Roughing It in the Bush Part 29

There was very noted character at C---, Mr. Q---, a great land-jobber, who did a large business in this way on his own account, besides getting through a great deal of dirty work for other more respectable speculators, who did not wish to drink at taverns and appear personally in such matters. To Mr. Q--- I applied, and effected a purchase of a farm of one hundred and fifty acres, about fifty of which were cleared, for 300 pounds, as I shall mention more particularly in the sequel. In the meantime, the character of this distinguished individual was--for he was long gone to give an account of his misdeeds in the other world--so remarkable, that I must endeavour to describe it for the edification of the reader. Q--- kept a shop, or store, in C---; but he left the princ.i.p.al management of this establishment to his clerks; while, taking advantage of the influx of emigrants, he pursued, with unrivalled success, the profitable business of land-jobbing.

In his store, before taking to this business, he had been accustomed for many years to retail goods to the farmers at high prices, on the usual long credit system. He had thus got a number of farmers deeply in his debt, and, in many cases, in preference to suing them, had taken mortgages on their farms. By this means, instead of merely recovering the money owing to him by the usual process of law, he was enabled, by threatening to foreclose the mortgages, to compel them to sell their farms nearly on his own terms, whenever an opportunity occurred to re-sell them advantageously to new comers.

Thus, besides making thirty or forty per cent. on his goods, he often realised more than a hundred per cent. on his land speculations.

In a new country, where there is no great compet.i.tion in mercantile business, and money is scarce, the power and profits of store-keepers are very great. Mr. Q--- was one of the most grasping of this cla.s.s. His heart was case-hardened, and his conscience, like gum, elastic; it would readily stretch, on the shortest notice, to any required extent, while his well-tutored countenance betrayed no indication of what was pa.s.sing in his mind. But I must not forget to give a sketch of the appearance, or outward man, of this highly-gifted individual.

He was about the middle size, thin and limber, and somewhat loose in his lower joints, like most of the native Canadians and Yankees.

He had a slight stoop in his shoulders, and his long, thin neck was continually stretched out before him, while his restless little cunning eyes were roaming about in search of prey. His face, when well watched, was an index to his selfish and unfeeling soul.

Complexion he had none, except that sempiternally enduring red-and-tawny mixture which is acquired by exposure and hard drinking. His cheeks and the corners of his eyes were marked by an infinity of curved lines, and, like most avaricious and deceitful men, he had a long, crooked chin, and that peculiar prominent and slightly aquiline nose which, by people observant of such indications, has been called "the rogue's nose." But how shall I describe his eye--that small hole through which you can see an honest man's heart? Q---'s eye was like no other eye I had ever seen. His face and mouth could a.s.sume a good-natured expression, and smile; but his eye was still the same--it never smiled, but remained cold, hard, dry, and inscrutable. If it had any expression at all, it was an unhappy one. Such were the impressions created by his appearance, when the observer was un.o.bserved by him; for he had the art of concealing the worst traits of his character in an extraordinary degree, and when he suspected that the curious hieroglyphics which Nature had stamped on his visage were too closely scanned, he knew well how to divert the investigator's attention to some other object.

He was a humorist, besides, in his way, because he found that jokes and fun admirably served his turn. They helped to throw people off their guard, and to conceal his hang-dog look.

He had a hard head, as well as hard heart, and could stand any quant.i.ty of drink. His drinking, however, like everything else about him, had a motive; and, instead of trying to appear sober, like other drunkards, he rather wished to appear a little elevated. In addition to his other acquirements, Q--- was a most accomplished gambler. In short, no virtuous man, who employs every pa.s.sing moment of his short life in doing good to his fellow-creatures, could be more devoted and energetic in his endeavours to serve G.o.d and mankind, than Q--- was in his endeavours to ease them of their spare cash.

He possessed a great deal of that free-and-easy address and tact which distinguish the Canadians; and, in addition to the current coin of vulgar flattery which is found so useful in all countries, his quick eye could discover the high-minded gentleman by a kind of instinct, which did not seem quite natural to his sordid character, and, knowing that such men are not to be taken by vulgar adulation, he could address them with deferential respect; against which no minds are entirely secure. Thus he wriggled himself into their good graces. After a while the unfavourable impression occasioned by his sinister countenance would become more faint, while his well-feigned kindness and apparent indulgence to his numerous debtors would tell greatly in his favour.

My first impression of this man was pretty nearly such as I have described; and, though I suspected and shunned him, I was sure to meet him at every turn. At length this unfavourable feeling wore off in some degree, and finding him in the best society of the place, I began to think that his countenance belied him, and I reproached myself for my ungenerous suspicions.

Feeling a certain security in the smallness of my available capital, I did not hesitate in applying to Mr. Q--- to sell me a farm, particularly as I was aware of his anxiety to induce me to settle near C---, for the reasons already stated. I told him that 300 pounds was the very largest sum I could give for a farm, and that, if I could not get one for that price, I should join my friends in the backwoods.

Q---, after scratching his head, and considering for a few minutes, told me that he knew a farm which he could sell me for that price, particularly as he wished to get rid of a set of Yankee rascals who prevented emigrants from settling in that neighbourhood. We afterwards found that there was but too good reason for the character he gave of some of our neighbours.

Q--- held a mortgage for 150 pounds on a farm belonging to a certain Yankee settler, named Joe H---, as security for a debt incurred for goods at his store, in C---. The idea instantly struck Q--- that he would compel Joe H--- to sell him his farm, by threatening to foreclose the mortgage. I drove out with Mr. Q--- next day to see the farm in question. It was situated in a pretty retired valley, surrounded by hills, about eight miles from C---, and about a mile from the great road leading to Toronto. There was an extensive orchard upon the farm, and two log houses, and a large frame-barn.

A considerable portion of the cleared land was light and sandy; and the uncleared part of the farm, situated on the flat, rocky summit of a high hill, was reserved for "a sugar bush," and for supplying fuel. On the whole, I was pleased with the farm, which was certainly cheap at the price of 300 pounds; and I therefore at once closed the bargain with Mr. Q---.

At that time I had not the slightest idea but that the farm actually belonged to the land-jobber; and I am to this day unable to tell by what means he succeeded in getting Mr. H--- to part with his property.

The father of Joe H--- had cleared the farm, and while the soil was new it gave good crops; but as the rich surface, or "black muck," as it is called, became exhausted by continual cropping, nothing but a poor, meagre soil remained.

The early settlers were wretched farmers; they never ploughed deep enough, and never thought of manuring the land. After working the land for several years, they would let it lie waste for three or four years without sowing gra.s.s-seeds, and then plough it up again for wheat. The greater part of the hay raised on these farms was sold in the towns, and the cattle were fed during the long severe winter on wheat-straw. The natural result of this poor nourishment was, that their cattle continually degenerated, and great numbers died every spring of a disease called the "hollow horn," which appears to be peculiar to this country. When the lands became sterile, from this exhausting treatment, they were called "worn-out farms;" and the owners generally sold them to new settlers from the old country, and with the money they received, bought a larger quant.i.ty of wild lands, to provide for their sons; by whom the same improvident process was recommenced.

These early settlers were, in fact, only fit for pioneers to a more thrifty cla.s.s of settlers.

Joe H---, or "Uncle Joe," as the country people call any acquaintance, after a fashion borrowed, no doubt, from the Dutch settlers of the State of New York, was, neither by his habits nor industry, likely to become more prosperous than his neighbours of the same thoughtless cla.s.s. His father had worked hard in his time, and Uncle Joe thought he had a good right to enjoy himself. The nearest village was only five miles from his place, and he was never without some excuse for going thither every two or three days. His horse wanted shoeing, or his plough or waggon wanted "to be fixed"

by the blacksmith or carpenter. As a matter of course, he came home "pretty high;" for he was in the constant habit of pouring a half-tumbler of whiskey down his throat, standing bolt upright at the bar of the tavern, after which he would drink about the same quant.i.ty of cold water to wash it down. These habits together with bad farming, and a lazy, slovenly helpmate, in a few years made Joe as poor as he could desire to be; and at last he was compelled to sell his farm to Mr. Q---.

After we had got settled down on this farm, I had often occasion to drive into C---, for the purpose of buying groceries and other necessaries, as we then thought them, at the store of Mr. Q---. On these occasions I always took up my quarters, for the time, at the tavern of our worthy Yankee friend, Mr. S---. As I drove up to the door, I generally found S--- walking about briskly on the boarded platform, or "stoop," in front of the house, welcoming his guests in his own peculiar free-and-easy style, looking after their horses, and seeing that his people were attentive to their duties. I think I see him now before me with his thin, erect, lathy figure, his snub nose, and puckered-up face, wriggling and twisting himself about, in his desire to please his customers.

On stopping in front of the tavern, shortly after our settlement on the farm, Mr. S--- stepped up to me, in the most familiar manner imaginable, holding out his hand quite condescendingly,--"Ah, Mister Moodie, ha-a-w do you do?--and ha-a-w's the old woman?"

At first I could not conceive whom he meant by this very homely appellation; and I very simply asked him what person he alluded to, as I had no old woman in my establishment.

"Why, YOUR old woman, to be sure--your missus--Mrs. Moodie, I guess. You don't quite understand our language yet."

"O! now I understand you; she's quite well, I thank you; and how is our friend Mrs. S---?" I replied, laying a slight emphasis on the MRS., by way of a gentle hint for his future guidance.

"Mrs. S---, I guess she's smart, pret-ty CON-siderable. She'll be right glad to see you, for you're pretty considerable of a favour-ITE with her, I tell you; but now tell me what you will drink?--for it's my treat."

As he said these words, he strutted into the tavern before me, throwing his head and shoulders back, and rising on his tiptoes at every step.

Mrs. S--- had been a very handsome woman, and still retained much of her good looks. She was a most exemplary housewife and manager.

I was often astonished to witness the incessant toil she had to ensure in attending to the wants of such a numerous household.

She had plenty of Irish "helps" in the kitchen; but they knew as much of cookery as they did of astronomy, and poor Mrs. S---'s hands, as well as her head, were in constant requisition.

She had two very pretty daughters, whom she would not suffer to do any rough work which would spoil their soft white hands. Mrs. S---, no doubt, foresaw that she could not expect to keep such fair creatures long in such a marrying country as Canada, and, according to the common caution of divines, she held these blessings with a loose hand.

There was one sweet little girl, whom I had often seen in her father's arms, with her soft dark eyes, and her long auburn ringlets hanging in wild profusion over his shoulders.

"I guess she likes pa, SOME," Mr. S--- would say when I remarked her fondness for him.

This little fairy had a natural genius for music, and though she was only four years old, she would sit for an hour at a time at the door of our room to hear me play on the flute, and would afterwards sing all the airs she picked up, with the sweetest voice in the world.

Humble as the calling of a tavern-keeper may be considered in England, it is looked upon in the United States, where Mrs. S--- was "raised," as extremely respectable; and I have never met with women, in any cla.s.s of society elsewhere, who possessed more of the good-feeling and un.o.btrusive manners which should belong to ladies than in the family of this worthy tavern-keeper.

When I contrast their genuine kindness and humanity with the haughty, arrogant airs a.s.sumed by some ladies of a higher standing in society from England who sojourned in their house at the same time with ourselves--when I remember their insolent way of giving their orders to Mrs. S---, and their still more wounding condescension--I confess I cannot but feel ashamed of my countrywomen. All these patronising airs, I doubt not, were a.s.sumed purposely to impress the minds of those worthy people with an idea of their vast superiority. I have sometimes, I confess, been a little annoyed with the familiarity of the Americans, Canadians as well as Yankees; but I must say that experience has taught me to blame myself at least as much as them. If, instead of sending our youthful aristocracy to the continent of Europe, to treat the natives with contempt and increase the unpopularity of the British abroad, while their stock of native arrogance is augmented by the cringing complaisance of those who only bow to their superiority in wealth, they were sent to the United States, or even to Canada, they would receive a lesson or two which would be of infinite service to them; some of their most repulsive prejudices and peculiarities would soon be rubbed off by the rough towel of democracy.

It is curious to observe the remarkable diversity in the accounts given by recent emigrants to this country of their treatment, and of the manners and character of the people in the United States and in Canada. Some meet with constant kindness, others with nothing but rudeness and brutality. Of course there is truth in both accounts; but strangers from an aristocratical country do not usually make sufficient allowance for the habits and prejudices of a people of a land, in which, from the comparatively equal distribution of property, and the certain prosperity attendant on industry, the whole const.i.tution of society is necessarily democratical, irrespectively of political inst.i.tutions. Those who go to such a country with the notion that they will carry everything before them by means of pretence and a.s.sumption, will find themselves grievously deceived. To use a homely ill.u.s.tration, it is just as irrational to expect to force a large body through a small aperture. In both cases they will meet with unyielding resistance.

When a poor and industrious mechanic, farmer, or labourer comes here without pretensions of any kind, no such complaints are to be heard.

He is treated with respect, and every one seems willing to help him forward. If in after-years the manners of such a settler should grow in importance with his prosperity--which is rarely the case--his pretensions would be much more readily tolerated than those of any unknown or untried individual in a higher cla.s.s of society.

The North Americans generally are much more disposed to value people according to the estimate they form of their industry, and other qualities which more directly lead to the acquisition of property, and to the benefit of the community, than for their present and actual wealth. While they pay a certain mock homage to a wealthy immigrant, when they have a motive in doing so, they secretly are more inclined to look on him as a well-fledged goose who has come to America to be plucked. In truth, many of them are so dexterous in this operation that the unfortunate victim is often stripped naked before he is aware that he has lost a feather.

There seems to be a fatality attending riches imported into Canada.

They are sure to make to themselves wings and flee away, while wealth is no less certain to adhere to the poor and industrious settler. The great fault of the Canadian character is an unwillingness to admit the just claims of education and talent, however unpretending, to some share of consideration. In this respect the Americans of the United States are greatly superior to the Canadians, because they are better educated and their country longer settled. These genuine Republicans, when their theory of the original and natural equality among them is once cheerfully admitted, are ever ready to show respect to MENTAL superiority, whether natural or acquired.

My evenings on visiting C--- were usually spent at Mr. S---'s tavern, where I was often much amused with the variety of characters who were there a.s.sembled, and who, from the free-and-easy familiarity of the colonial manners, had little chance of concealing their peculiarities from an attentive observer.

Mr Q---, of course, was always to be found there, drinking, smoking cigars, and cracking jokes. To a casual observer he appeared to be a regular boon companion without an object but that of enjoying the pa.s.sing hour. Among his numerous accomplishments, he had learnt a number of sleight-of-hand tricks from the travelling conjurors who visit the country, and are generally willing to sell their secrets singly, at a regulated price. This seemed a curious investment for Q---, but he knew how to turn everything to account. By such means he was enabled to contribute to the amus.e.m.e.nt of the company, and thus became a kind of favourite. If he could not manage to sell a lot of land to an immigrant or speculator, he would carelessly propose to some of the company to have a game at whist or loo, to pa.s.s the time away; and he never failed to conjure most of their money into his pockets.

At this time a new character made his appearance at C---, at Mr.

B---, an English farmer of the true yeoman breed. He was a short-legged, long-bodied, corpulent little man. He wore a brown coat, with ample skirts, and a vast expanse of vest, with drab-coloured small-clothes and gaiters. B--- was a jolly, good-natured looking man, with an easy blunt manner which might easily pa.s.s for honesty.

Q--- had sold him a lot of wild land in some out-of-the-way township, by making Mr. B--- believe that he could sell it again very soon, with a handsome profit. Of course his bargain was not a good one. He soon found from its situation that the land was quite unsaleable, there being no settlements in the neighbourhood. Instead of expressing any resentment, he fairly acknowledged that Q--- was his master at a bargain, and gave him full credit for his address and cunning, and quite resolved in his own mind to profit by the lesson he had received.

Now, with all their natural acuteness and habitual dexterity in such matters, the Canadians have one weak point; they are too ready to believe that Englishmen are made of money. All that an emigrant has to do to acquire the reputation of having money, is to seem quite easy, and free from care or anxiety for the future, and to maintain a certain degree of reserve in talking of his private affairs. Mr.

B--- perfectly understood how to play his cards with the land-jobber; and his fat, jolly physiognomy, and rustic, provincial manners and accent, greatly a.s.sisted him in the deception.

Every day Q--- drove him out to look at different farms. B--- talked carelessly of buying some large "block" of land, that would have cost him some 3000 or 4000 pounds, providing he could only find the kind of soil he particularly liked for farming purposes. As he seemed to be in no hurry in making his selection, Q--- determined to make him useful, in the meantime, in promoting his views with respect to others. He therefore puffed Mr. B--- up to everybody as a Norfolk farmer of large capital, and always appealed to him to confirm the character he gave of any farm he wished to sell to a new comer. B---, on his side, was not slow in playing into Q---'s hand on these occasions, and without being at all suspected of collusion.

In the evening, Mr. B--- would walk into the public room of the tavern, apparently fatigued with his exertions through the day; fling himself carelessly on a sofa, and unb.u.t.ton his gaiters and the knees of his small-clothes. He took little notice of anybody unless he was spoken to, and his whole demeanour seemed to say, as plainly as words, "I care for n.o.body, n.o.body cares for me." This was just the kind of man for Q---. He instantly saw that he would be an invaluable ally and coadjutor, without seeming to be so. When B--- made his appearance in the evening, Q--- was seldom at the tavern, for his time had not yet come. In the meanwhile, B--- was sure to be drawn gradually into conversation by some emigrants, who, seeing that he was a practical farmer, would be desirous of getting his opinion respecting certain farms which they thought of purchasing.

There was such an appearance of blunt simplicity of character about him, that most of these inquirers thought he was forgetting his own interest in telling them so much as he did. In the course of conversation, he would mention several farms he had been looking at with the intention of purchasing, and he would particularly mention some one of them as possessing extraordinary advantages, but which had some one disadvantage which rendered it ineligible for him; such as being too small, a circ.u.mstance which, in all probability, would recommend it to another description of settler.

It is hard to say whether Q--- was or was not deceived by B---; but though he used him for the present as a decoy, he no doubt expected ultimately to sell him some of his farms, with a very handsome profit. B---, however whose means were probably extremely small, fought shy of buying; and after looking at a number of farms, he told Q--- that, on mature reflection, he thought he could employ his capital more profitably by renting a number of farms, and working them in the English manner, which he felt certain would answer admirably in Canada, instead of sinking his capital at once in the purchase of lands. Q--- was fairly caught; and B--- hired some six or seven farms from him, which he worked for some time, no doubt greatly to his own advantage, for he neither paid rent nor wages.

Occasionally, other land-speculators would drop into the tavern, when a curious game would be played between Q--- and them. Once of the speculators would ask another if he did not own some land in a particular part of the country, as he had bought some lots in the same quarter, without seeing them, and would like to know if they were good. The other would answer in the affirmative, and pretend to desire to purchase the lots mentioned. The former, in his turn, would pretend reluctance, and make a similar offer of buying. All this cunning manoeuvring would be continued for a time, in the hope of inducing some third party or stranger to make an offer for the land, which would be accepted. It often happened that some other person, who had hitherto taken no part in the course of these conversations, and who appeared to have no personal interest in the matter, would quietly inform the stranger that he knew the land in question, and that it was all of the very best quality.

It would be endless to describe all the little artifices practised by these speculators to induce persons to purchase from them.