Canadian Crusoes

C >> Catherine Parr Traill >> Canadian Crusoes

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19

Produced by Juliet Sutherland, David Widger,
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

CANADIAN CRUSOES.

A Tale

of

THE RICE LAKE PLAINS.

CATHARINE PARR TRAIL,

AUTHORESS OF "THE BACKWOODS OF CANADA, ETC."

EDITED BY AGNES STRICKLAND.

ILLUSTRATED BY HARVEY.

LONDON:

ARTHUR HALL, VIRTUE, & CO.

25, PATERNOSTER ROW.

1852. DEDICATED

TO THE CHILDREN OF THE SETTLERS

ON

THE RICE LAKE PLAINS,

BY THEIR

FAITHFUL FRIEND AND WELL-WISHER

THE AUTHORESS.

OAKLANDS, RICE LAKE,

15_th Oct_ 1850 PREFACE

IT will be acknowledged that human sympathy irresistibly responds to any
narrative, founded on truth, which graphically describes the struggles of
isolated human beings to obtain the aliments of life. The distinctions
of pride and rank sink into nought, when the mind is engaged in the
contemplation of the inevitable consequences of the assaults of the gaunt
enemies, cold and hunger. Accidental circumstances have usually given
sufficient experience of their pangs, even to the most fortunate, to make
them own a fellow-feeling with those whom the chances of shipwreck, war,
wandering, or revolutions have cut off from home and hearth, and the
requisite supplies; not only from the thousand artificial comforts which
civilized society classes among the necessaries of life, but actually from
a sufficiency of "daily bread."

Where is the man, woman, or child who has not sympathized with the poor
seaman before the mast, Alexander Selkirk, typified by the genius of Defoe
as his inimitable Crusoe, whose name (although one by no means uncommon
in middle life in the east of England,) has become synonymous for all who
build and plant in a wilderness, "cut off from humanity's reach?" Our
insular situation has chiefly drawn the attention of the inhabitants of
Great Britain to casualties by sea, and the deprivations of individuals
wrecked on some desert coast; but it is by no means generally known that
scarcely a summer passes over the colonists in Canada, without losses of
children from the families of settlers occurring in the vast forests of the
backwoods, similar to that on which the narrative of the Canadian Crusoes
is founded. Many persons thus lost have perished in the wilderness; and it
is to impress on the memory the natural resources of this country, by the
aid of interesting the imagination, that the author of the well-known and
popular work, "The Backwoods of Canada," has written the following pages.

She has drawn attention, in the course of this volume, to the practical
solution [Footnote: See Appendix A; likewise p. 310.] of that provoking
enigma, which seems to perplex all anxious wanderers in an unknown land,
namely, that finding themselves, at the end of a day's toilsome march,
close to the spot from which they set out in the morning, and that this
cruel accident will occur for days in succession. The escape of Captain
O'Brien from his French prison at Verdun, detailed with such spirit in his
lively autobiography, offers remarkable instances of this propensity of the
forlorn wanderer in a strange land. A corresponding incident is recorded in
the narrative of the "Escape of a young French Officer from the depot near
Peterborough during the Napoleon European war." He found himself thrice at
night within sight of the walls of the prison from which he had fled in the
morning, after taking fruitless circular walks of twenty miles. I do
not recollect the cause of such lost labour being explained in either
narrative; perhaps the more frequent occurrence of the disaster in the
boundless backwoods of the Canadian colonies, forced knowledge, dearly
bought, on the perceptions of the settlers. Persons who wander without
knowing the features and landmarks of a country, instinctively turn their
faces to the sun, and for that reason always travel in a circle, infallibly
finding themselves at night in the very spot from which they started in
the morning. The resources and natural productions of the noble colony of
Canada are but superficially known. An intimate acquaintance with its rich
vegetable and animal productions is most effectually made under the high
pressure of difficulty and necessity. Our writer has striven to interest
children, or rather young people approaching the age of adolescence, in the
natural history of this country, simply by showing them how it is possible
for children to make the best of it when thrown into a state of destitution
as forlorn as the wanderers on the Rice Lake Plains. Perhaps those who
would not care for the berry, the root, and the grain, as delineated and
classified technically in books of science, might remember their uses
and properties when thus brought practically before their notice as the
aliments of the famishing fellow-creature, with whom their instinctive
feelings must perforce sympathies. When parents who have left home comforts
and all the ties of gentle kindred for the dear sakes of their rising
families, in order to place them in a more independent position, it is well
if those young minds are prepared with some knowledge of what they are to
find in the adopted country; the animals, the flowers, the fruits, and even
the minuter blessings which a bountiful Creator has poured forth over that
wide land.

The previous work of my sister, Mrs. Traill, "The Backwoods of Canada, by
the Wife of an Emigrant Officer," published some years since by Mr. C.
Knight, in his Library of Useful Knowledge, has passed through many
editions, and enjoyed, (anonymous though it was,) too wide a popularity as
a standard work for me to need to dwell on it, further than to say that
the present is written in the same _naive_, charming style, with the
same modesty and uncomplaining spirit, although much has the sweet and
gentle--author endured, as every English lady must expect to do who
ventures to encounter the lot of a colonist. She has now devoted her
further years of experience as a settler to the information of the
younger class of colonists, to open their minds and interest them in the
productions of that rising country, which will one day prove the mightiest
adjunct of the island empire; our nearest, our soundest colony, unstained
with the corruption of convict population; where families of gentle blood
need fear no real disgrace in their alliance; where no one need beg, and
where any one may dig without being ashamed. LIST OF ENGRAVINGS.

LOUIS CONFESSING HIS DECEPTION OF CATHARINE

THE FIRST BREAKFAST

CATHARINE FOUND BY THE OLD DOG

WOLF FINDING THE WOUNDED DOE

HECTOR BRINGING THE INDIAN GIRL

KILLING WILD FOWL

INDIAN WOMAN AT THE DOOR OF THE HUT

CATHARINE CARRIED OFF

INDIANA BEFORE THE BALD EAGLE

INDIANA AT THE STAKE

ATTACK ON THE DEER

RETURN HOME THE

CANADIAN CRUSOES.

CHAPTER I.

"The morning had shot her bright streamers on high,
O'er Canada, opening all pale to the sky;

Still dazzling and white was the robe that she wore,
Except where the ocean wave lash'd on the shore."
_Jacobite Song._

THERE lies between the Rice Lake and the Ontario, a deep and fertile
valley, surrounded by lofty wood-crowned hills, the heights of which were
clothed chiefly with groves of oak and pine, though the sides of the hills
and the alluvial bottoms gave a variety of noble timber trees of various
kinds, as the maple, beech, hemlock, and others. This beautiful and highly
picturesque valley is watered by many clear streams of pure refreshing
water, from whence the spot has derived its appropriate appellation of
"Cold Springs." At the time my little history commences, this now highly
cultivated spot was an unbroken wilderness,--all tut two small farms, where
dwelt the only occupiers of the soil,--which owned no other possessors than
the wandering hunting tribes of wild Indians, to whom the right of the
hunting grounds north of Rice Lake appertained, according to their forest
laws.

To those who travel over beaten roads, now partially planted, among
cultivated fields and flowery orchards, and see cleared farms and herds of
cattle and flocks of sheep, the change would be a striking one. I speak of
the time when the neat and flourishing town of Cobourg, now an important
port on the Ontario, was but a village in embryo--if it contained even
a log-house or a block-house it was all that it did, and the wild and
picturesque ground upon which the fast increasing village of Port Hope is
situated, had not yielded one forest tree to the axe of the settler. No
gallant vessel spread her sails to waft the abundant produce of grain and
Canadian stores along the waters of that noble sheet of water; no steamer
had then furrowed its bosom with her iron wheels, bearing the stream of
emigration towards the wilds of our Northern and Western forests, there to
render a lonely trackless desert a fruitful garden. What will not time and
the industry of man, assisted by the blessing of a merciful God, effect?
To him be the glory and honour; for we are taught, that "without the Lord
build the city, their labour is but lost that build it; without the Lord
keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain."

But to my tale. And first it will be necessary to introduce to the
acquaintance of my young readers the founders of our little settlement at
Cold Springs.

Duncan Maxwell was a young Highland soldier, a youth of eighteen, at the
famous battle of Quebec, where, though only a private, he received the
praise of his colonel for his brave conduct. At the close of the battle
Duncan was wounded, and as the hospital was full at the time with sick and
disabled men, he was lodged in the house of a poor French Canadian widow in
the Quebec suburb; here, though a foreigner and an enemy, he received much
kind attention from his excellent hostess and her family, which consisted
of a young man about his own age, and a pretty black-eyed lass not more
than sixteen. The widow Perron was so much occupied with other-lodgers--for
she kept a sort of boarding-house--that she had not much time to give to
Duncan, so that he was left a great deal to her son Pierre, and a little to
Catharine, her daughter.

Duncan Maxwell was a fine, open-tempered, frank lad, and he soon won the
regard of Pierre and his little sister. In spite of the prejudices of
country, and the difference of language and national customs, a steady and
increasing friendship grew up between the young Highlander and the children
of his hostess; therefore it was not without feelings of deep regret that
they heard the news, that the corps to which Duncan belonged was ordered
for embarkation to England, and Duncan was so far convalescent as to be
pronounced quite well enough to join them. Alas for poor Catharine! she now
found that parting with her patient was a source of the deepest sorrow to
her young and guileless heart; nor was Duncan less moved at the separation
from his gentle nurse. It might be for years, and it might be for ever,
he could not tell; but he could not tear himself away without telling the
object of his affections how dear she was to him, and to whisper a hope
that he might yet return one day to claim her as his bride; and Catharine,
weeping and blushing, promised to wait for that happy day, or to remain
single for his sake, while Pierre promised to watch over his friend's
interests and keep alive Catharine's love; for, said he, artlessly, "la
belle Catrine is pretty and lively, and may have many suitors before she
sees you again, mon ami."

They say the course of true love never did run smooth; but, with the
exception of this great sorrow, the sorrow of separation, the love of our
young Highland soldier and his betrothed knew no other interruption, for
absence served only to strengthen the affection which was founded on
gratitude and esteem.

Two long years passed, however, and the prospect of re-union was yet
distant, when an accident, which disabled Duncan from serving his country,
enabled him to retire with the usual little pension, and return to Quebec
to seek his affianced. Some changes had taken place during that short
period: the widow Perron was dead; Pierre, the gay, lively-hearted Pierre,
was married to the daughter of a lumberer; and Catharine, who had no
relatives in Quebec, had gone up the country with her brother and his wife,
and was living in some little settlement above Montreal with them.

Thither Duncan, with the constancy of his nature, followed, and shortly
afterwards was married to his faithful Catharine. On one point they had
never differed, both being of the same religion. Pierre had seen a good
deal of the fine country on the shores of the Ontario; he had been hunting
with some friendly Indians between the great waters and the Rice Lake, and
he now thought if Duncan and himself could make up their minds to a quiet
life in the woods, there was not a better spot than the hill pass between
the plains and the big lake to fix themselves upon. Duncan was of the same
opinion when he saw the spot. It was not rugged and bare like his own
Highlands, but softer in character, yet his heart yearned for the hill
country. In those days there was no obstacle to taking possession of any
tract of land in the unsurveyed forests, therefore Duncan agreed with his
brother-in-law to pioneer the way with him, get a dwelling put up and some
ground prepared and "seeded down," and then to, return for their wives and
settle themselves down at once as farmers. Others had succeeded, had formed
little colonies, and become the heads of villages in due time; why should
not they? And now behold our two backwoodsmen fairly commencing their
arduous life; but it was nothing, after all, to Pierre, by previous
occupation a hardy lumberer, or the Scottish soldier, accustomed to brave
all sorts of hardships in a wild country, himself a mountaineer, inured
to a stormy climate, and scanty fare, from his earliest youth. But it is
not my intention to dwell upon the trials and difficulties courageously met
and battled with by our settlers and their young wives.

There was in those days a spirit of resistance among the first settlers on
the soil, a spirit to do and bear, that is less commonly met with now. The
spirit of civilization is now so widely diffused, that her comforts are
felt even in the depths of the forest, so that the newly come emigrant
feels comparatively few of the physical evils that were endured by the
older inhabitants.

The first seed-wheat that was cast into the ground by Duncan and Pierre,
was brought with infinite trouble a distance of fifty miles in a little
skiff, navigated along the shores of the Ontario by the adventurous Pierre,
and from the nearest landing-place transported on the shoulders of himself
and Duncan to their homestead:--a day of great labour but great joy it was
when they deposited their precious freight in safety on the shanty floor.
They were obliged to make two journeys for the contents of the little
craft. What toil, what privation they endured for the first two years! and
now the fruits of it began slowly to appear. No two creatures could be more
unlike than Pierre and Duncan. The Highlander, stern, steady, persevering,
cautious, always giving ample reasons for his doing or his not doing. The
Canadian, hopeful, lively, fertile in expedients, and gay as a lark; if one
scheme failed another was sure to present itself. Pierre and Duncan were
admirably suited to be friends and neighbours. The steady perseverance of
the Scot helped to temper the volatile temperament of the Frenchman. They
generally contrived to compass the same end by different means, as two
streams descending from opposite hills will meet in one broad river in the
same valley.

Years passed on; the farm, carefully cultivated, began to yield its
increase, and food and warm clothing were not wanted in the homesteads.
Catharine had become, in course of time, the happy mother of four healthy
children; her sister-in-law had even exceeded her in these welcome
contributions to the population of a new colony. Between the children of
Pierre and Catharine the most charming harmony prevailed; they grew up as
one family, a pattern of affection and early friendship. Though different
in tempers and dispositions, Hector Maxwell, the eldest son of the Scottish
soldier, and his cousin, young Louis Perron, were greatly attached;
they, with the young Catharine and Mathilde, formed a little coterie of
inseparables; their amusements, tastes, pursuits, occupations, all blended
and harmonized delightfully; there were none of those little envyings and
bickerings among them that pave the way to strife and disunion in after
life.

Catharine Maxwell and her cousin Louis were more like brother and sister
than Hector and Catharine, but Mathilde was gentle and dove-like, and
formed a contrast to the gravity of Hector and the vivacity of Louis and
Catharine.

Hector and Louis were fourteen--strong, vigorous, industrious and hardy,
both in constitution and habits. The girls were turned of twelve. It is
not with Mathilde that our story is connected, but with the two lads and
Catharine. With the gaiety and naivete of the Frenchwoman, Catharine
possessed, when occasion called it into action, a thoughtful and
well-regulated mind, abilities which would well have repaid the care of
mental cultivation; but of book-learning she knew nothing beyond a little
reading, and that but imperfectly, acquired from her father's teaching. It
was an accomplishment which he had gained when in the army, having been
taught by his colonel's son, a lad of twelve years of age, who had taken a
great fancy to him, and had at parting given him a few of his school-books,
among which was a Testament, without cover or title-page. At parting, the
young gentleman recommended its daily perusal to Duncan. Had the gift been
a Bible, perhaps the soldier's obedience to his priest might have rendered
it a dead letter to him, but as it fortunately happened, he was unconscious
of any prohibition to deter him from becoming acquainted with the truths of
the Gospel. He communicated the power of perusing his books to his children
Hector and Catharine, Duncan and Kenneth, in succession, with a feeling of
intense reverence; even the labour of teaching was regarded as a holy duty
in itself, and was not undertaken without deeply impressing the obligation
he was conferring upon them whenever they were brought to the task. It was
indeed a precious boon, and the children learned to consider it as the
pearl beyond all price in the trials that awaited them in their eventful
career. To her knowledge of religious truths young Catharine added an
intimate acquaintance with the songs and legends of her father's romantic
country, which was to her even as fairyland; often would her plaintive
ballads and old tales, related in the hut or the wigwam to her attentive
auditors, wile away heavy thoughts; Louis and Mathilde, her cousins,
sometimes wondered how Catharine had acquired such a store of ballads and
wild tales as she could tell.

It was a lovely sunny day in the flowery month of June; Canada had not only
doffed that "dazzling white robe" mentioned in the songs of her Jacobite
emigrants, but had assumed the beauties of her loveliest season, the last
week in May and the first three of June being parallel to the English May,
full of buds and flowers and fair promise of ripening fruits. The high
sloping hills surrounding the fertile vale of Cold Springs were clothed
with the blossoms of the gorgeous scarlet enchroma, or painted-cup; the
large pure white blossoms of the lily-like trillium; the delicate and
fragile lilac geranium, whose graceful flowers woo the hand of the
flower-gatherer only to fade almost within his grasp; the golden
cyprepedium, or mocassin flower, so singular, so lovely in its colour and
formation, waved heavily its yellow blossoms as the breeze shook the stems;
and there, mingling with a thousand various floral beauties, the azure
lupine claimed its place, shedding almost a heavenly tint upon the earth.
Thousands of roses were blooming on the more level ground, sending forth
their rich fragrance, mixed with the delicate scent of the feathery
ceanothus, (New Jersey tea.) The vivid greenness of the young leaves of
the forest, the tender tint of the springing corn, were contrasted with the
deep dark fringe of waving pines on the hills, and the yet darker shade of
the spruce and balsams on the borders of the creeks, for so our Canadian
forest rills are universally termed. The bright glancing wings of the
summer red-bird, the crimson-headed woodpecker, the gay blue-bird, and
noisy but splendid plumed jay, might be seen among the branches; the air
was filled with beauteous sights and soft murmuring melodies. Under the
shade of the luxuriant hop-vines, that covered the rustic porch in front
of the little dwelling, the light step of Catharine Maxwell might be heard
mixed with the drowsy whirring of the big wheel, as she passed to and fro
guiding the thread of yarn in its course: and now she sang snatches of old
mountain songs, such as she had learned from her father; and now, with
livelier air, hummed some gay French tune to the household melody of her
spinning wheel, as she advanced and retreated with her thread, unconscious
of the laughing black eye that was watching her movements from among the
embowering foliage that shielded her from the morning sun.

"Come, ma belle cousine," for so Louis delighted to call her. "Hector and I
are waiting for you to go with us to the 'Beaver Meadow.' The cattle have
strayed, and we think we shall find them there. The day is delicious, the
very flowers look as if they wanted to be admired and plucked, and we shall
find early strawberries on the old Indian clearing."

Catharine cast a longing look abroad, but said, "I fear, Louis, I cannot go
to-day, for see, I have all these rolls of wool to spin up, and my yarn to
wind off the reel and twist; and then, my mother is away."

"Yes, I left her with mamma." replied Louis, "and she said she would be
home shortly, so her absence need not stay you. She said you could take a
basket and try and bring home some berries for sick Louise. Hector is sure
he knows a spot where we shall get some fine ones, ripe and red." As he
spoke Louis whisked away the big wheel to one end of the porch, gathered up
the hanks of yarn and tossed them into the open wicker basket, and the next
minute the large, coarse, flapped straw hat, that hung upon the peg in the
porch, was stuck not very gracefully on the top of Catharine's head
and tied beneath her chin, with a merry rattling laugh, which drowned
effectually the small lecture that Catharine began to utter, by way of
reproving the light-hearted boy.

"But where is Mathilde?"

"Sitting like a dear good girl, as she is, with sick Louise's head on
her lap, and would not disturb the poor sick thing for all the fruit and
flowers in Canada. Marie cried sadly to go with us, but I promised her and
petite Louise lots of flowers and berries if we get them, and the dear
children were as happy as queens when I left them."

"But stay, cousin, you are sure my mother gave her consent to my going?
We shall be away chief part of the day. You know it is a long walk to the
Beaver Meadow and back again," said Catharine, hesitating as Louis took her
hand to lead her out from the porch.

"Yes, yes, ma belle," said the giddy boy, quickly; "so come along, for
Hector is waiting at the barn; but stay, we shall be hungry before we
return, so let us have some cakes and butter, and do not forget a tin-cup
for water."

Nothing doubting, Catharine, with buoyant spirits, set about her little
preparations, which were soon completed; but just as she was leaving the
little garden enclosure, she ran back to kiss Kenneth and Duncan, her young
brothers. In the farm yard she found Hector with his axe on his shoulder.
"What are you taking the axe for, Hector? you will find it heavy to carry,"
said his sister.

"In the first place, I have to cut a stick of blue-beech to make a broom
for sweeping the house, sister of mine; and that is for your use, Miss
Kate; and in the next place, I have to find, if possible, a piece of rock
elm or hiccory for axe handles; so now you have the reason why I take the
axe with me."

The children now left the clearing, and struck into one of the deep defiles
that lay between the hills, and cheerfully they laughed and sung and
chattered, as they sped on their pleasant path; nor were they both to
exchange the glowing sunshine for the sober gloom of the forest shade. What
handfuls of flowers of all hues, red, blue, yellow and white, were gathered
only to be gazed at, carried for a while, then cast aside for others
fresher and fairer. And now they came to cool rills that flowed, softly
murmuring, among mossy limestone, or blocks of red or grey granite, wending
their way beneath twisted roots and fallen trees; and often Catharine
lingered to watch the eddying dimples of the clear water, to note the, tiny
bright fragments of quartz or crystallized limestone that formed a shining
pavement below the stream; and often she paused to watch the angry
movements of the red squirrel, as, with feathery tail erect, and sharp
scolding note, he crossed their woodland path, and swiftly darting up the
rugged bark of some neighbouring pine or hemlock, bade the intruders on
his quiet haunts defiance; yet so bold in his indignation, he scarcely
condescended to ascend beyond their reach.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19