XXVII.

YONGE STREET: FROM BOND'S LAKE TO THE HOLLAND LANDING, WITH DIGRESSIONS TO NEWMARKET AND SHARON.

We now speedily passed Drynoch, lying off to the left, on elevated land, the abode of Capt. Martin McLeod, formerly of the Isle of Skye. The family and domestic group systematized on a large scale at Drynoch here, was a Canadian reproduction of a chieftain's household.

Capt. McLeod was a Scot of the Norse vikinger type, of robust manly frame, of noble, frank, and tender spirit; an Ossianist too, and, in the Scandinavian direction, a philologist. Sir Walter Scott would have made a study of Capt. McLeod, and may have done so. He was one of eight brothers who all held commissions in the army. His own military life extended from 1808 to 1832. As an officer successively of the 27th, the 79th, and the 25th regiments, he saw much active service. He accompanied the force sent over to this continent in the War of 1812-13. It was then that he for the first time saw the land which was to be his final home. He was present, likewise, at the affair of Plattsburg; and also, we believe, at the attack on New Orleans. He afterwards took part in the so-called Peninsular war, and received a medal with four clasps for Toulouse, Orthes, Nive, and Nivelle. He missed Waterloo, "unfortunately," as he used to say; but he was present with the allied troops in Paris during the occupation of that city in 1815. Of the 25th regiment he was for many years adjutant, and then paymaster. Three of his uncles were general officers.

It is not inappropriate to add that the Major McLeod who received the honour of a Companionship in the Order of St. Michael and St. George for distinguished service in the Red River Expedition of 1870, was a son of Captain McLeod of Drynoch.

That in and about the Canadian Drynoch Gaelic should be familiarly heard was in keeping with the general character of the place. The ancient Celtic tongue was in fact a necessity, as among the dependents of the house there were always some who had never learned the English language. Drynoch was the name of the old home in Skye. The Skye Drynoch was an unfenced, hilly pasture farm, of about ten miles in extent, yielding nutriment to herds of wild cattle and some 8,000 sheep. Within its limits a lake, Loch Brockadale, is still the haunt of the otter, which is hunted by the aid of the famous terriers of the island; a mountain stream abounds with salmon and trout; while the heather and bracken of the slopes shelter grouse and other game.

Whittaker, in his _History of Whalley_, quoted by Hallam in his _Middle Ages_, describes the aspect which, as he supposes, a certain portion of England presented to the eye, as seen from the top of Pendle Hill, in Yorkshire, in the Saxon times. The picture which he draws we in Canada can realize with great perfectness. "Could a curious observer of the present day," he says, "carry himself nine or ten centuries back, and ranging the summit of Pendle, survey the forked vale of Calder on one side and the bolder margins of Ribble and Hodder on the other, instead of populous towns and villages, the castles, the old tower-built house, the elegant modern mansion, the artificial plantation, the enclosed park and pleasure-ground, instead of uninterrupted enclosures which have driven sterility almost to the summit of the fells, how great then must have been the contrast when, ranging either at a distance or immediately beneath, his eye must have caught vast tracts of forest-ground, stagnating with bog or darkened by native woods, where the wild ox, the roe, the stag and the wolf, had scarcely learned the supremacy of man, when, directing his view to the intermediate spaces, to the widening of the valleys, or expanse of plains beneath, he could only have distinguished a few insulated patches of culture, each encircling a village of wretched cabins, among which would still be remarked one rude mansion of wood, scarcely equal in comfort to a modern cottage, yet there rising proudly eminent above the rest, where the Saxon lord, surrounded by his faithful cotarii, enjoyed a rude and solitary independence, having no superior but his sovereign."

This writer asks us to carry ourselves nine or ten centuries back, to realize the picture which he has conceived. From the upland here in the vicinity of Drynoch, less than half a century ago, gazing southwards over the expanse thence to be commanded, we should have beheld a scene closely resembling that which, as he supposed, was seen from the summit of Pendle in the Saxon days; while at the present day we see everywhere, throughout the same expanse, an approximation to the old mother-lands, England, Ireland, and Scotland, in condition and appearance: in its style of agriculture, and the character of its towns, villages, hamlets, farm-houses, and country villas.

We now entered a region once occupied by a number of French military refugees. During the revolution in France, at the close of the last century, many of the devotees of the royalist cause passed over into England, where, as elsewhere, they were known and spoken of as _emigres_. Amongst them were numerous officers of the regular army, all of them, of course, of the noblesse order, or else, as the inherited rule was, no commission in the King's service could have been theirs. When now the royal cause became desperate, and they had suffered the loss of all their worldly goods, the British Government of the day, in its sympathy for the monarchical cause in France, offered them grants of land in the newly organized province of Upper Canada.

Some of them availed themselves of the generosity of the British Crown. Having been comrades in arms they desired to occupy a block of contiguous lots. Whilst there was yet almost all western Canada to choose from, by some chance these Oak Ridges, especially difficult to bring under cultivation and somewhat sterile when subdued, were preferred, partly perhaps through the influence of sentiment; they may have discovered some resemblance to regions familiar to themselves in their native land. Or in a mood inspired and made fashionable by Rousseau they may have longed for a lodge in some vast wilderness, where the "mortal coil" which had descended upon the old society of Europe should no longer harass them. When twitted by the passing wayfarer who had selected land in a more propitious situation, they would point to the gigantic boles of the surrounding pines in proof of the intrinsic excellence of the soil below, which must be good, they said, to nourish such a vegetation.

After all, however, this particular locality may have been selected rather for them than by them. On the early map of 1798 a range of nine lots on each side of Yonge Street, just here in the Ridges, is bracketed and marked, "French Royalists: by order of his Honor," _i.e._, the President, Peter Russell. A postscript to the _Gazetteer_ of 1799 gives the reader the information that "lands have been appropriated in the year of York as a refuge for some French Royalists, and their settlement has commenced."

On the Vaughan side, No. 56 was occupied conjointly by Michel Saigeon and Francis Reneoux; No. 57 by Julien le Bugle; No. 58 by Rene Aug. Comte de Chalus, Amboise de Farcy and Quetton St. George conjointly; No. 59 by Quetton St. George; No. 60 by Jean Louis Vicomte de Chalus. In King, No. 61 by Rene Aug. Comte de Chalus and Augustin Boiton conjointly. On the Markham side: No. 52 is occupied by the Comte de Puisaye; No. 53 by Rene Aug. Comte de Chalus; No. 54 by Jean Louis Vicomte de Chalus and Rene Aug. Comte de Chalus conjointly;--No. 55 by Jean Louis Vicomte de Chalus; No. 66 by le Chevalier de Marseuil and Michael Fauchard conjointly; No. 57 by the Chev. de Marseuil; No. 58 by Rene Letourneaux, Augustin Boiton and J. L. Vicomte de Chalus conjointly; No. 59 by Quetton St. George and Jean Furon conjointly; No. 60 by Amboise de Farcy. In Whitchurch, No. 61 by Michel Saigeon.

After felling the trees in a few acres of their respective allotments, some of these emigres withdrew from the country. Hence in the Ridges was to be seen here and there the rather unusual sight of abandoned clearings returning to a state of nature.

The officers styled Comte and Vicomte de Chalus derived their title from the veritable domain and castle of Chalus in Normandy, associated in the minds of young readers of English History with the death of Richard Coeur de Lion. Jean Louis de Chalus, whose name appears on numbers 54 and in 55 Markham and on other lots, was a Major-General in the Royal Army of Brittany. At the balls given by the Governor and others at York, the jewels of Madame la Comtesse created a great sensation, wholly surpassing everything of the kind that had hitherto been seen by the ladies of Upper Canada. Amboise de Farcy, of No. 58 in Vaughan and No. 60 in Markham, had also the rank of General. Augustin Boiton, of No. 48 in Markham and No. 61 in Vaughan, was a Lieutenant-Colonel.

The Comte de Puisaye, of No. 52 in Markham, figures conspicuously in the contemporary accounts of the royalist struggle against the Convention. He himself published in London in 1803 five octavo volumes of Memoirs, justificatory of his proceedings in that contest. Carlyle in his "French Revolution" speaks of de Puisaye's work, and, referring to the so-called Calvados war, says that those who are curious in such matters may read therein "how our Girondin National forces, _i.e._, the Moderates, marching off with plenty of wind music, were drawn out about the old chateau of Brecourt, in the wood-country near Vernon (in Brittany), to meet the Mountain National forces (the Communist) advancing from Paris. How on the fifteenth afternoon of July, 1793, they did meet:--and, as it were, shrieked mutually, and took mutually to flight, without loss. How Puisaye thereafter,--for the Mountain Nationals fled first, and we thought ourselves the victors,--was roused from his warm bed in the Castle of Brecourt and had to gallop without boots; our Nationals in the night watches having fallen unexpectedly into _sauve qui peut_."

Carlyle alludes again to this misadventure, when approaching the subject of the Quiberon expedition, two years later, towards the close of La Vendee war. Affecting for the moment a prophetic tone, in his peculiar way Carlyle proceeds thus, introducing at the close of his sketch de Puisaye once more, who was in command of the invading force spoken of, although not undividedly so. "In the month of July, 1795, English ships," he says, "will ride in Quiberon roads. There will be debarkation of chivalrous _ci-devants_, (_i.e._ ex-noblesse), of volunteer prisoners of war--eager to desert; of fire-arms, proclamations, clothes chests, royalists, and specie. Whereupon also, on the Republican side, there will be rapid stand-to arms; with ambuscade-marchings by Quiberon beach at midnight; storming of Fort Penthievre; war-thunder mingling with the roar of the mighty main; and such a morning light as has seldom dawned; debarkation hurled back into its boats, or into the devouring billows, with wreck and wail;--in one word, a _ci-devant_ Puisaye as totally ineffectual here as he was at Calvados, when he rode from Vernon Castle without boots."

The impression which Carlyle gives of M. de Puisaye is not greatly bettered by what M. de Lamartine says of him in the _History of the Girondists_, when speaking of him in connexion with the affair near the Chateau of Brecourt. He is there ranked with adventurers rather than heroes. "This man," de Lamartine says, "was at once an orator, a diplomatist, and a soldier,--a character eminently adapted for civil war, which produces more adventurers than heroes." De Lamartine describes how, prior to the repulse at Chateau Brecourt, "M. de Puisaye had passed a whole year concealed in a cavern in the midst of the forests of Brittany, where, by his manoeuvres and correspondence he kindled the fire of revolt against the republic." He professed to act in the interest of the moderates, believing that, through his influence, they would at last be induced to espouse heartily the cause of constitutional royalty.

Thiers, in his "History of the French Revolution," vii. 146, speaks in respectful terms of Puisaye. He says that "with great intelligence and extraordinary skill in uniting the elements of a party, he combined extreme activity of body and mind, and vast ambition:" and even after Quiberon, Thiers says "it was certain that Puisaye had done all that lay in his power." De Puisaye ended his days in England, in the neighbourhood of London, in 1827.--In one of the letters of Mr. Surveyor Jones we observe some of the improvements of the Oak Ridges spoken of as "Puisaye's Town."

It is possibly to the settlement, then only in contemplation, of emigres here in the Oak Ridges of Yonge Street, that Burke alludes, when in his Reflections on the French Revolution he says: "I hear that there are considerable emigrations from France, and that many, quitting that voluptuous climate and that seductive Circean liberty, have taken refuge in the frozen regions, and under the British despotism, of Canada."

"The frozen regions of Canada," the great rhetorician's expression in this place, has become a stereotyped phrase with declaimers. The reports of the first settlers at Tadousac and Quebec made an indelible impression on the European mind. To this day in transatlantic communities, it is realized only to a limited extent that Canada has a spring, summer and autumn as well as a winter, and that her skies wear an aspect not always gloomy and inhospitable. "British despotism" is, of course, ironically said, and means, in reality, British constitutional freedom. (In some instances these Royalist officers appear to have accepted commissions from the British Crown, and so to have become nominally entitled to grants of land.)

There are some representatives of the original emigres still to be met with in the neighbourhood of the Oak Ridges; but they have not in every instance continued to be seised of the lands granted in 1798. The Comte de Chalus, son of Rene Augustin, retains property here; but he resides in Montreal.

An estate, however, at the distance of one lot eastward from Yonge Street, in Whitchurch, is yet in the actual occupation of a direct descendant of one of the first settlers in this region. Mr. Henry Quetton St. George here engages with energy in the various operations of a practical farmer, on land inherited immediately from his father, the Chevalier de St. George, at the same time dispensing to his many friends a refined hospitality. If at Glenlonely the circular turrets and pointed roofs of the old French chateau are not to be seen,--what is of greater importance, the amenities and gentle life of the old French chateau are to be found. Moreover, by another successful enterprise added to agriculture, the present proprietor of Glenlonely has brought it to pass that the name of St. George is no longer suggestive, as in the first instance it was, of wars in La Vendee and fightings on the Garonne and Dordogne, but redolent in Canada, far and wide, only of vineyards in Languedoc and of pleasant wines from across the Pyrenees.

A large group of superior farm buildings, formerly seen on the right just after the turn which leads to Glenlonely, bore the graceful name of Larchmere,--an appellation glancing at the mere or little lake within view of the windows of the house: a sheet of water more generally known as Lake Willcocks--so called from an early owner of the spot, Col. Willcocks, of whom we have spoken in another section. Larchmere was for some time the home of his great grandson, William Willcocks Baldwin. The house has since been destroyed by fire.

Just beneath the surface of the soil on the borders of the lakelets of the Ridges, was early noticed a plentiful deposit of white shell-marl, resembling the substance brought up from the oozy floor of the Atlantic in the soundings preparatory to laying the telegraph-cable. It was, in fact, incipient chalk. It used to be employed in the composition of a whitewash for walls and fences. It may since have been found of value as a manure. In these quarters, as elsewhere in Canada, fine specimens of the antlers of the Wapiti, or great American stag, were occasionally dug up.

The summit level of the Ridges was now reached, the most elevated land in this part of the basin of the St. Lawrence; a height, however, after all, of only about eight hundred feet above the level of the sea. The attention of the wayfarer was hereabout always directed to a small stream, which the road crossed, flowing out of Lake Willcocks: and then a short distance further on, he was desired to notice a slight swale or shallow morass on the left. The stream in question, he was told, was the infant Humber, just starting south for Lake Ontario; while the swale or morass, he was assured, was a feeder of the east branch of the Holland River, flowing north into Lake Simcoe.

Notwithstanding the comparative nearness to each other of the waters of the Holland and the Humber, thus made visible to the eye, the earliest project of a canal in these parts was, as has once before been observed, for the connection, not of the Holland river and the Humber, but of the Holland river and the Rouge or Nen. The Mississaga Indians attached great importance to the Rouge and its valley as a link in one of their ancient trails between Huron and Ontario; and they seem to have imparted to the first white men their own notions on the subject. "It apparently rises," says the _Gazetteer_ of 1799, speaking of the Rouge or Nen, "in the vicinity of one of the branches of Holland's river, with which it will probably, at some future period, be connected by a canal." A "proposed canal" is accordingly here marked on one of the first manuscript maps of Upper Canada.

Father St. Lawrence and Father Mississippi pour their streams--so travellers assure us--from urns situated at no great distance apart. Lake Itaska and its vicinity, just west of Lake Superior, possess a charm for this reason. In like manner, to compare small things with great, the particular quarter of the Ridges where the waters of the Humber and the Holland used to be seen in near proximity to each other, had always with ourselves a special interest. Two small lakes, called respectively Lake Sproxton and Lake Simon, important feeders of the Rouge, a little to the east of the Glenlonely property, are situated very close to the streams that pass into the east branch of the Holland river; so that the conjecture of the author of the _Gazetteer_ was a good one. He says, "apparently the sources of the Rouge and Holland lie near each other."

After passing the notable locality of the Ridges just spoken of, the land began perceptibly to decline; and soon emerging from the confused glens and hillocks and woods that had long on every side been hedging in the view, we suddenly came out upon a brow where a wide prospect was obtained, stretching far to the north, and far to the east and west. From such an elevation the acres here and there denuded of their woods by the solitary axemen could not be distinguished; accordingly, the panorama presented here for many a year continued to be exactly that which met the eyes of the first exploring party from York in 1793.

As we used to see it, it seemed in effect to be an unbroken forest; in the foreground bold and billowy and of every variety of green; in the middle distance assuming neutral, indistinct tints, as it dipped down into what looked like a wide vale; then apparently rising by successive gentle stages, coloured now deep violet, now a tender blue, up to the line of the sky. In a depression in the far horizon, immediately in front, was seen the silvery sheen of water. This, of course, was the lake known since 1793 as Lake Simcoe; but previously spoken of by the French sometimes as Lake Sinion or Sheniong; sometimes as Lake Ouentironk, Ouentaron, and Toronto--the very name which is so familiar to us now, as appertaining to a locality thirty miles southward of this lake.

The French also in their own tongue sometimes designated it, perhaps for some reason connected with fishing operations, _Lac aux Claies_, Hurdle Lake. Thus in the _Gazetteer_ of 1799 we have "Simcoe Lake: formerly Lake aux Claies, Ouentironk, Sheniong, situated between York and Gloucester upon Lake Huron: it has a few small islands and several good harbours." And again on another page of the same _Gazetteer_, we have the article: "Toronto Lake (or Toronto): lake le Clie [_i. e._ Lac aux Claies] was formerly so called by some: (others," the same article proceeds to say, "called the chain of lakes from the vicinity of Matchedash towards the head of the Bay of Quinte, the Toronto lakes and the communication from the one to the other was called the Toronto river:" whilst in another place in the _Gazetteer_ we have the information given us that the Humber was also styled the Toronto river, thus: "Toronto river, called by some St. John's; now called the Humber.")

The region of which we here obtained a kind of Pisgah view, where

"The bursting prospect spreads immense around"

on the northern brow of the Ridges, is a classic one, renowned in the history of the Wyandots or Hurons, and in the early French missionary annals.

It did not chance to enter into the poet Longfellow's plan to lay the scene of any portion of his song of Hiawatha so far to the eastward; and the legends gathered by him

From the great lakes of the Northland, From the mountains, moors and fenlands, Where the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah, Feeds among the reeds and rushes--

tell of an era just anterior to the period when this district becomes invested with interest for us. Francis Parkman, however, in an agreeably written work, entitled "The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century," has dwelt somewhat at length on the history of this locality, which is the well-peopled Toronto region, _lieu ou il y a beaucoup de gens_, of which we have formerly spoken. (p. 74.)

In the early Reports of the Jesuit fathers themselves, too, this area figures largely. They, in fact, constructed a map, which must have led the central mission-board of their association, at Rome, to believe that this portion of Western Canada was as thickly strewn with villages and towns as a district of equal area in old France. In the "Chorographia Regionis Huronum," attached to Father du Creux's Map of New France, of the date 1660, given in Bressani's Abridgment of "the Relations," we have the following places conspicuously marked as stations or sub-missions in the peninsula bounded by Notawasaga bay, Matchedash or Sturgeon bay, the river Severn, Lake Couchichin, and Lake Simcoe, implying population in and round each of them:--St. Xavier, St. Charles, St. Louis, St. Ignatius, St. Denis, St. Joachim, St. Athanasius, St. Elizabeth, St. John the Baptist, St. Joseph, St. Mary, St. Michael, La Conception, St. Mary Magdalene, and others.

(In Schoolcraft's American Indians, p. 130, ed. 1851, the scene of the story of Aingodon and Naywadaha is laid at Toronto, by which a spot near Lake Simcoe seems to be meant, and not the trading-post of Toronto on Lake Ontario.)

But we must push on. The end of our journey is in sight. The impediments to our advance have been innumerable, but unavoidable. In spite of appearances, "Semper ad eventum festina," has all along been secretly goading us forward.

The farmhouses and their surroundings in the Quaker settlement through which, after descending from the Ridges on the northern side, we passed, came to be notable at an early date for a characteristic neatness, completeness, and visible judiciousness; and for an air of enviable general comfort and prosperity. The farmers here were emigrants chiefly from Pennsylvania. Coming from a quarter where large tracts had been rapidly transformed by human toil from a state of nature to a condition of high cultivation, they brought with them an inherited experience in regard to such matters; and on planting themselves down in the midst of an unbroken wild, they regarded the situation with more intelligence perhaps than the ordinary emigrant from the British Islands and interior of Germany, and so, unretarded by blunders and by doubts as to the issue, were enabled very speedily to turn their industry to profitable account.

The old _Gazetteer_ of 1799 speaks in an exalted sentimental strain of an emigration then going on from the United States into Canada. "The loyal peasant," it says, "sighing after the government he lost by the late revolution, travels from Pennsylvania in search of his former laws and protection; and having his expectations fulfilled by new marks of favour from the Crown in a grant of lands, he turns his plough at once into these fertile plains [the immediate reference is to the neighbourhood of Woodhouse on Lake Erie], and an abundant crop reminds him of his gratitude to his God and to his king."

We do not know for certain whether the Quaker settlers of the region north of the Ridges came into Canada under the influence of feelings exactly such as those described by the _Gazetteer_ of 1799. In 1806, however, we find them coming forward in a body to congratulate a new Lieutenant-Governor on his arrival in Upper Canada. In the _Gazette_ of Oct. 4, 1806, we read: "On Tuesday, the 30th September (1806), the following address from the Quakers residing on Yonge Street was presented to his Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor: "The Society of the people called Quakers, to Francis Gore, Governor of Upper Canada, sendeth greeting. Notwithstanding we are a people who hold forth to the world a principle which in many respects differs from the greater part of mankind, yet we believe it our reasonable duty, as saith the Apostle, 'Submit yourselves unto every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be the king as supreme, or unto governors as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well:' in this we hope to be his humble and peaceful subjects. Although we cannot for conscience sake join with many of our fellow-mortals in complimentary customs of man, neither in taking up the sword in order to shed human blood--for the Scripture saith that 'it is righteousness that exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people'--we feel concerned for thy welfare and the prosperity of the province, hoping thy administration may be such as to be a terror to the evil-minded and a pleasure to them that do well: then will the province flourish and prosper under thy direction; which is the earnest desire and prayer of thy sincere friends.--Read and approved in Yonge Street monthly meeting, held the 18th day of the ninth month, 1806. Timothy Rogers and Amos Armitage are appointed to attend on the Governor therewith." Signed by order of the said meeting, Nathaniel Pearson, clerk."

To this address, characteristic alike in the peculiar syntax of its sentences and in the well-meant platitudes to which it gives expression, his Excellency was pleased to return the following answer: "I return you my thanks for your dutiful address and for your good wishes for my welfare and prosperity of this province. I have no doubt of your proving peaceful and good subjects to his Majesty, as well as industrious and respectable members of society. I shall at all times be happy to afford to such persons my countenance and support. Francis Gore, Lieut.-Governor. Government House, York, Upper Canada, 30th Sept., 1806."

The Timothy Rogers here named bore a leading part in the first establishment of the Quaker settlement. He and Jacob Lundy were the two original managers of its affairs. On the arrival of Governor Peter Hunter, predecessor to Gov. Gore, Timothy Rogers and Jacob Lundy with a deputation from the settlement, came into town to complain to him of the delay which they and their co-religionists had experienced in obtaining the patents for their lands.

Governor Hunter, who was also Commander-in-Chief and a Lieut.-General in the army, received them in the garrison, and after hearing how on coming to York on former occasions they had been sent about from one office to another for a reply to their inquiries about the patents, he requested them to come to him again the next day at noon. Orders were at the same instant despatched to Mr. D. W. Smith, the Surveyor-General, to Mr. Small, Clerk of the Executive Council, to Mr. Burns, Clerk of the Crown, and to Mr. Jarvis, Secretary and Registrar of the Province (all of whom it appeared at one time or another had failed to reply satisfactorily to the Quakers), to wait at the same hour on the Lieut.-Governor, bringing with them, each respectively, such papers and memoranda as might be in their possession, having relation to patents for lands in Whitchurch and King.

Governor Hunter had a reputation for considerable severity of character; and all functionaries, from the judge on the bench to the humblest employe, held office in those days very literally during pleasure.

"These gentlemen complain,"--the personages above enumerated having duly appeared, together with the deputation from Yonge Street--"These gentlemen complain," the Governor said, pointing to the Quakers, "that they cannot get their patents."

Each of the official personages present offered in succession some indistinct observations; expressive it would seem of a degree of regret, and hinting exculpatory reasons, so far as he individually was concerned.

On closer interrogation, one thing however came out very clear, that the order for the patents was more than twelve months old.

At length the onus of blame seemed to settle down on the head of the Secretary and Registrar, Mr. Jarvis, who could only say that really the pressure of business in his office was so great that he had been absolutely unable, up to the present moment, to get ready the particular patents referred to.

"Sir!" was the Governor's immediate rejoinder, "if they are not forthcoming, every one of them, and placed in the hands of these gentlemen here in my presence at noon on Thursday next (it was now Tuesday), by George! I'll un-Jarvis you!"--implying, as we suppose, a summary conge as Secretary and Registrar.

It is needless to say that Mr. Rogers and his colleagues of the deputation carried back with them to Whitchurch lively accounts of the vigour and rigour of the new Governor--as well as their patents.

General Hunter was very peremptory in his dismissals occasionally. In a _Gazette_ of July 16, 1803, is to be seen an ominous announcement that the Governor is going to be very strict with the Government clerks in regard to hours: "Lieut.-Governor's office, 21st June, 1803. Notice is hereby given that regular attendance for the transaction of the public business of the Province will in future be given at the office of the Secretary of the Province, the Executive Council office, and the Surveyor-General's office, every day in the year (Sundays, Good Friday, and Christmas day only excepted) from ten o'clock in the morning until three in the afternoon, and from five o'clock in the afternoon until seven in the evening. By order of the Lieutenant-Governor, Jas. Green, Secretary."

Soon after the appearance of this notice, it happened one forenoon that young Alexander Macnab, a clerk in one of the public offices, was innocently watching the Governor's debarkation from a boat, preparatory to his being conveyed up to the Council-chamber in a sedan-chair which was in waiting for him. The youth suddenly caught his Excellency's eye, and was asked--"What business he had to be there? Did he not belong to the Surveyor-General's office? Sir! your services are no longer required!"

For this same young Macnab, thus summarily dismissed, Governor Hunter, we have been told, procured subsequently a commission. He attained the rank of captain and met a soldier's fate on the field of Waterloo, the only Upper Canadian known to have been engaged or to have fallen in that famous battle. (We have before mentioned that so late as 1868, Captain Macnab's Waterloo medal was presented, by the Duke of Cambridge personally, to the Rev. Dr. Macnab, of Bowmanville, nephew of the deceased officer.)

Two stray characteristic items relating to Governor Hunter may here be subjoined. The following was his brief reply to the Address of the Inhabitants of York on his arrival there in 1799:--"Gentlemen, nothing that is in my power shall be wanting to contribute to the happiness and welfare of this colony." (_Gazette_, Aug. 24, 1799)--At Niagara, an Address from "the mechanics and husbandmen" was refused by him, on the ground that an address professedly from the inhabitants generally had been presented already. On this, the _Constellation_ of Sep. 10 (1799), prints the following "anecdote," which is a hit at Gov. Hunter. "Anecdote.--When Governor Simcoe arrived at Kingston on his way here to take upon him the government of the Province, the magistrates and gentlemen of that town presented him with a very polite address. It was politely and verbally answered. The inhabitants of the country and town, who move not in the upper circles, presented theirs. And this also his Excellency very politely answered, and the answer being in writing, is carefully preserved to this day."

Among the patents carried home by Mr. Timothy Rogers, above named, were at least seven in which he was more or less personally interested. His own lot was 95 on the west or King side of Yonge Street. Immediately in front of him on the Whitchurch or east side, on lots 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, and 96, all in a row, were enjoyed by sons or near relatives of his, bearing the names respectively of Rufus Rogers, Asa Rogers, Isaac Rogers, Wing Rogers, James Rogers, and Obadiah Rogers.

Mr. Lundy's name does not appear among those of the original patentees; but lots or portions of lot in the "Quaker Settlement" are marked at an earlier period with the names of Shadrach Lundy, Oliver Lundy, Jacob Lundy, Reuben Lundy, and perhaps more.

In the region just beyond the Ridges there were farmers also of the community known as Mennonists or Tunkers. Long beards, when such appendages were rarities, dangling hair, antique-shaped, buttonless, home-spun coats, and wide-brimmed low-crowned hats, made these persons conspicuous in the street. On the seat of a loaded country-waggon, or on the back of a solitary rustic nag, would now and then be seen a man of this community, who might pass for John Huss or John a Lasco, as represented in the pictures. It was always curious to gaze upon these waifs and strays from old Holland, perpetuating, or at least trying to perpetuate, on a new continent, customs and notions originating in the peculiar circumstances of obscure localities in another hemisphere three hundred years ago.

Simon Menno, the founder and prophet of the Mennonists, was a native of Friesland in 1496. He advocated the utmost rigour of life. Although there are, as we are informed, modernized Mennonists now in Holland, at Amsterdam, for example, who are distinguished for luxury in their tables, their equipages and their country seats, yet a sub-section of the community known as Uke-Wallists, from one Uke Walles, adhere to the primitive strictness enjoined by Menno. Their apparel, we are told, is mean beyond expression, and they avoid everything that has the most distant appearance of elegance or ornament. They let their beards grow to an enormous length; their hair, uncombed, lies in a disorderly manner on their shoulders; their countenances are marked with the strongest lines of dejection and melancholy; and their habitations and household furniture are such as are only fitted to answer the demands of mere necessity. "We shall not enlarge," Mosheim adds, "upon the circumstances of their ritual, but only observe that they prevent all attempts to alter or modify their religious discipline, by preserving their people from everything that bears the remotest aspect of learning and science; from whatever, in a word, that may have a tendency to enlighten their devout ignorance."

The sympathies of our primitive Tunkers beyond the Ridges, were, as we may suppose, with this section of the fatherland Mennonists.

Thus, to get the clue to social phenomena which we see around us here in Canada, we have to concern ourselves occasionally with uninviting pages, not only of Irish, Scottish and English religious history, but of German and Netherlandish religious history likewise. Pity 'tis, in some respects, that on a new continent our immigrants could not have made a _tabula rasa_ of the past, and taken a start _de novo_ on another level--a higher one; on a new gauge--a widened one.

Though only a minute fraction of our population, an exception was early made by the local parliament in favour of the Mennonists or Tunkers, allowing them to make affirmations in the Courts, like the Quakers, and to compound for military service.--Like Lollard, Quaker and some other similar terms, Tunker, _i. e._ Dipper, was probably at first used in a spirit of ridicule.

_Digression to Newmarket and Sharon._

When Newmarket came in view off to the right, a large portion of the traffic of the street turned aside for a certain distance out of the straight route to the north, in that direction.

About this point the ancient dwellers at York used to take note of signs that they had passed into a higher latitude. Half a degree to the south of their homes--at Niagara, for example--they were in the land, if not of the citron and myrtle, certainly of the tulip-tree and pawpaw--where the edible chestnut grew plentifully in the natural woods, and the peach luxuriantly flourished.

Now, half a degree the other way, in the tramontane region north of the Ridges, they found themselves in the presence of a vegetation that spoke of an advance, however minute, towards the pole. Here, all along the wayside, beautiful specimens of the spruce-pine and balsam-fir, strangers in the forest about York, were encountered. Sweeping the sward with their drooping branches and sending up their dark green spires high in the air, these trees were always regarded with interest, and desired as graceful objects worthy to be transferred to the lawn or ornamental shrubbery.

A little way off the road, on the left, just before the turn leading to Newmarket, was the great Quaker meeting-house of this region--the "Friends' Meeting-house"--a building of the usual plain cast, generally seen with its solid shutters closed up. This was the successor of the first Quaker meeting-house in Upper Canada. Here Mr. Joseph John Gurney, the eminent English Quaker, who travelled on this continent in 1837-40, delivered several addresses, with a view especially to the re-uniting, if possible, of the Orthodox and the Hicksites.

Gourlay, in his "Statistical Account of Upper Canada," took note that this Quaker meeting-house and a wooden chapel at Hogg's Hollow, belonging to the Church of England, were the only two places of public worship to be seen on Yonge Street between York and the Holland Landing--a distance, he says, of nearly forty miles. This was in 1817.

Following now the wheel-marks of clearly the majority of vehicles travelling on the street, we turn aside to Newmarket.

Newmarket had for its germ or nucleus the mills and stores of Mr. Elisha Beaman, who emigrated hither from the State of New York in 1806. Here also, on the branch of the Holland river, mills at an early date were established by Mr. Mordecai Millard, and tanneries by Mr. Joseph Hill. Mr. Beaman's mills became subsequently the property of Mr. Peter Robinson, who was Commissioner of Crown Lands in 1827, and one of the representatives of the united counties of York and Simcoe; and afterwards, the property of his brother, Mr. W. B. Robinson, who for a time resided here, and for a number of years represented the County of Simcoe in the provincial parliament. Most gentlemen travelling north or to the north-west brought with them, from friends in York, a note of commendation to Mr. Robinson, whose friendly and hospitable disposition were well known:

"Fast by the road his ever-open door Oblig'd the wealthy and reliev'd the poor."

Governors, Commodores, and Commanders-in-chief, on their tours of pleasure or duty, were glad to find a momentary resting-place at a refined domestic fireside. Here Sir John Franklin was entertained for some days in 1835: and at other periods, Sir John Ross and Capt. Back, when on their way to the Arctic regions.

In 1847, Mr. W. B. Robinson was Commissioner of Public Works; and, at a later period, one of the Chief Commissioners of the Canada Company. Mr. Peter Robinson was instrumental in settling the region in which our Canadian Peterborough is situated, and from him that town has its name.

At Newmarket was long engaged in prosperous business Mr. John Cawthra, a member of the millionaire family of that name. Mr. John Cawthra was the first representative in the Provincial Parliament of the County of Simcoe, after the separation from the County of York. In 1812, Mr. John Cawthra and his brother Jonathan were among the volunteers who offered themselves for the defence of the country. Though by nature inclined to peace, they were impelled to this by a sincere sense of duty. At Detroit, John assisted in conveying across the river in scows the heavy guns which were expected to be wanted in the attack on the Fort. On the slopes at Queenston, Jonathan had a hair-breadth escape. At the direction of his officer, he moved from the rear to the front of his company, giving place to a comrade, who the following instant had a portion of his leg carried away by a shot from Fort Gray, on the opposite side of the river. Also at Queenston, John, after personally cautioning Col. Macdonell against rashly exposing himself, as he seemed to be doing, was called on a few minutes afterwards, to aid in carrying that officer to the rear, mortally wounded.

With Newmarket too is associated the name of Mr. William Roe, a merchant there since 1814, engaged at one time largely in the fur-trade. It was Mr. Roe who saved from capture a considerable portion of the public funds, when York fell into the hands of General Dearborn and Commodore Chauncey in 1813. Mr. Roe was at the time an employe in the office of the Receiver General, Prideaux Selby; and by the order of General Sheaffe and the Executive Council he conveyed three bags of gold and a large sum in army-bills to the farm of Chief Justice Robinson, on the Kingston road east of the Don bridge, and there buried them.

The army-bills were afterwards delivered up to the enemy; but the gold remained secreted until the departure of the invaders, and was handed over to the authorities in Dr. Strachan's parlour by Mr. Roe. The Receiver General's iron chest was also removed by Mr. Roe and deposited in the premises of Mr. Donald McLean, Clerk of the House of Assembly. Mr. McLean was killed while bravely opposing the landing of the Americans, and his house was plundered; the strong chest was broken open and about one thousand silver dollars were taken therefrom.

The name of Mr. Roe's partner at Newmarket, Mr. Andrew Borland, is likewise associated with the taking of York in 1813. He was made prisoner in the fight, and in the actual struggle against capture he received six severe rifle wounds, from the effects of which he never wholly recovered. He had also been engaged at Queenston and Detroit.

In the Report of the Loyal and Patriotic Society of Upper Canada, we have an entry made of a donation of sixty dollars to Mr. Andrew Borland on the 11th June, 1813, with the note appended: "The committee of the Loyal and Patriotic Society voted this sum to Mr. Borland for his patriotic and eminent services at Detroit, Queenston and York, at which latter place he was severely wounded."

We also learn from the Report that Mr. D'Arcy Boulton had presented a petition to the Society in favour of Mr. Borland. The members of committee present at the meeting held June 11th, 1813, were Rev. Dr. Strachan, chairman, Wm. Chewett, Esq., Wm. Allan, Esq., John Small, Esq., and Alex. Wood, Esq., secretary: and the minutes state that "The petition of D'Arcy Boulton, Esq., a member of the Society, in favour of Andrew Borland, was taken into consideration, and the sum of Sixty Dollars was voted to him, on account of his patriotic and eminent services at Detroit, Queenston and York, at which latter place he was most severely wounded." Mr. Borland had been a clerk in Mr. Boulton's store. In the order to pay the money, signed by Alexander Wood, Mr. Borland is styled "a volunteer in the York Militia." He afterwards had a pension of Twenty Pounds a year.

In 1838 his patriotic ardour was not quenched. During the troubles of that period he undertook the command of 200 Indians who had volunteered to fight in defence of the rights of the Crown of England, if there should be need. They were stationed for a time at the Holland Landing, but their services were happily not required.

From being endowed with great energy of character, and having also a familiar knowledge of the native dialects, Mr. Borland had great influence with the Indian tribes frequenting the coasts of Lakes Huron and Simcoe. Mr. Roe likewise, in his dealings with the aborigines, had acquired a considerable facility in speaking the Otchibway dialect, and had much influence among the natives.

Let us not omit to record, too, that at Newmarket, not very many years since, was successfully practising a grandson of Sir William Blackstone, the commentator on the Laws of England--Mr. Henry Blackstone, whose conspicuous talents gave promise of an eminence in his profession not unworthy of the name he bore. But his career was cut short by death.

The varied character of colonial society, especially in its early crude state, the living elements mixed up in it, and the curious changes and interchanges that take place in the course of its development and consolidation, receive illustrations from ecclesiastical as well as civil annals.

We ourselves remember the church-edifice of the Anglican communion at Newmarket when it was an unplastered, unlathed clap-board shell, having repeatedly officiated in it while in that stage of its existence. Since then the congregation represented by this clap-board shell have had as pastors men like the following: a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, not undistinguished in his University, a protege of the famous Archbishop Magee, a co-worker for a time of the distinguished Dr. Walter Farquhar Hook, of Leeds, and minister of one of the modern churches there--the Rev. Robert Taylor, afterwards of Peterborough here in Canada. And since his incumbency, they have been ministered to by a former vicar of a prominent church in London, St. Michael's, Burleigh Street, a dependency of St. Martin's in Trafalgar Square--the Rev. Septimus Ramsay, who was also long the chief secretary and manager of a well-known Colonial Missionary Society which had its headquarters in London.

While, on the other hand, an intervening pastor of the same congregation, educated for the ministry here in Canada and admitted to Holy Orders here, was transferred from Newmarket first to the vicarage of Somerton in Somersetshire, England, and, secondly, to the rectory of Clenchwarden in the county of Norfolk in England--the Rev. R. Athill. And another intervening incumbent was, after having been also trained for the ministry and admitted to orders here in Canada, called subsequently to clerical work in the United States, being finally appointed one of the canons of the cathedral church at Chicago, by Bishop Whitehouse of Illinois: this was the Rev. G. C. Street, a near relative of the distinguished English architect of that name, designer and builder of the New Law Courts in London.

As to the name "Newmarket"--in its adoption there was no desire to set up in Canada a memorial of the famous English Cambridgeshire racing town. The title chosen for the place was an announcement to this effect: "Here is an additional mart for the convenience of an increased population: a place where farmers and others may purchase and exchange commodities without being at the trouble of a journey to York or elsewhere." The name of the Canadian Newmarket, in fact, arose as probably that of the English Newmarket itself arose, when first established as a newly-opened place of trade for the primitive farmers and others of East Anglia and Mercia in the Anglo-Saxon period.

It deserves to be added that the English church at Newmarket was, a few years back, to some extent endowed by a generous gift of valuable land made by Dr. Beswick, a bachelor medical man, whose large white house on a knoll by the wayside was always noted by the traveller from York as he turned aside from Yonge Street for Newmarket.

Proceeding onwards now from Newmarket, we speedily come to the village of Sharon (or Hope as it was once named), situated also off the direct northern route of Yonge Street.

David Willson, the great notability and founder of the place, had been in his younger days a sailor, and, as such, had visited the Chinese ports. After joining the Quakers, he taught for a time amongst them as a schoolmaster. For some proceeding of his, or for some peculiarity of religious opinion, difficult to define, he was cut off from the Hicksite sub-division of the Quaker body. He then began the formation of a denomination of his own. In the bold policy of giving to his personal ideas an outward embodiment in the form of a conspicuous Temple, he anticipated the shrewd prophets of the Mormons, Joseph and Hiram Smith. Willson's building was erected about 1825. Nauvoo was not commenced until the spring of 1840.

In a little pamphlet published at Philadelphia in 1815, Willson gives the following account of himself: "I, the writer," he says, "was born of Presbyterian parents in the county of Dutchess, state of New York, in North America. In 1801 I removed with my family into this province (Upper Canada), and after a few years became a member of the Society of the Quakers at my own request, as I chose a spiritual people for my brethren and sisters in religion. But after I had been a member thereof about seven years, I began to speak something of my knowledge of God or a Divine Being in the heart, soul or mind of man, all which signifies the same to my understanding,--but my language was offensive, my spirit was abhorred, my person was disdained, my company was forsaken by my brethren and sisters. After which I retired from the society and was disowned by them for so doing; but several retired with me and were disowned also, because they would not unite in the disowning and condemning the fruits of my spirit; for, as I had been accounted a faithful member of the society for many years, they did not like to be hasty in condemnation. Therefore we became a separate people, and assembled ourselves together under a separate order which I immediately formed. After I retired from my former meetings--as our discipline led to peace with all people more than any one in my knowledge--we called ourselves Children of Peace, because we were but young therein."

The following account of the Temple erected by Willson at Sharon is by a visitor to the village in 1835. "The building," says Mr. Patrick Shirreff in his "Tour through North America," published in Edinburgh in 1835, "is of wood painted white externally, seventy feet high; and consists of three storeys. The first is sixty feet square, with a door in the centre of each side and three large windows on each side of the door. On two sides there is a representation of the setting sun and the word 'Armageddon' inscribed below. The second storey is twenty-seven feet square with three windows on each side; and the third storey nine feet square with one window on each side.

"The corners of each of the storeys are terminated by square lanterns, with gilded mountings; and the termination of the building is a gilded ball of considerable size. The interior was filled with wooden chairs placed round sixteen pillars, in the centre of which is a square cabinet of black walnut with a door and windows on each side. There was a table in the centre of the cabinet covered with black velvet, hung with crimson merino and fringe, in which was deposited a Bible. On the four central pillars were painted the words Faith, Hope, Charity, and Love; and on the twelve others, the names of the Apostles. The central pillars seemed to support the second storey; and at the foot of each was a table covered with green cloth. The house was without ornament, being painted fawn, green and white; and had not a pulpit or place for addressing an audience. It is occupied once a month for collecting charity; and contains 2,952 panes of glass, and is lighted once a year with 116 candles."

The materials of the frame-work of the Temple were, as we have been told, prepared at a distance from the site, and run rapidly up as far as possible without noise, in imitation of the building of Solomon's Temple. By the side of the principal edifice stood a structure 100 feet by 50 feet, used for ordinary meetings on Sundays. On the first Friday in September used to be an annual feast, when the Temple was illuminated. In this was an organ built by Mr. Coates of York.

David was an illiterate mystic, as his writings shew, in which, when the drift of his maundering is made out, there is nothing new or remarkable to be discerned.

At the close of the war of 1812-13-14, he appears to have been under the impression that the Government designed to banish him as a seditious person, under c. 1. 44 Geo. III. He accordingly published a document deprecating such action. It was thus headed: "Address to thy Crown, O England, and thy great name. I write as follows to all the inhabitants thereof." In the course of it he says: "After I have written, I will leave God to judge between you and me; and also to make judges of you, whether you will receive my ministry in your land in peace, yea or nay. . . . Ye are great indeed. I cannot help that, neither do I want to; but am willing ye should remain great in the sight of God, although I am but small therein, in the things thereof. Now choose whether I should or might be your servant in these things, yea or nay. As I think, it would be a shame for a minister to be banished from your nation for preaching the gospel of peace therein. I am a man," he continues, "under the visitation of God's power in your land; and many scandalous reports are in circulation against me. The intent of the spirit of the thing is to put me to flight from your dominions, or that I should be imprisoned therein. For which cause I, as a dutiful subject, make myself known hereby unto you of great estate in the world, lest your minds should be affected and stirred up against me without a cause by your inferiors, who seek to do evil to the works of God, whenever the Almighty is trying to do you good."

In some verses of the same date as this address to the home authorities, viz., 1815, he refers to the peril he supposed himself to be in. A stanza or two will suffice as a specimen of his poetical productions, which are all of the same Sternhold and Hopkins type, with the disadvantage of great grammatical irregularity. Thus he sings: (The tone of the _ci-devant_ Jack-tar is perhaps to be slightly detected.)

The powers of hell are now combin'd-- With war against me rage: But in my God my soul's resigned-- The rock of every age, &c.

Some thou doth set in king's estate, And some on earth must serve; And some hath gold and silver plate, When others almost starve, &c.

The earth doth hunger for my blood, And Satan for my soul; And men my flesh for daily food, That they may me control, &c.

If God doth give what I receive The same is due to thee; And thou in spirit must believe In gospel liberty, &c.

It's also mine, by George our king, The ruler of my day; And yet if I dishonour bring, Cut short my feeble stay, &c.

For this is in your hearts to do, Ye inferiors of the earth; And it's in mine to do so too, And stop that cursed birth, &c.

The style of a volume entitled "Impressions"--a kind of Alcoran, which used formerly to be sold to visitors in the Temple--does not rise much above the foregoing, either in its verse or prose.

What Mosheim says of Menno's books, may be said with at least equal truth of Willson's: "An extensively diffuse and rambling style, frequent and unnecessary repetitions, an irregular and confused method, with other defects of equal moment, render the perusal of the productions highly disagreeable." Nevertheless, the reduction of his solitary meditations to writing had, we may conceive, a pious operation and effect on Willson's own spirit; and the perusal of them may, in the simple-minded few who still profess to be his followers, have a like operation and effect, even when in the reading constrained, with poor monk Felix, to confess that, though believing, they do not understand.

The worthy man neither won martyrdom nor suffered exile; but lived on in great worldly prosperity here in Sharon, reverenced by his adherents as a sort of oracle, and flattered by attentions from successive political leaders on account of the influence which he might be supposed locally to possess--down to the year 1866, when he died in peace, aged eighty-nine years and seven months.

Of Willson's periodical missionary expeditions into town, we have spoken in another connection.

We return now to the great northern route, from which we have been deviating, and hasten on with all speed to the Landing. We place ourselves at the point on Yonge Street where we turned off to Newmarket.

Proceeding onward, we saw almost immediately, on the left, the conspicuous dwelling of Mr. Irving--the Hon. Jacob AEmilius Irving, a name historical in Canada, a Paulus AEmilius Irving having been Commander-in-Chief of the Forces in British America in 1765, and also President for a time of the Province of Quebec. (This Paulus AEmilius Irving had previously taken part under General Wolfe in the capture of Quebec.)

The house of his descendant, Jacob AEmilius Irving, here on Yonge Street, was known as Bonshaw, from some ancient family property in Dumfriesshire. He had been an officer in the 13th Light Dragoons, and was wounded at Waterloo. In addition to many strongly-marked English traits of character and physique, he possessed fine literary tastes, and histrionic skill of a high order, favoured by the possession of a grand barytone voice. He retained a professional liking for horses. A four-in-hand, guided by himself, issuing from the gates at Bonshaw and whirling along Yonge Street into town, was a common phenomenon.--He died at the Falls of Niagara in 1856. Since 1843 Mr. Irving had been a member of the Upper House of United Canada.

A little way back, ere we descended the northern slope of the Ridges we caught sight, as we have narrated, of the Holland River, or at least of some portion of the branch of it with which we are immediately concerned--issuing, "a new-born rill," from one of its fountains.

As we traversed the Quaker settlement it was again seen, a brook meandering through meadows. This was the eastern branch of the river. The main stream lies off to the west, flowing past the modern Bradford and Lloydtown. It is at the head of the main stream that the most striking approximation of the waters of the Humber and Holland rivers is to be seen.

We arrive now at the Upper Landing, the ancient canoe-landing, and we pause for a moment. Here it was that the war-parties and hunting-parties embarked and disembarked, while yet these waters were unploughed by the heavy boats of the white man.

The Iroquois from the south-side of Lake Ontario penetrated the well-peopled region of the Hurons by several routes, as we have already intimated: by the great Bay of Quinte highway; by the trails whose termini on Lake Ontario were near respectively the modern Bowmanville and Port Hope: and thirdly by a track which we have virtually been following in this our long ramble from York; virtually, we say, for it was to the west of Yonge Street that the trail ran, following first the valley of the Humber and then that of the main stream of the Holland river. The route which Mr. Holland took when he penetrated from Toronto Bay to the head waters of the river which now bears his name, is marked in the great MS. map which he constructed in 1791. He passed up evidently along the great water-course of the Humber.

"You can pass from Lake Frontenac, _i. e._, Ontario," Lahontan says (ii. 23), "into Lake Huron by the River Tan-a-hou-ate (the Humber), by a portage of about twenty-four miles to Lake Toronto, which by a river of the same name empties into Lake Huron," _i.e._ by the River Severn, as we should now speak.

Hunting-parties or war-parties taking to the water here at the Upper Landing, in the pre-historic period, would probably be just about to penetrate the almost insular district, of which we have spoken, westward of Lake Simcoe,--the Toronto region, the place of concourse, the well-peopled region. But some of them might perhaps be making for the Lake Huron country and North-west generally, by the established trail having its terminus at or near Orillia (to use the modern name).

In the days of the white man, the old Indian place of embarkation and debarkation on the Holland river, acquired the name of the Upper Canoe-landing; and hither the smaller craft continued to proceed.

Vessels of deeper draught lay at the Lower Landing, to which we now move on, about a mile and a half further down the stream. Here the river was about twenty-five yards wide, the banks low and bordered by a woody marsh, in which the tamarac or larch was a conspicuous tree.

In a cleared space on the right, at the point where Yonge Street struck the stream, there were some long low buildings of log with strong shutters on the windows, usually closed. These were the Government depositories of naval and military stores, and Indian presents, on their way to Penetanguishene. The cluster of buildings here was once known as Fort Gwillimbury. Thus we have it written in the old _Gazetteer_ of 1799: "It is thirty miles from York to Holland river, at the Pine Fort called Gwillimbury, where the road ends."

Galt, in his Autobiography, speaks of this spot. He travelled from York to Newmarket in one day. This was in 1827. "Then next morning," he says, "we went forward to a place on the Holland river, called Holland's Landing, an open space which the Indians and fur-traders were in the habit of frequenting. It presented to me," he adds, "something of a Scottish aspect in the style of the cottages; but instead of mountains the environs were covered with trees. We embarked at this place." He was on his way to Goderich at the time, via Penetanguishene.

The river Holland, at which we have so long been labouring to arrive, had its name from a former surveyor-general of the Province of Quebec, prior to the setting-off of the Province of Upper Canada--Major S. Holland.

In the _Upper Canada Gazette_ of Feb. 13, 1802, we have an obituary notice of this official personage. His history also, it will be observed, was mixed up with that of General Wolfe. "Died," the obituary says, "on the 28th instant (that is, on the 28th of December, 1801, the article being copied from the _Quebec Gazette_ of the 31st of the preceding December), of a lingering illness, which he bore for many years with Christian patience and resignation, Major S. Holland.

"He had been in his time," the brief memoir proceeds to say, "an intrepid, active, and intelligent officer, never making difficulties, however arduous the duty he was employed in. He was an excellent field-engineer, in which capacity he was employed in the year 1758 at the siege of Louisbourg in the detachment of the army under General Wolfe, who after silencing the batteries that opposed our entrance into the harbour, and from his own setting fire to three ships of the line, and obliging the remainder in a disabled state to haul out of cannon shot, that great officer by a rapid and unexpected movement took post within four hundred yards of the town, from whence Major Holland, under his directions, carried on the approaches, destroyed the defences of the town, and making a practicable breach, obliged the enemy to capitulate. He distinguished himself also at the conquest of Quebec in 1759, and was made honourable mention of in Gen. Wolfe's will as a legatee. He also distinguished himself in the defence of Quebec in 1760, after General Murray's unsuccessful attack on the enemy.--After the peace he was appointed Surveyor-General of this Province, and was usefully employed in surveying the American coasts, from which survey those draughts published some years since by Major Debarres have been principally taken."

Major Holland was succeeded in the Surveyor-generalship of Lower Canada by a nephew--the distinguished Colonel Joseph Bouchette. In 1791 Major Holland constructed a map of the British Province of Quebec, on the scale of six inches to the square mile. It exists in MS. in the Crown Land Office of Ontario. It is a magnificent map. On it, Lake Simcoe is left undefined on one side, not having been explored in 1791.

It was in 1832 that the project of a steamer for the Holland river and Lake Simcoe was mooted. We give a document relating to this undertaking which we find in the _Courier_ of Feb. 29, in that year, published at York. The names of those who were willing to embark, however moderately, in the enterprise are of interest. It will be observed that the expenditure contemplated was not enormous. To modern speculators in any direction, what a bagatelle seems the sum of L2,000!

"Steamboat on Lake Simcoe:" thus runs an advertisement in the _Courier_ of Feb. 29, 1832. "Persons who feel interested in the success of this undertaking, are respectfully informed that Capt. McKenzie, late of the _Alciope_, who has himself offered to subscribe one-fourth of the sum required to build the proposed steamboat, is now at Buffalo for the purpose of purchasing an Engine, to be delivered at Holland Landing during the present winter. Capt. McKenzie, who visited Lake Simcoe last summer, is of opinion that a boat of sufficient size and power for the business of the Lake can be built for L1,250. In order, however, to ensure success, it is proposed that stock to the amount of L2,000 should be subscribed; and it is hoped that this sum will be raised without delay, in order that the necessary steps may be taken, on the return of Capt. McKenzie, to commence building the boat with the view to its completion by the opening of the navigation.--The shares are Twelve Pounds ten shillings each, payable to persons chosen by the Stockholders. The following shares have been already taken up, viz.: The Hon. Peter Robinson, 8 shares; F. Hewson, 1; Edw. O'Brien, 2; W. B. Robinson, 4; W. R. Raines, 4; J. O. Bouchier, 2; Wm. Johnson, 2; John Cummer, 1; T. Mossington, 2; A. M. Raines, 1; Robert Clark, 1; Robert Johnston, 1; M. Mossington, 1; B. Jefferson, 1; J. M. Jackson, 1; R. Oliver, 1; Wm. Turner, 2; L. Cameron, 1; F. Osborne, 2; J. Graham, 1; J. White, 1; S. H. Farnsworth, 1; Andrew Mitchell, 5; Murray, Newbigging and Co., 2; Capt. Creighton, 2; Captain McKenzie, 40; Canada Company, 8; J. F. Smith, 2; John Powell, 1; Grant Powell, 2; A. Smalley, 1; Samuel P. Jarvis, 1; James E. Small, 1; R. W. Parker, 1; D. Cameron, 1; Capt. Castle, 79th Regt., 8; James Doyle, 2; Francis Phelps, East Gwillimbury, 1; G. Lount, West Gwillimbury, 1; Samuel Lount, West Gwillimbury, 1; George Playter, Whitchurch, 1; Joseph Hewett, 1; Thomas A. Jebb, 2; Charles S. Monck, Haytesbury, 1; G. Ridout, 2; T. G. Ridout, 1; Thomas Radenhurst, 1; Major Barwick, 2; Capt. W. Campbell, 2; C. C. Small, 1; J. Ketchum, 1; Capt. Davies, 2; Lieut. Carthew, 2; Capt. Ross, 1; C. McVittie, 1; Lieut. Adams, 1; S. Washburn, 2; J. C. Godwin, 1; F. T. Billings, 2; Thorne and Parsons, 2; James Pearson, 1; R. Mason, 2; Wm. Laughton, 2; Wm. Ware, 1; A. H. Tonge, 1; Sheldon, Dutcher & Co., 1; Jabez Barber, 1; R. W. Prentice, 1; T. Bell, 1; Lucius O'Brien, 1;--Total, 162 shares. Persons who are desirous of taking shares in this boat are respectfully informed that the subscription paper is lying at the Store of Messrs. Murray, Newbigging and Co., where they can have an opportunity of entering their names. York, 21st Dec., 1831."

The movement here initiated resulted in the steamer _Simcoe_, which plied for some years between the Landing and the ports of Lake Simcoe. The _Simcoe_ was built at the Upper Landing, and after being launched, it was necessary to drag the boat by main force down to deep water, through the thick sediment at the bottom of the stream. During the process, while the capstan and tackle or other arrangement was being vigorously worked,--instead of the boat advancing--the land in considerable mass moved bodily towards the boat, like a cake of ice set free from the main floe. Much of the ground and marsh in the great estuary of the Holland river is said to be simply an accumulation of earthy and vegetable matter, resting on water.

The _Simcoe_ was succeeded by the _Peter Robinson_, Capt. Bell; the _Beaver_, Capt. Laughton, and other steamers.

Standing on the deck of the _Beaver_, we have ourselves more than once threaded the windings of the Holland river; and we well remember how, like sentient things in a kind of agony, the broad floating leaves of the lilies along its eastern margin writhed and flapped as the waters were drawn away from under them by the powerful action of the wheels in the middle of the stream.

"The navigation of the Holland river," Capt. Bonnycastle observes in his "Canada in 1841," "is very well worth seeing, as it is a natural canal flowing through a vast marsh, and very narrow, with most serpentine convolutions, often doubling on itself. Conceive the difficulty of steering a large steamboat in such a course; yet it is done every day, in summer and autumn, by means of long poles, slackening the steam, backing, &c.; though very rarely without running a little way into the soft ground of the swamp. The motion of the paddles has, however, in the course of years, widened the channel, and prevented the growth of flags and weeds." We have been told that in the bed of the Holland river, near its mouth, solid bottom was not reached with a sounding-line of ninety feet.

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