Such We Knew This Canadian Home In The Days Of The Late Henry Lemesurier.
MONTAGUE COTTAGE.
"I knew by the smoke which so gracefully curled,
Above the green wood that a cottage was near."
- Moore's Woodpecker.
Facing Sillery hill, on the north side of "Sans Bruit," formerly the
estate of Lieut.-Col. the Hon. Henry Caldwell, Mr. Alfred P. Wheeler,
[245] the Tide Surveyor of H. M. Customs, Quebec, built in 1880, a
comfortable and pleasing little cottage. He has called it Montague Cottage
[246] in memory of Wolfe's brave assistant Quarter Master General Col.
Caldwell, of Sans Bruit, the Col. Rivers of "The Novel and the preferred
suitor of Emily Montague who addressed her romantic 'Sillery letters to
Col. Rivers from a house not far from the Hill of Sillery.
It is stated in all the old Quebec Guide Books that the house in which the
'divine Emily then dwelt stood on the foot of Sillery Hill, close to Mrs.
Graddon's property at Kilmarnock, her friend Bella Fermor probably lived
near her. Vol. I of the Work, page 61, states; "I am at present at an
extremely pretty farm on the banks of the River St. Lawrence, the house
stands as the foot of a steep mountain covered with a variety of trees
forming a verdant sloping wall, which rises in a kind of regular
confusion, shade above shade a woody theatre, and has in front this noble
river, on which ships continually passing present to the delighted eye the
most charming picture imaginable. I never saw a place so formed to inspire
that pleasing lassitude, that divine inclination to saunter, which may not
improperly be called the luxurious indolence of the country. I intend to
build a temple here to the charming goddess of laziness. A gentleman is
coming down the winding path on the side of the hill, whom by his air I
take to be your brother. Adieu. I must receive him, my father is in
Quebec. Yours,
ARABELLA FERMOR.
THE HISTORY OF EMILY MONTAGUE.
On the 22nd March 1769, a novelist of some standing Mrs. Frances
Brooks an officer's lady, [247] author of Lady Julia Mandeville
published in London a work in four volumes, which she dedicated to His
Excellency the Governor of Canada, Guy Carleton afterwards Lord
Dorchester, under the title of the History of Emily Montague being a
series of letters addressed from Sillery by Emily Montague the heroine
of the tale, to her lively and witty friend Bella Fermor - to some
military admirers in Quebec, Montreal, and New York - to some British
noblemen, friends of her father.
This novel, whether it was through the writer's entourage in
the world or her entree to fashionable circles, or whether on
account of its own intrinsic literary worth, had an immense success in
its day. The racy description it contains of Canadian scenery, and
colonial life, mixed with the fashionable gossip of our Belgravians of
1766, seven years after the conquest, caused several English families
to emigrate to Canada. Some settled in the neighborhood of Quebec, at
Sillery, it is said. Whether they found all things couleur-de-
rose, as the clever Mrs. Brooke had described them, - whether they
enjoyed as much Arcadian bliss as the Letters of Emily Montague
had promised - it would be very ungallant for us to gainsay, seeing
that Mrs. Brooke is not present to vindicate herself. As to the
literary merit of the novel, this much we will venture to assert, that
setting aside the charm of association, we doubt that Emily
Montague if republished at present, would make the fortune of her
publisher. Novel writing, like other things, has considerably changed
since 1766, and however much the florid Richardson style may have
pleased the great grandfathers of the present generation, it would
scarcely chime in with the taste of readers in our sensational times.
In Mrs. Brooke's day Quebecers appear to have amused themselves pretty
much as they do now, a century later. In the summer, riding, driving
boating, pic-nics at Lake St. Charles, the Falls of Montmorenci, &c.
In winter tandems, sleigh drives, toboganing at the ice cone, tomycod
fishing on the St. Charles, Chateau balls; the formation of a
pont or ice-bridge and its breaking up in the spring - two events of
paramount importance. The military, later on, the promoters of
conviviality, sport and social amusements; in return obtaining the
entree to the houses of the chief citizens; toying with every
English rosebud or Gallic-lily, which might strew their path in spite
of paternal and maternal admonitions from the other side of the
Atlantic; occasionally leading to the hymeneal altar a Canadian bride,
and next introducing her to their horror-stricken London relatives,
astounded to find out that our Canadian belles, were neither the
colour of copper, nor of ebony; in education and accomplishments,
their equals - sometimes their superiors when class is compared to
class. Would you like a few extracts from this curious old Sillery
novel? Bella Fermor, one of Emily Montague's familiars, and a most
ingrained coquette, thus writes from Sillery in favour of a
military protege on the 16th September, 1766, to the "divine" Emily,
who had just been packed oft to Montreal to recover from a love fit.
"Sir George is handsome as an Adonis ... you allow him to be of an
amiable character; he is rich, young, well-born, and he loves you..."
All in vain thus to plead Sir. George's cause, a dashing Col. Rivers
(meant, we were told, by the Hon. W. Sheppard, to personify Col. Henry
Caldwell, of Belmont) had won the heart of Emily, who preferred true
love to a coronet. Let us treasure up a few more sentences fallen from
Emily's light-hearted confidante. A postscript to a letter runs thus -
"Adieu, Emily, I am going to ramble in the woods and pick berries with
a little smiling civil captain [we can just fancy we see some of our
fair acquaintances' mouths water at such a prospect], who is enamoured
of me.
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