CHAPTER V.

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

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

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

“CHAPTER VII.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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