Part 29

Leaving behind this cape and river, we came again upon lovely groups of Elysian islands, channels winding among rocks and foliage, and more fields of water-lilies. In passing through a beautiful channel, I had an opportunity of seeing the manner in which an Indian communicates with his friends when _en route_. A branch was so arranged as to project far across the water and catch the eye: in a cleft at the extremity a piece of birch bark was stuck with some hieroglyphic marks scratched with red ochre, of which we could make nothing--one figure, I thought, represented a fish.

To-day we caught eleven bass, shot four pigeons, also a large water-snake--which last I thought a gratuitous piece of cruelty. We dined upon a large and picturesque island--large in comparison with those we usually selected, being perhaps two or three miles round; it was very woody and wild, intersected by deep ravines, and rising in bold, abrupt precipices. We dined luxuriously under a group of trees: the heat was overpowering, and the mosquitoes very troublesome.

After dinner we pursued our course through an archipelago of islets, rising out of the blue waves, and fringed with white water-lilies. Little fairy Edens, of such endless variety in form and colour, and of such wondrous and fantastic beauty, I know not how to describe them.

We landed on one, where there was a rock so exactly resembling the head and part of a turtle, that I could have taken it for sculpture. The Indians look upon it as sacred, and it is customary for all who pass to leave an offering in money, tobacco, corn, &c., to the spirit. I duly left mine, but I could see by the laughing eyes of Jacques and Louis, that "the spirit" was not likely to be the better for my devotion.

Mr. Jarvis asked me to sing a French song for the voyageurs, and Louis looked back with his bright arch face, as much as to say, "Pray do," when a shout was heard from the other canoe "A mink! A mink!"[54] and all the paddles were now in animated motion. We dashed up among the reeds, we chased the creature up and down, and at last to a hole under a rock; the voyageurs beat the reeds with their paddles, the gentlemen seized their guns; there were twenty-one men half frantic in pursuit of a wretched little creature, whose death could serve no purpose. It dived, but rose a few yards farther, and was seen making for the land: a shot was fired, it sprang from the water; another, and it floated dead;--thus we repaid the beauty, and enjoyment, and lavish loveliness spread around us with pain and with destruction.

I recollect that as we passed a lovely bit of an island, all bordered with flags and white lilies, we saw a beautiful wild-duck emerge from a green covert, and lead into the lake a numerous brood of ducklings. It was a sight to touch the heart with a tender pleasure, and I pleaded hard, very hard, for mercy; but what thorough sportsman ever listened to such a word? The deadly guns were already levelled, and even while I spoke, the poor mother-bird was shot, and the little ones, which could not fly, went fluttering and scudding away into the open lake, to perish miserably.

But what was really very touching was to see the poor gulls: sometimes we would startle a whole bevy of them as they were floating gracefully on the waves, and they would rise soaring away beyond our reach; but the voyageurs suspending their paddles, imitated exactly their own soft low whistle; and then the wretched, foolish birds, just as if they had been so many women, actually wheeled round in the air, and came flying back to meet the "fiery wound."

The voyageurs eat these gulls, in spite of their fishy taste, with great satisfaction.

I wonder how it is that some of those gentry whom I used to see in London, looking as though they would give an empire for a new pleasure or a new sensation, do not come here? If epicures, they should come to eat white-fish and beavers' tails; if sportsmen, here is a very paradise for bear-hunting, deer-hunting, otter-hunting;--and wild-fowl in thousands, and fish in shoals; and if they be contemplative lovers of the picturesque, _blases_ with Italy and elbowed out of Switzerland, let them come here and find the true philosopher's stone--or rather the true elixir of life--_novelty!_

[Footnote 53: This part of Lake Huron, and indeed all its upper shores, are very incorrectly laid down in Wyld's map of Upper Canada. Bouchette's large map, and also a beautiful small one published by Blackwood in 1833, are much more accurate.]

[Footnote 54: A species of otter.]

THE BEAR ISLANDS.

At sunset we encamped on a rocky island of most fantastic form, like a Z. They pitched my tent on a height, and close to the door was a precipitous descent into a hollow, where they lighted vast fires, and thus kept off the mosquitoes, which were in great force. I slept well, but towards morning some creature crept into my tent and over my bed--a snake, as I supposed; after this I slept no more.

We started at half-past four. Hitherto the weather had been glorious; but this morning the sun rose among red and black clouds, fearfully ominous. As we were turning a point under some lofty rocks, we heard the crack of a rifle, and saw an Indian leaping along the rocks, and down towards the shore. We rowed in, not knowing what it meant, and came upon a night-camp of Indians, part of the tribe of Aisence (the Clam). They had only hailed us to make some trifling inquiries; and I heard Louis, sotto voce, send them _au diable_!--for now the weather lowered darker and darker, and every moment was precious.

We breakfasted on an island almost covered with flowers, some gorgeous, and strange, and unknown, and others sweet and familiar; plenty of the wild pea, for instance, and wild-roses, of which I had many offerings. I made my toilette in a recess among some rocks; but just as I was emerging from my primitive dressing-room, I felt a few drops of rain, and saw too clearly that our good fortune was at an end. We swallowed a hasty breakfast, and had just time to arrange ourselves in the canoe with all the available defences of cloaks and umbrellas, when the rain came down heavily and hopelessly. But notwithstanding the rain and the dark gray sky, the scenery was even more beautiful than ever. The islands were larger, and assumed a richer appearance; the trees were of more luxuriant growth, no longer the dwarfed pine, but lofty oak and maple. These are called the Bear Islands, from the number of those animals found upon them; old Solomon told me that an Indian whom he knew had shot nine bears in the course of a single day. We found three bears' heads stuck upon the boughs of a dead pine--probably as offerings to the souls of the slaughtered animals, or to the "Great Spirit," both being usual.

We dined on a wet rock, almost covered with that species of lichen which the Indians call wa,ac, and the Canadians _tripe de roche_, because, when boiled till soft, and then fried in grease, it makes a dish not unpalatable--when one has nothing else.[55] The Clam and some of his people landed and dined at the same time. After dinner the rain came on worse and worse. Old Solomon asked me once or twice how I felt; and I thought his anxiety for my health was caused by the rain; but no; he told me that on the island where we had dined he had observed a great quantity of a certain plant, which, if only touched, causes a dreadful eruption and ulcer all over the body. I asked why he had not shown it to me, and warned me against it? he replied, that such warning would only have increased the danger, for when there is any knowledge or apprehension of it existing in the mind, the very air blowing from it sometimes infects the frame. Here I appealed to Mr. Jarvis, who replied, "All I know is, that I once unconsciously touched a leaf of it, and became one ulcer from head to foot; I could not stir for a fortnight."[56]

This was a dreadful day, for the rain came on more violently, accompanied by a storm of wind. It was necessary to land early, and make our fires for the night. The good-natured men were full of anxiety and compassion for me, poor, lonely, shivering woman that I was in the midst of them! The first thought with every one was to place me under shelter, and my tent was pitched instantly with such zeal, and such activity, that the sense of inconvenience and suffering was forgotten in the thankful sense of kindness, and all things became endurable.

The tent was pitched on a height, so that the water ran off on all sides: I contrived for myself a dry bed, and Mr. Jarvis brought me some hot madeira. I rolled myself up in my German blanket, and fell into a deep, sound sleep. The voyageurs, who apparently need nothing but their own good spirits to feed and clothe them, lighted a great fire, turned the canoes upside down, and, sheltered under them, were heard singing and laughing during great part of this tempestuous night.

Next morning we were off by five o'clock. My beautiful lake looked horribly sulky, and all the little islands were lost in a cold gray vapour: we were now in the Georgian Bay. Through the misty atmosphere loomed a distant shore of considerable height. Dupre told me that what I saw was the Isle des Chretiens, and that formerly there was a large settlement of the Jesuits there, and that still there were to be seen the remains of "une grande cathedrale." About nine o'clock we entered the bay of Penetanguishene, so called from a high sand-bank at the entrance, which is continually crumbling away. The expressive Indian name signifies "Look! it is falling sand!"

[Footnote 55: It is often mentioned in the Travels of Back and Franklin.]

[Footnote 56: I do not know the botanical name of this plant, which resembles a dwarf sumach: it was subsequently pointed out to me in the woods by a Methodist preacher, who told me that his daughter, merely by standing to windward of the plant while looking at it, suffered dreadfully. It is said that formerly the Indians used it to poison their arrows.]

* * * * *

PENETANGUISHENE.

We spent the greater part of two days at Penetanguishene, which is truly a most lovely spot. The bay runs up into the land like some of the Scottish lochs, and the shores are bolder and higher than usual, and as yet all clothed with the primeval forest. During the war there were dockyards and a military and naval depot here, maintained at an immense expense to government; and it is likely, from its position, to rise into a station of great importance; at present, the only remains of all the warlike demonstrations of former times are a sloop sunk and rotting in the bay, and a large stone-building at the entrance, called the "Fort," but merely serving as barracks for a few soldiers from the garrison at Toronto. There are several pretty houses on the beautiful declivity, rising on the north side of the bay, and the families settled here have contrived to assemble round them many of the comforts and elegancies of life. I have reason to remember with pleasure a Russian lady, the wife of an English officer, who made my short sojourn here very agreeable.

There was an inn here, not the worst of Canadian inns; and the _wee_ closet called a bed-room, and the little bed with its white cotton curtains appeared to me the _ne plus ultra_ of luxury. I recollect walking in and out of the room ten times a day for the mere pleasure of contemplating it, and anticipated with impatience the moment when I should throw myself down into it, and sleep once more on a christian bed. But nine nights passed in the open air, or on rocks, and on boards, had spoiled me for the comforts of civilisation, and to sleep _on a bed_ was impossible; I was smothered, I was suffocated, and altogether wretched and fevered;--I sighed for my rock on Lake Huron.

THE COMMUTED PENSIONERS.

At Penetanguishene there is a hamlet, consisting of twenty or thirty log-houses, where a small remnant of the poor commuted pensioners (in all a hundred and twenty-six persons) now reside, receiving daily rations of food, and some little clothing, just sufficient to sustain life.

From some particular circumstances the case of these commuted pensioners was frequently brought under my observation while I was in Canada, and excited my strongest interest and compassion. I shall give you a brief sketch of this tragedy, for such it truly is; not by way of exciting sympathy, which can now avail nothing, but because it is in many points of view fraught with instruction.

The commuted pensioners were veteran soldiers, entitled to a small yearly pension for wounds or length of service, and who accepted the offer made to them by our government in 1832, to commute their pensions for four years' purchase, and a grant of one hundred acres of land in Canada.

The _intention_ of the government seems to have been to send out able-bodied men, who would thus cease, after a few years, to be a burthen on the country. A part of the money due to them was to be deducted for their voyage and expenses out; of the remaining sum a part was to be paid in London, part at Quebec, and the rest when settled on the land awarded to them. These _intentions_ sound well; unluckily they were not properly acted upon. Some received the whole of the money due to them in England, and drank themselves to death, or squandered it, and then refused to leave the country. Some drank themselves to death, or died of the cholera, at Quebec; and of those who came out, one half were described to me[57] as presenting a list of all the miseries and diseases incident to humanity--some with one arm, some with one leg, bent with old age or rheumatism, lame, halt, and even, will it be believed, blind![58] And such were the men to be set down in the midst of the swamp and forest, there to live as they could. When some few, who had been more provident, presented themselves to the commissary at Toronto for payment of the rest of the money due to them, it was found that the proper papers had not been forwarded; they were written for to the Chelsea Board, which had to apply to the War-office, which had to apply to the Treasury: the papers, after being bandied about from office to office, from clerk to secretary, from secretary to clerk, were sent, at length, after a lapse of eight or ten months, during which time the poor men, worn out with suspense, had taken to begging, or to drinking, in utter despondency; and when the order for their money _did_ at last arrive, they had become useless, abandoned creatures.

Those who were located were sent far up into the bush (there being no disposable government lands nearer), where there were no roads, no markets for their produce if they _did_ raise it; and in this new position, if their hearts did not sink, and their limbs fail at once, their ignorance of farming, their improvidence and helplessness, arising from the want of self-dependence, and the mechanical docility of military service, were moral obstacles stronger than any physical ones. The forest-trees they had to contend with were not more deeply rooted than the adverse habits and prejudices and infirmities they had brought with them.

According to the commissary, the number of those who commuted their pensions was about twelve hundred. Of these it is calculated that eight hundred reached Upper Canada; of these eight hundred, not more than four hundred and fifty are now living; and of these, some are begging through the townships, living on public charity: some are at Penetanguishene: and the greater part of those located on their land, have received from time to time rations of food, in order to avert "impending starvation." To bring them up from Quebec during the dreadful cholera season in 1832, was a heavy expense to the colony, and now they are likely to become a permanent burthen upon the colonial funds, there being no military funds to which they can be charged.

I make no reflection on the commuting the pensions of these poor men at four instead of seven years' purchase: many of the men I saw did not know what was meant by _commuting their pension:_ they thought they merely gave up their pension for four years, and were then to receive it again; they knew nothing of Canada--had never heard of it--had a vague idea that a very fine offer was made, which it would be foolish to refuse. They were like children--which, indeed, disbanded soldiers and sailors usually are.

All that benevolence and prudence _could_ suggest, was done for them by Sir John Colborne[59]: he aided them largely from his own purse--himself a soldier and a brave one, as well as a good man--the wrongs and miseries of these poor soldiers wrung his very heart. The strongest remonstrances and solicitations to the heads of the government at home were sent over in their behalf; but there came a change of ministry; the thing once done, could not be undone--redress was nobody's business--the mother country had got rid of a burthen, and it had fallen on Canada; and so the matter ended;--that is, as far as it concerned the Treasury and the War-office; but the tragedy has not yet ended _here_. Sir Francis Head, who never can allude to the subject without emotion and indignation, told me, that when he was at Penetanguishene last year, the poor veterans attempted to get up a feeble cheer in his honour, but, in doing so, the half of them fell down. "It was too much for me--too much," added he, with the tears actually in his eyes. As for Sir John Colborne, the least allusion to the subject seemed to give him a twinge of pain.

From this sum of mischief and misery you may subtract a few instances where the men have done better; one of these I had occasion to mention. I have heard of two others, and there may be more, but the general case is as I have stated it.

These were the men who fought our battles in Egypt, Spain, and France! and here is a new page for Alfred de Vigny's "Servitude et Grandeur Militaire!" But do you not think it includes another lesson? That this amount of suffering, and injury, and injustice can be inflicted, from the errors, ignorance, and remoteness of the home government, and that the responsibility apparently rests nowhere--and that nowhere lies redress--seems to me a very strange, a very lamentable state of things, and what _ought_ not to be.

[Footnote 57: I have these particulars from the chief of the commissariat in Upper Canada, and the emigrant agent.]

[Footnote 58: One of these men, stone-blind, was begging in the streets of Toronto.]

[Footnote 59: Now Lord Seaton.]

* * * * *

DRIVE OVER THE NARROWS.

Our voyageurs had spent the day in various excesses, and next morning were still half tipsy, lazy, and out of spirits, except Le Duc; he was the only one I could persuade to sing, as we crossed Gloucester Bay from Penetanguishene to Coldwater. This bay abounds in sturgeon, which are caught and cured in large quantities by the neighbouring settlers; some weigh ninety and one hundred pounds.

At Matchadash (which signifies "bad and swampy place") we had nearly lost our way among the reeds.

There is a portage here of sixteen miles across the forest to the Narrows, at the head of Lake Simcoe. The canoe and baggage were laid on a cart, and drawn by oxen; the gentlemen walked, as I must also have done, if a Methodist preacher of the neighbourhood had not kindly brought his little waggon and driven me over the portage. We stopped about half-way at his log-hut in the wilderness, where I found his wife, a pretty, refined looking woman, and five or six lovely children, of all ages and sizes. They entertained me with their best, and particularly with delicious preserves, made of the wood-strawberries and raspberries, boiled with the maple sugar.

The country here (after leaving the low swamps) is very rich, and the settlers fast increasing. During the last winter the bears had the audacity to carry off some heifers to the great consternation of the new settlers, and the wolves did much mischief. I inquired about the Indian settlements at Coldwater and the Narrows; but the accounts were not encouraging. I had been told, as a proof of the advancement of the Indians, that they had here saw-mills and grist-mills. I now learned that they had a saw-mill and a grist-mill built for them, which they never used themselves, but _let out_ to the white settlers at a certain rate. The road through the forest was bordered in many places by wild raspberry bushes, bearing fruit as fine, and large, and abundant as any I have seen in our gardens.

In spite of the mosquitoes, my drive was very pleasant; for my companion was good-natured, intelligent, and communicative, and gave me a most interesting, but rather sad, account of his missionary adventures. The road was, _as usual_, most detestable. We passed a lovely little lake called Bass Lake, from the numbers of these fish found in it; and arrived late at the inn at the Narrows. Though much fatigued, I was kept awake nearly the whole night by the sounds of drunken revelry in the room below. Many of the settlers in the neighbourhood are discharged soldiers and half-pay officers, who have received grants of land; and, removed from all social intercourse and all influence of opinion, many have become reckless and habitual drunkards. The only salvation of a man here is to have a wife and children; the poor wife must make up her mind to lead a hard life; but the children are almost _sure_ to do well--that is, if they have intelligent parents: it is the very land for the young, and the enterprising. I used to hear parents regret that they could not give what is called a _good_ education to their children: but where there are affection and common sense, and a boundless nature round them, and the means of health and subsistence, which (with common industry) all can command here, it seems that education--_i. e._ the development of all the faculties in a direction suited to the country in which they are to exist--comes of course. I saw an example of this in the excellent family at Erindale; but those persons are unfortunate and miserable, and truly pitiable, who come here with habits previously formed, and unable to adapt themselves to an entirely new existence--of such I saw too many. My landlady gave me no agreeable picture of the prevalent habits of the settlers round this place; the riot of which I complained was of nightly occurrence.

LAKE CUCHUCHING.

Next day we went on a fishing and shooting excursion to Lake Cuchuching, and to see the beautiful rapids of the river Severn, the outlet from these lakes into Lake Huron. If I had not exhausted all my superlatives of delight, I could be eloquent on the charms of this exquisite little lake, and the wild beauty of the rapids. Of our _sport_, I only recollect the massacre of a dozen snakes, which were holding a kind of conversazione in the hollow of a rocky islet where we landed to dine. The islands in Lake Cuchuching belong to the Indian chief, the Yellow-head; and I understand that he and others of his tribe have lately petitioned for _legal titles_ to their reserved lands. They represent to their Father the governor that their prosperity is retarded from the circumstance of their not having titles to their lands, like their white brethren. They say, "Many of our young men, and some of our chiefs, fear that the time will arrive when our white brethren will possess themselves of our farms; whereas, if our Father the governor would be pleased to grant us titles, we should work with more confidence,"--and they _humbly_ entreat (these original lords of the soil!) as a particular boon, that their "little bits of land" may be secured to their children and posterity for ever.