The Englishwoman in America

I >> Isabella Lucy Bird >> The Englishwoman in America

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It would be out of place to enter upon the numerous geological
speculations which have arisen upon the structure and recession of
Niagara. It seems as if the faint light which science has shed upon the
abyss of bygone ages were but to show that its depths must remain for ever
unlighted by human reason and research.

There was such an air of gloom about the Clifton House that we sat in the
balcony till the cold became intense; and as it was too dark to see
anything but a white object in front, I could not help regretting the
waste (as it seems) of this wonderful display going on, when no eyes can
feast upon its sublimity. In the saloon there was a little fair-haired boy
of seven years old, with the intellectual faculties largely developed--
indeed, so much so as to be painfully suggestive of water on the brain.
His father called him into the middle of the room, and he repeated a long
oration of Daniel Webster's without once halting for a word, giving to it
the action and emphasis of the orator. This was a fair specimen of the
frequent undue development of the minds of American children.

At Niagara I finally took leave of the Walrences, as I had many visits to
pay, and near midnight left for Hamilton, under the escort of a very kind,
but very Grandisonian Scotch gentleman. I was intensely tired and sleepy,
and it was a very cheerless thing to leave a warm room at midnight for an
omnibus-drive of two miles along a bad, unlighted road. There did not
appear to be any waiting-room at the bustling station at the suspension
bridge, for, alas! the hollow scream of the locomotive is heard even above
the thunder of Niagara. I slept in the cars for an hour before we started,
and never woke till the conductor demanded payment of my fare in no very
gentle tones. We reached Hamilton shortly after two in the morning, in the
midst of a high wind and pouring rain; and in company with a dozen very
dirty emigrants we entered a lumber waggon with a canvas top, drawn by one
miserable horse. The curtains very imperfectly kept out the rain, and we
were in continual fear of an upset. At last the vehicle went down on one
side, and all the Irish emigrants tumbled over each other and us, with a
profusion of "Ochs," "murders," and "spalpeens." The driver composedly
shouted to us to alight; the hole was only deep enough to sink the vehicle
to the axletree. We got out into a very capacious lake of mud, and in
again, in very ill humour. At last the horse fell down in a hole, and my
Scotch friend and I got out and walked in the rain for some distance to a
very comfortable hotel, the City Arms. The sun had scarcely warmed the
world into waking life before I was startled from my sleep by the cry,
"Six o'clock; all aboard for the 'bus at half-past, them as goes by the
_Passport_ and _Highlander_:" but it was half-past, and I had barely time
to dress before the disagreeable shout of "All aboard!" echoed through the
house, and I hurried down stairs into an omnibus, which held twenty-two
persons inside, commodiously seated in arm-chairs. I went down Lake
Ontario in the _Highlander_; Mr. Forrest met me on the wharf, and in a few
hours I was again warmly welcomed at his hospitable house.

My relics of my visit to Niagara consisted of a few Indian curiosities,
and a printed certificate filled up with my name, [Footnote: "Niagara
Falls, C. W.: Register Office, Table Rock.--This is to certify, that Miss
---- has passed behind the Great Falling Sheet of Water to Termination
Rook, being 230 feet behind the Great Horse-shoe Fall.--Given under my
hand this 13th day of ----, 1854.--THOMAS BARNETT."] stating that I had
walked for 230 feet behind the great fall, which statement, I was assured
by an American fellow-traveller, was "a sell right entirely, an almighty
all-fired big flam."

CHAPTER XII.

A scene at starting--That dear little Harry--The old lady and the race--
Running the Rapids--An aside--Snow and discomfort-A new country--An
extemporised ball--Adventure with a madman--Shooting the cataract--First
appearance of Montreal--Its characteristics--Quebec in a fog--"Muffins"--
Quebec gaieties----The pestilence--Restlessness--St. Louis and St. Roch--
The shady side--Dark dens--External characteristics--Lord Elgin--Mistaking
a senator.

The _Arabian_, by which I left Toronto, was inferior to any American
steamer I had travelled in. It was crowded with both saloon and steerage
passengers, bound for Cobourg, Port Hope, and Montreal. It was very
bustling and dirty, and the carpet was plentifully sprinkled with tobacco-
juice. The captain was very much flustered with his unusually large living
cargo, but he was a good-hearted man, and very careful, having, to use his
own phrase, "climbed in at the hawse-holes, and worked his way aft,
instead of creeping in at the cabin window with his gloves on." The
stewards were dirty, and the stewardess too smart to attend to the
comforts of the passengers.

As passengers, crates, and boxes poured in at both the fore and aft
entrances, I went out on the little slip of deck to look at the prevalent
confusion, having previously ascertained that all my effects were secure.
The scene was a very amusing one, for, acting out the maxim that "time is
money," comparatively few of the passengers came down to the wharf more
than five minutes before the hour of sailing. People, among whom were a
number of "unprotected females," and juveniles who would not _move on_,
were entangled among trucks and carts discharging cargo--hacks, horses,
crates, and barrels. These passengers, who would find it difficult to
elbow their way unencumbered, find it next to impossible when their hands
are burdened with uncut books, baskets of provender, and diminutive
carpet-bags. Horses back carts against helpless females, barrels roll upon
people's toes, newspaper hawkers puff their wares, bonbon venders push
their plaster of Paris abominations almost at people's eyes, yet, strange
to say, it is very seldom that any accident occurs. Family groups
invariably are separated, and distracted mammas are running after children
whom everybody wishes out of the way, giving utterance to hopes that they
are not on shore. Then the obedient papa is sent on shore to look after
"that dear little Harry," who is probably all the time in the ladies'
saloon on some child-fancier's lap eating bonbons. The board is drawn in--
the moorings are cast off--the wheels revolve--the bell rings--the engine
squeals, and away speeds the steamer down the calm waters of Lake Ontario.
Little children and inquisitive young ladies are knocked down or blackened
in coiling the hawser, by "hands" who, being nothing but _hands_,
evidently cannot say, "I beg your pardon, miss." There were children, who
always will go where they ought not to go, running against people, and
taking hold of their clothes with sticky, smeared hands, asking commercial
gentlemen to spin their tops, and corpulent ladies to play at hide and
seek. I saw one stern-visaged gentleman tormented in this way till he
looked ready to give the child its "final quietus." [Footnote: American
juveniles are, generally speaking, completely destitute of that agreeable
shyness which prevents English and Scotch children from annoying
strangers.] There were angry people who had lost their portmanteaus, and
were ransacking the state-rooms in quest of them, and indolent people who
lay on the sofas reading novels and chewing tobacco. Some gentleman,
taking no heed of a printed notice, goes to the ladies' cabin to see if
his wife is safe on board, and meets with a rebuff from the stewardess,
who tells him that "gentlemen are not admitted," and, knowing that the
_sense_, or, as he would say, the _nonsense_ of the community is against
him, he beats a reluctant retreat. Everybody seems to have lost somebody
or something, but in an hour or two the ladies are deep in novels, the
gentlemen in the morning papers, the children have quarrelled themselves
to sleep, and the captain has gone to smoke by the funnel.

I sat on the slip of deck with a lady from Lake Superior, niece of the
accomplished poetess Mrs. Hemans, and she tried to arouse me into
admiration of the shore of Lake Ontario; but I confess that I was too much
occupied with a race which we were running with the American steamer
_Maple-leaf_, to look at the flat, gloomy, forest-fringed coast. There is
an inherent love of the excitement of a race in all human beings--even old
ladies are not exempt from it, if we may believe a story which I heard on
the Mississippi. An old lady was going down the river for the first time,
and expressed to the captain her earnest hope that there would be no
racing. Presently another boat neared them, and half the passengers urged
the captain to "_pile on_." The old lady shrieked and protested, but to no
purpose; the skipper "piled on;" and as the race was a very long and
doubtful one, she soon became excited. The rival boat shot ahead; the old
lady gave a side of bacon, her sole possession, to feed the boiler fires--
the boat was left behind--she clapped her hands--it ran ahead again, and,
frantic, she seated herself upon the safety-valve! It was again doubtful,
but, lo! the antagonist boat was _snagged_, and the lady gave a yell of
perfect delight when she saw it discomfited, and a hundred human beings
struggling in the water. Our race, however, was destitute of excitement,
for the _Maple-leaf_ was a much better sailer than ourselves.

Dinner constituted an important event in the day, and was despatched very
voraciously, though some things were raw, others overdone, and all greasy.
But the three hundred people who sat down to dinner were, as some one
observed, three hundred reasons against eating anything. I had to endure a
severe attack of ague, and about nine o'clock the stewardess gave up her
room to me, and, as she faithfully promised to call me half an hour before
we changed the boats, I slept very soundly. At five she came in--"Get up,
miss, we're at Guananoque; you've only five minutes to dress." I did dress
in five minutes, and, leaving my watch, with some very valuable lockets,
under my pillow, hastened across a narrow plank, half blinded by snow,
into the clean, light, handsome steamer _New Era_. I did not allow myself
to fall asleep in the very comfortable state-room which was provided for
me by the friend with whom I was travelling, but hurried upstairs with the
first grey of the chilly wintry dawn of the morning of the 18th of
October. The saloon-windows were dimmed with snow, so I went out on deck
and braved the driving wind and snow on that inhospitable morning, for we
were in the Lake of the Thousand Islands. Travellers have written and
spoken so much of the beauty of this celebrated piece of water, that I
expected to be disappointed; but, _au contraire_, I am almost inclined to
write a rhapsody myself.

For three hours we were sailing among these beautiful irregularly-formed
islands. There are 1692 of them, and they vary in size from mere rocks to
several acres in extent. Some of them are perfect paradises of beauty.
They form a complete labyrinth, through which the pilot finds his way,
guided by numerous beacons. Sometimes it appeared as if there were no
egress, and as if we were running straight upon a rock, and the water is
everywhere so deep, that from the deck of the steamer people can pull the
leaves from the trees. A hundred varieties of trees and shrubs grow out of
the grey lichen-covered rocks--it seems barbarous that the paddles of a
steamer should disturb their delicate shadows. If I found this lake so
beautiful on a day in the middle of October, when the bright autumn tints
had changed into a russet brown, and when a chill north-east wind was
blowing about the withered leaves, and the snow against the ship--and
when, more than all, I was only just recovering from ague--what would it
be on a bright summer-day, when the blue of heaven would be reflected in
the clear waters of the St. Lawrence!

By nine a furious snow-storm rendered all objects indistinct, and the fog
had thickened to such an extent that we could not see five feet ahead, so
we came to anchor for an hour. A very excellent breakfast was despatched
during this time, and at ten we steamed off again, steering by compass on
a river barely a mile wide! The _New Era_ was a boat of a remarkably light
draught of water. The saloon, or deck-house, came to within fifteen feet
of the bow, and on the hurricane-deck above there was a tower containing a
double wheel, with which the ship is steered by chains one hundred feet
long. There is a look-out place in front of this tower, generally occupied
by the pilot, a handsome, ruffian-looking French _voyageur_, with earrings
in his ears. Captain Chrysler, whose caution, urbanity, and kindness
render him deservedly popular, seldom leaves this post of observation, and
personally pays very great attention to his ship; for the river St.
Lawrence has as bad a reputation for destroying the vessels which navigate
it as the Mississippi.

The snow was now several inches deep on deck, and, melting near the deck-
house, trickled under the doors into the saloon. The moisture inside,
also, condensed upon the ceiling, and produced a constant shower-bath for
the whole day. Sofas and carpets were alike wet, everybody sat in
goloshes--the ladies in cloaks, the gentlemen in oilskins; the smell of
the latter, and of so many wet woollen clothes, in an apartment heated by
stove-heat, being almost unbearable. At twelve the fog and snow cleared
away, and revealed to view the mighty St. Lawrence--a rapid stream
whirling along in small eddies between slightly elevated banks dotted with
white homesteads. We passed a gigantic raft, with five log shanties upon
it, near Prescott. These rafts go slowly and safely down the St. Lawrence
and the Ottawa, till they come to La Chine, where frequent catastrophes
happen, if one may judge from the timber which strews the rocks. A
gentleman read from a newspaper these terrible statistics, "horrible if
true,"--"Forty-four murders and seven hundred murderous assaults have been
committed at New York within the last six months." (_Sensation_.) We
stopped at Prescott, one of the oldest towns in Canada, and shortly
afterwards passed the blackened ruins of a windmill, and some houses held
by a band of American "sympathisers" during the rebellion in 1838, but
from which they were dislodged by the cannon of the royal troops. Five
hundred American sympathisers, with several pieces of cannon, under cover
of darkness, on a lovely night in May, landed at this place. Soon after,
they were attacked by a party of English regulars and militiamen, who
drove them into a windmill and two strong stone houses, which they
loopholed, and defended themselves with a pertinacity which one would have
called heroism, had it been in a better cause. They finally surrendered,
and were carried prisoners to Kingston, where six of them were hanged.
Their leader, a military adventurer, a Pole of the name of Von Schoultz,
was the first to be executed. He fought with a skill and bravery worthy of
the nation from whence he sprung, and died without complaint, except of
those who had enticed him to fight for a godless cause, under the name of
liberty. Brighter days have since dawned upon Canada, and at this time the
most discontented can scarcely find the shadow of a grievance to lay hold
of.

As an instance of the way in which the utilitarian essentials of a high
state of civilisation are diffused throughout Canada, I may mention that
when we arrived at Cornwall I was able to telegraph to Kingston for my
lost watch, and received a satisfactory answer in half an hour.

After sailing down this mighty river at a rapid rate for some hours, we
ran the Galouse Rapids. Running the rapids is a favourite, and, I must
add, a charming diversion of adventurous travellers. There is just that
slight sense of danger which lends a zest to novelty, and it is furnished
by the facts that some timid persons land before coming to the rapids, and
that many vessels have come to an untimely end in descending them. There
is a favourite story of General Amherst, who during the war was sent down
by the river to attack Montreal, with three hundred and fifty men, and the
first intimation which the inhabitants received of the intended surprise
was through the bodies of the ill-fated detachment, clothed in the well-
known scarlet, floating by their city, the victims of the ignorance or
treachery of the pilot.

One of the great pleasures which I promised myself in my visit to Canada
was from running these rapids, and I was not disappointed. At the Galouse,
the river expands into a wide shallow stream, containing beautiful
islands, among which the water rushes furiously, being broken into large
waves, boiling, foaming, and whirling round. The steamer neared the
rapids--half her steam was shut off--six men appeared at the wheel--we
glided noiselessly along in smooth, green, deep water--the furious waves
were before us--the steamer gave one perceptible downward plunge--the
spray dashed over the bows--and at a speed of twenty-five miles an hour we
hurried down the turbulent hill of waters, running so near the islands
often that escape seemed hopeless--then guided safely away by the skill of
the pilot.

The next rapid was the Longue Sault, above a mile in length. The St.
Lawrence is here divided into two channels. The one we took is called the
Lost Passage; the Indian pilot who knew it died, and it has only been
recovered within the last five years. It is a very fine rapid, the islands
being extremely picturesque. We went down it at dizzy speed, with all our
steam on. I suppose that soon after this we entered the Lower Province,
for the aspect of things totally changed. The villages bore French names;
there were high wooden crosses by the water-side; the houses were many-
gabled and many-windowed, with tiers of balconies; and the setting sun
flashed upon Romish churches with spires of glittering tin. Everything was
marked by stagnation and retrogression: the people are _habitans_, the
clergy _cures_.

We ran the Cedars, a magnificent rapid, superior in beauty to the Grand
Rapids at Niagara, and afterwards those of the Coteau du Lac and the Split
Rock, but were obliged to anchor at La Chine, as its celebrated cataract
can only be shot by daylight. It was cold and dark, and nearly all the
passengers left La Chine by the cars for Montreal, to avoid what some
people consider the perilous descent of this rapid. As both means of
reaching Montreal were probably equally safe, I decided on remaining on
board, having secured a state-room. My companions in the saloon were the
captain's wife and a lady who seemed decidedly _flighty_, and totally
occupied in waiting upon a poodle lapdog. After the captain left, the
stokers and pokers, and stewards and cooks, extemporised a ball, with the
assistance of a blind Scotch fiddler, and invited numerous lassies, who
appeared as if by magic from a wharf to which we were moored. I cannot say
that they tripped it "on the _light_ fantastic toe," for brogues and
highlows stumped heavily on the floor; but what was wanting in elegance
was amply compensated for by merriment and vivacity. The conversation was
rather of a polyglot character, being carried on in French, Gaelic, and
English.

Throughout the night I was occupied in incessant attempts to keep up vital
warmth, and when the steward called me at five o'clock, I found that I had
been sleeping with the window open, and that the water in the jug was
frozen. Wintry-looking stars were twinkling through a frosty fog; the wet
hawsers were frozen stiff on deck; six came, the hour of starting, but
still there were no signs of moving. Railroads have not yet taught
punctuality to the Canadians, but better things are in store for them.
Cold to the very bone, I walked up and down the saloon to warm myself. The
floor was wet, and covered with saturated rugs; there were no fires in the
stoves, and my only resource was to lean against the engine-enclosure, and
warm my frozen hands on the hot wood. I was joined by a very old
gentleman, who, amid many complaints, informed me that he had had an
attack of apoplexy during the night, and some one, finding him insensible,
had opened the jugular vein. His lank white hair flowed over his
shoulders, and his neckcloth and shirt-front were smeared with blood. He
said he had cut his wife's throat, and that her ghost was after him.
"There, there!" he said, pointing to a corner. I looked at his eyes, and
saw at once that I was in the company of a madman. He then said that he
was king of the island of Montreal, and that he had murdered his wife
because she was going to betray him to the Queen of England. He was now,
he declared, going down to make a public entrance into Montreal. After
this avowal I treated him with the respect due to his fancied rank, till I
could call the stewards without exciting his suspicions. They said that he
was a confirmed lunatic, and had several times attempted to lay violent
hands upon himself. They thought he must have escaped from his keeper at
Brockville, and, with true madman's cunning, he had secreted himself in
the steamer. They kept him under strict surveillance till we arrived at
Montreal, and frustrated an attempt which he made to throw himself into
the rapid as we were descending it.

At seven we unmoored from the pier at La Chine, and steamed over the calm
waters of the Lac St. Louis, under the care of a Canadian _voyageur_, who
acted as a subordinate to an Indian pilot, who is said to be the only
person acquainted with the passage, and whom the boats are obliged under
penalty to take. The lake narrows at La Chine, and becomes again the St.
Lawrence, which presents a most extraordinary appearance, being a hill of
shallow rushing water about a mile wide, chafing a few islands which look
ready to be carried away by it. The large river Ottawa joins the St.
Lawrence a short distance from this, and mingles its turbid waters with
that mighty flood. The river became more and more rapid till we entered
what might be termed a sea of large, cross, leaping waves, and raging
waters, enough to engulf a small boat. The idea of descending it in a
steamer was an extraordinary one. It is said that from the shore a vessel
looks as if it were hurrying to certain destruction. Still we hurry on,
with eight men at the wheel--rocks appear like snags in the middle of the
stream--we dash straight down upon rocky islets, strewn with the wrecks of
rafts; but a turn of the wheel, and we rush by them in safety at a speed
('tis said) of thirty miles an hour, till a ragged ledge of rock stretches
across the whirling stream. Still on we go--louder roars the flood--
steeper appears the descent--earth, sky, and water seem mingled together.
I involuntarily took hold of the rail--the madman attempted to jump over--
the _flighty_ lady screamed and embraced more closely her poodle-dog; we
reached the ledge--one narrow space free from rocks appeared--down with
one plunge went the bow into a turmoil of foam--and we had "shot the
cataract" of La Chine.

The exploit is one of the most agreeable which the traveller can perform,
and the thick morning mist added to the apparent danger. We steamed for
four or five miles farther down the river, when suddenly the great curtain
of mist was rolled up as by an invisible hand, and the scene which it
revealed was _Montreal_. I never saw a city which looked so magnificent
from the water. It covers a very large extent of ground, which gently
slopes upwards from the lake-like river, and is backed by the Mountain, a
precipitous hill, 700 feet in height. It is decidedly foreign in
appearance, even from a distance. When the fog cleared away it revealed
this mountain, with the forest which covers it, all scarlet and purple;
the blue waters of the river hurried joyously along; the Green and
Belleisle mountains wore the rosy tints of dawn; the distances were bathed
in a purple glow; and the tin roofs, lofty spires, and cupolas of Montreal
flashed back the beams of the rising sun.

A lofty Gothic edifice, something from a distance like Westminster Abbey,
and handsome public buildings, with a superb wharf a mile long, of hewn
stone, present a very imposing appearance from the water. We landed from
the first lock of a ship-canal, and I immediately drove to the residence
of the Bishop of Montreal, a house near the mountain, in a very elevated
situation, and commanding a magnificent view. From the Bishop and his
family I received the greatest kindness, and have very agreeable
recollections of Montreal.

It was a most curious and startling change from the wooden erections, wide
streets, and the impress of novelty which pervaded everything I had seen
in the New World, to the old stone edifices, lofty houses, narrow streets,
and tin roofs of the city of Montreal. There are iron window-shutters,
convents with grated windows and long dead walls; there are narrow
thoroughfares, crowded with strangely-dressed _habitans_, and long
processions of priests. Then the French origin of the town contrasts
everywhere with the English occupation of it. There are streets--the Rue
St. Genevieve, the Rue St. Antoine, and the Rue St. Francois Xavier; there
are ancient customs and feudal privileges; Jesuit seminaries, and convents
of the _Soeurs Gris_ and the Sulpicians; priests in long black dresses;
native carters in coats with hoods, woollen nightcaps, and coloured
sashes; and barristers pleading in the French language. Then there are
Manchester goods, in stores kept by bustling Yankees; soldiers lounge
about in the scarlet and rifle uniforms of England; Presbyterian tunes
sound from plain bald churches; the institutions are drawn alike from
Paris and Westminster; and the public vehicles partake of the fashions of
Lisbon and Long Acre. You hear "_Place aux dames_" on one side of the
street, and "_g'lang_" on the other; and the United States have
contributed their hotel system and their slang.

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