PEN PICTURES FROM CANADA.

Evening Star, Issue 8118, 18 January 1890, Page 4 (Supplement)

PEN PICTURES FROM CANADA.

CANADIAN SEAPORTS. In my last picture I put iu the foreground Bome of our principal railways, particularly those that had been constructed since confederation. This time I present a little Eketch of our seaports, of which Canada has morethan any other country. She is not a sea-girt isle, but an island-girt Dominion, and a magnificent girdle her hundreds of thousands of islands form. But they are too numerous, and some of them too large to come into this picture; so I turn again to the seaports. In the greatness of their traffic they are neither Liverpoola nor Glasgows; but for natural advantages and the progress of their trade they can well bear comparison ylth these and other older ports.

The latest addition to our activelyemployed seaports is Vancouver City, on the Pacific coast, which has a long wharf half a mile wide, with English Bay and False Creek on one side, and on the other the splendid waters of Burrard Inlet. In this inlet the naviss of Europe could ride at anchor side by side and have plenty of room for naval eyoliftiona as well. Here the tea ships supplying th,e Continent of America am discharge their cargoes close by the Canadian Pacific Railway ; and if the tea demands of Em-ope come this way there is ample room for all alongside the great natural wharf of Vancouver Pity. This can be done at all times of the year, too, which cannot be said of all our ports, for Jack Frost comes along before Christmas with hia icy key, and locks up Montreal and Quebec for nearly half the year, and turns the rapid, sparkling, blue waters of the mighty St. Lawrence into a white, smooth, and strong highway for horses and sleighs. Instead of the steam whistle is now heard the merry jingle of the sleigh bells. The farmers and their wives in blankets and furs drive their produce to market, and the men draw the firewood citywards over this safe and easy road, till Old Sol rises up in his strength, and when he does Jack Frost has no power to hold in icy_ chains any longer. As to the navigation returns of Vancouver City, in ISSS, they were nil. It was not in existence. Two years later the returns show 100,000 tons of registered shipping arrived and departed.

Halifax, our great Atlantio seaport, han also a magnificent harbor, both deep and wide, which was formerly called Chebueto Bay. In 1878 Halifax had a seagoing tonnage in and out 0f'825,398 tons, and in 1887 1,175,560 tons ; while St. John, another seaport, increased from 803 591 tons to 1,001,818 tonß.

Montreal has made herself an ocean port, for when Cartier, three and' »cen>turiea ago, set out to explore the river St Lwrence he foi'nd that his little vessel, under 100 tons burdenß, was too large to be taken over the sand bars at Lake St. Peter ; while at the present time, by the removal of 16,000,000 cubic yards of dredged matter, Montreal, 1,000 miles inland from the Atlantic, and 250 miles above salt water, is easily reaqhed by the largest class of ocean merchant steamers. In 1873 Montreal had a total seagoing tonnage of '678,186 tons arrived and departed, which in 1887 had reached to 1,186,745 tons—an increase of nearly .75 per cent, in ten years. If we jake the' tonnage of seagoing shjppinc .entered and cleared with Mbntresd in the ten years shows jra increase of nearly 80 per cent., Halifax 32 per gent., and St. John over J44 percenjfc. I find the proof of my statement that our seaports in the progress of their traffic will bear comparing with older ports in the fact that during fifteen years only one European port—Hamburg—has increased more than Montreal and Halifax, Hamburg's increased trade being 86 percent., Montreal's B5 per cent,, and that of Halifax 80 per cent.; and only one American port shows during these fifteen years greater increase, Jfew York's percentage being 94.

HABDY FATHERS OF TOIL. Ihose hardy old men, the York Pioneers, met the other day in Toronto. The society is composed of persons who resided in what was originally the town of York, founded in 1794. "by the first Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, Colonel John Graves Simcoe. York beoame Toronto in 1834, bo that the youngest original Pioneer must be at least fifty-five years old. But if none of them are young the fire of youth is still in theii eyes ; and when one of their number, in their recent session, referred to the hardships they had undergone before and since 1834, all eyebrows twitched, and sharp glances of ap-

proval were cast towards the reminiscent speaker. Mr W. H. Doel read an interesting extract from a New York paper in reference to the experiment of sending the old propeller Michigan over Niagara Falls, in 1828. Thousands of people witnessed the descent, and not one plank was found nailed to another at the foot of the falls. Of the live animals put on board two bears jumped off and swam to the American side of the river before the boat reached the Falls. Of the bird family, two geese were found alive after the descent, and were afterwards exhibited as curiosities. The York Pioneers are engaged in collecting valuable relics of early Canadian history, which, with the relics of early Toronto history, they preserve in their museum, kept in an old log house formerly used as an office by Governor Simcoe, and now carefully preservedin Exhibition Park. In the same grounds is another old log house, which they keep as a relic of the home of the early Canadian settler. It is built of logs laid lengthwise, the interstices being filled with mud, and the shelving roof made of logs inclining towards the top of the wall. An Englishman from a pretty village in Wiltshire some sixty years ago had cut down the timber and erected one of these log cabins in the County of Peterborough. But before he had got his door made or his window put in—for he had no other means of getting a frame than to whittle one with his jack-knife—a neighbor brought him the news that his wife and child had arrived in the then village of Peterborough. He was nonplussed; but he laid down his knife, yoked his oxen together, fastened them to his cart, and set out. He had been a baker in England, and it was a bit of Old Country superstition that had sent him across the Atlautic. Some pitiable old woman, whom they called a witch, happened to pass by their bakehouse and ask for a loaf. This was denied, with the expression that they had no time to make bread for "tramping hussies like her." The old dame turned round, and in forcible language declared they should never bake another loaf of good bread. The next batch was sour: they were horrified. Tried again—the bread was heavy: they were bewitched. However that may be, they were bewildered. The wholo country side believed in the curse, and thej told everywhere they could make good bread no more. Their trade was gone. The baker across the way got their custom, and there was nothing to do but omigrate. He had come first to make ready a home ; and we have seen how far he had got when ho learned his wife and child were bo close at hand. The ox-cart was not a crusher to Mary, and even the rough corduroy road, formed by laying logs crosswise to fill up the holes, did not oppress her. She was going to their own farm-house on their own farm. They had come to the parcel of forest, which he hoped to clear and cultivate, and some day have some fine crops to gather in ; but now his heart failed him. He stopped the oxen, and she wanted to know what for. She asked again as she saw him unyoking them. "This is our farm, Mary." "But Jerem" —his name was Jeremiah—" Where's the house ?" This was a poser, and he tried to explain, but the more he said the more rebellious she grew. In her anger she called it a " pig-pen," and inside she vowed she would never set her foot. Jerem was at his wits' end. The hole in the roof was its only ingress, and at last in despair he picked up little Levi, climbed the ladder, and dropped out of sight, leaving poor Mary sitting outside on a fallen tree, and how to get her in he did not know. Her head and her heart both ached sorely, and the jolting over the terrible road had left her with a feeliug of utter tiredness she had never approached before. All at once she heard a sound that made her forget all her disgust and disappointment. It was the howling of wolves. "Jerem," she cried, in terror, "what's that?" "Wolves, Mary." The ferocious pack were in the woods, and might rush on her any i moment. With one bound, in spite of her aching joints, she was on the roof, and down she dropped into Jerem's arms. It was a refuge from wild beasts, anyway. The door and window were soon in place, a garden patch filled the little clearing, and a flower border from the English seeds flourished round the rude door. And though Jerem and Mary never succeeded in making the wilderness blossom as the rose, they had some degree of comfort ill the midst of their toil. Their children grew up around them contented and happy. It was the best home they had known, and they were as satisfied with it as the Governor's children are with Rideau Hall. One day Mary was sitting in tears. She had just contrived a pair of trousers for Levi out of Jerem's, and she was comparing this log cabin in the Canadian forest with her old cottage covered with roses and honeysuckle in the pretty English village. Levi, now five years old, came in, and, with childhood's selfishness, saw nothing but his new pants. Unnoticed by her he put them on, and now for the first time espied his mother's tears. " Oh, mother," he exclaimed, " there's nothing to cry for, I've got some new trousers." Mary laughed. The current of her thoughts was changed, and she set to work again with fresh courage. Amongst the hundred and one wants, it seems the lack of a flour mill cost the most trouble. They were English, and could not live by potatoes alone, and Jerem could not spare time from felling trees, logging tail burning underbrush, to carry wheat to a mill forty mile 3 off. So the lot fell upon Mary. It was near nightfall wher, twenty miles on her way, tired and travel-stained, and looking abput as demoralised as the woman she had in scorn turned from her door, she knocked at a road-side farmhouse to ask for a night's shelter. The request was denied and the door shut in her face with almost the same words she had used herself. Weary and footsore she went on her way, with the sharp words ringing in her ears, and full of indignation she passed house after house, for she was in an older settlement now. At length feeling unable to go any farther she ventured to knock at another door, and here met with only kindness. She reached the mill at Port Hope, and set out for home again with the flour on her back, unaware of the fright she was going to have. She was toiling up the hill, about five miles from the loghojjse, when what did she see coming over the brow but a bear; she stood still, and so did the bear. He could not have been hungry, for he turned lazily round and walked off, leaving Mary quaking with fear, and not at all sure master bruin would not turn up again. Instead of bruin, however, she soon met Jerem, and with the bag on his back and her on his arm, they trudged along. Yet another scare' awaited them. As they neared the clearing in the forest there was a sound of war. "Oh, Jerem, it's the bear at the children," she cried. The bag was dumped at the roadside, and Jerem and Mary ran. But it was uot the bear. Their only cow, a great black creature, had taken it into her head to walk in at the open door. Levi was terribly frightened. She took no notice of his attempts to keep her back, so, grabbing his younger brother, he managed to get into the other room, leaving the cow in possession. There was hardly room for her'' to turn round, and she was about' as much puzzled as they. JLovi shouted, the toddler bawled, the cow lowed, and a pretty hubbub it was. Jerem'soon got thfi cow out and the flour home, and, with his old trafle at'his fingerend", he made some hot cakes for their tea", and enough good bread to last a week. Mary thought a witch's curse could not cross the sea, so there was npthing to pre? vent the cakes and bread from rising to their hearts' content. In the Pioneers' log house is preserved as a curiosity a baker kettle like the one Jerem used now. Ifc was flat, round pofc, into which he placed bis dough; then raking forward hct coals on the hearth, he set his kettle on apd covered it with coals, taking care every now and then to turn it in order to brown the sides of the loaf before the fire. In the

log honse_ in Exhibition Park are other housekeeping appliances of these early days. Jerem and Mary are both gone. Levi has passed away, too. It is their grandchildren that are living in the neat brick house on the cleared and cultivated farm. They work hard, but they do not know what hardships mean, Their way has been paved for them by the brave and willing hands of Jerem and Mary. All honor to the toilers of the forest, who have turned the Canadian wilderness into a fruitful field. The York Pioneers have lately decided

to admit the sous and grandsons of Pioneers to membership. A society has also been formed in Hamilton, and a provincial society for the. whole of Ontario has been established, to which delegates from the local societies are sent. Societies such as this should be inaugurated in every new country, and would prove of immense advantage in preserving a knowledge of and interest in the loug-past days of trial and hardship, and also in forming museums for the reception of relics connected with the early days 'of colonial struggle with the wilderness. This is especially applicable to New Zealand, and I hope Dunedin will establish the first society of pioneers under the Southern Cross. THE GAME OF SHUFFLING. The Jesuit question is still to the fore, and likely to stay, though the powers that be seem to think it a rock, on which they will

get stranded, and therefore try to shuffle the stubborn thing off on some other authority. It is said that Premier Mercier did not want the Bill to become law. Where was he to get 400,000d0l to put into the outstretched hands of the Jesuit fathers? The province of Quebec belongs to a bygone age. She is France before the Revolution,

at a time when the church had vast possessions and the country next to nothing. At the conquest of Canada (1774) all the privileges she enjoyed under French rule—and everyone knows what French rule under the later Bourbons was—were granted to the French Canadians. In this state of affairs, that a rich church and empty treasury, it is said that Premier Mercier put into the preamble of the Bill the correspondence containing such disloyal statements as "The Holy Father reserved to himself the right of settling the Jesuit Estates Act;" "I deemed it my duty to ask your Eminence (Cardinal Simeoni) if you see any objection to the Government selling the property;" "It will perhaps be necessary to consult the Legislature," etc., etc., believing that these traitorous sentiments would arouse the ire of the Orange Premier of the Dominion and the members from Protestant Ontario to such a degree that they would never allow the Bill to pass the Commons. Then the polite Frenchman would turn to the Jesuit fathers : " I regret, Messieurs, this unfortunate and unforeseen state of matters, but " Well, the Scotch Premier (Macdonald) felt on this question the very same as the frog-eating Monsieur. Be too wanted to Btand well with the party that votes as the church points out; Laurier, the Leader of the Opposition, was in the self-same box, and so the Bill became an Act, enly 13 out of 201 daring to stand up and say nay. But when Sir John Macdonald found himself between two blazing fireshe endeavored to shuffle off the responsibility on the Governor. Meantime, it got sent over the Atlantic to the Queen to see if she would put her foot on it and stamp it out of existence. I suppose she and her Cabinet have their hands too full of Romish Ireland to care to meddle with Romish Quebec. Anyway, the troublesome question was sent to the right about, and came flying over the cable with the message that it was a matter that belonged to Canada herself. There was still the hope that the Governor would shoulder the responsibility, and veto the Act on or before the Bth of August. The hour had come, and the delegates from the Equal Rights Association, Principal Caven (of Queen's College, Kingston), and Dr L. H. Davidson (Q.C., of Quebec) went in search of the man, for Lord Stanley had left the capital and gone on his holiday ; but, after being detained by fog in the St. Lawrence, they found the Governor awaiting them in the Citadel at Quebec. Dr Given presented his petition, with 51,000 signatures from Ontario, which he said but very partially represented the intensity of popular indignation against the Jesuit Estates Act. Dr Davidson followed with his petition of 9,000 names from the Protestant minority of Quebec, and waxed warm and eloquent over their wrongs. But Lord Stanley had alrpady made up his mind. He was not going to bear the biunt, and he sent the battle right back to the Commons again. He did not see any use in stirring up raoe and religious prejudice, nor did he see anything derogatory to the Queen in the whole matter; but above all, ths House of Commons represented the Canadian people, and the vote in Parliament was not a thing to.be made little of, and he could not hold out to them the slightest hope that the Jesuit Act would be debarred from bee inning law. An indignation meeting was held when the delegates returned with this answer. Mr Wilson, another delegate, said: "The result of our mission simply means that the appeal is to be carried from the foot of the Throne to the sovereign people ; we have failed in the former, we will not fail in the latter. We live here, and have to grapple with a difficulty the Governor is only desirous, of staving off that there may be psace in his time. Our whole energy must now be concentrated upon the great fight which will follow the dissolution of the present House of Commons."

This Parliament has two year 3 yet to run before dying of old age, but Sir John Macdonald when in power has never allowed a Parliament to live out its days. He proudlv presented himself to the people before the last Bession. What he will do now, however, I am not prepared to say, not being a prophet.

The opinions delivered at the indignation meeting voiced the fixed determination of the Equal Rights Association—viz , that they will appeal to the puople. And if the present Parliament represented the Canadian people three years ago, before the hidden hand of the Jesuits was laid bare, all these conventions and resolutions of condemnation from every Protestant synod, conference, assembly, union, apd every Orange lodge would seem to say that they do not reprosent the Canadian people today. __ E.G.J.