March 15.
This last paragraph, which I wrote last evening, sent me to bed with my head full of all manner of thoughts, and memories, and fancies.
Whence and what are we, "that things whose sense we see not, frey us with things that be not?" If I had the heart of that wondrous bird in the Persian tales, which being pressed upon a human heart, obliged that heart to utter truth through the lips, sleeping or waking, then I think I would inquire how far in each bosom exists the belief in the supernatural? In many minds which I know, and otherwise strong minds, it certainly exists a hidden source of torment; in others, not stronger, it exists a source of absolute pleasure and excitement. I have known people most wittily ridicule, or gravely discountenance, a belief in spectral appearances, and all the time I could see in their faces that once in their lives at least they had been frightened at their own shadow. The conventional cowardice, the fear of ridicule, even the self-respect which prevents intelligent persons from revealing the exact truth of what passes through their own minds on this point, deprives us of a means to trace to its sources and develop an interesting branch of Psychology. Between vulgar credulity and exaggeration on the one hand, and the absolute scepticism and materialism of some would-be philosophers on the other, lies a vast space of debatable ground, a sort of twilight region orlimbo, through which I do not see my way distinctly.
How far are our perceptions confined to our outward senses? Can any one tell?—for that our perceptions are not wholly confined to impressions taken in by the outward senses, seems the only one thing proved; and are such sensible impressions the only real ones? When any one asks me gaily the so common and common-place question—common even in these our rational times—"Do you now really believe in ghosts?" I generally answer as gaily—"I really don't know!" In the common, vulgar meaning of the words, I certainly donot; but in the reality of many things termed imaginary I certainly do.
The following beautiful and original interpretation of Goethe's ballad of the "Erl-King" is not in Ekermann's book (the "Gespräche mit Goethe," which I am now studying), but I give it to you in the words in which it was given to me.
"Goethe's 'Erl-König' is a moral allegory of deep meaning, though I am not sure he meant it as such, or intended all that it signifies. There are beings in the world who see, who feel, with a finer sense than that granted to other mortals. They see the spiritual, the imaginative sorrow, or danger, or terror which threatens them; and those who see not with the same eyes, talk reason and philosophy to them. The poor frightened child cries out for aid, for mercy; and Papa Wisdom—worldly wisdom—answers,—
"Or,—
"It is only the vapour-wreath, or the grey willows waving, and tells him to be quiet! At last the poor child of feeling is found dead in the arms of Wisdom, from causes which no one else perceived—or believed! Is it not often so?"
On the subject of religion I find this beautiful comparison, but am not sure whether it be Ekermann's or Goethe's. "A connoisseur standing before the picture of a great master will regard it as a whole. He knows how to combine instantly the scattered parts into the general effect; the universal, as well as the individual, is to him animated. He has no preference for certain portions: he does not ask why this or that face is beautiful or otherwise; whythispart is light,thatdark; only he requires that all shall be in the right place, and according to the just rules of art; but place an ignorant person before such a picture, and you will see that the great design of the whole will either be overlooked by him, or confuse him utterly. Some small portion will attract him, another will offend him, and in the end he will dwell upon some trifling object which is familiar to him, and praise this helmet, or that feather, as being well executed.
"We men, before the great picture of the destinies of the universe, play the part of such dunces, such novices in art. Here we are attracted by a bright spot, a graceful configuration;therewe are repelled by a deep shadow, a painful object; the immenseWHOLEbewilders and perplexes us; we seek in vain to penetrate the leading idea of that great Being, who designed the whole upon a plan which our limited human intellect cannot comprehend."
March 29.
To those who see only with their eyes, the distant is always indistinct and little, becoming less and less as it recedes, till utterly lost; but to the imagination, which thus reverses the perspective of the senses, the far off is great and imposing, the magnitude increasing with the distance.
I amused myself this morning with that most charming book "The Doctor;"—it is not the second nor the third time of reading. How delicious it is wherever it opens!—how brimful of erudition and wit, and how rich in thought, and sentiment, and humour! but containing assumptions, and opinions, and prognostications, in which I would not believe;—no, not for the world!
How true what Southey says! (the Doctor I mean—I beg his pardon)—"We make the greater part of the evil circumstances in which we are placed, and then we fit ourselves for those circumstances by a process of degradation, the effect of which most people see in the classes below them, though they may not be conscious that it is operating in a different manner, but with equal force, upon themselves."
The effect of those pre-ordained evils—if they are such—which we inherit with our mortal state, inevitable death—the separation from those we love—old age with its wants, its feebleness, its helplessness—those sufferings which are in the course of nature, are quite sufficient in the infliction, or in the fear of them, to keep the spirit chastened, and the reflecting mind humble before God. But what Idodeprecate, is to hear people preaching resignation to social, self-created evils; fitting, or trying to fit, their own natures by "a process of degradation" to circumstances which they ought to resist, and which they doinwardlyresist, keeping up a constant, wearing, impotent strife between the life that iswithinand the life that iswithout. How constantly do I read this in the countenances of those I meet in the world!—They do not know themselves why there should be this perpetual uneasiness, this jarring and discord within; but it is the vain struggle of the soul, which God created in his own image, to fit its strong, immortal nature for the society which men have framed after their own devices. Avainstruggle it is! succeeding only in appearance, never in reality,—so we walk about the world the masks of ourselves, pitying each other. When we meet truth we are as much astonished as I used to be at the carnival, when, in the midst of a crowd of fantastic, lifeless, painted faces, I met with some one who had plucked away his mask and stuck it in his hat, and looked out upon me with the real human smile.
The Aurora Borealis is of almost nightly occurrence, but this evening it has been more than usually resplendent; radiating up from the north, and spreading to the east and west in form like a fan, the lower point of a pale white, then yellow, amber, orange, successively, and the extremities of a glowing crimson, intense, yet most delicate, like the heart of an unblown rose. It shifted its form and hue at every moment, flashing and waving like a banner in the breeze; and through this portentous veil, transparent as light itself, the stars shone out with a calm and steady brightness; and I thought, as I looked upon them, of a character we both know, where, like those fair stars, the intellectual powers shine serenely bright through a veil of passions, fancies, and caprices. It is most awfully beautiful! I have been standing at my window watching its evolutions, till it is no longer night, but morning.
April 15.
The ice in the Bay of Toronto has been, during the winter months, from four to five feet in thickness: within the last few days it has been cracking in every direction with strange noises, and last night, during a tremendous gale from the east, it was rent, and loosened, and driven at once out of the bay. "It moveth altogether, if it move at all." The last time I drove across the bay, the ice beneath me appeared as fixed and firm as the foundations of the earth, and within twelve hours it has disappeared, and to-day the first steam-boat of the season entered our harbour. They called me to the window to see it, as, with flags and streamers flying, and amid the cheers of the people, it swept majestically into the bay. I sympathised with the general rejoicing, for I can fully understand all the animation and bustle which the opening of the navigation will bring to our torpid capital.
May 19.
This beautiful Lake Ontario!—my lake—for I begin to be in love with it, and look on it as mine!—it changed its hues every moment, the shades of purple and green fleeting over it, now dark, now lustrous, now pale—like a dolphin dying; or, to use a more exact though less poetical comparison, dappled, and varying like the back of a mackerel, with every now and then a streak of silver light dividing the shades of green: magnificent, tumultuous clouds came rolling round the horizon; and the little graceful schooners, falling into every beautiful attitude, and catching every variety of light and shade, came curtseying into the bay: and flights of wild geese, and great black loons, were skimming, diving, sporting over the bosom of the lake; and beautiful little unknown birds, in gorgeous plumage of crimson and black, were fluttering about the garden: all life, and light, and beauty were abroad—the resurrection of Nature! How beautiful it was! how dearly welcome to my senses—to my heart—this spring which comes at last—so long wished for, so long waited for!
—A very pretty place, with a very pretty name. A kind invitation led me hither, to seek change of air, change of scene, and every other change I most needed.
The Britannia steam-boat, which plies daily between Toronto and Hamilton, brought us to the mouth of the Credit River in an hour and a half. By the orders of Mr. M * * *, a spring cart or wagon, the usual vehicle of the country, was waiting by the inn, on the shore of the lake, to convey me through the Woods to his house; and the master of the inn, a decent, respectable man, drove the wagon. He had left England a mere child, thirty years ago, with his father, mother, and seven brothers and sisters, and eighteen years ago had come to Canada from the United States, at the suggestion of a relation, to "settle in the bush," the common term for uncleared land; at that time they had nothing, as he said, but "health and hands." The family, now reduced to five, are all doing well. He has himself a farm of two hundred and fifty acres, his own property; his brother has much more; his sisters are well settled. "Any man," said he, "with health and a pair of hands, could get on well in this country, if it were not forthe drink; thatruins hundreds."
They are forming a harbour at the mouth of the river—widening and deepening the channel; but, owing to the want of means and money during the present perplexities, the works are not going on. There is a clean, tidy inn, and some log and frame houses; the situation is low, swampy, and I should suppose unhealthy; but they assured me, that though still subject to ague and fever in the spring, every year diminished this inconvenience, as the draining and clearing of the lands around was proceeding rapidly.
The River Credit is so called, because inancienttimes (i. e.forty or fifty years ago) the fur traders met the Indians on its banks, and delivered to them oncreditthe goods for which, the following year, they received the value, or rather ten times the value, in skins. In a country where there is no law of debtor or creditor, no bonds, stamps, bills, or bailiffs, no possibility of punishing, or even catching a refractory or fraudulent debtor, but, on the contrary, every possibility of being tomahawked by said debtor, this might seem a hazardous arrangement; yet I have been assured by those long engaged in the trade, both in the upper and lower province, that for an Indian to break his engagements is a thing unheard of: and if, by any personal accident, he should be prevented from bringing in the stipulated number of beaver skins, his relatives and friends consider their honour implicated, and make up the quantity for him.
The fur trade has long ceased upon these shores, once the scene of bloody conflicts between the Hurons and the Missassaguas. The latter were at length nearly extirpated; a wretched, degenerate remnant of the tribe still continued to skulk about their old haunts and the burial-place of their fathers, which is a high mound on the west bank of the river, and close upon the lake. These were collected by the Methodist missionaries into a village or settlement, about two miles farther on, where an attempt has been made to civilise and convert them. The government has expended a large sum in aid of this charitable purpose, and about fifty log-huts have been constructed for the Indians, each hut being divided by a partition, and capable of lodging two or more families. There is also a chapel and a school-house. Peter Jones, otherwise Kahkewaquonaby, a half-caste Indian, is the second chief and religious teacher; he was in England a few years ago to raise contributions for his people, and married a young enthusiastic Englishwoman with a small property. She has recently quitted the village to return to Europe. There is, besides, a regular Methodist preacher established here, who cannot speak one word of the language of the natives, nor hold any communion with them, except through an interpreter. He complained of the mortality among the children, and the yearly diminution of numbers in the settlement. The greater number of those who remain are half-breeds, and of these, some of the young women and children are really splendid creatures; but the general appearance of the place and people struck me as gloomy. The Indians, whom I saw wandering and lounging about, and the squaws wrapped in dirty blankets, with their long black hair falling over their faces and eyes, filled me with compassion. When the tribe were first gathered together, they amounted to seven hundred men, women, and children; there are now about two hundred and twenty. The missionary and his wife looked dejected; he told me that the conference never allowed them (the missionaries) to remain with any congregation long enough to know the people, or take a personal interest in their welfare. In general the term of their residence in any settlement or district was from two to three years, and they were then exchanged for another. Among the inhabitants a few have cultivated the portion of land allotted to them, and live in comparative comfort; three or four women (half-caste) are favourably distinguished by the cleanliness of their houses, and general good conduct; and some of the children are remarkably intelligent, and can read both their own language and English; but these are exceptions, and dirt, indolence, and drunkenness, are but too general. Consumption is the prevalent disease, and carries off numbers[3]of these wretched people.
After passing the Indian village, we plunged again into the depth of the green forests, through a road or path which presented every now and then ruts and abysses of mud, into which we sank nearly up to the axletree, and I began to appreciate feelingly the fitness of a Canadian wagon. On each side of this forest path the eye sought in vain to penetrate the labyrinth of foliage, and intermingled flowers of every dye, where life in myriad forms was creeping, humming, rustling in the air or on the earth, on which the morning dew still glittered under the thick shades.
From these woods we emerged, after five or six miles of travelling, and arrived at Springfield, a little village we had passed through in the depth of winter—how different its appearance now!—and diverging from the road, a beautiful path along the high banks above the river Credit, brought us to Erindale, for so Mr. M * * *, in fond recollection of his native country, has named his romantic residence.
Mr. M * * * is the clergyman and magistrate of the district, beside being the principal farmer and land proprietor. His wife, sprung from a noble and historical race, blended much sweetness and frankheartedness, with more of courtesy and manner than I expected to find. My reception was most cordial, though the whole house was in unusual bustle, for it was the 4th of June, parade day, when the district militia were to be turned out; and two of the young men of the family were buckling on swords and accoutrements, and furbishing up helmets, while the sister was officiating with a sister's pride at this military toilette, tying on sashes and arranging epaulettes; and certainly when they appeared—one in the pretty green costume of a rifleman, the other all covered with embroidery as a captain of lancers—I thought I had seldom seen two finer-looking men. After taking coffee and refreshments, we drove down to the scene of action.
On a rising ground above the river which ran gurgling and sparkling through the green ravine beneath, the motley troops, about three or four hundred men, were marshalled—no, not marshalled, but scattered in a far more picturesque fashion hither and thither: a few log-houses and a saw-mill on the river-bank, and a little wooden church crowning the opposite height, formed the chief features of the scene. The boundless forest spread all around us. A few men, well mounted, and dressed as lancers, in uniforms which were, however, anything but uniform, flourished backwards on the green sward, to the manifest peril of the spectators; themselves and their horses, equally wild, disorderly, spirited, undisciplined: but this was perfection compared with the infantry. Here there was no uniformity attempted of dress, of appearance, of movement; a few had coats, others jackets; a greater number had neither coats nor jackets, but appeared in their shirt-sleeves, white or checked, or clean or dirty, in edifying variety! Some wore hats, others caps, others their own shaggy heads of hair. Some had firelocks; some had old swords suspended in belts, or stuck in their waistbands; but the greater number shouldered sticks or umbrellas. Mrs. M * * * told us that on a former parade day she had heard the word of command given thus—"Gentlemen with the umbrellas, take ground to the right! Gentlemen with the walking sticks, take ground to the left!" Now they ran after each other, elbowed and kicked each other, straddled, stooped, chattered; and if the commanding officer turned his back for a moment, very coolly sat down on the bank to rest. Not to laugh was impossible, and defied all power of face. Charles M. made himself hoarse with shouting out orders which no one obeyed, except, perhaps, two or three men in the front; and James, with his horsemen, flourished their lances, and galloped, and capered, and curveted to admiration. James is the popular storekeeper and postmaster of the village, and when, after the show, we went into his warehouse to rest, I was not a little amused to see our captain of lancers come in, and, taking off his plumed helmet, jump over the counter to serve one customer to a "pennyworth of tobacco," and another to a "yard of check." Willy, the younger brother, a fine young man, who had been our cavalier on the field, assisted; and half in jest, half in earnest, I gravely presented myself as the purchaser of something or other, which Willy served out with a laughing gaiety and unembarrassed simplicity quite delightful. We returned to sit down to a plain, plenteous, and excellent dinner; everything on the table, the wine excepted, was the produce of their own farm. Our wine, water, and butter were iced, and everything was the best of its kind.
The parade day ended in a drunken bout and a riot, in which, as I was afterwards informed, the colonel had been knocked down, and one or two serious, and even fatal accidents had occurred; but it was all taken so very lightly, so very much as a thing of course, in this half-civilised community, that I soon ceased to think about the matter.
The next morning I looked out from my window upon a scene of wild yet tranquil loveliness. The house is built on the edge of a steep bank (what in Scotland they term ascaur), perhaps a hundred feet high, and descending precipitously to the rapid river.[4]The banks on either side were clothed with overhanging woods, of the sumach, maple, tamarisk, birch, in all the rich yet delicate array of the fresh opening year. Beyond, as usual, lay the dark pine-forest: and near to the house there were several groups of lofty pines, the original giant-brood of the soil; beyond these again lay the "clearing." The sky was without a cloud, and the heat intense. I found breakfast laid in the verandah: excellent tea and coffee, rich cream, delicious hot cakes, new laid eggs—a banquet for a king! The young men and their labourers had been out since sunrise, and the younger ladies of the house were busied in domestic affairs; the rest of us sat lounging all the morning in the verandah; and in the intervals of sketching and reading, my kind host and hostess gave me an account of their emigration to this country ten years ago.
Mr. M. was a Protestant clergyman of good family, and had held a considerable living in Ireland; but such was the disturbed state of the county in which he resided, that he was not only unable to collect his tithes, but for several years neither his own life nor that of any of his family was safe. They never went out unarmed, and never went to rest at night without having barricadoed their house like a fortress. The health of his wife began to fail under this anxiety, and at length, after a severe struggle with old feelings and old habits, he came to the determination to convert his Irish property into ready money, and emigrate to Canada, with four fine sons, from seven to seventeen years old, and one little daughter. Thus Canada has become an asylum, not only for those who cannot pay tithes, but for those who cannot get them.
Soon after his arrival, he purchased eight hundred acres of land along the banks of the Credit. With the assistance of his sons and a few labourers, he soon cleared a space of ground for a house, in a situation of great natural beauty, but then a perfect wilderness; and with no other aid, designed and built it in very pretty taste. Being thus secure of lodging and shelter, they proceeded in their toilsome work—toilsome, most laborious, he allowed it to be, but not unrewarded; and they have now one hundred and fifty acres of land cleared and in cultivation; a noble barn, entirely constructed by his sons, measuring sixty feet long by forty in width; a carpenter's shop, a turning-lathe, in the use of which the old gentleman and one of his sons are very ingenious and effective; a forge; extensive outhouses; a farmyard well stocked; and a house comfortably furnished, much of the ornamental furniture being contrived, carved, turned, by the father and his sons. These young men, who had received in Ireland the rudiments of a classical education, had all a mechanical genius, and here, with all their energies awakened, and all their physical and mental powers in full occupation, they are a striking example of what may be done by activity and perseverance; they are their own architects, masons, smiths, carpenters, farmers, gardeners; they are, moreover, bold and keen hunters, quick in resource, intelligent, cheerful, united by strong affection, and doating on their gentle sister, who has grown up among these four tall, manly brothers, like a beautiful azalia under the towering and sheltering pines. Then I should add, that one of the young men knows something of surgery, can bleed or set a broken limb in case of necessity; while another knows as much of law as enables him to draw up an agreement, and settle the quarrels and arrange the little difficulties of their poorer neighbours, without having recourse to the "attorney."
The whole family appear to have a lively feeling for natural beauty, and a taste for natural history; they know the habits and the haunts of the wild animals which people their forest domain; they have made collections of minerals and insects; and have "traced each herb and flower that sips the silvery dew." Not only the stout servant girl, (whom I met running about with a sucking-pig in her arms, looking for its mother,) and the little black boy Alick,—but the animals in the farmyard, the old favourite mare, the fowls which come trooping round the benignant old gentleman, or are the peculiar pets of the ladies of the family,—the very dogs and cats appear to me, each and all, the most enviable of their species. There is an atmosphere of benevolence and cheerfulness breathing round, which penetrates to my very heart. I know not when I have felt so quietly—so entirely happy—so full of sympathy—so light-hearted—so inclined to shut out the world, and its cares and vanities, and "fleet the time as they did i' the golden age."
Mr. M. told me, that for the first seven or eight years they had all lived and worked together on his farm; but latterly he had reflected that though the proceeds of the farm afforded a subsistence, it did not furnish the means of independence for his sons, so as to enable them to marry and settle in the world. He has therefore established two of his sons as storekeepers, the one in Springfield, the other at Streetsville, both within a short distance of his own residence, and they have already, by their intelligence, activity, and popular manners, succeeded beyond his hopes.
I could perceive that in taking this step there had been certain prejudices and feelings to be overcome on his own part and that of his wife: the family pride of the well-born Irish gentleman, and the antipathy to anything like trade, once cherished by a certain class in the old country—these were to be conquered, before he could reconcile himself to the idea of his boys serving out groceries in a Canadian village; but theywereovercome. Some lingering of the "old Adam" made him think it necessary to excuse—to account for this state of things. He did not know with what entire and approving sympathy I regarded, not the foolish national prejudices of my country, but the honest, generous spirit and good sense through which he had conquered them, and provided for the future independence of his children.
I inquired concerning the extent of his parish, and the morals and condition of his parishioners.
He said that on two sides the district under his charge might be considered as without bounds, for, in fact, there was no parish boundary line between him and the North Pole. He has frequently ridden from sixteen to thirty miles to officiate at a marriage or a funeral, or baptize a child, or preach a sermon, wherever a small congregation could be collected together; but latterly his increasing age rendered such exertion difficult. His parish church is in Springfield. When he first took the living, to which he was appointed on his arrival in the country, the salary—for here there are no tithes—was two hundred a year: some late measure, fathered by Mr. Hume, had reduced it to one hundred. He spoke of this without bitterness as regarded himself, observing that he was old, and had other means of subsistence; but he considered it as a great injustice both to himself and to his successors—"For," said he, "it is clear that no man could take charge of this extensive district without keeping a good horse, and a boy to rub him down. Now, in this country, where wages are high, he could not keep a horse and a servant, and wear a whole coat, for less than one hundred a year. No man, therefore, who had not other resources, could live upon this sum; and no man whohadother resources, and had received a fitting education, would be likely to come here. I say nothing of the toil, the fatigue, the deep responsibility—these belong to his vocation, in which, though a man must labour, he need not surely starve:—yet starve he must, unless he takes a farm or a store in addition to his clerical duties. A clergyman in such circumstances could hardly command the respect of his parishioners: what doyouthink, madam?"
When the question was thus put, I could only think the same: it seems to me that there must be something wrong in the whole of this Canadian church system, from beginning to end.
With regard to the morals of the population around him, he spoke of two things as especially lamentable, the prevalence of drunkenness, and the early severing of parental and family ties; the first, partly owing to the low price of whisky, the latter to the high price of labour, which rendered it the interest of the young of both sexes to leave their home, and look out and provide for themselves as soon as possible. This fact, and its consequences, struck him the more painfully, from the contrast it exhibited to the strong family affections, and respect for parental authority, which even in the midst of squalid, reckless misery and ruin, he had been accustomed to in poor Ireland. The general morals of the women he considered infinitely superior to those of the men; and in the midst of the horrid example and temptation, and one may add, provocation, round them, their habits were generally sober. He knew himself but two females abandoned to habits of intoxication, and in both instances the cause had been the same—an unhappy home and a brutal husband.
He told me many other interesting circumstances and anecdotes, but being of a personal nature, and his permission not expressly given, I do not note them down here.
On the whole, I shall never forget the few days spent with this excellent family. We bade farewell, after many a cordial entreaty on their part, many a promise on mine, to visit them again. Charles M. drove me over to the Credit, where we met the steam-boat, and I returned to Toronto with my heart full of kindly feelings, my fancy full of delightful images, and my lap full of flowers, which Charles had gathered for me along the margin of the forest: flowers such as we transplant and nurture with care in our gardens and green-houses, most dazzling and lovely in colour, strange and new to me in their forms, and names, and uses: unluckily I am no botanist, so will not venture to particularize farther; but one plant struck me particularly, growing everywhere in thousands: the stalk is about two feet in height, and at the top are two large fan-like leaves, one being always larger than the other; from between the two springs a single flower, in size and shape somewhat resembling a large wild rose, the petal white, just tinted with a pale blush. The flower is succeeded by an oval-shaped fruit, which is eaten, and makes an excellent preserve. They call it here the May-apple.
June 8.
We have already exchanged "the bloom and ravishment of spring" for all the glowing maturity of summer; we gasp with heat, we long for ices, and are planning venetian blinds; and three weeks ago there was snow lying beneath our garden fences, and not a leaf on the trees! In England, when Nature wakes up from her long winter, it is like a sluggard in the morning,—she opens one eye and then another, and shivers and draws her snow coverlet over her face again, and turns round to slumber more than once, before she emerges at last lazily and slowly, from her winter chamber; but here, no sooner has the sun peeped through her curtains, than up she springs, like a huntress for the chase, and dons her kirtle of green, and walks abroad in full-blown life and beauty. I am basking in her smile like an insect or a bird!—Apropos to birds, we have, alas! no singing birds in Canada. There is, indeed, a little creature of the ouzel kind, which haunts my garden, and has a low, sweet warble, to which I listen with pleasure; but we have nothing like the rich, continuous song of the nightingale or lark, or even the linnet. We have no music in our groves but that of the frogs, which set up such a shrill and perpetual chorus every evening, that we can scarce hear each other speak. The regular manner in which the bass and treble voices respond to each other is perfectly ludicrous, so that in the midst of my impatience I have caught myself laughing. Then we have every possible variety of note, from the piping squeak of the tree-frog, to the deep, guttural croak, almost roar, of the bull-frog.
The other day, while walking near a piece of water, I was startled by a very loud deep croak, as like the croak of an ordinary frog, as the bellow of a bull is like the bleat of a calf; and looking round, perceived one of those enormous bull-frogs of the country seated with great dignity on the end of a plank, and staring at me. The monster was at least a foot in length, with a pair of eyes like spectacles; on shaking my parasol at him, he plunged to the bottom in a moment. They are quite harmless, I believe, though slander accuses them of attacking the young ducks and chickens.
There is considerable beauty around me—not that I am going to give you descriptions of scenery, which are always, however eloquent, in some respect failures. Words can no more give you a definite idea of the combination of forms and colours in scenery, than so many musical notes: music were, indeed, the better vehicle of the two. Felix Mendelssohn, when a child, used to say, "I cannot tell you how such or such a thing was—I cannot speak it—I will play it to you!"—and run to his piano: sound was then to him a more perfect vehicle than words;—so, if I were a musician, I wouldplayyou Lake Ontario, rather than describe it. Ontario meansthe beautiful, and the word is worthy of its signification, and the lake is worthy of its beautiful name; yet I can hardly tell you in what this fascination consists: there is no scenery around it, no high lands, no bold shores, no picture to be taken in at once by the eye; the swamp and the forest enclose it, and it is so wide and so vast that it presents all the monotony without the majesty of the ocean. Yet, like that great ocean, when I lived beside it, the expanse of this lake has become to me like the face of a friend. I have all its variousexpressionsby heart. I go down upon the green bank, or along the King's Pier, which projects about two hundred yards into the bay. I sit there with my book, reading sometimes, but oftener watching untired the changeful colours as they flit over the bosom of the lake. Sometimes a thunder-squall from the west sends the little sloops and schooners sweeping and scudding into the harbour for shelter. Sometimes the sunset converts its surface into a sea of molten gold, and sometimes the young moon walks trembling in a path of silver; sometimes a purple haze floats over its bosom like a veil; sometimes the wind blows strong, and the wild turbid waves come rolling in like breakers, flinging themselves over the pier in wrath and foam, or dancing like spirits in their glee. Nor is the land without some charm. About four miles from Toronto the river Humber comes down between high wood-covered banks, and rushes into the lake: a more charming situation for villas and garden-houses could hardly be desired than the vicinity of this beautiful little river, and such no doubt we shall see in time.
The opposite shore of the bay of Toronto is formed by a long sand-bank, called "the Island," though, in fact, no island, but a very narrow promontory, about three miles in length, and forming a rampart against the main waters of the lake. At the extremity is a light-house, and a few stunted trees and underwood. This marsh, intersected by islets and covered with reeds, is the haunt of thousands of wild-fowl, and of the terrapin, or small turtle of the lake; and as evening comes on, we see long rows of red lights from the fishing-boats gleaming along the surface of the water, for thus they spear the lake salmon, the bass, and the pickereen.
The only road on which it is possible to take a drive with comfort is Yonge Street, which is macadamised for the first twelve miles. This road leads from Toronto northwards to Lake Simcoe, through a well-settled and fertile country. There are some commodious, and even elegant houses in this neighbourhood. Dundas Street, leading west to the London district and Lake Huron, is a very rough road for a carriage, but a most delightful ride. On this side of Toronto you are immediately in the pine forest, which extends with little interruption (except a new settlement rising here and there) for about fifty miles to Hamilton, which is the next important town. The wooded shores of the lake are very beautiful, and abounding in game. In short, a reasonable person might make himself very happy here, if it were not for some few things, among which, those Egyptian plagues, the flies and frogs in summer, and the relentless iron winter, are not the most intolerable; add, perhaps, the prevalence of sickness at certain seasons. At present many families are flying off to Niagara, for two or three days together, for change of air; and I am meditating a flight myself, of such serious extent, that some of my friends here laugh outright; others look kindly alarmed, and others civilly incredulous. Bad roads, bad inns—or rathernoroads, no inns;—wild Indians, and white men more savage far than they;—dangers and difficulties of every kind are threatened and prognosticated, enough to make one's hair stand on end. To undertake such a journeyaloneis rash perhaps—yet alone it must be achieved, I find, or not at all; I shall have neither companion nor man-servant, norfemme de chambre, nor even a "little foot-page" to give notice of my fate, should I be swamped in a bog, or eaten up by a bear, or scalped, or disposed of in some strange way; but shall I leave this fine country without seeing anything of its great characteristic features?—and, above all, of its aboriginal inhabitants? The French have a proverb which does honour to their gallantry, and to which, from experience, I am inclined to give full credence—"Ce que femme veut, Dieu veut." We shall see.
How admirable what Sir James Mackintosh says of Madame de Maintenon!—that "she was as virtuous as the fear of hell and the fear of shame could make her." The same might be said of the virtue of many women I know, and of these, I believe, that more are virtuous from the fear of shame than the fear of hell.—Shame is the woman's hell.
Who that has lived in the world, in society, and looked on both with observing eye, but has often been astonished at the fearlessness of women, and the cowardice of men, with regard to public opinion? The reverse would seem to be the natural, the necessary result of the existing order of things, but it is not always so. Exceptions occur so often, and so immediately within my own province of observation, that they have made me reflect a good deal. Perhaps this seeming discrepancy might be thus explained.
Women are brought up in the fear of opinion, but, from their ignorance of the world, they are in fact ignorant of that which they fear. They fear opinion as a child fears a spectre, as something shadowy and horrible, not defined or palpable. It is a fear based on habit, on feeling, not on principle or reason. When their passions are strongly excited, or when reason becomes matured, this exaggerated fear vanishes, and the probability is, that they are immediately thrown into the opposite extreme of incredulity, defiance, and rashness: but a man, even while courage is preached to him, learns from habitual intercourse with the world the immense, the terrible power of opinion. It wraps him round like despotism; it is a reality to him; to a woman a shadow, and if she can overcome the fear in her own person, all is overcome. A man fears opinion for himself, his wife, his daughter; and if the fear of opinion be brought into conflict with primary sentiments and principles, it is ten to one but the habit of fear prevails, and opinion triumphs over reason and feeling too.
June 13.
In these latter days I have lived in friendly communion with so many excellent people, that my departure from Toronto was not what I anticipated—an escape on one side, or a riddance on the other. My projected tour to the west has excited not only some interest, but much kind solicitude; and aid and counsel have been tendered with a feeling which touched me deeply.
The first bell of the steam-boat had not yet rung, when one of my friends came running up to tell me that the missionary from the Sault-Saint-Marie, and his Indian wife, had arrived at Toronto, and were then at the inn, and that there was just time to introduce me to them. No sooner thought than done: in another moment we were in the hotel, and I was introduced to Mrs. MacMurray, otherwise O-ge-ne-bu-go-quay, (i. e.the wild rose).
I must confess that the specimens of Indian squaws and half-caste women I had met with, had in no wise prepared me for what I found in Mrs. MacMurray. The first glance, the first sound of her voice, struck me with a pleased surprise. Her figure is tall—at least it is rather above than below the middle size, with that indescribable grace and undulation of movement which speaks the perfection of form. Her features are distinctly Indian, but softened and refined, and their expression at once bright and kindly. Her dark eyes have a sort of fawn-like shyness in their glance, but her manner, though timid, was quite free from embarrassment or restraint. She speaks English well, with a slightly foreign intonation, not the less pleasing to my ear that it reminded me of the voice and accent of some of my German friends. In two minutes I was seated by her—my hand kindly folded in hers—and we were talking over the possibility of my plans. It seems that there is some chance of my reaching the Island of Michilimackinac, but of the Sault-Saint-Marie I dare hardly think as yet—it looms in my imagination dimly described in far space, a kind of Ultima Thule; yet the sight of Mrs. MacMurray seemed to give something definite to the vague hope which had been floating in my mind. Her sister, she said, was married to the American Indian agent at Michilimackinac, and from both she promised me a welcome, should I reach their island. To her own far off home at the Sault-Saint-Marie, between Lake Huron and Lake Superior, she warmly invited me—without, however, being able to point out any conveyance or mode of travelling thither that could be depended on—only a possible chance of such. Meantime there wassomehope of our meetingsomewhere on the road, but it was of the faintest. She thanked me feelingly for the interest I took in her own fated race, and gave me excellent hints as to my manner of proceeding. We were in the full tide of conversation when the bell of the steam-boat rang for the last time, and I was hurried off. On the deck of the vessel I found her husband, Mr. MacMurray, who had only time to say, in fewest words, all that was proper, polite, and hospitable. This rencontre, which some would call accidental, and some providential, pleased and encouraged me. Then came blessings, good wishes, kind pressures of the hand, and last adieus, and waving of handkerchiefs from the shore, as the paddles were set in motion, and we glided swiftly over the mirror-like bay.
The day was sultry, the air heavy and still, and a strange fog, or rather a series of dark clouds, hung resting on the bosom of the lake, which in some places was smooth and transparent as glass—in others, little eddies of wind had ruffled it into tiny waves, or welts rather—so that it presented the appearance of patchwork. The boatmen looked up, and foretold a storm; but when we came within three or four miles from the mouth of the river Niagara, the fog drew off like a curtain, and the interminable line of the dark forest came into view, stretching right and left along the whole horizon; then the white buildings of the American fort, and the spires of the town of Niagara, became visible against the rich purple-green back-ground, and we landed after a four hours' voyage. The threatened storm came on that night. The summer storms of Canada are like those of the tropics: not in Italy, not among the Apennines, where I have in my time heard the "live thunder leaping from crag to crag," did I ever hear such terrific explosions of sound as burst over our heads this night. The silence and the darkness lent an added horror to the elemental tumult—and for the first time in my life I felt sickened and unpleasantly affected in the intervals between the thunder-claps, though I cannot say I felt fear. Meantime the rain fell as in a deluge, threatening to wash us into the lake, which reared itself up, and roared—like a monster for its prey.
Yet, the next morning, when I went down upon the shore, how beautiful it looked—the hypocrite!—there it lay rocking and sleeping in the sunshine, quiet as a cradled infant. Niagara, in its girdle of verdure and foliage, glowing with fresh life, and breathing perfume, appeared to me a far different place from what I had seen in winter. As I stood on the shore, quietly thinking, I was startled by the sound of the death-bell, pealing along the sunny blue waters. They said it was tolled for a young man of respectable family, who, at the age of three or four and twenty, had died from habitual drinking; his elder brother having a year or two before fallen from his horse in a state of intoxication, and perished in consequence. Yes, everything I see and hear on this subject convinces me that it should be one of the first objects of the government to put down, by all and every means, a vice which is rotting at the core of this colony—poisoning the very sources of existence; but all their taxes, and prohibitions, and excise laws, will do little good, unless they facilitate the means of education. In society, the same evening, the appearance of a very young, very pretty, sad-looking creature, with her first baby at her bosom, whose husband was staggering and talking drunken gibberish at her side, completed the impression of disgust and affright with which the continual spectacle of this vile habit strikes me since I have been in this country.
Before quitting the subject of Niagara, I may as well mention an incident which occurred shortly afterwards, on my last visit to the town, which interested me much at the time, and threw the whole of this little community into a wonderful ferment.
A black man, a slave somewhere in Kentucky, having been sent on a message, mounted on a very valuable horse, seized the opportunity of escaping. He reached Buffalo after many days of hard riding, sold the horse, and escaped beyond the lines into Canada. Here, as in all the British dominions, God be praised! the slave is slave no more, but free, and protected in his freedom.[5]This man acknowledged that he had not been ill treated; he had received some education, and had been a favourite with his master. He gave as a reason for his flight, that he had long wished to marry, but was resolved that his children should not be born slaves. In Canada, a runaway slave is assured of legal protection; but, by an international compact between the United States and our provinces, all felons are mutually surrendered. Against this young man the jury in Kentucky had found a true bill for horse-stealing; as a felon, therefore, he was pursued, and, on the proper legal requisition, arrested; and then lodged in the jail of Niagara, to be given up to his master, who, with an American constable, was in readiness to take him into custody, as soon as the government order should arrive. His case excited a strong interest among the whites, while the coloured population, consisting of many hundreds in the districts of Gore and Niagara, chiefly refugees from the States, were half frantic with excitement. They loudly and openly declared that they would peril their lives to prevent his being carried again across the frontiers, and surrendered to the vengeance of his angry master. Meantime there was some delay about legal forms, and the mayor and several of the inhabitants of the town united in a petition to the governor in his favour. In this petition it was expressly mentioned, that the master of the slave had been heard to avow that his intention was not to give the culprit up to justice, but to make what he called anexampleof him. Now there had been lately some frightful instances of what the slave proprietors of the south called "making an example;" and the petitioners entreated the governor to interpose, and save the man from a torturing death "under the lash or at the stake." Probably the governor's own humane feelings pleaded even more strongly in behalf of the poor fellow. But it was a case in which he could not act from feeling, or, "to do a great right, do a little wrong." The law was too expressly and distinctly laid down, and his duty as governor was clear and imperative—to give up the felon, although, to have protected the slave, he would, if necessary, have armed the province.
In the mean time the coloured people assembled from the adjacent villages, and among them a great number of their women. The conduct of this black mob, animated and even directed by the females, was really admirable for its good sense, forbearance, and resolution. They were quite unarmed, and declared their intention not to commit any violence against the English law. The culprit, they said, might lie in the jail, till they could raise among them the price of the horse; but if any attempt were made to take him from the prison, and send him across to Lewiston, they would resist it at the hazard of their lives.
The fatal orderdidat length come; the sheriff with a party of constables prepared to enforce it. The blacks, still unarmed, assembled round the jail, and waited till their comrade, or their brother as they called him, was brought out and placed handcuffed in a cart. They then threw themselves simultaneously on the sheriff's party, and a dreadful scuffle ensued; the artillery men from the little fort, our only military, were called in aid of the civil authorities, and ordered to fire on the assailants. Two blacks were killed, and two or three wounded. In themeléethe poor slave escaped, and has not since been retaken, neither was he, I believe, pursued.
But it was the conduct of the women which, on this occasion, excited the strongest surprise and interest. By all those passionate and persuasive arguments that a woman knows so well how to use, whatever be her colour, country, or class, they had prevailed on their husbands, brothers, and lovers to use no arms, to do no illegal violence, but to lose their lives rather than see their comrade taken by force across the lines. They had been most active in the fray, throwing themselves fearlessly between the black men and the whites, who, of course, shrank from injuring them. One woman had seized the sheriff, and held him pinioned in her arms; another, on one of the artillery-men presenting his piece, and swearing that he would shoot her if she did not get out of his way, gave him only one glance of unutterable contempt, and with one hand knocking up his piece, and collaring him with the other, held him in such a manner as to prevent his firing. I was curious to see a mulatto woman who had been foremost in the fray, and whose intelligence and influence had mainly contributed to the success of her people; M——, under pretence of inquiring after a sick child, drove me round to the hovel in which she lived, outside the town. She came out to speak to us. She was a fine creature, apparently about five-and-twenty, with a kindly animated countenance; but the feelings of exasperation and indignation had evidently not yet subsided. She told us, in answer to my close questioning, that she had formerly been a slave in Virginia; that, so far from being ill treated, she had been regarded with especial kindness by the family on whose estate she was born. When she was about sixteen her master died, and it was said that all the slaves on the estate would be sold, and therefore she ran away. "Were you not attached to your mistress?" I asked. "Yes," said she, "I liked my mistress, but I did not like to be sold." I asked her if she was happy here in Canada? She hesitated a moment, and then replied, on my repeating the question, "Yes—that is, Iwashappy here—but now—I don't know—I thought we were safehere—I thought nothing could touch ushere, on your British ground, but it seems I was mistaken, and if so, I won't stay here—I won't—I won't! I'll go and find some country where they cannot reach us! I'll go to the end of the world, I will!" And as she spoke, her black eyes flashing, she extended her arms, and folded them across her bosom, with an attitude and expression of resolute dignity, which a painter might have studied; and truly the fairest white face I ever looked on never beamed with more of soul and high resolve than hers at that moment.
Between the town of Queenston and the cataract of Niagara lies the pretty little village of Stamford (close to Lundy Lane, the site of a famous battle in the last war), and celebrated for its fine air. Near it is a beautiful house with its domain, called Stamford Park, built and laid out by a former governor (Sir Peregrine Maitland). It is the only place I saw in Upper Canada combining our ideas of an elegant, well-furnished English villa and ornamented grounds, with some of the grandest and wildest features of the forest scene. It enchanted me altogether. From the lawn before the house, an open glade, commanding a park-like range of broken and undulating ground and wooded valleys, displayed beyond them the wide expanse of Lake Ontario, even the Toronto light-house, at a distance of thirty miles, being frequently visible to the naked eye. By the hostess of this charming seat I was conveyed in a light pony carriage to the hotel at the Falls, and left, with real kindness, to follow my own devices. The moment I was alone, I hurried down to the Table-rock. The body of water was more full and tremendous than in the winter. The spray rose, densely falling again in thick showers, and behind those rolling volumes of vapour the last gleams of the evening light shone in lurid brightness, amid amber and crimson clouds; on the other side, night was rapidly coming on, and all was black, impenetrable gloom, and "boundless contiguity of shade." It was very, very beautiful, and strangely awful too! For now it was late, and as I stood there, lost in a thousand reveries, there was no human being near, no light but that reflected from the leaping, whirling foam; and in spite of the deep-voiced continuous thunder of the cataract, there was such a stillness that I could hear my own heart's pulse throb—or did I mistake feeling for hearing?—so I strayed homewards, or housewards I should say, through the leafy, gloomy, pathways,—wet with the spray, and fairly tired out.
The good people, travellers, describers, poets, and others, who seem to have hunted through the dictionary for words in which to depict these cataracts under every aspect, have never said enough of the rapids above—even for which reason, perhaps, they have struck me the more; not that any words in any language would have prepared me for what I now feel in this wondrous scene. Standing to-day on the banks above the Crescent Fall, near Mr. Street's mill, gazing on the rapids, they left in my fancy two impressions which seldom meet together,—that of the sublime and terrible, and that of the elegant and graceful—like a tiger at play. I could not withdraw my eyes; it was like a fascination.
The verge of the rapids is considerably above the eye; the whole mighty river comes rushing over the brow of a hill, and as you look up, it seems coming down to overwhelm you. Then meeting with the rocks, as it pours down the declivity, it boils and frets like the breakers of the ocean. Huge mounds of water, smooth, transparent, and gleaming like the emerald, or rather like the more delicate hue of the chrysopaz, rise up and bound over some unseen impediment, then break into silver foam, which leaps into the air in the most graceful fantastic forms; and so it rushes on, whirling, boiling, dancing, sparkling along, with a playful impatience, rather than overwhelming fury, rejoicing as if escaped from bondage, rather than raging in angry might,—wildly, magnificently beautiful! The idea, too, of the immediate danger, the consciousness that anything caught within its verge is inevitably hurried to a swift destination, swallowed up, annihilated, thrills the blood; the immensity of the picture, spreading a mile at least each way, and framed in by the interminable forests, adds to the feeling of grandeur; while the giddy, infinite motion of the headlong waters, dancing and leaping, and revelling and roaring, in their mad glee, gave me a sensation of rapturous terror, and at last caused a tension of the nerves in my head, which obliged me to turn away.
The great ocean, when thus agitated by conflicting winds or opposing rocks, is a more tremendous thing, but it is merely tremendous,—it makes us think of our prayers; whereas, while I was looking on these rapids, beauty and terror, and power and joy, were blended, and so thoroughly, that even while I trembled and admired, I could have burst into a wild laugh, and joined the dancing billows in their glorious, fearful mirth,—