The Englishwoman in America, Isabella Lucy Bird [top 10 books of all time txt] 📗

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