Though possessing an excellent general taste for
music, it is seldom in their power to bestow upon its study the time
which is required to make a really good musician. They are admirable
proficients in the other art, which they acquire readily, with the
least instruction, often without any instruction at all, beyond that
which is given almost intuitively by a good ear for time, and a
quick perception of the harmony of motion.
The waltz is their favorite dance, in which old and young join with
the greatest avidity; it is not unusual to see parents and their
grown-up children dancing in the same set in a public ball-room.
Their taste in music is not for the sentimental; they prefer the
light, lively tunes of the Virginian minstrels to the most
impassioned strains of Bellini.
On entering one of the public ball-rooms, a stranger would be
delighted with such a display of pretty faces and neat figures. I
have hardly ever seen a really plain Canadian girl in her teens;
and a downright ugly one is almost unknown.
The high cheek-bones, wide mouth, and turned-up nose of the Saxon
race, so common among the lower classes in Britain, are here
succeeded in the next generation, by the small oval face, straight
nose, and beautifully-cut mouth of the American; while the glowing
tint of the Albion rose pales before the withering influence of late
hours and stove-heat.
They are naturally a fine people, and possess capabilities and
talents, which when improved by cultivation will render them second
to no people in the world; and that period is not far distant.
Idiots and mad people are so seldom met with among natives of the
colony, that not one of this description of unfortunates has ever
come under my own immediate observation.
To the benevolent philanthropist, whose heart has bled over the
misery and pauperism of the lower classes in Great Britain, the
almost entire absence of mendicity from Canada would be highly
gratifying. Canada has few, if any, native beggars; her objects of
charity are generally imported from the mother country, and these
are never suffered to want food or clothing. The Canadians are a
truly charitable people; no person in distress is driven with harsh
and cruel language from their doors; they not only generously
relieve the wants of suffering strangers cast upon their bounty, but
they nurse them in sickness, and use every means in their power to
procure them employment. The number of orphan children yearly
adopted by wealthy Canadians, and treated in every respect as their
own, is almost incredible.
It is a glorious country for the labouring classes, for while
blessed with health they are always certain of employment, and
certain also to derive from it ample means of support for their
families. An industrious, hard-working man in a few years is able
to purchase from his savings a homestead of his own; and in process
of time becomes one of the most important and prosperous class of
settlers in Canada, her free and independent yeomen, who form the
bones and sinews of this rising country, and from among whom she
already begins to draw her senators, while their educated sons
become the aristocrats of the rising generation.
It has often been remarked to me by people long resident in the
colony, that those who come to the country destitute of means, but
able and willing to work, invariably improve their condition and
become independent; while the gentleman who brings out with him a
small capital is too often tricked and cheated out of his property,
and drawn into rash and dangerous speculations which terminate in
his ruin. His children, neglected and uneducated, yet brought up
with ideas far beyond their means, and suffered to waste their time
in idleness, seldom take to work, and not unfrequently sink down to
the lowest class.
But I have dwelt long enough upon these serious subjects; and I will
leave my husband, who is better qualified than myself, to give a
more accurate account of the country, while I turn to matters of a
lighter and a livelier cast.
It was towards the close of the summer of 1833, which had been
unusually cold and wet for Canada, while Moodie was absent at D - -,
inspecting a portion of his government grant of land, that I was
startled one night, just before retiring to rest, by the sudden
firing of guns in our near vicinity, accompanied by shouts and
yells, the braying of horns, the beating of drums, and the barking
of all the dogs in the neighborhood. I never heard a more stunning
uproar of discordant and hideous sounds.
What could it all mean? The maid-servant, as much alarmed as myself,
opened the door and listened.
"The goodness defend us!" she exclaimed, quickly closing it, and
drawing a bolt seldom used. "We shall be murdered. The Yankees must
have taken Canada, and are marching hither."
"Nonsense! that cannot be it. Besides they would never leave the
main road to attack a poor place like this. Yet the noise is very
near. Hark! they are firing again. Bring me the hammer and some
nails, and let us secure the windows."
The next moment I laughed at my folly in attempting to secure a log
hut, when the application of a match to its rotten walls would
consume it in a few minutes. Still, as the noise increased, I was
really frightened. My servant, who was Irish (for my Scotch girl,
Bell, had taken to herself a husband and I had been obliged to hire
another in her place, who had only been a few days in the country),
began to cry and wring her hands, and lament her hard fate in coming
to Canada.
Just at this critical moment, when we were both self-convicted of an
arrant cowardice, which would have shamed a Canadian child of six
years old, Mrs. O - - tapped at the door, and although generally a
most unwelcome visitor, from her gossiping, mischievous
propensities, I gladly let her in.
