Chapter XI: Part II (1)

In my former letters I spoke in a tone of mingled hope and fear as to the result of our efforts to make Bush-farming succeed without capital, and without even the means of living comfortably while trying the experiment.

It is needless to say to those who know anything of Muskoka, that the misgivings were fully realised, and the hopes proved mere delusions, and melted away imperceptibly as those airy fabrics too often do. We were certainly much deceived by the accounts given of Muskoka; after a four years’ residence I am inclined to think that from the very first the capabilities of its soil for agricultural purposes have been greatly exaggerated.

It will require years of extensive clearing, and constant amelioration of the land by means of manure and other applications, before it will be capable of bearing heavy grain crops; it is a poor and hungry soil, light and friable, mostly red sandstone loam and if a settler chances to find on his lot a small patch of heavy clay loam fit for raising wheat, the jubilant fuss that is made over it shows that it is not a common character of the soil.

The only crops at all reliable are oats and potatoes, and even these are subject to be injured by the frequent summer droughts and by the clouds of grasshoppers which occasionally sweep over Muskoka like an Egyptian plague.

For years to come the hard woods on a settler’s lot will be his most valuable source of profit; and as the railroad advances nearer and nearer, the demand for these woods for the lumber market will greatly increase.

But to return to our domestic history. The autumn of 1873 saw the first breaking-up of our little colony in the final departure from the Bush of my dear child, Mrs. C----, and her young family. My son-in-law, Mr. C----, soon found his Bush-farming as wearisome and unprofitable as we did ourselves. Having formerly taken his degree of B.A. at St. John’s College, Cambridge, and his wishes having long tended to the Church as a profession, nothing stood between him and ordination but a little reading up in classics and theology, which he accomplished with the assistance of his kind friend the Church of England clergyman at Bracebridge.

He was ordained by the Bishop of Toronto in October, 1873, and was at once appointed to a distant parish. The final parting was most painful, but it was so obviously for the good of the dear ones leaving us that we tried to repress all selfish regrets, and I, in particular, heartily thanked God that even a portion of the family had escaped from the miseries of Bush-life.

Our small community being so greatly lessened in number, the monotony of our lives was perceptibly increased. None but those who have experienced it can ever realise the utter weariness and isolation of Bush-life. The daily recurrence of the same laborious tasks, the want of time for mental culture, the absence of congenial intercourse with one’s fellow-creatures, the many hours of unavoidable solitude, the dreary unbroken silence of the immense forest which closes round the small clearings like a belt of iron; all these things ere long press down the most buoyant spirit, and superinduce a kind of dull despair, from which I have suffered for months at a time.

In conversation once with my daughter-in-law, who was often unavoidably alone for the whole day, we mutually agreed that there were times when the sense of loneliness became so dreadful, that had a bear jumped in at the window, or the house taken fire, or a hurricane blown down the farm buildings, we should have been tempted to rejoice and to hail the excitement as a boon.

And yet, strange as it may appear, I dreaded above all things visits from our neighbours. It is true they seldom came, but when they did, every one of them would have considered it a want of kindness not to prolong their visit for many hours. Harassed as I was with never ceasing anxiety, and much occupied with my correspondence and other writing, I found such visits an intolerable nuisance, particularly as after a little friendly talk about household matters, knitting, etc., where we met as it were on common ground, there was invariably a prolonged silence, which it required frantic efforts on my part to break, so as to prevent my guests feeling awkward and uncomfortable. On these occasions I was generally left with a nervous headache which lasted me for days.

One well-meaning, but especially noisy and vulgar individual was a continual terror to me. She more than once said to my eldest son:

“Your pore ma must be that lonesome and dull, that if it warn’t for the children I would often go and cheer her up a bit.”

My dear boy did his best to save his “pore ma” from such an infliction, and was thankful that the children presented an obstacle which fortunately for me was never got over.

In my estimation of the merits and agreeable conversation of our neighbours I made one great exception. Our nearest neighbour was an intelligent, well-conducted Englishman, who lived a lonely bachelor life, which in his rare intervals of rest from hard work he greatly solaced by reading. We lent him all our best books and English newspapers, and should have been glad to see him oftener, but he was so afraid of intruding that he seldom came except to return or change his books; at such times we had much really pleasant conversation, and often a stirring discussion on some public topic of the day, or it might be a particular reign in Cassell’s “English History,” or one of Shakespeare’s plays, both of which voluminous works he was reading through.

He had been head clerk in a large shop in Yorkshire, and was slightly democratic in his opinions, my tendencies being in the opposite direction; we just differed sufficiently to prevent conversation being dull. A more intelligent, hard-working, abstemious and trustworthy man I have seldom known, and we got to consider him quite in the light of a friend. For three winters, whether we had much or little, Mr. A----g was our honoured guest on Christmas Day.

One great solace of our lives was the number of letters we received from the “old country,” but even these were at times the cause of slight annoyance to my ever-sensitive feelings. All my dear friends and relations, after warm condolences on the disappointments we at first met with, would persist in assuring me that the _worst_ being over, we were sure to gain ground, and meet with more success for the future. From whence they gathered their consolatory hopes on our behalf it is impossible for me to say, certainly not from my letters home, which, in spite of all my efforts, invariably fell into a melancholy, not to say a grumbling tone. _I_ knew too well that, however bad things might be, the _worst_ was yet to come, and with a pardonable exaggeration of feeling under peculiar circumstances, often said to myself:

“And in the lowest deep, a lower deep,
Still threatening to devour me, opens wide.”

The autumn and winter of 1873 passed away with no more remarkable event than our first patch of fall wheat being sown, from which, in a burst of temporary enthusiasm, we actually expected to have sufficient flour for the wants of at least _one_ winter. 1874 having dawned upon us, we by no means slackened in our efforts to improve the land and make it profitable; but we found that although our expenses increased, our means did not. The more land we cleared, the more the want of money became apparent to crop and cultivate it, the labour of one individual being quite insufficient for the purpose.

To remedy this want, my son resolved to do what was a common practice in the settlement--go out to work for his neighbours, receiving from them return work, instead of any other payment. Our only difficulty in this matter was the having to provide sufficient food, even of the plainest kind, for hungry men engaged in logging; but even this we managed during the first half of the year. 1874 seemed to be a year of general want in our settlement; for when my son came home from his day of outside toil, our usual question was, “Well, dear, what did you have for dinner?” To which the reply mostly was, “Oh! bread-and-treacle and tea,” or “porridge and potatoes,” etc. And this in the houses of the better class of settlers, who were noted for putting the best they had before any neighbours working for them. In fact, there was so little of the circulating medium in the place, that all buying and selling was conducted in the most primitive style of barter. A settler having hay, corn, or cattle to sell, was obliged to take other commodities in exchange; and more than once, when we wanted some indispensable work done, my son, finding that we could in no way provide a money payment, would look over his tools or farm implements, and sometimes even his clothes, and part with whatever could possibly be spared.

I have mentioned our fall wheat sown in the autumn of 1873. Alas for all human expectations! The crop was pronounced to be a magnificent one by experienced judges; but when it came to be threshed, every grain was found to be wizened, shrivelled, and discoloured, and fit for nothing but to feed poultry. The crop had been winter-killed; that is, frozen and thawed so often before the snow finally covered it, that it was quite spoiled. We suffered at intervals this year more severely from the want of money than we had ever done; and had even long spells of hunger and want, which I trust have prepared us all to feel during the remainder of our lives a more full and perfect sympathy with our destitute fellow-creatures. In vain did we hope and wait, like Mr. Micawber, for “something to turn up;” nothing did turn up, but fresh troubles and increased fatigues.

Had it not been for the exceeding kindness of our friendly lawyer in London, and of a very dear friend of my early years (himself a lawyer), who sent us occasional assistance, we must have sunk under our wants and miseries. I did my very best to keep the “wolf from the door” by my literary efforts, and met with much kindness and consideration; but after unceasing industry, long continued, got to know that a few articles inserted at intervals in a fashionable American magazine, however much they might be liked and approved of, would do but little towards relieving the wants of a family. I became at last quite discouraged; for so much material was rejected and returned upon my hands, that I was fain to conclude that some frightful spell of dulness had fallen upon my once lively pen.

The work of this year appeared to us all to be harder than ever, and my eldest son’s health and strength were evidently on the decline. It is true that nearly every day he did the work of two men, as, in addition to the cultivation of the land, he had to chop all the fire-wood for daily use, to draw the water, and to do various jobs more or less fatiguing to insure anything like comfort to the family. He became so attenuated and cadaverous-looking, that we often told him that he would make his fortune on any stage as the lean apothecary in “Romeo and Juliet.”

It was with scarcely-suppressed anguish that, night after night, we saw him so fatigued and worn-out as to be hardly able to perform his customary ablutions and toilet before sitting down to the reading and writing with which he invariably concluded the day, and which was the only employment which linked us all to our happier life in former days. Indeed, both my sons, in spite of hard work and scanty fare, managed to give a few brief moments to study, and both at intervals wrote a few articles for our local paper, which at least showed an aptitude for higher pursuits than Bush-farming. Both my sons at times worked for and with each other, which was a most pleasant arrangement.

At this time my youngest son was going through, on his own farm, the same struggles as ourselves, and was, I am bound to say, in every respect as hard-working and energetic as his elder brother. His family was fast increasing, as he had now two little boys, in addition to the one of whom we had charge; and before the end of the year, he was thankful to accept the situation of schoolmaster at Allunsville, which added forty pounds a year to his slender means.

On one occasion, when he was working on our land with his brother, and when four other men were giving my son return-work, and were logging a large piece of ground near the house, having brought their oxen with them, we had half an hour of the delicious excitement of which my daughter-in-law and myself had talked so calmly some time before.

It was a bright sunny day, and my daughter and myself were busily engaged in cooking a substantial dinner for our working party, when, chancing to look up, my daughter exclaimed, “Mamma, is that sunlight or fire shining through the roof?” I ran out directly, and saw that the shingles below the chimney were well alight and beginning to blaze up. Calling to my daughter in passing, I flew to the end of the house and screamed out “Fire! fire!” in a voice which, my sons afterwards laughingly assured me, must have been heard at the post-office, three miles off. It had the immediate effect of bringing the whole party to our assistance in a few seconds, who were met by my daughter with two pails of water, which she had promptly procured from the well.

My two sons, both as active as monkeys, were immediately on the roof; one with an axe, to cut away the burning shingles; the other with water, handed up by men, to keep the fire from spreading. In ten minutes all danger was over; but it left us rather frightened and nervous, and I must confess that I never again wished for excitement of the same dangerous kind.

In the summer of this year I went to Bracebridge, on a visit to my daughter, Mrs. C., whose husband had lately taken priest’s orders, and been appointed by his bishop resident Church of England minister in that place, a change very agreeable to him, as he was well known, and much liked and esteemed by the inhabitants.

When I left the Bush to go into Bracebridge, it was with the full intention of never returning to it, and all my family considered my visit to Mrs. C. as a farewell visit before leaving for England. I had made great exertions to get from my kind lawyer and a friend an advance of sufficient money to take one of us back to the dear “old country,” and all agreed that I should go first, being well aware that my personal solicitations would soon secure the means of bringing back my eldest son and daughter, who, being the only unmarried ones of the family, were my constant companions.

Having, unfortunately for my plans, but quite unavoidably, made use of part of the money to leave things tolerably comfortable in the Bush, I waited anxiously till the deficit could be made up, which I fully hoped would soon be the case, a work of mine, in fifteen parts, having been forwarded to a publisher in New York, with a view to publication if approved of. What was my distress at receiving the manuscript back, with this observation appended to it: “The work is too English, local, and special, to be acceptable on this side of the Atlantic”! Other articles intended for the magazine I sometimes wrote for were also returned upon my hands about the same time. I draw a veil over my feelings, and will only say that disappointment, anxiety, suspense, and the burning heat of the weather gave me a very severe attack of illness, which frightened my dear child Mrs. C. most dreadfully, and left me so weak, feeble, and completely crushed, that I was thankful to send for my son, and to go back ignominiously to the hated Bush, to be tenderly nursed by my dear children, and to grieve over the loss of money so utterly thrown away.

The year wore slowly away, and Christmas Eve came at last; the snow had fallen in immense quantities, and the roads were nearly impassable from the deep drift. Our worthy friend Mr. A----g was away at the lochs, eight miles off, where he had taken a job of work, and we therefore felt pretty sure that he could not pay us his customary Christmas visit. We felt almost thankful, much as we liked him; for we had been literally without a cent for two months, and all our provision for Christmas festivities consisted in plenty of potatoes and a small modicum of flour.

But we were not to escape the humiliation of having nothing to put before our invited guest. Long after dark a well-known knock at the door announced Mr. A----g, who came for the key of his house, of which we always had the charge, and who had walked the whole way from the lochs to keep his tryst with us, over roads deep in snow and quite dangerous from snow-drifts at either side, which were so many pitfalls for unwary travellers. He came in, and we made him directly some hot tea--a welcome refreshment after his cold and fatiguing tramp of six hours.

When he was gone, we held a committee of ways and means; but as nothing could be done to alter the state of affairs, and as there was absolutely a ludicrous side to the question, we laughed heartily and went to bed.

Having edified the public with an account of our first Christmas dinner in the Bush, I cannot resist the temptation of giving the details of our last, which certainly did not show much improvement in our finances.

On Christmas morning, 1874, we very early heard a joyous shout, and saw dear Charles advancing triumphantly with two very small salt herrings (the last of his stock) dangling in one hand, and a huge vegetable-marrow in the other, these articles being the only addition he could make to our Christmas dinner, which for the three previous years he had been mainly instrumental in providing.

What could we do but laugh and cheerfully accept the situation? Charles promised to bring his dear wife and the two babies down on the ox-sleigh as early as possible. We borrowed, without hesitation, some butter from our friend Mr. A----g, who had a stock of it, and my eldest son went himself to fetch him before dinner, fearing that delicacy would prevent his coming, as he could too well guess the state of the larder.

Our guests assembled and dinner-time arrived, I placed on the table a large and savoury dish of vegetable-marrow mashed, with potatoes well buttered, peppered, salted and baked in the oven; the two herrings carefully cooked and a steaming dish of potatoes, with plenty of tea, made up a repast which we much enjoyed. When tea-time came, my daughter, who had devoted herself for the good of the community, supplied us with relays of “dampers,” which met with universal approbation.

In compliment to our guest, we had all put on what my boys jocosely term our “Sunday go-to-meeting clothes!” I was really glad that the grubs of so many weary weeks past on this day turned into butterflies. Cinderella’s transformations were not more complete. My daughter became the elegant young woman she has always been considered; my sons, in once more getting into their gentlemanly clothes, threw off the careworn look of working-day fatigue, and became once more distinguished and good-looking young men; and as to my pretty daughter-in-law, I have left her till the last to have the pleasure of saying that I never saw her look more lovely. She wore a very elegant silk dress, had delicate lace and bright ribbons floating about her, a gold locket and chain and sundry pretty ornaments, relics of her girlish days, and to crown all her beautiful hair flowing over her shoulders. I thought several times that afternoon, as I saw her caressing first one and then another of her three baby boys, that a painter might have been proud to sketch the pretty group, and to throw in at his fancy gorgeous draperies, antique vases and beautiful flowers, in lieu of the rude coarse framework of a log-house.

I could not but notice this Christmas Day that no attempt was made at _singing_, not even our favourite hymns were proposed; in fact the whole year had been so brim full of misfortune and trouble that I think none of our hearts were attuned to melody. Ah! dear reader, it takes long chastening before we can meekly drink the cup of affliction and say from the heart, “_Thy will be done!_” Let you and I, remembering our own shortcomings in this respect, be very tender over those of others!

Our party broke up early, as the children and their mother had to be got home before the light of the short winter-day had quite vanished, but we all agreed that we had passed a few hours very pleasantly.

Very different was our fare on New Year’s Day of 1875--a sumptuous wild turkey, which we roasted, having been provided for us by the kindness of one whom we must ever look upon in the light of a dear friend.

The “gentlemanly Canadian,” mentioned by me in my Bush reminiscences, read my papers and at once guessed at the authorship. Being in Muskoka on an election tour with his friend Mr. Pardee, he procured a guide and found us out in the Bush. He stayed but a short time, but the very sight of his kind friendly face did us good for days. Finding that I had never seen a wild turkey from the prairie, he asked leave to send me one, and did not forget his promise, sending a beautiful bird which was meant for our Christmas dinner, but owing to delays at Bracebridge only reached us in time for New Year’s Day; which brings me to 1875, an era of very important family changes.

I began this year with more of hopefulness and pleasure than I had known for a long time. My determination that this year should see us clear of the Bush had long been fixed, and I felt that as I brought unconquerable energy, and the efforts of a strong will to bear upon the project, it was sure to be successful. I had no opposition now to dread from my dear companions; both my son and daughter were as weary as myself of our long-continued and hopeless struggles. My son’s health and strength were visibly decreasing; he had already spent more than three years of the prime of his life in work harder than a common labourer’s, and with no better result than the very uncertain prospect of a bare living at the end of many years more of daily drudgery. His education fitted him for higher pursuits, and it was better for him to begin the world again, even at the age of thirty-two, than to continue burying himself alive.

We had long looked upon Bush life in the light of exile to a penal settlement without even the convict’s chance of a ticket-of-leave. All these considerations nerved me for the disagreeable task of getting money from England for our removal, in which, thanks to the unwearied kindness of the friends I have before mentioned, I succeeded, and very early in the year we began to make preparations for our final departure. It required the stimulus of hope to enable us to bear the discomforts of our last two months’ residence in the Bush.

After the turn of the year, immense quantities of snow continued to fall till we were closely encircled by walls of ice and snow fully five feet in depth. The labour of keeping paths open to the different farm-buildings was immense, and the unavoidable task of cutting away the superincumbent ice and snow from the different roofs was one of danger as well as toil. I was told that we were passing through an exceptional winter, and I must believe it, as long after we were in Bracebridge the snow continued to fall, and even so late as the middle of May a heavy snow-storm spread its white mantle on the earth, and hid it from view for many hours.

The last day at length arrived, we sat for the last time by our log-fire, we looked for the last time on the familiar landscape, and I, at least, felt not one pang of regret. My bump of adhesiveness is enormous; I cling fondly to the friends I love, to my pet animals, and even to places where I have lived; in quitting France I could have cried over every shrub and flower in my beloved garden. How great then must have been my unhappiness, and how I must have loathed my Bush life, when at quitting it for ever, my only feeling was joy at my escape!

At the time we left, the roads were so dangerous for the horses’ legs that my son had the greatest difficulty in hiring a wagon and team for our own use--all our heavy baggage had been taken in by ox-sleighs. He succeeded at last, and in the afternoon of the 2nd of March our exodus began. My son and the driver removed all but the front seat, and carefully spread our softest bedding, blankets and pillows, at the bottom of the wagon, and on these my daughter and myself reclined at our ease with our dear little charge between us. My favourite cat Tibbs, of “Atlantic Monthly” celebrity, was in a warm basket before me, and her companion Tomkins, tied up in a bag, slept on my lap the whole way. My son sat with the driver, and Jack, our black dog, ran by the side. We slept at Utterson, and in the morning went on to Bracebridge, where my son had secured for us a small roadside house.

When we were tolerably settled Edward started for Toronto and Montreal in search of employment, taking with him many excellent letters of introduction. In Montreal he was most kindly and hospitably welcomed by two dear friends, ladies who came out with us in the same ship from England, who received him into their house, introduced him to a large circle of friends, and did much to restore the shattered health of the “handsome emigrant,” as they had named him in the early stages of their acquaintance. Eventually finding nothing suitable in either place, our dear companion and protector for so many years decided to go on the Survey, his name having been put down by our kind friend, the donor of the wild turkey, on the Staff of his relation, Mr. Stuart, appointed by Government to survey the district of Parry Sound. Severe illness of our little boy, followed by illness of my own which still continues, was my welcome to Bracebridge, but still I rejoice daily that our Bush life is for ever over.

Here I finally drop the curtain on our domestic history, and make but a few parting observations. I am far from claiming undue sympathy for my individual case, but would fain deter others of the genteel class, and especially elderly people, from breaking up their comfortable homes and following an _ignis fatuus_ in the shape of emigration to a distant land.

I went into the Bush of Muskoka strong and healthy, full of life and energy, and fully as enthusiastic as the youngest of our party. I left it with hopes completely crushed, and with health so hopelessly shattered from hard work, unceasing anxiety and trouble of all kinds, that I am now a helpless invalid, entirely confined by the doctor’s orders to my bed and sofa, with not the remotest chance of ever leaving them for a more active life during the remainder of my days on earth.

A WEDDING IN MUSKOKA.

An Incident of Life in the Canadian Backwoods.

A WEDDING IN MUSKOKA.

I freely acknowledge that I am a romantic old woman; my children are continually telling me that such is my character, and without shame I confess the soft impeachment. I do not look upon romance as being either frivolous, unreal, or degrading; I consider it as a heaven-sent gift to the favoured few, enabling them to cast a softening halo of hope and beauty round the stern and rugged realities of daily life, and fitting them also to enter into the warm feelings and projects of the young, long after the dreams of love and youth have become to themselves things of the past. After this exordium, I need hardly say that I love and am loved by young people, that I have been the depositary of many innocent love secrets, and have brought more than one affair of the kind to a happy conclusion. I feel tempted to record my last experience, which began in France and ended happily in Muskoka. The parties, I am happy to say, are still living, to be, I doubt not, greatly amused at my faithful reminiscences of their past trials.

Just seven years ago I was in France busily working in my beautiful flower-garden, when I was told that visitors awaited me in the drawing-room. Hastily pulling off my garden-gloves and apron, I went in and found a very dear young friend, whom I shall call John Herbert; he asked my permission to present to me four young ladies of his acquaintance, all sisters, and very sweet specimens of pretty, lady-like English girls. The eldest, much older than the rest, and herself singularly attractive, seemed completely to merge her own identity in that of her young charges, to whose education she had devoted the best years of her early womanhood, and who now repaid her with loving affection and implicit deference to her authority. It was easy for me to see that the “bright, particular star” of my handsome, dashing young friend was the second sister, a lovely, shy girl of sixteen, whose blushes and timidity fully assured me of the state of matters between the two.

The mother of Mary Lennox (such was my heroine’s name) lived in France, her father in England, and in this divided household the care of the three younger girls had been entirely left to their eldest sister. John Herbert had made their acquaintance in that extraordinary manner in which young ladies and gentlemen do manage to become acquainted, as often in real life as in novels, without any intercourse between the respective families. For two or three months he had been much in their society, and the well-known result had followed. I have rarely seen a handsomer couple than these boy and girl lovers, on whom the eldest sister evidently looked with fond and proud admiration; and when, after a protracted visit, they took leave of me, I felt fully disposed to treat them with the warmest kindness and friendship.

In subsequent interviews, poor Herbert more fully opened his heart to me, and laid before me all his plans and projects for the future. The son of an old officer who fell during the Crimean war, he had neither friends nor fortune, but had to make his own position in the world. At this time he was twenty-one, and having just entered the merchant service was about to sail for Australia.

He told me also of the fierce opposition made by every member of Mary’s family, except her eldest sister, to their engagement. I was not at all surprised at this, and told him so; for could anything be more imprudent than an engagement between two people so young and so utterly without this world’s goods?

Mary, like himself, had neither fortune nor prospects. She was going to England to a finishing school with her two sisters, with the fixed idea of qualifying herself for a governess. Herbert entreated me to be a friend to these dear girls in his absence, to watch especially over his Mary during their brief holidays which were to be spent in France, to be his medium of correspondence with her while away, and above all to watch for every incidental opening to influence her family in his favour.

To all his wishes I at last consented, not without seriously laying before him that his carrying out this wish of his heart mainly depended upon his own steadiness, good conduct, and success in his profession. He promised everything, poor fellow, and religiously kept his promise. A few hurried interviews at my house were followed by a tearful farewell, and then, for the first time, the young lovers drifted apart. Herbert sailed for Australia, and Mary and her sisters crossed the Channel and went to school.

I shall try briefly to sketch the appearance of my two young friends at this momentous epoch of their lives. Mary Lennox had large, soft, grey eyes full of expression, with very beautifully pencilled eyebrows of dark-brown, the colour of her hair, of which she had a great abundance. She had a very handsome nose, and a well-formed face, with a colour varying with every shade of feeling. In height she was rather below than above middle size, with a pretty, slight figure, girlish and graceful. In complexion she was a fair brunette, which suited well with the colour of her eyes and hair. A great charm to me was the shy, downcast look of her pretty face, partly arising from the natural timidity of her character, and partly from the novelty of her position.

After a confidential intercourse of some weeks, I found her possessed of considerable character and steady principles, and her early engagement seemed to have given her far more serious views of life and its duties, than could have been expected in one so young. While her more mercurial sisters were romping in my garden, and chasing my pussy cats, she would mostly sit with her hand confidingly in mine, while her eldest sister and myself talked of books, music, and all the topics of the day.

As to John Herbert, none could look upon him and not acknowledge that he was as eminently handsome as his young lady-love. Not above middle height, his figure was slight and elegant, but well knit and muscular, giving promise of still greater strength when more fully developed. His merry laughing eyes were a clear hazel, with yellow spots, very uncommon and very beautiful. His features finely cut, and delicately chiselled, would have been perfect, but that critics pronounced his nose to be a trifle too long. His eyebrows were dark and rather thickly marked, giving great expression to his eyes. A beautiful head of dark curly hair, and a soft short moustache completed the appearance of one of the handsomest boys I have ever seen.

At this time he was full of energy, life, and determination, fond of active, outdoor employment, with a presence of mind and a dauntless courage which never failed him in moments of danger, and which enabled him in after years to extricate himself and others from scenes of imminent danger. Indeed, his sister averred that such was his presence of mind, that should his ship be wrecked, and every one on board be lost, Herbert would surely be saved if with only a butter-boat to cling to. He was truly affectionate and kind-hearted, but at this early age slightly imperious and self-willed, having been greatly flattered and spoilt in childhood; but contact with the world does much to smooth off the sharpest angularities and poor Herbert had a rough future before him.

After Herbert had sailed for Melbourne, and Mary and her sisters had gone to school, more than a year elapsed, during which time letters duly arrived, which I carefully forwarded; and soon after the expiration of that time, he and his ship arrived safely at Liverpool. Having with some difficulty obtained from the owners a few days’ leave, he hurried over to France to see and reassure his anxious and beloved Mary. Fortunately it was the Christmas holidays, and as soon as I could notify his arrival to Miss Lennox, she brought all the dear girls down to me.

Then ensued, for the lovers, long walks up and down my garden, in spite of the cold; for us all a few pleasant tea-parties; and then another separation, which this time was to extend over more than three years.

I am by no means favourable to long engagements, but these two were so young that I have always considered the years of anxiety and suspense they passed through, as an excellent training-time for both. They certainly helped to form Mary’s character, and to give her those habits of patience and trusting hopefulness which have been of so much benefit to her since. Nor was she ever allowed to think herself forgotten. Fond and affectionate letters came regularly every month, and at rare intervals such pretty tokens of remembrance as the slender means of her sailor lover could procure. Perfumes and holy beads from India, feathers from Abyssinia, and a pretty gold ring, set with pearls of the purest water, from the Persian Gulf.

Later came the pleasing intelligence that John Herbert had passed an excellent examination to qualify him as mate, and was on board one of the ships belonging to the company which took out the expedition for laying the cable in the Persian Gulf. On board this ship, called the _British India_, he met with a gentleman, whose influence over his future fate has long appeared to us all providential. This person was Major C----, the officer in command of the party sent out. They had many conversations together; and cheered and encouraged by his kindness, Herbert ventured to address a letter to him, in which he stated how much he was beginning to suffer from the heat of India; how in his profession he had been driven about the world for nearly five years, and still found himself as little able to marry and settle as at first; that he had no friend to place him in any situation which might better his position, and that his desire to quit a seafaring life was increased by the fact that he was never free from sea-sickness, which pursued and tormented him in every voyage just as it did in the beginning.

The kind and gentlemanly Major C---- responded warmly to this appeal; they had a long interview, in which he told Herbert that he himself was about to return to England, and felt sure that he could procure for him a good situation in the Telegraph Department in Persia. He gave him his address in London, and told him to come and see him as soon as he got back from India.

John Herbert lost no time, when the expedition was successfully over, in giving up his situation as mate, and in procuring all necessary testimonials as to good conduct and capacity. Indeed, he so wrought upon the officials of the _British India_, that they gave him a free passage in one of their ships as far as Suez. The letter containing the news of his improved prospects and speedy return occasioned the greatest joy.

I had some time before made the acquaintance of Mrs. Lennox, and from her manner, as well as from what Mrs. Lennox told me, I saw with joy that all active opposition was over, and that the engagement was tacitly connived at by the whole family. It was in the beginning of April that John Herbert arrived, his health much improved by absolute freedom from hard work and night watches. He had to pay all his own expenses from Suez, and just managed the overland journey on his little savings of eighteen or twenty pounds.

The “lovers’ walk” in my garden was now in constant occupation, and the summer-house at the end became a permanent boudoir. After a few days given to the joy of such an unexpected and hopeful reunion, Herbert wrote to Major C---- to announce his arrival, and to prepare him for a subsequent visit. He waited some days in great anxiety, and when he received the answer, brought it directly to me. I will not say that despair was written on his face--he was of too strong and hopeful a temperament for that--but blank dismay and measureless astonishment certainly were, and not without cause. The writer first expressed his deep regret that any hope he had held out of a situation should have induced Herbert to give up his profession for a mere chance. He then stated that on his own return to England he had found the Government in one of its periodical fits of parsimony, and that far from being able to make fresh appointments, he had found his own salary cut down, and all supernumeraries inexorably dismissed. Such were the contents of Major C----’s letter. It was indeed a crushing blow. John Herbert could not but feel that his five years of tossing about the world in various climates had been absolutely lost, so far as being settled in life was concerned, and he could not but feel also that he had again to begin the great battle of life, with prospects of success much diminished by the fact of his being now nearly twenty-six years of age.

Many long and anxious conversations ensued on the receipt of this letter. Both Herbert and Mary bravely bore up against the keen disappointment of all their newly-raised hopes. If the promised and coveted situation had been secured, there would have been nothing to prevent their almost immediate marriage; now all chance of this was thrown far into the background, and all that could be done was to trace out for Herbert some future plan of life to be begun with as little delay as possible. At the death of a near relative he would be entitled to a small portion of money amounting to five hundred pounds. This he now determined to sink for the present sum of two hundred pounds tendered by the Legal Assurance Society, in lieu of all future claims.

It was the end of July, 1870, before the necessary papers were all signed, and with the money thus raised, Herbert resolved at once to start for New York, where he proposed embarking his small capital in some business in which his thorough knowledge of French might be useful to him. He prudently expended a portion of his money in a good outfit and a gold watch.

Soon after his arrival in New York he wrote to tell us that at the same hotel where he boarded he had met with an old French gentleman recently from Paris, that they had gone into partnership and had opened a small establishment on Broadway for the sale of French wines and cigars. He wrote that they had every hope of doing well, numbers of foreigners buying from them, Frenchmen particularly coming in preference where they could freely converse in their own language. Just at this epoch the French and German war broke out, and stretching as it were across the broad Atlantic, swept into its ruinous vortex the poor little business in New York on which dear friends at home were building up such hopes of success. Herbert and his partner found their circle of French customers disappear as if by magic, the greater part recalled to their own country to serve as soldiers. No German would enter a French store, the English and Americans gave them no encouragement, and amid the stirring events which now occupied the public mind, the utter failure of the small business on Broadway took place without exciting either notice or pity.

Herbert saved nothing from the wreck of affairs but his gold watch and his clothes. It was about this time that a casual acquaintance mentioned to John Herbert the “free-grant lands” of Muskoka, pointing them out as a wide and promising field for emigration. He told him that he knew several families who had located themselves in that distant settlement, and who had found the land excellent, the conditions on which it was to be held easy of fulfilment, and the climate, though cold, incomparably healthy.

This intelligence, coming at a time when all was apparently lost, and his future prospects of the gloomiest kind, decided John Herbert to find his way to Muskoka and to apply for land there. He found a companion for his long journey in the person of a German who had come over with him in the same ship from Havre, and who, like himself, had entirely failed in bettering his condition in New York.

This poor young man had left a wife and child in Germany, and now that the war had broken out, having no vocation for fighting, he was afraid to venture back. Herbert sold his gold watch (for which he had given twenty pounds) for fifty dollars, and his companion being much on a par as to funds, they joined their resources and started for Muskoka. After a very fatiguing journey, performed as much as possible on foot, but latterly partly by rail and partly by boat, they arrived at Bracebridge, where the German took up one hundred acres, Herbert preferring to wait and choose his land in spring; and it was agreed that during the winter, now beginning with great severity, they should work together and have everything in common.

Having engaged a man who knew the country well to go with them and point out the land they had just taken up, they bought a few necessary articles, such as bedding, tools, a cooking-stove, and a small supply of provisions, and started for the township in which they were about to locate. Once upon the land they set to work, cleared a spot of ground, and with some assistance from their neighbours built a small shanty sufficient to shelter them for the winter. It was when they were tolerably settled that Herbert began to feel what a clog and a hindrance his too hastily formed partnership was likely to be. Feeble in body and feeble in mind, his companion became every day more depressed and home-sick. At last he ceased entirely from doing any work, which threw a double portion upon Herbert, who had in addition to do all commissions, and to fetch the letters from the distant post-office in all weathers.

Poor Wilhelm could do nothing but smoke feebly by the stove, shudder at the cold now becoming intense, and bemoan his hard fate. He was likewise so timid that his own shadow frightened him, and he could not bear to be left alone in the shanty. Herbert had a narrow escape of being shot by him one night on his return, rather late, from the post-office. Wilhelm, hearing footsteps, in his fright took down from the wall Herbert’s double-barrelled gun, which was kept always loaded, and was vainly trying to point it in the right direction, out of the door, when Herbert entered to find him as pale as death, and with limbs shaking to that degree that fortunately he had been unable to cock the gun.

It was indeed hard to be tied down to such a companionship. Herbert himself suffered severely from the cold of the Canadian climate, coming upon him as it did after some years’ residence in India, but he never complained, and his letters home to Mary and all of us spoke of hopeful feelings and undiminished perseverance. He has often told us since that he never left the shanty without a strong presentiment that on his return he should find it in flames, so great was the carelessness of his companion in blowing about the lighted ashes from his pipe. For this reason he always carried in the belt he wore round him, night and day, his small remainder of money and all his testimonials and certificates. A great part of his time was occupied in snaring rabbits and shooting an occasional bird or squirrel with which to make soup for his invalid companion. He used to set his snares overnight and look at them the first thing in the morning. One bitter cold morning he went out as usual to see if anything had been caught, leaving Wilhelm smoking by the stove. He returned to find the shanty in flames and his terrified companion crying, screaming, and wringing his hands. Herbert called to him in a voice of thunder, “The powder!” The frightened fool pointed to the half-burnt shanty, into which Herbert madly dashed, and emerged, half smothered, with a large carpet-bag already smouldering, in which, among all his best clothes, he had stored away his entire stock of gunpowder in canisters. He hurled the carpet-bag far off into a deep drift of snow, by which prompt measure he probably saved his own life and his companion’s, who seemed quite paralysed by fear. He then attempted to stop the fire by cutting away the burning rafters, but all his efforts were useless; hardly anything was saved but one trunk, which he dragged out at once though it was beginning to burn.

The tools, the bedding, the working-clothes, and most of his good outfit were consumed, and at night he went to bed at a kind neighbour’s who had at once taken him in, feeling too truly that he was again a ruined man.

One blessing certainly accrued to him from this sweeping misfortune. He for ever got rid of his helpless partner, who at once left the settlement, leaving Herbert again a free agent. Necessity compelled him now to do what he had never done before--to write home for assistance. His letter found his eldest sister in a position to help him, as she had just sunk her own portion in the same manner that he had done, not for her own benefit, but to assist members of the family who were in difficulties. She sent him at once fifty pounds, and with the possession of this sum all his prospects brightened.

He left the scene of his late disaster, took up one hundred acres of land for himself and another one hundred in the name of Mary Lennox, making sure that she would eventually come out to him. He set hard to work chopping and clearing a few acres, which, as the spring opened, he cropped judiciously. He then called a “bee,” which was well attended, and raised the walls of a good large log-house, the roof of which he shingled entirely himself in a masterly manner. For stock he bought two cows and some chickens; and then wrote to Mary, telling of his improved prospects, and asking her if, when he was more fully settled, she would consent to share his lot in this far-off corner of the earth. At this time Mary was on a visit to me, having been allowed, for the first time, to accept my warm invitation. All her family were at the sea-side in England, having left during the French war.

I have often said that a special Providence certainly watched over Herbert and Mary. It did seem most extraordinary that just at this particular time a married sister of John Herbert, with her husband and children, had suddenly determined to join him in Muskoka. The reason was this: Mr. C----, her husband, was the classical and mathematical professor in a large French academy; but years of scholastic duties and close attention to books had so undermined his health, that he was quite unable to continue the exercise of his profession; indeed, the medical men consulted by him gave it as their opinion that nothing but an entire change of climate and occupation, and a complete abstinence from all studious pursuits, together with an outdoor life, would give him the slightest chance of recovery. Herbert was written to and authorised to take up land for them near his own, and it was settled that they were to sail in the end of July.

Now came my time for persuasion and influence. I opened a correspondence with Mary’s father, who had recently received an explicit and manly letter from Herbert, with which he was much pleased. I represented to Mr. Lennox that this was no longer the “boy-and-girl love” (to quote his own words) of five years ago, but a steady affection, which had been severely tested by trouble, difficulty, opposition, and separation; that no future opportunity could ever be so favourable as the present one for his daughter going out to her future husband under the protection and guardianship of a family soon to become her relations, and who would, in everything, watch over her interest and comfort. In short, I left nothing unsaid that could make a favourable impression, willingly conceding to his paternal feelings that it was, in a worldly point of view, a match falling short of his just expectations for his beautiful and accomplished child.