, so beautiful in the Waverley Novels.
We left the pretty village of Sydney behind us, and were not long in gaining the margin of the Bras d'Or. This great lake, or rather arm of the sea, is, as I have said, about one hundred miles in length by its shore road; but so wide is it, and so indented by broad bays and deep coves, that a coasting journey around it is equal in extent to a voyage across the Atlantic. Besides the distant mountains that rise proudly from the remote shores, there are many noble islands in its expanse, and forest-covered peninsulas, bordered with beaches of glittering white pebbles. But over all this wide landscape there broods a spirit of primeval solitude; not a sail broke the loneliness of the lake until we had advanced far upon our day's journey. For strange as it may seem, the Golden Arm is a very useless piece of water in this part of the world; highly favored as it is by nature, land-locked, deep enough for vessels of all burden, easy of access on the gulf side, free from fogs, and only separated from the ocean at its western end by a narrow strip of land, about three quarters of a mile wide; abounding in timber, coal, and gypsum, and valuable for its fisheries, especially in winter, yet the Bras d'Or is undeveloped for want of that element which scorns to be alien to the Colonies, namely,enterprise.
If I had formed some romantic ideas concerning the new and strange people we found on the road we were now travelling, the Highlandmen, the Rob Roys and Vich Ian Vohrs of Nova Scotia, those ideas were soon dissipated. It is true here were the Celts in their wild settlements, but without bagpipes or pistols, sporrans or philabegs; there was not even a solitary thistle to charm the eye; and as for oats, there were at least two Scotchmen to one oat in this garden of exotics. I have a reasonable amount of respect for a Highlandman in full costume; but for a carrot-headed, freckled, high-cheeked animal, in a round hat and breeches, that cannot utter a word of English, I have no sympathy. One fellow of this complexion, without a hat, trotted beside our coach for several miles, grunting forth his infernal Gaelic to John Ormond, with a hah! to every answer of the driver, that was really painful. When he disappeared in the woods his red head went out like a torch. But we had scarcely gone by the first Highlandman, when another darted out upon us from a by-path, and again broke the sabbath of the woods and waters; and then another followed, so that the morning ride by the Bras d'Or was fringed with Gaelic. Now I have heard many languages in my time, and know how to appreciate the luxurious Greek, the stately Latin, themellifluousChinese, the epithetical Sclavic, the soft Italian, the rich Castilian, the sprightly French, sonorous German, and good old English, but candor compels me to say, that I do not think much of the Gaelic. It is not pleasing to the ear.
Yet it was a stately ride, that by the Bras d'Or; in one's own coach, as it were, traversing such old historic ground. For the very name, and its associations, carry one back to the earliest discoveries in America, carry one back behind Plymouth Rock to the earlier French adventurers in this hemisphere; yea, almost to the times of Richard Crookback; for on the neighboring shores, as the English claim, Cabot first landed, and named the placePrima Vista, in the days of Henry the Seventh, the "Richmond" of history and tragedy.
"Le Bras d'Or! John Ormond, do you not think le Bras d'Or sounds much like Labrador?"
"'Deed does it," answered John.
"And why not? That mysterious, geological coast is only four days' sail from Sydney, I take it? Labrador! with its auks and puffins, its seals and sea-tigers, its whales and walruses? Why not an offshoot of le Bras d'Or, its earlier brother in the family of discovery. But drive on, John Ormond, we will leave etymology to the pedants."
Well, well, ancient or modern, there is not a lovelier ride by white-pebbled beach and wide stretch of wave. Now we roll along amidst primeval trees, not the evergreens of the sea-coast, but familiar growths of maple, beech, birch; and larches, juniper orhackmatack—imperishable for ship craft. Now we cross bridges, over sparkling brooks, alive with trout and salmon, and most surprising of all, pregnant withwater-power. "Surprising," because no motive-power can be presented to the eye of a citizen of the young republic without the corresponding thought of "Why not use it?" Andwhy not, when Bras d'Or is so near, or the sea-coast either, and land at forty cents an acre, and trees as closely set, and as lofty, as ever nature planted them? Of a certainty, there would be a thousand saw-mills screaming between this and Canseau if a drop of Yankee blood had ever fertilized this soil.
Well, well, perhaps it is well. But yet to ride through a hundred miles of denationalized, high-cheeked, red, or black-headed Highlandmen, with illustrious names, in breeches and round hats, without pistols or feathers, is a sorry sight. Not one of these McGregors can earn more than five shillings a day, currency, as a laborer. Not a digger upon our canals but can do better than that; and with the chance ofrising. But here there seems be no such opportunity. The colonial system provides that every settler shall have a grant of about one hundred and twenty acres, in fee, and free. What then? the Government fosters and protects him. It sends out annually choice stocks of cattle, at a nominal price; it establishes a tariff of duties on foreign goods, so low that the revenue derived therefrom is not sufficient to pay the salaries of its officers. What then? The colonist is only a parasite with all these advantages. He is not an integral part of a nation; a citizen, responsible for his franchise. He is but a colonial Micmac, or Scotch-Mac; a mere sub-thoughted, irresponsible exotic, in a governmental cold grapery. By the great forefinger of Tom Jefferson, I would rather be a citizen of the United States thanownall the five-shilling Blue Noses between Sydney and Canseau!
As we roll along up hill and down, a startling flash of sunlight bursts forth from the dewy morning clouds, and touches lake, island, and promontory, with inexpressible beauty. Stop, John Ormond, or drive slowly; let us enjoydolce far niente. To hang now in our curricle upon this wooded hill-top, overlooking the clear surface of the lake, with leafy island, and peninsula dotted in its depths, in all its native grace, without a touch or trace of hand-work, far or near, save and except a single spot of sail in the far-off, is holy and sublime.
And there we rested, reverentially impressed with the week-day sabbath. We lingered long and lovingly upon our woody promontory, our eyrie among the spruces of Cape Breton.
"Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,With the wild world I dwelt in, is a thingWhich warns me, with its stillness, to forsakeEarth's troubled waters for a purer spring."
"Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,With the wild world I dwelt in, is a thingWhich warns me, with its stillness, to forsakeEarth's troubled waters for a purer spring."
Down hill go horses and mail-coach, and we are lost in a vast avenue of twinkling birches. Formiles we ride within breast-high hedges of sunny shrubs, until we reach another promontory, where Bras d'Or again breaks forth, with bay, island, white beach, peninsula, and sparkling cove. And before us, bowered in trees, lies Chapel Island, the Micmac Mecca, with its Catholic Church and consecrated ground. Here at certain seasons the red men come to worship the whiteChrist. Here the western descendants of Ishmael pitch their bark tents, and swing their barbaric censers before the Asiatic-bornRedeemer. "They that dwell in the wilderness shall bow beforeHim." That gathering must be a touching sermon to the heart of faith!
But we roll onwards, and now are again on the clearings, among the log-cabins of the Highlandmen. Although every settler has his governmental farm, yet nearly the whole of it is still in forest-land. A log hut and cleared-acre lot, with Flora McIvor's grubbing, hoeing, or chopping, while their idle lords and masters trot beside the mail-coach to hear the news, are the only results of the home patronage. At last we come to a gentle declivity, a bridge lies below us, a wider brook; we cross over to find a cosy inn and a rosy landlord on the other side; and John Ormond lays down the ribbons, after a sixty-mile drive, to say: "This is St. Peter's."
Now so far us the old-fashioned inns of New Scotland are concerned, I must say they make me ashamed of our own. Soap, sand, and water, do not cost so much as carpets, curtains, and fly-blown mirrors; but still, to the jaded traveller, they have a more attractive aspect. We sit before a snow-white table without a cloth, in the inn-parlor, kitchen, laundry, and dining-room, all in one, just over against the end of the lake; and enjoy a rasher of bacon and eggs with as much gusto as if we were in the midst of a palace of fresco. Ornamental eating has become with us a species of gaudy, ostentatious vulgarity; and a dining-room a sort of fool's paradise. I never think of the little simple meal at St. Peter's now, without tenderness and respect.
Here we change—driver, stage, and horses. Still no other passenger. The new whip is a Yankee from the State of Maine; a tall, black-eyed, taciturn fellow, with gold rings in his ears. Now we pass the narrow strip of land that divides Bras d'Or from the ocean. It is only three-quarters of a mile wide between water and water, and look at Enterprise digging out a canal! By the bronze statue of De Witt Clinton, if there are not three of the five-shilling Rob Roys at work, with two shovels, a horse, and one cart!
As we approach Canseau the landscape becomes flat and uninteresting; but distant ranges of mountains rise up against the evening sky, and as we travel on towards their bases they attract the eye more and more. Ear-rings is not very communicative. He does not know the names of any of them. Does not know how high they are, but has heard say they are the highest mountains in Nova Scotia. "Are those the mountains of Canseau?" Yes, them's them. So with renewed anticipations we ride on towards the strait "of unrivalled beauty," that travellers say "surpasses anything in America."
And, indeed, Canseau can have my feeble testimony in confirmation. It is a grand marine highway, having steep hills on the Cape Breton Island side, and lofty mountains on the other shore; a full, broad, mile-wide space between them; and reaching from end to end, fifteen miles, from the Atlantic to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. As I took leave of Ear-rings, at Plaister Cove, and wrapped myself up in my cloak in the stern-sheets of the row-boat to cross the strait, the full Acadian moon, larger than any United States moon, rose out of her sea-fog, and touched mountain, height, and billow, with effulgence. It was a scene of Miltonic grandeur. After the ruined walls of Louisburgh, and the dark caverns of Sydney, comes Canseau, with its startling splendors! Truly this is a wonderful country.
Another night in a clean Nova-Scotian inn on the mountain-side, a deep sleep, and balmy awakening in the clear air. Yet some exceptions must be taken to the early sun in this latitude. To get up at two o'clock or four; to ride thirty or forty miles to breakfast, with a convalescent appetite, is painful. But yet, "to him, who in the love of Nature holds communion with her visible forms, she speaks a various language." Admiration and convalescent hunger make a very good team in this beautiful country. You look out upon the unfathomable Gulf of St. Lawrence, and feel as if you were an unfathomable gulf yourself. You ride through lofty woods, with a tantalizing profusion of living edibles in your path; at every moment a cock-rabbit is saying his prayers before the horses; at every bosk and bole a squirrel stares at you with unwinking eyes, and Robin Yellow-bill hops, runs, and flies before the coach within reach of the driver's whip,sans peur! And this too is the land of moose and cariboo: here the hunters, on snow-shoes, track the huge animals in the season; and moose and cariboo, in the Halifax markets, are cheaper than beef with us. And to think this place is only a four days' journey from the metropolis, in the languid winter! By the ashes of Nimrod, I will launch myself on a pair of snow-shoes, and shoot a moose in the snow before I am twelvemonths older, as sure as these ponies carry us to breakfast!
"How far are we from breakfast, driver?"
"Twenty miles," quoth Jehu.
Now I had been anxious to get a sight of our ponies, for the sake of estimating their speed and endurance; but at this time they were not in sight. For the coach we (three passengers) were in, was built like an omnibus-sleigh on wheels, with a high seat and "dasher" in front, so that we could not see what it was that drew our ark, and therefore I climbed up in the driver's perch to overlook our motors. There were four of them; little, shaggy, black ponies, with bunchy manes and fetlocks, not much larger than Newfoundland dogs. Yet they swept us along the road as rapidly as if they were full-sized horses, up hill and down, without visible signs of fatigue. And now we passed through another French settlement, "Tracadie," and again the Norman kirtle and petticoat of the pastoral, black-eyed Evangelines hove in sight, and passed like a day-dream. And here we are in an English settlement, where we enjoy a substantial breakfast, and then again ride through the primeval woods, with an occasional glimpse of the broad Gulf and its mountain scenery, until we come upon a pretty inland village, by name Antigonish.
At Antigonish, we find a bridal party, and thepretty English landlady offers us wine and cake with hospitable welcome; and a jovial time of it we have until we are summoned, by crack of whip, to ride over to West River.
I must say that the natural prejudices we have against Nova Scotia are ill-placed, unjust, and groundless. The country itself is the great redeeming feature of the province, and a very large portion of it is uninfested by Scotchmen. Take for instance the road we are now travelling. For hours we bowl along a smooth turnpike, in the midst of a deep forest: although scarce a week has elapsed since these gigantic trees were leafless, yet the foliage has sprung forth as it were with a touch, and now the canopy of leaves about us, and overhead, is so dense as scarcely to afford a twinkle of light from the sun. Sometimes we ride by startling precipices and winding streams; sometimes overlook an English settlement, with its rolling pasture-lands, bare of trees and rich in verdure. At last we approach the precincts of Northumberland Strait, and are cleverly carried into New Glasgow. It is fast-day, and the shops are closed in Sabbath stillness; but on the sign-boards of the village one reads the historic names of "Ross" and "Cameron;" and "Graham," "McGregor" and "McDonald." What a pleasant thing it must beto live in that village! Here too I saw for the first time in the province a thistle! But it was a silver-plated one, in the blue bonnet of a "pothecary's boy." A metallic effigy of theoriginal plant, that had bloomed some generations ago in native land. There was poetry in it, however, even on the brow of an incipient apothecary.
When we had put New Glasgow behind us, we felt relieved, and rode along the marshes on the border of the strait that divides the Province from Prince Edward's Island, so named in honor of his graceless highness the Duke of Kent, Edward, father of our Queen Victoria. Thence we came forth upon higher ground, the coal-mines of Pictou; and here is the great Pictou railway, from the mines to the town, six miles in length. Then by rolling hill and dale down to West River, where John Frazer keeps the Twelve-Mile House. This inn is clean and commodious; only twelve miles from Pictou; and, reader, I would advise you, as twelve miles is but a short distance, to go to Pictou without stopping at West River. For John Frazer's is a house of petty annoyances. From the moment you enter, you feel the insolence of the surly, snarling landlord, and his no less gifted lady; the same old greed which has no eye except for money; the miserly table, for which you are obliged to pay before hand; the lack of attendance; the abundance of impertinence. Just as you are getting into bed you are peremptorily called to the door to pay for your room, which haply you had forgotten; if you want your boots brushed the answer is, "Perhaps"—if you request them to call you in the morning, for the only stage, they say, "Just as it happens;" (indeed, it was only by accident that the stage-driver discovered he had one more trunk than his complement of passengers, and so awoke me just as the coach was on the point of departure;) if you can submit to all this, then, reader, go to Twelve-Mile House, at West River.
We left this last outpost of the Scotch settlements with pleasure. After all, there is a secret feeling of joy in contrasting one's self with such wretched, penurious, mis-made specimens of the human animal. And from this time henceforth I shall learn to prize my own language, and not be carried away by any catch-penny Scotch synonyms, such as theliftfor the sky, and thegloaminfor twilight. And as forpoortith cauld, andpauky chiel, I leave them to those who can appreciate them: