BADDECK AND THAT SORT OF THING

By Charles Dudley Warner

PREFACE

TO JOSEPH H. TWICHELL

It would be unfair to hold you responsible for these light sketches of asummer trip, which are now gathered into this little volume in responseto the usual demand in such cases; yet you cannot escape altogether. Forit was you who first taught me to say the name Baddeck; it was you whoshowed me its position on the map, and a seductive letter from a homemissionary on Cape Breton Island, in relation to the abundance of troutand salmon in his field of labor. That missionary, you may remember, wenever found, nor did we see his tackle; but I have no reason to believethat he does not enjoy good fishing in the right season. You understandthe duties of a home missionary much better than I do, and you knowwhether he would be likely to let a couple of strangers into the bestpart of his preserve. 

But I am free to admit that after our expedition was started youspeedily relieved yourself of all responsibility for it, and turnedit over to your comrade with a profound geographical indifference; youwould as readily have gone to Baddeck by Nova Zembla as by Nova Scotia. The flight over the latter island was, you knew, however, no part of ouroriginal plan, and you were not obliged to take any interest in it. You know that our design was to slip rapidly down, by the back way ofNorthumberland Sound, to the Bras d'Or, and spend a week fishing there;and that the greater part of this journey here imperfectly describedis not really ours, but was put upon us by fate and by the peculiararrangement of provincial travel. 

It would have been easy after our return to have made up from librariesa most engaging description of the Provinces, mixing it with historical, legendary, botanical, geographical, and ethnological information, andseasoning it with adventure from your glowing imagination. But itseemed to me that it would be a more honest contribution if our accountcontained only what we saw, in our rapid travel; for I have a theorythat any addition to the great body of print, however insignificantit may be, has a value in proportion to its originality andindividuality, --however slight either is, --and very little value if itis a compilation of the observations of others. In this case I knowhow slight the value is; and I can only hope that as the trip was veryentertaining to us, the record of it may not be wholly unentertaining tothose of like tastes. 

Of one thing, my dear friend, I am certain: if the readers of thislittle journey could have during its persual the companionship that thewriter had when it was made, they would think it altogether delightful. There is no pleasure comparable to that of going about the world, inpleasant weather, with a good comrade, if the mind is distracted neitherby care, nor ambition, nor the greed of gain. The delight there isin seeing things, without any hope of pecuniary profit from them! Wecertainly enjoyed that inward peace which the philosopher associateswith the absence of desire for money. For, as Plato says in the Phaedo, "whence come wars and fightings and factions? whence but from thebody and the lusts of the body? For wars are occasioned by the love ofmoney. " So also are the majority of the anxieties of life. We leftthese behind when we went into the Provinces with no design of acquiringanything there. I hope it may be my fortune to travel further with youin this fair world, under similar circumstances. 

NOOK FARM, HARTFORD, April 10, 1874. 

C. D. W. 

BADDECK AND THAT SORT OF THING

I

 "Ay, now I am in Arden: the more fool I; when I was at home, I was in a better place; but travellers must be content. " --TOUCHSTONE. 

Two comrades and travelers, who sought a better country than the UnitedStates in the month of August, found themselves one evening in apparentpossession of the ancient town of Boston. 

The shops were closed at early candle-light; the fashionable inhabitantshad retired into the country, or into the second-story-back, of theirprincely residences, and even an air of tender gloom settled upon theCommon. The streets were almost empty, and one passed into the burntdistrict, where the scarred ruins and the uplifting piles of new brickand stone spread abroad under the flooding light of a full moon likeanother Pompeii, without any increase in his feeling of tranquilseclusion. Even the news-offices had put up their shutters, and aconfiding stranger could nowhere buy a guide-book to help his wanderingfeet about the reposeful city, or to show him how to get out of it. There was, to be sure, a cheerful tinkle of horse-car bells in the air, and in the creeping vehicles which created this levity of sound were afew lonesome passengers on their way to Scollay's Square; but the twotravelers, not having well-regulated minds, had no desire to go there. What would have become of Boston if the great fire had reached thissacred point of pilgrimage no merely human mind can imagine. Withoutit, I suppose the horse-cars would go continually round and round, never stopping, until the cars fell away piecemeal on the track, andthe horses collapsed into a mere mass of bones and harness, and thebrown-covered books from the Public Library, in the hands of the fadingvirgins who carried them, had accumulated fines to an incalculableamount. 

Boston, notwithstanding its partial destruction by fire, is still a goodplace to start from. When one meditates an excursion into an unknownand perhaps perilous land, where the flag will not protect him andthe greenback will only partially support him, he likes to steady andtranquilize his mind by a peaceful halt and a serene start. So we--forthe intelligent reader has already identified us with the two travelersresolved to spend the last night, before beginning our journey, in thequiet of a Boston hotel. Some people go into the country for quiet: weknew better. The country is no place for sleep. The general absence ofsound which prevails at night is only a sort of background which bringsout more vividly the special and unexpected disturbances which aresuddenly sprung upon the restless listener. There are a thousandpokerish noises that no one can account for, which excite the nerves toacute watchfulness. 

It is still early, and one is beginning to be lulled by the frogs andthe crickets, when the faint rattle of a drum is heard, --just a fewpreliminary taps. But the soul takes alarm, and well it may, for a rollfollows, and then a rub-a-dub-dub, and the farmer's boy who is handlingthe sticks and pounding the distended skin in a neighboring horse-shedbegins to pour out his patriotism in that unending repetition ofrub-a-dub-dub which is supposed to represent love of country in theyoung. When the boy is tired out and quits the field, the faithfulwatch-dog opens out upon the stilly night. He is the guardian of hismaster's slumbers. The howls of the faithful creature are answeredby barks and yelps from all the farmhouses for a mile around, andexceedingly poor barking it usually is, until all the serenity of thenight is torn to shreds. This is, however, only the opening of theorchestra. The cocks wake up if there is the faintest moonshine andbegin an antiphonal service between responsive barn-yards. It is notthe clear clarion of chanticleer that is heard in the morn of Englishpoetry, but a harsh chorus of cracked voices, hoarse and abortiveattempts, squawks of young experimenters, and some indescribable thingbesides, for I believe even the hens crow in these days. Distractingas all this is, however, happy is the man who does not hear a goatlamenting in the night. The goat is the most exasperating of the animalcreation. He cries like a deserted baby, but he does it without anyregularity. One can accustom himself to any expression of suffering thatis regular. The annoyance of the goat is in the dreadful waiting forthe uncertain sound of the next wavering bleat. It is the fearfulexpectation of that, mingled with the faint hope that the last was thelast, that aggravates the tossing listener until he has murder in hisheart. He longs for daylight, hoping that the voices of the night willthen cease, and that sleep will come with the blessed morning. But hehas forgotten the birds, who at the first streak of gray in the easthave assembled in the trees near his chamber-window, and keep up for anhour the most rasping dissonance, --an orchestra in which each artistis tuning his instrument, setting it in a different key and to playa different tune: each bird recalls a different tune, and none sings"Annie Laurie, "--to pervert Bayard Taylor's song. 

Give us the quiet of a city on the night before a journey. As wemounted skyward in our hotel, and went to bed in a serene altitude, wecongratulated ourselves upon a reposeful night. It began well. But as wesank into the first doze, we were startled by a sudden crash. Was it anearthquake, or another fire? Were the neighboring buildings all tumblingin upon us, or had a bomb fallen into the neighboring crockery-store? Itwas the suddenness of the onset that startled us, for we soon perceivedthat it began with the clash of cymbals, the pounding of drums, and theblaring of dreadful brass. It was somebody's idea of music. It openedwithout warning. The men composing the band of brass must have stolensilently into the alley about the sleeping hotel, and burst into theclamor of a rattling quickstep, on purpose. The horrible sound thussuddenly let loose had no chance of escape; it bounded back from wallto wall, like the clapping of boards in a tunnel, rattling windows andstunning all cars, in a vain attempt to get out over the roofs. But suchmusic does not go up. What could have been the intention of this assaultwe could not conjecture. It was a time of profound peace through thecountry; we had ordered no spontaneous serenade, if it was a serenade. Perhaps the Boston bands have that habit of going into an alley anddisciplining their nerves by letting out a tune too big for the alley, and taking the shock of its reverberation. It may be well enough for theband, but many a poor sinner in the hotel that night must have thoughtthe judgment day had sprung upon him. Perhaps the band had some remorse, for by and by it leaked out of the alley, in humble, apologetic retreat, as if somebody had thrown something at it from the sixth-story window, softly breathing as it retired the notes of "Fair Harvard. "

The band had scarcely departed for some other haunt of slumber andweariness, when the notes of singing floated up that prolific alley, like the sweet tenor voice of one bewailing the prohibitory movement;and for an hour or more a succession of young bacchanals, who wereevidently wandering about in search of the Maine Law, lifted up theirvoices in song. Boston seems to be full of good singers; but they willruin their voices by this night exercise, and so the city will ceaseto be attractive to travelers who would like to sleep there. But thisentertainment did not last the night out. 

It stopped just before the hotel porter began to come around to rousethe travelers who had said the night before that they wanted to beawakened. In all well-regulated hotels this process begins at twoo'clock and keeps up till seven. If the porter is at all faithful, hewakes up everybody in the house; if he is a shirk, he only rouses thewrong people. We treated the pounding of the porter on our door withsilent contempt. At the next door he had better luck. Pound, pound. Anangry voice, "What do you want?"

"Time to take the train, sir. "

"Not going to take any train. "

"Ain't your name Smith?"

"Yes. "

"Well, Smith"--

"I left no order to be called. " (Indistinct grumbling from Smith'sroom. )

Porter is heard shuffling slowly off down the passage. In a little whilehe returns to Smith's door, evidently not satisfied in his mind. Rap, rap, rap!

"Well, what now?"

"What's your initials? A. T. ; clear out!"

And the porter shambles away again in his slippers, grumbling somethingabout a mistake. The idea of waking a man up in the middle of the nightto ask him his "initials" was ridiculous enough to banish sleep foranother hour. A person named Smith, when he travels, should leave hisinitials outside the door with his boots. 

Refreshed by this reposeful night, and eager to exchange the stagnationof the shore for the tumult of the ocean, we departed next morning forBaddeck by the most direct route. This we found, by diligent studyof fascinating prospectuses of travel, to be by the boats of theInternational Steamship Company; and when, at eight o'clock in themorning, we stepped aboard one of them from Commercial Wharf, wefelt that half our journey and the most perplexing part of it wasaccomplished. We had put ourselves upon a great line of travel, andhad only to resign ourselves to its flow in order to reach the desiredhaven. The agent at the wharf assured us that it was not necessary tobuy through tickets to Baddeck, --he spoke of it as if it were as easy aplace to find as Swampscott, --it was a conspicuous name on the cards ofthe company, we should go right on from St. John without difficulty. The easy familiarity of this official with Baddeck, in short, madeus ashamed to exhibit any anxiety about its situation or the means ofapproach to it. Subsequent experience led us to believe that the onlyman in the world, out of Baddeck, who knew anything about it lives inBoston, and sells tickets to it, or rather towards it. 

There is no moment of delight in any pilgrimage like the beginningof it, when the traveler is settled simply as to his destination, and commits himself to his unknown fate and all the anticipations ofadventure before him. We experienced this pleasure as we ascended to thedeck of the steamboat and snuffed the fresh air of Boston Harbor. Whata beautiful harbor it is, everybody says, with its irregularly indentedshores and its islands. Being strangers, we want to know the names ofthe islands, and to have Fort Warren, which has a national reputation, pointed out. As usual on a steamboat, no one is certain about thenames, and the little geographical knowledge we have is soon hopelesslyconfused. We make out South Boston very plainly: a tourist is lookingat its warehouses through his opera-glass, and telling his boy about arecent fire there. We find out afterwards that it was East Boston. Wepass to the stern of the boat for a last look at Boston itself; andwhile there we have the pleasure of showing inquirers the Monument andthe State House. We do this with easy familiarity; but where thereare so many tall factory chimneys, it is not so easy to point out theMonument as one may think. 

The day is simply delicious, when we get away from the unozoned air ofthe land. The sky is cloudless, and the water sparkles like the top ofa glass of champagne. We intend by and by to sit down and look at itfor half a day, basking in the sunshine and pleasing ourselves with theshifting and dancing of the waves. Now we are busy running about fromside to side to see the islands, Governor's, Castle, Long, Deer, and theothers. When, at length, we find Fort Warren, it is not nearly so grimand gloomy as we had expected, and is rather a pleasure-place than aprison in appearance. We are conscious, however, of a patriotic emotionas we pass its green turf and peeping guns. Leaving on our rightLovell's Island and the Great and Outer Brewster, we stand away northalong the jagged Massachusetts shore. These outer islands look cold andwind-swept even in summer, and have a hardness of outline which is veryfar from the aspect of summer isles in summer seas. They are too low andbare for beauty, and all the coast is of the most retiring and humbledescription. Nature makes some compensation for this lowness by aneccentricity of indentation which looks very picturesque on the map, and sometimes striking, as where Lynn stretches out a slender arm withknobby Nahant at the end, like a New Zealand war club. We sit and watchthis shore as we glide by with a placid delight. Its curves and lowpromontories are getting to be speckled with villages and dwellings, like the shores of the Bay of Naples; we see the white spires, thesummer cottages of wealth, the brown farmhouses with an occasionalorchard, the gleam of a white beach, and now and then the flag of somemany-piazzaed hotel. The sunlight is the glory of it all; it must havequite another attraction--that of melancholy--under a gray sky and witha lead-colored water foreground. 

There was not much on the steamboat to distract our attention from thestudy of physical geography. All the fashionable travelers had gone onthe previous boat or were waiting for the next one. The passengerswere mostly people who belonged in the Provinces and had the listlessprovincial air, with a Boston commercial traveler or two, and a fewgentlemen from the republic of Ireland, dressed in their uncomfortableSunday clothes. If any accident should happen to the boat, it wasdoubtful if there were persons on board who could draw up and pass theproper resolutions of thanks to the officers. I heard one of these Irishgentlemen, whose satin vest was insufficient to repress the mountainousprotuberance of his shirt-bosom, enlightening an admiring friend as tohis idiosyncrasies. It appeared that he was that sort of a man that, ifa man wanted anything of him, he had only to speak for it "wunst;" andthat one of his peculiarities was an instant response of the deltoidmuscle to the brain, though he did not express it in that language. Hewent on to explain to his auditor that he was so constituted physicallythat whenever he saw a fight, no matter whose property it was, he lostall control of himself. This sort of confidence poured out to a singlefriend, in a retired place on the guard of the boat, in an unexcitedtone, was evidence of the man's simplicity and sincerity. The very actof traveling, I have noticed, seems to open a man's heart, so that hewill impart to a chance acquaintance his losses, his diseases, his tablepreferences, his disappointments in love or in politics, and his mostsecret hopes. One sees everywhere this beautiful human trait, thiscraving for sympathy. There was the old lady, in the antique bonnet andplain cotton gloves, who got aboard the express train at a way-stationon the Connecticut River Road. She wanted to go, let us say, to Peak'sFour Corners. It seemed that the train did not usually stop there, butit appeared afterwards that the obliging conductor had told her to getaboard and he would let her off at Peak's. When she stepped into thecar, in a flustered condition, carrying her large bandbox, she began toask all the passengers, in turn, if this was the right train, and ifit stopped at Peak's. The information she received was various, but theweight of it was discouraging, and some of the passengers urged her toget off without delay, before the train should start. The poor womangot off, and pretty soon came back again, sent by the conductor; but hermind was not settled, for she repeated her questions to every personwho passed her seat, and their answers still more discomposed her. "Sitperfectly still, " said the conductor, when he came by. "You must getout and wait for a way train, " said the passengers, who knew. In thisconfusion, the train moved off, just as the old lady had about madeup her mind to quit the car, when her distraction was completed by thediscovery that her hair trunk was not on board. She saw it standing onthe open platform, as we passed, and after one look of terror, and adash at the window, she subsided into her seat, grasping her bandbox, with a vacant look of utter despair. Fate now seemed to have done itsworst, and she was resigned to it. I am sure it was no mere curiosity, but a desire to be of service, that led me to approach her and say, "Madam, where are you going?"

"The Lord only knows, " was the utterly candid response; but then, forgetting everything in her last misfortune and impelled to a burst ofconfidence, she began to tell me her troubles. She informed me thather youngest daughter was about to be married, and that all herwedding-clothes and all her summer clothes were in that trunk; and asshe said this she gave a glance out of the window as if she hoped itmight be following her. What would become of them all now, all brandnew, she did n't know, nor what would become of her or her daughter. Andthen she told me, article by article and piece by piece, all that thattrunk contained, the very names of which had an unfamiliar sound in arailway-car, and how many sets and pairs there were of each. It seemedto be a relief to the old lady to make public this catalogue whichfilled all her mind; and there was a pathos in the revelation thatI cannot convey in words. And though I am compelled, by way ofillustration, to give this incident, no bribery or torture shall everextract from me a statement of the contents of that hair trunk. 

We were now passing Nahant, and we should have seen Longfellow's cottageand the waves beating on the rocks before it, if we had been nearenough. As it was, we could only faintly distinguish the headland andnote the white beach of Lynn. The fact is, that in travel one is almostas much dependent upon imagination and memory as he is at home. Somehow, we seldom get near enough to anything. The interest of all this coastwhich we had come to inspect was mainly literary and historical. And nocountry is of much interest until legends and poetry have draped itin hues that mere nature cannot produce. We looked at Nahant forLongfellow's sake; we strained our eyes to make out Marblehead onaccount of Whittier's ballad; we scrutinized the entrance to SalemHarbor because a genius once sat in its decaying custom-house and madeof it a throne of the imagination. Upon this low shore line, which liesblinking in the midday sun, the waves of history have beaten for twocenturies and a half, and romance has had time to grow there. Out ofany of these coves might have sailed Sir Patrick Spens "to Noroway, toNoroway, "

 "They hadna sailed upon the sea A day but barely three, Till loud and boisterous grew the wind, And gurly grew the sea. "

The sea was anything but gurly now; it lay idle and shining in an Augustholiday. It seemed as if we could sit all day and watch the suggestiveshore and dream about it. But we could not. No man, and few women, cansit all day on those little round penitential stools that the companyprovide for the discomfort of their passengers. There is no scenery inthe world that can be enjoyed from one of those stools. And when thetraveler is at sea, with the land failing away in his horizon, and hasto create his own scenery by an effort of the imagination, these stoolsare no assistance to him. The imagination, when one is sitting, willnot work unless the back is supported. Besides, it began to be cold;notwithstanding the shiny, specious appearance of things, it was cold, except in a sheltered nook or two where the sun beat. This was nothingto be complained of by persons who had left the parching land inorder to get cool. They knew that there would be a wind and a draughteverywhere, and that they would be occupied nearly all the time inmoving the little stools about to get out of the wind, or out of thesun, or out of something that is inherent in a steamboat. Most peopleenjoy riding on a steamboat, shaking and trembling and chow-chowingalong in pleasant weather out of sight of land; and they do not feel anyennui, as may be inferred from the intense excitement which seizes themwhen a poor porpoise leaps from the water half a mile away. "Did you seethe porpoise?" makes conversation for an hour. On our steamboat therewas a man who said he saw a whale, saw him just as plain, off to theeast, come up to blow; appeared to be a young one. I wonder where allthese men come from who always see a whale. I never was on a sea-steameryet that there was not one of these men. 

We sailed from Boston Harbor straight for Cape Ann, and passed close bythe twin lighthouses of Thacher, so near that we could see the lanternsand the stone gardens, and the young barbarians of Thacher all at play;and then we bore away, straight over the trackless Atlantic, across thatpart of the map where the title and the publisher's name are usuallyprinted, for the foreign city of St. John. It was after we passed theselighthouses that we did n't see the whale, and began to regret the hardfate that took us away from a view of the Isles of Shoals. I am nottempted to introduce them into this sketch, much as its surface needstheir romantic color, for truth is stronger in me than the love ofgiving a deceitful pleasure. There will be nothing in this record thatwe did not see, or might not have seen. For instance, it might not bewrong to describe a coast, a town, or an island that we passed while wewere performing our morning toilets in our staterooms. The travelerowes a duty to his readers, and if he is now and then too weary or tooindifferent to go out from the cabin to survey a prosperous villagewhere a landing is made, he has no right to cause the reader to sufferby his indolence. He should describe the village. 

I had intended to describe the Maine coast, which is as fascinatingon the map as that of Norway. We had all the feelings appropriate tonearness to it, but we couldn't see it. Before we came abreast ofit night had settled down, and there was around us only a gray andmelancholy waste of salt water. To be sure it was a lovely night, with ayoung moon in its sky, "I saw the new moon late yestreen Wi' the auld moon in her arms, "

and we kept an anxious lookout for the Maine hills that push so boldlydown into the sea. At length we saw them, --faint, dusky shadows in thehorizon, looming up in an ashy color and with a most poetical light. We made out clearly Mt. Desert, and felt repaid for our journey by thesight of this famous island, even at such a distance. I pointed out thehills to the man at the wheel, and asked if we should go any nearer toMt. Desert. 

"Them!" said he, with the merited contempt which officials in thiscountry have for inquisitive travelers, --"them's Camden Hills. You won'tsee Mt. Desert till midnight, and then you won't. "

One always likes to weave in a little romance with summer travel on asteamboat; and we came aboard this one with the purpose and the languageto do so. But there was an absolute want of material, that would hardlybe credited if we went into details. The first meeting of the passengersat the dinner-table revealed it. There is a kind of female plainnesswhich is pathetic, and many persons can truly say that to them it ishomelike; and there are vulgarities of manner that are interesting; andthere are peculiarities, pleasant or the reverse, which attract one'sattention: but there was absolutely nothing of this sort on our boat. The female passengers were all neutrals, incapable, I should say, of making any impression whatever even under the most favorablecircumstances. They were probably women of the Provinces, and tooktheir neutral tint from the foggy land they inhabit, which is neither arepublic nor a monarchy, but merely a languid expectation of somethingundefined. My comrade was disposed to resent the dearth of beauty, not only on this vessel but throughout the Provinces generally, --aresentment that could be shown to be unjust, for this was evidently notthe season for beauty in these lands, and it was probably a bad year forit. Nor should an American of the United States be forward to set uphis standard of taste in such matters; neither in New Brunswick, NovaScotia, nor Cape Breton have I heard the inhabitants complain of theplainness of the women. 

On such a night two lovers might have been seen, but not on our boat, leaning over the taffrail, --if that is the name of the fence around thecabin-deck, looking at the moon in the western sky and the long track oflight in the steamer's wake with unutterable tenderness. For the sea wasperfectly smooth, so smooth as not to interfere with the most perfecttenderness of feeling; and the vessel forged ahead under the stars ofthe soft night with an adventurous freedom that almost concealed thecommercial nature of her mission. It seemed--this voyaging through thesparkling water, under the scintillating heavens, this resolute pushinginto the opening splendors of night--like a pleasure trip. "It is thewitching hour of half past ten, " said my comrade, "let us turn in. " (Thereader will notice the consideration for her feelings which has omittedthe usual description of "a sunset at sea. ")

When we looked from our state-room window in the morning we saw land. We were passing within a stone's throw of a pale-green and rathercold-looking coast, with few trees or other evidences of fertile soil. Upon going out I found that we were in the harbor of Eastport. Ifound also the usual tourist who had been up, shivering in his winterovercoat, since four o'clock. He described to me the magnificentsunrise, and the lifting of the fog from islands and capes, in languagethat made me rejoice that he had seen it. He knew all about the harbor. That wooden town at the foot of it, with the white spire, was Lubec;that wooden town we were approaching was Eastport. The long islandstretching clear across the harbor was Campobello. We had been obligedto go round it, a dozen miles out of our way, to get in, because thetide was in such a stage that we could not enter by the Lubec Channel. We had been obliged to enter an American harbor by British waters. 

We approached Eastport with a great deal of curiosity and considerablerespect. It had been one of the cities of the imagination. Lying in thefar east of our great territory, a military and even a sort of navalstation, a conspicuous name on the map, prominent in boundary disputesand in war operations, frequent in telegraphic dispatches, --we hadimagined it a solid city, with some Oriental, if decayed, peculiarity, aport of trade and commerce. The tourist informed me that Eastport lookedvery well at a distance, with the sun shining on its white houses. Whenwe landed at its wooden dock we saw that it consisted of a few piles oflumber, a sprinkling of small cheap houses along a sidehill, a big hotelwith a flag-staff, and a very peaceful looking arsenal. It is doubtlessa very enterprising and deserving city, but its aspect that morningwas that of cheapness, newness, and stagnation, with no compensatingpicturesqueness. White paint always looks chilly under a gray sky and onnaked hills. Even in hot August the place seemed bleak. The tourist, whowent ashore with a view to breakfast, said that it would be a good placeto stay in and go a-fishing and picnicking on Campobello Island. It hasanother advantage for the wicked over other Maine towns. Owing to thecontiguity of British territory, the Maine Law is constantly evaded, inspirit. The thirsty citizen or sailor has only to step into a boatand give it a shove or two across the narrow stream that separates theUnited States from Deer Island and land, when he can ruin his breath, and return before he is missed. 

This might be a cause of war with, England, but it is not the mostserious grievance here. The possession by the British of the island ofCampobello is an insufferable menace and impertinence. I write withthe full knowledge of what war is. We ought to instantly dislodge theBritish from Campobello. It entirely shuts up and commands our harbor, one of our chief Eastern harbors and war stations, where we keep a flagand cannon and some soldiers, and where the customs officers look outfor smuggling. There is no way to get into our own harbor, except infavorable conditions of the tide, without begging the courtesy of apassage through British waters. Why is England permitted to stretchalong down our coast in this straggling and inquisitive manner? Shemight almost as well own Long Island. It was impossible to prevent ourcheeks mantling with shame as we thought of this, and saw ourselves, free American citizens, land-locked by alien soil in our own harbor. 

We ought to have war, if war is necessary to possess Campobello and DeerIslands; or else we ought to give the British Eastport. I am not surebut the latter would be the better course. 

With this war spirit in our hearts, we sailed away into the Britishwaters of the Bay of Fundy, but keeping all the morning so close to theNew Brunswick shore that we could see there was nothing on it; that is, nothing that would make one wish to land. And yet the best part of goingto sea is keeping close to the shore, however tame it may be, if theweather is pleasant. A pretty bay now and then, a rocky cove withscant foliage, a lighthouse, a rude cabin, a level land, monotonous andwithout noble forests, --this was New Brunswick as we coasted along itunder the most favorable circumstances. But we were advancing into theBay of Fundy; and my comrade, who had been brought up on its high tidesin the district school, was on the lookout for this phenomenon. The veryname of Fundy is stimulating to the imagination, amid the geographicalwastes of youth, and the young fancy reaches out to its tides withan enthusiasm that is given only to Fingal's Cave and other pictorialwonders of the text-book. I am sure the district schools would becomewhat they are not now, if the geographers would make the other partsof the globe as attractive as the sonorous Bay of Fundy. The recitationabout that is always an easy one; there is a lusty pleasure in the mereshouting out of the name, as if the speaking it were an innocent sort ofswearing. From the Bay of Fundy the rivers run uphill half the time, and the tides are from forty to ninety feet high. For myself, I confessthat, in my imagination, I used to see the tides of this bay gostalking into the land like gigantic waterspouts; or, when I was betterinstructed, I could see them advancing on the coast like a solid wallof masonry eighty feet high. "Where, " we said, as we came easily, and neither uphill nor downhill, into the pleasant harbor of St. John, ---"where are the tides of our youth?"

They were probably out, for when we came to the land we walked out uponthe foot of a sloping platform that ran into the water by the side ofthe piles of the dock, which stood up naked and blackened high in theair. It is not the purpose of this paper to describe St. John, nor todwell upon its picturesque situation. As one approaches it from theharbor it gives a promise which its rather shabby streets, decayinghouses, and steep plank sidewalks do not keep. A city set on a hill, with flags flying from a roof here and there, and a few shining spiresand walls glistening in the sun, always looks well at a distance. St. John is extravagant in the matter of flagstaffs; almost every well-to-docitizen seems to have one on his premises, as a sort of vent for hisloyalty, I presume. It is a good fashion, at any rate, and its moregeneral adoption by us would add to the gayety of our cities when wecelebrate the birthday of the President. St. John is built on a steepsidehill, from which it would be in danger of sliding off, if its houseswere not mortised into the solid rock. This makes the house-foundationssecure, but the labor of blasting out streets is considerable. We notethese things complacently as we toil in the sun up the hill to theVictoria Hotel, which stands well up on the backbone of the ridge, andfrom the upper windows of which we have a fine view of the harbor, and of the hill opposite, above Carleton, where there is the brokenlytruncated ruin of a round stone tower. This tower was one of the firstthings that caught our eyes as we entered the harbor. It gave an antiquepicturesqueness to the landscape which it entirely wanted without this. Round stone towers are not so common in this world that we can afford tobe indifferent to them. This is called a Martello tower, but I couldnot learn who built it. I could not understand the indifference, almostamounting to contempt, of the citizens of St. John in regard to thistheir only piece of curious antiquity. "It is nothing but the ruins ofan old fort, " they said; "you can see it as well from here as by goingthere. " It was, however, the one thing at St. John I was determined tosee. But we never got any nearer to it than the ferry-landing. Want oftime and the vis inertia of the place were against us. And now, as Ithink of that tower and its perhaps mysterious origin, I have a longingfor it that the possession of nothing else in the Provinces couldsatisfy. 

But it must not be forgotten that we were on our way to Baddeck; thatthe whole purpose of the journey was to reach Baddeck; that St. John wasonly an incident in the trip; that any information about St. John, whichis here thrown in or mercifully withheld, is entirely gratuitous, and isnot taken into account in the price the reader pays for this volume. Butif any one wants to know what sort of a place St. John is, we can tellhim: it is the sort of a place that if you get into it after eighto'clock on Wednesday morning, you cannot get out of it in any directionuntil Thursday morning at eight o'clock, unless you want to smugglegoods on the night train to Bangor. It was eleven o'clock Wednesdayforenoon when we arrived at St. John. The Intercolonial railway trainhad gone to Shediac; it had gone also on its roundabout Moncton, Missaquat River, Truro, Stewiack, and Shubenacadie way to Halifax; theboat had gone to Digby Gut and Annapolis to catch the train that way forHalifax; the boat had gone up the river to Frederick, the capital. Wecould go to none of these places till the next day. We had no desire togo to Frederick, but we made the fact that we were cut off from it anaddition to our injury. The people of St. John have this peculiarity:they never start to go anywhere except early in the morning. 

The reader to whom time is nothing does not yet appreciate the annoyanceof our situation. Our time was strictly limited. The active world isso constituted that it could not spare us more than two weeks. We mustreach Baddeck Saturday night or never. To go home without seeing Baddeckwas simply intolerable. Had we not told everybody that we were going toBaddeck? Now, if we had gone to Shediac in the train that left St. Johnthat morning, we should have taken the steamboat that would have carriedus to Port Hawkesbury, whence a stage connected with a steamboat on theBras d'Or, which (with all this profusion of relative pronouns) wouldland us at Baddeck on Friday. How many times had we been over this routeon the map and the prospectus of travel! And now, what a delusion itseemed! There would not another boat leave Shediac on this route tillthe following Tuesday, --quite too late for our purpose. The reader seeswhere we were, and will be prepared, if he has a map (and any feelings), to appreciate the masterly strategy that followed. 

II

 During the pilgrimage everything does not suit the tastes of the pilgrim. --TURKISH PROVERB. 

One seeking Baddeck, as a possession, would not like to be detained aprisoner even in Eden, --much less in St. John, which is unlike Eden inseveral important respects. The tree of knowledge does not grow there, for one thing; at least St. John's ignorance of Baddeck amounts to afeature. This encountered us everywhere. So dense was this ignorance, that we, whose only knowledge of the desired place was obtained fromthe prospectus of travel, came to regard ourselves as missionaries ofgeographical information in this dark provincial city. 

The clerk at the Victoria was not unwilling to help us on our journey, but if he could have had his way, we would have gone to a place onPrince Edward Island which used to be called Bedeque, but is now namedSummerside, in the hope of attracting summer visitors. As to CapeBreton, he said the agent of the Intercolonial could tell us all aboutthat, and put us on the route. We repaired to the agent. The kindness ofthis person dwells in our memory. He entered at once into our longingsand perplexities. He produced his maps and time-tables, and showed usclearly what we already knew. The Port Hawkesbury steamboat from Shediacfor that week had gone, to be sure, but we could take one of anotherline which would leave us at Pictou, whence we could take another acrossto Port Hood, on Cape Breton. This looked fair, until we showed theagent that there was no steamer to Port Hood. 

"Ah, then you can go another way. You can take the Intercolonial railwayround to Pictou, catch the steamer for Port Hawkesbury, connect with thesteamer on the Bras d'Or, and you are all right. "

So it would seem. It was a most obliging agent; and it took us half anhour to convince him that the train would reach Pictou half a day toolate for the steamer, that no other boat would leave Pictou for CapeBreton that week, and that even if we could reach the Bras d'Or, weshould have no means of crossing it, except by swimming. The perplexedagent thereupon referred us to Mr. Brown, a shipper on the wharf, whoknew all about Cape Breton, and could tell us exactly how to get there. It is needless to say that a weight was taken off our minds. We pinnedour faith to Brown, and sought him in his warehouse. Brown was a promptbusiness man, and a traveler, and would know every route and everyconveyance from Nova Scotia to Cape Breton. 

Mr. Brown was not in. He never is in. His store is a rusty warehouse, low and musty, piled full of boxes of soap and candles and dried fish, with a little glass cubby in one corner, where a thin clerk sits at ahigh desk, like a spider in his web. Perhaps he is a spider, for thecubby is swarming with flies, whose hum is the only noise of traffic;the glass of the window-sash has not been washed since it was put inapparently. The clerk is not writing, and has evidently no other use forhis steel pen than spearing flies. Brown is out, says this young votaryof commerce, and will not be in till half past five. We remark upon thefact that nobody ever is "in" these dingy warehouses, wonder when thebusiness is done, and go out into the street to wait for Brown. 

In front of the store is a dray, its horse fast-asleep, and waitingfor the revival of commerce. The travelers note that the dray is of apeculiar construction, the body being dropped down from the axles soas nearly to touch the ground, --a great convenience in loading andunloading; they propose to introduce it into their native land. Thedray is probably waiting for the tide to come in. In the deep slip lie adozen helpless vessels, coasting schooners mostly, tipped on their beamends in the mud, or propped up by side-pieces as if they were built forland as well as for water. At the end of the wharf is a long Englishsteamboat unloading railroad iron, which will return to the Clyde fullof Nova Scotia coal. We sit down on the dock, where the fresh sea-breezecomes up the harbor, watch the lazily swinging crane on the vessel, and meditate upon the greatness of England and the peacefulness of thedrowsy after noon. One's feeling of rest is never complete--unless hecan see somebody else at work, --but the labor must be without haste, asit is in the Provinces. 

While waiting for Brown, we had leisure to explore the shops of King'sStreet, and to climb up to the grand triumphal arch which stands on topof the hill and guards the entrance to King's Square. 

Of the shops for dry-goods I have nothing to say, for they tempt theunwary American to violate the revenue laws of his country; but he maysafely go into the book-shops. The literature which is displayed in thewindows and on the counters has lost that freshness which it once mayhave had, and is, in fact, if one must use the term, fly-specked, likethe cakes in the grocery windows on the side streets. There are oldillustrated newspapers from the States, cheap novels from the same, andthe flashy covers of the London and Edinburgh sixpenny editions. Butthis is the dull season for literature, we reflect. 

It will always be matter of regret to us that we climbed up to thetriumphal arch, which appeared so noble in the distance, with the treesbehind it. For when we reached it, we found that it was built of wood, painted and sanded, and in a shocking state of decay; and the grove towhich it admitted us was only a scant assemblage of sickly locust-trees, which seemed to be tired of battling with the unfavorable climate, andhad, in fact, already retired from the business of ornamental shadetrees. Adjoining this square is an ancient cemetery, the surface ofwhich has decayed in sympathy with the mouldering remains it covers, andis quite a model in this respect. I have called this cemetery ancient, but it may not be so, for its air of decay is thoroughly modern, andneglect, and not years, appears to have made it the melancholy place ofrepose it is. Whether it is the fashionable and favorite resort of thedead of the city we did not learn, but there were some old men sittingin its damp shades, and the nurses appeared to make it a rendezvous fortheir baby-carriages, --a cheerful place to bring up children in, and tofamiliarize their infant minds with the fleeting nature of provinciallife. The park and burying-ground, it is scarcely necessary to say, added greatly to the feeling of repose which stole over us on this sunnyday. And they made us long for Brown and his information about Baddeck. 

But Mr. Brown, when found, did not know as much as the agent. He hadbeen in Nova Scotia; he had never been in Cape Breton; but he presumedwe would find no difficulty in reaching Baddeck by so and so, and so andso. We consumed valuable time in convincing Brown that his directionsto us were impracticable and valueless, and then he referred us to Mr. Cope. An interview with Mr. Cope discouraged us; we found that wewere imparting everywhere more geographical information than we werereceiving, and as our own stock was small, we concluded that we shouldbe unable to enlighten all the inhabitants of St. John upon the subjectof Baddeck before we ran out. Returning to the hotel, and taking ourdestiny into our own hands, we resolved upon a bold stroke. 

But to return for a moment to Brown. I feel that Brown has been let offtoo easily in the above paragraph. His conduct, to say the truth, wasnot such as we expected of a man in whom we had put our entire faith forhalf a day, --a long while to trust anybody in these times, --a man whomwe had exalted as an encyclopedia of information, and idealized inevery way. A man of wealth and liberal views and courtly manners we haddecided Brown would be. Perhaps he had a suburban villa on the heightsover-looking Kennebeckasis Bay, and, recognizing us as brothers in acommon interest in Baddeck, not-withstanding our different nationality, would insist upon taking us to his house, to sip provincial tea withMrs. Brown and Victoria Louise, his daughter. When, therefore, Mr. Brownwhisked into his dingy office, and, but for our importunity, wouldhave paid no more attention to us than to up-country customers withoutcredit, and when he proved to be willingly, it seemed to us, ignorantof Baddeck, our feelings received a great shock. It is incomprehensiblethat a man in the position of Brown with so many boxes of soap andcandles to dispose of--should be so ignorant of a neighboring province. We had heard of the cordial unity of the Provinces in the New Dominion. Heaven help it, if it depends upon such fellows as Brown! Of course, his directing us to Cope was a mere fetch. For as we have intimated, itwould have taken us longer to have given Cope an idea of Baddeck, thanit did to enlighten Brown. But we had no bitter feelings about Cope, forwe never had reposed confidence in him. 

Our plan of campaign was briefly this: To take the steamboat at eighto'clock, Thursday morning, for Digby Gut and Annapolis; thence to go byrail through the poetical Acadia down to Halifax; to turn north and eastby rail from Halifax to New Glasgow, and from thence to push on by stageto the Gut of Canso. This would carry us over the entire length of NovaScotia, and, with good luck, land us on Cape Breton Island Saturdaymorning. When we should set foot on that island, we trusted that weshould be able to make our way to Baddeck, by walking, swimming, orriding, whichever sort of locomotion should be most popular in thatprovince. Our imaginations were kindled by reading that the "most superbline of stages on the continent" ran from New Glasgow to the Gut ofCanso. If the reader perfectly understands this programme, he has theadvantage of the two travelers at the time they made it. 

It was a gray morning when we embarked from St. John, and in fact alittle drizzle of rain veiled the Martello tower, and checked, likethe cross-strokes of a line engraving, the hill on which it stands. Themiscellaneous shining of such a harbor appears best in a golden haze, orin the mist of a morning like this. We had expected days of fog in thisregion; but the fog seemed to have gone out with the high tides of thegeography. And it is simple justice to these possessions of her Majesty, to say that in our two weeks' acquaintance of them they enjoyed asdelicious weather as ever falls on sea and shore, with the exception ofthis day when we crossed the Bay of Fundy. And this day was only one ofthose cool interludes of low color, which an artist would be thankfulto introduce among a group of brilliant pictures. Such a day rests thetraveler, who is overstimulated by shifting scenes played upon by thedazzling sun. So the cool gray clouds spread a grateful umbrella aboveus as we ran across the Bay of Fundy, sighted the headlands of the Gutof Digby, and entered into the Annapolis Basin, and into the region ofa romantic history. The white houses of Digby, scattered over the downslike a flock of washed sheep, had a somewhat chilly aspect, it is true, and made us long for the sun on them. But as I think of it now, I preferto have the town and the pretty hillsides that stand about the basinin the light we saw them; and especially do I like to recall the highwooden pier at Digby, deserted by the tide and so blown by the wind thatthe passengers who came out on it, with their tossing drapery, broughtto mind the windy Dutch harbors that Backhuysen painted. We landed apriest here, and it was a pleasure to see him as he walked along thehigh pier, his broad hat flapping, and the wind blowing his long skirtsaway from his ecclesiastical legs. 

It was one of the coincidences of life, for which no one can account, that when we descended upon these coasts, the Governor-General of theDominion was abroad in his Provinces. There was an air of expectation ofhim everywhere, and of preparation for his coming; his lordship was thesubject of conversation on the Digby boat, his movements were chronicledin the newspapers, and the gracious bearing of the Governor and LadyDufferin at the civic receptions, balls, and picnics was recorded withloyal satisfaction; even a literary flavor was given to the provincialjournals by quotations from his lordship's condescension to letters inthe "High Latitudes. " It was not without pain, however, that even inthis un-American region we discovered the old Adam of journalism in thedisposition of the newspapers of St. John toward sarcasm touchingthe well-meant attempts to entertain the Governor and his lady in theprovincial town of Halifax, --a disposition to turn, in short, upon thedemonstrations of loyal worship the faint light of ridicule. There werethose upon the boat who were journeying to Halifax to take part in thecivic ball about to be given to their excellencies, and as we were goingin the same direction, we shared in the feeling of satisfaction whichproximity to the Great often excites. 

We had other if not deeper causes of satisfaction. We were sailing alongthe gracefully moulded and tree-covered hills of the Annapolis Basin, and up the mildly picturesque river of that name, and we were about toenter what the provincials all enthusiastically call the Garden of NovaScotia. This favored vale, skirted by low ranges of hills on eitherhand, and watered most of the way by the Annapolis River, extends fromthe mouth of the latter to the town of Windsor on the river Avon. Weexpected to see something like the fertile valleys of the Connecticutor the Mohawk. We should also pass through those meadows on the Basin ofMinas which Mr. Longfellow has made more sadly poetical than any otherspot on the Western Continent. It is, --this valley of the Annapolis, --inthe belief of provincials, the most beautiful and blooming place in theworld, with a soil and climate kind to the husbandman; a land of fairmeadows, orchards, and vines. It was doubtless our own fault that thisland did not look to us like a garden, as it does to the inhabitants ofNova Scotia; and it was not until we had traveled over the rest ofthe country, that we saw the appropriateness of the designation. Theexplanation is, that not so much is required of a garden here as in someother parts of the world. Excellent apples, none finer, are exportedfrom this valley to England, and the quality of the potatoes is said toap-proach an ideal perfection here. I should think that oats would ripenwell also in a good year, and grass, for those who care for it, may besatisfactory. I should judge that the other products of this garden arefish and building-stone. But we anticipate. And have we forgotten the"murmuring pines and the hemlocks"? Nobody, I suppose, ever travelshere without believing that he sees these trees of the imagination, soforcibly has the poet projected them upon the uni-versal consciousness. But we were unable to see them, on this route. 

It would be a brutal thing for us to take seats in the railway trainat Annapolis, and leave the ancient town, with its modern houses andremains of old fortifications, without a thought of the romantichistory which saturates the region. There is not much in the smart, new restaurant, where a tidy waiting-maid skillfully depreciates ourcurrency in exchange for bread and cheese and ale, to recall the earlydrama of the French discovery and settlement. For it is to the Frenchthat we owe the poetical interest that still invests, like a garment, all these islands and bays, just as it is to the Spaniards that we owethe romance of the Florida coast. Every spot on this continent thateither of these races has touched has a color that is wanting in theprosaic settlements of the English. 

Without the historical light of French adventure upon this town andbasin of Annapolis, or Port Royal, as they were first named, I confessthat I should have no longing to stay here for a week; notwithstandingthe guide-book distinctly says that this harbor has "a strikingresemblance to the beautiful Bay of Naples. " I am not offended at thisremark, for it is the one always made about a harbor, and I am sure thepassing traveler can stand it, if the Bay of Naples can. And yetthis tranquil basin must have seemed a haven of peace to the firstdiscoverers. 

It was on a lovely summer day in 1604, that the Sieur de Monts and hiscomrades, Champlain and the Baron de Poutrincourt, beating about theshores of Nova Scotia, were invited by the rocky gateway of the PortRoyal Basin. They entered the small inlet, says Mr. Parkman, whensuddenly the narrow strait dilated into a broad and tranquil basin, compassed with sunny hills, wrapped with woodland verdure and alive withwaterfalls. Poutrincourt was delighted with the scene, and would fainremove thither from France with his family. Since Poutrincourt's day, the hills have been somewhat denuded of trees, and the waterfalls arenot now in sight; at least, not under such a gray sky as we saw. 

The reader who once begins to look into the French occupancy of Acadiais in danger of getting into a sentimental vein, and sentiment is theone thing to be shunned in these days. Yet I cannot but stay, though thetrain should leave us, to pay my respectful homage to one of the mostheroic of women, whose name recalls the most romantic incident inthe history of this region. Out of this past there rises no figure socaptivating to the imagination as that of Madame de la Tour. And itis noticeable that woman has a curious habit of coming to the front incritical moments of history, and performing some exploit that eclipsesin brilliancy all the deeds of contemporary men; and the exploit usuallyends in a pathetic tragedy, that fixes it forever in the sympathy of theworld. I need not copy out of the pages of De Charlevoix the well-knownstory of Madame de la Tour; I only wish he had told us more about her. It is here at Port Royal that we first see her with her husband. Charlesde St. Etienne, the Chevalier de la Tour, --there is a world of romancein these mere names, --was a Huguenot nobleman who had a grant of PortRoyal and of La Hive, from Louis XIII. He ceded La Hive to Razilli, the governor-in-chief of the provinces, who took a fancy to it, fora residence. He was living peacefully at Port Royal in 1647, when theChevalier d'Aunay Charnise, having succeeded his brother Razilli at LaHive, tired of that place and removed to Port Royal. De Charnise wasa Catholic; the difference in religion might not have produced anyunpleasantness, but the two noblemen could not agree in dividing theprofits of the peltry trade, --each being covetous, if we may so expressit, of the hide of the savage continent, and determined to take it offfor himself. At any rate, disagreement arose, and De la Tour moved overto the St. John, of which region his father had enjoyed a grant fromCharles I. Of England, --whose sad fate it is not necessary now to recallto the reader's mind, --and built a fort at the mouth of the river. Butthe differences of the two ambitious Frenchmen could not be composed. De la Tour obtained aid from Governor Winthrop at Boston, thus verifyingthe Catholic prediction that the Huguenots would side with the enemiesof France on occasion. De Charnise received orders from Louis to arrestDe la Tour; but a little preliminary to the arrest was the possession ofthe fort of St. John, and this he could not obtain, although be sent allhis force against it. Taking advantage, however, of the absence of Dela Tour, who had a habit of roving about, he one day besieged St. John. Madame de la Tour headed the little handful of men in the fort, and madesuch a gallant resistance that De Charnise was obliged to draw off hisfleet with the loss of thirty-three men, --a very serious loss, when thesupply of men was as distant as France. But De Charnise would notbe balked by a woman; he attacked again; and this time, one of thegarrison, a Swiss, betrayed the fort, and let the invaders intothe walls by an unguarded entrance. It was Easter morning when thismisfortune occurred, but the peaceful influence of the day did notavail. When Madame saw that she was betrayed, her spirits did not quail;she took refuge with her little band in a detached part of the fort, andthere made such a bold show of defense, that De Charnise was obliged toagree to the terms of her surrender, which she dictated. No sooner hadthis unchivalrous fellow obtained possession of the fort and of thisHistoric Woman, than, overcome with a false shame that he had made termswith a woman, he violated his noble word, and condemned to death allthe men, except one, who was spared on condition that he should be theexecutioner of the others. And the poltroon compelled the brave womanto witness the execution, with the added indignity of a rope round herneck, --or as De Charlevoix much more neatly expresses it, "obligea saprisonniere d'assister a l'execution, la corde au cou. "

To the shock of this horror the womanly spirit of Madame de la Toursuccumbed; she fell into a decline and died soon after. De la Tour, himself an exile from his province, wandered about the New World in hiscustomary pursuit of peltry. He was seen at Quebec for two years. Whilethere, he heard of the death of De Charnise, and straightway repairedto St. John. The widow of his late enemy received him graciously, andhe entered into possession of the estate of the late occupant with theconsent of all the heirs. To remove all roots of bitterness, De laTour married Madame de Charnise, and history does not record any ill ofeither of them. I trust they had the grace to plant a sweetbrier onthe grave of the noble woman to whose faithfulness and courage they owetheir rescue from obscurity. At least the parties to this singularunion must have agreed to ignore the lamented existence of the Chevalierd'Aunay. 

With the Chevalier de la Tour, at any rate, it all went well thereafter. When Cromwell drove the French from Acadia, he granted great territorialrights to De la Tour, which that thrifty adventurer sold out to oneof his co-grantees for L16, 000; and he no doubt invested the money inpeltry for the London market. 

As we leave the station at Annapolis, we are obliged to put Madame de laTour out of our minds to make room for another woman whose name, and wemight say presence, fills all the valley before us. So it is that womancontinues to reign, where she has once got a foothold, long after herdear frame has become dust. Evangeline, who is as real a personage asQueen Esther, must have been a different woman from Madame de la Tour. If the latter had lived at Grand Pre, she would, I trust, have madeit hot for the brutal English who drove the Acadians out of theirsalt-marsh paradise, and have died in her heroic shoes rather than floatoff into poetry. But if it should come to the question of marrying theDe la Tour or the Evangeline, I think no man who was not engaged in thepeltry trade would hesitate which to choose. At any rate, the women wholove have more influence in the world than the women who fight, and soit happens that the sentimental traveler who passes through Port Royalwithout a tear for Madame de la Tour, begins to be in a glow of tenderlonging and regret for Evangeline as soon as he enters the valley of theAnnapolis River. For myself, I expected to see written over the railwaycrossings the legend, "Look out for Evangeline while the bell rings. "

When one rides into a region of romance he does not much notice hisspeed or his carriage; but I am obliged to say that we were not hurriedup the valley, and that the cars were not too luxurious for the plainpeople, priests, clergymen, and belles of the region, who rode in them. Evidently the latest fashions had not arrived in the Provinces, and wehad an opportunity of studying anew those that had long passed away inthe States, and of remarking how inappropriate a fashion is when it hasceased to be the fashion. 

The river becomes small shortly after we leave Annapolis and before wereach Paradise. At this station of happy appellation we looked for thesatirist who named it, but he has probably sold out and removed. Ifthe effect of wit is produced by the sudden recognition of a remoteresemblance, there was nothing witty in the naming of this station. Indeed, we looked in vain for the "garden" appearance of the valley. There was nothing generous in the small meadows or the thin orchards;and if large trees ever grew on the bordering hills, they have givenplace to rather stunted evergreens; the scraggy firs and balsams, infact, possess Nova Scotia generally as we saw it, --and there is nothingmore uninteresting and wearisome than large tracts of these woods. Weare bound to believe that Nova Scotia has somewhere, or had, great pinesand hemlocks that murmur, but we were not blessed with the sight ofthem. Slightly picturesque this valley is with its winding river andhigh hills guarding it, and perhaps a person would enjoy a foot-trampdown it; but, I think he would find little peculiar or interesting afterhe left the neighborhood of the Basin of Minas. 

Before we reached Wolfville we came in sight of this basin and some ofthe estuaries and streams that run into it; that is, when the tide goesout; but they are only muddy ditches half the time. The Acadia Collegewas pointed out to us at Wolfville by a person who said that it is afeeble institution, a remark we were sorry to hear of a place describedas "one of the foremost seats of learning in the Province. " But ourregret was at once extinguished by the announcement that the nextstation was Grand Pre! We were within three miles of the most poeticplace in North America. 

There was on the train a young man from Boston, who said that he wasborn in Grand Pre. It seemed impossible that we should actually be neara person so felicitously born. He had a justifiable pride in the fact, as well as in the bride by his side, whom he was taking to see forthe first time his old home. His local information, imparted to her, overflowed upon us; and when he found that we had read "Evangeline, " hisdelight in making us acquainted with the scene of that poem was pleasantto see. The village of Grand Pre is a mile from the station; and perhapsthe reader would like to know exactly what the traveler, hastening on toBaddeck, can see of the famous locality. 

We looked over a well-grassed meadow, seamed here and there by beds ofstreams left bare by the receding tide, to a gentle swell in the groundupon which is a not heavy forest growth. The trees partly conceal thestreet of Grand Pre, which is only a road bordered by common houses. Beyond is the Basin of Minas, with its sedgy shore, its dreary flats;and beyond that projects a bold headland, standing perpendicular againstthe sky. This is the Cape Blomidon, and it gives a certain dignity tothe picture. 

The old Normandy picturesqueness has departed from the village of GrandPre. Yankee settlers, we were told, possess it now, and there are nodescendants of the French Acadians in this valley. I believe that Mr. Cozzens found some of them in humble circumstances in a village on theother coast, not far from Halifax, and it is there, probably, that the

"Maidens still wear their Norman caps and their kirtles of homespun, And by the evening fire repeat Evangeline's story, While from itsrocky caverns the deep-voiced, neighboring ocean Speaks, and in accentsdisconsolate answers the wail of the forest. "

At any rate, there is nothing here now except a faint tradition of theFrench Acadians; and the sentimental traveler who laments that they weredriven out, and not left behind their dikes to rear their flocks, andcultivate the rural virtues, and live in the simplicity of ignorance, will temper his sadness by the reflection that it is to the expulsion heowes "Evangeline" and the luxury of his romantic grief. So that if thetraveler is honest, and examines his own soul faithfully, he will notknow what state of mind to cherish as he passes through this region ofsorrow. 

Our eyes lingered as long as possible and with all eagerness upon thesemeadows and marshes which the poet has made immortal, and we regrettedthat inexorable Baddeck would not permit us to be pilgrims for a day inthis Acadian land. Just as I was losing sight of the skirt of trees atGrand Pre, a gentleman in the dress of a rural clergyman left his seat, and complimented me with this remark: "I perceive, sir, that you arefond of reading. "

I could not but feel flattered by this unexpected discovery of mynature, which was no doubt due to the fact that I held in my hand oneof the works of Charles Reade on social science, called "Love me Little, Love me Long, " and I said, "Of some kinds, I am. "

"Did you ever see a work called 'Evangeline'?"

"Oh, yes, I have frequently seen it. "

"You may remember, " continued this Mass of Information, "that there isan allusion in it to Grand Pre. That is the place, sir!"

"Oh, indeed, is that the place? Thank you. "

"And that mountain yonder is Cape Blomidon, blow me down, you know. "

And under cover of this pun, the amiable clergyman retired, unconscious, I presume, of his prosaic effect upon the atmosphere of the region. Withthis intrusion of the commonplace, I suffered an eclipse of faith as toEvangeline, and was not sorry to have my attention taken up by the riverAvon, along the banks of which we were running about this time. It isreally a broad arm of the basin, extending up to Windsor, and beyond ina small stream, and would have been a charming river if there had been adrop of water in it. I never knew before how much water adds to a river. Its slimy bottom was quite a ghastly spectacle, an ugly gash in the landthat nothing could heal but the friendly returning tide. I should thinkit would be confusing to dwell by a river that runs first one way andthen the other, and then vanishes altogether. 

All the streams about this basin are famous for their salmon and shad, and the season for these fish was not yet passed. There seems to be anuntraced affinity between the shad and the strawberry; they appear anddisappear in a region simultaneously. When we reached Cape Breton, wewere a day or two late for both. It is impossible not to feel a littlecontempt for people who do not have these luxuries till July and August;but I suppose we are in turn despised by the Southerners because we donot have them till May and June. So, a great part of the enjoyment oflife is in the knowledge that there are people living in a worse placethan that you inhabit. 

Windsor, a most respectable old town round which the railroad sweeps, with its iron bridge, conspicuous King's College, and handsome churchspire, is a great place for plaster and limestone, and would be a goodlocation for a person interested in these substances. Indeed, if a mancan live on rocks, like a goat, he may settle anywhere between Windsorand Halifax. It is one of the most sterile regions in the Province. With the exception of a wild pond or two, we saw nothing but rocksand stunted firs, for forty-five miles, a monotony unrelieved by onepicturesque feature. Then we longed for the "Garden of Nova Scotia, " andunderstood what is meant by the name. 

A member of the Ottawa government, who was on his way to theGovernor-General's ball at Halifax, informed us that this country isrich in minerals, in iron especially, and he pointed out spots wheregold had been washed out. But we do not covet it. And we were not sorryto learn from this gentleman, that since the formation of the Dominion, there is less and less desire in the Provinces for annexation to theUnited States. One of the chief pleasures in traveling in Nova Scotianow is in the constant reflection that you are in a foreign country; andannexation would take that away. 

It is nearly dark when we reach the head of the Bedford Basin. The nobleharbor of Halifax narrows to a deep inlet for three miles along therocky slope on which the city stands, and then suddenly expands intothis beautiful sheet of water. We ran along its bank for five miles, cheered occasionally by a twinkling light on the shore, and then cameto a stop at the shabby terminus, three miles out of town. This basin isalmost large enough to float the navy of Great Britain, and it couldlie here, with the narrows fortified, secure from the attacks ofthe American navy, hovering outside in the fog. With these patrioticthoughts we enter the town. It is not the fault of the railroad, but itspresent inability to climb a rocky hill, that it does not run into thecity. The suburbs are not impressive in the night, but they look betterthen than they do in the daytime; and the same might be said of the cityitself. Probably there is not anywhere a more rusty, forlorn town, andthis in spite of its magnificent situation. 

It is a gala-night when we rattle down the rough streets, and havepointed out to us the somber government buildings. The Halifax ClubHouse is a blaze of light, for the Governor-General is being receivedthere, and workmen are still busy decorating the Provincial Buildingfor the great ball. The city is indeed pervaded by his lordship, andwe regret that we cannot see it in its normal condition of quiet; thehotels are full, and it is impossible to escape the festive feeling thatis abroad. It ill accords with our desires, as tranquil travelers, to beplunged into such a vortex of slow dissipation. These people take theirpleasures more gravely than we do, and probably will last the longer fortheir moderation. Having ascertained that we can get no more informationabout Baddeck here than in St. John, we go to bed early, for we are todepart from this fascinating place at six o'clock. 

If any one objects that we are not competent to pass judgment on thecity of Halifax by sleeping there one night, I beg leave to plead theusual custom of travelers, --where would be our books of travel, if morewas expected than a night in a place?--and to state a few facts. Thefirst is, that I saw the whole of Halifax. If I were inclined, I coulddescribe it building by building. Cannot one see it all from the citadelhill, and by walking down by the horticultural garden and the RomanCatholic cemetery? and did not I climb that hill through the mostdilapidated rows of brown houses, and stand on the greensward of thefortress at five o'clock in the morning, and see the whole city, and theBritish navy riding at anchor, and the fog coming in from the AtlanticOcean? Let the reader go to! and if he would know more of Halifax, gothere. We felt that if we remained there through the day, it would be aday of idleness and sadness. I could draw a picture of Halifax. I couldrelate its century of history; I could write about its free-schoolsystem, and its many noble charities. But the reader always skips suchthings. He hates information; and he himself would not stay in this dullgarrison town any longer than he was obliged to. 

There was to be a military display that day in honor of the Governor. 

"Why, " I asked the bright and light-minded colored boy who sold paperson the morning train, "don't you stay in the city and see it?"

"Pho, " said he, with contempt, "I'm sick of 'em. Halifax is played out, and I'm going to quit it. "

The withdrawal of this lively trader will be a blow to the enterprise ofthe place. 

When I returned to the hotel for breakfast--which was exactly like thesupper, and consisted mainly of green tea and dry toast--there was acommotion among the waiters and the hack-drivers over a nervous littleold man, who was in haste to depart for the morning train. He was aspecimen of provincial antiquity such as could not be seen elsewhere. His costume was of the oddest: a long-waisted coat reaching nearly tohis heels, short trousers, a flowered silk vest, and a napless hat. Hecarried his baggage tied up in mealbags, and his attention was dividedbetween that and two buxom daughters, who were evidently enjoying theirfirst taste of city life. The little old man, who was not unlike apetrified Frenchman of the last century, had risen before daylight, roused up his daughters, and had them down on the sidewalk by fouro'clock, waiting for hack, or horse-car, or something to take themto the station. That he might be a man of some importance at home wasevident, but he had lost his head in the bustle of this great town, and was at the mercy of all advisers, none of whom could understandhis mongrel language. As we came out to take the horse-car, he saw hishelpless daughters driven off in one hack, while he was raving among hismeal-bags on the sidewalk. Afterwards we saw him at the station, flyingabout in the greatest excitement, asking everybody about the train; andat last he found his way into the private office of the ticket-seller. "Get out of here!" roared that official. The old man persisted thathe wanted a ticket. "Go round to the window; clear out!" In a veryflustered state he was hustled out of the room. When he came to thewindow and made known his destination, he was refused tickets, becausehis train did not start for two hours yet!

This mercurial old gentleman only appears in these records because hewas the only person we saw in this Province who was in a hurry to doanything, or to go anywhere. 

We cannot leave Halifax without remarking that it is a city of greatprivate virtue, and that its banks are sound. The appearance of itspaper-money is not, however, inviting. We of the United States lead theworld in beautiful paper-money; and when I exchanged my crisp, handsomegreenbacks for the dirty, flimsy, ill-executed notes of the Dominion, at a dead loss of value, I could not be reconciled to the transaction. I sarcastically called the stuff I received "Confederate money;" butprobably no one was wounded by the severity; for perhaps no one knewwhat a resemblance in badness there is between the "Confederate" notesof our civil war and the notes of the Dominion; and, besides, theConfederacy was too popular in the Provinces for the name to be areproach to them. I wish I had thought of something more insulting tosay. 

By noon on Friday we came to New Glasgow, having passed through acountry where wealth is to be won by hard digging if it is won at all;through Truro, at the head of the Cobequid Bay, a place exhibiting morethrift than any we have seen. A pleasant enough country, on the whole, is this which the road runs through up the Salmon and down theEast River. New Glasgow is not many miles from Pictou, on the greatCumberland Strait; the inhabitants build vessels, and strangers driveout from here to see the neighboring coal mines. Here we were to dineand take the stage for a ride of eighty miles to the Gut of Canso. 

The hotel at New Glasgow we can commend as one of the most unwholesomein the Province; but it is unnecessary to emphasize its condition, forif the traveler is in search of dirty hotels, he will scarcely go amissanywhere in these regions. There seems to be a fashion in diet whichendures. The early travelers as well as the later in these Atlanticprovinces all note the prevalence of dry, limp toast and green tea; theyare the staples of all the meals; though authorities differ in regardto the third element for discouraging hunger: it is sometimes boiledsalt-fish and sometimes it is ham. Toast was probably an inspiration ofthe first woman of this part of the New World, who served it hot; butit has become now a tradition blindly followed, without regard totemperature; and the custom speaks volumes for the non-inventivenessof woman. At the inn in New Glasgow those who choose dine in theirshirt-sleeves, and those skilled in the ways of this table get all theywant in seven minutes. A man who understands the use of edged toolscan get along twice as fast with a knife and fork as he can with a forkalone. 

But the stage is at the door; the coach and four horses answer theadvertisement of being "second to none on the continent. " We mountto the seat with the driver. The sun is bright; the wind is in thesouthwest; the leaders are impatient to go; the start for the long rideis propitious. 

But on the back seat in the coach is the inevitable woman, young andsickly, with the baby in her arms. The woman has paid her fare throughto Guysborough, and holds her ticket. It turns out, however, that shewants to go to the district of Guysborough, to St. Mary's Cross Roads, somewhere in it, and not to the village of Guysborough, which is awaydown on Chedabucto Bay. (The reader will notice this geographicalfamiliarity. ) And this stage does not go in the direction of St. Mary's. She will not get out, she will not surrender her ticket, nor pay herfare again. Why should she? And the stage proprietor, the stage-driver, and the hostler mull over the problem, and sit down on the woman's hairtrunk in front of the tavern to reason with her. The baby joins itsvoice from the coach window in the clamor of the discussion. The babyprevails. The stage company comes to a compromise, the woman dismounts, and we are off, away from the white houses, over the sandy road, outupon a hilly and not cheerful country. And the driver begins to tell usstories of winter hardships, drifted highways, a land buried in snow, and great peril to men and cattle. 

III

 "It was then summer, and the weather very fine; so pleased was I with the country, in which I had never travelled before, that my delight proved equal to my wonder. " -- BENVENUTO CELLINI. 

There are few pleasures in life equal to that of riding on the box-seatof a stagecoach, through a country unknown to you and hearing the drivertalk about his horses. We made the intimate acquaintance of twelvehorses on that day's ride, and learned the peculiar dispositionand traits of each one of them, their ambition of display, theirsensitiveness to praise or blame, their faithfulness, their playfulness, the readiness with which they yielded to kind treatment, theirdaintiness about food and lodging. 

May I never forget the spirited little jade, the off-leader in the thirdstage, the petted belle of the route, the nervous, coquettish, mincingmare of Marshy Hope. A spoiled beauty she was; you could see that asshe took the road with dancing step, tossing her pretty head about, andconscious of her shining black coat and her tail done up "in any simpleknot, "--like the back hair of Shelley's Beatrice Cenci. How she ambledand sidled and plumed herself, and now and then let fly her little heelshigh in air in mere excess of larkish feeling. 

"So! girl; so! Kitty, " murmurs the driver in the softest tones ofadmiration; "she don't mean anything by it, she's just like a kitten. "

But the heels keep flying above the traces, and by and by the driveris obliged to "speak hash" to the beauty. The reproof of the displeasedtone is evidently felt, for she settles at once to her work, showingperhaps a little impatience, jerking her head up and down, andprotesting by her nimble movements against the more deliberate trotof her companion. I believe that a blow from the cruel lash would havebroken her heart; or else it would have made a little fiend of thespirited creature. The lash is hardly ever good for the sex. 

For thirteen years, winter and summer, this coachman had driven thismonotonous, uninteresting route, with always the same sandy hills, scrubby firs, occasional cabins, in sight. What a time to nurse histhought and feed on his heart! How deliberately he can turn things overin his brain! What a system of philosophy he might evolve out of hisconsciousness! One would think so. But, in fact, the stagebox is noplace for thinking. To handle twelve horses every day, to keep each toits proper work, stimulating the lazy and restraining the free, humoringeach disposition, so that the greatest amount of work shall be obtainedwith the least friction, making each trip on time, and so as to leaveeach horse in as good condition at the close as at the start, takingadvantage of the road, refreshing the team by an occasional spurt ofspeed, --all these things require constant attention; and if the driverwas composing an epic, the coach might go into the ditch, or, if noaccident happened, the horses would be worn out in a month, except forthe driver's care. 

I conclude that the most delicate and important occupation in life isstage-driving. It would be easier to "run" the Treasury Departmentof the United States than a four-in-hand. I have a sense of theunimportance of everything else in comparison with this business inhand. And I think the driver shares that feeling. He is the autocrat ofthe situation. He is lord of all the humble passengers, and they feeltheir inferiority. They may have knowledge and skill in some things, butthey are of no use here. At all the stables the driver is king; all thepeople on the route are deferential to him; they are happy if he willcrack a joke with them, and take it as a favor if he gives them betterthan they send. And it is his joke that always raises the laugh, regardless of its quality. 

We carry the royal mail, and as we go along drop little sealed canvasbags at way offices. The bags would not hold more than three pints ofmeal, and I can see that there is nothing in them. Yet somebody alonghere must be expecting a letter, or they would not keep up the mailfacilities. At French River we change horses. There is a mill here, andthere are half a dozen houses, and a cranky bridge, which the driverthinks will not tumble down this trip. The settlement may have seenbetter days, and will probably see worse. 

I preferred to cross the long, shaky wooden bridge on foot, leaving theinside passengers to take the risk, and get the worth of their money;and while the horses were being put to, I walked on over the hill. Andhere I encountered a veritable foot-pad, with a club in his hand and abundle on his shoulder, coming down the dusty road, with the wild-eyedaspect of one who travels into a far country in search of adventure. Heseemed to be of a cheerful and sociable turn, and desired that I shouldlinger and converse with him. But he was more meagerly supplied with themedia of conversation than any person I ever met. His opening addresswas in a tongue that failed to convey to me the least idea. I repliedin such language as I had with me, but it seemed to be equally lost uponhim. We then fell back upon gestures and ejaculations, and by these Ilearned that he was a native of Cape Breton, but not an aborigine. Bysigns he asked me where I came from, and where I was going; and he wasso much pleased with my destination, that he desired to know my name;and this I told him with all the injunction of secrecy I could convey;but he could no more pronounce it than I could speak his name. Itoccurred to me that perhaps he spoke a French patois, and I asked him;but he only shook his head. He would own neither to German nor Irish. The happy thought came to me of inquiring if he knew English. But heshook his head again, and said, "No English, plenty garlic. "

This was entirely incomprehensible, for I knew that garlic is not alanguage, but a smell. But when he had repeated the word severaltimes, I found that he meant Gaelic; and when we had come to thisunderstanding, we cordially shook hands and willingly parted. One seldomencounters a wilder or more good-natured savage than this stalwartwanderer. And meeting him raised my hopes of Cape Breton. 

We change horses again, for the last stage, at Marshy Hope. As we turndown the hill into this place of the mournful name, we dash past aprocession of five country wagons, which makes way for us: everythingmakes way for us; even death itself turns out for the stage with fourhorses. The second wagon carries a long box, which reveals to us themournful errand of the caravan. We drive into the stable, and get downwhile the fresh horses are put to. The company's stables are all alike, and open at each end with great doors. The stable is the best house inthe place; there are three or four houses besides, and one of them iswhite, and has vines growing over the front door, and hollyhocks by thefront gate. Three or four women, and as many barelegged girls, have comeout to look at the procession, and we lounge towards the group. 

"It had a winder in the top of it, and silver handles, " says one. 

"Well, I declare; and you could 'a looked right in?"

"If I'd been a mind to. "

"Who has died?" I ask. 

"It's old woman Larue; she lived on Gilead Hill, mostly alone. It'sbetter for her. "

"Had she any friends?"

"One darter. They're takin' her over Eden way, to bury her where shecome from. "

"Was she a good woman?" The traveler is naturally curious to know whatsort of people die in Nova Scotia. 

"Well, good enough. Both her husbands is dead. "

The gossips continued talking of the burying. Poor old woman Larue! Itwas mournful enough to encounter you for the only time in this world inthis plight, and to have this glimpse of your wretched life on lonesomeGilead Hill. What pleasure, I wonder, had she in her life, and whatpleasure have any of these hard-favored women in this doleful region? Itis pitiful to think of it. Doubtless, however, the region isn't doleful, and the sentimental traveler would not have felt it so if he had notencountered this funereal flitting. 

But the horses are in. We mount to our places; the big doors swing open. 

"Stand away, " cries the driver. 

The hostler lets go Kitty's bridle, the horses plunge forward, and weare off at a gallop, taking the opposite direction from that pursued byold woman Larue. 

This last stage is eleven miles, through a pleasanter country, and wemake it in a trifle over an hour, going at an exhilarating gait, thatraises our spirits out of the Marshy Hope level. The perfection oftravel is ten miles an hour, on top of a stagecoach; it is greater speedthan forty by rail. It nurses one's pride to sit aloft, and rattle pastthe farmhouses, and give our dust to the cringing foot tramps. There issomething royal in the swaying of the coach body, and an excitement inthe patter of the horses' hoofs. And what an honor it must be to guidesuch a machine through a region of rustic admiration!

The sun has set when we come thundering down into the pretty Catholicvillage of Antigonish, --the most home-like place we have seen on theisland. The twin stone towers of the unfinished cathedral loom up largein the fading light, and the bishop's palace on the hill--the home ofthe Bishop of Arichat--appears to be an imposing white barn withmany staring windows. At Antigonish--with the emphasis on the lastsyllable--let the reader know there is a most comfortable inn, kept by acheery landlady, where the stranger is served by the comely handmaidens, her daughters, and feels that he has reached a home at last. Here wewished to stay. Here we wished to end this weary pilgrimage. CouldBaddeck be as attractive as this peaceful valley? Should we find any innon Cape Breton like this one?

"Never was on Cape Breton, " our driver had said; "hope I never shall be. Heard enough about it. Taverns? You'll find 'em occupied. "

"Fleas?

"Wus. "

"But it is a lovely country?"

"I don't think it. "

Into what unknown dangers were we going? Why not stay here and be happy?It was a soft summer night. People were loitering in the street; theyoung beaux of the place going up and down with the belles, after theleisurely manner in youth and summer; perhaps they were students fromSt. Xavier College, or visiting gallants from Guysborough. They lookinto the post-office and the fancy store. They stroll and take theirlittle provincial pleasure and make love, for all we can see, as ifAntigonish were a part of the world. How they must look down on MarshyHope and Addington Forks and Tracadie! What a charming place to live inis this!

But the stage goes on at eight o'clock. It will wait for no man. Thereis no other stage till eight the next night, and we have no alternativebut a night ride. We put aside all else except duty and Baddeck. This isstrictly a pleasure-trip. 

The stage establishment for the rest of the journey could hardly becalled the finest on the continent. The wagon was drawn by two horses. It was a square box, covered with painted cloth. Within were two narrowseats, facing each other, affording no room for the legs of passengers, and offering them no position but a strictly upright one. It was a mostingeniously uncomfortable box in which to put sleepy travelers for thenight. The weather would be chilly before morning, and to sit uprighton a narrow board all night, and shiver, is not cheerful. Of course, thereader says that this is no hardship to talk about. But the reader ismistaken. Anything is a hardship when it is unpleasantly what one doesnot desire or expect. These travelers had spent wakeful nights, in theforests, in a cold rain, and never thought of complaining. It isuseless to talk about the Polar sufferings of Dr. Kane to a guest at ametropolitan hotel, in the midst of luxury, when the mosquito sings allnight in his ear, and his mutton-chop is overdone at breakfast. Onedoes not like to be set up for a hero in trifles, in odd moments, and ininconspicuous places. 

There were two passengers besides ourselves, inhabitants of Cape BretonIsland, who were returning from Halifax to Plaster Cove, where they wereengaged in the occupation of distributing alcoholic liquors at retail. This fact we ascertained incidentally, as we learned the nationalityof our comrades by their brogue, and their religion by their livelyejaculations during the night. We stowed ourselves into the rigid box, bade a sorrowing good-night to the landlady and her daughters, who stoodat the inn door, and went jingling down the street towards the opencountry. 

The moon rises at eight o'clock in Nova Scotia. It came above thehorizon exactly as we began our journey, a harvest-moon, round and red. When I first saw it, it lay on the edge of the horizon as if tooheavy to lift itself, as big as a cart-wheel, and its disk cut by afence-rail. With what a flood of splendor it deluged farmhouses andfarms, and the broad sweep of level country! There could not be a moremagnificent night in which to ride towards that geographical mystery ofour boyhood, the Gut of Canso. 

A few miles out of town the stage stopped in the road before apost-station. An old woman opened the door of the farmhouse to receivethe bag which the driver carried to her. A couple of sprightly littlegirls rushed out to "interview" the passengers, climbing up to ask theirnames and, with much giggling, to get a peep at their faces. And uponthe handsomeness or ugliness of the faces they saw in the moonlight theypronounced with perfect candor. We are not obliged to say what theirverdict was. Girls here, no doubt, as elsewhere, lose this trustfulcandor as they grow older. 

Just as we were starting, the old woman screamed out from the door, ina shrill voice, addressing the driver, "Did you see ary a sick man 'bout'Tigonish?"

"Nary. "

"There's one been round here for three or four days, pretty bad off; 'sgot the St. Vitus's. He wanted me to get him some medicine for it up toAntigonish. I've got it here in a vial, and I wished you could take itto him. "

"Where is he?"

"I dunno. I heern he'd gone east by the Gut. Perhaps you'll hear ofhim. " All this screamed out into the night. 

"Well, I'll take it. "

We took the vial aboard and went on; but the incident powerfullyaffected us. The weird voice of the old woman was exciting in itself, and we could not escape the image of this unknown man, dancing aboutthis region without any medicine, fleeing perchance by night and alone, and finally flitting away down the Gut of Canso. This fugitive mysteryalmost immediately shaped itself into the following simple poem:

 "There was an old man of Canso, Unable to sit or stan' so. When I asked him why he ran so, Says he, 'I've St. Vitus' dance so, All down the Gut of Canso. '"

This melancholy song is now, I doubt not, sung by the maidens ofAntigonish. 

In spite of the consolations of poetry, however, the night wore onslowly, and soothing sleep tried in vain to get a lodgment in thejolting wagon. One can sleep upright, but not when his head is everymoment knocked against the framework of a wagon-cover. Even a jollyyoung Irishman of Plaster Cove, whose nature it is to sleep underwhatever discouragement, is beaten by these circumstances. He wishes hehad his fiddle along. We never know what men are on casual acquaintance. This rather stupid-looking fellow is a devotee of music, and knows howto coax the sweetness out of the unwilling violin. Sometimes he goesmiles and miles on winter nights to draw the seductive bow for the CapeBreton dancers, and there is enthusiasm in his voice, as he relatesexploits of fiddling from sunset till the dawn of day. Otherinformation, however, the young man has not; and when this is exhausted, he becomes sleepy again, and tries a dozen ways to twist himself intoa posture in which sleep will be possible. He doubles up his legs, heslides them under the seat, he sits on the wagon bottom; but thewagon swings and jolts and knocks him about. His patience underthis punishment is admirable, and there is something pathetic in hisrestraint from profanity. 

It is enough to look out upon the magnificent night; the moon is nowhigh, and swinging clear and distant; the air has grown chilly; thestars cannot be eclipsed by the greater light, but glow with a chastenedfervor. It is on the whole a splendid display for the sake of foursleepy men, banging along in a coach, --an insignificant little vehiclewith two horses. No one is up at any of the farmhouses to see it; no oneappears to take any interest in it, except an occasional baying dog, ora rooster that has mistaken the time of night. By midnight we come toTracadie, an orchard, a farmhouse, and a stable. We are not far from thesea now, and can see a silver mist in the north. An inlet comes lappingup by the old house with a salty smell and a suggestion of oyster-beds. We knock up the sleeping hostlers, change horses, and go on again, deadsleepy, but unable to get a wink. And all the night is blazing withbeauty. We think of the criminal who was sentenced to be kept awake tillhe died. 

The fiddler makes another trial. Temperately remarking, "I am verysleepy, " he kneels upon the floor and rests his head on the seat. Thisposition for a second promises repose; but almost immediately his headbegins to pound the seat, and beat a lively rat-a-plan on the board. Thehead of a wooden idol couldn't stand this treatment more than a minute. The fiddler twisted and turned, but his head went like a triphammer onthe seat. I have never seen a devotional attitude so deceptive, or onethat produced less favorable results. The young man rose from his knees, and meekly said, "It's dam hard. "

If the recording angel took down this observation, he doubtless made anote of the injured tone in which it was uttered. 

How slowly the night passes to one tipping and swinging along in aslowly moving stage! But the harbinger of the day came at last. Whenthe fiddler rose from his knees, I saw the morning-star burst out of theeast like a great diamond, and I knew that Venus was strong enough topull up even the sun, from whom she is never distant more than an eighthof the heavenly circle. The moon could not put her out of countenance. She blazed and scintillated with a dazzling brilliance, a throbbingsplendor, that made the moon seem a pale, sentimental invention. Steadily she mounted, in her fresh beauty, with the confidence and vigorof new love, driving her more domestic rival out of the sky. And thissort of thing, I suppose, goes on frequently. These splendors burn andthis panorama passes night after night down at the end of Nova Scotia, and all for the stage-driver, dozing along on his box, from Antigonishto the strait. 

"Here you are, " cries the driver, at length, when we have become wearilyindifferent to where we are. We have reached the ferry. The dawn has notcome, but it is not far off. We step out and find a chilly morning, andthe dark waters of the Gut of Canso flowing before us lighted here andthere by a patch of white mist. The ferryman is asleep, and his door isshut. We call him by all the names known among men. We pound upon hishouse, but he makes no sign. Before he awakes and comes out, growling, the sky in the east is lightened a shade, and the star of the dawnsparkles less brilliantly. But the process is slow. The twilight islong. There is a surprising deliberation about the preparation of thesun for rising, as there is in the movements of the boatman. Both appearto be reluctant to begin the day. 

The ferryman and his shaggy comrade get ready at last, and we step intothe clumsy yawl, and the slowly moving oars begin to pull us upstream. The strait is here less than a mile wide; the tide is running strongly, and the water is full of swirls, --the little whirlpools of the rip-tide. The morning-star is now high in the sky; the moon, declining in thewest, is more than ever like a silver shield; along the east is a faintflush of pink. In the increasing light we can see the bold shores of thestrait, and the square projection of Cape Porcupine below. 

On the rocks above the town of Plaster Cove, where there is a blackand white sign, --Telegraph Cable, --we set ashore our companions ofthe night, and see them climb up to their station for retailing thenecessary means of intoxication in their district, with the mournfulthought that we may never behold them again. 

As we drop down along the shore, there is a white sea-gull asleep onthe rock, rolled up in a ball, with his head under his wing. The rockis dripping with dew, and the bird is as wet as his hard bed. We passwithin an oar's length of him, but he does not heed us, and we do notdisturb his morning slumbers. For there is no such cruelty as the wakingof anybody out of a morning nap. 

When we land, and take up our bags to ascend the hill to the whitetavern of Port Hastings (as Plaster Cove now likes to be called), thesun lifts himself slowly over the treetops, and the magic of the nightvanishes. 

And this is Cape Breton, reached after almost a week of travel. Here isthe Gut of Canso, but where is Baddeck? It is Saturday morning; if wecannot make Baddeck by night, we might as well have remained inBoston. And who knows what we shall find if we get there? A forlornfishing-station, a dreary hotel? Suppose we cannot get on, and areforced to stay here? Asking ourselves these questions, we enter thePlaster Cove tavern. No one is stirring, but the house is open, and wetake possession of the dirty public room, and almost immediately drop tosleep in the fluffy rocking-chairs; but even sleep is not strong enoughto conquer our desire to push on, and we soon rouse up and go in pursuitof information. 

No landlord is to be found, but there is an unkempt servant in thekitchen, who probably does not see any use in making her toilet morethan once a week. To this fearful creature is intrusted the daintyduty of preparing breakfast. Her indifference is equal to her lack ofinformation, and her ability to convey information is fettered by heruse of Gaelic as her native speech. But she directs us to the stable. There we find a driver hitching his horses to a two-horse stage-wagon. 

"Is this stage for Baddeck?"

"Not much. "

"Is there any stage for Baddeck?"

"Not to-day. "

"Where does this go, and when?"

"St. Peter's. Starts in fifteen minutes. "

This seems like "business, " and we are inclined to try it, especially aswe have no notion where St. Peter's is. 

"Does any other stage go from here to-day anywhere else?"

"Yes. Port Hood. Quarter of an hour. "

Everything was about to happen in fifteen minutes. We inquire further. St. Peter's is on the east coast, on the road to Sydney. Port Hood ison the west coast. There is a stage from Port Hood to Baddeck. It wouldland us there some time Sunday morning; distance, eighty miles. 

Heavens! what a pleasure-trip. To ride eighty miles more without sleep!We should simply be delivered dead on the Bras d'Or; that is all. Tellus, gentle driver, is there no other way?

"Well, there's Jim Hughes, come over at midnight with a passenger fromBaddeck; he's in the hotel now; perhaps he'll take you. "

Our hope hung on Jim Hughes. The frowzy servant piloted us up to hissleeping-room. "Go right in, " said she; and we went in, according to thesimple custom of the country, though it was a bedroom that one would notenter except on business. Mr. Hughes did not like to be disturbed, buthe proved himself to be a man who could wake up suddenly, shake hishead, and transact business, --a sort of Napoleon, in fact. Mr. Hughesstared at the intruders for a moment, as if he meditated an assault. 

"Do you live in Baddeck?" we asked. 

"No; Hogamah, --half-way there. "

"Will you take us to Baddeck to-day?"

Mr. Hughes thought. He had intended to sleep--till noon. He had thenintended to go over the Judique Mountain and get a boy. But he wasdisposed to accommodate. Yes, for money--sum named--he would give up hisplans, and start for Baddeck in an hour. Distance, sixty miles. Herewas a man worth having; he could come to a decision before he was out ofbed. The bargain was closed. 

We would have closed any bargain to escape a Sunday in the Plaster Covehotel. There are different sorts of hotel uncleanliness. There isthe musty old inn, where the dirt has accumulated for years, and slowneglect has wrought a picturesque sort of dilapidation, the mouldinessof time, which has something to recommend it. But there is nothingattractive in new nastiness, in the vulgar union of smartness and filth. A dirty modern house, just built, a house smelling of poor whiskey andvile tobacco, its white paint grimy, its floors unclean, is ever so muchworse than an old inn that never pretended to be anything but a rookery. I say nothing against the hotel at Plaster Cove. In fact, I recommendit. There is a kind of harmony about it that I like. There is a harmonybetween the breakfast and the frowzy Gaelic cook we saw "sozzling" aboutin the kitchen. There is a harmony between the appearance of the houseand the appearance of the buxom young housekeeper who comes upon thescene later, her hair saturated with the fatty matter of the bear. Thetraveler will experience a pleasure in paying his bill and departing. 

Although Plaster Cove seems remote on the map, we found that we wereright in the track of the world's news there. It is the transfer stationof the Atlantic Cable Company, where it exchanges messages withthe Western Union. In a long wooden building, divided into two mainapartments, twenty to thirty operators are employed. At eight o'clockthe English force was at work receiving the noon messages from London. The American operators had not yet come on, for New York business wouldnot begin for an hour. Into these rooms is poured daily the news of theworld, and these young fellows toss it about as lightly as if it werehousehold gossip. It is a marvelous exchange, however, and we hadintended to make some reflections here upon the en rapport feeling, soto speak, with all the world, which we experienced while there; butour conveyance was waiting. We telegraphed our coming to Baddeck, anddeparted. For twenty-five cents one can send a dispatch to any partof the Dominion, except the region where the Western Union has still afoothold. 

Our conveyance was a one-horse wagon, with one seat. The horse waswell enough, but the seat was narrow for three people, and the entireestablishment had in it not much prophecy of Baddeck for that day. Butwe knew little of the power of Cape Breton driving. It became evidentthat we should reach Baddeck soon enough, if we could cling to thatwagon-seat. The morning sun was hot. The way was so uninteresting thatwe almost wished ourselves back in Nova Scotia. The sandy road wasbordered with discouraged evergreens, through which we had glimpses ofsand-drifted farms. If Baddeck was to be like this, we had come ona fool's errand. There were some savage, low hills, and the JudiqueMountain showed itself as we got away from the town. In this firststage, the heat of the sun, the monotony of the road, and the scarcityof sleep during the past thirty-six hours were all unfavorable to ourkeeping on the wagon-seat. We nodded separately, we nodded and reeled inunison. But asleep or awake, the driver drove like a son of Jehu. Suchdriving is the fashion on Cape Breton Island. Especially downhill, we made the most of it; if the horse was on a run, that was only aninducement to apply the lash; speed gave the promise of greater possiblespeed. The wagon rattled like a bark-mill; it swirled and leaped about, and we finally got the exciting impression that if the whole thingwent to pieces, we should somehow go on, --such was our impetus. Roundcorners, over ruts and stones, and uphill and down, we went jolting andswinging, holding fast to the seat, and putting our trust in things ingeneral. At the end of fifteen miles, we stopped at a Scotch farmhouse, where the driver kept a relay, and changed horse. 

The people were Highlanders, and spoke little English; we had struckthe beginning of the Gaelic settlement. From here to Hogamah we shouldencounter only the Gaelic tongue; the inhabitants are all Catholics. Very civil people, apparently, and living in a kind of niggardly thrift, such as the cold land affords. We saw of this family the old man, whohad come from Scotland fifty years ago, his stalwart son, six feet and ahalf high, maybe, and two buxom daughters, going to the hay-field, --goodsolid Scotch lassies, who smiled in English, but spoke only Gaelic. The old man could speak a little English, and was disposed to beboth communicative and inquisitive. He asked our business, names, andresidence. Of the United States he had only a dim conception, but hismind rather rested upon the statement that we lived "near Boston. " Hecomplained of the degeneracy of the times. All the young men had goneaway from Cape Breton; might get rich if they would stay and work thefarms. But no one liked to work nowadays. From life, we diverted thetalk to literature. We inquired what books they had. 

"Of course you all have the poems of Burns?"

"What's the name o' the mon?"

"Burns, Robert Burns. "

"Never heard tell of such a mon. Have heard of Robert Bruce. He was aScotchman. "

This was nothing short of refreshing, to find a Scotchman who had neverheard of Robert Burns! It was worth the whole journey to take thishonest man by the hand. How far would I not travel to talk with anAmerican who had never heard of George Washington!

The way was more varied during the next stage; we passed through somepleasant valleys and picturesque neighborhoods, and at length, windingaround the base of a wooded range, and crossing its point, we came upona sight that took all the sleep out of us. This was the famous Brasd'Or. 

The Bras d'Or is the most beautiful salt-water lake I have ever seen, and more beautiful than we had imagined a body of salt water could be. If the reader will take the map, he will see that two narrow estuaries, the Great and the Little Bras d'Or, enter the island of Cape Breton, onthe ragged northeast coast, above the town of Sydney, and flow in, atlength widening out and occupying the heart of the island. The waterseeks out all the low places, and ramifies the interior, running awayinto lovely bays and lagoons, leaving slender tongues of land andpicturesque islands, and bringing into the recesses of the land, to theremote country farms and settlements, the flavor of salt, and the fishand mollusks of the briny sea. There is very little tide at any time, sothat the shores are clean and sightly for the most part, like those offresh-water lakes. It has all the pleasantness of a fresh-water lake, with all the advantages of a salt one. In the streams which run into itare the speckled trout, the shad, and the salmon; out of its depths arehooked the cod and the mackerel, and in its bays fattens the oyster. This irregular lake is about a hundred miles long, if you measure itskillfully, and in some places ten miles broad; but so indented is it, that I am not sure but one would need, as we were informed, to ride athousand miles to go round it, following all its incursions into theland. The hills about it are never more than five or six hundredfeet high, but they are high enough for reposeful beauty, and offereverywhere pleasing lines. 

What we first saw was an inlet of the Bras d'Or, called, by the driver, Hogamah Bay. At its entrance were long, wooded islands, beyond whichwe saw the backs of graceful hills, like the capes of some poeticsea-coast. The bay narrowed to a mile in width where we came upon it, and ran several miles inland to a swamp, round the head of which we mustgo. Opposite was the village of Hogamah. I had my suspicions from thebeginning about this name, and now asked the driver, who was liberallyeducated for a driver, how he spelled "Hogamah. "

"Why-ko-ko-magh. Hogamah. "

Sometimes it is called Wykogamah. Thus the innocent traveler is misled. Along the Whykokomagh Bay we come to a permanent encampment of theMicmac Indians, --a dozen wigwams in the pine woods. Though lumber isplenty, they refuse to live in houses. The wigwams, however, aremore picturesque than the square frame houses of the whites. Built upconically of poles, with a hole in the top for the smoke to escape, andoften set up a little from the ground on a timber foundation, they areas pleasing to the eye as a Chinese or Turkish dwelling. They may becold in winter, but blessed be the tenacity of barbarism, which retainsthis agreeable architecture. The men live by hunting in the season, and the women support the family by making moccasins and baskets. TheseIndians are most of them good Catholics, and they try to go once a yearto mass and a sort of religious festival held at St. Peter's, wheretheir sins are forgiven in a yearly lump. 

At Whykokomagh, a neat fishing village of white houses, we stopped fordinner at the Inverness House. The house was very clean, and the tidylandlady gave us as good a dinner as she could of the inevitable greentea, toast, and salt fish. She was Gaelic, but Protestant, as thevillage is, and showed us with pride her Gaelic Bible and hymn-book. Apeaceful place, this Whykokomagh; the lapsing waters of Bras d'Or madea summer music all along the quiet street; the bay lay smiling with itsislands in front, and an amphitheater of hills rose behind. But for theline of telegraph poles one might have fancied he could have securityand repose here. 

We put a fresh pony into the shafts, a beast born with an everlastinguneasiness in his legs, and an amount of "go" in him which suited hisreckless driver. We no longer stood upon the order of our going; wewent. As we left the village, we passed a rocky hay-field, where theGaelic farmer was gathering the scanty yield of grass. A comely Indiangirl was stowing the hay and treading it down on the wagon. The driverhailed the farmer, and they exchanged Gaelic repartee which set all thehay-makers in a roar, and caused the Indian maid to darkly and sweetlybeam upon us. We asked the driver what he had said. He had only inquiredwhat the man would take for the load--as it stood! A joke is a joke downthis way. 

I am not about to describe this drive at length, in order that thereader may skip it; for I know the reader, being of like passion andfashion with him. From the time we first struck the Bras d'Or for thirtymiles we rode in constant sight of its magnificent water. Now we weretwo hundred feet above the water, on the hillside, skirting a point orfollowing an indentation; and now we were diving into a narrow valley, crossing a stream, or turning a sharp corner, but always with the Brasd'Or in view, the afternoon sun shining on it, softening the outlines ofits embracing hills, casting a shadow from its wooded islands. Sometimeswe opened on a broad water plain bounded by the Watchabaktchkt hills, and again we looked over hill after hill receding into the soft and hazyblue of the land beyond the great mass of the Bras d'Or. The reader cancompare the view and the ride to the Bay of Naples and the Cornice Road;we did nothing of the sort; we held on to the seat, prayed that theharness of the pony might not break, and gave constant expression toour wonder and delight. For a week we had schooled ourselves to expectnothing more from this wicked world, but here was an enchanting vision. 

The only phenomenon worthy the attention of any inquiring mind, in thiswhole record, I will now describe. As we drove along the side of ahill, and at least two hundred feet above the water, the road suddenlydiverged and took a circuit higher up. The driver said that was to avoida sink-hole in the old road, --a great curiosity, which it was worthwhile to examine. Beside the old road was a circular hole, which nippedout a part of the road-bed, some twenty-five feet in diameter, filledwith water almost to the brim, but not running over. The water was darkin color, and I fancied had a brackish taste. The driver said that a fewweeks before, when he came this way, it was solid ground where this wellnow opened, and that a large beech-tree stood there. When he returnednext day, he found this hole full of water, as we saw it, and the largetree had sunk in it. The size of the hole seemed to be determined by thereach of the roots of the tree. The tree had so entirely disappeared, that he could not with a long pole touch its top. Since then the waterhad neither subsided nor overflowed. The ground about was compactgravel. We tried sounding the hole with poles, but could make nothing ofit. The water seemed to have no outlet nor inlet; at least, it did notrise or fall. Why should the solid hill give way at this place, andswallow up a tree? and if the water had any connection with the lake, two hundred feet below and at some distance away, why didn't the waterrun out? Why should the unscientific traveler have a thing of this kindthrown in his way? The driver did not know. 

This phenomenon made us a little suspicious of the foundations of thisisland which is already invaded by the jealous ocean, and is anchored tothe continent only by the cable. 

The drive became more charming as the sun went down, and we saw thehills grow purple beyond the Bras d'Or. The road wound around lovelycoves and across low promontories, giving us new beauties at every turn. Before dark we had crossed the Middle River and the Big Baddeck, on longwooden bridges, which straggled over sluggish waters and long reachesof marsh, upon which Mary might have been sent to call the cattle home. These bridges were shaky and wanted a plank at intervals, but theyare in keeping with the enterprise of the country. As dusk came on, we crossed the last hill, and were bowling along by the still gleamingwater. Lights began to appear in infrequent farmhouses, and under coverof the gathering night the houses seemed to be stately mansions; and wefancied we were on a noble highway, lined with elegant suburban seasideresidences, and about to drive into a town of wealth and a port of greatcommerce. We were, nevertheless, anxious about Baddeck. What sort ofhaven were we to reach after our heroic (with the reader's permission)week of travel? Would the hotel be like that at Plaster Cove? Were ourthirty-six hours of sleepless staging to terminate in a night of miseryand a Sunday of discomfort?

We came into a straggling village; that we could see by the starlight. But we stopped at the door of a very unhotel-like appearing hotel. Ithad in front a flower-garden; it was blazing with welcome lights; itopened hospitable doors, and we were received by a family who expectedus. The house was a large one, for two guests; and we enjoyed the luxuryof spacious rooms, an abundant supper, and a friendly welcome; and, inshort, found ourselves at home. The proprietor of the Telegraph Houseis the superintendent of the land lines of Cape Breton, a Scotchman, of course; but his wife is a Newfoundland lady. We cannot violate thesanctity of what seemed like private hospitality by speaking freely ofthis lady and the lovely girls, her daughters, whose education has beenso admirably advanced in the excellent school at Baddeck; but we canconfidently advise any American who is going to Newfoundland, to get awife there, if he wants one at all. It is the only new article he canbring from the Provinces that he will not have to pay duty on. Andhere is a suggestion to our tariff-mongers for the "protection" of NewEngland women. 

The reader probably cannot appreciate the delicious sense of rest andof achievement which we enjoyed in this tidy inn, nor share theanticipations of undisturbed, luxurious sleep, in which we indulged aswe sat upon the upper balcony after supper, and saw the moon rise overthe glistening Bras d'Or and flood with light the islands and headlandsof the beautiful bay. Anchored at some distance from the shore wasa slender coasting vessel. The big red moon happened to come up justbehind it, and the masts and spars and ropes of the vessel came out, distinctly traced on the golden background, making such a night pictureas I once saw painted of a ship in a fiord of Norway. The scene wasenchanting. And we respected then the heretofore seemingly insaneimpulse that had driven us on to Baddeck. 

IV

 "He had no ill-will to the Scotch; for, if he had been conscious of that, he never would have thrown himself into the bosom of their country, and trusted to the protection of its remote inhabitants with a fearless confidence. " --BOSWELL'S JOHNSON. 

Although it was an open and flagrant violation of the Sabbath day as itis kept in Scotch Baddeck, our kind hosts let us sleep late on Sundaymorning, with no reminder that we were not sleeping the sleep of thejust. It was the charming Maud, a flitting sunbeam of a girl, who waitedto bring us our breakfast, and thereby lost the opportunity of goingto church with the rest of the family, --an act of gracious hospitalitywhich the tired travelers appreciated. 

The travelers were unable, indeed, to awaken into any feeling ofSabbatical straitness. The morning was delicious, --such a morning asnever visits any place except an island; a bright, sparkling morning, with the exhilaration of the air softened by the sea. What a day it wasfor idleness, for voluptuous rest, after the flight by day and nightfrom St. John! It was enough, now that the morning was fully openedand advancing to the splendor of noon, to sit upon the upper balcony, looking upon the Bras d'Or and the peaceful hills beyond, reposeful andyet sparkling with the air and color of summer, and inhale the balmyair. (We greatly need another word to describe good air, properlyheated, besides this overworked "balmy. ") Perhaps it might in someregions be considered Sabbath-keeping, simply to rest in such a soothingsituation, --rest, and not incessant activity, having been one of theoriginal designs of the day. 

But our travelers were from New England, and they were not willing tobe outdone in the matter of Sunday observances by such an out-of-the-wayand nameless place as Baddeck. They did not set themselves up asmissionaries to these benighted Gaelic people, to teach them by examplethat the notion of Sunday which obtained two hundred years ago inScotland had been modified, and that the sacredness of it had prettymuch disappeared with the unpleasantness of it. They rather lentthemselves to the humor of the hour, and probably by their demeanorencouraged the respect for the day on Cape Breton Island. Neither bybirth nor education were the travelers fishermen on Sunday, and theywere not moved to tempt the authorities to lock them up for droppinghere a line and there a line on the Lord's day. 

In fact, before I had finished my second cup of Maud-mixed coffee, mycompanion, with a little show of haste, had gone in search of the kirk, and I followed him, with more scrupulousness, as soon as I could withoutbreaking the day of rest. Although it was Sunday, I could not but noticethat Baddeck was a clean-looking village of white wooden houses, ofperhaps seven or eight hundred inhabitants; that it stretched alongthe bay for a mile or more, straggling off into farmhouses at each end, lying for the most part on the sloping curve of the bay. There were afew country-looking stores and shops, and on the shore three or fourrather decayed and shaky wharves ran into the water, and a few schoonerslay at anchor near them; and the usual decaying warehouses leaned aboutthe docks. A peaceful and perhaps a thriving place, but not a bustlingplace. As I walked down the road, a sailboat put out from the shoreand slowly disappeared round the island in the direction of the GrandNarrows. It had a small pleasure party on board. None of them weredrowned that day, and I learned at night that they were Roman Catholicsfrom Whykokornagh. 

The kirk, which stands near the water, and at a distance shows a prettywooden spire, is after the pattern of a New England meeting-house. WhenI reached it, the house was full and the service had begun. There wassomething familiar in the bareness and uncompromising plainnessand ugliness of the interior. The pews had high backs, with narrow, uncushioned seats. The pulpit was high, --a sort of theologicalfortification, --approached by wide, curving flights of stairs on eitherside. Those who occupied the near seats to the right and left of thepulpit had in front of them a blank board partition, and could notby any possibility see the minister, though they broke their necksbackwards over their high coat-collars. The congregation had a strikingresemblance to a country New England congregation of say twenty yearsago. The clothes they wore had been Sunday clothes for at least thatlength of time. 

Such clothes have a look of I know not what devout and painfulrespectability, that is in keeping with the worldly notion of rigidScotch Presbyterianism. One saw with pleasure the fresh and rosy-cheekedchildren of this strict generation, but the women of the audience werenot in appearance different from newly arrived and respectable Irishimmigrants. They wore a white cap with long frills over the forehead, and a black handkerchief thrown over it and hanging down the neck, --aquaint and not unpleasing disguise. 

The house, as I said, was crowded. It is the custom in this region togo to church, --for whole families to go, even the smallest children;and they not unfrequently walk six or seven miles to attend the service. There is a kind of merit in this act that makes up for the lack ofcertain other Christian virtues that are practiced elsewhere. Theservice was worth coming seven miles to participate in!--it was abouttwo hours long, and one might well feel as if he had performed a workof long-suffering to sit through it. The singing was strictlycongregational. Congregational singing is good (for those who like it)when the congregation can sing. This congregation could not sing, but itcould grind the Psalms of David powerfully. They sing nothing else butthe old Scotch version of the Psalms, in a patient and faithful longmeter. And this is regarded, and with considerable plausibility, as anact of worship. It certainly has small element of pleasure in it. Here is a stanza from Psalm xlv. , which the congregation, without anyinstrumental nonsense, went through in a dragging, drawling manner, andwith perfect individual independence as to time:

"Thine arrows sharply pierce the heart of th' enemies of the king, Andunder thy sub-jec-shi-on the people down do bring. "

The sermon was extempore, and in English with Scotch pronunciation; andit filled a solid hour of time. I am not a good judge of sermons, andthis one was mere chips to me; but my companion, who knows a sermonwhen he hears it, said that this was strictly theological, and Scotchtheology at that, and not at all expository. It was doubtless my faultthat I got no idea whatever from it. But the adults of the congregationappeared to be perfectly satisfied with it; at least they sat boltupright and nodded assent continually. The children all went to sleepunder it, without any hypocritical show of attention. To be sure, theday was warm and the house was unventilated. If the windows had beenopened so as to admit the fresh air from the Bras d'Or, I presumethe hard-working farmers and their wives would have resented such aninterference with their ordained Sunday naps, and the preacher's sermonwould have seemed more musty than it appeared to be in that congenialand drowsy air. Considering that only half of the congregation couldunderstand the preacher, its behavior was exemplary. 

After the sermon, a collection was taken up for the minister; and Inoticed that nothing but pennies rattled into the boxes, --a melancholysound for the pastor. This might appear niggardly on the part of theseScotch Presbyterians, but it is on principle that they put only a pennyinto the box; they say that they want a free gospel, and so far as theyare concerned they have it. Although the farmers about the Bras d'Or arewell-to-do they do not give their minister enough to keep his soul inhis Gaelic body, and his poor support is eked out by the contributionsof a missionary society. It was gratifying to learn that this wasnot from stinginess on the part of the people, but was due to theirreligious principle. It seemed to us that everybody ought to be good ina country where it costs next to nothing. 

When the service was over, about half of the people departed; therest remained in their seats and prepared to enter upon their Sabbathexercises. These latter were all Gaelic people, who had understoodlittle or nothing of the English service. The minister turned himselfat once into a Gaelic preacher and repeated in that language the longexercises of the morning. The sermon and perhaps the prayers werequite as enjoyable in Gaelic as in English, and the singing was a greatimprovement. It was of the same Psalms, but the congregation chantedthem in a wild and weird tone and manner, as wailing and barbarous tomodern ears as any Highland devotional outburst of two centuries ago. This service also lasted about two hours; and as soon as it was overthe faithful minister, without any rest or refreshment, organized theSunday-school, and it must have been half past three o'clock before thatwas over. And this is considered a day of rest. 

These Gaelic Christians, we were informed, are of a very old pattern;and some of them cling more closely to religious observances than tomorality. Sunday is nowhere observed with more strictness. The communityseems to be a very orderly and thrifty one, except upon solemn andstated occasions. One of these occasions is the celebration ofthe Lord's Supper; and in this the ancient Highland traditions arepreserved. The rite is celebrated not oftener than once a year byany church. It then invites the neighboring churches to partake withit, --the celebration being usually in the summer and early fall months. It has some of the characteristics of a "camp-meeting. " People come fromlong distances, and as many as two thousand and three thousand assembletogether. They quarter themselves without special invitation upon themembers of the inviting church. Sometimes fifty people will pounce uponone farmer, overflowing his house and his barn and swarming all abouthis premises, consuming all the provisions he has laid up for hisfamily, and all he can raise money to buy, and literally eating him outof house and home. Not seldom a man is almost ruined by one of thesereligious raids, --at least he is left with a debt of hundreds ofdollars. The multitude assembles on Thursday and remains over Sunday. There is preaching every day, but there is something besides. Whatevermay be the devotion of a part of the assembly, the four days are, in general, days of license, of carousing, of drinking, and of otherexcesses, which our informant said he would not particularize; wecould understand what they were by reading St. Paul's rebuke of theCorinthians for similar offenses. The evil has become so great andburdensome that the celebration of this sacred rite will have to bereformed altogether. 

Such a Sabbath quiet pervaded the street of Baddeck, that the fastdriving of the Gaels in their rattling, one-horse wagons, crowdedfull of men, women, and children, --released from their long sanctuaryprivileges, and going home, --was a sort of profanation of the day; andwe gladly turned aside to visit the rural jail of the town. 

Upon the principal street or road of Baddeck stands the dreadfulprison-house. It is a story and a quarter edifice, built of stone andsubstantially whitewashed; retired a little from the road, with a squareof green turf in front of it, I should have taken it for the residenceof the Dairyman's Daughter, but for the iron gratings at the lowerwindows. A more inviting place to spend the summer in, a vicious personcould not have. The Scotch keeper of it is an old, garrulous, obligingman, and keeps codfish tackle to loan. I think that if he had a prisonerwho was fond of fishing, he would take him with him on the bay inpursuit of the mackerel and the cod. If the prisoner were to takeadvantage of his freedom and attempt to escape, the jailer's feelingswould be hurt, and public opinion would hardly approve the prisoner'sconduct. 

The jail door was hospitably open, and the keeper invited us to enter. Having seen the inside of a good many prisons in our own country(officially), we were interested in inspecting this. It was a favorabletime for doing so, for there happened to be a man confined there, a circumstance which seemed to increase the keeper's feeling ofresponsibility in his office. The edifice had four rooms on theground-floor, and an attic sleeping-room above. Three of these rooms, which were perhaps twelve feet by fifteen feet, were cells; the thirdwas occupied by the jailer's family. The family were now also occupyingthe front cell, --a cheerful room commanding a view of the villagestreet and of the bay. A prisoner of a philosophic turn of mind, whohad committed some crime of sufficient magnitude to make him willing toretire from the world for a season and rest, might enjoy himself herevery well. 

The jailer exhibited his premises with an air of modesty. In the rearwas a small yard, surrounded by a board fence, in which the prisonertook his exercise. An active boy could climb over it, and anenterprising pig could go through it almost anywhere. The keeper saidthat he intended at the next court to ask the commissioners to buildthe fence higher and stop up the holes. Otherwise the jail was in goodcondition. Its inmates were few; in fact, it was rather apt to be empty:its occupants were usually prisoners for debt, or for some triflingbreach of the peace, committed under the influence of the liquor thatmakes one "unco happy. " Whether or not the people of the region havea high moral standard, crime is almost unknown; the jail itself is anevidence of primeval simplicity. The great incident in the old jailer'slife had been the rescue of a well-known citizen who was confined on acharge of misuse of public money. The keeper showed me a place in theouter wall of the front cell, where an attempt had been made to battera hole through. The Highland clan and kinsfolk of the alleged defaultercame one night and threatened to knock the jail in pieces if he was notgiven up. They bruised the wall, broke the windows, and finally smashedin the door and took their man away. The jailer was greatly excited atthis rudeness, and went almost immediately and purchased a pistol. Hesaid that for a time he did n't feel safe in the jail without it. Themob had thrown stones at the upper windows, in order to awaken him, andhad insulted him with cursing and offensive language. 

Having finished inspecting the building, I was unfortunately moved by Iknow not what national pride and knowledge of institutions superior tothis at home, to say, "This is a pleasant jail, but it doesn't look much like our greatprisons; we have as many as a thousand to twelve hundred men in some ofour institutions. "

"Ay, ay, I have heard tell, " said the jailer, shaking his head in pity, "it's an awfu' place, an awfu' place, --the United States. I suppose it'sthe wickedest country that ever was in the world. I don't know, --I don'tknow what is to become of it. It's worse than Sodom. There was thatdreadful war on the South; and I hear now it's very unsafe, full ofmurders and robberies and corruption. "

I did not attempt to correct this impression concerning my native land, for I saw it was a comfort to the simple jailer, but I tried to put athorn into him by saying, "Yes, we have a good many criminals, but the majority of them, themajority of those in jails, are foreigners; they come from Ireland, England, and the Provinces. "

But the old man only shook his head more solemnly, and persisted, "It'san awfu' wicked country. "

Before I came away I was permitted to have an interview with thesole prisoner, a very pleasant and talkative man, who was glad to seecompany, especially intelligent company who understood about things, hewas pleased to say. I have seldom met a more agreeable rogue, or one sophilosophical, a man of travel and varied experiences. He was a lively, robust Provincial of middle age, bullet-headed, with a mass of curlyblack hair, and small, round black eyes, that danced and sparkled withgood humor. He was by trade a carpenter, and had a work-bench in hiscell, at which he worked on week-days. He had been put in jail onsuspicion of stealing a buffalo-robe, and he lay in jail eight months, waiting for the judge to come to Baddeck on his yearly circuit. He didnot steal the robe, as he assured me, but it was found in his house, andthe judge gave him four months in jail, making a year in all, --a monthof which was still to serve. But he was not at all anxious for the endof his term; for his wife was outside. 

Jock, for he was familiarly so called, asked me where I was from. As Ihad not found it very profitable to hail from the United States, and hadfound, in fact, that the name United States did not convey any definiteimpression to the average Cape Breton mind, I ventured upon the boldassertion, for which I hope Bostonians will forgive me, that I was fromBoston. For Boston is known in the eastern Provinces. 

"Are you?" cried the man, delighted. "I've lived in Boston, myself. There's just been an awful fire near there. "

"Indeed!" I said; "I heard nothing of it. ' And I was startled with thepossibility that Boston had burned up again while we were crawling alongthrough Nova Scotia. 

"Yes, here it is, in the last paper. " The man bustled away and found hislate paper, and thrust it through the grating, with the inquiry, "Canyou read?"

Though the question was unexpected, and I had never thought beforewhether I could read or not, I confessed that I could probably makeout the meaning, and took the newspaper. The report of the fire "nearBoston" turned out to be the old news of the conflagration in Portland, Oregon!

Disposed to devote a portion of this Sunday to the reformation of thislively criminal, I continued the conversation with him. It seemed thathe had been in jail before, and was not unaccustomed to the life. He wasnot often lonesome; he had his workbench and newspapers, and it was aquiet place; on the whole, he enjoyed it, and should rather regret itwhen his time was up, a month from then. 

Had he any family?

"Oh, yes. When the census was round, I contributed more to it thananybody in town. Got a wife and eleven children. "

"Well, don't you think it would pay best to be honest, and live withyour family, out of jail? You surely never had anything but trouble fromdishonesty. "

"That's about so, boss. I mean to go on the square after this. But, yousee, " and here he began to speak confidentially, "things are fixed aboutso in this world, and a man's got to live his life. I tell you howit was. It all came about from a woman. I was a carpenter, had a goodtrade, and went down to St. Peter's to work. There I got acquainted witha Frenchwoman, --you know what Frenchwomen are, --and I had to marry her. The fact is, she was rather low family; not so very low, you know, butnot so good as mine. Well, I wanted to go to Boston to work at my trade, but she wouldn't go; and I went, but she would n't come to me, so in twoor three years I came back. A man can't help himself, you know, when hegets in with a woman, especially a Frenchwoman. Things did n't go verywell, and never have. I can't make much out of it, but I reckon a man 'sgot to live his life. Ain't that about so?"

"Perhaps so. But you'd better try to mend matters when you get out. Won't it seem rather good to get out and see your wife and familyagain?"

"I don't know. I have peace here. "

The question of his liberty seemed rather to depress this cheerful andvivacious philosopher, and I wondered what the woman could be from whosecompanionship the man chose to be protected by jail-bolts. I asked thelandlord about her, and his reply was descriptive and sufficient. Heonly said, "She's a yelper. "

Besides the church and the jail there are no public institutions inBaddeck to see on Sunday, or on any other day; but it has very goodschools, and the examination-papers of Maud and her elder sister woulddo credit to Boston scholars even. You would not say that the placewas stuffed with books, or overrun by lecturers, but it is an orderly, Sabbath-keeping, fairly intelligent town. Book-agents visit it withother commercial travelers, but the flood of knowledge, which is saidto be the beginning of sorrow, is hardly turned in that direction yet. I heard of a feeble lecture-course in Halifax, supplied by localcelebrities, some of them from St. John; but so far as I can see, thisis a virgin field for the platform philosophers under whose instructionswe have become the well-informed people we are. 

The peaceful jail and the somewhat tiresome church exhaust one'sopportunities for doing good in Baddeck on Sunday. There seemed to be noidlers about, to reprove; the occasional lounger on the skeleton wharveswas in his Sunday clothes, and therefore within the statute. No one, probably, would have thought of rowing out beyond the island to fish forcod, --although, as that fish is ready to bite, and his associationsare more or less sacred, there might be excuses for angling for himon Sunday, when it would be wicked to throw a line for another sort offish. My earliest recollections are of the codfish on the meeting-housespires in New England, --his sacred tail pointing the way the wind went. I did not know then why this emblem should be placed upon a house ofworship, any more than I knew why codfish-balls appeared always upon theSunday breakfast-table. But these associations invested this plebeianfish with something of a religious character, which he has never quitelost, in my mind. 

Having attributed the quiet of Baddeck on Sunday to religion, we did notknow to what to lay the quiet on Monday. But its peacefulness continued. I have no doubt that the farmers began to farm, and the traders totrade, and the sailors to sail; but the tourist felt that he had comeinto a place of rest. The promise of the red sky the evening before wasfulfilled in another royal day. There was an inspiration in the air thatone looks for rather in the mountains than on the sea-coast; it seemedlike some new and gentle compound of sea-air and land-air, which was theperfection of breathing material. In this atmosphere, which seemed toflow over all these Atlantic isles at this season, one endures a greatdeal of exertion with little fatigue; or he is content to sit still, andhas no feeling of sluggishness. Mere living is a kind of happiness, andthe easy-going traveler is satisfied with little to do and less to see, Let the reader not understand that we are recommending him to go toBaddeck. Far from it. The reader was never yet advised to go to anyplace, which he did not growl about if he took the advice and wentthere. If he discovers it himself, the case is different. We know toowell what would happen. A shoal of travelers would pour down upon CapeBreton, taking with them their dyspepsia, their liver-complaints, their"lights" derangements, their discontent, their guns and fishing-tackle, their big trunks, their desire for rapid travel, their enthusiasm aboutthe Gaelic language, their love for nature; and they would very likelydeclare that there was nothing in it. And the traveler would probably beright, so far as he is concerned. There are few whom it would pay to goa thousand miles for the sake of sitting on the dock at Baddeck whenthe sun goes down, and watching the purple lights on the islands andthe distant hills, the red flush in the horizon and on the lake, and thecreeping on of gray twilight. You can see all that as well elsewhere?I am not so sure. There is a harmony of beauty about the Bras d'Orat Baddeck which is lacking in many scenes of more pretension. No. Weadvise no person to go to Cape Breton. But if any one does go, he neednot lack occupation. If he is there late in the fall or early in thewinter, he may hunt, with good luck, if he is able to hit anything witha rifle, the moose and the caribou on that long wilderness peninsulabetween Baddeck and Aspy Bay, where the old cable landed. He may alsohave his fill of salmon fishing in June and July, especially on theMatjorie River. As late as August, at the time, of our visit, a hundredpeople were camped in tents on the Marjorie, wiling the salmon withthe delusive fly, and leading him to death with a hook in his nose. Thespeckled trout lives in all the streams, and can be caught whenever hewill bite. The day we went for him appeared to be an off-day, a sort ofholiday with him. 

There is one place, however, which the traveler must not fail to visit. That is St. Ann's Bay. He will go light of baggage, for he must hirea farmer to carry him from the Bras d'Or to the branch of St. Ann'sharbor, and a part of his journey will be in a row-boat. There is noride on the continent, of the kind, so full of picturesque beauty andconstant surprises as this around the indentations of St. Ann's harbor. From the high promontory where rests the fishing village of St. Ann, thetraveler will cross to English Town. High bluffs, bold shores, exquisitesea-views, mountainous ranges, delicious air, the society of a member ofthe Dominion Parliament, these are some of the things to be enjoyed atthis place. In point of grandeur and beauty it surpasses Mt. Desert, andis really the most attractive place on the whole line of the AtlanticCable. If the traveler has any sentiment in him, he will visit here, notwithout emotion, the grave of the Nova Scotia Giant, who recently laidhis huge frame along this, his native shore. A man of gigantic heightand awful breadth of shoulders, with a hand as big as a shovel, therewas nothing mean or little in his soul. While the visitor is gazing athis vast shoes, which now can be used only as sledges, he will betold that the Giant was greatly respected by his neighbors as a man ofability and simple integrity. He was not spoiled by his metropolitansuccesses, bringing home from his foreign triumphs the same quiet andfriendly demeanor he took away; he is almost the only example of asuccessful public man, who did not feel bigger than he was. He performedhis duty in life without ostentation, and returned to the home he lovedunspoiled by the flattery of constant public curiosity. He knew, havingtried both, how much better it is to be good than to be great. I shouldlike to have known him. I should like to know how the world looked tohim from his altitude. I should like to know how much food it took atone time to make an impression on him; I should like to know what effectan idea of ordinary size had in his capacious head. I should like tofeel that thrill of physical delight he must have experienced in merelyclosing his hand over something. It is a pity that he could not havebeen educated all through, beginning at a high school, and ending in auniversity. There was a field for the multifarious new education! If wecould have annexed him with his island, I should like to have seen himin the Senate of the United States. He would have made foreign nationsrespect that body, and fear his lightest remark like a declaration ofwar. And he would have been at home in that body of great men. Alas!he has passed away, leaving little influence except a good example ofgrowth, and a grave which is a new promontory on that ragged coast sweptby the winds of the untamed Atlantic. 

I could describe the Bay of St. Ann more minutely and graphically, if itwere desirable to do so; but I trust that enough has been said to makethe traveler wish to go there. I more unreservedly urge him to go there, because we did not go, and we should feel no responsibility for hisliking or disliking. He will go upon the recommendation of two gentlemenof taste and travel whom we met at Baddeck, residents of Maine andfamiliar with most of the odd and striking combinations of land andwater in coast scenery. When a Maine man admits that there is any placefiner than Mt. Desert, it is worth making a note of. 

On Monday we went a-fishing. Davie hitched to a rattling wagon somethingthat he called a horse, a small, rough animal with a great deal of "go"in him, if he could be coaxed to show it. For the first half-hourhe went mostly in a circle in front of the inn, moving indifferentlybackwards or forwards, perfectly willing to go down the road, butrefusing to start along the bay in the direction of Middle River. Ofcourse a crowd collected to give advice and make remarks, and womenappeared at the doors and windows of adjacent houses. Davie said he didn't care anything about the conduct of the horse, --he could start himafter a while, --but he did n't like to have all the town looking athim, especially the girls; and besides, such an exhibition affected themarket value of the horse. We sat in the wagon circling round and round, sometimes in the ditch and sometimes out of it, and Davie "whaled" thehorse with his whip and abused him with his tongue. It was a pleasantday, and the spectators increased. 

There are two ways of managing a balky horse. My companion knew one ofthem and I the other. His method is to sit quietly in the wagon, and atshort intervals throw a small pebble at the horse. The theory is thatthese repeated sudden annoyances will operate on a horse's mind, and hewill try to escape them by going on. The spectators supplied my friendwith stones, and he pelted the horse with measured gentleness. Probablythe horse understood this method, for he did not notice the attack atall. My plan was to speak gently to the horse, requesting him to go, andthen to follow the refusal by one sudden, sharp cut of the lash; to waita moment, and then repeat the operation. The dread of the coming lashafter the gentle word will start any horse. I tried this, and with acertain success. The horse backed us into the ditch, and would probablyhave backed himself into the wagon, if I had continued. When the animalwas at length ready to go, Davie took him by the bridle, ran by hisside, coaxed him into a gallop, and then, leaping in behind, lashedhim into a run, which had little respite for ten miles, uphill or down. Remonstrance on behalf of the horse was in vain, and it was only on thereturn home that this specimen Cape Breton driver began to reflect howhe could erase the welts from the horse's back before his father sawthem. 

Our way lay along the charming bay of the Bras d'Or, over the sprawlingbridge of the Big Baddeck, a black, sedgy, lonesome stream, to MiddleRiver, which debouches out of a scraggy country into a bayou with raggedshores, about which the Indians have encampments, and in which are theskeleton stakes of fish-weirs. Saturday night we had seen trout jumpingin the still water above the bridge. We followed the stream up two orthree miles to a Gaelic settlement of farmers. The river here flowsthrough lovely meadows, sandy, fertile, and sheltered by hills, --a greenEden, one of the few peaceful inhabited spots in the world. I couldconceive of no news coming to these Highlanders later than the defeatof the Pretender. Turning from the road, through a lane and crossing ashallow brook, we reached the dwelling of one of the original McGregors, or at least as good as an original. Mr. McGregor is a fiery-hairedScotchman and brother, cordial and hospitable, who entertained ourwayward horse, and freely advised us where the trout on his farm weremost likely to be found at this season of the year. 

It would be a great pleasure to speak well of Mr. McGregor's residence, but truth is older than Scotchmen, and the reader looks to us for truthand not flattery. Though the McGregor seems to have a good farm, hishouse is little better than a shanty, a rather cheerless place for the"woman" to slave away her uneventful life in, and bring up her scantilyclothed and semi-wild flock of children. And yet I suppose there mustbe happiness in it, --there always is where there are plenty of children, and milk enough for them. A white-haired boy who lacked adequatetrousers, small though he was, was brought forward by his mother todescribe a trout he had recently caught, which was nearly as long asthe boy himself. The young Gael's invention was rewarded by a present ofreal fish-hooks. We found here in this rude cabin the hospitality thatexists in all remote regions where travelers are few. Mrs. McGregorhad none of that reluctance, which women feel in all more civilizedagricultural regions, to "break a pan of milk, " and Mr. McGregor evenpressed us to partake freely of that simple drink. And he refused totake any pay for it, in a sort of surprise that such a simple act ofhospitality should have any commercial value. But travelers themselvesdestroy one of their chief pleasures. No doubt we planted the notionin the McGregor mind that the small kindnesses of life may be madeprofitable, by offering to pay for the milk; and probably the nexttravelers in that Eden will succeed in leaving some small change there, if they use a little tact. 

It was late in the season for trout. Perhaps the McGregor was aware ofthat when he freely gave us the run of the stream in his meadows, andpointed out the pools where we should be sure of good luck. It was acharming August day, just the day that trout enjoy lying in cool, deepplaces, and moving their fins in quiet content, indifferent to theskimming fly or to the proffered sport of rod and reel. The MiddleRiver gracefully winds through this Vale of Tempe, over a sandy bottom, sometimes sparkling in shallows, and then gently reposing in the broadbends of the grassy banks. It was in one of these bends, where thestream swirled around in seductive eddies, that we tried our skill. Weheroically waded the stream and threw our flies from the highest bank;but neither in the black water nor in the sandy shallows could any troutbe coaxed to spring to the deceitful leaders. We enjoyed the distinctionof being the only persons who had ever failed to strike trout in thatpool, and this was something. The meadows were sweet with the newly cutgrass, the wind softly blew down the river, large white clouds sailedhigh overhead and cast shadows on the changing water; but to all thesegentle influences the fish were insensible, and sulked in their coolretreats. At length in a small brook flowing into the Middle River wefound the trout more sociable; and it is lucky that we did so, for Ishould with reluctance stain these pages with a fiction; and yet thepublic would have just reason to resent a fish-story without any fishin it. Under a bank, in a pool crossed by a log and shaded by a tree, we found a drove of the speckled beauties at home, dozens of them a footlong, each moving lazily a little, their black backs relieved by theircolored fins. They must have seen us, but at first they showed no desirefor a closer acquaintance. To the red ibis and the white miller and thebrown hackle and the gray fly they were alike indifferent. Perhaps thelove for made flies is an artificial taste and has to be cultivated. These at any rate were uncivilized-trout, and it was only when wetook the advice of the young McGregor and baited our hooks with theangleworm, that the fish joined in our day's sport. They could notresist the lively wiggle of the worm before their very noses, and welifted them out one after an other, gently, and very much as if we werehooking them out of a barrel, until we had a handsome string. It mayhave been fun for them but it was not much sport for us. All the smallones the young McGregor contemptuously threw back into the water. Thesportsman will perhaps learn from this incident that there are plentyof trout in Cape Breton in August, but that the fishing is notexhilarating. 

The next morning the semi-weekly steamboat from Sydney came into thebay, and drew all the male inhabitants of Baddeck down to the wharf;and the two travelers, reluctant to leave the hospitable inn, and thepeaceful jail, and the double-barreled church, and all the loveliness ofthis reposeful place, prepared to depart. The most conspicuous person onthe steamboat was a thin man, whose extraordinary height was mademore striking by his very long-waisted black coat and his very shortpantaloons. He was so tall that he had a little difficulty in keepinghis balance, and his hat was set upon the back of his head to preservehis equilibrium. He had arrived at that stage when people affected ashe was are oratorical, and overflowing with information and good-nature. With what might in strict art be called an excess of expletives, heexplained that he was a civil engineer, that he had lost his rubbercoat, that he was a great traveler in the Provinces, and he seemed tofind a humorous satisfaction in reiterating the fact of his familiaritywith Painsec junction. It evidently hovered in the misty horizon of hismind as a joke, and he contrived to present it to his audience in thatlight. From the deck of the steamboat he addressed the town, and then, to the relief of the passengers, he decided to go ashore. When the boatdrew away on her voyage we left him swaying perilously near the edgeof the wharf, good-naturedly resenting the grasp of his coat-tail bya friend, addressing us upon the topics of the day, and wishing usprosperity and the Fourth of July. His was the only effort in the natureof a public lecture that we heard in the Provinces, and we could notjudge of his ability without hearing a "course. "

Perhaps it needed this slight disturbance, and the contrast of thishazy mind with the serene clarity of the day, to put us into the mostcomplete enjoyment of our voyage. Certainly, as we glided out upon thesummer waters and began to get the graceful outlines of the wideningshores, it seemed as if we had taken passage to the Fortunate Islands. 

V

 "One town, one country, is very like another;... There are indeed minute discriminations both of places and manners, which, perhaps, are not wanting of curiosity, but which a traveller seldom stays long enough to investigate and compare. "--DR. JOHNSON. 

There was no prospect of any excitement or of any adventure on thesteamboat from Baddeck to West Bay, the southern point of the Bras d'Or. Judging from the appearance of the boat, the dinner might have been anexperiment, but we ran no risks. It was enough to sit on deck forward ofthe wheel-house, and absorb, by all the senses, the delicious day. Withsuch weather perpetual and such scenery always present, sin in thisworld would soon become an impossibility. Even towards the passengersfrom Sydney, with their imitation English ways and little insulargossip, one could have only charity and the most kindly feeling. 

The most electric American, heir of all the nervous diseases of all theages, could not but find peace in this scene of tranquil beauty, andsail on into a great and deepening contentment. Would the voyage couldlast for an age, with the same sparkling but tranquil sea, and the sameenvironment of hills, near and remote! The hills approached and fellaway in lines of undulating grace, draped with a tender color whichhelped to carry the imagination beyond the earth. At this point thenarrative needs to flow into verse, but my comrade did not feel likeanother attempt at poetry so soon after that on the Gut of Canso. Aman cannot always be keyed up to the pitch of production, though hisemotions may be highly creditable to him. But poetry-making in thesedays is a good deal like the use of profane language, --often without theleast provocation. 

Twelve miles from Baddeck we passed through the Barra Strait, or theGrand Narrows, a picturesque feature in the Bras d'Or, and came into itswidest expanse. At the Narrows is a small settlement with a flag-staffand a hotel, and roads leading to farmhouses on the hills. Here is aCatholic chapel; and on shore a fat padre was waiting in his wagonfor the inevitable priest we always set ashore at such a place. The missionary we landed was the young father from Arichat, and inappearance the pleasing historical Jesuit. Slender is too corpulent aword to describe his thinness, and his stature was primeval. Envelopedin a black coat, the skirts of which reached his heels, and surmountedby a black hat with an enormous brim, he had the form of an eleganttoadstool. The traveler is always grateful for such figures, and is notdisposed to quarrel with the faith which preserves so much of the uglypicturesque. A peaceful farming country this, but an unremunerativefield, one would say, for the colporteur and the book-agent; and wintermust inclose it in a lonesome seclusion. 

The only other thing of note the Bras d'Or offered us before we reachedWest Bay was the finest show of medusm or jelly-fish that could beproduced. At first there were dozens of these disk-shaped, transparentcreatures, and then hundreds, starring the water like margueritessprinkled on a meadow, and of sizes from that of a teacup to adinner-plate. We soon ran into a school of them, a convention, a herdas extensive as the vast buffalo droves on the plains, a collection asthick as clover-blossoms in a field in June, miles of them, apparently;and at length the boat had to push its way through a mass of them whichcovered the water like the leaves of the pondlily, and filled the deepsfar down with their beautiful contracting and expanding forms. I did notsuppose there were so many jelly-fishes in all the world. What a repastthey would have made for the Atlantic whale we did not see, and whatinward comfort it would have given him to have swum through them onceor twice with open mouth! Our delight in this wondrous spectacle didnot prevent this generous wish for the gratification of the whale. Itis probably a natural human desire to see big corporations swallow uplittle ones. 

At the West Bay landing, where there is nothing whatever attractive, we found a great concourse of country wagons and clamorous drivers, totransport the passengers over the rough and uninteresting nine miles toPort Hawkesbury. Competition makes the fare low, but nothing makes theride entertaining. The only settlement passed through has the promisingname of River Inhabitants, but we could see little river and lessinhabitants; country and people seem to belong to that commonplace orderout of which the traveler can extract nothing amusing, instructive, ordisagreeable; and it was a great relief when we came over the last hilland looked down upon the straggling village of Port Hawkesbury and thewinding Gut of Canso. 

One cannot but feel a respect for this historical strait, on accountof the protection it once gave our British ancestors. Smollett makesa certain Captain C----tell this anecdote of George II. And hisenlightened minister, the Duke of Newcastle: "In the beginning of thewar this poor, half-witted creature told me, in a great fright, thatthirty thousand French had marched from Acadie to Cape Breton. 'Wheredid they find transports?' said I. 'Transports!' cried he; 'I tell you, they marched by land. ' By land to the island of Cape Breton?' 'What! isCape Breton an island?' 'Certainly. ' 'Ha! are you sure of that?' When Ipointed it out on the map, he examined it earnestly with his spectacles;then taking me in his arms, 'My dear C----!' cried he, you always bringus good news. I'll go directly and tell the king that Cape Breton is anisland. '"

Port Hawkesbury is not a modern settlement, and its public house isone of the irregular, old-fashioned, stuffy taverns, with low rooms, chintz-covered lounges, and fat-cushioned rocking-chairs, the decay anduntidiness of which are not offensive to the traveler. It has a lowback porch looking towards the water and over a mouldy garden, damp andunseemly. Time was, no doubt, before the rush of travel rubbed off thebloom of its ancient hospitality and set a vigilant man at the doorof the dining-room to collect pay for meals, that this was an abode ofcomfort and the resort of merry-making and frolicsome provincials. Onthis now decaying porch no doubt lovers sat in the moonlight, and vowedby the Gut of Canso to be fond of each other forever. The travelercannot help it if he comes upon the traces of such sentiment. Therelingered yet in the house an air of the hospitable old time; the swiftwillingness of the waiting-maids at table, who were eager that we shouldmiss none of the home-made dishes, spoke of it; and as we were notobliged to stay in the hotel and lodge in its six-by-four bedrooms, wecould afford to make a little romance about its history. 

While we were at supper the steamboat arrived from Pictou. We hastenedon board, impatient for progress on our homeward journey. But haste wasnot called for. The steamboat would not sail on her return till morning. No one could tell why. It was not on account of freight to take in ordischarge; it was not in hope of more passengers, for they were all onboard. But if the boat had returned that night to Pictou, some of thepassengers might have left her and gone west by rail, instead of wastingtwo, or three days lounging through Northumberland Sound and idling inthe harbors of Prince Edward Island. If the steamboat would leave atmidnight, we could catch the railway train at Pictou. Probably theofficials were aware of this, and they preferred to have our companyto Shediac. We mention this so that the tourist who comes this way maylearn to possess his soul in patience, and know that steamboats are notrun for his accommodation, but to give him repose and to familiarizehim with the country. It is almost impossible to give the unscientificreader an idea of the slowness of travel by steamboat in these regions. Let him first fix his mind on the fact that the earth moves throughspace at a speed of more than sixty-six thousand miles an hour. This isa speed eleven hundred times greater than that of the most rapidexpress trains. If the distance traversed by a locomotive in an hour isrepresented by one tenth of an inch, it would need a line nine feet longto indicate the corresponding advance of the earth in the same time. But a tortoise, pursuing his ordinary gait without a wager, moves elevenhundred times slower than an express train. We have here a basis ofcomparison with the provincial steamboats. If we had seen a tortoisestart that night from Port Hawkesbury for the west, we should havedesired to send letters by him. 

In the early morning we stole out of the romantic strait, and bybreakfast-time we were over St. George's Bay and round his cape, andmaking for the harbor of Pictou. During the forenoon something in thenature of an excursion developed itself on the steamboat, but it had sofew of the bustling features of an American excursion that I thoughtit might be a pilgrimage. Yet it doubtless was a highly developedprovincial lark. For a certain portion of the passengers had theunmistakable excursion air: the half-jocular manner towards eachother, the local facetiousness which is so offensive to uninterestedfellow-travelers, that male obsequiousness about ladies' shawls andreticules, the clumsy pretense of gallantry with each other's wives, the anxiety about the company luggage and the company health. It becamepainfully evident presently that it was an excursion, for we heardsinging of that concerted and determined kind that depresses the spiritsof all except those who join in it. The excursion had assembled on thelee guards out of the wind, and was enjoying itself in an abandon ofserious musical enthusiasm. We feared at first that there might be somelevity in this performance, and that the unrestrained spirit of theexcursion was working itself off in social and convivial songs. But itwas not so. The singers were provided with hymn-and-tune books, andwhat they sang they rendered in long meter and with a most dolefulearnestness. It is agreeable to the traveler to see that the provincialsdisport themselves within bounds, and that an hilarious spree here doesnot differ much in its exercises from a prayer-meeting elsewhere. Butthe excursion enjoyed its staid dissipation amazingly. 

It is pleasant to sail into the long and broad harbor of Pictou on asunny day. On the left is the Halifax railway terminus, and three riversflow into the harbor from the south. On the right the town of Pictou, with its four thousand inhabitants, lies upon the side of the ridge thatruns out towards the Sound. The most conspicuous building in it as weapproach is the Roman Catholic church; advanced to the edge of the townand occupying the highest ground, it appears large, and its gilt crossis a beacon miles away. Its builders understood the value of a strikingsituation, a dominant position; it is a part of the universal policy ofthis church to secure the commanding places for its houses of worship. We may have had no prejudices in favor of the Papal temporality when welanded at Pictou, but this church was the only one which impressed us, and the only one we took the trouble to visit. We had ample time, forthe steamboat after its arduous trip needed rest, and remained somehours in the harbor. Pictou is said to be a thriving place, and itsstreets have a cindery appearance, betokening the nearness of coal minesand the presence of furnaces. But the town has rather a cheap and rustylook. Its streets rise one above another on the hillside, and, excepta few comfortable cottages, we saw no evidences of wealth in thedwellings. The church, when we reached it, was a commonplace brickstructure, with a raw, unfinished interior, and weedy and untidysurroundings, so that our expectation of sitting on the inviting hilland enjoying the view was not realized; and we were obliged to descendto the hot wharf and wait for the ferry-boat to take us to the steamboatwhich lay at the railway terminus opposite. It is the most unfair thingin the world for the traveler, without an object or any interest in thedevelopment of the country, on a sleepy day in August, to express anyopinion whatever about such a town as Pictou. But we may say of it, without offence, that it occupies a charming situation, and may have aninteresting future; and that a person on a short acquaintance can leaveit without regret. 

By stopping here we had the misfortune to lose our excursion, a lossthat was soothed by no know ledge of its destination or hope of seeingit again, and a loss without a hope is nearly always painful. Going outof the harbor we encounter Pictou Island and Light, and presently seethe low coast of Prince Edward Island, --a coast indented and agreeableto those idly sailing along it, in weather that seemed let down out ofheaven and over a sea that sparkled but still slept in a summerquiet. When fate puts a man in such a position and relieves him of allresponsibility, with a book and a good comrade, and liberty to makesarcastic remarks upon his fellow-travelers, or to doze, or to lookover the tranquil sea, he may be pronounced happy. And I believe that mycompanion, except in the matter of the comrade, was happy. But I couldnot resist a worrying anxiety about the future of the British Provinces, which not even the remembrance of their hostility to us during ourmortal strife with the Rebellion could render agreeable. For I couldnot but feel that the ostentatious and unconcealable prosperity of "theStates" over-shadows this part of the continent. And it was for once invain that I said, "Have we not a common land and a common literature, and no copyright, and a common pride in Shakespeare and Hannah Moreand Colonel Newcome and Pepys's Diary?" I never knew this sort ofconsolation to fail before; it does not seem to answer in the Provincesas well as it does in England. 

New passengers had come on board at Pictou, new and hungry, and notall could get seats for dinner at the first table. Notwithstanding thesupposed traditionary advantage of our birthplace, we were unableto dispatch this meal with the celerity of our fellow-voyagers, andconsequently, while we lingered over our tea, we found ourselves at thesecond table. And we were rewarded by one of those pleasing sights thatgo to make up the entertainment of travel. There sat down opposite tous a fat man whose noble proportions occupied at the board the spaceof three ordinary men. His great face beamed delight the moment he camenear the table. He had a low forehead and a wide mouth and smalleyes, and an internal capacity that was a prophecy of famine to hisfellow-men. But a more good-natured, pleased animal you may never see. Seating himself with unrepressed joy, he looked at us, and a great smileof satisfaction came over his face, that plainly said, "Now my time hascome. " Every part of his vast bulk said this. Most generously, by hisfriendly glances, he made us partners in his pleasure. With a Napoleonicgrasp of his situation, he reached far and near, hauling this and thatdish of fragments towards his plate, giving orders at the same time, andthrowing into his cheerful mouth odd pieces of bread and pickles in anunstudied and preliminary manner. When he had secured everything withinhis reach, he heaped his plate and began an attack upon the contents, using both knife and fork with wonderful proficiency. The man'sgood-humor was contagious, and he did not regard our amusement asdifferent in kind from his enjoyment. The spectacle was worth a journeyto see. Indeed, its aspect of comicality almost overcame its grossness, and even when the hero loaded in faster than he could swallow, and wasobliged to drop his knife for an instant to arrange matters in his mouthwith his finger, it was done with such a beaming smile that a pig wouldnot take offense at it. The performance was not the merely vulgar thingit seems on paper, but an achievement unique and perfect, which one isnot likely to see more than once in a lifetime. It was only when theman left the table that his face became serious. We had seen him at hisbest. 

Prince Edward Island, as we approached it, had a pleasing aspect, andnothing of that remote friendlessness which its appearance on the mapconveys to one; a warm and sandy land, in a genial climate, withoutfogs, we are informed. In the winter it has ice communication withNova Scotia, from Cape Traverse to Cape Tormentine, --the route of thesubmarine cable. The island is as flat from end to end as a floor. Whenit surrendered its independent government and joined the Dominion, oneof the conditions of the union was that the government should build arailway the whole length of it. This is in process of construction, andthe portion that is built affords great satisfaction to the islanders, a railway being one of the necessary adjuncts of civilization; but thatthere was great need of it, or that it would pay, we were unable tolearn. 

We sailed through Hillsborough Bay and a narrow strait to Charlottetown, the capital, which lies on a sandy spit of land between two rivers. Ourleisurely steamboat tied up here in the afternoon and spent the night, giving the passengers an opportunity to make thorough acquaintance withthe town. It has the appearance of a place from which something hasdeparted; a wooden town, with wide and vacant streets, and the air ofwaiting for something. Almost melancholy is the aspect of its freestonecolonial building, where once the colonial legislature held itsmomentous sessions, and the colonial governor shed the delightful aromaof royalty. The mansion of the governor--now vacant of pomp, becausethat official does not exist--is a little withdrawn from the town, secluded among trees by the water-side. It is dignified with a windingapproach, but is itself only a cheap and decaying house. On our way toit we passed the drill-shed of the local cavalry, which we mistook for askating-rink, and thereby excited the contempt of an old lady of whomwe inquired. Tasteful residences we did not find, nor that attentionto flowers and gardens which the mild climate would suggest. Indeed, we should describe Charlottetown as a place where the hollyhock in thedooryard is considered an ornament. A conspicuous building is a largemarket-house shingled all over (as many of the public buildings are), and this and other cheap public edifices stand in the midst of a largesquare, which is surrounded by shabby shops for the most part. The townis laid out on a generous scale, and it is to be regretted that we couldnot have seen it when it enjoyed the glory of a governor and court andministers of state, and all the paraphernalia of a royal parliament. That the productive island, with its system of free schools, is about toenter upon a prosperous career, and that Charlottetown is soon to becomea place of great activity, no one who converses with the natives candoubt; and I think that even now no traveler will regret spending anhour or two there; but it is necessary to say that the rosy inducementsto tourists to spend the summer there exist only in the guide-books. 

We congratulated ourselves that we should at least have a night ofdelightful sleep on the steamboat in the quiet of this secluded harbor. But it was wisely ordered otherwise, to the end that we should improveour time by an interesting study of human nature. Towards midnight, whenthe occupants of all the state-rooms were supposed to be in profoundslumber, there was an invasion of the small cabin by a large andloquacious family, who had been making an excursion on the islandrailway. This family might remind an antiquated novel-reader of thedelightful Brangtons in "Evelina;" they had all the vivacity of thepleasant cousins of the heroine of that story, and the same generositytowards the public in regard to their family affairs. Before they hadbeen in the cabin an hour, we felt as if we knew every one of them. There was a great squabble as to where and how they should sleep; andwhen this was over, the revelations of the nature of their beds andtheir peculiar habits of sleep continued to pierce the thin dealpartitions of the adjoining state-rooms. When all the possibletrivialities of vacant minds seemed to have been exhausted, therefollowed a half-hour of "Goodnight, pa; good-night, ma;" "Goodnight, pet;" and "Are you asleep, ma?" "No. " "Are you asleep, pa?" "No; go tosleep, pet. " "I'm going. Good-night, pa; good-night, ma. " "Goodnight, pet. " "This bed is too short. " "Why don't you take the other?" "I'm allfixed now. " "Well, go to sleep; good-night. " "Good-night, ma; goodnight, pa, "--no answer. "Good-night, pa. " "Goodnight, pet. " "Ma, are youasleep?" "Most. " "This bed is all lumps; I wish I'd gone downstairs. ""Well, pa will get up. " "Pa, are you asleep?" "Yes. " "It's better now;good-night, pa. " "Goodnight, pet. " "Good-night, ma. " "Good-night, pet. "And so on in an exasperating repetition, until every passenger on theboat must have been thoroughly informed of the manner in which thisinteresting family habitually settled itself to repose. 

Half an hour passes with only a languid exchange of family feeling, andthen: "Pa?" "Well, pet. " "Don't call us in the morning; we don't wantany breakfast; we want to sleep. " "I won't. " "Goodnight, pa; goodnight, ma. Ma?" "What is it, dear?" "Good-night, ma. " "Good-night, pet. "Alas for youthful expectations! Pet shared her stateroom with a youngcompanion, and the two were carrying on a private dialogue duringthis public performance. Did these young ladies, after keeping all thepassengers of the boat awake till near the summer dawn, imagine thatit was in the power of pa and ma to insure them the coveted forenoonslumber, or even the morning snooze? The travelers, tossing in theirstate-room under this domestic infliction, anticipated the morningwith grim satisfaction; for they had a presentiment that it would beimpossible for them to arise and make their toilet without waking upevery one in their part of the boat, and aggravating them to such anextent that they would stay awake. And so it turned out. The familygrumbling at the unexpected disturbance was sweeter to the travelersthan all the exchange of family affection during the night. 

No one, indeed, ought to sleep beyond breakfast-time while sailing alongthe southern coast of Prince Edward Island. It was a sparkling morning. When we went on deck we were abreast Cape Traverse; the faint outline ofNova Scotia was marked on the horizon, and New Brunswick thrust out CapeTomentine to greet us. On the still, sunny coasts and the placid sea, and in the serene, smiling sky, there was no sign of the coming tempestwhich was then raging from Hatteras to Cape Cod; nor could one imaginethat this peaceful scene would, a few days later, be swept by a fearfultornado, which should raze to the ground trees and dwelling-houses, and strew all these now inviting shores with wrecked ships and drowningsailors, --a storm which has passed into literature in "The Lord's-DayGale" of Mr Stedman. 

Through this delicious weather why should the steamboat hasten, in orderto discharge its passengers into the sweeping unrest of continentaltravel? Our eagerness to get on, indeed, almost melted away, and we werescarcely impatient at all when the boat lounged into Halifax Bay, pastSalutation Point and stopped at Summerside. This little seaport isintended to be attractive, and it would give these travelers greatpleasure to describe it, if they could at all remember how it looks. Butit is a place that, like some faces, makes no sort of impression onthe memory. We went ashore there, and tried to take an interest in theship-building, and in the little oysters which the harbor yields; butwhether we did take an interest or not has passed out of memory. Asmall, unpicturesque, wooden town, in the languor of a provincialsummer; why should we pretend an interest in it which we did not feel?It did not disturb our reposeful frame of mind, nor much interfere withour enjoyment of the day. 

On the forward deck, when we were under way again, amid a group readingand nodding in the sunshine, we found a pretty girl with a companion anda gentleman, whom we knew by intuition as the "pa" of the pretty girland of our night of anguish. The pa might have been a clergyman in asmall way, or the proprietor of a female boarding-school; at any rate, an excellent and improving person to travel with, whose willingness toimpart information made even the travelers long for a pa. It was nopart of his plan of this family summer excursion, upon which he had comeagainst his wish, to have any hour of it wasted in idleness. He heldan open volume in his hand, and was questioning his daughter on itscontents. He spoke in a loud voice, and without heeding the timidity ofthe young lady, who shrank from this public examination, and begged herfather not to continue it. The parent was, however, either proud of hisdaughter's acquirements, or he thought it a good opportunity to shameher out of her ignorance. Doubtless, we said, he is instructing herupon the geography of the region we are passing through, its earlysettlement, the romantic incidents of its history when French andEnglish fought over it, and so is making this a tour of profit as wellas pleasure. But the excellent and pottering father proved to be nodisciple of the new education. Greece was his theme and he got hisquestions, and his answers too, from the ancient school history in hishand. The lesson went on:

"Who was Alcibiades?

"A Greek. "

"Yes. When did he flourish?"

"I can't think. "

"Can't think? What was he noted for?"

"I don't remember. "

"Don't remember? I don't believe you studied this. "

"Yes, I did. "

"Well, take it now, and study it hard, and then I'll hear you again. "

The young girl, who is put to shame by this open persecution, begins tostudy, while the peevish and small tyrant, her pa, is nagging her withsuch soothing remarks as, "I thought you'd have more respect for yourpride;" "Why don't you try to come up to the expectations of yourteacher?" By and by the student thinks she has "got it, " and the publicexposition begins again. The date at which Alcibiades "flourished" wasascertained, but what he was "noted for" got hopelessly mixed with whatThemistocles was "noted for. " The momentary impression that the battleof Marathon was fought by Salamis was soon dissipated, and the questionscontinued. 

"What did Pericles do to the Greeks?"

"I don't know. "

"Elevated 'em, did n't he? Did n't he elevate Pem?"

"Yes, sir. "

"Always remember that; you want to fix your mind on leading things. Remember that Pericles elevated the Greeks. Who was Pericles?

"He was a"--

"Was he a philosopher?"

"Yes, sir. "

"No, he was n't. Socrates was a philosopher. When did he flourish?"

And so on, and so on. 

O my charming young countrywomen, let us never forget that Pericleselevated the Greeks; and that he did it by cultivating the nationalgenius, the national spirit, by stimulating art and oratory and thepursuit of learning, and infusing into all society a higher intellectualand social life! Pa was this day sailing through seas and by shores thathad witnessed some of the most stirring and romantic events in the earlyhistory of our continent. He might have had the eager attention of hisbright daughter if he had unfolded these things to her in the midst ofthis most living landscape, and given her an "object lesson" that shewould not have forgotten all her days, instead of this pottering overnames and dates that were as dry and meaningless to him as they wereuninteresting to his daughter. At least, O Pa, Educator of Youth, if youare insensible to the beauty of these summer isles and indifferent totheir history, and your soul is wedded to ancient learning, why do younot teach your family to go to sleep when they go to bed, as the classicGreeks used to?

Before the travelers reached Shediac, they had leisure to ruminate uponthe education of American girls in the schools set apart for them, andto conjecture how much they are taught of the geography and history ofAmerica, or of its social and literary growth; and whether, when theytravel on a summer tour like this, these coasts have any historicallight upon them, or gain any interest from the daring and chivalricadventurers who played their parts here so long ago. We did not hearpa ask when Madame de la Tour "flourished, " though "flourish" thatdetermined woman did, in Boston as well as in the French provinces. Inthe present woman revival, may we not hope that the heroic women of ourcolonial history will have the prominence that is their right, and thatwoman's achievements will assume their proper place in affairs? Whenwomen write history, some of our popular men heroes will, we trust, be made to acknowledge the female sources of their wisdom and theircourage. But at present women do not much affect history, and they aremore indifferent to the careers of the noted of their own sex than menare. 

We expected to approach Shediac with a great deal of interest. It hadbeen, when we started, one of the most prominent points in our projectedtour. It was the pivot upon which, so to speak, we expected to swingaround the Provinces. Upon the map it was so attractive, that we onceresolved to go no farther than there. It once seemed to us that, if weever reached it, we should be contented to abide there, in a place soremote, in a port so picturesque and foreign. But returning from thereal east, our late interest in Shediac seemed unaccountable to us. Firmly resolved as I was to note our entrance into the harbor, I couldnot keep the place in mind; and while we were in our state-room andbefore we knew it, the steamboat Jay at the wharf. Shediac appearedto be nothing but a wharf with a railway train on it, and a few shantybuildings, a part of them devoted to the sale of whiskey and to cheaplodgings. This landing, however, is called Point du Chene, and thevillage of Shediac is two or three miles distant from it; we had apleasant glimpse of it from the car windows, and saw nothing in itssituation to hinder its growth. The country about it is perfectly level, and stripped of its forests. At Painsec Junction we waited for thetrain from Halifax, and immediately found ourselves in the whirl ofintercolonial travel. Why people should travel here, or why they shouldbe excited about it, we could not see; we could not overcome a feelingof the unreality of the whole thing; but yet we humbly knew that we hadno right to be otherwise than awed by the extraordinary intercolonialrailway enterprise and by the new life which it is infusing intothe Provinces. We are free to say, however, that nothing can beless interesting than the line of this road until it strikes theKennebeckasis River, when the traveler will be called upon to admirethe Sussex Valley and a very fair farming region, which he would like topraise if it were not for exciting the jealousy of the "Garden of NovaScotia. " The whole land is in fact a garden, but differing somewhat fromthe Isle of Wight. 

In all travel, however, people are more interesting than land, and soit was at this time. As twilight shut down upon the valley of theKennebeckasis, we heard the strident voice of pa going on with theGrecian catechism. Pa was unmoved by the beauties of Sussex or by thecolors of the sunset, which for the moment made picturesque the scraggyevergreens on the horizon. His eyes were with his heart, and that was inSparta. Above the roar of the car-wheels we heard his nagging inquiries. 

"What did Lycurgus do then?"

Answer not audible. 

"No. He made laws. Who did he make laws for?"

"For the Greeks. "

"He made laws for the Lacedemonians. Who was another great lawgiver?"

"It was--it was--Pericles. "

"No, it was n't. It was Solon. Who was Solon?"

"Solon was one of the wise men of Greece. "

"That's right. When did he flourish?"

When the train stops at a station the classics continue, and thestudious group attracts the attention of the passengers. Pa is wellpleased, but not so the young lady, who beseechingly says, "Pa, everybody can hear us. "

"You would n't care how much they heard, if you knew it, " replies thisaccomplished devotee of learning. 

In another lull of the car-wheels we find that pa has skipped over toMarathon; and this time it is the daughter who is asking a question. 

"Pa, what is a phalanx?"

"Well, a phalanx--it's a--it's difficult to define a phalanx. It's astretch of men in one line, --a stretch of anything in a line. When didAlexander flourish?"

This domestic tyrant had this in common with the rest of us, that he wasmuch better at asking questions than at answering them. It certainly wasnot our fault that we were listeners to his instructive struggles withancient history, nor that we heard his petulant complaining to his cowedfamily, whom he accused of dragging him away on this summer trip. We areonly grateful to him, for a more entertaining person the traveler doesnot often see. It was with regret that we lost sight of him at St. John. 

Night has settled upon New Brunswick and upon ancient Greece before wereach the Kennebeckasis Bay, and we only see from the car windowsdimly a pleasant and fertile country, and the peaceful homes of thriftypeople. While we are running along the valley and coming under theshadow of the hill whereon St. John sits, with a regal outlook upon amost variegated coast and upon the rising and falling of the great tidesof Fundy, we feel a twinge of conscience at the injustice the passingtraveler must perforce do any land he hurries over and does not study. Here is picturesque St. John, with its couple of centuries of historyand tradition, its commerce, its enterprise felt all along the coast andthrough the settlements of the territory to the northeast, with itsno doubt charming society and solid English culture; and the summertourist, in an idle mood regarding it for a day, says it is naught!Behold what "travels" amount to! Are they not for the most part therecords of the misapprehensions of the misinformed? Let us congratulateourselves that in this flight through the Provinces we have notattempted to do any justice to them, geologically, economically, orhistorically, only trying to catch some of the salient points of thepanorama as it unrolled itself. Will Halifax rise up in judgment againstus? We look back upon it with softened memory, and already see it againin the light of history. It stands, indeed, overlooking a gate of theocean, in a beautiful morning light; and we can hear now therepetition of that profane phrase, used for the misdirection of waywardmortals, ---"Go to Halifax!" without a shudder. 

We confess to some regret that our journey is so near its end. Perhapsit is the sentimental regret with which one always leaves the east, forwe have been a thousand miles nearer Ireland than Boston is. Collectingin the mind the detached pictures given to our eyes in all thesebrilliant and inspiring days, we realize afresh the variety, the extent, the richness of these northeastern lands which the Gulf Stream pets andtempers. If it were not for attracting speculators, we should delightto speak of the beds of coal, the quarries of marble, the mines of gold. Look on the map and follow the shores of these peninsulas and islands, the bays, the penetrating arms of the sea, the harbors filled withislands, the protected straits and sounds. All this is favorable tothe highest commercial activity and enterprise. Greece itself and itsislands are not more indented and inviting. Fish swarm about the shoresand in all the streams. There are, I have no doubt, great forests whichwe did not see from the car windows, the inhabitants of which donot show themselves to the travelers at the railway-stations. In thedining-room of a friend, who goes away every autumn into the wilds ofNova Scotia at the season when the snow falls, hang trophies--enormousbranching antlers of the caribou, and heads of the mighty moose--which Iam assured came from there; and I have no reason to doubt that the noblecreatures who once carried these superb horns were murdered by my friendat long range. Many people have an insatiate longing to kill, once intheir life, a moose, and would travel far and endure great hardshipsto gratify this ambition. In the present state of the world it is moredifficult to do it than it is to be written down as one who loves hisfellow-men. 

We received everywhere in the Provinces courtesy and kindness, whichwere not based upon any expectation that we would invest in mines orrailways, for the people are honest, kindly, and hearty by nature. Whatthey will become when the railways are completed that are to bind St. John to Quebec, and make Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, and Newfoundland onlystepping-stones to Europe, we cannot say. Probably they will become likethe rest of the world, and furnish no material for the kindly persiflageof the traveler. 

Regretting that we could see no more of St. John, that we could scarcelysee our way through its dimly lighted streets, we found the ferry toCarleton, and a sleeping-car for Bangor. It was in the heart of thenegro porter to cause us alarm by the intelligence that the customsofficer would, search our baggage during the night. A search is a blowto one's self-respect, especially if one has anything dutiable. But asthe porter might be an agent of our government in disguise, we preservedan appearance of philosophical indifference in his presence. It takesa sharp observer to tell innocence from assurance. During the night, awaking, I saw a great light. A man, crawling along the aisle of thecar, and poking under the seats, had found my traveling-bag and was"going through" it. 

I felt a thrill of pride as I recognized in this crouching figure anofficer of our government, and knew that I was in my native land.